"They have now mobilized a magical psyop machine that has even infected the Left and seems to be endemic on this accursed platform."
Thank you for the shout out there. We don't think of the platform as accursed but rather its opposite!
For the record, we are not part of the "denial machine" OR the "magical psyop machine". We have zero connections to fossil fuels, or any fuel or energy source for that matter.
No, we're just a simple group of environmental industry experts, each with 30+ years of helping to cleanup some of the worst excesses of American early industrialization. Engineering, remedial investigation/cleanup, soil, groundwater, surface water, sediment. Sites you wouldn't let a kid near 50 years ago that are today thriving redevelopment communities on former industrial sites. We understand a bit about physics, science, economics, and risk.
We'll be direct: what we think we have here is a philosophical difference. You believe that all energy should be owned and controlled by "the science of central planning". Your "petrocommunism" explicitly recognizes that he who controls energy controls the strings of capitalism. The "scientific" central planners know the energy budget min/max for each person/industry, etc.
This is the essence of what we recognized 25 years ago, and became the driving force behind environMENTAL. Recognizing all forms of collectivism failed everywhere throughout the twentieth century, communists realized in the late 1990s they couldn’t sell their human meat grinder philosophy to the people on the basis of Marx' ideas. But, they understood that if they could infect the "environmental" movement and help them get control of energy through a policy of fear about the environment, they could accomplish the same thing without a bloody revolution. This is what EcoStatism, EcoMarxism, EcoCommunism are all about.
And, this insidious way of gaining control of societies through the back door needs exposure, and lots of it. Then it needs to be tossed in the bin of history. Marx and Paul Ehrlich could not have been more wrong or done more damage, each in his respective way.
So, no, we're not funded by anyone. We're a free Substack. And when we do go behind a paywall, we will never accept a penny from any form of sponsor. Hate what we write, but it is ours, and it based on our analysis, our research, and our best view of the playing field.
Thanks for the shout out there, Jed. Come back by some. Especially now that I have a better sense of your perspective.
I did want to reiterate what's been established in previous interactions with you @environmental. I overall have respect for you, and I think the more we antagonistically engage on this platform, the better for both our audiences. You've said the thing about working in environmental remediation before, and it's certainly interesting. It reminds me of James Lovelock's work for the oil industry, which resulted in the formation of his Gaia hypothesis, which, under the hood, is a cybernetic/systems-theory vision of the ecological world; a stable system under most circumstances, and one that can absorb a fairly large amount of abuse before it's fully destabilized. This opens the possibility for the environmental remediation industry, which of course depends on the pollution industry for its very existence. Once again, I think you are ideologically closer to the classic Environmentalist movement (as signified in your very name) that you believe has been ideologically taken over by communists.
Well, I'm afraid that you've bought into a false historical narrative about the end of communism in the Soviet Union. It did not collapse because of loss of popular support; it was murdered in a genocidal campaign masterminded by the capitalist class via the national security apparatus.
Paul Ehrlich has nothing to do with Marx. His brand of environmentalism is what I consider Ecofascism, not ecosocialism. The strain in environmentalism you critique as somehow aligned with communism is in fact a right-wing streak -- this is obvious when you look at the history. Liberalism (as capitalism) always itself with fascism in various forms.
I would add that what Venezuela has done using its oil wealth, to help free Central and South America, and the Caribbean, from the historical iron grip of the US empire, is a key example.
Here's an essay that goes into a deeper dive on the geopolitics of oil and natural gas.
Mapping The Escher-like Landscape Of United States Fossil Fuel Sanctions & How Oil & Natural Gas Fracking Became A Powerful US Lever For Global Control
Yeah they just re-elected a popular socialist leader in a completely fair election that was ridiculously maligned by the US State Department. We love to see it.
It exists within capitalism but that doesn't make it good or inevitable. Marx does show that when more of a commodity is produced within a given amount of labor time, the value is spread out among more commodities and so the price of each goes down. We do see oil companies carefully manipulating the "supply" in order to control prices.
That's a really good post, perfect followup. The same strategy of crashing energy prices was used against the USSR in the eighties. It's part of the foreign policy playbook now.
Petrocommunism is obviously a step beyond the current model of nationalized oil companies, but nationalization's better than the pre-1979 situation.
Right, you got it. Because it matters why you're burning fuel. If you are doing it to enrich a tiny ownership class while immiserating everyone else, it's bad. If you're doing it to build a more just society, that's good. In the historical context. -- Exxon knew about global warming in the 50s, it's much less clear if Stalin did.
Considered today, a communist government would know that we have to burn much less of it and still build a more just society, which is a feat that only a transparent dictatorship of the proletariat could achieve. Right now the capitalist class has zero interest in mitigating climate change. Communist parties, including CCP, at least recognize the problem.
"They have now mobilized a magical psyop machine that has even infected the Left and seems to be endemic on this accursed platform."
Thank you for the shout out there. We don't think of the platform as accursed but rather its opposite!
