For several years I’ve been a regular contributor to the comments section of Naked Capitalism and was considered very popular. Rather suddenly the tenor of the blog changed and I was suddenly attacked with great vigor as being a blight on the blog where just a half-year previously I was considered a “golden boy.” What changed? Who knows–I suspect some people in high places may have expressed displeasure over my talk of a “deep state” which I carefully explained as being not a strictly hierarchical construction but an emergent network which, it seems, no one quite understood there–if fact I was accused of not understanding it myself.
But the events were not about anything I said–I had written about the deep state some time ago and had not referred to it for quite a while. The real cause of the attacks was the fact I referred to some Paul Craig Roberts links that indicated skepticism about the Charlie Hebdo attacks–that was the final straw for Yves and Lambert.
I’m writing this in case anyone at NC does a search for me to see my side of the story. I only am doing writing this because I had written there for some years and thought people should get an explanation.
The other thing I want to emphasize here is how the general movement in our society towards tribalism infects the left as well as the right. The tendency in many blogs, not just NC, is to see things in black and white terms. Dissent is demonized political correctness is encouraged. If I bring up ideas that come from people either in the ruling class or people on the right and center I am criticized there’s a relatively narrow band of opinion that is encouraged and an inability to listen and accept opinions outside a particular box. This has been a severe problem on all internet discussion sites–the tendency to demonize opposition in order to create coherent tribal boundaries and NC with its view of itself as having a high level of intellectual content simply misses the mark.
I’ve seen this happen over the past year as libertarians are hounded out of discussions and a narrowing of opinion and reluctance to engage intellectually with contrary voices. On balance, NC, has avoided the usual flame-wars.
The moribund nature of the left is due first by an inability to understand how politics really functions, i.e., that it is about the application of force–if you can’t reward friends and punish enemies (non-violently) then you have no seat at the table of politics–end of story. This is hard for most people on the left to grasp. In order to make politics work you need to make alliances–in some areas, as Ralph Nader has pointed out, you need to make alliances with people on the anti-authoritarian right in order to further your agenda–and that’s another way to get power. But these ideas are met with shock and anger by many on NC–how can the left move beyond its own ghetto? If you believe that the assassination of the sixties were a result of government action you are banned from commenting on most sites. So who is left?
Banger's Blog 
Hi Banger — I always enjoyed your posts even if sometimes I didn’t agree — but whatever, it would be very strange for me to find someone I always agreed with.
I have been commenting on and off (very important) since 2008 over at Naked Capitalism. I have seen many commentators come and go. I think the most important thing is to not get hooked on commenting there. it is crucial to take time off — to disappear for six months at a time, etc. Don’t get married to the site, use it as an occasional fling.
I studied the JFK assassination obsessively around 30 years ago (damn I am getting old) and clearly it was a conspiracy. I read a lot about the Deep State but while something like this surely exists, the concept never resonated with me. I suppose if one wanted to do a serious job researching it one would have to start in Turkey, where the concept originated.
Although conspiracy theories are sometimes true, they are also often just used to shield fellow tribal members from blame. For example pro-Islamic voices are promoting the CT around Charlie Hebdo. Which doesn’t mean questions cannot be posed; just that pretty quickly the CT’s become used as smokescreens to hide real problem. You see this with the pro-gun crowd in the US. Whenever there is a mass shooting they start screaming false flag.
That said, conspiracies do happen. In Charlie Hebdo the idea is that it would be it was Mossad who set it up. Yes, they would have an interest in doing so but I’m not at all convinced it is true.
While Lambert lambasted your Deep State conspiracy theories, he was a leading proponent of Deep White, the conspiracy theory of White Privilege where a central committee of redneck crackers is sitting around a table deciding how they are going to screw blacks over (while at the same time allowing Asians to outperform them).
In any case I wish you luck. Among others I comment over at the various blogs at Unz.com (which is trying to do a left/right mix) but they tend to be more to the right (but some of the comments will surprise you). The key is to not get married to one blog but to have several blogs that you can make a booty call on whenever you need. When the tension starts to rise on a blog, back off for several months and then slowly come back.
Cheers,
WCN
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thanks for your comment. I don’t subscribe to any theory of a bunch of guys sitting around the table. I emphasized, and no one seemed to get it, that this Deep State was an emergent neural network–and that seems really obvious to me from my time in Washington. People connect to others who connect to others and those that have the most connections have the most influence (it’s not that simple but you get the idea) . The centers of power a filled with very intelligent and able operatives–I knew some of them from both parties, to name, drop I knew Roger Stone and he and others told me how things work in power. This virtual state is now coming into its own and we need to understand it better and not demonize others as conspiracy theorists. Washington is filled with conspiracies–almost everything there is–most of them very minor in terms of getting things done, getting power and so on. Everything is used, facts, fables, sex and so on. It’s a fucking circus in fact as most historians who have studied empires know–the difference is one of scale–the scale of Washington/NY is beyond anything the Romans or the Ottomans could have imagined and the mechanisms of power much more interesting. It’s a shame so few people are interested in the subject and prefer the fictions in the media and blogs like NC and DKOS–I was also booted from that blog needless to say–it was far, far, far worse than NC. I’ll be back on my own blog more often–I needed a hiatus and kept myself mainly on MSM blogs and FB and maybe focusing a little more on other things. But I’m going to focus on this one and use it to flesh out my ideas.
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Was wondering what happened to you – miss your comments
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It was an interesting ride. Yves actually reluctantly said to me, privately that i was the most popular or influential commentator on the blog yet they banned me for talking about the “deep state” and refusing to debate me on the issue. I believe they got flack from other more powerful folks who read the blog who are in the power structure as you can see if you examine the current blog–much more tame and narrowly focused. But that’s what she wants and so be it. I will be writing more stuff here after a long time in between mainly focused on other blogs and FB.
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I’ve been banned (under different aliases ) from NC more times than I can count and very often for no better reason that what appears to be spite or knee-jerk “oh, this sounds like Beard so I’ll ask him and we know Christians aren’t supposed to lie.” I guess Lambert never heard of the 5th Amendment?
Nevertheless, the points I’ve made are starting to sink in so Yves and Co are going to find it harder to save government-subsidized private credit creation from itself than she’d like.
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I tried that on Daily Kos–got banned twice there. Haven’t tried it on NC because I don’t respect the site at all. I figured out that Yves and Lambert have specific ambitions for the site that is very similar to Daily Kos. They want access to the White House and other powerful players in the game. This is why Lambert was so adamant about the non-existence of the Deep State and would not listen to my definition of it and would address none of the points I made about anything. He just wanted me to shut the fuck up because, as Yves admitted, I was during that last year the most popular poster on the site and that was not going to make a very favorable impression on the Very Serious People they are trying to influence–and, mind you, having been around Washington for as long as I have, I understand that they mean well but the place will corrupt anyone and everyone who plays the game–and they want to play the game of influence. The same goes with nearly all the left-wing blogs online that have some degree of popularity. The right blogosphere is more honest and more open than the left where you can’t say anything without being attacked for being politically incorrect. Sanders, by being blunt–may rescue the left from its own meekness and schoomarmishness–we’ll see.
Thanks for replying.
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