Immediately, while you’re in the thick of it, self-compassion and self-love are of utmost importance.

• Give yourself permission to feel your emotions:

  Don’t run from it or insulate yourself (beyond a reasonable “take the edge off of things” kind of response). I’m not knocking people who take refuge in chemical comfort, but it has pretty significant limits and a short shelf life for being useful. Feel the gravity of the things in your life and throughout society that seem to be crushing you. When you pull out of the tailspin, you’ll see better why you deserve credit.

• Find a way to make yourself smile:

  Smiling is one of those things that once you do it, it gets easier to do. If you like stand-up, or podcasts, or those videos where kids scold pets, or whatever. If books are your thing, pick a light, cheeky one. Whatever you can do to show yourself it’s both possible and okay to feel good —even briefly — fucking do it.

• Take a long shower/bath:

  Self-care is important, and for me it can be really helpful to imagine you’re washing away the residue of a hard day, month, year, life… you owe yourself the opportunity to wipe some of the grime off the windows so you can see clearer.

• Do one light bit of housework:

  The dopamine hit from accomplishing something— anything really — is something that you can build momentum with in a positive, constructive direction.

• Take yourself out to dinner, or make yourself a nice meal at home if you aren’t feeling up to people right now:

  Fed is best, even if it’s only a little bit. Good food won’t fix things magically, but it will keep you thinking straight and physically healthier, and that’s got loads of value.

• Cut yourself a break: Things are going to be hard. Being a person is difficult and stressful, and the way Western societies are set up, especially America, only serve to further immiserate people on a regular basis.

Doing things for others, no matter how small does multiple things at once. It gets you out of your head, forces you to be present rather than dwelling on the past or sweating the future.

• Call/text a friend and ask how they’re doing:

  This can be a really powerful way to short-circuit those feelings, especially if you can be there for them while they’re having a hard time. We all need support, and offering it to a loved one can be a great way to improve the way you see yourself and demonstrate that you have agency, are valued, and that you can make a difference, however small.

• Volunteer locally at a food bank or mutual aid project:

  This is a step up the “giving back” ladder, and is usually done repeatedly, regularly and with the same people. Now you’ve got a community and people who can model for you how service work can be life-saving.

• Get involved with a community or political organization that is working to change something you care about for the better:

  At the top of the ladder, you can take on a role in limiting the harms done to others in the future, an exercise in empathy that can have unseen yet profound ripple effects that make the world a less ugly place than it currently is or would have become. That’s a huge victory, and also helps you find community and belonging. Without those, most people tend to languish and wallow, and don’t get better quickly—if at all.

By no means is this a complete list of strategies, these are the ones that have worked best for me that I think will resonate the most with folks out there. I want to hear from y’all though—how do you keep chugging along when it feels like the universe is playing games with your peace? Drop suggestions in the comments so we can all give ‘em a try if they fit the version of ourselves we’re striving to be. Share this with anyone who might need it, who might feel seen and thus feel less alone. Lastly, never forget that you have untold value beyond what you produce or how others perceive you.

In solidarity with those who are feeling defeated, abandoned, and alone—my DMs are open, so if you need to vent or hear that you matter, or if there’s anything I can do to support you, I will.

— Dee

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First and foremost, in order to properly understand the use of narcotics as tools of repression by the state, we must properly understand drugs simply as tools. Just like an eyeglass repair kit contains screwdrivers fitted for specific parts, the molecular structure of a drug suits it to various applications. Properly applied, these arrangements of atoms can alleviate symptoms of diseases and disorders. The electrochemical interaction between a synapse and a ligand is exactly what these chemicals were designed for, and they generally do their jobs well. Improperly applied, however, they can have devastating consequences. They can ruin one life. Cut another tragically short… Demobilize an entire nation with crippling addiction epidemics?

Racialization of Drug Use and Early Criminalization Efforts

As early as the nineteenth century, racial animus was being whipped into a frenzy around “foreigners” bringing “dirty” substances into America. [2] What a tragedy that must have been – what ever will they do with options beyond alcohol (widely considered the most damaging and volatile major drug of abuse, save for maybe benzodiazepines in some individuals) for chemical enjoyment? As is a common theme in American history, much of the hysterics in the early narco-panics came from the religious/social conservative communities in major cities on the West coast. These “upstanding citizens” were happy to binge drink, fight, fornicate, and all manner of other groovy things, but when they caught wind that the Chinese immigrant population had begun to import, enjoy, and sell copious amounts of opium, they lost their ever-loving shit–time to gin up a race war. This would set the country off on a war between racial minorities and “Heritage Americans,” immigrants versus the native-born, moralistic puritans against godless heathens. The painfully sober against those who enjoy themselves.

Opium dens and the Smoking Opium Exclusion Act of 1909

In the late 19th century, as immigration from East Asia became more and more prominent, cities dotting the West coast began to swell with immigrants. This was a great boon to the region, and with themselves and their families, the immigrants brought a variety of goods which Americans had seen little or none of–fireworks, prognosticatory desserts, and of course opium. Prior to the introduction of smokeable opium, laudanum was the favored means of consuming opiates in 19th century America. Laudanum was a doctor’s favorite treatment and beloved even more by the habitual user–laudanum is essentially opium (codeine and morphine in a naturally occurring mixture) dissolved into high-proof alcohol with some sugar to cover the bitterness. Imagine a brand of flammable schnapps that’s just called “Overdose.”

The racial anxieties of the native-born white Americans in the region led to the vilification of opium as somehow uniquely damaging, unlike laudanum, which was a medicine–specifically something with which they were already familiar and thus couldn’t be blamed for the explosion of popularity of smoking parlors frequented by opium smokers, known colloquially as “opium dens.” These were portrayed in the media as houses of ill repute where all manners of sin could be going on, what with those godless Chinese people operating them. The reality is they were no more debauched than the average bar–likely quite less so.

But with an established taste for opiates in the cultural memory and the rapid onset of opium, many people did become problematically addicted. Now, a sensible person might look at what drove those people to use drugs in the first place, solve that, and thereby remove the “push” factor from the equation. Instead, the Federal government decided to institute the first racialized narcotics legislation aimed at a particular outgroup, with drug concerns cited as the “reasonable cause” for de jure punishment of people for their ethnic heritage. [1]

The racist hysteria behind the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act of 1914

At the turn of the 20th century, an urban legend-meets-klan-hood took hold in the American South. Newspapers across Dixie ran lurid, utterly unbelievable stories attempting to portray cocaine as an agent of change–turning Black men into “fiends” who became superhumanly strong, impervious to pain, and prone to attacking white people. Just wait ‘til they find out about phencyclidine… As it happens, these were not the side effects of cocaine, but rather the delusions of racist Southerners who were filled with racial anxieties after having recently lost a war over whether they could keep owning black people. If every third sentence out of your mouth has the n-word in it, Colonel Beauregard, maybe you should have to watch your ass for a couple decades.

Unfortunately for law-abiding Americans everywhere who enjoyed coca medicine from time to time, delivered by reputable companies like Sears & Roebuck — who engaged in a great deal of quality control and who weren’t in the slightest bit violent about their narcotics business — the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act was passed, which allowed for the government to levy taxes on drugs that had previously been left to individuals and businesses to freely exchange narcotics unfettered. This creates opportunities for a black market to develop, with discounted stock and inventory of questionable provenance, but which could serve the needs of the drug-using population, which even then was fairly prominent and numerous.

Reefer Madness, manufacturing racial anxiety, and why cannabis got a new name

It was the early 1930s. The Great Depression was in full swing, jazz clubs were popular with the non-racists in America and many Americans were becoming acquainted with cannabis, a relatively benign intoxicant that livened up an otherwise bleak world. Derived from hemp, cannabis fiber can be used much the same as hemp fiber can, including for industrial and commercial purposes. In fact, cannabis fiber was poised to overtake wood pulp as a cheap and sustainable source of paper, as well as textiles and other commercial goods. Lumber industry representatives lobbied for the ban of the entire plant, meaning that with the stroke of a pen, their competition would be long gone, buried under heaping piles of red tape.

To build public support for the measure, a film known affectionately as “Reefer Madness” was released in 1936. It warned middle-class white parents about the dangers of their innocent kids smoking marjuana cigarettes, called “reefers,” saying that the “marijuana” (a Spanish word for cannabis) would make their children crazy and they would be in grave danger. See the sleight of hand? Thing you know about already: not very scary; call it by a “foreign-sounding” name, especially one associated with Mexican immigrants: all of a sudden doobies are pants-shittingly terrifying. The Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 was passed by congress and summarily signed into law (fuck you, FDR), and the playbook was fully established:

1. identify drug(s) of concern,

2. associate with minorities,

3. “well-behaved” white folks support draconian enforcement measures,

4. profits/existing order are protected–‘til next time…

That is, until a little agency called the CIA decides to start dabbling in psychotropic manipulation, mind control, and a bunch of other early-series-JRE-style conspiracies (only these were very much real, and the Agency did untold damage to countless real people in the process).

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America’s State-Sponsored Narco-Violence Against Its Own People

Project Artichoke

Would you believe that attempts at mind control and hypnosis using drug-induced altered states of consciousness set the stage for MK Ultra? [3] Of course you would…

This was the foundational covert narcotics research program, complete with massive ethical conflicts, though it was less ambitious than MK Ultra in its aims. It was considered “above-board” and was sanctioned officially, whereas later operations were moved under the radar. Writing on the project is fairly sparse, but its methodology appears to be similar to that of MK Ultra and related programs, though more narrow in scope and more reserved in its practices.

MK Ultra

“Illegal” program attempting to develop mind control protocol via psychotropic manipulation- many drugs were tested over the course, but LSD and other psychedelics were explored most thoroughly by the agents and scientists involved. Testing was done on unwitting subjects, which – and I can say this with certainty, having dabbled a fair amount back in the day — is the kind of thing you’d have to be morally bankrupt to come up with. Having no clue you’re about to undergo a sudden, profound shift in how you perceive and experience reality is a sure-fire recipe for a soul-shreddingly bad trip. The ubiquity and legality of LSD in this time period leads to its explosion in popularity, culminating in the drug-fueled free love of the late 1960s counterculture, which scattered potentially-revolutionary energy in too many directions to be a threat (the Weather Underground gave way to The Grateful Dead).

Smuggling Dope for the Khmer Rouge

The CIA, according to the official narrative, documented the Khmer Rouge’s $20 million/year heroin trade in the late 1970s. This is not up for debate – the agency knew that the Khmer Rouge was built on a foundation of drug trafficking before deciding they were deserving of millions in under-the-table aid and comfort to prop them up in their fight against Vietnam (ironic, considering they labelled themselves as Marxist-Leninists yet they happily became lapdogs for the Imperial Core). Still, the CIA proceeded to funnel $85 million in covert aid to the regime from 1980-1986–beginning just a year after their genocidal regime was broken up by a Vietnamese invasion. Whether the drug trade was tolerated as collateral damage or tacitly encouraged remains debated, [5] but the result was the same: a genocidal regime received American support while its narcotics flooded regional and international markets. [7]

This boom in the heroin supply leads to a massive addiction spike amongst returning veterans, and the lower classes. The surge in heroin use was primarily among the poor or otherwise immiserated, like most addiction issues, and disproportionately affecting minorities since a greater share of those in or near poverty are people of color. The CIA’s awareness of the fallout from their illicit machinations at the outset is unclear. That disproportionate effect is twisted by conservative rhetoricians who erase the white working poor suffering from addiction so that the situation can be used as “evidence” that people of color are inferior or morally deficient. They managed to divide and strike at the multiracial working class all with one relatively simple but unbelievably compelling, endlessly powerful chemical tool.

