REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

A thread for Democrats Only

POSTED BY: THGRRI
UPDATED: Wednesday, March 13, 2024 08:08
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Sunday, May 6, 2018 7:45 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Hey Sigs....

This is getting too funny.

I've been mislabled as a snowflake by the right and left fringes now, twice in one week.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

6ix, you've told stories about yourself melting down under adversity. I'd believe you are not a frail snowflake if you hadn't told them. You need to build a false internet facade for yourself, making you look braver, tougher, smarter, less beaten down by life than you really are. You can start building the strength illusion by ignoring accusations of being a snowflake. For example, every time Trump says "No Collusion!" I know he knows he colluded. When he says "Believe Me" I know he knows he told a lie.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly



lol

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Sunday, May 6, 2018 3:07 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Hey Sigs....

This is getting too funny.

I've been mislabled as a snowflake by the right and left fringes now, twice in one week.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

6ix, you've told stories about yourself melting down under adversity. I'd believe you are not a frail snowflake if you hadn't told them. You need to build a false internet facade for yourself, making you look braver, tougher, smarter, less beaten down by life than you really are. You can start building the strength illusion by ignoring accusations of being a snowflake. For example, every time Trump says "No Collusion!" I know he knows he colluded. When he says "Believe Me" I know he knows he told a lie.

lol

Do Right, Be Right. :)

Is this like, whenever second posts something, we all know it is pure lies?

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Sunday, May 6, 2018 5:32 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:
Quote:

White trash think that dividing money equally with people they despise will mean far less money for white trash. But the white trash of America will never get the money they think they deserve unless Mexicans, niggers, queers and women also get a much bigger share of the wealth.
It's not true that one group will prosper only if other groups prosper, which is the only argument in favor of identity politics.

That argument is the fallacy of identity politics. Through it we are being played by identity politics into an unstated zero-sum game. The notion is that it's OK to be pitted against each other for survival, as long as the fight is FAIR. But it doesn't matter how FAIRLY we are judged in the arena. There will be the winners at the expense of the losers. If some groups rise it will be because other groups fall. It's still the same zero-sum game.

Democrats - or some new party that rises up out of the ashes - need to specifically reject the notion that people being FAIRLY pitted against each other for survival is the end goal.

The end goal should be to raise us all up. Together.

The zero-sum game that should be played is the one where the wealthy lose to everyone poorer.

This continues to resonate as the most brainless concept possible.

Remove the resources and effectiveness of the most successful, so that the least successful will get a few more dollars to spend on lottery. Genius.

Essentially, replace any CEO with the average McDonald's or Walmart employee. Then wonder why the previously successful company falls to pieces and insolvency. Best. Idea. Ever.


Of course, anybody with a brain understands second is, yet again, pushing Communism/Socialism as the Ultimate Utopia we all know it is.

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Sunday, May 6, 2018 7:32 PM

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.


Quote:

Originally posted by JEWELSTAITEFAN:
This continues to resonate as the most brainless concept possible.

Remove the resources and effectiveness of the most successful, so that the least successful will get a few more dollars to spend on lottery. Genius.

Essentially, replace any CEO with the average McDonald's or Walmart employee. Then wonder why the previously successful company falls to pieces and insolvency. Best. Idea. Ever.

Of course, anybody with a brain understands second is, yet again, pushing Communism/Socialism as the Ultimate Utopia we all know it is.

Unlike you, SECOND understands that wealth is nearly always acquired through an unearned, undeserved fluke of external circumstances - having wealthy parents for example, or owning land that turns out to have resources buried underground. America is not a meritocracy. That's a fact you need to grasp if you want to live in reality.

But SECOND'S imagination is limited by his fears of poverty; and your imagination is limited by your blind ideology. You both assume that to lift everyone up, the wealthy must be made POOR. Instead, they need to be made SUFFICIENT and SECURE, as does everyone else. And their living needs to come from their work - their productive input to society; and not from family, or from control over the levers of power.




So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

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Sunday, May 6, 2018 8:47 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by JEWELSTAITEFAN:
Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Hey Sigs....

