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micromacrofoot

I'd go a little further and say that tech has exacerbated the failings of the USA.

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Exacerbated, or just exposed?

Not all tech. There are specific actors and business models.

That comment needs expansion and amplification.

Unfortunately the tech with the most power.

I'd be a little more accurate and say extreme neoliberalism has exacerbated the failings of the USA.

Neoconservatism too. Let's not forget about Bush, Blair, Powell and Iraq...

Neoliberalism is an economic philosophy. It's not tied to "progressivism" or "conservatism". In short, it promotes free-market economics without borders.

Where did I mention progressivism or conservativism? Neoliberalism is intrinsically tied to politics because you can't affect economic policy without getting involved in the political system...

Regardless, your implications surrounding my comment, and my intent by making it, are incorrect. Both movements have been disastrous for the United States.

The confusion stems from the introduction of "neoconservatism" into a thread which just before was topic-centered around neoliberalism. To a reader it looks as if it's trying to establish that neoliberalism and neoconservatism belong to the same category and together form a unity of opposing forces. It reads as if neoconservatism is a conservative form of neoliberalism (or vice versa).

Neoliberalism is entirely unrelated to neoconservatism. The "liberal" part refers entirely to free-market economics.

The two philosophies are similar only in name. It is possible to be both a neoliberal and a neoconservative.

For example, every Republican president from the 1980s up to Trump was a neoliberal. This includes Bush who you mention as a counterexample. Trump was the first anti-neoliberal president we have had in decades as he, unlike his predecessors, promoted tariffs.

I'm not so sure. There are other neoliberal countries that aren't experiencing some of the same issues.

I'd go even further and say that tech is fundamental in the destruction of the fabric of American society.

This. Social Media has advanced the fiefdoms at an alarming rate. No matter how strange or out of touch your ideas, you can find similar people to reinforce them. When your only connection is with people that agree with you it becomes 'us vs them' and extremely insular. Throw in 'click bait' news and you have a growing level of fear and uncertainty that adds to the comfort of staying within your tribe.

Civil society takes work and we aren't doing that work in the US right now. No one wants to discuss things, they just want to yell down the other person. We need to get out on the front porch and talk instead of posting from our basements.

i mean, if that is the case then it happened in the 18th century when the industrial revolution caused the undoing of the jeffersonian ideal and the supremacy of the yeoman farmer. i tend to gather that most of this site's users are not planters, candlestick makers or slave owners. if anything destroyed the fabric of communities in post-new-deal-industrial-world-superpower-america, it was financialization and trade agreements.

We might as well go back to the social contract then. My comment written to open up some historical debate about when the downfall of America started, but to point out that big tech is a fundamental contributor to the destruction of the fabric of America. I never claimed there were no other contributors or that it started with the advent of big tech.

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