Comments by "L.W. Paradis" (@l.w.paradis2108) on "The Real News Network" channel.

  1. No one who has ever suffered trauma will ever feel fully connected with other people again. Not under rabid capitalism, at any rate.
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  2. Ask anyone who dated a cop.
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  3.  @goodwifeweaver  It wasn't confusing. His comment was classic flak.
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  4. In the fall of 2019, all the major actors knew the pandemic was coming, Trump included.
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  5. No, I'm sorry -- ignoring the larger picture in this instance is unacceptable. Greece was pushed to the brink, and essentially did collapse in 2015, and for years, 25 to 30% of those under 25 had no job and no hope of finding a job. It is an EU neo-colony. When Greece elected a decent government, it was not allowed to govern. The banks decided policy instead. And then, the very same forces who did this also determined that Greece should be the stopping place for all refugees. Can you be serious? At the very end, Helen Benedict gives a nod to "a few nice Greek people -- they aren't all racists." Benedict, who has had her choice of living in London or New York her entire life, is going to pontificate to a people who still see no solution for their own predicament. She is the embodiment of petite bonne femme bien pensante. I'm not sure whether the Greeks are racist, but I have no doubt the English are. After all, they don't have to live there.
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  6. WOW, what a lineup!! What would this world be without Chris Hedges?
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  7. ​ @Eleerm  The global corporations rely on the US military as their own police force. They could never depend on foreign contracts and global logistics to offshore production without the US military to protect them.
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  8.  @stephenlock7236  Just like the US, huh?
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  9. Absolutely every physical job and every physically risky job must have a union. It's a necessity.
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  10.  @marshadingle3550  On the contrary, it should go without saying that every degree should lead to a decent job -- one that allows a person to live independently. The rest is up to the individual. A high school diploma should provide that minimum. It's not that I disagree -- of COURSE college is not vocational school, nor should it be. It should be more, not less.
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  11.  @darkstarmatter5678  Er, you don't know that husbands leave and fail to support their kids? This is a new, shocking development for you??
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  12. TRUTH. He works hard. Often deeply resented. But "Holocaust denier???" His parents' families all perished in the Holocaust. The charge could not be more perverse and obscene.
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  13.  @africkinamerican  Maybe you don't know that for the last 30 years, Business has been the most common university degree? Next are the various medical specialties, with Nursing on top. If you think Gender Studies is something that more than 1 to 3% of degrees, or that those people don't follow up their degree with an MSW, MLS, MPA, MEd, or go on to Law, then you . . . don't know.
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  14. Omg, my two favorites. What a perfect start to the weekend.
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  15.  @papaal7014  If you're so cynical, why aren't you rich?
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  16. Very compelling, and in contradiction with the interview just presented on Push Back/ The Grayzone, by Aaron Mate. Really worth it to consider both and compare them.
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  17. Of course. What was done to them is brutal.
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  18. @A_Boogeyperson  Trust your own experience. "Someone, somewhere is doing well." I thought so and was wrong so many times. I agree about categorical statements, though, you're right about that. Maybe it is possible. Humans can astound us.
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  19. There is some truth in that, but Israel also has a robust peace and justice movement, exactly as South Africa did. They are a minority, and they are suppressed at every turn. AIPAC has also been a force of suppression and has sought to influence Israeli elections in favor of right-wing extremists. AIPAC IS HERE. American journalists who cross AIPAC and report on the Israeli peace movement are fired from their jobs. The Middle East is more complex than you might think.
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  20. Her timeline seems to ignore that in 2004, Russia lacked the power to challenge NATO. This was an invasion of opportunity.
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  21. Appreciation for Marc Steiner.
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  22. What I'm having trouble with is why people say Shakespeare was poorly educated. My understanding was that he attended a Latin school, where by the 8th grade, if pupils were caught speaking English on the premises, they were thrashed. Then he was an actor, which further trained his memory. Have people lost the sense of the immense value of an education like that? I know that even today, people in France (who I grant you speak a Romance language) tell me that if they study Latin while young, they can pick up Spanish or Italian by living in Spain or Italy for the summer. These are not linguistically talented people, just regular good students. Moreover, I don't think a recluse could have written the plays, like some of the people posting appear to believe. That an actor-director did strikes me as far more plausible.
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  23. Well, how many are willing to admit that the demise of the Soviet Union was, on balance, a bad thing? Because it was.
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  24. 25:51 Chris was wise to ask exactly how these private equity bankers are able to "load [a company] up with debt." Exactly how leverage allows the bankers to double and triple their profits practically overnight is not clear. It needs to be explained, so that the listeners could explain it in turn. Without this level of understanding, ordinary people will just revert to "personal responsibility," or worse, "positivity" mantras --- or, they will believe Tucker or Elon or Donald Trump will save us. That's what's happening.
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  25. ​​ @klauskinski5969  Reagan gutted mathematics education for a reason. This is true.
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  26.  @handleyobusiness  Where do you see that OP was never married?
