i actually suspect he's working for the banks, just like obama, and is on a parallel mission to take down clinton. it's a lot of deja vu with 2008. i mean, who is running all these youtube channels? and where's he getting all this money from, all of a sudden?

it's not that i'm particularly fond of clinton, or even have many agreements with her regarding much of anything. but the way that a certain segment of the establishment has consistently gone after her is very curious to me. the base anti-establishmentarian in me finds that sort of compelling.

in public, she hasn't signaled anything but every intent to do what she's told. so, why are they so keen to keep her out of office?

Upton Sinclair
+deathtokoalas Bill Clinton removed provisions from Glastegel which helped the banks a great deal and Miss Clinton has received a lot of campaign donations from banks, he gets money from unions and regular people donating as they like him - kinda like a kick starter but political.

deathtokoalas
+Upton Sinclair the situation around glass-steagall was kind of complicated. clinton didn't write the legislation, it was written by senate republicans, and did not have the power to veto it. republicans had tried to pass similar legislation through the 80s, but it was always blocked by senate democrats, who had a congressional majority for a very long time - up until the clinton administration.

it's an open question as to whether he would have vetoed it, if he could. he's on the record as claiming he would have, but his record is kind of spotty on it. but, the bottom line is that he didn't write the repeal, and he couldn't have stopped it.

i don't think glass-steagall was the issue that lined the banks up against her in 2008. i think it was health care. and, that's largely been taken care of. further, few would argue that she was not a sufficient enough war monger during her time as secretary of state. and yet they continue to despise her.

what i find curious about the situation is that it's really not clear why this is. it can't be just a kind of broad, general fear that she's "too liberal" - even if any liberal would scoff at such a claim. the lengths that they go to to get rid of her are just off the wall. there has to be a specific reason for this, and it's not obvious.

Upton Sinclair
+deathtokoalas I personally dislike her due to the fact that she just seems fake and heavily influenced by the various donors backing her and not liberal enough, she seems like if she were elected she'd bring home pocket change. I personally find Bernie more appealing than her due to the facts he's not getting huge campaign donations from billionaires and millionaires like Clinton and basically all other major politicians, he's a proven progressive who's always stood by what he believed in and not what's most popular at the time, and he's just more to the left - which I like.

deathtokoalas
+Upton Sinclair see, i think that that's the "official narrative" which is meant to convince you to vote for him and keep her out.

bernie sanders is somebody that's been in politics a long time and who has blazed his own path for a long time. but, this run seems orchestrated. i'm not falling for it.

i don't think he's actually running on grassroots support and union funds. i think it's just what you're being told. that's what they told you about obama, too - and you learned the hard way that it wasn't true.

i'm not stumping for clinton. i'm much too far to the left to consider voting in the two-party system in the united states. i'm just calling a spade; bernie's not what he appears to be.

i'll acknowledge that there is a difference between sanders and obama, in relation to clinton. on paper, clinton was always to the left of obama, they just created a mirage to hide that. on paper, sanders is clearly to the left of clinton. but, i'm not expecting the outcome to be different.

i don't have any evidence. not yet, anyways. it's just informed intuition. but it's a skepticism that is necessary and that will unfortunately probably reveal evidence as time unfolds,

bloodybleeder
+deathtokoalas I'm more fascinated with a persons ability to ignore the shit out of Hillary's corruption. The very thing leftists HATE about government corruption... "but... she's a woman, its all propaganda...YOU HATE WOMEN!"

deathtokoalas
+bloodybleeder leftists don't really care about government corruption. it's a christian values, conservative right-wing kind of thing. like most leftists, i take the socratic position that democracy is impossible without corruption, and upsetting yourself over it is banging your head against the wall for no rational reason.

i should clarify a little. exactly how the left views government corruption depends on how far left you go. but this discussion is kind of outside the realm of democratic politics. and i need to state again that i'm not a clinton supporter; if i was an american, i would certainly prefer bernie's rhetoric, but would lean rather heavily towards a more left-leaning party like the green party. i'm just pointing out that i'm very skeptical of all of this, and suspect that something on the order of a vast right-wing conspiracy is underlying it.

but, the basic idea on the left - that really anchors the whole concept of what left-wing means - is that government is inherently corrupt. you can't make government less corrupt; power corrupts. not absolute, absolutely. but relative, relatively. so, we might bring something like a class analysis in to explain this, and try to find ways around this. but whether you're talking about the anarchists or communists or anybody else on the far left, our basic argument is that we need to get rid of government altogether because it can never be reformed.

