Nola

The only time people in the capitalist class are truly punished in America is if they defraud other capitalists or threaten the broader imperialist policies meant to protect US hegemonic capitalism…Enron, Savings and Loans, and Bernie Madoff.

So if he receives anything, based on history, it will be because of that and would be little more than a pyrrhic victory.

Certainly not a sign that suddenly healthcare CEOs will be dragged to the firing squads for denying cancer treatments to patients to boost shareholder value. Or that America’s institutions set up to protect this system are on the cusp of a reckoning over decades of imperialist exploitation.

I’m sure Kash Patel, the Trump DOJ, and an organization that has heavily functioned to preserve existing political and economic hierarchies will go thru the motions and corporate Dems will hold their hearings and make a pageantry of some things. And the result will be at best, a big wet fart, and at most, it will just be directed in a way that will end up advancing broader capitalist/imperialist interests.

Like say putting much stricter controls on the sale of AMD/Nvidia chips which will conveniently benefit all the AI companies who want China and even consumers to have less access to the underlying components of this tech. Which is the one area Jenson was at odds with AI. Open weight and broad access to AI is good for Nvidia, but not for the AI companies.

The big issue with American unions has been that capitalists were very slick with things like Taft Hartley and largely banned or made incredibly difficult sectoral bargaining.

That not only makes it very hard to unionize, it creates contradictions and alignment asymmetries that make the labor movement easier to discipline or suppress.

But as imperfect a vessel it is(american unions, for instance, were at times bulwarks of defending US imperialism), aside from actual revolution, no social democratic advancement has succeeded in a capitalist country without strong organized labor movements on their side.

This is a very good conversation about the connection with unions and socialism from a Marxist that is also colleagues or working in close proximity with other people at top levels of DSA strategy and thinking.

https://confrontingcapitalism.substack.com/p/why-socialists-fight-for-unions

If you think this stops with Nvidia you are missing the forest for the trees…AI companies want to put a militarized moat around their techno fiefdoms. In the words of Altman “if only all these people didn’t have DRAM at home”

“did you see the latest model break containment OMGOMG!!!” I guess the government should step in and serve as gatekeeper for who can have this “dangerous national security threatening” tech…I mean we just can’t risk some open weight chinese model or some incel with a local LLM hacking into the pentagon with a rogue AI, guess Antrhopic, Microsoft, X, and Google need to be allowed to form a cartel to control this dangerous tech and we should put strict restrictions on who can buy certain AI components…for national security of course.

That all swallows AMD too. Who is partnered with Anthropic.

Please don’t give them any more ideas lol, what OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic want is exactly more stuff like this.

They want a “moat” around their services. Protected by the most powerful government in the world, the US.

Almost everything these companies have done has been an attempt to keep this tech and it’s supply chain as closed and proprietary as possible.

Hell, Sam Altman is out there saying the quiet part out loud that they don’t even want consumers to have direct access to things like ram anymore.

And frankly, I wouldn’t be shocked if the reason this is happening is for that very reason. A justification they can carve out to justify letting Nvidia stock fall as they simultaneously lock down the tech in a way only US AI companies will be able to easily use it.

I think like almost everything else America does it will bite us in the ass longterm, but this is directly giving the AI companies what they want. And I suspect we are on the road to that happening.

Honest question, why should I give a shit that some CEO wanted to sell GPU’s to China?

Of all the things I would want to see an American CEO put into jail for, selling GPU’s to China(which everyone knew was happening) and being semi in favor of China’s open weight AI development strategy that would be better from a consumer perspective is close to the bottom of that list.

Put the CEO’s in jail for systematically exploiting global south labor for decades. For colluding to bribe politicians and override democratic processes to force data centers into communities. For stealing more productive human output in a few years then all the labor theft in the whole history of capitalism.

Throwing it all away?

Even after losing his job and the divorce settlement he’ll be one of the wealthiest people on the planet and to ever live.

It’s not like this is China where they will actually jail or execute CEO’s.

Capital still runs the show.

Just like third party’s, I wish it were this simple…

Putting DSA in charge of the DNC will still lead to whoever that is being disciplined by the same broad economic and systemic pressures as the current corporate Dems…assuming they don’t purge and block DSA before that.

You still have to fundraise, still have to staff the party, still have to support all the infrastructure to operate, still have to buy ads on oligarchy owned media, still have to provide resources for candidates etc. And that will still confer enormous power to the oligarchy to influence and discipline the party because there is currently no alternative base of organized power to counteract that.

This is not me arguing defeatism or some sort of pragmatic centrist bullshit, but it is to say that entryism can’t just be about replacement or it will fail.