This is getting too funny.

I've been mislabled as a snowflake by the right and left fringes now, twice in one week.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

6ix, you've told stories about yourself melting down under adversity. I'd believe you are not a frail snowflake if you hadn't told them. You need to build a false internet facade for yourself, making you look braver, tougher, smarter, less beaten down by life than you really are. You can start building the strength illusion by ignoring accusations of being a snowflake. For example, every time Trump says "No Collusion!" I know he knows he colluded. When he says "Believe Me" I know he knows he told a lie.


lol

Do Right, Be Right. :)

Is this like, whenever second posts something, we all know it is pure lies?



It does seem to be an admittance of how he lives his own life online. Particularly this part.

Quote:

You need to build a false internet facade for yourself, making you look braver, tougher, smarter, less beaten down by life than you really are.


Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Sunday, May 6, 2018 10:29 PM

JO753

rezident owtsidr


Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:...Instead, they need to be made SUFFICIENT and SECURE, as does everyone else. And their living needs to come from their work - their productive input to society; and not from family, or from control over the levers of power.


Good post.

I mostly agree. The only differens being that earning money by working iz a consept that's dayz are numbered.

Assuming the current mess eventually gets scrapped, I think the only peepl who will be paid in the future beyond the normal standard credit will be athletes and artists.

----------------------------
DUZ XaT SEM RiT TQ YQ? - Jubal Early

http://www.7532020.com

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Monday, May 7, 2018 1:20 AM

JEWELSTAITEFAN


Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:
You both assume that to lift everyone up, the wealthy must be made POOR.

WTF?

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Monday, May 7, 2018 4:07 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.


"Remove the resources and effectiveness of the most successful" (who you mistakenly assume are the 'most capable') and, as you imagine, replace them "with the average McDonald's or Walmart employee".

In other words, make the formerly rich into the poor.

BTW, you aren't rich. The REALLY rich, the people Janet Yellen and Hillary Clinton care about, don't ever worry about it all being taken away or lost.




So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

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Monday, May 7, 2018 4:56 AM

JEWELSTAITEFAN


Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:
"Remove the resources and effectiveness of the most successful" (who you mistakenly assume are the 'most capable') and, as you imagine, replace them "with the average McDonald's or Walmart employee".

In other words, make the formerly rich into the poor.

BTW, you aren't rich. The REALLY rich, the people Janet Yellen and Hillary Clinton care about, don't ever worry about it all being taken away or lost.

So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

That was me pointing out the stupidity of second's concept.
The "genius" was sarcasm.

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Monday, May 7, 2018 6:49 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.


It's the assumptions you two make I have a problem with. Whether you agree it'll work or not, both you SECOND assume that to make poor people better off, rich people need to be made poor. You claim SECOND sees it as a viable solution while you think it'll fail.

Neither of you seem to understand that there's a different way to get there, that doesn't involve anyone being poor.




So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

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Monday, May 7, 2018 7:56 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by JO753:
Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:...Instead, they need to be made SUFFICIENT and SECURE, as does everyone else. And their living needs to come from their work - their productive input to society; and not from family, or from control over the levers of power.


Good post.

I mostly agree. The only differens being that earning money by working iz a consept that's dayz are numbered.

Assuming the current mess eventually gets scrapped, I think the only peepl who will be paid in the future beyond the normal standard credit will be athletes and artists.



Well that kind of sounds like communism to me.

I can't imagine we're going to be seeing an America where I'm getting paid to stock product overnight the same amount that a brain surgeon gets paid.

I do, however, believe that there could be a ton of benefits to a Basic Universal Income. That's $12,000 per year to everyone, regardless of race, sex, and class. You get it. I get it. Even Trump and Clinton get it.

For somebody like me, I could actually live off of that alone. All of the money that I made would then be able to be spent on things that I'd never buy for myself, thus stimulating the local economy more.

Anybody who's under 18 wouldn't be able to spend it. It would go into a college and/or trade school fund. If they opt out of any training or school past high school then they don't get to collect any of that money and they only begin getting the universal income on their 18th birthday.

You could have some more free cash to work on your cars.

