October 13th, 2008
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The first leg of the international break is over; altogether it can be said that it was a very satisfactory first leg for many FC Barcelona players. As usual we will start with South American Qualifier. Argentina beat Uruguay with a scoreline of 2 goals to one to end their winless streak. Barca players - Lionel Messi and Martin Caceres both started this match for their respective teams. Lionel Messi put Argentina ahead in the fifth minute through a header from the former Barca player Riquelme’s cross. After seven minutes Atletico Madrid striker Sergio Aguero doubled the lead. Diego Lugano reduced the lead for Uruguay in the 39th minute. From South America to Africa now.
All of FC Barcelona players from Africa had a very successful night. Yaya Toure started in the starting eleven in the 3-0 victory over Madagascar. Boubacar Sanogo scored twice for Ivory Coast and team mate Simon Kalou made it 3-0 for the night. Samuel Eto starred in Cameroon’s 5-0 thrashing of Mauritius. Eto scored two goals - one from penalty in the 47th minute and the first goal in the 26th minute. Keita also started in Mali’s 2-1 victory against Chad. Tenema Ndiaye and Cheick Diabate were the goal scorer for Mali whereas Leger Djime scored for Chad. In Europe Barca players had a mixed night. Eidur Gudjonsen’s Iceland was defeated by a much superior Dutch team. The dutch side had Van Der Saar guarding the goal after coming out of international retirement. Huntelaar and Mathijsen scored for the dutch. France were lucky to grab a point from their match against Romania. Romania went two up with in 16 minutes with help of goals from Petre and Goian. Ribery pulled one back for France in the 36th minute and Gourcuff equalised in the 68th minute to the relief of captain Thierry Henry. Meanwhile Spain continued their excellent run with a 3-0 victory over Estonia. Juanito, Villa and Puyol all entered the scoresheet.
Written by Bibin on October 13th, 2008 with no comments.
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Picture of the day from this SI article. Shows Switzerland training near an uninterested onlooker.
Vancouver Whitecaps win USL-1 title 2-1 over Puerto Rico Islanders [Canadian Press]
Refereeing controversy in MLS? [Soccer America]
Scotland’s friendly with Argentina will not see Messi. Or many other good Argies, for that matter [Sky Sports]
Alright, that’s it. We’re all booed out.
Written by Darkvader on October 13th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on Backpasses and ĂĽ75.
Know what’s hysterical?
Racial epithets. Seriously. Try it. Walk up the next black person you see and call him the N-word. Or if that’s a skosh much for you, maybe just call him a ’spearchucker’ or ‘jungle bunny.’ Hilarity will ensue.
Ridiculous right? Well, that’s what happened to DC United keeper Louis Crayton—not the hilarity, just the epithet—after the team’s scoreless draw against the Dynamo in Houston last night (Sunday). Somehow Crayton, a native of Liberia, kept enough composure to respond to the offender in a rational manner instead of maybe dismembering him. Crayton recounts:
“It is so sad that he would say that to me,” Crayton said. “I am saying hi to the fans and he walked up to me and told me, ‘Hey, you’re a monkey, go back to the jungle.’ I told him, ‘Hey, you can’t say that to me. I am not a monkey, I am a human being like you.’ I jumped over to ask him why he insulted me, and he kept going.”
The person in question was escorted from the grounds by Robertson Stadium officials and banned from Dynamo games indefinitely. It’s a pretty sorry event. And if there is any silver lining it’s that it didn’t escalate into anything violent.
As a fan of football—not to mention a human in general—this is disappointing to say the least. For all the positive aspects of the game we’re trying to import from around the world, racism isn’t on the list and shouldn’t be tolerated. Assuming this is all accurate, anything the Dynamo or MLS can do beyond simply banning this person it totally cool with us.
Written by Darkvader on October 13th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on DC United and Houston Dynamo and Louis Crayton and Racism and Unrepentant Racism.
Sorry Germany, you won’t be seeing this facial hair/jersey combo again any time soon.
As if the Cole saga and the Kris Boyd moaning weren’t enough, it appears that Poor/Afflicted Footballer Syndrome has reached the mainland, and in particular, the German national team.
