A republic is a form of government in which a state is ruled by
representatives of the citizen body. Modern republics are founded on
the idea that sovereignty rests with the people, though who is included
and excluded from the category of the people has varied across history.
A democracy is a form of government in which the leaders are chosen by
the citizens’ votes, and in which the people have a say in decisions
about the state’s affairs. The primary characteristics of democracy
include political freedom, rule of law, and legal equality. In order
for these principles to be authentic, every eligible citizen must have
equal access to the legislative process, and the legal system.
Tyranny is government by a ruler or small group of people who have
unlimited power over the people in their country or state and use it
unfairly and cruelly: a situation in which someone or something
controls how you are able to live, in an unfair way.
Fascism is a way of ruling that advocates total control of the people.
Fascism is a totalitarian philosophy of government that glorifies the
state and nation and assigns to the state control over every aspect of
national life
Corporatism is a political ideology which advocates the organization of
society by corporate groups, such as agricultural, labor, military,
scientific, or guild associations on the basis of their common
interests. To understand the larger objectives of the global and financial elite
it is important to understand the global financial interests they
seek to protect and global financial exploitation of national markets:
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Multinational corporations purchase controlling interests in various national elements of developed industrial western nations.
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The Multinational Corporations making the purchases are underwritten
by massive global financial institutions, multinational banks.
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The Multinational Banks and the Multinational Corporations then
utilize lobbying interests to manipulate the internal political policy
of the targeted nation state(s).
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With control over the targeted national industry or interest, the
multinationals then leverage export of the national asset
(exfiltration) through trade agreements structured to the benefit of
lesser developed nation states – where they have previously established
a proactive financial footprint.
America's biggest companies have paid no federal taxes. The world’s richest 1 percent own 45 percent of the world’s wealth. 10 percent of the global population own 84 percent of global wealth.
Mike Lofgren, a congressional staff member for 28 years, joined Bill Moyers to talk about what he calls Washington's "Deep State,"
in which elected and unelected figures collude to protect and serve
powerful vested interests. “It is how we had deregulation,
financialization of the economy, the Wall Street bust, the erosion or
our civil liberties and perpetual war," Lofgren tells Moyers.
The military-industrial complex (MIC) is an informal alliance between a
nation's military and the defense industry that supplies it, seen
together as a vested interest which influences public policy. John Perkins describes
the methods he used to bribe and threaten the heads of state of
countries on four continents in order to create a global empire and he
reveals how the leaders who did not “play the game" were assassinated or
overthrown.
All of the leading Republican presidential candidates
either outright deny climate change exists, doubt it is a serious
problem, or insist that no action should be taken to assuage the
potential “environmental catastrophe.” The world’s leading climate scientists (IPCC) have warned there is only a dozen
years for global warming to be kept to a maximum of 1.5C, beyond which
even half a degree will significantly worsen the risks of drought,
floods, extreme heat and poverty for hundreds of millions of people.
Emerging technologies also affect society, policy, and culture. An algorithm
is a set of instructions designed to produce an output: a recipe for
decision-making, for finding solutions. In computerized form,
algorithms are increasingly important to our political lives.
Algorithms are critical ingredients in devices and services that affect
our behavior - what we buy, what we consume, and how we travel, and how
we vote. Because of the size of its population, China has recognized
the potential for algorithmic manipulation.
Algorithms
in themselves are neither 'good' nor 'bad', but where the public has
little access to information about the workings of algorithms in
decision-making, there is a serious lack of transparency and therefore
accountability and choice and has become a looming challenge for
privacy, democracy, and national security. Dataism is a term that has been used to describe the mindset or philosophy created by the emerging significance of
Big Data. Google and Facebook and even supermarkets know more about you (your choices)
than your parents do and tech knows you better than you know yourself.
Automated decision-making systems
like predictive policing or remote welfare eligibility no longer simply
help humans in government agencies apply procedural rules; instead,
they have become primary decision-makers in public policy. Algorithms
play a potentially harmful part in driving the content we’re served by
social media and search engines, leaving some consumers particularly
susceptible to fake news and propaganda or, a less than comprehensive views of current events.
We
need to address the political context of algorithms. Even if we achieve
perfect transparency in policy algorithms, it might not change their
innate biases. Like drones, decision-making algorithms are a form of politics played out at a distance, generating a troubling amount of emotional remove. Historian and futurist Yuval Harari has a story about the future that is unsettling.
He says that in a world deluged by irrelevant information, clarity is power. An American presidential candidate who tells the American public
the truth has a 100 percent guarantee of losing the elections.
Governance by algorithms
is real and ominous. Google's prevailing culture appears to be hostile
to right-wing political views. So a political candidate is designed for
a campaign that denigrates Caucasian males and conservatives. Like Trump
the real agenda is hidden.
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