/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.22801433]

Are there any good books about modern politics or is it all just random politician's hit or fluff pieces with no substance? What writers or recommendations should I be looking for?

[Anonymous No.22801489]

Blood Meridian .
I am not even joking .
It´s really what are you asking for it in your question .
I suggest to read to the beginning to the end , if possible reread .
https://altair.pw/pub/lib/Cormac%20Mccarthy%20-%20The%20Blood%20Meridian.pdf

[Anonymous No.22801496]

>>22801489
It's not at all what I was asking for but thank you for the recommendation.

[Anonymous No.22801536]

>>22801433
John Mearshimers Tragedy of Great Power Politics/The Israel Lobby are both great
Chip War by Chris Miller
Killing the Host by Michael Hudson
No Trade Is Free by Robert Lighthizer
Revolt of the Elites by Christopher Lasch
The Unspoken Kennedy Truth by Laurent Guyenot
The Transgender Industrial Complex by Scott Howard
American Pravda by Ron Unz
The Long Truce by A.J. Conyers
Testimony by Jon Ward
Putinomics by Chris Miller
Wireless Wars by Jonathan Pelson

[Anonymous No.22801548]

>>22801536
Oh gosh I cant believe I forgot
Suicide of a Superpower by Buchanon.

[Anonymous No.22801569]

>>22801536
I have little to no respect for Mearshimers analysis, but I've only seen what he's written about the Ukraine War. He comes off as someone stuck in an outdated Cold War mindset who refuses to admit that Russia simply isn't a great power anymore. I'll keep these in mind, though.

[Anonymous No.22801573]

he is on the cusp of turning into Sulla if he manages to get back in. The Prison sentence is his Hidler arc

[Anonymous No.22801576]

>>22801536
Also, in terms of what you SHOULD be looking for. Generally I always think you should look for books regarding topics and stay away from ideological musings. I do not mean by this that you should be a centrist or to not have an ideology, but I mean in the sense that many people gravitate toward books that advocate for this or that ism. But these things, these "isms", are downstream from political issues both economical and cultural before they even do the homework on the issues. So no Mein Kampf, no For My Legionairres, no Das Kapital, no Leviathan, no Against the State. Read Theology/Philosophy and apply it and none of these manifestos waxing and waning about what the state aught to be and who it is for and how should it be structured and what it should do should be mostly evident already.

[Anonymous No.22801601]

>>22801569
The thing with Russia and also China is that because of who they are and how their country is they are destined to become powerful countries because they have strong economies backed by a lot of natural resources and a lot of land mass and population. Russia will become a great power again most likely if it isnt already basically one right now. The west knows this and that is why they are shitting their pants about the Ukraine war, because it is a signal that the unipolarity of the United States is ending. Mearshimer is actually correct in that regard. That doesnt mean I support the U.S. in the Ukraine thing, but objectively he is correct that Russia isnt in the run down state it had been in the 2000s

[Anonymous No.22801629]

>>22801569
He recognizes Russia as a military- and resource-based great power (how are they not after standing up to nato and winning?), and China as a peer competitor.

[Anonymous No.22801633]

>>22801576
I've already read Leviathan, so I've already failed you

>>22801601
It's the exact opposite for Russia though. The Ukraine War is the last desperate hail mary of a dying empire. Russia doesn't have a big enough population to be a major player going forward, and it's declining harshly. They are falling further and further behind in all tech sectors and their military is increasingly outdated. They can pretend they are keeping par all they want, you actually have to field the modern equipment you say you have for it to matter. America's unipolarity is probably ending, but only in the face of China's rise; Russia is destined to become China's gas station and nothing more.

[Anonymous No.22801644]

>>22801629
They have no been standing up to NATO though. They've been beat back by a smattering of NATO toys in the hands of Ukraine and just Ukraine. They've failed all their original objectives of the war, the best they can hope for now is a cucked truce where they hold on to half of 4 provinces instead of a full defeat of Ukraine and installation of a new government like they wanted. They've pushed Ukraine out of the Russia sphere of influence forever, it's an abject failure for them.

