Democrats are going to have to give up their “biggest losers” hats to the Ukrainians who wanted to stay a part o’ Ukraine in Donetsk, Luhansk People’s Republics, Zaporizhzhia, & Kherson, who lost greater than Ralph Nader did in US elections with only 2% o’ the vote in the former 2, 7% o’ the vote in Zaporizhzhia, & a slightly better score than Nader, 13% in Kherson, in totally valid, genuine referendums that would determine whether or not these places would voluntarily join the Federation that just-so-happens to be militarily occupying them. In normal times you would think a vote gainst your own nation would a’least be a somewhat close race, — for example, Americans are so delusionally patriotic that they’re willing to risk their lives so their beloved country can swipe oil & not e’en lower said oil’s price for ordinary consumers, & Britains will so earnestly sacrifice themselves for patriotism that they’re willing to eat British food — much less in favor o’ a country that is invading you & killed many people you knew.

These #s are interesting in that it shows that the Russian government isn’t e’en trying to hide what a sham this referendum is — presumably as a show o’ mocking force. A halfway competent organization trying to genuinely fake a referendum would have the modicum o’ subtlety to make the election close. After all, this is how Dark Brando Sando the Bando — a word just as totally valid as these referendums — stole Light Trump the Pump’s massive dumps with his underground magnets & USB slots. They — the Russian government, not Dark Brando Sando the Bando — might as well have declared the results as the infinity symbol or the poop emoji. It’s basically a shitpost.

Still, the US midterms are only a li’l mo’ than a month from now. Democrats may take back their crown & somehow lose the house, & maybe e’en the senate if they’re truly on their F game, to the lamest insurrectionists in the world.

I should add an addendum too long to not make an obnoxiously long title ( as if I were e’er allergic to such a thing ), that I am not saying “why I vote Democrat now that ‘democracy’, as the US calls their arbitrary electoral system, is in peril”, but “why I have voted Democrat e’ery election I could since I became an adult”. For 1, unlike the many bandwagonning moderate liberals & centrists who have just now noticed, I, as well as many leftists who were actually paying attention, was well aware o’ the US’s creepin’ an’ a crawlin’ toward fascism since the early 2000s, & since I actually have longterm memory, I remember that W. Bush succeeded where Trump failed when the Brooks Brothers managed to successfully Stop the Vote™.

One may be surprised that such a cynical person who memes ’bout Smashing Capitalism™ ( but not thru any actual physical means, ¡’cause that would be tiring! ), writes such extreme-to-the-max claims as the 100% accurate assertion that the US is not & has ne’er been a valid democracy, but is effectively an oligarchy, due to its electoral college, which gives states votes ’stead o’ people; its minority-rule senate, which is also voted in by states, not people; its supreme court for life, who can not only unilaterally eliminate any laws they want, but can also effectively create laws, making them defacto dictators for life, with no o’ersight & almost no practical means for reigning them in, & whose only theoretical boundary is that they have to vaguely fit some ol’ document that the living public ne’er voted on, making the US also effectively a constitutional theocracy; its legalized bribery; the fact that in Soviet America politicians choose voters thru gerrymandering; the stringent voter laws that intentionally make it difficult for ordinary people to vote, including the lack o’ a national holiday for voting, despite the existence o’ dozens o’ useless national holidays, which is unquestionable fact that the US only lacks a voting holiday ’cause the US hates the idea o’ people voting, ’mong many other wacky hijinks that ensue, & who yearly writes an article dunking on Democrats for constantly failing to make meaningful electoral victories despite consistently having many mo’ party members than Republicans for the past century ( it might have something to do with the US not being actually democratic, & therefore popularity is irrelevant to electoral success… ) would be as disgustingly mainstream as to vote for Demo-rats in, like, elections & stuff. I might as well listen to Imagine Dragons & play Among Us. Here are a few reasons:

1. As stated, the US itself hates the idea o’ its plebs voting, since it only begrudgingly taped together a fake democracy to ’scuse their coup gainst the English crown, since it’d be awfully stupid if the US fought a war to “free” themselves from the British monarchy just to become servile to ’nother & ’cause their aristocrats, who were actually s’posed to hold power, needed some means to orderly share power without everyone going to war with each other ( which was the threat that the weaker government set up by the Articles of Confederation was vulnerable to ). That by itself is a good reason to vote: to spite the US.