JSF could put an extra 12,000 bucks a year into the DOW.

Hillary could put an extra hit out every year on somebody she didn't like.

Trump could buy a few thousand extra bricks every year for his little wall.

Second could finally move out from his Texas Republican Mom's basement.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Monday, May 7, 2018 8:29 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:
It's the assumptions you two make I have a problem with. Whether you agree it'll work or not, both you SECOND assume that to make poor people better off, rich people need to be made poor. You claim SECOND sees it as a viable solution while you think it'll fail.

Neither of you seem to understand that there's a different way to get there, that doesn't involve anyone being poor.

And once you point us to this third way, we will certainly believe you. Is it Denmark? Is it South Korea? Where is this third way that Americans can copy? And how do you imagine America goes from where it is, with the quirky people it has, to become this better country? America runs the way it does because it is to the advantage of the people who actually run it. They are still following the basic plan laid down by wealthy slave-owners who wrote the Constitution in 1788. It wasn't the best plan, but it was the best they could write at the time for their own benefit.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Monday, May 7, 2018 8:32 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


An article about the mental quirks of some Americans and how those quirks left America where it is:

White Evangelicals’ Continued Support of Trump Feels Surprising. It Shouldn’t.
By John Ehrenreich, May 07, 2018, 5:45 AM

Jerry Falwell Jr., president of evangelical college Liberty University, put it this way: “God called King David a man after God’s own heart even though he was an adulterer and a murderer,” adding, “I think evangelicals have found their dream president.”

One of the enduring puzzles of contemporary American politics is why white evangelicals, who loudly proclaim their devotion to the teachings of the Bible, continue to support the thrice-married, six-times-bankrupted, multiple-times-unfaithful, chronically lying president, who has, at the very least, violated three of the Ten Commandments (“Thou shalt not commit adultery,” “Thou shalt not steal,” and “Thou shalt not bear false witness”) and arguably several others.

. . . Evangelicals’ religious beliefs seem in direct opposition to their support for the president’s actions. To many, the evangelical embrace of Trump seems a “corruption of a religious tradition by politics,” as Michael Gerson put it in his recent Atlantic cover story.

But behind the apparent disparity, there exists a psychological kinship between Trumpism and evangelical thought—at least, for white evangelicals. (In this article, I am focusing on white evangelicals.)

More at https://slate.com/technology/2018/05/white-evangelicals-would-keep-sup
porting-trump-even-without-roe-v-wade.html


The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Monday, May 7, 2018 8:45 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

I can't imagine we're going to be seeing an America where I'm getting paid to stock product overnight the same amount that a brain surgeon gets paid.

I do, however, believe that there could be a ton of benefits to a Basic Universal Income. That's $12,000 per year to everyone, regardless of race, sex, and class. You get it. I get it. Even Trump and Clinton get it.

For somebody like me, I could actually live off of that alone. All of the money that I made would then be able to be spent on things that I'd never buy for myself, thus stimulating the local economy . . .

Do Right, Be Right. :)

6ixStringJack, you won't live to see a Basic Universal Income in your state. It is even less likely than you living long enough to ride a starship to the Firefly Universe.

Universal Basic Income fails in Finland
By Natalia Castro - May 5, 2018
http://sonorannews.com/2018/05/05/universal-basic-income-fails-finland/

Finland to end basic income trial after two years
Government rejects request for funds to expand scheme and plans stricter benefits rules
www.theguardian.com/world/2018/apr/23/finland-to-end-basic-income-tria
l-after-two-years


"The idea of UBI has gained traction recently amid predictions that automation could threaten up to a third of current jobs." I think that 6ix's pay will always be competitive with robots. Those things will be expensive to buy, while 6ix will work for only food -- a few dollars a day will buy 2,000 calories. Robots can't compete with that. A comic for 6ix: http://bizarro.com/comics/may-7-2018/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Monday, May 7, 2018 9:19 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Finland doesn't have a money printing press.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Monday, May 7, 2018 11:41 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.


"And once you point us to this third way, we will certainly believe you."

