@wdlindsy

[npars01@mstdn.social]

@wdlindsy

"Tapping a thick, rich vein of stupid" didn't happen by accident.

Koch Network waged a 60 year effort to destroy public education, driving average literacy down to 6th grade comprehension.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2019/10/16/koch-network-says-it-wants-remake-public-education-that-means-destroying-it-says-author-new-book-billionaire-brothers/

Mapping the Movement to Dismantle Public Education

It's not just the Koch brothers: a state by state look at the forces driving school privatization.

(jacobin.com)

There's just a few publishers left.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/11/opinion/penguin-simon-schuster-publishing.html

The Epstein Class has been consolidating all media into a one-party platform. Larry Ellison copies Goebbels.
https://fair.org/home/as-ellison-buys-out-tiktok-us-moves-toward-one-party-media/

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/18/opinion/larry-ellison-paramount-cbs-tiktok.html

https://www.wired.com/story/everything-the-ellison-family-will-control-if-paramount-acquires-warner-brothers-discovery/

[alex_p_roe@mastodon.world]

@Npars01 @wdlindsy Yup, the rich know they need the stupid to gain and hold onto power - hence the continued attacks on any and all public education. And Trump’s toadies are trying to destroy US unis because they educate the wrong people.

[npars01@mstdn.social]

@alex_p_roe @wdlindsy

Like slave owning societies, progress stops when caste & class becomes a role for government enforcement.

A self-perpetuating social order: a recipe for stagnation, ripe for conquest.

Bigotry is a national security vulnerability.
https://billmoyers.com/story/hitler-america-nazi-race-law/

https://interminablerambling.medium.com/hitler-nazism-jim-crow-and-the-united-states-af44f2351809

https://macmillan.yale.edu/europe/publications/hitlers-american-modelthe-united-states-and-making-nazi-race-law-2017

https://tribunemag.co.uk/2020/10/the-fascist-sympathies-of-britains-aristocracy

https://www.counterfire.org/article/the-nazis-and-the-british-establishment/

https://www.history.com/articles/how-the-nazis-were-inspired-by-jim-crow

https://www.historyextra.com/period/second-world-war/hitler-millionaire-backers-how-german-elite-facilitated-rise-nazis-third-reich/

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/freedom-riders-jim-crow-laws/

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[npars01@mstdn.social]

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https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2023/oct/01/britain-blighted-by-class-system-letters

https://www.vice.com/en/article/foreigners-react-to-british-class-system/

https://www.historytoday.com/archive/social-structure-england-part-ii

https://www.vice.com/en/article/british-class-system-today-expert/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Stagnation

https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/social-justice-pacifists/202502/the-indian-caste-system-a-self-perpetuating-social-order

https://roguepsych.medium.com/what-is-the-british-class-system-63ee7731b33f

https://www.jstor.org/stable/4227194

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_class_in_the_United_Kingdom

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste_system_in_India

Divide & Conquer is always popular with Caesar-style wannabe despots.

[alex_p_roe@mastodon.world]

@Npars01 Human beings, aside from being viciously violent, are exceptionally slow learners. Makes one wonder how long such a species can survive. We might already be living on borrowed time and we (OK, not all of us, but far too many) love being led by idiots.

[npars01@mstdn.social]

@alex_p_roe

The idiots of the Epstein class buy idiots for public office, after years of grooming.
Pedophiles do that.

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/05/stephen-miller-duke-donald-trump

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/apr/16/donald-trump-adviser-stephen-miller-duke-newpaper-column

The idiots fostered by Koch Network were manufactured & groomed to be dumb

The Federalist Society grooms lawyers for decades

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/04/17/the-conservative-pipeline-to-the-supreme-court

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2017/01/how-the-federalist-society-became-the-de-facto-selector-of-republican-supreme-court-justices.html

Example: the wealthy seek unhappy & unsuccessful people in their formative years & immerse them in a system of public corruption & radicalization.

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[npars01@mstdn.social]

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Such people are of utility, sometimes unknowingly.

Charlie Kirk flunked out of college, as did so many broligarchs like Zuckerberg.

Steve Bannon still ignores how his maladaptive social skills killed his Hollywood writing career & ousted him out of Trump’s inner circle.

Bannon, Kirk, & Miller are stuck in adolescent rage & unable to self-reflect, learn, & grow. They never realize their blameshifting is manipulated and put to use by the wealthy. They're useful but not trusted.

[npars01@mstdn.social]

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We must also recognize how The Moneyed manufacture idiots in bulk.