Kevin Kuranyi, the prolific 26-year-old Bundesliga striker (84 goals in 202 games is decent, right?), was a little disgruntled about being omitted from the 18-man squad for the World Cup qualifier against Russia over the weekend, so much so that he upped and left at half-time.
The end result? Manager Joachim Low doesn’t want him back as long as he’s in charge.
Here’s hoping young Kevin feels good about his decision in the long-term. He didn’t get picked for one game, and now he’s out of the running for any future Germany games? Sure, it’s predicated upon Low being in charge, but do you think any future coach is going to feel enamored to pick this malcontent?
Reports suggested that Kuranyi was about to retire from international duty shortly, but it’s the classic “You can’t quit… you’re fired!” routine as Low beat him to the punch:
“As a coach, you have got to make decisions like this and you expect that some are hurt or disappointed, but that is my job and the players have got to accept it. It would have been advisable for him to come and talk to me or one of my colleagues. But none of us knew what had happened - we just sat on the bus and waited for him. I am disappointed with the way he acted. I can understand his disappointment, but he should not overreact - that is not right.”
Kuranyi’s having a tough season, but it doesn’t excuse such petulant behavior. Germany are having a difficult time finding strikers who can score goals (something I thought England were struggling with, although not recently!), but he would have had another turn sooner or later. Klose couldn’t score a goal if the posts were a mile apart, so it was merely a matter of time until the Wheel of Fortune landed on him again.
And yet, it wasn’t enough for ol’ Kevin, and now he’s going to have plenty of spare time not helping his country to win their first significant tournament since 1996.
So, another sob story invades the news landscape. Who’s next: Karim Benzema? Someone Portuguese? Antonio Cassano pulling a gun on Marcelo Lippi?
Written by Darkvader on October 13th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on Boo Hoo Hoo and Germany and International Duty and Lingering Bursitis and fun with soundbites.
Carlos Tevez has had a slow, gentle start to the season, much like the rest of his teammates. 8th place after 7 weeks is a little lower than they’d like to be, as is Tevez’ strikerate of 1 goal in his first 9 games for the Red Devils in 2008/09.
And yet, as with most things Mancunian, they have a tendency to even out over time, and you just know they’ll be fine. Despite the endless fun we poke at their underwhelming campaign to date, but we know they’ll get back on track, charming their way into the title hunt. Heck, they’ll probably win the whole thing.
For Carlos Tevez’ brother, it’s another story entirely. Being arrested for attempted robbery will do that to you.
From the Daily Mail:
“Juan Alberto Martinez, 29 - the United and Argentina star’s older half-brother - reportedly was part of a gang of four masked men who attacked a security van at a service station.
They allegedly threatened the guards and ran off with their weapons and cash boxes.”
Martinez, the older half-brother to Carlos T, ended up with a ton of empty boxes and was eventually arrested in Buenos Aires, while the rest of the gang was rounded up in Cordoba. Interestingly enough, the gang had another lad connected to Tevez: his half-sister’s boyfriend.
There’s not much to make fun of here, as invariably these stories come up every once in a while and remind us that yes, there’s more to life than soccer. Of course, Carlos isn’t implicated or involved in any way, but it’s hardly the sort of family matter you wish to be dealing with, is it?
After all, they’re hosting West Bromwich Albion this coming weekend!
Written by Darkvader on October 13th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on Carlos Tevez and Lingering Bursitis and adventures in punishment and crime and manchester united.
A lot has been made of the booing that Ashley Cole received from England fans on Saturday, especially from the pampered stars like Rio Ferdinand. He believes that fans should be ashamed of themselves and that they are ignorant. That statement is rich coming from a man who “forgot” he was selected to take a drug test and was banned for eight months.
What players like Ferdinand forget is that fans have every right to voice their opinion. They pay huge amounts of money to go and see football matches so I think that they have every right to voice an opinion and if the players don’t like it then tough.
Players earn fortunes and are lucky that they play football for a living, its the most perfect job in the world. They know that booing is part and parcel of the game and should just accept it. At least it was only booing and it wasn’t the racist chanting heard in Croatia. It puts the situation into perspective when you compare booing and racist chants.
