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REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS
Rich Businessman, TV Host Says It's 'Fantastic' that 85 People Possess More Combined Wealth than Half of the World
Wednesday, January 22, 2014 1:55 PM
NIKI2
Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...
Quote:Most sensible people were shocked and horrified by the stats in the recent report released by Oxfam ( http://www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/bp-working-for-few-political-capture-economic-inequality-200114-en.pdf) revealing that the 85 wealthiest people in the world possess the total combined wealth of all the people who comprise the bottom half of the world's population--or three billion ( that's 3,000,000,000) people. Not Kevin O'Leary, a Canadian businessman who co-hosts the "Lang & O'Leary Exchange." He thought it was wonderful news. "It's fantastic and this is a great thing because it inspires everybody, gets them motivation to look up to the one percent and say, ‘I want to become one of those people, I’m going to fight hard to get up to the top,’” O'Leary said. “This is fantastic news and of course I applaud it. What can be wrong with this?” His co-host, Amanda Lang, was skeptical. "Really?" she said. "So, someone living on a dollar a day in Africa is getting up in the morning and saying, ‘I’m going to be Bill Gates’?” Nevertheless, no reason could penetrate O'Leary's absurdly pro-capitalist outlook. Nevermind those 3 billion poor folks, he said. Let's celebrate the 85. As The Atlantic reports ( http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/01/the-worlds-85-richest-people-are-as-wealthy-as-the-poorest-3-billion/283206/), inequality of "wealth" is not the same as inequality of "income": Wealth is composed of assets that don't immediately translate to spendable income, like mortgages, stocks, and investments that tend to generate more wealth in the future. The report also reveals that the wealthiest one percent of the world hold onto $110 trillion, which is 65x more than the bottom half of the world's population, and that the worst levels of inequality have been concentrated in the wealthiest countries, with the United States topping the list. Some other notable revelations from the Oxfam report include: •The richest one percent in the US, along with those in China and Portugal, have doubled their share of national income since 1980. •The unprecedented surge in inequality has led to a political system in the US that is in the service of the wealthiest. Oxfam point to a correlation between rising inequality and falling patterns of deregulation, union membership, and top marginal tax rates since the early 1980s to support this. •In the US, the wealthiest captured 95% of the post-financial crisis "recovery," while the bottom 90% grew poorer. •Within a great many countries, inequality amongst social classes is becoming increasingly entrenched, as falling access to things like quality education and public goods weakens social mobility across generations. •It is likely that the true extent of inequality is worse than what official numbers can illustrate, because there is an estimated $18.5 trillion is hidden away in tax havens. Finally, the report details some of its recommendations for how the world's governments can lay the grounds for a fairer society: • Cracking down on financial secrecy and tax dodging • Redistributive transfers; and strengthening of social protection schemes • Investment in universal access to free healthcare and education • Progressive taxation • Strengthening wage floors and worker rights • Removing the barriers to equal rights and opportunities for women http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/video-rich-businessman-tv-host-says-its-fantastic-85-people-possess-more-combined
Friday, January 24, 2014 3:02 PM
SIGNYM
I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.
Friday, January 24, 2014 6:12 PM
AURAPTOR
America loves a winner!
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: You see, this is where a really committed left-wing sociopath would know what to do with those 85 people.
Friday, January 24, 2014 6:20 PM
WHOZIT
Saturday, January 25, 2014 12:28 AM
FREMDFIRMA
Saturday, January 25, 2014 12:46 AM
Quote: That said, my violent impulses in this regard don't come from sociopathy, but rather compassion gone beserk, not like it'd make any difference to them on the receiving end, but it's the principle of the thing.
Saturday, January 25, 2014 1:09 AM
1KIKI
Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.
Saturday, January 25, 2014 1:16 AM
Saturday, January 25, 2014 2:38 AM
Quote: I had a friend - a very nice, conventional, smart and hard-working person - who nervelessness had a slightly different take. She would say 'Sometimes I'd like to get a machine gun and clean house.'
Saturday, January 25, 2014 6:57 AM
SECOND
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two
Saturday, January 25, 2014 8:31 AM
Quote:Originally posted by AURaptor: Sounds a lot like the mind set of post French Revolution beheadings.
