Wertheimer

(brief pause while I google this)

Mein Gott, I almost found one.

I have a turbolib neighbor whom I've never met, but since they're flag enthusiasts with what must be an insane vexillology budget I use them to figure out which way the wind is blowing (as it were). It took them weeks after Biden dropped out to remove their "BIDEN / HARRIS 2024" banner, but their hand-painted blue-and-yellow "STOP THE WAR" sign has never wavered, except after storms, when it sometimes takes them a few days to notice it's become askew.

Anyway, since Biden has dropped out their flags have come and gone fairly quickly. There was a donkey, a more straightforward Harris/Walz flag, and another Ukrainian flag. Since the election they had a week or two with a Mexican flag, before moving on to an upside-down American one and another with an illegible message. March Madness must have meant they wanted to (briefly) support their favorite college team, but that team must have lost because now we have another Ukrainian flag up top and, finally, for the first time, a Palestinian flag flying beneath it.

I happened upon this while on my way to the library to pick up this book, which I guess has already been proven partially correct.

https://theonion.com/stuck-in-the-timiddle-with-you/

Despite the terror, the early weeks of the pandemic contained perhaps more hope than I've felt in the subsequent five years. It became more apparent than ever where the weak links in capital's chain were located. Millions of people realized that their jobs were bullshit. The massive decrease in commuter vehicles proved that there were actually ways we could alter society to combat climate change. Powerful people started talking about universal basic income and universal healthcare.

Then it seems like the 1% got together on Zoom or whatever and put an end to all of that. There was a drumbeat of "it's patriotic to let grandma die." (Was Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick the first to say it out loud?) Teachers' unions became villains for wanting to prevent children and workers from spreading the plague. The people whose jobs couldn't go remote were given the title "essential workers" but never got sick days. In the months and years that followed, the Democrats nominated their most anti-healthcare candidate, who went on to crush a strike that threatened to give supply chain workers sick days. The CDC took its isolation recommendations from Delta Airlines, and masks became rarer and rarer. And worse, and worse, and worse, and millions of people are dead or disabled and we're further into fascism and farther from universal healthcare than we were five years ago.

I'm looking for books or longform essays about this switch, because the change happened very quickly - before the George Floyd uprising, even. Today too much of this is lost in the memory hole, but I wonder if studying the days in which the discourse changed can give us clues about where we should direct our organizing efforts.

Recommended by @MF_COOM@hexbear.net in this post

Looks great but I can't find it on LibGen or Anna's Archive.

Thanks for the help!

lol

The California Department of Motor Vehicles issued an apology Thursday after a personalized license plate referencing the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel was spotted in Culver City (Los Angeles County).

The custom plate, on a Tesla Cybertruck, read “LOLOCT7,” combining internet slang for “laugh out loud” with a reference to the Hamas-led assault in which nearly 1,200 Israelis were killed and 250 were kidnapped.

The organization StopAntisemitism raised concerns about the plate on social media, condemning it as a “sickening display” that appeared to trivialize the violence.

In response, the DMV quickly apologized, calling the plate “unacceptable and disturbing.”

The department acknowledged that the plate had been approved due to an error in its internal review process and vowed to strengthen its procedures to prevent such oversights.

“The DMV Is taking swift action to recall these shocking plates, and we will immediately strengthen our internal review process to ensure such an egregious oversight never happens again,” the department said in a statement.

It added, “The use of hateful language is not only a clear violation of our policies but also a violation of our core values to proudly serve the public and ensure safe and welcoming roadways.”

A DMV spokesperson confirmed that the owner of the Cybertruck, who was not publicly identified, would be notified of the recall, though they could appeal the decision.

The agency also stated that it would review its entire database of personalized license plates, also known as vanity plates, to identify any similar content.

Books, Letterboxd reviewers, Substacks, anything. I've been watching a bunch of Czechoslovak New Wave films and so many of the English-language essays I can find about them have brainworms and insist that every film by an Eastern European director is first and foremost an anti-communist allegory.

This book looks great but doesn't cover all of the movements I'm interested in.