Historically the only proletarian centered balance of power was not from the inside, but from the outside. Namely, organized labor and mass semi organized movements of people. The only group that can literally bring capitalists and imperialists to their knees by organizing things like strikes, mass boycotts, and coordinated vote conditioning in a way no singular politician in the American system can. It’s not a perfect tool, as history also shows, but that is also why IMO an entryist strategy should be centered first and foremost on making it easier to organize power outside of the two party system.

TBH all this shit is so farcical and humorous to me. Just the sheer absurdity of how this is playing out in the face of all the larger contradictions and moral rot that is just normalized, ignored, or outright encouraged in this economic sector.

This is a company that’s core growth trajectory now is to melt the planet for quarterly profit to keep a bubble going on a tech sector that wants to deskill workers and put rent-seeking enclosures around knowledge and expertise itself off the back of the largest theft of productive output in human history. Built off a supply chain dependent on slave-like labor for it’s basic resource inputs. Led by increasingly fascistic psychopathic unaccountable tech billionaires. Thats part of a larger economic system that requires constant exploitation and violent imperialism to maintain. But the thing that produces scandal in the zeitgeist and crisis inside this monstrosity is the PR hit from their CEO getting his dick sucked by some CCP baddie and breaking their HR rules about workplace romance.

I feel the term is both overused and improperly used most of the time, but this is the sort of example I think is fitting of the term Late Stage Capitalism.

The problem to me is the demand for feature parity and availability on both Microsoft specs. Same issue they forced on developers and consumers with the Xbox 360 with no HDD.

It does legitimately force an entire generation to design for the lowest common denominator and everyone pays for that opportunity cost.

If Microsoft just allowed companies the freedom to skip the Series S, or reduce more settings/features, then it wouldn’t be a problem.

But of course if Microsoft allowed that then consumers would be upset they can’t play every game and it would reduce the value proposition.

And from a consumer perspective, I hate that. So yeah, I dont want more Series S type consoles either.

Especially cause enough games for years continue to be cross platform so if money is an issue just stick to the cheaper last gen consoles and wait for the price drops

No offense OP, but that is a misleading headline given just reading the sub headline makes it clear they are doing a clickbait and switch:

Reddit disclosed user information in 69% of cases involving legal requests in the first half of 2026, but pushed back against Germany’s attempt to identify an activist and challenged US demands for information about critics of its immigration enforcement policies.

In its latest transparency report, the social media giant said it received 1,306 standard legal requests for user account information in the first half of the year, up 7% from the second half of 2025. The company disclosed data from 1,327 accounts in response to 906 of those requests.

So in reality, Reddit is actively complying with doxxing a majority of their users when the gestapo or Trump DOJ comes knocking. And it’s very unclear what the basis is for Reddit’s denials or that as the headline implies, their default is to protect users or to cooperate unless it exposes them to a potential greater legal harm, like with fraud attempts mentioned

“The Empire and the Death Star have a right to a tax funded missile defense system to defend itself from Rebel attacks”

• Democratic Party of the Galactic Senate of Coruscant

And the way you change that overton window and shift those pressures leftward is thru sustained outside pressure

Corporate Dems have no real incentive to betray their actual constituents, donors, especially when their former main lovers(tech oligarchs and Israel) are sending all the signals their pocketbooks will open back up for them if they play nice, and if voters as a whole just go back to brunch, guess who easily wins that influence battle?

So while there is a type of corporate media propaganda that I think undermines the left, this is one of those rare instances I think this sort of coverage is actually helping. As it is keeping focus on who the villains inside the tent are and that they can’t be trusted(which they can’t). And right now they are banking on people going quiet and falling in line so they can maneuver behind the scenes and preserve their power and the status quo dynamic.

The only wedge this drives though is with the vast masses against the corporatist zionist wing of the party…which IMO is the energy people need to keep up.

I don’t know of any meaningful constituency of voters that is out there angry that people are getting mad at Hailey Stevens for making her dreams of Israel come true and up and leaving, or Nancy Pelosi ironically skipping the vote to end an illegal and unjust war to get a lifetime achievement award from a veterans organization.

If I missed a crucial meeting at my work that was pivotal for positioning the future of the company, I would expect to reprimanded far more consequentially than some mean words.

I need to see more details of this

On the one hand the industry needs more regulation and frankly, far more restrictions then is currently happening, and this coming from the progressive wing and not centrists is at least a somewhat better sign.

On the other, most Dems are still corporatist ghouls, and I think even Bernie has shown some bad instincts on handling AI at times, and this reads eerily similar to the cartelification the AI companies are reported to themselves be seeking.

Where instead of the Chinese approach of open sourcing the tech more, America, in the name of national and domestic security, essentially grants the existing companies defacto protectionism and in a way that will make it impossible to dislodge them.

I must applaud this analysis cause rarely in the wild do I find sickos that know ball this well

So bravo

And cause I am also a sicko I want to add a few more things to chew on

As you already alluded to, and I will add an additional allegory, Tucker is the Daniel Day Lewis of political pundits.

