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The Sanders’ campaign spent over $75 million on advertising, often with the very same mainstream media outlets that worked nonstop to undermine his campaign.

It is time for the left to invest in our own institutions. 1/4

video.vice.com/en_us/video/be…
The MSM is owned by the 1% and, like any business, primarily works to serve the interests of its owners.

They work to undermine & obfuscate any real understanding/solutions of the systematic problems we face especially when it conflicts with the interests of their owners. 2/4
The US left desperately needs to build long-term institutions, including media, labor & movement organizing institutions that go far beyond electoral politics.

Showing up & rebuilding every four years is not enough to win. 3/4
Further enriching the very MSM institutions that seek to prevent real progress is a horrible strategy.

Investing in our own media & organizing institutions outside of electoral politics, which can be leveraged for political power is a good strategy. 4/4
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More from @ArashKolahi see all

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Arash Kolahi
@ArashKolahi
There are really two pandemics working against us simultaneously:

COVID-19
OLIGARCHY-1%

One can be dealt with sensibly.

The other is actively exploiting the current systemic shock, consolidating power, preventing humane solutions & must be overthrown. 1/6
Unemployment is around 25%: on par with the worst months of the Great Depression.

Approximately 50% of households lost income since the pandemic.

About 20% missed rent in April & May.

All of this was easily predictable to anyone paying attention: 2/6

Economic solutions were there all along.

The most effective solution is obvious: We need to counter the 20% GDP contraction by getting 4.5 trillion into the hands of the most vulnerable.

Sanders’ $2,000/month plan would have cost only about $2T. 3/6

Read 6 tweets
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Arash Kolahi
@ArashKolahi
Capitalism is inherently & by-definition:
• Anti-democratic
• Alienating
• Inequitable & unfair
• Environmentally destructive
• A zero-sum game that rewards the worst & punishes the best of humanity

An economic primer on capitalism #RIPCapitalism 1/12
Democracy means those affected by decisions get to have a say in those decisions.

Capitalism, from its top-down workplaces to its market system which exclude all affected by transactions other than the buyer & seller are inherently anti-democratic. 2/12

Markets are inherently anti-democratic because they externalize & even *incentivize* the externalization of those affected by transactions from having any say in those decisions, i.e., it incentivizes anti-democracy. #RIPCapitalism 3/12

Read 13 tweets
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Arash Kolahi
@ArashKolahi
Excellent article.

But it also highlights just how much insight has been lost by the erasure of anarchist philosophy from political & academic discourse.

Anarchism elegantly reconciles “the unreconcilable: individual freedom and community freedom.”

Here’s how: 1/10
Anarchism seeks to give decision making power to those affected by decisions, in proportion to the degree they are affected.

If a decision only affects an individual, with no effect on anyone else, then that individual should have full say:

i.e. individual freedom. 2/10
But once a decision affects another person, group, class, etc then they too should have a say: a say in proportion to the degree they are affected.

What matters is *who* is affected & if a decision affects a community, they get to have a fair say.

i.e. community freedom. 3/10
Read 10 tweets

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