When you said "Chess" I was like aaaaaa but I've been playing it for the past hour - its a great commendation.

I am the Madam of this web. I am Madam Webb!

1. Colonial exploitation → funds liberal democracy
2. Erosion of exploitation → erodes that material base

What if Western democracy was never primarily about values?

What if it was, at least partly, about what extraction could afford? (5/5)

Eventually those neo-colonial arrangements fray. Former colonies build new alliances, new partners. The old circuits don't deliver like they used to.

Suddenly the "core" countries are economically exposed in ways they haven't been in generations. (4/5)

The sequence: Colonies win independence → but colonizers leave behind structures (comprador elites, extractive institutions, rigged trade) that keep value flowing outward.

For about 50 years this works. The wealth pump keeps running through subtler channels. (3/5)

Those democratic systems were never fully self-sustaining. They were built on – and subsidized by – the economic dominance of colonial extraction and empire.

The "liberal democratic miracle" was, in part, a massive wealth transfer dressed up as enlightenment values. (2/5)

My highschool band used to watch it after practice. There was a small black and white TV in the basement that couldn’t have been more than 14 inches which was via an AFRTS/AFN feed in Berlin.

So on my list of things to get is a watch called the Murphy- it’s from one of my favorite movies but I’ll keep it in your honor.

I’ll get it for being a completionist. Not sure if I’ll be able to read it again because the last thing I read in French was your book in 2020.

There’s a 2nd edition?

Well that was the plan but she was running out of time and Johnny wouldn’t retire

Tonight show Joan Rivers was Peak Joan Rivers.