I already did, more than once. And 6-string found at least one of them, though you're too stupid to.

When you do, perhaps you could respond to what I posted, rather than 6-string's interpretation.




So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

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Monday, May 7, 2018 12:17 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:
"And once you point us to this third way, we will certainly believe you."

I already did, more than once. And 6-string found at least one of them, though you're too stupid to.

When you do, perhaps you could respond to what I posted, rather than 6-string's interpretation.

Only in your imagination did you answer that question. I don't want your bullshit theorizing and hypothetical scenarios. I want you to point to an actual example. I gave you two examples, but you pick your own: Denmark, because of Bernie Sanders using it as an example of what America could be and South Korea, because it threw two crooked Presidents and the greediest, richest industrialists into jail. America should have done the same with Nixon and, next on the list, Trump.
www.cnn.com/2018/04/06/asia/south-korea-park-geun-hye-corruption-intl/
index.html


The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Monday, May 7, 2018 3:57 PM

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.



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Monday, May 7, 2018 4:03 PM

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.


I see that - with prompting - you were able to find at least one post. So it's not that I didn't post something - as you claimed - "And once you point us to this third way, we will certainly believe you." ie You lied. AGAIN.

And your refusal to discuss tells me - you've got nothing. So once again, you resort to insult, setting after-the-fact preconditions, and changing the topic.

You've amply displayed that you're too stupid to participate in an actual conversation.




So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

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Monday, May 7, 2018 4:25 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:
I see that - with prompting - you were able to find at least one post. So it's not that I didn't post something - as you claimed - "And once you point us to this third way, we will certainly believe you." ie You lied. AGAIN.

And your refusal to discuss tells me - you've got nothing. So once again, you resort to insult, setting after-the-fact preconditions, and changing the topic.

You've amply displayed that you're too stupid to participate in an actual conversation.

1kiki, if you aren't a Russian troll, then you are one fucking nutjob if you actually live in the USA. Do you remember writing this?
Quote:

It's the assumptions you two make I have a problem with. Whether you agree it'll work or not, both you SECOND assume that to make poor people better off, rich people need to be made poor. You claim SECOND sees it as a viable solution while you think it'll fail.

Neither of you seem to understand that there's a different way to get there, that doesn't involve anyone being poor.

You went too far, 1kiki. The American rich don't have to become poor, but they do have to become poorer. The American rich are not about to cooperate in anything that makes them even a little bit poorer or even slows down the rate they get richer. Kiplinger’s has revealed just how powerfully the “myth of merit” still dominates our national discourse over our super rich and their fabulous fortunes.

This myth of merit holds that the ultra rich among us owe their incredibly good fortune to good behavior of one sort or another. Either they work incredibly hard or perform incredible feats — or discipline themselves to lead fantastically frugal lives. As a society, in effect, we simply do not want to believe that our rich may have gained their riches through exploiting others or rigging our economy or just finding themselves in the right place at the right time. So we ascribe to our awesomely affluent rich noble qualities that make them ever so deserving of their wealth.

https://ourfuture.org/20180423/the-fake-frugality-of-the-fabulously-fo
rtunate


1kiki, the rich will fight with all their might the Democrats because the Dem's agenda will be paid by the taxes of the rich. The rich don't want to pay:

Democrats have an agenda nobody knows about
www.vox.com/2018/5/7/17326576/stormy-daniels-trump-michael-avenatti-mi
dterm-elections


The Democratic Party is running on policy. Their ideas include:

1) a range of measures to strengthen workers’ rights to form labor unions and go on strike,
https://abetterdeal.democraticleader.gov/the-proposals/

2) an ambitious infrastructure plan of the sort Trump promised but never delivered,
https://abetterdeal.democraticleader.gov/creating-jobs-lowering-costs-
boosting-local-economies
/

3) the most sweeping revision of antitrust policy we’ve seen in a generation or two,
www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/7/31/16021844/antitrust-better-de
al


4) a crackdown on prescription drug prices,
https://abetterdeal.democraticleader.gov/prescription-drugs/

5) and a big new scheme to subsidize child care costs for most Americans.
https://abetterdeal.democraticleader.gov/pass-the-child-care-for-worki
ng-families-act
/

Critically, none of this involves abandoning Democrats’ core commitments on racial or gender justice issues, all of it is focused on the economic realm.