[Anonymous No.22801664]

>>22801644
Ukraine hasnt been in Russias sphere of influence since the U.S. backed color revolution in 2014

[Anonymous No.22801692]

>>22801644
They've failed all their "original objectives" having degraded the enemy militarily and annexed four oblasts? Why were they ready to negotiate days into the war? Smattering of nato toys, only Ukrainian troops? That's cope. Ukraine will barely be a country when it's done. It wasn't as easy as they may have expected but the West has turned out to be far more retarded than they expected also. Gas station is the exact shit they were saying before all this. I don't think it's so easy to predict what the realignment of most of the world outside America and Europe will look like. You sound like a very confident Spook Zeihan listener.

[Anonymous No.22801715]

>>22801644
>>22801633
Last gasp of a dying empire? That is cartoonish, in January of 2022 before the war started Zelensky said they would join NATO and acquire nuclear weapons. Why should Russia, one of the most powerful states on the globe even if they are behind, accept having a military alliance and nukes on their border? Russia has layed out time and time again that they wont accept Ukraine being in NATO but the west went for it anyway, it is unacceptable for their national security.
and the demographics point is frankly irrelevent because China and Americas demographics are just as bad. America tries to hide it with immigration but all it is doing is creating an underclass that doesnt work and actually costs them money.

[Anonymous No.22801723]

politics hasnt changed in the 200 years that the atheists have done their revolutions.

[Anonymous No.22801729]

>>22801715
and on top of that, "China's gas station" is supposed to be desparaging. But dont forget Chinas entire economic resurgence was built on being Americas factory. Being "China's gas station" essentially means they will be in a lucrative economic partnership with one of the strongest nations in the world. Americas unstable service economy is also unsustainable, it cant last as it is

[Anonymous No.22801742]

>>22801496
you must be retarded

[Anonymous No.22801885]

>>22801715
>3 day ”special” military operation
>day 654…
It has been utter debacle the soviets, casualty figures alone demonstrate what an utterly subhuman empire Russia is today. A society of insects dying because Tsar cannot be perceived as weak, held together by lies and fear of gulags and being sent to the frontline. Future is uncertain, there will be no great revival of empire.

[Anonymous No.22801899]

>>22801664
The US did not back 2014, not a shred of evidence for that.

>>22801692
Their original objective of capturing Kiev and installing a puppet government, yes. Then they fell back to their secondary objective, capturing Eastern Ukraine, and then they got kicked out of Kherson and Kharkiv so they fell back to the even more cope ridden third objective of just taking Donbas. So yes, they already failed and are now fighting for to make it a slightly less pathetic failure.

>>22801715
Russia already had a military alliance on their doorstep called NATO, they had for years. Ukraine joining NATO doesn't change anything for Russia unless Russia had plans to invade Ukraine, which would in turn justify Ukraine's desire to join NATO. It's Ukraine's decision to join if they want to anyway, Russia doesn't have the right to decide and their attempt to stop it, this war, has proven that they're not capable of preventing it.

[Anonymous No.22802630]

>>22801899
>not a shred of evidence for that
I bet you think Russia blew up their own pipeline too

[Anonymous No.22803147]

tip top kek
imagine the entire combined weight of the ZOG-western world, flailing and failing embarrassingly against a corrupt krokodil shithole

[Anonymous No.22803522]

>>22803147
>imagine the entire combined weight of the ZOG-western world
yeah... imagine... great point

[Anonymous No.22803552]

>>22801885
Imagine being this much of a pleb

>>22801899
>It's Ukraine's decision to join if they want to anyway, Russia doesn't have the right to decide and their attempt to stop it, this war, has proven that they're not capable of preventing it.

Russia has been preventing it for the last 2 years at this point. They've swallowed half of Ukraine and coming for the other half. Its historical russian land anyway.

[Anonymous No.22803575]

>>22801433
Fukuyama's "Origins of Political Order" and "Political Order and Political Decay" is a good summary of all the work on state development.

Honneth's Freedom's Right is a pretty good application of Hegel to modern politics.

[Anonymous No.22803608]

>>22803552
>Imagine being this much of a pleb
That's the problem mate, you live in your imagination, but don't worry, reality will bitchslap you to reality. It always does.

[Anonymous No.22803851]

>>22801569
Mearsheimer has a new book. I think you can get some things out of it, but I noticed this critique in Foreign Affairs:

>Their new book is sweeping. In How States Think, Mearsheimer and Rosato examine policymakers’ collective choices from World War I to the present. They revisit major choices from the past that have often been considered nonsensical and argue that they were, in fact, quite rational. Even Germany’s disastrous 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union and Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor that same year are cited as rational decisions.