When he changes characters he is in a league of his own. And part of that is he has a genius level read on the pulse of politics. And ironically, cause it is typically something you more often find Marxists doing, not so much modern right-wingers, is that he is insanely good at identifying the contradictions in our politics, in our imperialism, and even in capitalism itself.

Like if someone is so inclined, if you read the opening chapter or so of his book, I think it was Ship of Fools, it basically just reads like semi accurate leftist critique of American capitalism translated into America B language. But he peppers in just enough ethnonationalism and causation misdirection to seed people in a more right wing Trumpian direction and away from a true capitalist and class critique.

And I suspect that is what he is doing here again thru this new persona that as you rightly note is targeting the political/voter contradictions on Israel and repackaging ethnonationalist right wing economic populism and astutely incorporating some of the DSA energy as well(see him praising Abdul El Sayed and note the shift in people under 40 embracing socialism and socialist policies, even on the right).

And I will add this elite/counter-elite push and pull is a pattern we see repeat again and again in right wing politics and media.

There is the Establishment and the elites that are backing them. Then there is typically some counterfroces to their right dialing up the rhetoric on various tension points between the party elite and the right wing masses, identifying those contradictions and misalignments so they can exploit them as the more authentic voice for “the people.” Who themselves are usually backed by some counter elites seeking to gain more influence in the larger political space.

They embrace positions, posturing, and/or manufacture a movement that presents like it is challenging the Republican Party, eschewing unpopular aspects while fronting certain populist energies thru that anti establishment image. Gain enough support for it to create a crisis within the existing status quo, use that to leverage to gain more power and influence within the party/politics in exchange for sheep-dogging people back into the party.

Reagan Revolution, Moral Majority, Tea Party, Trumpism, etc. All followed a similar pattern.

And on the media side no one has done it better or more often then Tucker. He is a bellwether people should not ever ignore or underestimate.

And a cheat code for seeing who and where people are aligning themselves is not to just look at what they say, but what they do behind the scenes.

Peek thru the veil at Tucker and you will find someone maneuvering in between his post Fox News backer Omeed Malik and toward the JD Vance wing of oligarchs(not a fan of the source but it is the one I could find reporting on this recently)

https://jewishinsider.com/2026/08/vance-fundraiser-with-tucker-carlson-backer-omeed-malik-raises-eyebrows/

My personal theory is Tucker, and this is based on his movements behind the scenes, is trying to position himself as a kingmaker voice in 28 for using his clout on this issues he is on the correct side of to then sheepdog people into Vance. Which he will use to demonstrate he is a goodboy to the Thiel wing of the oligarchy he is trying to ingratiate with, and he is smart enough to know Vance has no chance in 28(in 150 years no party with an incumbent president anywhere near this unpopular has won a non-incumbent presidential race and the Republican Party under current material conditions is in no position to break that trend).

And I would also go out on a limb and say I would not be shocked if Tucker wants to then position himself as a Trumpian like figure for 2032 or 2036.

Why do we assume this is real to begin with and not just more theater in the lead up to the re-escalation?

Nothing Hegseth did was without the explicit consent of the president and the implicit consent of Republican controlled congress(and quite a lot of Democrats)

And at ANY TIME congress could have pulled funding for the war as is their power constitutionally.

This is simply a way to shovel all the blame onto one person while obfuscating their own accountability, Trump’s own accountability, and Israel’s accountability.

While actively avoiding the mechanism in their face that could end this war tomorrow because deep down most Republicans and a good chunk of Democrats support these actions or at least the larger foreign policy behind it.

Which TBC also only works if Trump doesn’t continue the war and goes further up the escalation ladder. Which by all accounts he is positioning to do.

No one does false flags

I wouldn’t go that far…

Second Gulf of Tonkin, The Nayirah Testimony, Operation Northwoods, USS Liberty, Gleiwitz Incident, Ryazan, Lavon Affair, USS Maine

And it depends on how strictly we are defining that term, cause CIA activities are awash in operations meant to create or foment incidents, create pretenses for further interventions/escalations, and obfuscate US or western responsibility.

It’s not a bad litmus test under current US politics.

It is about the most powerful third rail in politics right now that exposes the contradictions within the Democratic Party and their voters

Someone that is an Israel First Democrat is basically a 1 for 1 for being corporate captured on other issues as well.

And a willingness to call Israel a genocide, an apartheid, and support a full arms embargo(including defensive weapons) is also a good clue they won’t be speaking half measured on healthcare policy, housing, wealth taxes, universal childcare, fighting Trump, ending Citizens United, supporting unions, banning AI data centers, a living wage, and any other issue that faces internal contradictions with Establishment corporate Dems and their voters.

And sure enough, Ossoff is problematic on all those domains as well.