Cointelpro, weaponized stigma, and the assassination of Fred Hampton

By this part of the story, the Agency can’t claim ignorance. They can’t wring their hands, and cry “ohh, woe is me… I didn’t realize…” Nope. They had to have known – after all the testing, the blind and double blind trials on subjects of varying degrees of awareness over the last couple decades – that it would make their job easier, vis a vis vilifying Fred Hampton [10] and other thought leaders and radical organizers, if some of the “ringleaders” were found with narcotics on their person or in their bloodstream. That knowledge – combined with a prerogative to act “in defense of the nation” (read: liberal capitalism) and the long ties between industry (especially the military industrial complex) and the CIA – makes the conspiracist’s notion a fairly believable story at first glance.

This does the necessary work of delegitimizing Hampton and other victims of the COINTELPRO infiltrations and ratfuckery [9] by allowing the Lazy American ear to connect “drugs” with “subversive element” or some similarly accurate but bad faith framing. When Lazy Americans can write off revolutionaries as dirty, morally bankrupt addicts simply on the basis of drugs present in their system, rather than the content of their character or the works done throughout their lives. It’s a quintessentially thought-terminating cliche. Drugs equals bad equals subhuman, and this is almost certainly the effect they desired from the outset. Best case scenario, from the perspective of a pollyannish bystander, is that it’s just a series of happy accidents that they replicate unwittingly again and again and again.

Iran-Contra, the Sandanistas, and the worst kept secret of the crack epidemic

If you’re an adult in America, you’ve heard of crack cocaine. Maybe you’ve got a friend or family member who smoked it. A select few of you will know what I mean when I cryptically mutter “choy” while itching my neck slowly—y’all are real ones. Without the CIA, “rocks” wouldn’t have caught on like a bank-emptying wildfire that devastated urban communities of color and set the stage for the unbelievable proliferation of organized crime syndicates—unlike the CIA operatives who pushed drugs for the state, these men and women were frequently incarcerated for pushing the same drugs that CIA operations flooded the streets of America with in the 1980s.

The subject of much denial and obfuscation, anyone serious about their analysis of the CIA’s serial abuses of power [8] will tell you that Iran-Contra is day one stuff—practically passé to bring up the question in some circles. The guns-for-coke and guns-for-whatever swap meets hosted by the Agency throughout Central and South America, [4] curated specifically to arm literal right-wing death squads that terrorized the majority of an entire continent in the name of “anti-communism” (read: scuttling any attempt at self-determination for Latin America). [6]

Have New Dogs Re-learned The Same Old Tricks?

The violence that the influx of arms and money and training offered these cutthroats were later reoriented and appropriated by cartels and non-state actors engaging in the cocaine trade. Just to recap real quick: CIA swaps guns for cocaine to vicious fashy militias, after they succeed at denying Latin American self-determination through force, the Agency abandons the militias and withdraws from their aid-for-blow arrangement, militias start running drugs themselves, and turn guns on the local population, and finally CIA gets involved in drug interdiction and narcotics enforcement actions as recently as April, 2026 — though that was in Mexico and a meth lab bust—it’s all an outgrowth of the same rotten modus operandi: state-sanctioned violence, when serving the interests of liberal capitalist regimes, is as bloody or bloodier than even the most ruthless, morally bankrupt cartels. The difference is they have the full force of the (now former) global hegemon behind their illicit activities.

In solidarity with all those caught under the heel of the American “justice system” for nonviolent drug offenses,

— Dee

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1. “Opium Exclusion Act,” EBSCO Research Starters, accessed March 30, 2026, https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/law/opium-exclusion-act.

2. “Public Policy Statement on Justice,” American Society of Addiction Medicine, accessed March 30, 2026, https://www.asam.org/advocacy/public-policy-statements/justice.

3. “Document Friday: Project Artichoke or The CIA Attempt to Create a Manchurian Candidate,” Unredacted, April 23, 2010, https://unredacted.com/2010/04/23/document-friday-project-artichoke-or-the-cia-attempt-to-create-a-manchurian-candidate/.

4. U.S. Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General, Special Report 97-12, Chapter 1, December 1997, https://oig.justice.gov/sites/default/files/archive/special/9712/ch01p1.htm.

5. “Newspaper Article,” Google News Archive, October 1, 1972, https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1291&dat=19721001&id=usJTAAAAIBAJ&sjid=No0DAAAAIBAJ&pg=5921,3238572&hl=en.

6. Document 146504, Mary Ferrell Foundation, accessed March 30, 2026, https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=146504#relPageId=443.

7. ⁸ “The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade,” University of Wisconsin-Madison History Department, accessed March 30, 2026, https://history.wisc.edu/publications/the-politics-of-heroin-cia-complicity-in-the-global-drug-trade/.

8. “Congressional Record,” Federation of American Scientists, May 7, 1998, https://irp.fas.org/congress/1998_cr/980507-l.htm.

9. “A Study of Cointelpro: Counter Intelligence Program,” FBI, 1971, https://vault.fbi.gov/cointelpro.

10. “The Murder of Fred Hampton,” Howard Copeland, Chicago State University, 1971.

A Brief History of Trotsky

Leon Trotsky began his journey as a key figure in the 1905 Russian Revolution, helping to organize the St. Petersburg soviet (worker’s council). He formed a countervailing force that balanced Lenin’s vanguardism, seeking to inspire spontaneous revolution amongst the masses rather than rely on party infrastructure. In the end, Lenin’s vanguardism won the day, and after a brief period in exile – a recurring theme in Trotsky’s life – he returned to Russia and joined forces with the Bolsheviks. He served as the primary organizer of the Red Army and was the practical architect of the October Insurrection. Under the fledgeling USSR, Trotsky became the People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs and later for War as well.

Ever going against the grain, with Lenin falling ill, dying in 1924, and the subsequent rise of Stalinist forces – to which Trotsky was vehemently opposed – he became marginalized within party infrastructure. He was eventually expelled from the Communist Party in 1927, exiled internally in 1928, and eventually deported from the USSR in 1929. Trotsky bounced around the world, writing communist political theory fiercely critical of Stalin and Stalinism (that would become the backbone of modern Trotskyism). He lived in Turkey, France, Norway, and was eventually caught by a Soviet assassin in Mexico city on August 21st, 1940. He was killed with an ice pick–typical of Stalin’s brutish nature.

Central Tenets of Trotskyism

Theory of Permanent Revolution

Trotsky’s keystone theoretical flourish was the concept of “Permanent Revolution,” around which his internationalism and criticism of Stalin would grow. Trotsky’s core argument was that “backward” countries (agrarian, feudal societies, or otherwise less-developed nations) would need to undergo both a democratic revolution and a workers’ revolution simultaneously, rather than letting the bourgeois gain strength and form their own liberal democracy and eventually create conditions where institutions could form and drive forward socialism separately. This sublimation of liberal capitalist democracy was carried out spontaneously in China under Mao – though through a distinct, unique means (which we’ll be covering in a week or two) – and in Cuba by Guevara and Castro.

Trotskyists themselves may not draw a direct line between “Permanent Revolution” and these movements, in both cases, the sublimation of agrarian societies into communist ones was the means by which communism was achieved. Both also served as hubs from which socialism spread regionally. To my mind, there is an ideological rhyme between these two cases and Trotsky’s thoughts on the concept of Permanent Revolution. Neither China nor Cuba were heavily industrialized, yet they formed the two most robust, lasting examples of Marxist-Leninist communism–even outlasting the USSR. Guevara’s internationalism and dedication to a socialist alternative for the Global South echoes this strategy of supporting revolutions skipping over the liberal capitalist democracy period entirely. This internationalist perspective stands in sharp contrast to Stalin’s “socialism in one country” approach to which Trotsky was diametrically opposed.

On the Nature of the USSR:

Under Stalin’s bureaucratic hierarchy, which eventually became the seat of power in the USSR with Josef Stalin as its most senior member, the Soviet Union became what Trotsky would call a “degenerated worker’s state.” Rather than socialism, he claimed that under Stalin’s brutal and corrupt leadership the Soviet Union had become a degenerated lesser form of social organization where the means of production are owned collectively, however the benefits accrue to only party insiders and not the workers themselves. He called this degenerated bureaucracy a parasitic institution, sucking the life and labor from the workers while enjoying the fruits of the workers’ labor all by themselves. It’s hard to argue that Stalin was fair, egalitarian, or even concerned with the lot of the common worker in the abstract, much less their actual lives and livelihoods.

Trotsky saw but one way out of the degenerated workers’ state that Stalin had wrought: A political revolution to restore control and agency to the workers’ councils and the workers themselves, rather than allow for the fat-cattery of the Stalinist bureaucracy. This is not to say, he wanted to institute a bourgeois capitalist democracy. Quite the contrary, Trotsky wanted the communism of the USSR to be the communism of Marx, and thought that it should concern itself with the needs of the working class–not simply create new means of ruling over the working class, as Stalin had.

Democratic Centralism:

Within the Communist party, democratic measures were to be given the utmost importance, with thorough debate and deliberation upon each issue being necessary. Once the party made its decision, though, Trotsky favored unified action. It was through discipline and unity, he wrote, that the working class should rule over themselves, and that this structure and form would suffice for executing the will of the people as expressed by the Communist Party. This organizational form is called democratic centralism, and is a key feature of Trotskyist thought.

Critique of Bureaucracy:

Unlike Lenin and Stalin, however, Trotsky was exceedingly wary of lending too much power and deference to any officials, lest they become corrupted and abuse their position. The expansive power structure that Stalin built was largely busy with the maintenance of the bureaucracy, and not with workers’ affairs. Concentrating power outside the working class by creating a new upper caste served Stalin’s interests, but did tangible harm to the people of the Soviet Union, and Trotsky was very insistent on the dangers and maladaptive nature of such a monstrosity.

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Trotskyism Post-Trotsky

Fragmentation and Reorganization:

After Trotsky’s assassination in Mexico City, the movement fractured into a few different camps. The Fourth International was reorganized in 1946 but suffered splits over the nature of the USSR, the role of national liberation movements, and the interpretation of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, to which one of Stalin’s more iron-fisted military and political responses to internal struggles for democratic representation was levied. Imre Nagy and the student-led attempt to establish an independent, communist Hungary from under the heel of Stalin’s degenerated state was crushed summarily, and Stalin’s priorities became abundantly clear–self-preservation over self-determination.

Key Tendencies:

The International Socialist Tendency (IST):

This faction of Trotskyists, led by the Socialist Workers Party (UK/US), broke with the Fourth International. They argue that the USSR was “state capitalist” rather than a degenerated workers’ state, and emphasized “entryism” into mass labor parties and trade unions as a vehicle for achieving socialist gains..

The Reunified Fourth International (FI-92):

This more traditionalist strain of Trotskyism maintains the original “degenerated workers’ state” analysis and focuses on building revolutionary parties within existing mass organizations.

Committee for a Workers’ International (CWI):

Similar to the IST, CWI is known for its focus on “entryism” into social democratic political parties and its analysis of the USSR as a form of state capitalism, pointing to the state-run and state-benefitting economy that exploited workers for the benefit of the privileged caste of bureaucrats.

Modern Trots:

Contemporary Trotskyist groups are often involved in climate justice, anti-racist movements, and anti-fascist fronts, among other pursuits and political projects. However, like any robust, varied ideological tradition, they face internal debates regarding pressing, pertinent topics–the relevance of traditional labor organizing versus new social movements, the best role to be played supporting the rise of left-wing populism in Latin America, and other means of furthering an internationalist perspective on socialism and social change.

Criticisms and Analysis

From the Left (Stalinists/Maoists):

Ultra-Leftism:

Critics argue Trotsky underestimated the ability of the USSR to build socialism independently and dismissed the anti-colonial struggles led by non-proletarian forces (see: Mao in China, Che and Castro in Cuba).

Pessimism:

Some argue his insistence on international revolution led to a paralysis in supporting national liberation movements that didn’t fit his strict criteria. This is a convenient criticism for Stalin simps, who demand that socialism be under their big, mustachioed Daddy (or a reasonable facsimile), or else nobody gets any socialism.