Research from Vanderbilt University’s Larry Bartels shows that economic policy issues tend to unite rank-and-file Democrats while dividing Republicans, while culture war issues are exactly the opposite. Many Republicans, in other words, have at least a few strong disagreements with conservative economic policy, and many Democrats have at least a few strong disagreements with cultural liberalism.
www.vanderbilt.edu/csdi/includes/Workingpaper2_2108.pdf

In other words, a campaign focused on culture war topics tends to shore up the GOP base, and one focused on economic policy can fracture it. Democrats need to fracture the GOP base to win. The rich need to promote culture war to keep the Democrats from winning. A win for Dems means higher taxes for the rich.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Monday, May 7, 2018 4:26 PM

CAPTAINCRUNCH

... stay crunchy...


Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:


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Monday, May 7, 2018 7:00 PM

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.


SECOND - do you remember posting this? Isn't it YOUR prescription for reform?
Quote:

Originally posted by second:
The zero-sum game that should be played is the one where the wealthy lose to everyone poorer.

I take it when the rich need to loose to *everyone* poorer that includes the poorest of the poor, for example, the indigent homeless with no assets, no income, and only the coins they cage on the streets. You're stating that rich people need to lose to them - ie, the rich themselves need to be poorer than those poor.

How about this?
Quote:

Originally posted by second:
1kiki, the rich will fight with all their might the Democrats because the Dem's agenda will be paid by the taxes of the rich. The rich don't want to pay

Perhaps I should remind you that *I* proposed none of that. It's all you, babe. Your focus, your fears, your anxieties, and most important, your assumptions, which you cloak under the banner of 'the rich'.




So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

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Monday, May 7, 2018 7:25 PM

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.


So ... what do I propose?

Closing down a lot of military bases, mothballing our useless fleets of destroyers, and shuttering expensive military projects. Aside from an EMP or cyberattack, there's simply no master-military stroke, ie NCBW, that an enemy can launch that will not ultimately circle the globe and bite them in the ass. Ramping up doomsday weapons lethality and numbers is a race to the edge of a cliff. NOBODY wins, even if one side decimates the other as they both fall all the way down to the bottom.

Now, a lot of young people from flyover country join the military because it's the only steady job around.

I propose we put our military to better use - we teach these men and women a trade or three, like welding, carpentry, heavy machinery operating, machining, nursing, radiology- pulmonary- EKG-technician, electrical installation ... etc. And then we put them to work clearing forest overgrowth and underbrush, planting new forests, building artificial reefs to protect our shores from storm surges, building roads and bridges, creating housing in slum areas, caring for people in underserved areas. And so on. The list is only limited by your grasp of all the things that need to be done.


THIS IS STEP ONE paid for with existing taxes, repurposed






So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

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Tuesday, May 8, 2018 7:56 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


I admired Yanis Varoufakis when he was in the news as Greece’s finance minister, negotiating with Central Bankers and creditors. It was typical of how negotiations go when those on the richer side know in great detail what they want and have a well-tested strategy, used for centuries, while the poorer side is divided about goals and strategy and even their willingness to fight. He wrote an admirable introduction to an old book.

Yanis Varoufakis: Marx predicted our present crisis – and points the way out
www.theguardian.com/news/2018/apr/20/yanis-varoufakis-marx-crisis-comm
unist-manifesto

The Communist Manifesto foresaw the predatory and polarised global capitalism of the 21st century. But Marx and Engels also showed us that we have the power to create a better world.

On the topic of dystopia, the sceptical reader will perk up: what of the manifesto’s own complicity in legitimising authoritarian regimes and steeling the spirit of gulag guards? Instead of responding defensively, pointing out that no one blames Adam Smith for the excesses of Wall Street, or the New Testament for the Spanish Inquisition, we can speculate how the authors of the manifesto might have answered this charge. I believe that, with the benefit of hindsight, Marx and Engels would confess to an important error in their analysis: insufficient reflexivity. This is to say that they failed to give sufficient thought, and kept a judicious silence, over the impact their own analysis would have on the world they were analysing.