2. Republicans hate the idea o’ people voting for Democrats. Similarly, making Republicans feel spiteful is in itself a reward. Some may counter, “but then you give up the ability to make Democrats feel spiteful”, but making Democrats spiteful isn’t nearly as fun, tho the urge is tempting whene’er I hear them blame their voting demographic for their failure to make people want to vote for them. The truth is that Democrats spite themselves by their own self-loathing existence, so trying to make them feel spite is just a waste o’ time, whereas Republicans love themselves way too much — probably ’cause they’re the only ones who love them — & could use some spite to round out their character. As per my Pulitzer-winning Satiric Function for Determining Value o’ Mockery for Particular Participants, since Republicans have a higher ratio of opinion o’ their own intelligence vs. their actual intelligence than Democrats, spiting them is mo’ efficient, & therefore the mo’ rational choice.

3. Ironically, my greater cynicism makes me less susceptible to the reasons leftists make for not voting. Since I’ve already established that the US election is a farce, there’s no reason for me to feel any qualms gainst “voting” — that is to say, exploiting what feeble means the US gives me for having influence o’er US power as a form o’ compromise to prevent the plebs from revolting — for a Democrat, who, say, doesn’t shut down Guantanamo Bay ( ¿Why bother? The public has already forgotten it’s still up & keeping people locked up without trial ) or stop drone striking terrorists children & aid workers or mo’ importantly doesn’t raise his fist in the air & proclaim, <¡Down with the bourgeoisie!>, which would be useless, but a’least hilariously awesome to see, c’mon Biden, stop being a coward, since I’m not “voting” for them — I don’t get to choose who gets to be President, much less actually get to choose the specific details o’ policy — but merely flicking a 2-way switch in the direction less likely to lead to dead people. I’m utterly indifferent — actually I hold contempt for — pure-heart leftists who have ne’er soiled their imaginary soul “voting” for a war criminal, ’cause they hold the delusion that makes them not a collaborator to fascists, when the fact is that they still pay taxes & still obey the US government. The fact is that all US citizens are collaborators to fascism, end o’ discussion. It’s better that one acknowledges & accepts this fact & a’least tries to act in an underhanded manner that is most likely to end said fascism & a’least weakens the effects o’ said fascism than act in a purely symbolic manner that will solve nothing other than maybe ending up in Leftist Jesus’s book o’ pure souls & end up in Communist Heaven.

I mean, I guess I could storm the white house in my Super Squirtle Bros. T-shirt & no weapons ( as a sophisticated leftist who supports gun control, I, ’course, don’t have any vulgar guns or military training, which are insignificant in revolutions, which succeed based on how righteous & romantic they are, not based on such tedious vulgarities as tactics, support, & material ), but that would require leaving my house, & I can barely force myself to get out o’ bed. Someone else can do it, K. I’m sure all those savvy politicos who see thru the charade o’ the 2 corporate wings o’ the same party are prepping for that sexy communist revolution that’s going to happen any moment now, just you wait, & aren’t just sitting round whining & doing nothing.

4. It’s not e’en all that accurate to describe me as a “communist”, or anything, tho it certainly wouldn’t be accurate to call me pro-capitalist ( tho I’m sure there are plenty o’ people who will insist I am either-or ’cause I lack the 100% conviction necessary to not be a part o’ the other side ). This is not ’cause I’m an enlightened centrist who both-sides & thinks we should compromise & make poor people only half-slaves to the rich, but ’cause labeling people as political systems is stupid. If you live in a capitalist system, by definition you are not a communist, as you have to act like a capitalist to stay ’live. Only brain-dead libertarians ( ¡but I repeat myself! ) or the sheltered rich think acting 100% by one’s beliefs is the most practical means by which one makes those beliefs successful. For instance, a rich communist who gives all their money ’way to the poor is, perhaps, truer to their beliefs in an abstract, symbolic way ( read: in a religious way ), but they may have actually helped their cause better if they used that power to influence culture & politics toward communism — for example, by bribing politicians ( ¡they’re cheaper than you think! ) or spreading propaganda. Radicals who refuse to vote to stay “true” to their views are accomplishing nothing but self-owning.

