Dumb as usual or dumber than usual?

*cough*

Many Millennials were raised during a period of economic expansion, from a period lasting from the mid 90s to the mid 2000s.

This was during a temporary post-Soviet period which lasted only a few years, largely influenced by a Western World which had seriously cut down on military expenditure.

The post-Soviet era, by 2001, saw the Anglo-Saxon military invade Iraq and Afghanistan.

After that, after the Obama era, we saw mass unemployment along with a housing problem around 2013.

After that, we saw a Cost of Living Crisis, a Housing Crisis and a depleted Purchasing Power by 2016.

By this point, we had the the 2020 Two-Year Lockdown. We were told that we should shed our expectations of our Purchasing Power for the greater good.

Immediately after that, we were told that we had to put up with higher costs because of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The price of many basic foodstuffs went up by about 40%.

Now, we are told that we should anticipate a draft, on top of every new Once In A Lifetime events that we have already suffered through.

This Millennial generation, which has already lived through about six "Once In A Lifetime" events - why should Zoomers sign up?

Between 9/11, the Iraq War, the Recession, the Housing Crisis, the Cost of Living Crisis, the Mass Immigration Crisis, the Two-Year Lockdown and the Ukraine conflict - why should any young person sign up for any Western Army?

How much more can the younger generation take? Will they be handed a brand-new house after their service?

Twice this year, supervisory personnel at the US Postal Service Michigan Metroplex in Pontiac activated sorting machinery while a maintenance worker was underneath. Neither incident resulted in an injury but in other circumstances the outcome could have been tragic, resulting in death or serious injury.

According to a grievance filed by the president of APWU local, the incidents happened in May and September of 2026. Steve Woods said the unit had filed grievances and a complaint with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) as well as postal management. Woods also notified the offices of Michigan Democratic Congressional representatives Debbie Dingell, Haley Stevens and Rashida Tlaib.

The grievance filed by Woods stated, “They’ve been multiple incidents of both clerks and operations supervisors using the code” to activate the machine.

In response to the reports many workers posted on social media expressing concern and shock that proper lockout/tagout procedures on machinery were not in place at the Metroplex. One worker wrote, “I work at the metroplex and I can say [from] first-hand experience that place is being ran down to ground. This is not the first time nor the last time.” Another responded, “I work there as well and you’re absolutely right when you say it’s getting ran down to the ground.”

Another posted, “I am an ET at that facility and that machine should’ve been LOTO. (locked out) ESPECIALLY that machine! It’s over 100 ft long and taller than he is and he was INSIDE of it! So REGARDLESS of who pressed the start button, it should’ve been powered down.”

The same Pontiac facility was investigated a decade ago after workers raised the alarm over multiple employee deaths. A February 2016 USPS inspector general’s alert recorded a complaint that five workers had died in 14 months. A later APWU account gave a different chronology: four workers were taken from the plant by emergency services between October 2014 and August 2015 and subsequently died, while a fifth died under similar circumstances in June 2011. They ranged in age from 38 to 64.

One of them was Keesha Gray, 38, who died on June 9, 2015. Her family’s attorney, Brian McKeen, told WXYZ that she felt ill at work and informed managers she was going to her car. She collapsed and died there, remaining undiscovered for nearly two hours. APWU officials questioned why managers had not noticed her prolonged absence. The medical examiner attributed her death to bronchial asthma. Her family hired McKeen to investigate whether conditions at the facility contributed.

A local mail handlers’ representative told WDIV that the five deaths involved three reported heart attacks, an asthma attack and a stroke. Coworkers also complained of headaches and coughing. The Metroplex was built on a contaminated former General Motors foundry site, with ventilation and methane-detection systems intended to prevent gas accumulating inside. The inspector general found the detection system had malfunctioned since March 2015. USPS maintained that testing showed safe methane levels; no causal link between methane and the deaths was established. Its January 2017 follow-up nevertheless documented continuing deficiencies in sensor maintenance and staff training.

...

Similar conditions exist at postal facilities around the country. Postal workers filed 38,977 federal workers’ compensation claims in 2025. That was almost half of all federal workers’ comp cases opened that year.

These are just a few of the deaths and life-threatening situations workers have suffered resulting from the efficiency schemes and speed up imposed by management and their collaborators in the union bureaucracy as safety conditions erode. These measures are aimed at improving “efficiency” and slashing costs in preparation for the privatization of the post office.

These attacks have accelerated under the Delivering for America (DFA) restructuring launched by former Postmaster General Louis DeJoy in 2021. The plan consolidates work into fewer, larger automated facilities, cuts jobs and combines routes; Palmetto opened as part of this program. Workers’ testimony to the postal inquiry described billions being invested in automated equipment while basic medical equipment, trained medical staff and written emergency procedures were absent. Cutting staffing and treating every interruption as lost productivity puts workers under pressure to keep working through illness and to service machinery without adequate safeguards.