if you pull a little more into the center, they argue for things like regulatory bodies to try and minimize corruption. but, the basic premise remains that the corruption is unavoidable. the best you can do is try and police it. and, that might be preferable to you if you don't like corruption but aren't quite upset enough about it to start a revolution.

people like me that are further left than this will point out the capture issue, but are ultimately left shrugging it off until more people come to our side and argue for the abolition of the state altogether. we know there's nothing that can really be done.

it's only the right that has ever identified corruption as a sin on an individual level rather than a systemic problem. it's only the right that has ever promoted the idea that the solution to corruption is voting out the corrupt individuals and replacing them with incorruptible ones. the left has always seen that as naive.

so, in practice, while parts of the moderate left may argue for regulatory bodies to minimize corruption, the broad left sees it as a systemic issue that exists independent of individual politicians and is forced to accept it as a part of the system until more broad-based support can be generated for anti-statist reforms. the left consequently rarely bases voting decisions on the issue of corruption. but, the right seems to maintain the kind of protestant perspective that corruption is a consequence of wicked people and can be stamped out by replacing them with more scrupulous people.

to put it another way: left-leaning voters are going to tend to assume that they're all equally corrupt and either decide not to vote at all or base their voting decisions on something else.

it's hard to claim this disc is a lost classic, if you're a canadian - it was ubiquitous for a little while. but it sort of seems like it.

it may be partly because it's at about the time that canada began to lose it's own, distinctive musical culture. we hung on for a few more years, and arguably even hit a peak in the mid 90s. but, since then, canadian music has become an expression of what america has lost. younger people may correctly see something of greater value, by comparison. but, it's a different animal. the truth is that we've lost as much as they have; it's just harder to tell from the outside.

never did get into the beach boys. more of a beatles fan. but this song really hit me just the right way when i was about ten or so.

their bassist was actually a rather substantial musical influence on me and, along with mccartney, still really forms the crux of how i approach the bass guitar, underneath however many other influences.

jim m
+deathtokoalas beetles? stones

deathtokoalas
+jim m the rolling stones created almost nothing of any lasting value. their legacy will die with their fan base.

the beatles-stones debate is an anachronism. people will follow their parents. bloody wankers. but anybody under 40 (if not 50, nowadays) can clearly here that the stones were not in the same league as the beatles. it's the same thing with the beach boys, really.

we can have beatles-floyd debates - and i may side with floyd, depending on the context. or maybe beatles-byrds debates, if you're so inclined. but a beatles-stones debate is pointless. it's like arguing the relative merits of thomas pynchon v. dr. seuss.

Anonymous User
+deathtokoalas Nothing of lasting value? The Beatles are undeniably a major influence to many artists, but to act like the Rolling Stones made nothing of lasting value is hilariously wrong. I'm not even a Rolling Stones fan, I would also rather listen to The Beatles, but let's not kid ourselves.

Jake Britt
+deathtokoalas Brian Wilson is the guy The Beatles went to for their inspiration...

deathtokoalas
+Anonymous User they never even released a mediocre record. their one attempt at doing something interesting - satanic majesties request - is just laughably bad.

they were talentless hacks. they were always absolute followers - there's not an original idea in their discography. they may have some place in the history of fashion. but, they will be lucky to get a footnote in the musical history of the period. the beatles, on the other hand, will be remembered for quite some time.

it's all ** or * records - out of ten stars.

they'll have a better chance in a paragraph on the mahavishnu orchestra.

"john spent his early days loosely attached to a clownish group of bohemian village idiots called 'the rolling stones' before he began his career in earnest. remaining information about this group is scarce, but it is known that they were of great popularity in their day amongst the uneducated, rural underclass."

deathtokoalas
+Jake Britt that's a poor way to express the relationship between brian wilson and paul mccartney. there was a kind of a rivalry. brian wilson was very impressed by revolver, and made pet sounds in response to it. mccartney was impressed by pet sounds, and countered with sgt. peppers. his inability to top sgt. peppers is the actual reason that brian wilson never released another record. it drove him insane.

fwiw, mccartney has since acknowledged the importance of the session musicians on pet sounds. he was not initially aware that the bass parts were mostly written and performed by carol kaye, for instance. and, he seemed to be a little taken aback by that, as though a fraud had been exposed to him.