The most accurate truth is that I, like any other rational person, am a consequentialist & utilitarian who doesn’t fret so much o’er some fantasy world I’d like to see, but based on the choices I can make in the present real world & what are the likely effects o’ those choices, both short-term & long-term ( the long-term point is important: 1 reason I do criticize filthy moderate “intellectuals” for watering down their opinions for the sake o’ not scaring people & gaining immediate influence on them is that it procrastinates teaching people inevitable reality, which has worse long-term effects; we could’ve avoided the political problems we’re having now if liberals acknowledged from the start that the US electoral system is broken @ its core & worked to solve it, rather than wait till its brokenness became obvious to e’eryone & it became too late to fix it. Unlike voting, where your choices are limited, you have no limits on what you can say, so there’s no reason for me to not go full radical with my pontifications, e’en while voting moderate ). When voting, I don’t think o’ such abstract dreams as “communism”; I think merely in terms o’ the effects o’ voting & not voting, & it turns out that voting Democrat leads to the most efficient outcome out o’ all choices.

5. Voting doesn’t compete with radical action in any way. It’s not like there’s some universal unbreakable law o’ physics that says you can’t vote & revolt @ the same time.

6. I don’t harbor as strong an aversion to “failure” as many mo’ idealistic leftists, mainly ’cause that “failure” barely lost me anything. ’Gain, it’s not as if not voting would’ve created an opportunity for sexy radical communism that I gambled ’way by voting. As obvious from my yearly articles ’bout it, I take Democrats failing for granted. It’s weird seeing so many young people express such disillusionment after voting, like, once, & then seeing Biden, ¡gasp!, didn’t fulfill his promise to erase all student debt. The fact that they expected much from Democrats, specially Democrats who only hold the presidency, the house, & half o’ the senate ( many wrongly claim the Democrats hold all 3 branches, which is obviously wrong: the 3 branches aren’t president, house, & senate; they’re the presidency, legislature, — including both the house & senate — & the supreme court; Democrats only unquestionably control 1 o’ these, arguably controls ’nother, & unquestionably doesn’t control the supreme court, who can just declare anything the other branches pass “unconstitutional”, anyway ), when they don’t e’en accomplish much when they do fully control the government, shows a level o’ political incompetence that is both immense & embarrassing. Like, they actually thought checking a bunch o’ boxes a few times once should’ve guaranteed them all their wishes fulfilled. It makes me wonder if these same people gave up on having jobs after being rejected from 1 job application & then just decided that applying for jobs is a waste o’ time. I thought ’twas obvious to e’eryone that in capitalism if you’re not born rich & powerful you have to fail ’gain & ’gain & ’gain & if you’re extremely lucky the 10,000th time you try you might manage to claw back for yourself a meager crumb o’ success. I don’t know how anyone can e’en survive living without having a strong tolerance for failure. Then ’gain, many o’ these people may be upper-middle-class people who ne’er had to struggle that much to get their material needs &, dabbling in politics, are bewildered by the fact that e’en moderately wealthy people have to try & fail many times to achieve any kind o’ success in politics — which is why they’re so idealistic & not as cynical as I am. Maybe after their family falls into poverty after the middle class collapses & they find they’re ineligible for food stamps ’cause the Republicans cut its funding they’ll discover a potent difference ’tween Democrats & Republicans.

7. In fairness to other leftists who may live in places where it’s hard or nigh impossible to vote, I live in a civilized state where you get your form in the mail, fill it out, & then put it in the mailbox. I probably spend mo’ time ordering groceries for the week than I do voting every half year ( I also understand that primaries are a thing & play a key role in making Democrats less lame, fellow young people who didn’t bother to vote in the 2020 Presidential primary & were “shocked” that their bro boi Bernie Sanders didn’t win & ’stead boring white ol’ inferior Obama whose best accomplishment is still playing as Luigi in Mario Kart won. Thanks, idiots ), which is just the right time investment that voting is worth in the US. I can understand people in 3rd-world US like Texas, where you have to register by mail or in-person ( apparently no one in Texas’s government knows how to use the internet or they think that Bill Gates will hack their computers & replace all their registrations with Bill Gates so he can trick the Texan government into letting him vote millions o’ times ); go thru the tedious rigmarole for getting an ID, which the US government should just send to you without needing to go to the DMV, since they already collect info on every conversation you’re having, anyway ( to be fair, Washington State still requires this if you want to get a job, which is still savagery ); & worse, ’less your ol’ or physically disabled, you have to wait in line for several hours @ some fucking elementary school like some beast. I could understand why somebody wouldn’t consider such degradation worth voting for some Democrat who calls Republicans “pro-rich socialists”, whate’er that is.

