Political Tea Leaves

Saturday, July 5, 2025

Thoughts for the Progressive Paranoiac

The Dawn of Real Authority...

...from Real Violence

...& Birthing Symbolic Authority from Its' Shadow in the Process

Mladen Dolar concisely formulates Hannah Arendt's reflections on authority. Symbolic authority essentially functions as a postponed threat, a suspended force or violence. It works as authority only for as long as it does not need to directly deploy force. The moment it does, authority loses its authority.
In relation to authority, authoritarianism starts at the opposite end. It begins as an already lost authority. It usually starts with force and the realization of threats and tries to make its way back to the impossible point of the coincidence of symbolic authority with the real. In authoritarianism, authority is over-realized. Authoritarianism is all about realization. We do things and efficiently, not just talk about them. Yet at the same time, this realization is desperately trying to reach the point of symbolic efficiency. That is the efficiency of talk itself, which remains inaccessible to it. This inaccessibility is the driving force of the surplus, realization, and efficiency. The flood of executive orders we are witnessing these days is not merely a strategy to overwhelm the opposition. It is also a need that drives this particular authoritarian order which operates through a peculiar combination of paranoia and perversion. Or should we say that in the position of symbolic power, paranoia becomes a form of perversion.

Trump's Enhanced Symbolic Authority

Rests upon the Foundation of his Ability to Unleash the Very Real of Violence

Friday, July 4, 2025

Thursday, July 3, 2025

Xi Jinping Demoted. Zhang Youxia His Boss?

Big Changes to CCP and PLA Leadership

What About the US-China Trade Deal?

China Opening Up?

...or the CCP Simply Reducing Xi's Symbolic Authority whilst Increasing Its' Own?

When Capitalism Replaces Commerce

...and EVERYTHING Gets Commodified.

Will CIA go the criminal sustainment route to replace the USAID funding? Or will the billionaires set up more hedge funds and private NGOs (ala Soros) to fund and coordinate their "Capacity Built" influence projects?