They’re hand in glove, that’s for sure. Any attempt to paint Musk or any other haute bourgeois as separate from the capitalist state is intended to confuse readers and hide the material relations in capitalism.

The reason it seems like I’m dodging the question is because if I can challenge the assumptions in the question and show that it’s a faulty question, the answer becomes irrelevant. Still, if you keep reading, you’ll see that I have provided an answer below.

As for my opinion, it’s like anyone else’s. It isn’t worth much. My statements of fact, however… in a world where people try to paint the US in a positive light, endlessly making distinctions to deny any blame to the US state for all the horror that it unleashes on the world… probably also not worth much.

I either make a logical argument that stands up to scrutiny or I don’t. If my argument stands up, it doesn’t matter whether I look like a weak idiot. If my argument fails, it doesn’t matter if I pretend control or to appear smart or to act it.

For a bourgeois state, it is ahistorical to separate the government from it’s businesses. Companies and the government go hand in hand. It was, for example, the East India Company, rather than the British ‘state’, that colonised so much of Asia.

In relation to WWII and the US-Nazi connection, Michael Parenti wrote in Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism (City Lights Books, CA, 1997, p17):

Corporations like DuPont, Ford, General Motors, and ITT owned factories in enemy countries that produced fuel, tanks, and planes that wreaked havoc on Allied forces. After the war, instead of being prosecuted for treason, ITT collected $27 million from the U.S. government for war damages inflicted on its German plants by allied bombings. General Motors collected over $33 million. Pilots were given instructions not to hit factories in Germany that were owned by U.S. firms. Thus Cologne was almost levelled by Allied bombing but it’s Ford plant, providing military equipment for the Nazi army, was untouched; indeed German civilians began using the plant as an air raid shelter. [Citing Charles Higham, Trading with the Enemy (Dell, NY, 1983).]

Fn14: After the war, Herman Abs, head of the Deutsche Bank and in effect “Hitler’s paymaster,” was hailed by David Rockefeller as “the most important banker of our time.” … Rockefeller [failed to say] a word about Abs’ Nazi connections, his bank’s predatory incursions across Nazi occupied Europe, and his participation, as a board member of I.G. Farben, in the use of slave labor at Auschwitz: Robert Karl Miller, Portland Free Press, Sept/Oct 1994

All this, and we haven’t really touched on:

• the way that US state officials intervened to—
• • protect Nazi war criminals from prosecution at Nuremberg,
• • rehabilitate and promote Nazi officials to lead NATO,
• • doing the all this with Mussolini and others,
• how the US ruling class platformed Nazis in the US press and silenced critical domestic voices,
• the relationship between the US government and its ruling bourgeois, the familial relations.

The US is to be applauded for is role in defeating the Nazi war machine, including supplying the allies. The US soldiers who fought the Nazis were heroes. But it is problematic to claim the US (i.e. it’s ruling class) was on the right side of history through that period.

Likewise, in Ukraine, the US worsened the whole mess, possibly caused it all, by meddling in the region since before the 90’s. Since the recent invasion US media and spokespersons have been nonchalantly saying the US has reaped many benefits from the war with very little cost (except for Ukrainians—added in parentheses, as if the Ukrainians are of secondary concern).

I do think the invaders are bad, whichever war were talking about.

I think we agree in principle and I think I know what you mean but I must raise a challenge. There’s an example that shows an invasion is not necessarily bad, the one that you pointed out: the Allies invading Nazi Germany.

If invasion is not bad in one example situation, then logically it doesn’t hold as a blanket statement. It cannot of itself lead us to conclude that Russia is bad for invading Ukraine. To be clear, I am not saying Russia is good for invading Ukraine; I’m saying it is not self evidently bad by virtue of being the invader.

To further the clear statement, I wish Russia had not invaded. I wish the war would end today. Short of that I wish a ceasefire could be negotiated for today, so that peace and an end to the war can be negotiated for the near future.

No flippant comments about how dangerous war is for the workers who must fight in it. Only firm conviction that the only right choice is to stop the killing and maiming as soon as possible, not to send increasingly dangerous weapons with increasingly higher chances of causing collateral damage.

Unfortunately for Ukraine, the US wanted the opposite at all stages and it’s representatives (officials and corporate agents) have machinated to ensure that war broke out and now that it cannot stop.

You brought up the example of the US in relation to WWII. If you make a comparison, you can’t get stroppy when people point out that it contradicts your main argument and in fact supports the argument that you’re trying to challenge.

However, for as long as you think the US is the Good Guy^TM, you’re going to struggle to find examples that support your viewpoint, so you may want to be careful with any comparison. Otherwise, you’ll start to notice a pattern of them pointing out that the US was as monstrous as always in the cited example and then you’ll say they’re doing whataboutism ad infinitum.

The yanks were funding the WWII Nazis before they ‘sent supplies to the allies’.

Congratulations on your promotion.

It’s often the way. Hopefully someone else reading will see the flaw in forever calling an alternative viewpoint ‘bad faith’ because it’s presented with humour.