8. E’en if I’m cynical ’bout the US’s present electoral system, it’s obvious that I have a morbid curiosity for it in the same way I have a morbid curiosity for modern Nintendo games, e’en tho most o’ them aren’t good & I only play them for like an hour. A’least the US government doesn’t expect me to pay $60 — well, not yet, a’least. Unlike my mo’ idealistic, pure-@-heart fellow leftist who touches no evil, I have no qualms with getting dirty & moving a token with my grubby prole hands, e’en if I only get to move a pawn buried far ’hind giant queens.

CNN, who I have been informed have only just recently become “centrists”, really want us to feel bad for rich, Republican ( which apparently didn’t stop the Democrat President from nominating him for a 2nd term ) Federal Reserve chair, Jay Powell, who had the “iron stomach” to provide “shock therapy” ( as if this writer is giggling ’hind their mouth while glancing @ Naomi Klein’s The Shock Doctrine ), AKA suffering & destitution for others, while he takes no economic risks if he makes any mistakes, a perfect example o’ the US’s “meritocracy”, where only the lower classes have to accept the consequences for their actions ­— or for the actions o’ their superiors, as they get laid off for economic & business policies that they had nothing to do with:

Part of the reason Volcker is remembered so favorably by Powell and others is that it required a savvy mind and an iron stomach to a) understand the problem of rampant inflation, and b) implement the painful shock therapy of interest rate hikes that cost millions of people their jobs. Volcker’s plan worked, but it really sucked for a while. There was indeed some pain, to borrow Powell’s euphemistic phrasing.

Considering poverty rose in the 80s, I want to ask how Volcker’s plan ”worked”, but unlike CNN’s writers, I don’t need to pretend to be too stupid to understand what Volcker’s main goals were. One might wonder why the government would want to sabotage the economy for the many for the sake o’ keeping a tiny minority o’ rich people’s hoarded gold stacks still valuable & able to borrow money @ the cheap right before midterms, but we have to remember that Powell is a Republican, so the answer is probably that he wants to screw o’er Democrats. The better question is why Biden would nominate a Republican for a 2nd term ’stead o’, say, Janet Yellen, who led the US to have the lowest unemployment rate since 1970. The best answer is that Democrats are idiots ( specifically, it’s probably for the sake o’ “decorum” o’ following the long-held pattern o’ always giving Federal Reserve chairs 2 terms, which Trump broke when he only gave Yellen 1 term, as Republicans understand that having mo’ power is always better than following made-up rituals that only help the other side ).

“Volcker’s mantra, one he told me again and again through 2008-9, was that in a crisis the only asset you have is your credibility,” Austan Goolsbee, an economist who advised the Obama administration, wrote in 2019 just after Volcker died at age 92.

“¡The only thing that matters is that we keep the scam ’live!”.

But, wait, we have a bonus bit from CNN:

Congrats, rich people — you ranks are multiplying. Thanks to gains in the stock market and soaring home prices, the world got another 5.2 million millionaires last year, nearly half of whom are in the United States. It’s the largest increase in millionaire numbers for any country in any year this century, according to Credit Suisse, which published its annual global wealth report this week.

Well, it’s good to see we have some good news in this dire economy for on —

Meanwhile, the pandemic has pushed about 100 million people into extreme poverty, raising that global total to 711 million in 2021, according to the World Bank.

O… Right… & there’s ’bout 20 times as many people now in destitution. But “congrats”, I guess. Thank the Invisible Hand for that stock market that, nonetheless, is still not high ’nough, so we need to raise those rates & throw some mo’ people out onto the street. A real human being with any semblance o’ empathy would put the massive increase o’ poverty @ the top & be much mo’ morose, but as we’ve established time & time ’gain, US news organizations aren’t staffed by humans, but by sheltered sociopaths.