People will think that I’m only defending the taunts on Ashley Cole because I can’t forgive his move to Chelsea. Of course his move and how it developed still rankles with me but that is not the reason for writing this, I think that fans pay enough money to boo and cheer as much as they want.
Players love the adulation from fans but when it gets tough they begin to cry. They should just deal with it and get on with it. They can’t have it all their own way. Unless they want to start paying for the fans to watch then I suggest the players just shut up and play football, which is what they are payed to do.
Keep it Goonerish……………
Written by Wrighty7 on October 13th, 2008 with no comments.
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Bigus is not a fan of Ashley Cole. Let’s start with that.
In short, I hate him. I think he is a ungracious, spoiled, greedy, two-timing twat. What Cheryl Tweedy sees in him in beyond me! (Ed. Note: Thankfully, his missus is accepting other offers…) I don’t want Cole playing for England, but booing any England player after playing a dodgy pass across his own goal while you are winning a game is totally unacceptable and disgraceful.
Until recently I cannot remember the awful booing being a part of England’s historical past and NEVER at the old Wembley. It makes me ashamed. Booing away from home has been heard when the team is losing or playing garbage football, but not when they are winning. So why has the new Wembley been filled with boos, even when the team is winning?
When Wembley was being built, the England team traveled the Country. They played at Old Trafford, the Stadium of Light in Sunderland, Elland Road in Leeds, Villa Park in Birmingham, the Walkers Stadium in Leicester, St Mary’s in Southampton and they even played on the filthy turf at Portaloo Road. I don’t remember booing.
That’s because there was none. The traveling England roadshow gave people in different parts of the country a chance to see England, a chance they wouldn’t normally be offered. Traveling to London on a Wednesday evening to spend a ridiculous amount of moolah on a game is not really an option when you live in Gateshead and earn a modest living, but the short trip to Sunderland presents an excellent opportunity. What came from England’s tour was great support: real fans getting to see their heroes.
What is happening at Wembley is something completely different.
The only real reason for the impatience at Wembley and the expectation of 4-5 goals a game can only be created by casual England fans. Corporate watchers and the wealthy who ‘fancy a night out’. They want goals and they want them now. The new Wembley has become a haven for corporate events, the social gathering with clients, the wining and dining and the expected 5 goal entertainment. The facilities at the old Wembley were tat. Not at all ideal for ’sealing the deal’ or treating your high-earners. High-earners who may prefer Rugby or Cricket and think that Joe and Ashley Cole are twins.
The tickets at the new Wembley are pricey but the place is full. Last Saturday’s game vs. Kazakhstan was a sell-out, and yet there were plenty of empty seats at the end of the first half and at the beginning of the second. The bars must be packed.
You see, watching England at Wembley has become the new ‘night at the theatre’. The place is filled with rich casual fans while the real fans shake their head at the cost of attending a game at Wembley AND at the booing that gives them a bad name. If the FA are not careful they will completely isolate real England supporters. I honestly feel ashamed at such behavior. You pay your money and there is nothing wrong with voicing your opinion if the team loses or is having a stinker at half-time, but booing a player for a bad pass is shocking. Even more so do it when the team is up a goal! The Football Association may need to review their ticketing policy if the team is to get the support it genuinely needs to be successful.
- But Bigus, You seem certain it’s corporate folk…How so?
If you have ever been to a Cup Final at Wembley, and I was very lucky to go to this year’s, you will note that the joint is full of real supporters from the two places competing. Real fans with real passion cheering for success. The atmosphere is electric and the noise for either side tremendous. Spine tingling in fact. Cardiff V Portsmouth doesn’t attract the corporate boo boys, but one’s Country? Big difference. It also appears to have become trendy to see England play.
The real Theatre of Dreams!
Wembley cost a fortune to build and was well over budget. The England team were supposed to get a nice new environment and the supporters a home to be proud of. But that environment appears to have a cost as the F.A look to recoup theirs. 5-1 was the final result on Saturday and that’s 3 well earned points but I didn’t feel pride afterwards, Just embarrassment.
If the best stadium in the World comes with boos and dispassionate businessmen then I’ll take the obstructed views, minuscule leg-room and the nasty loos that the old Wembley offered… gladly.
- Bigus.