If you’re talking about violence used to uphold their rule, you can’t separate domestic and foreign violence. All those people living, working, and dying young in atrocious conditions outside of the US for US prosperity, all those people gunned down in the dark or in protests against their government’s subservience to the US, and all those people murdered in wars and ‘conflicts’ and by sanctions to further US interests must be counted.

Otherwise you’re doing that thing where you redefine violence in such a way that distorts the picture. It doesn’t matter whether you now explicitly mention the US because by nature of a comparison, the US is implicated, anyway. Likewise, replace US for every other government in the above equation for the true figures of how violent a state is in its own protection.

Did he assign a trait to liberals? Because if not, there’s no inconsistency.

Then a follow up question: is there a difference between ‘liberals’ as a group (i.e. not liberalism) and a government (i.e. an institution)? If so, there may be no inconsistency.

What I mean is, when people talk about governments it’s often as a non-human legal person, which can act, omit, sue, and be sued, but which does not have the full range of human traits, like insincerity. Whereas a group that does not have legal personality and only describes a collection of humans, albeit in the abstract, like ‘liberals’, can demonstrate a fuller range of human traits.

Then, as an experiment, switch the terms and see if it has the same ring to it:

politics for [governments] are just a big reality show

Does this anthropomorphise ‘governments’ in the same way as attributing human emotions to them?

I don’t necessarily have answers to these questions but it seems that you can’t be calling someone out for bad faith unless you can strongly argue yes, no, yes, to the above questions.

That’s a different story to being told, for shaking hands after competing. So at the very least, if you’re right, there’s another plausible story than the one presented. Which casts doubt on the narrative. Which means we’d be wise to suspend our belief until there are better sources than unreliable western media that have a firm track record of being number one and refusing to shake hands with numbers two and three in making shit up competitions.

No worries. We’ve got to stand together during tough times like these.

From one lib to another I thought that was high praise sorry

I’d expect no less from a user of such a liberal instance.

I’m at a loss as to how you’re interpreting my words. You say you’re asking simple questions, then you put words in my mouth and ask me to defend them.

If the Ukrainian government can’t be trusted to decide on when to surrender, who do you suggest?

When did I say or imply this?

If you think saving Ukrainian lives isn’t a good reason to find an alternative to war, this is unlikely to become a fruitful discussion.

Zelensky is not forced by NATO in the sense of being a hostage. Although he does seem to be in over his head. Hence trying to come to a peace deal last year and then being told by NATO, apparently through Boris Johnson, that it wasn’t going to fly.

Since then, especially since the start of the counteroffensive, there have been several reports in US media explaining that the US military pushed Ukraine into the action knowing that it was under supplied and unlikely to achieve its goals. The US ‘hoped’ Ukrainian grit would see the day. Those soldiers are braver than I am for running headfirst through minefields into Russian artillery and defensive lines that Russia had months to prepare. But it’s a careless and tragic use of Ukrainian lives.

The US knows that it has not – likely cannot – supplied Ukraine with what it needs. Neither can the rest of NATO. If Ukraine is to keep fighting, it must look elsewhere. NATO doesn’t have the industry for it. Other US reports confirm this and hint if not confirm that the US interest is not in helping Ukraine to secure it’s independence but to fuel the US economy while trying to undermine the Russian economy. Ukraine is collateral damage for the US. This is the same US that had Ukraine dismantle it’s military through the 90s by insisting on economic reforms attached as conditions to IMF and World Bank loans.

NATO support is waning. Partly because Ukraine is losing. (Partly because the US plans to start a war with China, which will occupy all its attention. In fact, a new cold war may have started this week, according to China and the US.) Zelensky may be able to regain that support but only if things turn around on the battlefield soonish. Until the steps taken to do so clash with US/NATO goals, Zelensky can do what he likes.

It’s not that Zelensky can’t decide for himself. It’s that if he hadn’t already decided to align with the US, he wouldn’t be where he is. He is where he is because his class interests align with those of the US/Anglo-European bourgeoisie.

With this context and clarification of what I meant about the US running the show, I can now address your question.

Seeking weapons outside the NATO-sphere to better achieve NATO goals does not, to be trite, conflict with NATO goals. The US is not going to be upset if Zelensky can get support from elsewhere to keep fighting US enemy #2 (China being enemy #1).

Zelensky is also one man. Just like with Putin, Biden, or anyone else, individual men can’t make decisions of this nature alone.

Can he just fold? Without the support of whoever supports him, if he decides to fold, alone, he’ll be replaced or assassinated or otherwise incapacitated. Does he have the power to fold if he did just take a stand? I’m unsure what the Ukrainian constitution says or of how it will be effected by martial law.

I don’t know why or how you interpreted what I said as meaning that Ukrainians

can’t be trusted because ‘they were brainwashed by the CIA’[.]