DeJoy’s successor, David Steiner, is preparing further cuts after the New Year. At the August 7 Board of Governors meeting, he said management “would not take any action until after the New Year,” while threatening changes to service standards and the closure of “thousands of unprofitable post offices.” He has told Congress that USPS plans to employ 30,000 to 35,000 fewer workers within four years. Further reductions would intensify the understaffing and overwork already endangering workers while accelerating the dismantling of the post office as a public service.

No confidence can be placed in the APWU bureaucracy, Democratic politicians, OSHA or USPS to address these conditions or to implement the measures needed to keep postal workers safe. Acker’s coworkers told the WSWS that safety grievances had been filed less than 90 days before his death and that APWU officials knew about them. One worker described disabled stop switches and the removal of the additional worker who should have been available to stop the machinery. The grievance machinery left these dangers unresolved.

The APWU leadership continues to channel opposition into appeals to Congress. At its August convention, President Jonathan Smith declared: “Congress just has to get off of their ass and act.” But at a House hearing in March, ranking Democrat Kweisi Mfume said USPS “obviously needs to cut costs and increase revenue.” The union apparatus subordinates workers to the same political framework of cost cutting that management invokes to justify restructuring. Workers need organizations capable of enforcing safety against management’s production demands.

The Postal Workers Rank-and-File Committee is fighting these conditions based on mobilizing the independent strength of workers themselves. It unites postal workers across the US, Canada and internationally in a common fight. Workers must organize at their worksites independently of the union apparatus to assert their own interests. These committees give workers the means to expose unsafe conditions and organize a collective fight back, including worker oversight of safety and the right to refuse unsafe work.

It feels like there's only one official opinion on that sub these days, and everything else gets drowned out by the same ideological bullshit. People talk like they're medieval crusaders or something, fighting some grand civilizational war, while completely dgaf how ordinary Europeans actually live. It's like regular people are just pawns to be sacrificed for some greater geopolitical goals set by the Uncle Sam

Seriously, go through the top 20 posts and see what people are talking about all day: Ukraine Russia and Chayna. Maybe a few shitposts about Trump and their right wing leaders. As if Europe have so much to gain from constantly escalating tensions with these countries, when they're the ones who end up dealing with the economic fallout and the security risks

They pretend to hate us too and you know what? These mfs claim to oppose American imperialism or say Europe should stand on its own, yet so much of their rhetoric ends up serving American geopolitical interests

The whole place has developed this weird, smug, cynical attitude where everything is framed as good vs bad, civilized vs barbarians, and anyone who questions the narrative is treated like a traitor and downvoted to hell. It's less about improving life for Europeans and more about proving ideological loyalty. Btw the writing style is so damn recognizable too. Half the posts sound like they're written by some perpetually online, unattractive, middle-aged millennial white women trying way too hard to sound cool and sophisticated, but somehow coming across as bitter and chronically miserable instead

THE NEW DEAL: HARD TIMES AND TOUGH REFORMS

In 1932 Senator Hugo Black (D-Ala.) observed, “Labor has been underpaid and capital overpaid. This is one of the chief contributing causes of the present depression…. You cannot starve men employed in industry and depend upon them to purchase.” Even banker Frank Vanderlip admitted, “Capital kept too much and labor did not have enough to buy its share of things.” But most members of the plutocracy blamed the depression on its victims. Thus, millionaire Henry Ford said the crisis came because “the average man won’t really do a day’s work…. There is plenty of work to do if people would do it.” A few weeks later Ford laid off seventy-five thousand workers.

With a third of the nation ill-fed, ill-clothed, and ill-housed, and easily another third just barely getting by, a torrent of strikes swept the nation, involving hundreds of thousands of workers. Between 1936 and 1940, the newly formed Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) organized millions of workers and won significant gains in wages and work conditions. These victories were achieved only after protracted struggles in which many thousands occupied factories in sit-downs, or were locked out, blacklisted, beaten, and arrested; hundreds more were wounded or killed by police, soldiers, and company thugs. The gains were real but they came at a high price.

The first two terms of President Franklin Roosevelt’s administration have been called the New Deal, an era commonly believed to have brought great transformations on behalf of “the forgotten man” (Roosevelt’s phrase). ((Actually, the New Deal’s prime dedication was to business recovery rather than social reform.** First came the National Recovery Administration (NRA), which set up “code authorities,” usually composed of the leading corporate representatives in each industry, to restrict production and set minimum price requirements—with results that were more beneficial to big corporations than to smaller competitors. In attempting to spur production, the Reconstruction Finance Corporation alone lent $15 billion to big business. The federal housing program subsidized construction firms and mortgage bankers—all of little benefit to the many millions of ill-housed. Likewise, the New Deal’s efforts in agriculture primarily benefited the large producers through a series of price supports and production cutbacks. Many tenant farmers and sharecroppers were evicted when federal acreage rental programs took land out of cultivation.