>Some of Mearsheimer and Rosato’s criticisms are valid. The authors correctly point out that “rationality” is a foggy term, and they are rightfully dismissive of commentators who decide whether an action was a success “and then reason backward” to determine whether it was rational. The authors also effectively pick apart overly narrow definitions of rationality that make almost every leader come off as a cartoonish madman.

>But when Mearsheimer and Rosato begin to spell out their own theory of rationality, the book’s claims unravel. They write that rationality is “making sense of the world for the purpose of navigating it in the pursuit of desired goals” and that rational decisions are those based on theories supported by “realistic assumptions,” “compelling causal logic,” and “evidentiary support.” It is a formulation that is just as squishy as the definitions they take down. All leaders, after all, think their theories, ideas, and choices are consistent, logical, and well supported—and there is rarely an objective test that can prove otherwise or that does not rely on post hoc reasoning.

>The authors unintentionally illustrate this problem when they explain which theories they consider credible and which ones they do not. They dismiss as unconvincing the domino theory, which holds that if one country becomes a democracy or a communist dictatorship, then its neighbors would quickly make the same switch. Yet they argue that Putin’s belief that Russia and Ukraine are part of one country is credible because, historically, Ukraine has been Moscow’s strategic buffer against the rest of Europe. There is no objective reason why decisions guided by domino theory are irrational and Putin’s attack on Ukraine is not. But there is a subjective one. Mearsheimer and Rosato are both realists, and according to their version of realism, Putin’s decision was the natural response to NATO expansion. A theory’s credibility, in other words, is in the eye of the beholder.
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/reviews/why-smart-leaders-do-stupid-things

[Anonymous No.22803943]

>>22801692
>They've failed all their "original objectives" having degraded the enemy militarily and annexed four oblasts? ... Ukraine will barely be a country when it's done.
That may be true, but Ukraine is historically part of their sphere anyways according to the Russian government's own logic, so Ukraine being destroyed is, from this perspective, part of the ongoing destruction of the former Russian empire. It's self-contradictory in that way and also mutually destructive. It seems the result will be that both Russia and Ukraine lose a lot, Europe loses some but not as much, and the U.S. and China gain a little.

>Gas station is the exact shit they were saying before all this.
True. Russia is not just a gas station, it has a big military which is a lot of capability with the political will to invade Ukraine. That counts for a lot more than the gas station down the street from my house. I agree with the other anon that Russia is in long-term decline. A lot of numbers for them particularly the mortality rate for men are pretty shocking, much worse than the U.S. or China.

>>22801715
>Russia has layed out time and time again that they wont accept Ukraine being in NATO but the west went for it anyway, it is unacceptable for their national security.
From their perspective, you're right. But part of the problem is that the end result makes that outcome permanent anyways. I remember Kissinger getting some love from people sympathetic the Russian position on this because he said it would wise for Ukraine to make peace and give Russia the eastern territories and then Ukraine would be neutral. But they didn't show the same love when he later said that Ukraine should now join NATO because the ship has sailed basically. Also I think part of the fact -- or among the changing facts on the ground -- is that a significant amount of Russian military capability has been destroyed (even if Russia is holding onto some territory). There's also the Ukrainian position to consider, because as a matter of fact, they do still control most of the country.

Point is, strategic mistakes can accelerate outcomes you don't want. Saddam once thought Kuwait was part of Iraq and then he did a stupid thing.

>>22801729
>Americas unstable service economy is also unsustainable, it cant last as it is
Sure, and I have some problems with it. But the U.S. is the second industrial power in the world along with China and it has an enormous domestic market. It produces more natural gas than Russia and more oil than Saudi Arabia. Don't assume the U.S. can't build stuff. It does have problems here, to be sure, but the U.S. is actually much less reliant on international trade than many countries which is why Trump could get away with a lot of his schemes I think.

[Anonymous No.22803947]

>>22801433
>Within the concentric circles of Trump's regime lies an unseen culture of occultists, power-seekers, and mind-magicians whose influence is on the rise. In this unparalleled account, historian Gary Lachman examines the influence of occult and esoteric philosophy on the unexpected rise of the alt-right.