Quote:“There are two great powers, and they’ve been fighting since time began. Every advance in human life, every scrap of knowledge and wisdom and decency we have has been torn by one side from the teeth of the other. Every little increase in human freedom has been fought over ferociously between those who want us to know more and be wiser and stronger, and those who want us to obey and be humble and submit.”
Quote:Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit upon his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats. - H. L. Mencken
Saturday, January 25, 2014 9:34 AM
Saturday, January 25, 2014 10:15 AM
ANONYMOUSE
Saturday, January 25, 2014 10:44 AM
Quote: "It is time that equality bore its scythe above all heads. It is time to horrify all the conspirators. So legislators, place Terror on the order of the day! Let us be in revolution, because everywhere counter-revolution is being woven by our enemies. The blade of the law should hover over all the guilty."
Saturday, January 25, 2014 11:37 AM
Quote:Originally posted by Niki2: I'm obviously not in favor of violence in any form ...
Saturday, January 25, 2014 11:56 AM
Quote:Originally posted by ANONYMOUSE: It is indeed a fantastic statistic. It is also deeply wrong.
Saturday, January 25, 2014 12:16 PM
Quote:Shoot them all and then shove Chick-fil-A sammichs in their faces ?
Quote:Robespierre's attempt at justifying his virtuous terror was, as I said, every bit as inspiring as Hitler's " Final Solution ", or Pol Pot's killing fields.
Quote:There is no justification for such wanton and haphazard slaughtering of humans.
Quote:This phony sense of self absorbed moral authority to kill those who you perceive have wronged 'society' is twisted sociopathy every bit as on par w/ Hitler's "final solution ".
Saturday, January 25, 2014 12:19 PM
Quote:I'm obviously not in favor of violence in any form ...- NIKI As has been pointed out to me in the past, the rich will never voluntarily give up their power. My personal preference is for people in democracies to ride the vote and see how far it goes. But when the people in power are seriously threatened they'll - oh, have the military dissolve the government, ban the majority political party, re-write the constitution and promise an end to the junta 'soon' - as in Egypt. Then what?-KIKI
Saturday, January 25, 2014 12:58 PM
Saturday, January 25, 2014 12:59 PM
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: Quote:Shoot them all and then shove Chick-fil-A sammichs in their faces ? I have no idea what you're referring to. Could you save me the trouble of giburuing shoot+chick-fil-a and tell me what you're talking about? In any case, it sounds like a waste of sandwiches.
Quote: Quote:Robespierre's attempt at justifying his virtuous terror was, as I said, every bit as inspiring as Hitler's " Final Solution ", or Pol Pot's killing fields. Or Shock and Awe. Don't feel so high and virtuous, dweeb. We- the United States- have displaced over 50 government since WWII, most of them democracies. And we didn't do it by jawboning people. In the process, we managed to kill millions- certainly more than Hitler ever did. Quote:There is no justification for such wanton and haphazard slaughtering of humans. And yet, you'll manage to justify. Quote:This phony sense of self absorbed moral authority to kill those who you perceive have wronged 'society' is twisted sociopathy every bit as on par w/ Hitler's "final solution ". Indeed. So bring it, dude. Let the justification begin!
Saturday, January 25, 2014 1:19 PM
Quote:I've asked NIKI that question five or six times, never got an answer. So, then ... nothing, I guess. But yanno- those 85 people.... and the 85,000 people after them... they're building up some bad mo'fo juju. So karma will sort it all out. (You can't argue people out of their religions, and that is NIKI's.)
Saturday, January 25, 2014 1:21 PM
Saturday, January 25, 2014 1:51 PM
Quote:Sorry, apples to oranges.
Saturday, January 25, 2014 1:56 PM
Saturday, January 25, 2014 2:02 PM
Saturday, January 25, 2014 2:05 PM
Quote:Because one is a military .... whole sale slaughtering of men, women at the whims of a tyrannical blood lust movement.
Saturday, January 25, 2014 2:06 PM
GEEZER
Keep the Shiny side up
Quote:Originally posted by FREMDFIRMA: Did it never occur to anyone WHY the French were so eager to help us found a country without a class system, does no one remember it was THEY who built the Statue of Liberty ? Because they knew what their Liberty HAD COST, thanks to an entrenched aristocracy which had wrapped itself around their country till it had begun to strangle.