The slump in consumption and the glut of unbought goods caused a severe drop in prices in many markets, including farm products. To bolster prices, the New Dealers paid farmers to destroy millions of acres of cotton crops, vast wheat reserves, and millions of hogs and piglets. The stark contrast of overabundance and hunger caused many to question the serviceability of capitalism. “Food had to be destroyed to save the market.” The public outcry caused the White House to form the Federal Surplus Relief Corporation, which bought up large amounts of surplus foods to feed the unemployed. Faced with mass unrest, the federal government created a variety of relief programs that eased some of the privation. But as the New Deal moved toward measures that threatened to compete with private enterprises and undermine low wage structures, business withdrew its support and became openly hostile. While infuriating Roosevelt, who saw himself as trying to rescue the capitalist system, business opposition enhanced his reformist image in the public mind.

The disparity between the New Deal’s popular image and its actual accomplishments remains one of the unappreciated aspects of the Roosevelt era. For instance, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) provided jobs at subsistence wages for only 3 million of the 15 million unemployed. At its peak, the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and related agencies employed almost 9 million people but often for unstable duration and grossly inadequate wages. Of the millions who were earning subsistence wages, only about half a million were helped by the minimum-wage law. The Social Security Act of 1935 covered but half the population and provided paltry monthly payments with no medical insurance or protection against illness before retirement. Unemployment insurance covered only those who had enjoyed sustained employment in select occupations. Implementation was left to the states, which were free to set whatever restrictive conditions they chose.

While government programs were markedly inadequate for the needs of the destitute, they helped dilute public discontent. But once the threat of political unrest subsided, federal relief was slashed, and large numbers of destitute people were thrust onto a labor market already glutted with unemployed. The Roosevelt administration’s tax policy was virtually a continuation of former President Hoover’s program, with its generous loopholes for business. When taxes were increased to pay for military spending in World War II, the major burden was taken up by middle- and low-income classes that had never before been subjected to income taxes.

All this is not to deny that, in response to enormous popular agitation and the threat of widespread radicalization, the Roosevelt administration produced real democratic gains, including some long overdue social welfare legislation, a number of worthwhile conservation and public works projects, a rural electrification program, and a reduction in unemployment from 25 to 19 percent. Millions of hungry and destitute people were fed and sheltered. The steep inequality in income was noticeably eased, thanks to stronger unions, greater regulation of industry, and progressive taxes on corporate profits and wealth. Under Social Security, working people won not only retirement pensions but disability insurance and survivors insurance (for children of deceased workers).

The New Deal built or improved roads across the country, and constructed thousands of schools, parks, playgrounds, athletic fields, and airports, along with hundreds of hospitals, post offices, bridges, tunnels, and courthouses. The CCC created fifty-two thousand acres of public camp grounds, built over thirteen thousand foot trails, and restored almost four thousand historic landmarks or monuments. It stocked waterways with millions of fish, made important contributions to firefighting, rodent and pest control, water conservation, and preventing soil erosion. Thousands of unemployed writers, actors, musicians, and painters were given modest support and opportunity to enrich the lives of many in performances that ordinary people could afford to attend.

Before the Roosevelt era, unions were readily broken by court injunctions, heavy fines, and violent repression. The New Deal produced a series of laws such as the Wagner Act and the Norris-La Guardia Act to legalize labor’s ability to bargain collectively. Management-controlled company unions were banned, and a minimum wage and forty-hour week were established. Congress set up the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) with broad powers to oversee the certification of unions and penalize employers who violated the organizing rights of workers. Such legislation was both a response and a stimulus to labor’s growing organization and militancy.

Yet the New Deal era hardly adds up to a great triumph for the common people. They were ready to go a lot further than Roosevelt did, and probably would have accepted a nationalized banking system, a more massive job program, and a national health care system. In regard to desegregation, open housing, fair employment practices, anti-lynch laws, and voting rights for Blacks, the New Deal did nothing. Domestics and farmworkers, the two most common occupations for African Americans at the time, were excluded from Social Security coverage. African Americans were excluded from jobs in the Civilian Conservation Corps, received less than their proportional share of public assistance, and under the NRA were frequently paid wages below the legal minimum.