>Did positive thinking and mental science help put Donald Trump in the White House? And are there any other hidden powers of the mind and thought at work in today's world politics? In Dark Star Rising: Magick and Power in the Age of Trump, historian and cultural critic Gary Lachman takes a close look at the various magical and esoteric ideas that are impacting political events across the globe. From New Thought and Chaos Magick to the far-right esotericism of Julius Evola and the Traditionalists, Lachman follows a trail of mystic clues that involve, among others, Norman Vincent Peale, domineering gurus and demagogues, Ayn Rand, Pepe the Frog, Rene Schwaller de Lubicz, synarchy, the Alt-Right, meme magic, and Vladimir Putin and his postmodern Rasputin. Come take a drop down the rabbit hole of occult politics in the twenty-first century and find out the post-truths and alternative facts surrounding the 45th President of the United States with one of the leading writers on esotericism and its influence on modern culture.

[Anonymous No.22804118]

>>22801899
> Their original objective of capturing Kiev
Are you stupid? Capturing Kiev would have led to immense civil losses. It's a huge industrial city with a lot of population, it would be a disaster.
Look at the Georgian War. The capital, Tbilisi, was never taken, and yet the Russians won. It only took them 7 days.
I hate Americans and their lapdogs because they don't seem to understand that their actions have consequences. They don't understand what it means to be a neighbor. They perceive everything as if it was a videogame.
> "Take the Kiev!"
> "Install puppet government!"
It's so easy to utter these words from your mom's basement on the other side of the Earth. It's so easy to never think. USA have destroyed — and I mean really destroyed — demolished, massacred Yugoslavia, Irak, Afganistan, Vietnam. Half of these countries are now shitholes, and another half are not even a countries anymore. USA comes, destroys and then leaves.
And the stupidest thing is… they believe this is normal. They really believe it's normal to play with people's lifes like they are less valuable than the pecks of dust. And they expect — yes, expect! — everybody else to have this mindset, and if they don't… well, they must be weak then! Russia didn't bomb Tbilisi into the stone age — they must be weak! Russia didn't unleash shoke and awe unto their historical partners, who are considered to be a "brother nation" amongst the population — well, they must be a failing empire then!
And the most stupid thing is that Russian elites don't even want to play geopolitics or "install puppet governments" and would have been happy to simply freeze the conflict and sign another piece of toilet paper telling Ukraine to "not join the NATO too soon and do something about Donbass please" they have been signing for the last 8 years. But you, degenerates, just cannot think outside the box, can you?
I wish you to experience first hand the true meaning of the world "indifference", you hypocrite bitch.

[Anonymous No.22804150]

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[Anonymous No.22804373]

>>22804118
>Half of these countries are now shitholes, and another half are not even a countries anymore.
>Yugoslavia, Irak, Afganistan, Vietnam.
Sorry to be the one to tell you but those "countries" have always been shitholes. Now go buy a new tracksuit to cheer yourself up, Vlad.

[Anonymous No.22804681]

>>22804118
>Are you stupid? Capturing Kiev would have led to immense civil losses. It's a huge industrial city with a lot of population, it would be a disaster.
Yeah, but someone should've explained that to Putin two years ago. So, obviously, I don't know what's rattling around inside his head, but I think he believed Ukraine was like Afghanistan. You know, American puppet, would collapse if given a push, and the U.S. is in decline anyways and had just retreated from Afghanistan with its tail between its legs. I think he believed that, but if he had known what was going to happen, he wouldn't have done it.

>And the most stupid thing is that Russian elites don't even want to play geopolitics
I don't believe that. The Russian elites are obsessed with geopolitics. They can never stop yapping about it. They're lost in it. Actually during the Soviet period, geopolitics was condemned as a tool of militarism. But since then, geopolitics has almost become a new unifying ideal, and every nation needs an ideal. And if you don't have any exciting ideas or an ideology to offer, you go with what God gives you, which is geography (and resources).

It's all this Mackinder stuff. Geography is everything and has a magical effect in how the world works, like an invisible hand that you can figure out. Okay, well, by that viewpoint, Russia was originally just a small principality trapped deep in the forest. By chance, it became a superpower spanning Europe and Asia. The extremely harsh living environment, vast territory, and history of Mongol invasions created Russia's mentality of continuous expansion in modern times, and even a fascination with violence and tyranny.

[Anonymous No.22804981]

>>22804118