Written by Darkvader on October 13th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on Ashley Cole and Bigus Dickus and England and corporate arseholes and losing when you are winning.
Guys, this is a must watch! Look how well he impersonate Rafa, Gerrard, Owen and even… Carragher! You thought it’s impossible eh! Just have a look…
I thought the Gerrard one was pretty much spot on. Heh!
Written by DROGBALLS on October 13th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on Humour and Impersonator and Jamie Carragher and Liverpool and Michael Owen and Peter Crouch and Rafa Benitez and Steven Gerrard and The Red Cauldron and funny.
Sergio Leonel AgĂĽero del Castillo, also known as Kun Aguero (El Kun) is one of the best Argentinean football players nowadays despite being only 20. He is natural supporting striker and he represents the colors of Atletico Madrid.
Aguero is a husband of Diego Maradona’s daughter Giannina.
Aguero was born in June 2, 1988 in Quilmes, Buenos Aires Province and started his football steps in the youth ranks of the local club Independiente. In July 2003 Aguero became the youngest player to debut in the Argentinean Primera division with only 15 years and 35 days, breaking the record of Diego Maradona. In his first three seasons with Independiente he played 53 games and scored impressive 23 goals, success that guarantied his place in the Argentina U-17 and later U-20 team.
Many big European clubs gained interest in the new Argentinean wunderkind but Atletico Madrid was the one who was lucky to get his signature. The deal was reached in May 2006 for about 20 € which was the biggest transfer fee that Independiente has ever received. El Kun settled himself very well in the Spanish capital and quickly became “Los Colchoneros” fans favorite. Very quickly after that the call-up for the Argentina senior team came and in September Aguero made his debut against Brazil.
In his first (2006-07) season with Atletico, Aguero scored 8 goals some of them very attractive and against highly regarded opponents, but his season was not the one from his dreams.
The best days of Aguero’s career definitely began in the 2007 FIFA U-20 World Cup. He was top scorer with 6 goals and was proclaimed as the best player of the tournament. Months later he was shining in the red and white shirt building outstanding scoring tandem with Diego Forlan. In the season of 2007-08 Aguero scored 20 goals for Atletico and contributed lots of assists that made him the best player of Madrid’s second club at age of only 19. He helped Atletico to win the impressive 4th place, just behind Barcelona, which leads to the Champions League.
Aguero started the new 2008-09 season with success. In August he was invited for the Argentinean Olympic team in Beijing where he scored twice in the semi finals against Brazil. Argentina won the tournament.
The start of the club season with Atletico was better than solid, scoring 3 La liga goals and 4 in the Champions league.
Sergio Aguero plays the SS role (supporting striker) just behind the striker. He is quick, agile, full of determination and gains perfect technique on the ball. He has the ball very close to the foot and for the defenders it’s extremely hard to tackle. His powerful shot makes him very dangerous for the opposing keepers. By many this super kid is the successor of the great Maradona and is even better than Barcelona’s Messi.
Enjoy in his great talent:
Aguero on Wikipedia
Written by done_mkd on October 13th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on Diego Maradona and Independiente and Super youths and argentina and atletico madrid.
Each month, we provide a few Flashback posts, where we reprint historical posts that, for some laterally thought reason or another, we feel are appropriate for our real-time hyperrealities.
Today’s Flashback was originally posted on August 12th 2007. It represented a rather naive attempt to put forward a Libertarian Socialist vision and yet, with the recent exposures of massive co-ordinated global corruptions in the financial markets, its relevance has grown more valid.
US philosopher, J. Dewey: “Politics is the shadow cast on society by big business.”
Dewey believed that this hyperreality would remain so as long as power resides in “business for private profit through private control of banking, land, industry, reinforced by command of the press, press agents and other means of publicity and propaganda.”
The massive injection of taxpayer’s money into the rancid financial system is an outrage.
$700 billion US bailout, ÂŁ550 billion GB bailout, the effective nationalisation on poor terms of vast swathes of the banking sector, $125 billion pumped into AIG, the take over of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the gaming of the Depression by a Goldman Sachs team of insiders, the planning of the next crisis with the right hand (Dark Pools are the next crisis) while emptying our wallets with their left.
Socialise the costs, privatise the gains.