It’s that time ’gain: time for ’nother example that proves we live in a postparody world where the most ridiculous satire is, in fact, reality.

Yes, in our hypercapitalist dystopian world, this is real headline I read from Reuters, a news organization people keep telling me is s’posedly 1 o’ the best sources for information: “Gen Z poses a problem for the luxury industry”. As you can see, the zoomzooms have grown up ’nough to join an ol’ tradition that millennials have been a part o’ ( & are still a part o’ ) for decades now: newspapers whining ’bout young people not buying ’nough stupid shit. Thruout the past 2 decades there were way mo’ news articles than I e’er needed to read in my lifetime whining ’bout how millennials were too good with their money to invest in housing bubble schemes to buy shitty, o’ervalued McMansions in suburban wastelands so they can be surrounded by illiterate yokels with houses painted entirely in MAGA election stickers, unlike their parents who went bankrupt buying useless houses in 2007. &, ’course, we can’t forget that unforgettable article we looked @ in my Pulitzer-winning treatise on equisquiliology, “A Year o’ Yuppie Inanity with Mozilla’s Pocket ( An Unpublished Classic )”: “The Raisin Situation”, wherein the fucking The New York Times ( Jesus, what a dogshit ’scuse for a newspaper ) described the valiant efforts o’ some rich guy to bring enlightenment to the savage millennials like Promethean fire & manipulate convince them to buy mo’ raisins.

From $300 bucket hats to $900 sneakers and $700 t-shirts, the high-flying luxury sector is fretting over the appetite among financially stretched Gen Z consumers for such “aspirational” purchases.

If you didn’t catch it, “aspirational” here is a euphemism for “stupid & pointless”.

If you pay close attention you might catch the words “financially stretched” & be curious ’bout the point o’ view o’ the Gen Z people & how they feel ’bout their own financial struggles. Well, you’ll have to use your imagination, as Reuters could only find time in their busy schedules to examine the financial struggles o’ billionaires trying to make up for that li’l bit o’ extra gold they won’t be able to add to their Scrooge McDuck swimming pools o’ gold.

Whereas in North America and Europe, inflation and a rising cost-of-living are hitting discretionary incomes of young consumers especially hard, China’s problem is different.

“In the U.S., inflation is a huge issue, the major focus of a lot of luxury companies … In China, it’s the youth unemployment rate that’s alarming right now,” Kenneth Chow, principal at consultancy Oliver Wyman said.

You selfish proletarians probably thought that unemployment is only a problem for you & your inability to afford basic needs like food & rent, but you forgot to consider the harm this causes for luxury sellers: if you can barely afford to buy food or pay rent, ¿how will you e’er pay them for $300 bucket hats?

Government data for July registers the unemployment rate of China’s urban population aged 16 to 24 at a record 19.9%, exacerbated by the impact of COVID-19 lockdowns and a crackdown on big tech firms that traditionally hired droves of graduates.

“This might be the first time that a lot of young adults (in China) are facing (such an) economic impact, so it will be a testing ground on how these consumers are going to spend on luxury items going forward,” Chow said.

Yes, Chow certainly has his word cut out for him, figuring out the magical mathematical equation to get people without money in a deeply dysfunctional economy devastated by a deadly pandemic & the pall o’ rising authoritarian politics to buy mo’ $700 T-shirts with the words “Ne’er Trust a Taco Tuesday Fart” on it. My thoughts & prayers are out there for our brave luxury sellers.

“If a recession happens, then I will 100% buy less or maybe even stop buying altogether,” said U.S.-based luxury lifestyle and travel TikToker Jeffrey Huang, 28, who shares his Louis Vuitton shopping trips and hauls with his 150,000 followers.

The cancellation o’ Pokémon Card Unboxing #243,143 was mo’ tragic than the premature cancellation o’ Firefly.

And big brands have signaled their intention to grow top end sales of $10,000 handbags and $5,000 coats rather than focus on attracting new entrants onto the bottom rung of the ladder.

This is a smart plan: in economies where the total amount o’ money isn’t shrinking, but the # o’ people who have money are shrinking, with those few gaining much mo’ money, it makes sense to rely less on selling several affordable goods to the masses o’ people going broke & rely more on trying to get as much money out o’ the few goods they sell to the shrinking % o’ rich people, relying on their psychological need for conspicuous consumption to reinforce their economic superiority.