The manifesto told a powerful story in uncompromising language, intended to stir readers from their apathy. What Marx and Engels failed to foresee was that powerful, prescriptive texts have a tendency to procure disciples, believers – a priesthood, even – and that this faithful might use the power bestowed upon them by the manifesto to their own advantage. With it, they might abuse other comrades, build their own power base, gain positions of influence, bed impressionable students, take control of the politburo and imprison anyone who resists them.

Similarly, Marx and Engels failed to estimate the impact of their writing on capitalism itself. To the extent that the manifesto helped fashion the Soviet Union, its eastern European satellites, Castro’s Cuba, Tito’s Yugoslavia and several social democratic governments in the west, would these developments not cause a chain reaction that would frustrate the manifesto’s predictions and analysis? After the Russian revolution and then the second world war, the fear of communism forced capitalist regimes to embrace pension schemes, national health services, even the idea of making the rich pay for poor and petit bourgeois students to attend purpose-built liberal universities. Meanwhile, rabid hostility to the Soviet Union stirred up paranoia and created a climate of fear that proved particularly fertile for figures such as Joseph Stalin and Pol Pot.

I believe that Marx and Engels would have regretted not anticipating the manifesto’s impact on the communist parties it foreshadowed. They would be kicking themselves that they overlooked the kind of dialectic they loved to analyse: how workers’ states would become increasingly totalitarian in their response to capitalist state aggression, and how, in their response to the fear of communism, these capitalist states would grow increasingly civilised.

More at www.theguardian.com/news/2018/apr/20/yanis-varoufakis-marx-crisis-comm
unist-manifesto


Key to their analysis is the ever-expanding chasm between those who produce and those who own the instruments of production. The problematic nexus of capital and waged labour stops us from enjoying our work and our artefacts, and turns employers and workers, rich and poor, into mindless, quivering pawns who are being quick-marched towards a pointless existence by forces beyond our control.

But why do we need politics to deal with this? Isn’t politics stultifying, especially socialist politics, which Oscar Wilde once claimed “takes up too many evenings”? Marx and Engels’ answer is: because we cannot end this idiocy individually; because no market can ever emerge that will produce an antidote to this stupidity. Collective, democratic political action is our only chance for freedom and enjoyment. And for this, the long nights seem a small price to pay.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Tuesday, May 8, 2018 8:09 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.


And yet, I have read neither Marx nor Engels. And not only have I NOT proposed a workers utopia, I haven't called for a redistribution of wealth. All I've proposed so far is a re-purposing of tax dollars already collected.

Since, AS ALWAYS, your post neither accurately portrays mine nor responds to it, I will assume that you're strawmanning (lying) and/ or changing the subject. AS ALWAYS.

Do you think you can learn to discuss anything with anyone with at least a small amount of honesty? Or is that completely beyond you? And I have to ask - are you really the sane one in your family?




So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

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Tuesday, May 8, 2018 8:34 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.


So, SECOND - here are the questions you need to address to respond to my post: what do you think of re-purposing the military to 1) provide valuable skills to the members, 2) provide jobs, and 3) perform important unaddressed tasks to society and the nation?




So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

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Tuesday, May 8, 2018 2:54 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN


Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:
It's the assumptions you two make I have a problem with. Whether you agree it'll work or not, both you SECOND assume that to make poor people better off, rich people need to be made poor. You claim SECOND sees it as a viable solution while you think it'll fail.

Neither of you seem to understand that there's a different way to get there, that doesn't involve anyone being poor.

So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

I can't imagine that I have ever said that making wealthy poor was in any way connected to making poor richer.
I subscribe to Rising Tides Raising All Boats.

I can see that, technically speaking, the wealthy would have comparatively less buying power if they do not increase wealth while the poor do. Is that what you are saying?

Otherwise you are misattributing concepts to me.