This simply represents a colossal global regressive redistribution of wealth.
It is a highly regressive bailout - remember how Psychopathic Paulson did not even mention housing in his initial application for government funding.
There should have been no bailouts without extensive global regulation in a socialised infrastructure.
After 1929 Depression, we got the New Deal and Bretton Woods.
Free market ideologists constantly worked to remove the restrictions on unfettered shareholder capitalism and the New Deal became the Bum Deal (unless you happen to be lucky enough to sit on the Forbes Rich List).
And, it is this Rich List that offers a far more just, meritocratic and sustainable solution to the current crisis.
The richest 400 people in the US are worth $1500 billion. If they each dipped their hands into their offshore bank accounts and handed 50% of their ill-begotten gains over to the financial sector that aided them in the stealing of their wealth, there would have been no need of a taxpayer-led bailout.
And, they’d still have an average of a couple of billion dollars apiece.
This is hardly poverty.
The rich bailing themselves out would have a further systemic benefit - no moral hazard. If they know that they cannot get away with operating tilted tables at the Capitalist Casino, then these tilted tables will become something more akin to level playing fields.
And, the rescue package entirely ignores this systemic level of the crisis.
From Paulson’s point of view, he is pulling the levers of a vast state based economic system.
This is not a free market, it is the equivalent of China or North Korea or the Soviet Union.
As Carlos Ferrero’s letter to the Economist stated: “The Economist supporting a massive bail-out? Now I’ve seen everything. The only thing left to do is change the name of your newspaper to The Communist.”
Shareholder capitalism has two major non-sustainable idiocies at its foundation.
Firstly, externalities are ignored and risk is underpriced. So, you buy a car. But the true cost is far greater than the cash that changes hands - think pollution, climate change, petrol extraction, road deaths, destruction of environment etc etc etc.
So shareholder capitalism refuses to factor in the Real costs of climate change.
As a species, we are pushing up against Malthusian limits, and all the financial-heads are able to come up with are schemes that enable them, in reality, to trade the factors that are destroying the planet.
Lets trade those emissions schemes!!!
This would be almost humourous if it were not systemic suicide.
The second fundamental problem with state-based shareholder capitalism is the belief in efficient markets. For, the markets are not only not free, they are also entirely inefficient.
The irrationality of our collective behavioural psychologies take the True Price away from the Market Price.
Insider market manipulation, the banning of short-selling, the cornering of markets, rampant competitive speculation, all with no assessment of where the Real risk lies, results in markets that are largely arbitrary in the numbers that they provide.
These figures are not based on any scientific statistical evaluation of robust parameters within a physical system, it is more akin to modelling the human behaviours (both abusive and abused) in a casino, or at a racehorse track.
If a murderer were on trial, and, if it was known that he was planning another murder even while he stood on trial, would you give him a gun?
We no longer partake in your system.
_____________________________________________________________________________________
Instinct For Freedom
Football Is Fixed was established to seek out and identify structures of authority, hierarchy and power both in sport and in wider society and to challenge their authenticity. Unless a justification may be provided for such institutions, they are illegitimate and should be dismantled in order to enhance our freedom and rights as human beings. This is, in essence, a Libertarian Socialist position.
In the words of Chomsky “we have, perhaps, reached a point in history when it is possible to think seriously about a society in which freely constituted social bonds replace the fetters of autocratic institutions”.
Throughout this post, we will be incorporating the thoughts of prescient thinkers from over the last 250 years. We are not political scientists and we have nothing to add to the summation of their intellectual endeavours except, hopefully, to combine these thoughts logically and to illuminate them with pertinent examples.
Due to the rampant filtration of left libertarian views in the media of the First World, we should start with some definitions and explanations regarding libertarianism and the utilisation of language by civil society to disguise meanings and create confusions.
• Democracy – Equality of all citizens before the law.
• Liberalism – Rights of people over their own person.