For the record, we are not part of the "denial machine" OR the "magical psyop machine". We have zero connections to fossil fuels, or any fuel or energy source for that matter.
No, we're just a simple group of environmental industry experts, each with 30+ years of helping to cleanup some of the worst excesses of American early industrialization. Engineering, remedial investigation/cleanup, soil, groundwater, surface water, sediment. Sites you wouldn't let a kid near 50 years ago that are today thriving redevelopment communities on former industrial sites. We understand a bit about physics, science, economics, and risk.
We'll be direct: what we think we have here is a philosophical difference. You believe that all energy should be owned and controlled by "the science of central planning". Your "petrocommunism" explicitly recognizes that he who controls energy controls the strings of capitalism. The "scientific" central planners know the energy budget min/max for each person/industry, etc.
This is the essence of what we recognized 25 years ago, and became the driving force behind environMENTAL. Recognizing all forms of collectivism failed everywhere throughout the twentieth century, communists realized in the late 1990s they couldn’t sell their human meat grinder philosophy to the people on the basis of Marx' ideas. But, they understood that if they could infect the "environmental" movement and help them get control of energy through a policy of fear about the environment, they could accomplish the same thing without a bloody revolution. This is what EcoStatism, EcoMarxism, EcoCommunism are all about.
And, this insidious way of gaining control of societies through the back door needs exposure, and lots of it. Then it needs to be tossed in the bin of history. Marx and Paul Ehrlich could not have been more wrong or done more damage, each in his respective way.
So, no, we're not funded by anyone. We're a free Substack. And when we do go behind a paywall, we will never accept a penny from any form of sponsor. Hate what we write, but it is ours, and it based on our analysis, our research, and our best view of the playing field.
Thanks for the shout out there, Jed. Come back by some. Especially now that I have a better sense of your perspective.
I did want to reiterate what's been established in previous interactions with you @environmental. I overall have respect for you, and I think the more we antagonistically engage on this platform, the better for both our audiences. You've said the thing about working in environmental remediation before, and it's certainly interesting. It reminds me of James Lovelock's work for the oil industry, which resulted in the formation of his Gaia hypothesis, which, under the hood, is a cybernetic/systems-theory vision of the ecological world; a stable system under most circumstances, and one that can absorb a fairly large amount of abuse before it's fully destabilized. This opens the possibility for the environmental remediation industry, which of course depends on the pollution industry for its very existence. Once again, I think you are ideologically closer to the classic Environmentalist movement (as signified in your very name) that you believe has been ideologically taken over by communists.
Well, I'm afraid that you've bought into a false historical narrative about the end of communism in the Soviet Union. It did not collapse because of loss of popular support; it was murdered in a genocidal campaign masterminded by the capitalist class via the national security apparatus.
Paul Ehrlich has nothing to do with Marx. His brand of environmentalism is what I consider Ecofascism, not ecosocialism. The strain in environmentalism you critique as somehow aligned with communism is in fact a right-wing streak -- this is obvious when you look at the history. Liberalism (as capitalism) always itself with fascism in various forms.
I would add that what Venezuela has done using its oil wealth, to help free Central and South America, and the Caribbean, from the historical iron grip of the US empire, is a key example.
Here's an essay that goes into a deeper dive on the geopolitics of oil and natural gas.
Mapping The Escher-like Landscape Of United States Fossil Fuel Sanctions & How Oil & Natural Gas Fracking Became A Powerful US Lever For Global Control
https://ericbrooks.substack.com/p/mapping-the-escher-like-landscape
Have you seen the condition of Venezuela lately?
Yeah they just re-elected a popular socialist leader in a completely fair election that was ridiculously maligned by the US State Department. We love to see it.
> Yeah they just re-elected a popular socialist leader in a completely fair election
Sorry, I didn't realize this was meant to be sarcasm.
it's not. you believe imperialist propaganda.
As a communist I suppose you consider even things like the law of supply and demand "imperialist propaganda".
It exists within capitalism but that doesn't make it good or inevitable. Marx does show that when more of a commodity is produced within a given amount of labor time, the value is spread out among more commodities and so the price of each goes down. We do see oil companies carefully manipulating the "supply" in order to control prices.
That's a really good post, perfect followup. The same strategy of crashing energy prices was used against the USSR in the eighties. It's part of the foreign policy playbook now.
Petrocommunism is obviously a step beyond the current model of nationalized oil companies, but nationalization's better than the pre-1979 situation.
So when the USSR uses its oil&gas dominance it is good and then the USA uses their oil&gas dominance it is imperialism? 🤔
Right, you got it. Because it matters why you're burning fuel. If you are doing it to enrich a tiny ownership class while immiserating everyone else, it's bad. If you're doing it to build a more just society, that's good. In the historical context. -- Exxon knew about global warming in the 50s, it's much less clear if Stalin did.
Considered today, a communist government would know that we have to burn much less of it and still build a more just society, which is a feat that only a transparent dictatorship of the proletariat could achieve. Right now the capitalist class has zero interest in mitigating climate change. Communist parties, including CCP, at least recognize the problem.