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Thinking About Rome
In the flickering neon of late capitalism, we glimpse the mirrored chrome of a fallen giant. The Roman Republic, that sprawling, data-driven empire, its coliseum servers humming with gladiatorial content, serves as a stark historical prompt. Remember the burn Notice, the flickering scroll that announced the Empire’s terminal error? It wasn’t a barbarian horde at the gates, chums, it was a system crash. Reliance on a…
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Gamblers are Fragilistas
Dig this, man. These fragilistas, these jitterbugging fiends of the roulette wheel, ain’t some high rollers out for a score.Naw, they’re optionality junkies, strung out on the fumes of some imaginary jackpot. Blind as bats to the house edge, that meat grinder slowly chomping away at their stacks. Volatility, baby, that’s their drug. Each spin a potential freak wave of fortune, a Black Swan of bling that…
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Allons Enfants
France. A bureaucratic behemoth, a sluggish centipede choked on Brie and Beaujolais. The glorious postwar dream of prosperity curdles into a nightmare of rising debt, a fromage-fueled fever dream. France. A Gaullic hallucination, a decadent Disneyland sketched by de Sade. The once-proud engine of industry, sputtering, gears grinding into existential cheese rinds. The welfare state,…
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The revolution will not be televised, it’ll be live-streamed, monetized, and sponsored by a megacorp and then it will turn out that it never really happened
Venusian fluorescents bled across the greasy monitor, illuminating a grainy, handheld view of the Ministry buckling under a tide of bodies. Or were they extras, hired by the hour to flesh out the revolution aesthetic? The caption, pulsating in a font stolen from a discount cyber-goth store, read “End The Feed! Power To The Proles!” – a slogan as pre-chewed and digestible as…
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The Commodification of Authenticity
Authenticity? A phantom limb, a ghost in the machine, flickering in the space between manufactured personas. We twitch and posture, marionettes dancing to the tune of unseen puppeteers. Every citizen a brand, These chrome-plated corporations pump out pre-fab individuality like some deranged filling station. Freedom? Progress? You got it, chum – freedom to be a…
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Common Knowledge
Common knowledge bleeds through the streets like a junky’s last fix. Coronations and executions, public spectacles of power and death, not for the king or the condemned but for the hungry eyes of the crowd devouring itself. The laugh track howls, a narcotic rhythm pumped into sitcom veins. American Idol’s studio audience, a pulsing mass…
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Fear and Loathing in the Supreme Court
SCOTUS Smackdown: A Legalized Thunderdome Here’s the CliffsNotes, man: this term, the Supremes have been on a bender, rewriting the whole damn rulebook. So here we are, America, knuckles white around the latest SCOTUS screed. These supposed guardians of justice have been snorting a mystery brand of powdered liberty and it’s got them raving like a pack of hyenas…
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The French Bourgeoisie: A Cut-Up Caper with a Side of Fascism
The French bourgeoisie, oh those respectable frock-coated fiends. Power was their aphrodisiac, and they weren’t picky about the bedfellows it brought. Here’s a glimpse into their sordid little boudoir of political maneuvering: 1. The July Monarchy: 1830 to 1848. A constitutional monarchy? Now that was a cut-up they could dig. A king with a leash, a system that kept the rabble at bay – pure bourgeois bliss! …
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Nero
Emperor Nero (Rome): A teenage viper thrust onto the golden throne, dripping with silk and delusions of grandeur. Fiddled while Rome burned, they say. But the fire was a flicker compared to the inferno raging inside his skull. A mother, Agrippina the Ambitious, a she-wolf in a silk dress, clawed her way to power through…
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