Barrett > Recent Status Updates

“California did not see capitalist economics evolve step-by-step out of feudal property relations. Capital hit California like a meteor, alien tendrils surging from the crash site.”

“It is always assumed that a leader … is motivated only by vainglorious impulse. It may also be … a way of strengthening his public image thereby maximizing his political clout. Caesar’s concern was not to lord over the common people but to outdo a powerfully entrenched aristocratic oligarchy. By elevating himself above that plutocracy, he was more likely to attain success with his reform agenda.”

“To this day, defenders of class privilege resort to ad hominem attacks, maligning any leader who pursues policies on behalf of the common people as a self-promoting demagogue, a panderer intent upon usurping power”

“It is a time-honored practice to blame “rash” and “provocative” reformers for the violence delivered upon them by reactionary forces.”

“Facing a popular upsurge against their illegal land holdings, the oligarchs could not easily attack Tiberius’s law. So they attacked Tiberius himself. They took every opportunity to denounce him as a demagogue and tyrant who was intent upon crowning himself king.”

Can’t attack the message, so they attack the messenger

« that is the inescapable essence of slavery: The degrading exploitation of one human being so that another may pursue whatever comforts and advantages wealth might confer. Ultimately, the same can be said of all exploitative class relations perpetrated by those who accumulate wealth for themselves by reducing others to poverty. »

“You showed me the only thing that I could really hope to become, what depth of evil, what degree of coldness I would have to attain to end my pain. And I accepted that. And so that passion, that love you saw in me, was extinguished. And you see now simply a mirror of yourself.”

“I drank of the beauty of the world as a vampire drinks. I was satisfied. I was filled to the brim. But I was dead. And I was changeless”

Reading aloud to Sydni

Angels feel love, and pride…the pride of The Fall…and hatred. The strong overpowering emotions of detached persons in whom emotion and will are one

I saw my real gods…the gods of most men. Food, drink, and security in conformity. Cinders.

Reading aloud to Sydni

Terrible purpose! In that moment, his whole life was a limb shaken by the departure of a bird . . . and the bird was chance. Free will.