Each of these basic concepts of human existence is demolished by the realities imposed by capitalism in all its forms – a capitalist democracy is obviously a contradiction in terms. To quote Edmund Phelps of Columbia University who was awarded last year’s Nobel Prize for Economics: “Europe will continue to lag in productivity and innovation because it is stuck in a corporate [ie stakeholder] model of capitalism that takes the wishes of government and workers into consideration”. Like this should be regarded as a bad thing…
• Libertarian Socialism – There are two entirely different types of libertarianism. Libertarian Socialism is a truly bottom-up democratic system where the institutions and the frameworks that provide advancement and enlightenment are the possessions of each and every one of us. Social responsibility is at its core. This type of libertarianism shares many facets with the Anarchist philosophies of Bakunin and others.
• Libertarian Capitalism - This form of libertarianism is neatly described by “gain wealth forgetting all but self and, under no circumstances other than short term tactical, show any indication of a sense of responsibility to others”. It is evident that this breed of libertarianism shares equivalence with fascism.
Since the beginning of the twentieth century, there has been a conscious effort by the captains of industry to warp the meanings of these terminologies. Is democracy really what the coalition of the willing are exporting to Iraq? Does Anarchism deserve its association with destruction and violence? Of course not… By reframing the political arguments, the non-democratic elite steals the language of equality and rights and transforms this language into their propaganda.
This is not just a recent phenomenon. In the late eighteenth century, Rousseau stated that “civil society is hardly more than a conspiracy by the rich to guarantee their plunder” while von Humboldt noted: “the labourer who tends a garden is perhaps in a truer sense its owner than the listless voluptuary who enjoys its fruits”. Our modern world is run by a whole battalion of such listless voluptuaries who refuse any freedom of expression for the masses while accumulating incredible wealth in their offshore bank accounts. As Alexis de Tocqueville said: “what can be expected of a man who spent twenty years of his life making heads for pins?” The same question is of equal relevance to the call centres of Mumbai and the workhouse slaves of South East Asia lacing up Nike trainers.
Capitalism has moved forward in a series of clearly defined steps. Previous centuries endured the impacts of free trade and slavery as the forerunners of today’s system of globalisation. The politicisation of the people following the French Revolution, the Famine, two World Wars, the Bolshevik Revolution and the crushing of the Anarchosyndicalist collectives in the Spanish Civil War forced this fiercely non-democratic system to allow certain rights for the peoples of the First World – welfare states were created to offer safety nets for work, health and old age. Workers were even allowed a say in the running of the companies that employed them. This system of stakeholder capitalism, although still evidently an abuse of democratic rights, at least allowed wage slaves an input to their existence.
In the eyes of a corporate capitalist, stakeholder capitalism was an accommodation and not a goal in itself. The last quarter century has seen the establishment of a progression towards a far more abusive system of shareholder capitalism which entirely eliminates the rights of workers and their families (see Phelps’ opinion above). Capitalism was only able to move forward in this manner due to two coincident facts. Firstly, media propaganda had demonised democratic institutions such as the unions and, secondly, industrial sectors were maturing which significantly reduced the number of individual companies operating in any one sector. At present, aircraft manufacture is effectively dominated by Boeing and Airbus; there are just four global accounting firms; similar restrictive choice is seen in the oil and food retailing and many other sectors. This maturing of the marketplace puts massively increased abusive power in the hands of a very small number of companies with the obvious related potential abusive structures of cartels, oligarchies, monopolies and duopolies.
At the beginning of the twenty first century, we may only view life through the distorting prism of the coercive and personally destructive system in which we live. Freedom is a commodity – one can have as much as one can afford to purchase. Fraud by the poor is rampantly criminalised; tax evasion by the rich is creative accounting. Black youth smoking crack lose their freedom and, in the US, their right to vote; white investment bankers snorting cocaine is not an issue. According to Eduardo Galeano: “the majority must resign itself to the consumption of fantasy. Illusions of wealth are sold to the poor, illusions of freedom to the oppressed, illusions of power to the weak.” The privatisation of government goes hand in hand with the privatisation of the market. This is the central theme of modern political culture.
David Hume noted: “force is always on the side of the governed, the governors have nothing to support them but opinion”. Shareholder capitalists are more than aware of this fact and their coercion necessarily involves the incorporation of propaganda in their media and publicity machines. But Hume is obviously correct. If the disenfranchised of the world were simply to fold their arms and say “no!”, the whole abusive structure would grind to a halt.
