What is happening in the United States now is a fascistic insurrection to stop the transfer of power, instigated by Trump in an attempt to nullify the elections and overthrow the Constitution. 1/

The storming of the Capitol building in DC will also give an impulse to militias and far-right organizations in states throughout the country. Just this past October, a plot was uncovered to kidnap and execute the Governor of Michigan and other states. 2/
Trump has repeatedly declared his refusal to accept the results of the election, which he clearly lost. On Monday, he proclaimed at a rally in Georgia: “They are not taking this White House. We are going to fight like hell.” 3/
As we state in the perspective on the WSWS today, "In the face of Trump’s active effort to overthrow the Constitution, the Democratic Party and its defenders are doing everything possible to conceal and downplay the threat posed by Trump’s actions." 4/

https://t.co/M42KhcofU2
Throughout the election and post-election crisis, the Democrats have worked to cover-up the character of Trump's actions, from the threat to invoke the Insurrection Act in June, through the Michigan coup plot, up to the post-election refusal to transfer power. 5/
While Trump denounces his opponents and threatens violence, the Democrats respond by pledging to work with their "Republican friends," as Biden put it on Monday. The more aggressive Trump's threats, the more the Democrats seek to accommodate the far-right. 6/
All those who claimed that there is not a serious crisis (The Nation referred to it as a "clown coup") are preaching soporifics in the face of the breakdown of democratic forms of rule in the United States. 7/
The Democrats' constant appeal for "unity" is a class response. As Obama put it after Trump's inauguration, the conflict is an "intramural scrimmage" between two sides on the same team. Both parties represent the financial oligarchy. 8/
The Democrats' primary concern at every point is to prevent the growth of a social movement that will get out of control. 9/
Armed standoff at the door of the House floor.

More from Society

The UN just voted to condemn Israel 9 times, and the rest of the world 0.

View the resolutions and voting results here:

The resolution titled "The occupied Syrian Golan," which condemns Israel for "repressive measures" against Syrian citizens in the Golan Heights, was adopted by a vote of 151 - 2 - 14.

Israel and the U.S. voted 'No'
https://t.co/HoO7oz0dwr


The resolution titled "Israeli practices affecting the human rights of the Palestinian people..." was adopted by a vote of 153 - 6 - 9.

Australia, Canada, Israel, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and the U.S. voted 'No' https://t.co/1Ntpi7Vqab


The resolution titled "Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and the occupied Syrian Golan" was adopted by a vote of 153 – 5 – 10.

Canada, Israel, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and the U.S. voted 'No'
https://t.co/REumYgyRuF


The resolution titled "Applicability of the Geneva Convention... to the
Occupied Palestinian Territory..." was adopted by a vote of 154 - 5 - 8.

Canada, Israel, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and the U.S. voted 'No'
https://t.co/xDAeS9K1kW

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"I lied about my basic beliefs in order to keep a prestigious job. Now that it will be zero-cost to me, I have a few things to say."


We know that elite institutions like the one Flier was in (partial) charge of rely on irrelevant status markers like private school education, whiteness, legacy, and ability to charm an old white guy at an interview.

Harvard's discriminatory policies are becoming increasingly well known, across the political spectrum (see, e.g., the recent lawsuit on discrimination against East Asian applications.)

It's refreshing to hear a senior administrator admits to personally opposing policies that attempt to remedy these basic flaws. These are flaws that harm his institution's ability to do cutting-edge research and to serve the public.

Harvard is being eclipsed by institutions that have different ideas about how to run a 21st Century institution. Stanford, for one; the UC system; the "public Ivys".
I just finished Eric Adler's The Battle of the Classics, and wanted to say something about Joel Christiansen's review linked below. I am not sure what motivates the review (I speculate a bit below), but it gives a very misleading impression of the book. 1/x


The meat of the criticism is that the history Adler gives is insufficiently critical. Adler describes a few figures who had a great influence on how the modern US university was formed. It's certainly critical: it focuses on the social Darwinism of these figures. 2/x

Other insinuations and suggestions in the review seem wildly off the mark, distorted, or inappropriate-- for example, that the book is clickbaity (it is scholarly) or conservative (hardly) or connected to the events at the Capitol (give me a break). 3/x

The core question: in what sense is classics inherently racist? Classics is old. On Adler's account, it begins in ancient Rome and is revived in the Renaissance. Slavery (Christiansen's primary concern) is also very old. Let's say classics is an education for slaveowners. 4/x

It's worth remembering that literacy itself is elite throughout most of this history. Literacy is, then, also the education of slaveowners. We can honor oral and musical traditions without denying that literacy is, generally, good. 5/x