I said it is difficult to parse what Ukrainians want i.e. from what I am told Ukrainians want. The means of information distribution are not owned and controlled by ordinary Ukrainians. Further, almost all the press to which I have access is western; it doesn’t even pretend to be Ukrainian although it frequently pretends to speak for them. They know what they want; I’m just not privy to that information.

On this topic, more broadly, I can recommend a book called Inventing Reality by Michael Parenti. It’s similar to Manufacturing Consent but in my view significantly better because it begins with concrete analysis and moves towards a theory of the political economy of news media whereas Herman and Chomsky begin with a model and set out to illustrate it’s truth.

Starting an analysis of what Ukrainian people think by relying on outputs that are owned and controlled by particular interests (frequently US/western bourgeois interests, inside and outside Ukraine) will not explain what ordinary Ukrainians want. This does not mean that Ukrainians don’t have a view or can’t be trusted to decide their own fate.

I said that Ukraine deciding on it’s own isn’t an option because it’s materially not an option. The west and Russia are already involved. Zelensky cannot do what he wants or what he thinks the majority of Ukrainians want because and for as long as NATO is running the show. To paraphrase a famous quote, we make history but not in conditions that we choose. It seems idealistic to suggest that Ukrainians can just decide what they want to do and have it happen. It also seems idealistic to suggest that Ukrainians would all think the same.

You’ll also note that I said, to quote:

I do not think that Russia should decide what happens in Ukraine. That’s for Ukrainians to decide.

And I reiterated:

…in Donetsk and Luhansk; that should be for the people of Donetsk and Luhansk to decide[.]

I don’t know what you’re referring to in relation to ‘smaller Russian republics’, I’m afraid. You’ll have to be specific and I would have to do some research. If you’re trying to probe my view on self determination, I’m in favour of self determination but it’s problematic to suggest that the future of any region should be determined exclusively by and for a single ethnicity.

If I wasn’t clear, the concept of an ethnostate is or is dangerously close to being fascist; the idea of breaking up Russia into states along ethnic lines is fascist. In the inverse, this might also apply if Russia expelled all ethnicities other than ethnic Russian from the annexed regions of Ukraine, for example. We’ll have to see how that plays out in the short, medium, and long term.

Before asking me another question, I’m going to say that it feels like you’re asking loaded questions and misinterpreting me to try to catch me out. I’m not going to play along for much longer if it continues.

Those Ukrainians don’t just ‘feel’ Russian they are Russian. They are ethically Russian and Russia issued hundreds of thousands of passports in the region a while back. The idea that someone can only be one ‘nationality’, etc, is a rather US way of looking at things. Loads of countries accept dual citizenship. I also reject the framing that insists or implies that Ukrainians must be of one ethnicity. That concept of an ethno-state is aligned with fascism.

FWIW I do not think that Russia should decide what happens in Ukraine. That’s for Ukrainians to decide. Unfortunately, it’s hard to parse what Ukrainians would want because the US is and has been heavily involved in manipulating politics, the press, and popular opinion. In that case, I kinda reject the question of whether Russia should have a say: the only two current options are who should decide between Russia and NATO. Ukraine deciding on it’s own isn’t really an option.

It’s also tricky now because the separatist regions appear to have not only separated but also joined Russia. This could’ve been avoided if Ukraine had granted those regions more autonomy, as they agreed in Minsk II. As it is, the question now might be ‘Should Russia decide what happens in Russia?’ The lawyers will have fun working whether the law supports that. The answer isn’t clear.

My view would still be no, not in Donetsk and Luhansk; that should be for the people of Donetsk and Luhansk to decide—if they’re part of Russia and Russia was concerned with their autonomy, Russia can still grant it where Ukraine wouldn’t.

This is all rather idealist, though. Only in communist countries do the ‘people’ decide what happens.

It’s also still a warzone dominated by Russia; there will be an internal struggle between Russian factions. I’m not overly optimistic, considering Spain and Catalan, Britain and Wales, Scotland, and NI, and Kurdistan to Turkey, Syria, Iran, and Iraq, the US to Hawaii and Puerto Rico, to name a few similar situations.

Do you think the US should decide what Ukraine does because it’s decided that it’s okay to sacrifice Ukrainians to achieve its geopolitical goals?

This seems to be a poorly framed question. A big portion of the Ukrainian population is Russian. What does it mean for Russia to meddle in that context?

The lengths they’ll go to ensure that losing a password never has to mean losing data again.

Good points. I also wouldn’t be opposed to accepting that capitalists in Russia would/will try to become imperialistic in the monopoly of finance capital sense. In the one hand, the logic of capital might force their hand. On the other hand, capitalists are gonna capitalist, in part because they fetishise the hoarding of wealth like everyone else living under capitalism.

Whether Russian imperialism becomes a realistic possibility, though… I’d be interested in seeing some stats on that, interpreted in light of the idea that the next type of multipolarity will be quite different to the one at the turn of the twentieth century. Ig if anyone’s done that leg work it’d be Michael Hudson but I’ve not come across it if he has.

I don’t know what you think I’ve been trying to say. And I don’t know what you’re trying to say.