From the Right (Liberals/Academics):

Authoritarianism:

Critics often conflate Trotsky’s views with Stalin’s, arguing that the Bolshevik tradition itself was inherently authoritarian. They point to Trotsky’s role in suppressing the Kronstadt rebellion and the Cheka as evidence of his authoritarian tendencies, which flies in the face of Trotsky’s numerous anti-authoritarian works. Single-party states, while typically having an authoritarian flavor, are not (strictly speaking) inherently authoritarian if internal democracy can be maintained, and this is something Trotsky took very seriously. While certainly more hierarchical and ordered than some to Trotsky’s left would advocate for (*cough, cough* ya boy right here…) it’s hardly the same as Stalin’s iron-fist or even Lenin’s cult of personality. While still far too hierarchically designed for my taste, Trotskyism was not the invention of some would-be despot.

Utopianism:

The idea of “Permanent Revolution” is often dismissed as unrealistic, given the historical failure of socialist revolutions to spread beyond single nations–except that Che’s work and Trotsky-inspired socialists around the world saw mixed successes, due primarily to intervention from the Imperial core, rather than any naturally-occurring reason that socialism ought not spread freely in the absence of such interlopers.

Intra-Trotskyist Infighting and Debate:

The “State Capitalism” Debate:

Many Trotskyists eventually concluded the USSR was not a degenerated workers’ state but a form of state capitalism, leading to significant splits within the movement–going to show you that if any group of socialists can find a reason to divide themselves artificially, they usually will.

Electoral Strategy:

Debates continue over whether to participate in electoral politics (e.g., supporting progressive candidates) or maintain a strictly extra-parliamentary stance, as are going on right now in other communist, socialist, and anarchist tendencies.

Closing Thoughts on Trotskyism and Trots

Overall, I think I’d give Trotsky’s ideology about a B, and the modern day Trots I’ve known an A minus. Trotsky’s dedication to a socialist future for all workers, not just those of the USSR, is a testament to the same driving force in him that led to his exile and murder: Trotsky appears to have genuinely been in it for the working class, and not for himself in the slightest. That excellent focus and circumspect view of the world is carried on by some of the best comrades I’ve known personally, as well as half-read zines distributed by Trots anywhere and everywhere you might expect.

I am wary of the one-party state envisioned, and have some real problems with concentrating power at all, lest another Stalin rise up and begin again the great work of ratfucking socialism before I can enjoy it. I’m happy to work alongside Trotskyists though, as in my experience they are some of the more hard-working and driven political organizers one might find out in the wild. It’s kind of a funny position to be in: not anti-hierarchy and thus not fully welcomed by anarchists like myself, and on the shit list of the classically authoritarian Stalinists and less internationalism-oriented Marxist-Leninists. It’s lonely work being a Trot, it seems…

In cross-tendency solidarity,

– Dee

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Any magician worth their salt will tell you one thing about deception: the “big motion” covers the “small motion.” Put simply, the big showy, flashy stuff is meant to cover up the sleight-of-hand that the trick depends on. This is likely one of the many negative effects of Trump’s Illegal war in Iran: little to no scrutiny for his depraved authoritarian moves here at home is possible while everyone is focused on his overseas authoritarianism. From grift to ICE crackdowns to lawfare against his opponents, Trump is executing his agenda while everyone’s attention is tied up in the Strait.

Stock Manipulation Any Given Friday Night

The most obviously affected area is the one nearest and dearest to the demented old fart–his wallet. Nearly every Friday since the start of the war has seen the start of a manic-depressive stock market rollercoaster. Trump pumps up the markets with talks of peace and goodwill toward his Iranian opponents. The markets rally, and everyone who bought before the spike makes a nice profit. Then by Monday morning Trump has again dragged us to the brink of nuclear war, at which point the savvy, plugged-in investor class short-sells key stocks and futures, namely in crude oil and other commodities. [1] They make a mint while we all shit our pants in genuine terror at the prospect of nuclear war.

ICE Enforcement Ramps Up Quietly

Immigration enforcement is a layer deeper in the sleight-of-hand, covered even more so by the grifting as well as the warmongering. It’s no surprise that ICE has ramped up activities while our eyes are turned eastward, but how effective and ruthless they have been is cause for alarm. The goon squad is up to some shit again, and it’s not good in the slightest.

Here are some of the key developments on the immigration enforcement front:

ICE Deployed To The Nation’s Airports

With turmoil in the skies and in the boarding lines, amid the throttling of TSA’s funding, Trump’s paramilitary was quickly deployed to “help” TSA perform airport security. [2] Or at least that’s the official narrative – in reality the surge in airport ICE presence has been a menace to society and has done more to slow down air traffic than to speed up things or increase efficiency. [3] Arrests of unarmed nonoffenders, some on their way out of the country, baffled and upset onlookers in airports around the country this Spring.

I-9 Audit Changes And Engineered Gross Negligence

Less publicized but even more reprehensible is the ramp up in deportation numbers, buoyed by I-9 audit enforcement changes. ICE dresses these workers’ expulsion with flowery talk of vicious, bloodthirsty criminals being ejected from the failing state–as if a few genuinely reprehensible people make up for the 30,000 or so lives ruined every month. [4] And what do these poor souls get for conditions while they wait to be jettisoned like a bad lay tossed aside after the third date? Horrible conditions in ICE concentration camps, gross negligence, and the rapidly increasing likelihood of death in detention. Seventeen human beings have already lost their lives in ICE/CBP custody this year alone, with countless others endangered or dead shortly after their deportation–often back to deplorable conditions from which they had been rightfully seeking asylum in their home countries. [5]

Lawfare And Aggressive Action Against Dissidents

Digging yet another layer deeper, we find even more fuckery afoot. Donald Trump has mobilized the Department of Justice to “Make America Safe Again” (read: take out Trump’s political opposition). The irony is every move this joker makes is calculated to do the most damage, to make us as unsafe as possible, while providing fodder for the headsmen in the press–they serve up cases framed to make Trump look victorious and triumphant in the face of wrongdoing and sinister machinations, all the while being the real sinister actor himself.

The Prairieland Antifa Prosecutions

The first convictions of anyone under the auspices of NSPM-7, specifically largely uncoordinated actions by antifascists (known collectively as Antifa) who were involved in a 7/4/25 direct action outside a Texas ICE facility. The administration has used NSPM-7 to successfully label these protesters exercising their first amendment rights as terrorists and agitators after a gun was discharged late into the action on Independence Day, which also featured fireworks being set off. [6] While perhaps not the wisest move, this is far from the “terror threat” involving “explosive devicess” that you may have seen this characterized as in de facto state media coverage.

DOJ Lawfare Against SPLC

Most recently, and with little resistance, the FBI has filed charges against the Southern Poverty Law Center for eleven counts related to fraud and money laundering. The DOJ is obviously mischaracterizing the legitimate undercover reporting work that the SPLC has done for decades, infiltrating and bringing down white supremacist groups and other racist organizations from the inside, often aiding the DOJ or state government investigations in the process. [7] The regime is engaging in the most playfully ironic labelling of all–apparently the anti-racist organization has defrauded its supporters because some of the funds they used ended up in the coffers of racist groups, which they characterize as “material support.” The fucking balls on these guys…

The Big Motion Covers The Small Motion

So, at the end of it all we have as follows: lawfare covered by immigration brutality, covered by grift covered by an illegal, at times borderline-genocidal, war in Iran. The bigger motions cover the smaller, more sinister motions. Trump shows us the red puff ball, waves it around, then as it disappears from our view, his agenda slips through the back door undetected. We need to be vigilant in times such as these, or who knows what else this shabby trickster will pull from his hat next.

In solidarity with everyone under the regime’s heel,

– Dee

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Footnotes:

1. “Trump’s Big Iran Announcement Just Around the Corner,” Yahoo Finance, accessed April 23, 2026, https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/trump-big-iran-announcement-just-133430130.html.

2. “ICE Agents at Airport Deployment: What We Know,” CNN, March 24, 2026, https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/24/us/ice-agents-airport-deployment-what-we-know.

3. “ICE Deployment to U.S. Airports Raises Questions Amid Shutdown,” UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, accessed April 23, 2026, https://luskin.ucla.edu/ice-deployment-to-u-s-airports-raises-questions-amid-shutdown.

4. “Quiet Change, Serious Consequences: ICE Expands Form I-9,” Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP, April 2026, https://www.hklaw.com/en/insights/publications/2026/04/quiet-change-serious-consequences-ice-expands-form-i9.

5. “Eleven People Died in U.S. Immigration Custody This Year, ICE Says,” Reuters, April 18, 2026, https://www.reuters.com/world/eleven-people-died-us-immigration-custody-this-year-ice-says-2026-04-18/.

6. “Antifa Cell Members Convicted in Prairieland ICE Detention Center Shooting,” U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Public Affairs, accessed April 23, 2026, https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/antifa-cell-members-convicted-prairieland-ice-detention-center-shooting.

7. “Southern Poverty Law Center Under DOJ Investigation,” The New York Times, April 21, 2026, https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/21/us/politics/southern-poverty-law-center-doj-investigation.html.

Solidarity Without Borders

Who needs our support specifically, you ask? The proper response may not be comfortable to the Western ear, but it’s time we reorient ourselves in such a way as we can understand the forces resisting neocolonial oppression. The Houthis in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and other defensive militias, while imperfect, are fighting against occupation and aggression in ways that differ fundamentally from the state-sponsored violence and displacement caused by the IDF. Rojava also deserves the support of the Internationalist Left, both ideologically and materially, as they struggle to maintain the gains they’ve made in a chronically war-torn region. The Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico are a similar example to which the Internationalist Left is duty-bound to provide critically important support.

The Need For International Solidarity in the Imperial Core

The Imperial Core, should its people embrace an internationalist perspective on issues of decolonization, globalization, and the exploitation of the Global South, would also benefit from this shift of our outlook. The dehumanization of the Global South serves to dehumanize people of color everywhere, which in turn devalues all human life. The effect this has on the psyche of the West is truly devastating, doing untold damage to people everywhere. If the people of the Global South deserve the most severe exploitation and perpetual servitude, as a Western chauvinist perspective would necessitate, then Westerners are forced into the position of accepting their own relatively less dire, but no less real, exploitation by the capitalist class. The Western chauvinist rationalizes the dynamic thusly: “They deserve exploitation because they are lesser; my place is above them, yet still beneath the heel of those ‘better’ than I.”

A hierarchical mindset lends itself immediately to oppression, abuse, and mistreatment by the so-called “betters” of society. Abandoning this mindset, and embracing one wherein all people are of equal value and deserving of equal respect and dignity, would benefit everyone in the global community. It would free the Global South from their subjugation by the West, and it would free the West of its subjugation within its own borders. The only ones who stand to lose anything but their chains have more than enough to afford parting with their undeserved positions of power. Even these people, who despite their unjust and inhumane treatment of their fellow man, stand to benefit from being freed of their perversely assumed dominion over others – without the “responsibility” of being at the top of the hierarchy, they might enjoy a truly self-actualized life alongside the rest of us.

Our Fates Are Tied to the Fate of the Global South

As the Earth heats up at an ever-increasing rate, it will become necessary to work together – all people aligned toward a greener, less destructive future – if we are to avoid global catastrophe. If the worst possibilities come to pass, those living in the Global South will be forced to seek refuge wherever they can. The West already considers the existing refugee crises – a great many of which are the result of colonial oppression and extraction – to be a threat to their security and way of life. While overstated and sensationalized, an influx of many, many millions more people seeking help when their homes become uninhabitable – due to flooding, famine, lack of potable water, and internal conflict – will only further inflame tensions. If we are to share this world, as we must, it is time we abandon the nationalist illusions that divide us and embrace a shared global destiny—a realignment necessary if we are to realize the socialist future we need to survive.

