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It's no secret that the housing crisis in CA is a humanitarian catastrophe. In CA (as in many other right-wing dictatorships), the law enshrines numerous privileges for landlords and corporate developers.

One of these is the Costa-Hawkins act, a special exemption that forbids any municipality from controlling rents on "new construction", which includes any housing built after 1995.^1^

There is a proposition 33^2^ on the ballot to repeal this privilege. Thankfully, the Council for Affordable Housing is here to protect the poor landlords. They are blasting the airwaves with shameless misinformation, claiming that weakening landlord privileges would imperil rent control as a whole. They join a deep tradition of corporate developers masquerading as pro-housing advocates.^3^

The anchor point of this is the far-right trickle-down housing narrative, which is sadly very popular in otherwise "progressive" urbanist circles. The basic parts of this corporate developer-backed myth are:

  • Increasing the availability of housing is sufficient to make it affordable
  • Decommodifying housing will exacerbate the housing crisis by disincentivising corporate developers from increasing availability

More information about the dark money behind the "No on prop 33" campaign. And this is for just one of many landlord privileges like this. Dictatorship of the bourgeoisie in action.

Sorry for linking the lib sites.

^1^ This date is absolute---it's the date the law was signed into effect. So "new construction" is never transferred into the "affordable rental housing" market under this law.

^2^ For those unfamiliar, a "proposition" is basically a plebiscite/referendum.

^3^ See for example the infamous "California YIMBY".

[-] COMBAT_OBAMUNISM@hexbear.net 53 points 3 months ago

ukkkraine launched either the early stages of an offensive (reconnaissance in force) or a feint from Sumy across the border into the Russian Federation, into Kursk oblast.

  • The fighting is ongoing, and Ukrainian losses appear substantial.
  • Misinformation and conflicting accounts are in abundance, with some accounts reporting that the NATO regime in Kyiv has amassed a full brigade in this direction while others suggest this is little more than another PR stunt.
  • The attack has also generated a few "victories" for Kyiv, including footage of a Ka-52 shot down and a small group of captured Russian soldiers. Some vehicles apparently made it a few km in before they were destroyed.
  • There is a degree of frustration among some ostensibly pro-UA sources over opening a new front at a time when military resources and personnel are stretched thin.

It's still early, so there aren't many reliable sources. Here is the report from Rybar (CW: Twitter---every kind of reactionary, pro-imperialist comment)

[-] COMBAT_OBAMUNISM@hexbear.net 61 points 3 months ago

Might not quite qualify as news, but market indices across the Transpacific satellites have cratered after Monday's opening. Not even close to being a finance person so I might be relaying some information incorrectly; perhaps others who are more informed can chime in.

japan-cool Nikkei was down ~7 percent over the past 2 days, its largest such drop ever (but has recovered some), nearly 20pct contraction from peak

Occupied Korea: KOSPI down 7pct over the past week, triggered a halt when futures precipitously dropped

roc-cool down nearly 7pct just today

[-] COMBAT_OBAMUNISM@hexbear.net 54 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

With much of the world's attention directed toward West Asia, there was another large-scale ukkkraine drone attack against targets within the pre-2014 borders of the Russian Federation last night. The attack appears to have saturated air defences. Targets where strikes were successful include several oil facilities, an apartment block, and an ammunition depot on the grounds of the Morozovsk airfield.

Sources that follow are from Twitter, so standard CWs apply: reactionary and pro-imperialist content is ubiquitous in the comments.

Pro-Russian source (summary from Rybar)

Pro-Ukrainian "OSINT" source (satellite imagery of Morozovsk after the ammo depot was blown)

(edit: word order)

[-] COMBAT_OBAMUNISM@hexbear.net 65 points 3 months ago

Imperial media agencies are reporting that "anonymous officials" affiliated with the IRGC say Khamenei has issued a directive to strike the occupation entity directly (CW: Imperial/pro-Zionist source with all that entails)

Several Resistance-adjacent sources however are suggesting this could be a fake leak planted by the occupation to manufacture justification for "preemptive" aggression against Iran and the axis

Delta and United Airlines (US airlines) and British Airways have suspended flights to Ben Gurion

[-] COMBAT_OBAMUNISM@hexbear.net 22 points 3 months ago

amerikkka and zelensky-pain working to pressure eu-cool into dumping all those ruZZian aZZets and demolishing the euro?