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  27. Why do you believe that a visit to a PRISON is the answer, and not just one more demonstration that "might makes right?"
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  28. ​ @lyndamonchak4072 I think the process can no longer be stopped. Not hopeless, no --- but close.
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  29. My heart also breaks for all the Jewish people for real peace and real justice. I've been reading Haaretz, I've been watching Democracy Now, I know who Uri Avnery was, and who Neve Gordon is and why he left Israel. Not news to me. Breaks my heart.
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  30. ​ @jasondavis1949 They think it can't happen to them.
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  31. Not for anybody who values mental health and warm relations with other people.
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  32. Change in management. Those with senority are often targetted, because they are making "too much" money. It happens all the time. The 19-year career IS the answer. Gosh, are most people are like the beautiful lady in this video? Do they think companies "mean well," and just need to be made aware? Good grief, no.
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  33. I have doubts about her thesis, but I don't dismiss it. I like the dialectic. See also a Aaron Mate's most recent interview on Push Back, which supports your view.
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  34. Countries with tuition-free university and universal health often have criminal penalties against such harassment, for the obvious, unsentimental reason that these societies need for everyone to be productive, rather than on disability and under psychiatric care at public expense. Sorry if I put that baldly, I don't mean it to sound insensitive, but these things go together. You invest in people, you protect your investment. Some have real compassion, others make sure not to commit crimes. So, they all behave.
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  35. And Harvard couldn't do anything about the abusive fraternities and sororities . . .
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  36. I thought so, too, and that was my first reaction, but I wouldn't go there after hearing from some of those from the festival who survived. At least some of them were from a peace and justice movement and want a ceasefire now. So, I don't want to rub their noses in it now, either.
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  37. ​ @NewOrleansSeptember There was no evidence presented here, either, just speculation, accurate accounts of certain unscholarly vested interests whom we may ignore, and deft burden shifting. Who do you think has the burden of proof on the question? Her speaking style (not anything she said) made you think that those who believe Shakespeare was the author of the plays (within the meaning of the word at the time) have to prove it. Nope. She needs to show he wasn't.
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  38. If a person could just go get a job, everyone would have one. Someone has to give you a job, and in our system, no one has to.
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  39. @edwardsisk-ix8nj  "yes, the woke answer to everything . . . " This is how you all talk now, because someone disagreed with you? Blocked.
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  40.  @mustang19ms  In Greece, a very small number of neoliberal political leaders, with support from the US/EU of course, took power and indebted the country, leaving the people with the bill and no way to escape it. You probably know how debt peonage works. What you say about Syria is undoubtedly true. I use Greece as an example for obvious reasons -- it was the victim in a "war" that never got hot, a "war" that was conducted with paper.
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  41. @weslee511  We don't have fractional reserve banking any more. We have less. I just checked. The reserve requirement has been ZERO since early March 2020. Source: The Federal Reserve.
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  42. About 50% of all economic activity is mediated in some way by government: government contracts, tax subsidies, dependence on the military to offshore jobs and import the product safely, and benefitting from government-funded basic research and technology, are just some major examples.
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  43.  @aprilk141  Are you joking? We have no general workplace harassment law, much less criminal penalties. Do you know the barriers to filing under Title VII? You have to go to the EEOC first and obtain a right-to-sue letter, and the statute of limitations is shorter than for most torts. The procedural hurdles are huge. You need the money for a GOOD lawyer --- but those who have the money are the people least likely to be harassed, because the bullies know they can fight back.
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  44.  @handleyobusiness  A lot of people do what you would rather die than do. You must have noticed.
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  45.  @Joe-qv6jh  No, 1990 was not the Dark Ages. $250k per year was certainly possible. But if a graphic artist made that, it was almost surely at the conclusion of one major free-lance contract, and not a regular salary. The first million dollar per year baseball player was in 1979.
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  46.  @imveryhungry112  CPI inflation calculator: "$250,000 in 1990 is equivalent in purchasing power to about $587,272.38 today." You're off by a factor of 5.
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  47. Are you joking? Do they read other books?
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  48. @edwardsisk-ix8nj  I'm sorry. This is a program featuring a discussion with a psychiatrist, and I had simply presumed that we were using the term as it is used in psychiatry, not as, say, poets might use it. Trauma is not subjective and does have a threshold, and generally involves coming face to face with some existential threat. For example, distress in a woman whose pet rabbit got away and distress in a woman who was assaulted at knifepoint while living in a homeless shelter would very likely not receive the same diagnosis. I'm not making light of anyone's feelings by drawing the distinction. (The woman whose rabbit was lost might have been reminded of the time she was asked to babysit and was too young to do that. That's not trivial by any means --- but I don't call it trauma.) If everybody has it, then call it life. And turn away. You obviously have more important things to do, like abuse strangers on message boards.
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  49. ​​ @Augfordpdoggie How did Martha Argerich become a polyglot without formal schooling, when she was staying up late a lot and playing piano all the time?
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  50. ​ @brianbutler3318 She politicized the issue and deftly shifted the burden of proof.
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