Andreessen and the tech reactionaries were not betrayed by “American-hating communists” backed by the “Democratic machine;” they simply could not be content to be merely rich. Out of spite towards those who disrespected them and contempt for the liberal democratic governments that attempted to hold them to the obligations of citizenship and the law, Andreesen and his peers have betrayed the very arrangement that made them wealthy and influential.
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Andreessen has made no secret of the fact that he feels he and his tech oligarch peers have been betrayed by elite institutions and the Democratic party.
Makes me wonder if all these techbros going fascist and racist is, at its core, the long term effects of being an insecure nerd who wasn’t invited to the “coolest” parties.
We know Trump was rejected by elite and celebrity society. That probably fueled his bitter insecurities. Likewise, the Andreessens, Musks, Altmans and Zuckerbergs probably felt like social pariahs and, now that they have immense wealth, feel empowered to exact revenge.
I hear Trump was invited to some interesting elite parties in the Caribbean.
The American system is not an unbridled free market, and that’s a good thing. It is also not central planning, either, and that’s a good thing as well.
I honestly don’t see how liberals can see the results and still say shit like this. This author is very aware of exactly why the American system offers the worst of both worlds, funneling public money into private pockets with very poor levels of actual private innovation or development of new industry. But still they defend it as the perfect middle ground. “If only there was more oversight and less regulatory capture.” I’m sure the defense industry, the space industry, the nuclear industry until the 80s, this research/private tech axis they’re describing, and just about every other bit of privatization and public/private initiatives are just aberrations.
This focus on risk supposedly justifying rewards when we’re talking about LLCs in industry directly taking loans from the government is particularly bizarre. The risk of your LLC going bankrupt and defaulting on the governments money. So brave.
Seeing a system like this, and the results it produces and then claiming it’s because some shithead capitalist and his buddies are traitors to the system is fucking strange. You’d think looking at the system as a problem would be obvious.
I completely agree, and it’s pretty clear the author is well-off enough to have little empathy with people struggling under the American system. That’s why I’m shocked he’s bothering to call out Andreesen.