It is, consequently, a critical input to the system to buy off a managerial and/or skilled level in society in the ultimate form of divide and rule. A few statements related to the selfish obedience and acquiescence of the blinkered middle classes are given below:
Dostoyevsky’s Grand Inquisitor - “Ignorance, and admiration arising from ignorance, are the parents of evil devotion and obedience.”
Chomsky – “The specialised class is offered the opportunities to manage public affairs by virtue of their subservience to those with the real power in our society – dominant business interests – and this is a critical fact that is, not surprisingly, ignored in the self-praise of the elect.”
Von Humboldt - “When a man is acquiescent, we may admire what he does but despise what he is.”
Chomsky (again) – “Since they are usually not very bright, or are bright enough to know that they better avoid the arena of fact and argument, they’ll turn to misrepresentation, vilification and other devices that are available to those who know that they’ll be protected by the various means available to the powerful.”
And, yet, it is the individuals who have effectively sold out on their fellow human beings who are most at risk from the impacts of the future path of capitalism. The regression from stakeholder to shareholder to private capitalism is almost complete. Having been bought off by the selfish fruits of their labour and limited power (wages, promotions, property, access to the stock and bond markets), the acquiescent will be entirely excluded from such constructs as capitalism advances to a world of private equity, market manipulation, hedge funds, cartelisation, monopoly, offshore financial centres, corporate corruption and currency manipulations. Those of us who have learned to accept our degree of disenfranchisement in a fascistic system will be psychologically (if not financially) more able to deal with the final progression of capitalism on its route from stakeholder – shareholder – psychopathic.
The power of the oligarchy always rests on fraud as it is necessary to make use of the masses, and the masses would not cooperate if they realized that they were simply serving the purposes of a minority. This opinion was put forward over half a century ago by a right wing ideologue called James Burnham and, despite an abhorrence of his political agenda, respect must be given as his vision is coming sharply into focus.
Bolshevism and capitalism are equivalent – they are both totalitarian systems. In the words of Martin Buber: “one cannot in the nature of things expect that a little tree that has been turned into a club to put forward leaves”. Libertarian Socialism according to von Humboldt establishes “the fullest, richest and most harmonious development for the potentialities of the individual, the community or the human race. Progress will follow the creation of freedom at every step”. We are a creative, inquisitive, learning species but freedom of thought and enlightenment should not only be for the rich. Education is the key input here – not the current educational system orientated to maintaining the existing social and economic structures but an educational system that allows us to transform such structures in a more creative and egalitarian manner.
One of the prime kneejerk responses to suggestions of a more utopian system for our planet is that such a goal is idealistic. Not so. Incrementalism has transformed our world as the autocrats have been forced to (allegedly) abolish slavery, give the vote to Blacks and Women, create social safety nets for the poor and allow workers to organise and share information (albeit in a repressive infrastructure). Libertarian Socialism is a work in progress. For example, Libertarian Socialists perceive a strategic future without the need for the corrupting powers of government and, yet, in the immediate term, government is our only structure whereby we may decelerate the progression of capitalism to its psychopathic conclusion of unaccountable private tyrannies. A further objection raised by opponents of even making the decision to seek a better future for the planet is that Anarchists and Libertarian Socialists are unable to provide a comprehensive template of the structural requirements and the ongoing development of a new social system. And yet, such an opponent would agree, if they were able to produce a valid argument at all, that science moves forward in incremental steps as people work together for a social and informational advancement of the world. Why should political science be any different?
John Stuart Mill provides, I think, the clearest description of what happiness is. “Those only are happy who have their minds fixed on some object other than their own happiness - on the happiness of others; on the improvement of mankind; even on some art or pursuit - followed not as a means but, as itself, an ideal end. Aiming thus at something else, they find happiness by the way”. One of the things that most befuddles the acquiescent in the capitalist machine is that their obedience to the system results in a deficit of happiness and fulfillment. There is a significant amount of medical research that shows a positive correlation between life/career satisfaction and life longevity. In the words of Emma Goldman “Anarchism is the only belief that shows men and women their true selves and who they can be”.
No Cartesian Gods, No Capitalist Masters…
© Football Is Fixed/Dietrological
Written by Football Is Fixed on October 13th, 2008 with no comments.
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