“As the prices are rising, I’m becoming more and more cautious because I feel like I did do a good amount of spending in the last year,” said Sara Yogi, a 26-year-old San Francisco, California resident, adding that she may hold off buying a $2,900 Prada bag and one costing $3,200 from Bottega Veneta which are both on her wish list.

You can tell things are dire when people are reducing themselves to the level o’ caveman savagery by withholding from themselves, like water from a parched throat in a desert, $2,900 bags — which is ’bout $2,900 mo’ expensive than the bags you can just cadge from your local Walmart’s self-checkout stations.

This shift to focus on core luxury consumers also encompasses a cohort of wealthy Gen Z consumers less likely to be impacted by inflation or unemployment.

“1% o’ Gen Z consumers are reported to have said, ‘Fuck you, I’ve got mine’”.

But the concern is over would-be buyers who were meant to help Gen Z account for a fifth of all spending in the luxury goods sector globally by 2025.

You other failures, on the other hand, are shirking what you’re meant to do, which is raise your peoples’ abstract # up to 20%. ¿Have you no shame, poor people? ¿Have you no concern for your responsibility to luxury sellers?

Some luxury labels, including Balenciaga and Dior, are embracing the metaverse —

¡Nope! ¡Stop! ¡I’ve heard ’nough!

This is why Marxism is outdated: imagine wasting so much o’ your time writing 3 volumes attempting to critique capitalism in detail when nowadays you could just say, “Look, guys, capitalism led to the metaverse. ¿What mo’ proof do you need?”.

Virtual sneakers from brands like Gucci have already proved wildly popular, with a price point of $17.99.

Who wants to bet that these virtual sneakers can’t be bought with virtual money.

Whether in the real or virtual world, entry-level products call for high levels of creative investment.

“Creative investment” is an interesting way to say “stupidity”.

“There is this young crowd of consumers that are entering into the market that requires a lot of creativity at more affordable price points,” said Bain partner Claudia D’Arpizio, adding that not all brands are equipped for this.

Yes, I can imagine it takes a lot o’ imagination to convince people to spend money on shit that doesn’t e’en exist ’stead o’, you know, stuff that actually exists & has a use. & by “imagination”, I mean “lying”.

There is good news for brands, however.

Well, that calms my breathing a lot. When unemployment is almost 1/5th o’ the youth population, my greatest concern is always how Tony the fucking Tiger is weathering the storm.

If they do find the right offering of entry-level products, or if the economic situation of Gen Z consumers improves, the desire for luxury products remains undimmed.

This is idiotic. If people don’t have money, they can’t buy shit, no matter how “right” the offering — well, ’less they buy on credit, which will ’ventually run out, & would just be a short-lived bubble if many people did that & would lead to many o’ you idiotic companies going out o’ business. That’s basic math. They keep hammering in the importance o’ some vague “solution”, mostly revolving round inspiring or convincing consumers, when the problem isn’t a lack o’ desire, but a lack o’ money. ¿Are they so stupid that they think poor people can be convinced into becoming richer by enticing them with luxuries?

& the situation for Gen Z consumers won’t improve: if fewer people are buying things, then fewer things will need to be produced, & thus fewer jobs are needed, which will only cause unemployment to rise, & therefore fewer people with money & fewer people buying things. This is also basic math & the basics o’ how recessions work.

“Young people in China are enthusiastic about luxury products,” Yi said. “Lockdowns, or the temporary unemployment rate won’t change their long-term preferences.”

What Reuters fails to mention is the obvious solution to this seemingly inharmonious contradiction ’tween unemployed youth’s desire for expensive, useless junk & their lack o’ money to buy said junk: have the government tax these luxury sellers’ excess money & redistribute to the poor youth so they can buy this junk. Or better yet, only redistribute to people not dumb ’nough to want virtual sneakers & let the luxury sellers go bankrupt, ’cause, now that I think ’bout it, these luxury sellers provide no value to society whatsoe’er & the world would be better off if they were gone. In short: no, Reuters, I don’t give a shit ’bout the problems o’ businesses who don’t belong in any halfway meritocratic or productive economy. A bigger question is why Reuters does & why anyone would consider Reuters a news organization worth taking seriously.