In solidarity with all,

— Dee

In solidarity with everyone—even the 15% he wrote off wholesale toward the end of the discussion,

— Dee

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Thank you to everyone who tuned into my live video! Join me tomorrow with Robert Patton-Spruill for a debate on the endpoints of capitalism and the inevitability of Donald Trump’s rise.

I genuinely appreciate the support y’all have offered and the help provided in creating a place for us to have serious discussions about the world around us. If you’d like to get in on the conversation, support SLSC via the link below and become a paid subscriber.

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If you’d like to discuss these topics and more on a stream, please reach out and we’ll set something up. I’m more than happy to discuss my positions, or yours, on any number of topics.

Thanks again to everybody in the SLSC community. Y’all are the best <3

Forever in solidarity.

— Dee

Just hours after Iran reopened the Strait of Hormuz to commercial traffic, the critical waterway is again shuttered. The continued US counter-blockade, an attempt to strangle the Islamic Republic of Iran economically after their more traditional state-sponsored terror campaign proved ineffective, is reportedly one of the main reasons for the increased tensions. Also to blame are the numerous Israeli attacks against Lebanon, which violate the threadbare ceasefire that Trump touted just days ago. The Strait of Hormuz is poised to be a point of perpetual leverage for Iran, no matter how the Trump regime flails.

Iran’s Blockade Remains Highly Effective; US Refuses To Lift Their Blockade Despite Progress Made In Islamabad

Despite initially announcing a reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, Iran has again closed the strait to commercial traffic following US refusal to lift their counter blockade. US demands to keep their blockade in place and control the waterway off the coast of Iran appear to have backfired. Iran referred to their posturing as simple “banditry” in a statement announcing the closure of the strait. Their blockade is proving to hold, with reports of gunfire from a commercial vessel attempting to traverse the Strait of Hormuz despite the blockade. [1]

The US blockade of Iranian ports has turned away, according to US official statements, twenty three ships bound for Iranian ports, meaning their stranglehold on the Iranian economy is not insignificant. It is because of this aggression that Iran has returned the Strait of Hormuz to a state of “strict control” by the Islamic Republic. [2] While much progress appears to have been made in the Islamabad peace negotiations, and I sincerely hope that peace prevails, it seems to be getting farther from reach with each passing hour as the addled, literally demented US leader (in that he is showing clear signs of dementia) vacillates between (relatively speaking) friendly and congenial Trump and aggressive, vindictive Trump.

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Israel Predictably Shits All Over Ceasefire

Another point of tension that remains to be resolved is the ongoing ethnic cleansing of southern Lebanon by Israeli military forces. The IDF has continued to bulldoze Lebanese homes and wipe out any hope of evidence-gathering that might speak to war crimes committed during their Gazafication of southern Lebanon. Despite a ceasefire being announced, and US insistence that their attack dog stand down, it appears the dog has slipped its collar and has continued to attack cities in southern Lebanon while it clears the land it sees as the latest addition to Israel’s lebensraum campaign. The Lebanese cities of Beit Lif, al-Qantara and Toul have been under attack throughout the supposed ceasefire, which had rather impotent wording included that allowed the IDF to continue “defensive” operations. [3] This included “preemptive” strikes against Hezbollah–the defensive militia, however, would be held to a higher standard and expected to cease all hostilities in the region. [4] The double-standard between Israel and its neighbors is clearer than ever as Israel continues to bomb southern Lebanon, daring Trump to rein them in.

A Difficult Spot For The Trump Regime – Iran Has The Upper Hand

As I see it, the US has a couple options on the table that end in varying degrees of defeat. There is no path forward where it can be said that Trump has succeeded in any of his goals, much less the overall conflict. On one hand, Trump could cut his losses, accept the majority of Iran’s demands in the next round of negotiations, and turn his sights elsewhere for a win before the 2026 midterms (a move I think wouldn’t do much, if anything, to save his ass electorally). From another perspective, the US blockade could drag things out longer, continuing the immiseration of the entire world, in an attempt to get better terms in future negotiations (a move I think would backfire catastrophically). The third option I see on the table would be to ramp up a military offensive and revert to their more traditional campaign of violence and terror as a means of extracting concessions.

This third choice would be a huge misstep, and would lose America what little goodwill somehow remains around the world for the Imperial Core. If the US was to cut its losses now, minimizing the damage to both the domestic population and the world at large, some of that goodwill would be preserved. In the newly emerging multipolar world order, goodwill and soft power will be necessary currencies with which to accomplish any foreign policy agenda. Squandering what little opportunity to preserve those ideological resources would be myopic and baby-brained–the standard fare of Trumpists these days. Hopefully they choose the way of least aggression, but I’m not holding my breath.

In solidarity with all who resist imperialism and oppression,

—Dee

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Plus, you don’t want to miss my first live debate — “Trump: Aberration or Inevitability?” — featuring on Monday, April 20th at 2pm EDT. The debate will be live streamed and posted the following morning for everyone to enjoy, but the Aftershow — where I’ll do some self-criticism and breakdown how the debate went while taking questions from y’all — will be reserved for paid subscribers only.

I’ve lived a pretty checkered life. I’ve not always been the most upstanding citizen, though not out of any antisocial tendencies or anything. It’s not hard to develop addiction issues when you grow up in an abusive environment and have fairly significant mental health issues. In fact, it was kind of a rational decision at a certain point — give in to anxiety and manic-depression, or insulate myself until I could handle my shit. I chose the latter; addicts aren’t the type to give up without a fight.

At Home With The Underclass

Eventually I started hustling, just small amounts of what I already had on hand. Then I got connected to the music festival circuit in my region by my old plug, I met more and more people who were opting out of a society that had left them behind. There were train-hoppers, the Dead Family (yes, they are still around), artists of all sorts who lived out in the boonies and weren’t to be fucked with — not to mention the enterprising tweakers trying to make technicolor handicrafts (admittedly of exceptional quality) into a means of survival — all gathered in one place with a bunch of, relatively speaking, normal people. I would show up the day before the show with this cadre of shitheads I was tight with, when the higher-tiered hustlers would be trying to unload bulk acid, MDMA, coke, and the like. We’d get ourselves an early bird special and triple our money in 24 hours if we were on our A-game.

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Eerily Similar Social Dynamics Despite Radically Different Conditions

After a good run, I ended up flying too close to the sun, and Shithead Icarus ended up in Richmond City Jail for a few months while I was waiting on a trumped up — but not completely off-base — distribution charge, which was eventually wiped from my record after intesive addiction treatment, a year of probation, and one hundred grueling hours of community service. In that time, I got to know another subset of the American underclass. To my surprise, they had a good deal in common with the “festie trash” I knew so well, namely adherence to the following shared social mores:

• Being authentic was valued over most other social traits.

• Newcomers were made to feel welcome immediately — if they didn’t set off any red flags.

• Everybody eats, but closed mouths don’t get fed — folks would break bread with you if you were hungry, but you had to ask. None of us are mind-readers.

• If your word loses value, you’re fucked. Meet your obligations and don’t take on any you can’t follow through on.

• Don’t fuck with cops. They aren’t your friends. Ever.

In either setting I’d say political awareness was about average for Americans, if not above average among some subgroups in my “pod”. In jail, you have nothing but time and your own thoughts about whatever misdeeds got you locked up. Your conditions, while meager and distressing, are not generally (immediately) life-threatening. It’s easy enough to — under such circumstances— read up on theory, follow the news, and compare different sources critically if you choose to. There were a couple in my “pod” who did, myself included. Most though were concerned with their material deprivation and how they had been fucked over, time and time again, by a system that offers them shitty options then punishes them no matter what choices they make.

This was a trend I saw across the board growing up in a fairly impoverished setting (save for a five or so year period where subprime loans allowed my parents to make a run at the petit-bourgeoisie, which failed spectacularly, sending us straightback to the poor house). They can recognize right away who is screwing them and how, yet because they’re demobilized many write them off as a political force. Dirt poor folks, have plenty of conviction and could be mobilized but nobody has given them something to rally around in a very, very long time — whether they’re the urban underclass or the rural underclass, they feel that nobody is looking out for their interests. Rightly so. The lumpenproletariat doesn’t have a billion-dollar lobby, so politicians often ignore them. We have to mobilize themselves.

What Does This Mean For Movement-Builders?

People need to be made whole if they are ever going to trust any government (not that I necessarily do, at least not within the current understanding of “government”) or participate in politics and engage democratically with the world around them — if you want people to line up to change society for the better, it has to be in favor of one that rightly corrects its past injustices. Of course, different groups of people are subjected to different systems of oppression and need different support to account for those systemic imbalances, namely the descendants of African slaves and indigenous Americans. They deserve the lion’s share of any sort of program designed to make the people whole again. Providing for the material security of everyone, though, is absolutely non-negotiable if you want to mobilize a massive, untapped reserve of people power. Folks are hurting bad these days, and If we want a real movement for radical change to succeed, we’ve got to start offering people something material, not just hollow rhetoric. You can’t eat rhetoric, and the people need to get fed.

Solidarity with all the proles and lumpenproles out there,

— Subcomandante Dee

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Israel Violated the Terms of the Ceasefire After Only One Day

Iran, has shown incredible restraint amid the US-Israeli terror campaign they are being subjected to. Even agreeing to sit down with negotiators is a risky step, as negotiators have been targeted by the IDF for decapitation strikes. America tries to make peace (though they are clearly not operating wholly in good faith) and the Israelis scuttle the talks. One of Iran’s requirements for the ceasefire was a halt to all hostilities against themselves and their proxies, which is sort of definitional — cease the firing during a ceasefire. It’s hard to understand how anyone could see the continued aggression as anything but a maneuver to prolong the war and keep the United States engaged.

Over 1700 Lebanese civilians have been killed since the fighting began at their southern border, the latest area annexed by Israel [4] as it seizes chunks of their surrounding neighbors. To see this expansionist aggression combined with the Gazan genocide and not compare it to the Nazi’s lebensraum campaign takes a wealth of ignorance I personally am happy to lack. It’s blatantly obvious what Israel is up to — daring America to rein it in, with a “neener neener” after every bombed hospital, every decimated refugee encampment, every gleefully-violated ceasefire. It’s time to call their bluff, but with the current leadership that’s virtually impossible. If Chuck Schumer bucks Israel and moves to rein in the American war machine, I’ll eat a pair of Doc Martens raw.

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The Strait of Hormuz Must Be Reopened, or America Will Balk

US negotiators have one real focus for these talks — reopen the Straight of Hormuz. NOW [3] It was a combination of ignorance and hubris that led them to attack Iran without realizing how easily they could leverage their geographic position and throttle the world’s oil supply in the first place. We made a big-ass oopsie, and it’s time to pay the piper while trying to save as much face for the rabid MAGA base at home. Ignorance and hubris, though, is the American way of life, so it’s no surprise we’ve gotten ourself in over our heads. The question that remains is this: Will Iran reopen the Strait to global trade while Israel continues its belligerent terror campaign against the people of Lebanon?

It’s hard to imagine that they would. The Strait of Hormuz’s closure exposed the Achilles Heel of international trade — not just oil flows through the Straight, and the deprivation we’ve yet to feel will hurt badly enough even without an end to the war. If it drags on even a few more months, the impact will be devastating for people all around the world. If Iran is to avoid future attempts at toppling their government from without, they’d be perfectly rational to refuse to reopen the straight. Iran has made a comprehensive ten-point list of demands for the negotiation, and given they were attacked in an unprovoked and inhumane manner, with no regard for civilian lives — including a primary school where nearly 170 Iranian girls between the ages of seven and twelve were slaughtered by American bombs. [5] Even the Department of Defense’s internal investigation showed it was America who took their lives and the lives of their teachers.