After the United States entered World War II in December 1941, industrial plant utilization more than doubled. The gross national product, which had stood at $88 billion in 1940, mushroomed to $135 billion within a few years. Those who profited most were the industrial tycoons and arms contractors. But some of it trickled down. Almost all the 8.7 million unemployed were either drafted into the armed forces or drawn back into the workforce, along with 10 million new workers, many of them women. Only by entering the war and remaining thereafter on a permanent war economy was the United States able to significantly reduce unemployment. The ruling politico-economic elites were willing to make the kind of all-out spending effort to kill people in wartime that they would not make to assist people in peacetime.

In sum, over the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, government’s growing involvement in economic affairs was not at the contrivance of meddling Washington bureaucrats but was a response to the systemic instability and crises of corporate capitalism. Along with the many small labor conflicts handled by local government, there developed large-scale class struggles—which had to be contained by the national government. Government provided the subsidies, services, and protections that business could not provide for itself. The corporate economy needed a corporate state.

While the populace won formal rights to participate as voters, the state with its courts, police, and army remained mostly at the disposal of the moneyed class. However, working people were not without resources of their own, specifically the ability to disrupt and threaten the process of capital accumulation by withholding their labor through strikes, and by engaging in other acts of protest and resistance. Such agitation wrested concessions from the owning class and the state. These victories fell short of achieving a social democracy but they represented important democratic gains for working people.

As our history shows, those on the left—liberals, progressives, and radicals—have fought for egalitarian and democratic reforms. They opposed lynching and pushed for laws to abolish child labor. They pushed for the elimination of property qualifications and poll taxes for voting. They supported anti-monopoly laws, women’s suffrage, desegregation, the right of workers to unionize, occupational safety, aid to poor families, disability insurance, unemployment insurance, federal pensions, survivors insurance, the right to voice dissenting views, peace movements, and the separation of church and state.

In just about every one of these instances, it was the wealthy plutocrats (with some notable exceptions) who resisted such reforms and who favored regressive taxes, massive public subsidies to big business, and repressive measures against political dissent and against labor unions.

Parenti, Michael: Democracy for the Few (PDF)

I was just scrolling Twitter and saw a screenshot of a horror story post on the aforementioned sub. The first comment was like: "All the posts on that sub are like this", so on a whim, out of a morbid curiosity, I had a look on it myself and my God!, they weren't fucking kidding! 😬

• "15 out of 22 students that submitted an essay for the Quarter used A.I. I don't know what to do."
• "ChatGPT encouraging a student to drop out of high school."
• "Base Knowledge is Gone."
• "It's really bumming out how little imagination students have (high school)."
• "My 8th graders are absolutely helpless."
• "My entire room was destroyed by an aggressive student, and now admin is mad I’m taking a sick day."
• "Had a kid threaten to kill me and nothing was done:)."
• "Feel Like AI is rotting admin brains."
• "Grading floor was eliminated starting this year. Suddenly, principal keeps saying it is our fault if a kid is failing."
• "The gen-alpha stare."
• "Students need to start being left behind and districts need to stop pleasing the parents."
• "Now I understand why some of you don’t ever want to talk to parents."
• "Year 8 and a new kind of struggle: 1st graders with violent behavior."
• "Students coming in not potty trained."

This is what I found in less than five minutes of scrolling down. Don't believe me? Look it up yourself. Every single post is indeed like this and it just goes on and on and on.

WTF is going to happen to this country at this rate?

I see two main reactions to the outsourcing of knowledge work from western countries to AI/Actual Indians: doomerism, which is largely unproductive, and a full-throated call to divert a generation's productive labor into blue collar trades and nursing as those fields are considered understaffed. I found the latter to be lacking, but for a while I couldn't put my finger on why, wondering if perhaps my perspective had been poisoned by pro-academic media.

On further thought, I realize neither of these jobs can really work as "exports" from one economy to another. Aside from big infrastructure projects, these fields are mostly maintenance costs to people and property; if communities under liberal capitalism aren't getting their checks from factory/office workers, who is going to pay for the maintenance industries that people are currently flocking to?

I hear about how, during the Great Depression, you would have roving men in search of day labor, looking for any way to earn money for food. I fear even this would be unviable today in a mass unemployment event, as gig work has already become saturated by migrants and the underemployed. Farmers seethe at the idea of resolving their labor shortages with extra pay, as even competing with fast food is too much after decades of exploiting seasonal workers.

So, I'm seeing a strange disconnect between the material conditions of western countries and the supposed solutions given to those facing career displacement on a macroeconomic level. Sure, an American could take the hit on an individual level to not starve, but as a media talking point, it is concerning to see a generation funneled into maintaining old homes they will never afford, and old bodies paying in the spoils of jobs that they outlived.

Perhaps the election season noise is simply getting to me though. Are western democracies truly blind, or is a post-industry, post-invention service economy actually viable for a nation?