[-] COMBAT_OBAMUNISM@hexbear.net 57 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

For the Burgerreich electoral theatre watchers/speculators, a phone call between brandon and Harris campaign just dropped. His first "appearance" since something like the 17 July. Starts just after the 2 min mark. Another brief exchange with Harris is around 11:20. It's a minimal voice sample, but you can judge for yourself if this is the same Joe Biden we've been hearing from.

Harris: I knew you were still there. You're not going anywhere, Joe!

(edit: corrected time stamp)

[-] COMBAT_OBAMUNISM@hexbear.net 11 points 4 months ago

voting for Joe Biden is not an endorsement of Joe Biden

And yet, anything but fullthroated support for the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians to the imperial extraction regime in ukkkraine means you love Vladolf Putler according to these same people

Libs are truly incapable of self-reflection

[-] COMBAT_OBAMUNISM@hexbear.net 70 points 5 months ago

The situation in Lebanon continues to escalate. Earlier today, Hezbollah successfully directed a significant drone attack against an occupation outpost, destroying a settler military unit.

Source 1 (Al-Mayadeen)

Source 2 (telegram)

Source 3 (telegram)

There are now reports on telegram and twitter that aggression from the occupier has ratcheted up, including what seem to be indiscriminate missile attacks / air strikes against south Lebanon, mostly near the city of Tyre. As always CW for possible reactionary content, and wait for confirmation from more reliable sources

video 1 tweet 2

[-] COMBAT_OBAMUNISM@hexbear.net 8 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

As somebody who is pretty ignorant of the region and theory as regards multinationalism vs national self-determination, the Spanish system (within the Iberian landmass, saying nothing of the obvious historical exploitation relations with regard to overseas occupations) of "autonomous communities" superficially appears relatively progressive. Now, when we factor in that the side seeking further autonomy or independence is often left-aligned and struggling against a bourgeois dictatorship deeply ensconced in EU institutions, the case for support is clear. But on the other hand vulgar support for "national self-determination" is an imperial instrument of the liberal order that is selectively used to empower ultranationalists against multinational or pluralistic systems, as seen in Xinjiang, Yugoslavia, the USSR cases.

So I guess I'm asking, outside the scope of exploitation of one people by another and the superstructure (e.g., racialisation of an underclass) that emerges from this, what are the cases for supporting independence movements? And is there any recommended theory on this? I'm not talking about the obvious cases here (like "New Caledonia"), but for instance Scotland--critical support for the breakup of one of history's most brutal metropoles, but potentially at the cost of strengthening a modern institution of the hard right, the EU.

[-] COMBAT_OBAMUNISM@hexbear.net 45 points 7 months ago

The president of Kyrgyzstan, Sadyr Japarov, has recently signed into law major restrictions on imperial NGOs (ratified last month). Some here might recall similar events in Georgia around a year ago sparking an attempted colour revolution. Hopefully Kyrgyzstan's better economic integration with China and Eurasia (and the absence of any delusions about eu-cool ) will lead to a cleaner expulsion of imperial influences.

Relatedly, Georgia's government has not given up on their efforts to ratify an anti-NGO bill. (Although the western-sponsored riots in Tbilisi around a year ago successfully intimidated the plurality Georgian Dream party into withdrawing the bill, it failed to remove the government.) Now a resurrected bill is back in the news after the parliament voted on and passed a first reading. The president has declared intentions to veto, while the plurality party continues to back it with the potential of recruiting supermajority support.

[-] COMBAT_OBAMUNISM@hexbear.net 55 points 7 months ago

Major protests in solidarity with the resistance have renewed in Amman, Jordan during the past several days. The focus of the protests is the embassy of the occupier, with which the Hashemite puppet regime retains numerous agreements and close ties. The police enforcers of the Hashemite regime have continued their months-long crackdown against the overwhelmingly pro-Palestine population and responded with the usual state violence.

CW: police, beating, descriptions of violence

Source 1 (video)

Source 2 (video)

Source 3 (text)

To be clear, most of the reports were from the night before

view more: next ›

COMBAT_OBAMUNISM

joined 7 months ago