Iran has demanded the following [1] in order to end hostilities with the former hegemon and its Middle Eastern attack dog:

• An immediate end to all sanctions on Iran

• Iranian control of the Strait of Hormuz, which it will charge a $2 million toll for the use of, to be split 50:50 with Oman in lieu of war reparations

• Complete US military withdrawal from the Middle East

• An end to attacks on Iran and its allies, including Hezbollah and the Houthis

• The release of all remaining frozen Iranian assets held hostage by the West

• A binding resolution by the UN Security Council which will maintain the deal moving forward

If agreed to, this proposal would cement Iran’s place as a regional power and strike a devastating blow against American interests in the region. American negotiators have said that the reopeniong of the Strait is a must-have for any peace deal with Iran, making a lasting peace seem unlikely in the short term.

What Does This All Mean?

Well, it seems to me that between the Israeli defiance of the ceasefire — which the US has not done anything about — and the posturing of American diplomats regarding the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz to internation trade withoutany restrictions, that neogtiators will likely be at an impass. If this comes as a shock to you, welcome to 2026. Nice to see you’ve crawled out from under that rock of yours. Quick recap: the world’s on fire, it’s our fault, and shit is about to get much worse before it gets any better. Get ready for your local Exxon to look like a scene from Road Warrior, because the one thing the Trump administration seems incapable of doing is telling Israel to get fucked like they ought to. Instead, the proverbial punchbowl is filled with floaters.

Solidarity with Lebanon,

— Dee

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Footnotes

1. “Iran 10-Point Plan Ceasefire Donald Trump US,” The Guardian, April 8, 2026, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/apr/08/iran-10-point-plan-ceasefire-donald-trump-us.

2. “Israel Strikes Residential Areas Destroys Homes in Southern Lebanon,” Al Jazeera, April 10, 2026, https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/4/10/israel-strikes-residential-areas-destroys-homes-in-southern-lebanon.

3. “Iran War Live: US Negotiators Due to Arrive in Pakistan for Ceasefire Talks,” Al Jazeera, April 11, 2026, https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2026/4/11/iran-war-live-us-negotiators-due-to-arrive-in-pakistan-for-ceasefire-talks.

4. “Lebanon thought there was a ceasefire - then Israel unleashed a deadly blitzkrieg,” BBC News, accessed April 11, 2026, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cgk0edynpmzo.

5. “USA Iran: Those Responsible for Deadly and Unlawful US Strike on School That Killed Over 100 Children Must Be Held Accountable,” Amnesty International, March 2026, https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2026/03/usa-iran-those-responsible-for-deadly-and-unlawful-us-strike-on-school-that-killed-over-100-children-must-be-held-accountable/.

6. “At least 182 killed across Lebanon in large wave of Israeli strikes,” BBC News, accessed April 11, 2026, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0j6d538l6qo.

In the fallout of World War II, European countries were presented with an opportunity to rebuild their economies with support from the United States under the Marshall Plan. Post-war America was a social democratic state, though — true to form — access to government programs was racialized, and people of color were shamefully barred from enjoying many of the benefits that a social democratic state offers its people. This direct tie to now-extinct American social democracy (survived still by systemic racism), led to the adoption of Keynesian social democracy in Post-War Europe. France, Germany, Britain, and others based their Keynesian welfare state programs on the best parts of the New Deal fused with some of the more mainstream reforms proposed by democratic socialists in their governing coalitions.

Mid-Century Theoreticians and Strategic Shifts

Michael Harrington (1928–1989)

Michael Harrington was the earliest prominent American democratic socialist theorist, and is credited with laying the groundwork for DSA and related movements to be built upon. His most famous work, the Other America, was a cornerstone of modern DemSoc theory. He espoused a mass politics program that depended on building and maintaining diverse coalitions, an approach uniquely tailored to the American context within which he developed his theory. This approach was called coalition politics, and it was this coalition that would maintain the so-called “long march through institutions” required to achieve the methodical reforms he prescribed over a revolutionary rupture and immediate overthrow of the capitalist system. Without Harrington, there would likely be no Bernie Sanders, AOC, or DSA- at least not as we know them today.

Nicos Poulantzas (1936–1979)

Nicos Poulantzas is best known for his work on the theory of the state. Specifically, his focus shifted some people’s perspectives on the state’s function as a tool of capital, arguing that instead state apparatuses should be seen as yet another theatre of class struggle. It’s an interesting argument, whether bourgoise institutions can be captured and repurposed like workplaces, apartment buildings, and other institutions. Rather than dismantling and rebuilding them with a worker-first orientation, Poulantzas argues that the state should be seized popularly and then its focus shifted instead. This was an organizing principle in the Eurocommunism movement, which specifically intended to use electoraly means within the context of parliamentary democracies of southern Europe in the .

C.L.R. James (1901–1989)

In the mid-twentieth century, liberatory movements, especially anti-racist and anti-imperialist movements, finally began to be integrated within the Left more broadly. This inherently anti-colonial ideological discipline that has left its influence indelibly upon understandings of capitalism that were class-oriented exclusively, what we would today know as class-reductionism. James was not an adherent to the inherently hierarchiacal party model, instead advocating for mass self-activity by grassroots movements to accomplish democratic socialist aims. We owe the multi-racial understanding of the working class to James, an indispensible development of the socialist tradition — not just of democratic socialism, but across all tendencies.

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Historical Case Studies: Successes, Failures, and Ambiguities

• Chile’s Unidad Popular (1970–1973)

  In November of 1970, Salvador Allende — the Marxist candidate put forth by the Popular Socialist Party — became the first socialist to win an election held by a Latin American liberal democratic state. His program, and the platform of the Popular Socialist Party, closely adhered to democratic socialist ideology. Expansion of social programs formed the backbone of Allende’s project, bolstered by the nationalization of copper — Chile’s primary natural resource — and agrarian reform. Sadly, Allende’s leadership — which was poised to provide a model for Latin American socialism that could have been replicated across the region and eventually around the world — was brought to an end. A US-backed coup took advantage of capital flight and political isolation imposed by the West, ending one of the most promising attempts at socialism in the 20th century.

• Portugal’s Carnation Revolution (1974–1976)

  On the other side of the Atlantic Oceean, around a year after Allende was deposed, Portugal’s Carnation Revolution made an attempt of an democratic socialism in the context of post-autocracy Iberian politics. Their program was similar to Allende’s, though with more expansive nationalization efforts, land reform that reshaped both agribusiness and real estate, and a broad expansion of human and political rights. One critical takeaway from the successful parts of this period is that revolutionary movements do not necessarily lead to an autocratic regime — quite the opposite happened, actually — but ensuring the stability and viability of the program requires careful consideration, diligence, and dedication.

Contemporary Interpretations and Movements

• Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) & Bernie Sanders

  A lot of Americans first encountered Democratic socialism during the 2015-2016 Democratic Party primary race, where Bernie Sanders rose to prominence out of relative obscurity. This explosion in popularity laid the foundation for the Democratic Socialists of America, a coalition of democratic socialists, Marxists, anarchists, social democrats, and others occupying the left wing of American politics. Policy proposals like single-payer healthcare, housing justice, workplace democracy and unionism, and the “Green New Deal” have helped reshape the American political landscape. DSA has been one of the driving forces behind the American Left using both electoral politics and grassroots movement-building strategies.

• The Green New Deal Framework

  As one of the key policy proposals of DSA, the Sunrise Movement, and other groups that comprise the American Left, the Green New Deal provides a framework for climate justice and ecosocialist reforms. It advocates for nationalization of the energy sector, Medicare for All (single-payer healthcare), massive infrastructure renewal projects, economic justice reforms, and sustainability efforts in pursuit of net zero emissions. It is tied strongly to the EU Green Deal and Latin American eco-socialist movements.

  

• Latin America’s “Pink Tide” (Second Generation)

  Speaking of Latin American socialism, the 21st century has seen the resurgence of leftist politics. This second generation “Pink Tide” has been led by passionate, dedicated leftist leaders like AMLO (Andrés Manuel López Obrador) and Claudia Sheinbaum in Mexico, Petro in Colombia, and Lula (Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva) in Brazil. Their projects largely pursue similar policies as their North American counterparts, such as nationalization of natural resources, economic and climate justice reforms, and social inclusion and support for indigenous South Americans. This ambitious policy set oftenbutts up against the realities of a Western-dominated world, with immense pressure being applied in opposition to these fairly mild reform efforts by multi-national corporations, financial institutions, and Western nation-states with interests in the region.

Unresolved Tensions and Future Directions

Despite the gains many democratic socialist movements have made in recent years, several questions remain unanswered. Should democratic socialists prioritize winning elections or building power outside the electoral system? Is it enough to stop at the decommodification of essentials and nationalization of certain industries, or must the system be overhauled entirely to prevent a backslide into neoliberalism and capitalist control of the economy? Are the answers to these questions the same throughout Latin America, or will different material conditions require different approaches?

The issue of maintaining an internationist perspective within the context of rising nationalist currents around the world presents another challenge, as does the complexity of supply chains developed to serve cxapitalistic interests ratherm than provide the best conditions possible to as many people as possible. These tensions leave us with one overarching question that will need to be answered by modern democratic socialists: can democratic socialism scale globally without triggering capital strikes or authoritarian backlash, and if it does can it withstand the full-court press these forces will engage in to reclaim Latin America?

Conclusion

Beginning with the central question that democratic socialism seeks to answer — should socialism be achieved by a program of reforms via an electoral strategy or through a revolution, either by mounting an armed revolution to seize control or by mass action and seizure of political power through electoral means — democratic socialism has grown into a major international force in left-wing politics. The dedication shown by many democratic socialists and those within their coalitions to ensuring better conditions for all members of society is typical of socialist ideology, however what distinguishes it from revolutionary socialist movements is that is does not seek complete overhaul of oppressive systems, but rather transforming those systems of oppression into systems that provide for the needs of all of society, rather than catering to the capitalist class.

Democratic socialism now exists in an era of digital activism, ecological collapse, social media networking, and globalization which provide both hurdles to be cleared and opportunities to rally popular support in ways that weren’t possible just a few decades ago. Resistance from capitalist forces and the fragility of social democracy still plague transitional attempts. Through these struggles and via the adaptation to new conditions which is employed by many democratic socialist movements, democratic socialism remains a living project that will grow and change over time as the terrain on which the struggle between capitalism and socialism shifts constantly in response to each strategic maneuver.

Solidarity,

— Dee

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It’s not easy trying to make sure I can keep going with this project and offer folks what I’d like to see available to people, and navigating complex siuations in my personal life. SLSC has been a major point of positivity for me, and I’d like to think it has given you all something that is both enjoyable and which has a positive impact. Making a community available to everyone regardless of economic status is what I would want to see from a principled leftist creator, and as such all subscribers are welcome. I'd love to make it all free, but in order to keep this project sustainable, I'm going to be paywalling a large portion of newly-developed video content, including the interactive Aftershow following my upcoming 4/20 debate, Trump: Aberration or Inevitability?

A Word Or Two On Paywalled Content

This project is meant for everyone, and in trying to figure out how to maintain viability, I nearly deprived you all of each other’s company. If you're reading this, then I invite you to click this link and join the SLSC Discord, where the real fun is going to be had soon. Discord members will get a more behind-the-scene view of the Surviving Late-Stage Capitalism community. Y'all probably know each other a bit from the comment sections anyway — come make some new leftie friends and kick it with some truly rad radicals.

Paywalled content will be managed via server roles with custom permissions and Substack's post settings. Highlights from paid content may periodically be released, but the content supported by paid subscribers will largely be reserved for their enjoyment. It's a great time to upgrade to a paid subscription, at only $5 per month or $40 per year for a standard paid subscription.

If you're still on the fence about upgrading, I totally get it. Video content is somewhat new to me, and there's a learning curve. Trepidation is both rational and expected. Rest assured I'm a fast learner, and I have faith that once some proof-of-concept video posts drop, the content will speak for itself. ‘Til then, I look forward to seeing you in our Discord server.