Saturday, January 25, 2014 2:18 PM
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: Quote:Because one is a military .... whole sale slaughtering of men, women at the whims of a tyrannical blood lust movement. Shock and awe fits that description, as do the many other genocides that we've fomented and supported. You can't seem to get the idea that if you massacre people, even with "the best of intentions"... yanno, you've still killed lots of innocent people. And NO government is going to say- hey, we're going to invade your nation and break it apart for resources. Every single massacre, every single occupation, is going to have some great-sounding rationale: white man's burden, self-defense, the enemy among us, bringing democracy to benighted tyrannies, responsibility to protect, anticommunism, revolution of the people... you've really got to look very carefully at mass slaughter to see whether it is truly necessary, and not just given acceptable propaganda.
Saturday, January 25, 2014 2:21 PM
Saturday, January 25, 2014 2:37 PM
Saturday, January 25, 2014 2:42 PM
Quote: Did it never occur to anyone WHY the French were so eager to help us found a country without a class system, does no one remember it was THEY who built the Statue of Liberty ?
Sunday, January 26, 2014 11:20 AM
Sunday, January 26, 2014 11:26 AM
Quote:Originally posted by SIGNYM: Because according to rappy, even tho we killed 100,000+ civilians and rounded them up and tortured them in military prisons with no due process, gosh, we meant well!
Sunday, January 26, 2014 11:56 AM
Sunday, January 26, 2014 12:06 PM
Sunday, January 26, 2014 12:22 PM
Sunday, January 26, 2014 12:35 PM
Quote:... NIKI, we have to get beyond the plaintive Why can't we all just get along? approach. The reason why society is as fucked up as it is, is because the wealthy and powerful have made it that way for their benefit. And as KIKI has pointed out, wealth begets assholeness... which begets wealth... which begets... And even the wealthy who are honest enough to recognize that they're parasites on society don't stop. Like Soros, they say- Hey, I just play by the rules, I didn't make them "Asking" the rich and powerful to be nice is like expecting a lion to stop eating zebras. It's pointless. There are only two ways to make this a decent society: either get rid of the rich and powerful (a guillotine would be a nice touch), or build an alternate society and refuse to let the rich and powerful in. In order to build an alternate society, you need an alternate medium of exchange, because money and the current financial system pretty much has us all by the short-hairs. Yanno what I mean? ... Hoping for input from NIKI. ... OH BTW- NIKI, I am specifically waiting for an answer from you. What I posted goes directly against your Buddhist grain (I think) and yet it is a real-world observation. I'd appreciate seeing how you resolve the problem. ... Still hoping for some kind of response from you NIKI. WHAT IF "getting back to a decent society" involves breaking some legs... or some necks? How do you resolve this conundrum? ... Interesting. NIKI is a Buddhist; quite evidently she believes in being nice and would like other people to be nice as well. So I asked NIKI five times (or so) what she would do if getting "back to being a decent society" mean breaking some necks. It's a question she studiously avoided. .... Well, I still want an answer from NIKI and an answer from RAPPY. I've asked each of them... oh, about 7 times by now. Maybe more. I would LOVE to get to the bottom of their beliefs, understand the nub from which everything else springs. Like a lot of things, it prolly has to do with a personal experience. Our most enduring lessons are the ones most deeply felt.
Sunday, January 26, 2014 12:39 PM
Sunday, January 26, 2014 12:43 PM
Sunday, January 26, 2014 12:56 PM
Quote:I'm not sure what kind of snark "You can't argue people out of their religions, and that is NIKI's" is, first, because Buddhism isn't a religion, although many consider it one, and second, because you appear to have decided what my position would be, tho' you said you never got an answer
Quote: And you didn't state clearly what question you ARE asking...I'm guessing, given what you quoted, whether I think violence would be justified if things got bad enough? I can't answer that except for myself: If it got to the point you suggested, "have the military dissolve the government, ban the majority political party, re-write the constitution and promise an end to the junta 'soon'", I would certainly understand people turning to violence.
Sunday, January 26, 2014 1:28 PM
Sunday, January 26, 2014 1:32 PM
Sunday, January 26, 2014 1:44 PM
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