There Is Only One Important Question in American Politics Today

By lambert –
Topic(s)
Politics

Why isn’t capital1 under democratic control?

That’s it. That’s the post.

NOTE

1 Economic capital, not social or symbolic capital, etc.

NOTE

The controversy (via) over this post from Jacobin on the resistance (dread word) to AI data centers is interesting and useful, but I think the critique being made could be generalized. I will have more to say about this, but I wanted to post the simple question.

Venue
Jacobin
Tags
democracy
artificial intelligence

Comments

But the question doesn’t really skew towards an answer or an outcome. Vehement kneejerk reactions (if any) aside, it might not be possible to put capital under democratic control (as opposed to ameliorating its effects, FDR or trustbuster-style).

But the question is certainly one to be asked. War is surely a form of capital allocation (as it preparing for it, 1, but also making it). Can anybody seriously claim that capital was under democratic control, from Vietnam all the way to Iran today? I think that would be pretty hard to do.

1 “If you want war, prepare for war.” —Lord Vetinari, Terry Pratchett somewhere