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— Dee

Tune in next Sunday morning for another look at the state of the world, and as much hope for humanity as can be mustered given the state of things.

If you want to support my work, please subscribe to SLSC, share your favorite clips and articles with your network, and hit the like button before you leave! Most critically, if I’ve missed something in my analysis, please point it out! Aiming for max clarity and impact with my work, and I know I’m not all-knowing.

To those of you new to the community: Welcome! This is meant to be a place for lefties of all ages, sizes, colors, persuasions, and across any other lines that might be otherwise used to divide us in service of exploitation. In the last week or so, subscriber count has nearly doubled. I have been periodically vetting subscribers with suspicious usernames and trying to make sure that there aren’t bad faith actors attempting to troll y’all in the comments, and have rooted out a few white supremacists who mistake anti-zionism for their preffered brand of ethnic hatred. I’m doing my best given time contrainsts and other obligations to ensure a respectful discourse free from harassment. To wit — if you see abusive or malicious behavior in the comments or restacks, please bring it to my attention if you have the time and energy.

SLSC will always remain free to enjoy and is a labor of both love and praxis, but if you feel moved to chip in toward better production quality, paid subscriptions are available with benefits including Q&A sessions on the 1st and 15th day of each month, credits for support in email footers (to be added when they’re needed), fostering growth and expanding the reach of truly independent media, and making it sustainable to produce revolutionary content intent on forging a better world- one quip, one barb, one bit of biting analysis at a time.

Ko-fi is set up for those of you who want to send one-time tips/donations or keep funds out of Substacks hands — a position I understand and agree with to a point, but combatting reactionary ideology is an arduous process that requires consistent, active participation. This is where my people are, and I’m not one to cede territory to fascists or their enablers. A recurring minimum donation on Ko-fi will include a comped paid subscruiption on here.

Solidarity,

Dee

Two Jets Shot Down By IRGC

Yesterday, The Iranian Revolutionary Guard managed to take down two Jets, one over Iranian territory and the other in the Persian Gulf. Prior to repelling the USAF for the first time and shattering the myth of American air superiority, Iran wasn’t believed to have the capacity to inflict much damage on the former global hegemon so long as they stayed at altitude. America was already on the ropes, with the closing of the Strait of Hormuz and attacks on Western corporations operating in the Middle East have thrown markets into turmoil, foreshadowing a truly catastrophic economic crisis that is just around the corner.

Oil prices consistently and rapidly climbing, over $140 per barrel in one instance, [1] portends gas shortages and multi-sector inflation as transportation costs skyrocket. The downing of the two American jets has the potential to trigger further escalation, likely an Easter Sunday ground offensive, which would prolong and intensify the economic impact of the US-Israeli war of aggression against the Islamic Republic. As if the American public can withstand any more economic strain, much less for a total nothing-burger of a war.

Rescue Mission Flies Into Iran’s Crosshairs, Multiple Soldiers Injured

The pilot shot down over the Gulf has been successfully retrieved, alive but injured. The rescue mission consisted of two heavily armed helicopters that swooped into the area, taking small arms fire and sustaining significant casualties in the process of extracting the downed pilot. As the conflict drags on, it’s only reasonable to expect more such pain to be inflicted against American forces in the Persian Gulf. I don’t see The United States doing the rational thing and cutting its losses. The pain pigs at the DoD think this war of choice is the holy war that will bring about the endtimes, and these bloodthirsty fundamentalists see themselves as modern-day crusaders ordained by God to slaughter nonbelievers.

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One Pilot Still MIA In Iranian Territory

The other pilot, who was downed over mainland Iran, has still not been located or retrieved, nor even confirmed alive. It is possible they have been captured by the IRGC, a worst case scenario for American central command. That kind of leverage against the United States might provide the necessary conditions for an end to this war, and would be a colossal embarrassment to President Trump. Pilots are highly trained in survival and evasion techniques so it’s not the most likely outcome that they are taken captive, but retrieving the pilot behind enemy lines will be risky as hell and likely a cost lives to accomplish. Still, the President claims Iran has been completely decimated before a live international audience. Something tells me Iran will not be backing down, at least not any time soon.

US “Covers Up” Casualty Figures As War Intensifies

The American casualty count is already being obfuscated by the Department of Defense, according to reporting from the Intercept. [2] Official figures are on the low end, with reports from state-friendly media indicating a casualty count of 365, [4] yet the figures are likely above 500 servicemembers injured or killed in this unnecessary war of choice. These men and women are being scarred for life – literally and figuratively – for a war whose aims have shifted along with the whims of USA’s demented Commander-in-Chief.

The excuses deployed by the Trump regime for the wanton brutality America is engaging in have ranged from liberation of Iranians to eliminating the nuclear weapons program Iran didn’t even have — and had agreed not to pursue at any point in the future just before they were bombed mercilessly at the behest of Jeffrey Epstein’s best friend, President Trump — to simply reopening the Strait of Hormuz for passage by oil tankers and cargo ships. It’s clear that Americans and the international community are being lied to at every turn by the depraved architects of this war, who seem hell-bent on lining the pockets of the military-industrial complex.

Iran Strikes Fossil Fuel Infrastructure And Desalination Plant in Kuwait

Striking while their adversaries are occupied scrambling to rescue downed pilots, Iran has hit an oil refinery in Kuwait, damaging a desalination plant in the process. Being a desert region, this attack on the supply of clean water for drinking and irrigation will impact civilians negatively for quite some time, and if more are taken out it may make the region virtually uninhabitable for the majority of the population. It’s a violation of international law to target civilian infrastructure – which America and its fascistic colonial outpost have been doing since the beginning of the war, when US bombs were dropped on a school, killing ~165 young girls between ages seven and twelve. [5] This was followed not long after by the Israeli bombing of oil fields near Tehran, leading to black, oily rain for days – in a few years the number of Iranians who develop Gulf War Syndrome will indicate how severe the long-term damage really is.

Where Will It Go From Here?

It is impressive that Iran has exercised as much restraint as they have. If the shoe was on the other foot and they were to strike an elementary school and then try to claim they did it to themselves, we would have decimated every square inch we could reach, likely with a nuclear strike of some kind (which hasn’t been ruled out even absent Iranian attacks inside American borders). Realistically speaking, these escalations are an indication that we’re going to be embroiled in war for a long time if the pig-headed rube that got us into this mess has anythign to say about it. The whole world is held hostage by his ego, and Raytheon, Boeing, and the rest of the war profiteers are taking it to the bank.

My fear is he’s going to mount an Easter invasion and the already-tragic will turn to nightmare fuel in a few short hours. America’s global hegemony is almost a wrap. We won’t recover from this any time soon unless drastic and immediate change is demanded and implemented. Grab some popcorn, y’all – time to watch an empire crumble while Orange Nero fucks around and LARPs as the world’s tackiest interior designer from his gold lamé throne while Rome burns.

Solidarity,

-Dee

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1. “Dated Brent Oil Price Actual Cargo Highest Level Since 2008,” CNBC, April 2, 2026, https://www.cnbc.com/2026/04/02/dated-brent-oil-price-actual-cargo-highest-level-2008.html.

2. “Iran Update Special Report April 3, 2026,” Institute for the Study of War, April 3, 2026, https://understandingwar.org/research/middle-east/iran-update-special-report-april-3-2026/.

3. “Iran War Israel Trump Live Updates,” Associated Press, April 3, 2026, https://apnews.com/live/iran-war-israel-trump-04-03-2026.

4. Ben Norton et al., “Iran War US Casualty Numbers Trump Hegseth,” The Intercept, April 1, 2026, https://theintercept.com/2026/04/01/iran-war-us-casualty-numbers-trump-hegseth/

5. Nick Turse, “Iran School Missile Investigation,” The Intercept, March 11, 2026, https://theintercept.com/2026/03/11/iran-school-missile-investigation/, accessed April 3, 2026.

His following is built largely on prostelytizing against the existence and dignity of the autistic community. In his relatively short statement, he trotted out his most common grift-slop almost immediately: the empirically disproven claim that vaccines somehow make someone autistic, an ableist belief based on a single study linking autism to the MMR vaccine. This study of only twelve kids had some very convenient “findings” which were later determined to be provably fraudulent, [1] after which it was retracted by The Lancet, the journal in which it was originally published. It is worth noting that the researcher had a financial interest in finding a link to autism in his study, namely his patent on a rival vaccine and a massive payment made to him by a group of families seeking monetary damages for their child’s autism diagnoses. Funny how most of the personalities involved in conspiracism have a financial incentive to demean and dehumanize neurodivergent people wholesale, but can’t do so without lies and stereotyped caricatures.

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The way he speaks about autistics as a monolith betrays the digust he’s disguising as pity, which would still be demeaning in its own way even if it was sincere. What he is really doing is far more sinister than pitying parents of autistic kids with high support needs in the face of indequate public health infrastructure, no — He’s trying to sow fear in new and would-be parents that their child might have ASD. Here’s what RFK, Jr. sees when he sees a child with autism:

If you read between the lines, in light of his long history of antagonism toward the neurodivergent community and healthcare conspiracism, should be understood as an attempt to make the last thing a parent would want for their kid is for them to be autistic. Let me translate that for you, so the subtext of RFK’s word choice is crystal clear and we can see this ‘roided up freak for who he is:

It’s one or two degrees off from him actively and explicitly framing us as subhuman in a very literal sense, and he wants that to be the takeaway from his time in office — if you’re a wealthy socialite, a member of the professional managerial class, or are useful enough to capitalists that you can afford to take care of yourself, you’re superior and “healthy”; if you’re not or have any support needs that get in the way of “healthy people” (read: mostly upper-middle class and above WASPs and anyone with property or a position of influence) enjoying their lives unhindered by responsibility to the rest of society, you’re not a full human being that deserves agency, dignity, respect, and human rights — a crock of shit, utterly and completely, but one that gives people who feel uncomfortable around people with disabilities a vehicle for that discomfort. Now they aren’t “prejudiced,” they’re “concerned about public health.”

Even after decades of attempts to prove a link between vaccination and autism, the original study that mainstreamed these claims has never been replicated. In simple terms, it is a fraud. [3] RFK Jr. either knows this or is so far down a radically disproven rabbit hole that he is thoroughly unfit to hold his position in government (no shocker there). My belief is that he is intentionally deploying red meat to his MAHA base in an attempt mainstream eugenics in the Trump regime. They continue to peddle false claims that autism is somehow caused by environmental factors — despite countless attempts to do so failing spectacularly — and not something intrinsic to autistic individuals. Much to MAHA’s chagrin, neurodivergence is a fundamental part of the human experience; denying this does the necessary work of the eugenicist by separating “autistics” from “human beings.” Accepting any sort of supremacist framing will serve the interests of ethnic supremacism, ableism, and, more broadly, the rise of modern fascism.

In a simpler time, these remarks would have led to some form of censure and possibly his removal from office. Instead, we have to not only mask enough to get along under the conditions we are accustomed and equipped to handle, albeit to varying degrees depending on the individual and the circumstances they are in. Now we are put in a position where policymakers are discussing our existence as tragic — I see only one practical path forward, which is also the prosocial and morally defensible response: reject the framing entirely. Rather than prove them wrong by trying to mask even more, enjoy public spaces less, and stay silent so as to avoid attracting their ire, get involved in radical movements for social and political change. I for one am done conforming to ideas of how to move through life held by people who see me as broken or less-deserving because I experience life in a way that they can’t relate to and won’t accept.

Solidarity,

-Dee

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1. Fiona Godlee, “Retraction: Ileal-lymphoid-nodular hyperplasia, non-specific colitis, and pervasive developmental disorder in children,” BMJ 342 (February 2011), https://www.bmj.com/content/342/bmj.c7452. (Note: Although the URL contains “c7452” which corresponds to the 2011 retraction notice, the original study was retracted in 2010. The BMJ article is the official retraction notice.)

2. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., “Secretary Kennedy on Autism,” C-SPAN, video clip, accessed April 2, 2026, https://www.c-span.org/clip/news-conference/secretary-kennedy-on-autism/5160723.

3. Paulina Fialkova, “Fact-Checking Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Statements on Autism,” PBS NewsHour, March 2025, https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/fact-checking-robert-f-kennedy-jr-s-statements-on-autism. (Note: I inferred the date as March 2025 based on the context of the “recent” event in your text, but you should verify the exact publication date on the page if possible.)

4. Autism Society of America, “Challenging Misleading Narratives and Urging Collaboration in the Executive Order ‘Make America Healthy Again’,” press release, accessed April 2, 2026, https://autismsociety.org/challenging-misleading-narratives-and-urging-collaboration-in-the-executive-order-make-america-healthy-again/.

Despite the skyrocketing cost of care, half of rural hospitals are barely scraping by on inadequate budgets, regularly risking closures and a cascading, town-destroying tragedy from which rural America could take decades to recover from. [1] Rural hospitals cut services and reduce staffing and hours, trying to stay afloat so their communities don’t wither and die. The struggle is a perennial one. Patients pay more for ever-worsening quality care which is delivered with a perpetually shrinking budget. The money is going somewhere, and it’s obviously not going to services. It doesn’t have to be this way, but milquetoast politicians, the vampiric pharmaceutical-industrial complex, and cash-hungry private equity ghouls are fighting tooth and nail against the public interest.

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We Could’ve Avoided This — Obamacare Should Have Been A Single-Payer System

The insufficiencies and disappointments of the Obama years were many, from Wall Street bailouts at the expense of Main Street to the wanton drone strikes to the failure to hold members of the Bush administration who lied our way into the Iraq War accountable in a court of law for the blood all over their hands. Uncle Dick and George W. should have been cellmates when they left office — not duck hunters with terrible aim or shitty painters. People sometimes forget, though, that Obamacare was very nearly a single-payer healthcare system that abandons profits as the primary motivator. Similarly, the bank bailout was nearly a homeowner bailout, which would have made economic recovery a real possibility for lots of people. Had Obamacare not become a watered-down neoliberal subsidy to the insurance industry, the American healthcare system most people experience might by now actually be the best the world has to offer.

Instead, we have entire towns on the verge of collapse because, yet again, Republicans have the reins of power and have used that position to gut public services — including kicking ~10-14 million people off of Medicaid over the next decade, totalling ~$1 trillion in cuts to an already strained healthcare system [2]. Medicaid funds account for about one fifth of the revenue taken in by rural hospitals [3] which means that their already-dwindling coffers will soon run bone dry if not dip into budget deficits. With budget troubles and lean times come the financial vultures, circling hospital after hospital, practice after practice until they swoop in and begin to pick what little meat is left on the bones of our healthcare system.

According to the Private Equity Stakeholder Project, as of April 2025 there are 488 American hospitals which are owned by private equity firms. These corporations are not interested in providing access to high-quality, low-cost healthcare for the benefit of the community they’ve swooped down onto. Far from it. Their modus operandi is to squeeze communities filled with desperate, materially-deprived Americans — who have no access to public health services and no support from the government which spends their tax dollars on wars of choice in the Middle East — until the last few pennies drip from their wallets. Over 27% of these are rural hospitals, and over 22% are psychiatric hospitals [4]. A savvy observer would note that a whopping 0% put patient care above profit margins; the model is extraction, not one that centers public health, indivual outcomes, or community stability.

Public Services Must Be Collectivized To Serve Community Interests And Avoid Collapse

First and foremost, the only solution to our broken-in-so-many-places healthcare system is radical socialist overhaul. A paradigm-shifting healthcare revolution is the only way to save both hospitals and rural towns. The problem is much greater than that of the Obama years for many, and it’s only getting worse from here before it gets better. With the war in Iran continuing to deal blows at various nodes of the tech sector, and the majority of the stock market defying gravity thanks to AI speculation that is overdue an unpleasant correction. All of that all-American hubris is going to catch up with us literally any day now, and I don’t think it will pan out well.

The healthcare sector should be nationalized top to bottom if we want to avoid civil unrest, and it’s getting closer to a breaking point with each volatile swing of the stock market. A country that spends the most per capita on healthcare of any nation on earth which cannot administer healthcare yet starts illegal wars and commits acts of genocide a half a world away fundamentally misunderstands national security management. People throw around “national security” as justifications to build public will for so many small-potatoes issues and outright non-issues — this is one big-ass spud calling into question our security like no other could. How stable and secure can a country remain if its already strained and insufficient healthcare system collapses, leaving large swaths of the country with zero hospitals or ERs. How long before that population turns on the government that signed their death sentence with the passing of the most recent national budget, or on the C-Suite of their local hospital, or even more tragically themselves or each other.

Luigi’s act of heroism and self-sacrifice — which successfully put insurance companies on notice and secured roughly two weeks of zero denied claims from United, which is two weeks more than any politician or capitalist has — was not a symptom of a diseased healthcare system. It was our collective immune system responding to a sickness with which American society was built upon, which is greed — inhumane, cruel, exploitative greed. America needs to be cured of profit motives entirely, or else the immune system will continue to respond in whatever way it can until things actually get better. When one is driven by greed society must answer thismaladaption with economic security, a place amongst one’s community, a sense of purpose, and regular and enthusiastic social support. The only therapeutic approach to a society so fundamentally broken by greed is a socialized society motivated to improve the material conditions of everyone in it.

Solidarity,

Dee

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For a quick introduction to SLSC and what the project intends to accomplish, check out the piece below:

1. American Hospital Association, “AHA Report: Rural Hospital Closures Threaten Patient Access to Care,” AHA News, September 8, 2022, https://www.aha.org/news/headline/2022-09-08-aha-report-rural-hospital-closures-threaten-patient-access-care.

2. The Century Foundation, “The Truth About the One Big Beautiful Bill Acts’ Cuts to Medicaid and Medicare,” American Progress, accessed March 30, 2026, https://www.americanprogress.org/article/the-truth-about-the-one-big-beautiful-bill-acts-cuts-to-medicaid-and-medicare/.

3. Kaiser Family Foundation, “10 Things to Know About Rural Hospitals,” KFF Health Costs, accessed March 30, 2026, https://www.kff.org/health-costs/10-things-to-know-about-rural-hospitals/.

4. PE Stakeholder, “Private Equity Hospital Tracker,” PE Stakeholder, accessed March 30, 2026, https://pestakeholder.org/private-equity-hospital-tracker/.

The evening began and ended with eggs.

When I arrived I was greeted by a warm, friendly hug with just a hint of hypermasculine muscling around the outsider. On his coffee table were two bowls filled with eggs, one variety slightly larger than the other. “Duck eggs,” he says, pointing to the larger ones. He then offered me a fried egg very enthusiastically, which I cooked and began to eat politely. The bisonhide rug in the center of the floor really tied the room together.

What unraveled next was a slightly manic, very invested deep dive into some of the deepest cuts from all of the modern conspiracist tradition. It took a greater deal of composure than I'd exercised in some time.

We started off with a drink, an aged bourbon toasted (without directly saying so) to the “sizing up” each of us was doing with the other. I do my best to give him a wide berth, but after some fairly reasonable complaints about Trump due to being “controlled by Israel” – given the state of the world that's not a hard conclusion to come to – but at least he's deporting the illegals. What makes them “illegals” I ask. He barks about how they are replacing us and it's all part of some plan (more on that later).

There were points where I provided mild pushback to get an idea of where everything is coming from. Of course, pushback – on the lack of criminality in being undocumented in America, or even simply asking for sources for claims – were met defensively, the magnitude of which surprised me despite expecting that to be the tenor of the discussion going in.

I Can Smell What He's Cooking

He starts to rail about immigrants for a while, but cant find the phrase “Great Replacement Theory,” though it's clearly a core belief structure of his. He articulated outright that, when asked who they were, we “already knew” – everybody knows they're just in denial or working for them. Miraculously, I manage to convince him I'm being earnest (which I am, because on a personal level he's a likeable guy, if rough around the edges). I really was rooting for this sweet summer child of a man to not go full blown nutjob.

Please don't say Jews… Please… I think repeatedly to myself. “It's, uh, Israel – the Je- uh, the Rothschilds… bankers… people pulling the strings…” I just sit there looking at him, expecting lizardpeople to be thrown out next. Or goblins. “So the Infowars greatest hits?” I say, attempting to lighten the mood and cut some tension. I'm fairly sure he thinks I'm on Soros’ payroll, since he got thrown out at one point as a perpetrator of the demographic majority being “replaced.”

Aliens did come up eventually – his position being that interdimentional beings (which I'm down to entertain the idea of at least) are the only viable form of aliens there could be, because clearly the Earth is flat (lost me again). I don't argue the premise. There wouldn't be any use in doing so. He's built himself a nice little pocket-world for himself to live in where he can simultaneously look down on critical thinkers and other conspiracists alike, who he calls derisively “Q-tards.” Gotta love verbal irony.

Light Pushback, Heavy Butthurt

In commenting on the gravity of the war in Iran, which he seemed to genuinely take seriously and treat with the concern one ought have for other people in distress, he decides he'll read aloud what he asserts is a letter sent to Marine Corps Reserves. He claims it says they'll be deploying soon, and they need to prepare to die for the country. To me, it sounds like AI slop. I say “asserts” because I asked him where he found this fairly compelling piece of intel, as one does when they don't know where someone found information.

Not in a shitty tone either, just “Where was it posted? Is it publicly available?” Apparently that was enough to elicit a defensive response, because he starts looking around for a thought-terminating cliché to use to seal off the cracks in his conspiracy bubble. You can't tell me where you saw this thing you've based an entire subset of beliefs on? Not even a vague idea. He just says “it's everywhere.” I must've looked unimpressed, which I kick myself for silently.

He pivots to aggression, and starts asking if I got vaccinated. Obviously feeling confident he thinks he knows the answer and wearing his smugness proudly. I ask what that has to do with anything we were discussing. He scoffs derisively, and takes that as the “proof” he needs to discount anything I say that might challenge his worldview, adding I must not put much thought into “important things.” I can tell this is where he realizes I'm not buying his bullshit and never will, nor will I praise him and feed him ego cookies for embracing what is unironically just virulent dogshit antisemitism.

This guy, this fucking guy might as well be the avatar of the easily 10-20% of the population who've conspiracy-cucked themselves into thinking they're under totalitarian control already and that it's only a problem because it's not run by the good, white authoritarian Daddy.

“Ohh,” a look of assumed superiority overtakes his face, and for a second, I think about dropping the kid gloves but he finishes his jeering, thankfully. “You're one of them – those people”

Oh boy, here we go.

He's got me pegged as a leftist for sure, or maybe he thinks I'm a “globalist” myself, but he's on a roll and continues to talk for a while more, going into a soliloquy about a church that respects all religions- but NOT the Unitarians, they're way too liberal or progressive even- this church centers Christ, after all. He goes on a bit about esoterics and mysticism as we wrap up, rather than anything political, deciding to tell the story of a time a medium gave him a reading while he was selling tie dyes at a Summer Solstice service of some kind. To my “surprise”:

A) he had been present in past lives at consequential events (doesn't recall which ones);

B) he was called by a higher power to do something great, though this too is light on the specifics;

C) he maybe had spears once or twice and another time he was on horseback, but rest assured he was a mighty warrior;

I know – and he knows – a skilled grifter can just “cold read” people if they're good, saying as much quite confidently when scoffing at how other people get duped, while totally avoiding that train of thought any further than “but too many things lined up” for him – he's “special” and “blessed” and… That's all it took for him to completely miss how that was exactly what happened to him- with some of the most hackneyed simple flattery in the medium's toolbelt, at that.

Our conversation reached the end of the second hour and we shortly parted ways as we met, with eggs offered freely. I take a couple loose duck eggs after hugging him properly, and head off to a friend's house for the evening.