Precarity & economic duress produces an electorate too busy surviving to engage in democracy. Perpetual endebtedness & high unemployment for example.

Constant disinformation to engender FUD & TMT creates a group that has had their amygdala hijacked so badly they vote against their own self-interest.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear,_uncertainty,_and_doubt

Trump's Iran threats are just the latest example.

FUD started as a marketing campaign tactic &....

[npars01@mstdn.social]

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... has been morphed & melded into fascist malign influence narratives & anti-democracy disinformation campaigns.

https://theconversation.com/how-you-can-tell-propaganda-from-journalism-lets-look-at-tucker-carlsons-visit-to-russia-223829

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/15/us/politics/tucker-carlson-fuentes.html

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2023/08/tucker-carlson-media-venture-peter-thiel

https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2024/02/why-tucker-carlson-uae-after-controversial-russia-visit

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/laura-loomer-tucker-carlson-maga-qatar-b2773366.html

Tucker Carlson's "Just Asking Questions" technique is just one example.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terror_management_theory

These narratives are funded & amplified by people like Elon Musk & Putin.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/media/2024/09/05/tenet-media-russia-rt-tim-pool/

https://www.thebulwark.com/p/lauren-chen-trump-administration-scores-visa-for-founder-russian-propaganda-outlet-tenet

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-brings-putins-booted-propaganda-goon-lauren-chen-back-to-us/

[npars01@mstdn.social]

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It's why The Moneyed hate public services like education & health care for the proles.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_A._Freeman_(economist)

Air & water pollution creates the cognitively disadvantaged. Lead & other contaminants is a great way to create brain-damaged adults in the so-called "lower orders".
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/mar/18/oil-industry-fossil-fuels-air-pollution-documents

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_Alley

Regular exposure to contagious diseases like covid & measles has created a generation of brain fogged kids.

https://www.unmc.edu/healthsecurity/transmission/2026/01/07/rfk-jr-guts-the-us-childhood-vaccine-schedule-despite-its-decades-long-safety-record/

[npars01@mstdn.social]

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Mass layoffs in tech & finance are intended to distract the well educated & redirect them to survival mode.

How the Koch Network Is Spreading COVID Misinformation

As the Omicron variant surges, an institute funded by the Koch network may be undermining government attempts to stop the pandemic.

(jacobin.com)

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/09/richard-hanania-origins-of-woke-book/675348/

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/timothy-mellon-maga-millions-donor-trump-robert-kennedy-jr-1235058295/

Literacy & good health gives longevity, ie time enough to learn. The wealthy do all they can to reduce longevity in the poors.
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/03/dan-patrick-coronavirus-grandparents

https://jacobin.com/2022/02/charles-koch-epa-carbon-emissions-supreme-court

Health care austerity & cost-cutting are eugenics schemes poorly disguised.

https://read.dukeupress.edu/books/book/1101/chapter-abstract/153138/Three-Generations-of-Imbeciles-Are-Enough-American

https://www.jstor.org/content/oa_chapter_monograph/10.3998/mpub.11865737.13

[npars01@mstdn.social]

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Koch Network & its fossil fuel axis alliance aren't "libertarians", they are corporate fascists recreating Leisure Class robber barons of the Gilded Age, desperate to keep status, power, control & wealth, no matter the cost.

The Libertarians Who Dream of a World Without Democracy

The late 20th century saw the creation of special economic zones that free capitalists from the normal constraints of popular sovereignty. This went hand in hand with the rise of radical libertarian ideologies proposing to do away with democracy entirely.

(jacobin.com)

[npars01@mstdn.social]

@alex_p_roe

Thiel is invoking the wish fulfillment fantasies of survivalists, preppers & end-times evangelicals.
https://jacobin.com/2025/11/peter-thiel-palantir-apocalypse-antichrist

https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/peter-thiel-looks-everywhere-for

The Real Stakes, and Real Story, of Peter Thiel’s Antichrist Obsession

Thirty years ago, a peace-loving Austrian theologian spoke to Peter Thiel about the apocalyptic theories of Nazi jurist Carl Schmitt. They’ve been a road map for the billionaire ever since.

WIRED (www.wired.com)

He's trying to bolster self-serving narratives of "Nothing Matters. Why bother?"

Nihilism & impotence is a useful toy for FUD disinformation. It hijacks people's fears and is utilized for his agenda as people freeze.

They delude themselves that a post-apocalyptic world means that they "win".

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