People in the west should stop this madness ...hek whom am I kidding ,they won't .
this post was submitted on 03 Sep 2023
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GenZedong
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Dumb take. Putin holds far more power as an individual within his country than any western head of state does - they are tools of the capitalist class more than anything else. Yes, neither Putin nor Western leaders care about working class people, but that doesn’t make them identical.
Why? The Western political system is more resilient and powerful, but that means that the individual people who are part of that system (including the heads of state) have less power over that system they can exert by themselves.
Is the Western capitalist class more powerful? Yes. Are the political systems that function for their benefit more powerful? Also yes. But are the individuals who temporarily serve as heads of state more powerful within that system? Resoundingly no.
And yeah, the relationship between the Russian capital class and that of the Western capital class and the respective workers under their thumb is identical, but that doesn’t mean that the relationship they have with the political leaders is identical. In the West politicians are arguably more like well paid employees of the capitalists, while in Putin’s case there’s a more equal footing.
Does that make a difference to the people at the bottom? No. Does it make those situations identical? Also no.
Yeah fucking duh, but that wasn’t the point we were arguing, my guy.
The POTUS can launch nuclear weapons without any briefing or coordination with the rest of the government. It is his sole power, not even the legislative congress can override him.
The Russian head of state must consult with their top brass to even have the ability to do so.
The CPC have a documented retaliation policy and can't just launch nukes preemptively.
Nice shitlib logic. You just repackage white superemacy with imperialist characteristics because that model of the world absolves you of urgency.
Power within their own country, I meant, and it was abundantly clear. Also, I was talking about Western leaders in general, and even if your example is an argument against what I said it applies to only one country.
That’s not to defend the nuclear button or the US in general. But come on, my guy. We’re talking about the power they hold over the people and how they relate to the capital class, and the US’ dodgy nuclear weapons policies honestly have little to do with that.
Again, you're minimizing when faced with an inherent contradiction.
The US is not "one country", it is the entire security apparatus of the modern imperial core of minority nations. Every western leader is aligned with the US for legitimacy and resources. US policy dictates the global climate. The rise of reactionary fascist politics in Western Europe under Trump was not a coincidence.
Would it surprise you to learn that the DPRK has repeatedly petioned the US to mutually dearm its nukes and the US has refused? The nuclear "button" is the entire point of this thread. It is also the way the US threatens the integrity of the entire world.
None of that has to do with what I’m talking about. Fucking of course the US is the head of the bloc of capitalist countries and fucking of course they use the threat of violence to uphold their global position of power. But none of that relates to what I said in any meaningful way.
You could argue about how the US is bad until the cows come home and I’d most likely agree with all of it, but you’re talking past my basic point here.
Your initial point is that Putin has more power in his own country than any other western leader.
I provided a clear example of why that isn't the case and is related to OP's original topic. POTUS can fire nukes with zero oversight, Putin cannot.
You flipped out when faced with this and deflected my point. You didn't even reiterate your "basic point"
Nice going, liberal.
My original comment was already about how Western leaders and Putin relate to both the capital and the working class. Your argument against this is one power that one Western leader holds that doesn’t even relate to class relations at all.
Like, I’m not denying the disproportionate power it gives the POTUS on the world stage, but that wasn’t what I was talking about in the first place.
You are missing a very important detail, which is that if they are tools of the capitalist class, it's the capitalists making decisions and the amount of "power" individual politicians within that apparatus have is essentially a mundane question of administrative structure. Putin the capitalist puppet is no more or less dangerous than a hypothetical quadrivium of capitalists puppets would if they collectively had his power.