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Important Takeaways

1. His is a completely self-sealing ideology, triggered by anything challenging the perceived reality.

He's very obviously in a particularly conspiratorial media bubble – the dead giveaway that he's down a seriously convoluted “rabbit hole” was a casual tossout of the phrase “fifth, sixth, seventh generational warfare,” which wasn't even applied correctly in context, but Tim Pool said it recently on TRIGGERnometry, so it must be a great way to demonstrate your veracity if people aren't just sucking down a big glass of dumb juice.

2. Hero/victim cognitive dissonance was front and center throughout the interaction

He sees himself as both a hero or pivotal figure – as in relative to the broader world, not in a grounded, self-aware way like most people who have that frame of mind – and a victim, ironically without noticing ways in which he's actually being manipulated or taken advantage of, evidenced by the medium incident.

3. He's likely perma-fried from doing too many drugs too often for far too long (based on self-reported use, not assumptions)

He's obviously been doing psychedelics far too often for far too long based on how many of his stories involve psychedelics and other drugs and some of the “props” he had in plain view (I'm no snitch, but if you know you know). He seems to have so thoroughly “destroyed his ego” that a new one was poured into the social-media-mold he's been Clockwork Orange-ing himself with. This is something of an educated guess, and is based on observations made during the interview. I can say with confidence that the failure to integrate certain experiences and just generally abusing psychedelics like he appears to do with some frequency can fuck up your executive functioning and distort the self juxtaposed with the other.

4. No transphobic comments came up!

Trans people didn’t come up, so if they're on his radar, which seems likely given the Reiki-Protestantism-Qabbalah combo he's rocking spiritually (why someone who fairly openly hates Jews studies Qabbalah is beyond me), but they clearly aren't a priority for him enough to unsolicited pop off about them.

5. Predictable fragility was particularly acute, triggered by even mild pushback or disagreement

The fragility of this full-grown man getting defensive and lashing out as soon as he hears someone else's perspective is honestly really sad. That tells me somewhere in there is the necessary self-doubt any attempt at reprogramming will require, but he's already in such dire straights for some other reason he can't admit he fell hook line and sinker for the greatest hits – fluoride is a mind control device, Soros buys elections and hires antifa supersoldiers to replace whitey with immigrants from the Global South, getting an mRNA vaccine is crazy, right?

6. Isolation is a huge factor in someone getting sucked rabbit holes

He's seemingly very isolated, though he'd likely make it sound as if it were a personal preference, not that he lost custody of his daughter and he doesn't see her often. When family is the most basic and only level of community that you're sold, that must be an absolutely devastating blow to take as regularly as one might think of such dynamics. He also made a point of identifying his time in prison as a period where he could read and focus a lot, probably without the ability to fact check anything even if he had wanted to.

7. Understands that critical thinking is a desirable trait and lends credence to an idea, but not how it works.

The times where I felt myself prickle were definitely related directly to him sneering condescendingly about how I don't have critical thinking skills or must not have thought about things enough because I don't share his worldview. If you wanna know the easiest way to raise my blood pressure, try telling me I haven't thought enough about my worldview. It was really surreal to hear someone who's core beliefs could be shaken by a trip to any air and space museum. Bonus points if they talk about Copernicus, but he's probably just another time traveler.

8. Nationalism underlies it all

Everything really, at the bedrock, is just a series of weird costumes trying to dress up white nationalist ideology and white supremacy. Multiple times he said he hopes he dies fighting for “the country he loves,” which he said multiple times was under attack, seemingly at all times. I asked for clarification and after a brief attempt to soften it he doubled down anyway. Dude literally has gone full death cult, and thinks that's not just normal but is a mark of moral superiority. The irony of saying you're willing to die for a country you believe is being controlled by a cabal of bankers and “globalists,” led by George Soros despite the Republican party holding literally every single branch of government…

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The Bottom Line

Holy shit not only can that guy vote but he's in the upper third of the most politically active people in my area – not that he could be flipped. I genuinely think once you move on to flat earths and time travelers, you'd be better off picking up some comics or a sci-fi novel than trying to do politics, but he's operating on motivated reasoning- being “called to greatness” or some fashy shit like that. The bottom line is there's no convincing some people, so when they start confidently “sharing knowledge” with you that doesn't add up at all, don't take them for a serious person. If they take it personally that you want to know where information came from, that's their problem, not yours. Most of his political project is either working the way he wants it to, or he has not taken the time to see how his coalition is winning because he doesn't care at all for mass politics, and so he gets to feign powerlessness.

Such “political” actors are only amusing themselves, and without an inciting incident, emotional distress, and access to firearms, in the absence of positive influences to the contrary, they are relatively harmeless as individuals – though that combination is surely possible in such circles for sure. Their influence would be expressed most forcefully by finding fringe characters like RFK Jr. to whome they lend unyielding, cultish support. Pundits and consultants may then misconstrue the dynamic and it may seem to them like there's a broader base for this kind of thought that is scalable.

The conspiracist wing of American conservatism is heavily fragmented. Because the evangelical NazCon element (which this gentleman surely represents) is more organized and more easily mobilized thanks to their church networks, I see a potential for electoral gains for the socialist left (i.e. scuttling far-right candidates or referendums) to be made fostering that fragmentation. That would take the negative, racialized animus, redirect it away from real politics, then break it into smaller bits that are then demobilized by infighting. How to do something is something that will take some thought.

Corrosive chemicals need to be neutralized, and so too does conspiracism need to be defanged and left to eat itself rather than cannibalizing the portion of the population engaging in reality and grounding their analysis in observable and measurable facts. Pretending like their positions deserve equal weight because we're all “entitled to our opinions” would be dangerous, because people love to scapegoat of it lets them off the hook for shit or explains something they want easy answers for, and that's his entire worldview: aggrievement and scapegoating, wrapped in highly racialized fears of the other. He is representative, I think, of a bloc of voters with outsized influence – one that will slash their own tires and drive off a cliff if left to their own devices.

I'd like to think people like this guy are reachable to a point, but it would certainly take far more time and patience than I have to unwind all those twists and turns, and in my specific case I am ill-suited to such work – I'd be trying to engage in good faith on realistic terms, but that may not be what the assignment requires here. I hope he'll be willing to sit down on the record sometime in the coming weeks and months. This surely deserves a revisit.

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ICE has put out a call for “unpaid volunteers” according to recent reports online. Many people, myself included, have speculated that these “volunteers” will be involved not in direct enforcement activity (though it can’t be ruled out as a possibility) but engaged in information gathering and other forms of snitchery. As if I didn’t have enough disdain for these brownshirts already, a brownshirt snitch is somehow even worse.

OpSec, or operational security, is the idea that one should manage the flow of information for the security of an individual, group, community, etc. that is credibly under threat of infiltration or abuse by a second or third party opposed to the individual, group, or community effort. The techniques employed depend heavily on the medium of organizing (online, hybrid, in-person), the assessed level of threat, the potential harm done if there is a security breach, and interpersonal dynamics that may color how information is disseminated and protected.

Threat Modeling

• Who might want to monitor or disrupt your work?

  Modern leftists face opposition from a number of parties. Various alphabet Feds, militias, Proud Boy-style or Boogaloo Boys-style organizations, and other bootlicker types can be expected to side with capital and the current administration. Even centrist liberals should be handled with care, because if push comes to shove they’d sell any leftist down the river in exchange for a nice quiet brunch.

• What information could harm members of your community if exposed?

  Personally identifiable information like home addresses, phone numbers, dates-of-birth, etc. can be used to confirm identities of people pictured while engaging in direct action or demonstrations. Location data is especially sensitive, most critically for immigrant community members, since it could be operationalized and used for direct “immigration enforcement” (read: abductions) or politically-motivated harassment.

• What resources do adversaries likely have?

  This is the scary one. Palantir, Flock, and a whole cornucopeia of SaaS contractors that partner with law enforcement, ICE, CBP, and other agencies have massive databases and information gathering capabilities. Since they are commercial products, and they are not bound by the Fourth Amendment, many agencies regularly conduct warrantless searches, using these technologies as a digital dragnet of sorts. Additionally, state actors can use the full force of the State and Federal governments, should they be able to provide a compelling enough reason to investigate or surveil a person or group. It is essential that no probable cause be afforded to them.

Practical Considerations

Software/hardware For More Secure Communications

There are numerous apps and tools that can further OpSec aims far greater than simply using open-channel communications. This is not a full list of all the things that might be helpful for organizers trying to stay safe and safeguard information. If anyone needs personal recommendations for specific use-cases, feel free to message me and I can recommend particular apps, etc.

• No-logs VPN

• MAC Address Changer

• Burner/single-use-case mobile phones

• Encrypted messaging app(s) not tied to PID

• Encrypted email accounts not tied to PID

• FDE (Full Disk Encryption)

Information Management

• Need-to-know basis for all sensitive information, provided to the fewest community members possible

• Standards for document retention/destruction

• Knowing what’s already known and what’s still protected

• Social media footprints (timing, geotags, connections, other metadata)

• Coded language, passphrases, etc.

• Compartmentalization- X person knows “info A” and “info B,” but only Y person knows “info C”

Physical Security

• Meeting location selection and rotation

• Limits on size and scope of affinity groups and working groups

• Counter-surveillance awareness

• Protecting participant lists and contact information

• Legal observer protocols during actions

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Vetting

When moving from a forward-facing action to anything even the slightest bit sensitive, vetting of all working group members should be conducted unless already established as a trusted person to work closely with. Whether online or in person, there are a few red flags to look for when trying to determine whther someone is doing the work out of good faith motivations, or whether they are engaging in surreptitious activity. Here are some fairly simple ways to filter out a good deal of the unwanted or unwelcome actors from your organization.

• Peer verification/name searches for questionable associations or personal history that would indicate increased risk level- think pending felony charges, convictions for violent crimes, fraud, or other harmful behavior, associations with law enforcement or militia groups, aliases they keep to themselves, and anything else that seems fishy or deceptive.

• At least two personal references that have known the vettee for 12 or more months, who can confirm basic info about the vettee, such as name, brief description of their appearance, how they know the referenced person, and details the vettee has already shared with you. Ideally reference checks would be done by phone or video call and not by text, since one person could manage three messaging accounts at once, but it would take far more resources to fake two different voices and phone numbers at the same time.

• Social media account analysis for questionable associations and behavior, or rapid ideological shifts that fit too perfectly with the beliefs of the group/community; “fresh” account holders should not be accepted unless EVERYTHING else checks out- sloppy amateurish infiltrators may think a brand new account is better than an old one since it shows nothing, but wanting to show nothing, if you’re ostensibly acting in good faith, is pretty out of place.

For some use-cases, one of these is fine, and there are undoubtably other methods of determining risk. These are the ones I’m most comfortable using if sensitive or potentially sensitive information is to be shared with new or unfamiliar people. Keep in mind I’m about a half a paranoiac, butit’s far better to be safe than sorry, so long as you don’t cause friction amongst existing members.

Trade-Offs and Considerations

As in all things, there is a balance to be struck between safety and operability. Most organizations will need to provide a degree of transparency for members to feel things are above board and that accountability exists, should something go awry. It’s important to temper the desire to be open and welcoming just enough to limit potential harms, but not so much that it keeps potentially valuable group members from joining the effort or continuing to participate. How strict your vetting and OpSec regimes are depends on the actions your community plans to engage in, and it’s likely a good idea to develop levels of vetting, such as a “generally safe” status, or vetting processes tailored to one action in particular or the other (i.e. Person A could have clearance for action X but not action Y).

Hopefully this primer has provided a clear, concise, and comprehensive schematic for developing institutional OpSec for your organization or community. In a time of rising fascism, state violence, and surveillance state horrors, arming yourself with information is the first step toward building robust, formidable movements capable of affecting real change. Go forth and OpSec!

Solidarity,

Dee

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