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Tuesday, May 8, 2018 3:09 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Quote:

Originally posted by JO753:
Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:...Instead, they need to be made SUFFICIENT and SECURE, as does everyone else. And their living needs to come from their work - their productive input to society; and not from family, or from control over the levers of power.
Good post.

I mostly agree. The only differens being that earning money by working iz a consept that's dayz are numbered.

Assuming the current mess eventually gets scrapped, I think the only peepl who will be paid in the future beyond the normal standard credit will be athletes and artists.

Well that kind of sounds like communism to me.

I can't imagine we're going to be seeing an America where I'm getting paid to stock product overnight the same amount that a brain surgeon gets paid.

We already tried that here, as the Original Colonies. The disastrous consequences of that experiment were the widespread starvation and destitution, requiring the Pilgrims get bailed out by the Indians: the First Thanksgiving. Too bad this excellent example of communism isn't more widely taught, when our children can still learn.

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Tuesday, May 8, 2018 4:42 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN


Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:
"And once you point us to this third way, we will certainly believe you."

I already did, more than once. And 6-string found at least one of them, though you're too stupid to.

When you do, perhaps you could respond to what I posted, rather than 6-string's interpretation.

So anyway ... anyone up for a rational, fact-based, and civil discussion about the topic?

This thread has 1,030 posts spanning 7 months. Is your pointing included in one of these posts, or in another thread among the 62,400?

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Wednesday, May 9, 2018 6:54 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:

So ... what do I propose?
. . .
So, SECOND - here are the questions you need to address to respond to my post: what do you think of re-purposing the military to 1) provide valuable skills to the members, 2) provide jobs, and 3) perform important unaddressed tasks to society and the nation?
. . .
And not only have I NOT proposed a workers utopia, I haven't called for a redistribution of wealth. All I've proposed so far is a re-purposing of tax dollars already collected.

Since, AS ALWAYS, your post neither accurately portrays mine nor responds to it, I will assume that you're strawmanning (lying) and/ or changing the subject. AS ALWAYS.

There is so much wrong with how you write, 1kiki. It is a great, if you were running for political office or for a CEO’s job. You are letting the ‘Verse know what you will do with the power. You show that you are touchy, bossy, and obnoxious. So much wrong. Now I will show you what I want to write about. It is not about you, 1kiki:

A Nobel laureate explains why we get the bad economic policies we deserve
https://qz.com/1140481

“People who voted for Trump, or Brexit, or Le Pen and Mélenchon in France are by and large very concerned about their future with robots, with rising debts, with inequality and unemployment. We have neglected some people, the losers of globalization, and we have a society that’s more and more unequal. It might get worse, unfortunately, with new technology.

When people are afraid or upset, they also tend to dismiss their current governments and the experts. They want a big change, which is often supplied by populists who offer fairytales and the wrong policies. People are trying to grab something that will give them hope.

We get the economic policies we deserve. And as long as a lack of economic understanding prevails among the general public, making good policy choices will take a lot of political courage.”


The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, May 9, 2018 7:06 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:

Originally posted by JEWELSTAITEFAN:

We already tried that here, as the Original Colonies. The disastrous consequences of that experiment were the widespread starvation and destitution, requiring the Pilgrims get bailed out by the Indians: the First Thanksgiving. Too bad this excellent example of communism isn't more widely taught, when our children can still learn.

Effort to revive coal tests Rick Perry's devotion to free markets
www.houstonchronicle.com/business/article/Perry-caught-between-free-ma
rket-past-and-White-12896348.php


While governor of Texas, Rick Perry was approached by a group of power executives who warned that unless state regulators took steps to raise electricity rates, power plants across the state would close and regular blackouts could follow.

But Perry, a fierce advocate of keeping government out of the marketplace, turned them down.

“He was heavily lobbied,” recalled Ken Anderson, a former Texas Public Utility Commissioner appointed by Perry. “Ultimately, he said, ‘We’re going to rely on the market,’ and that’s what we did.” (The plants closed, but there were no blackouts.)

But since taking over as secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy, Perry’s devotion to the magic of markets has waned as he advocates for the same sort of government intervention he avoided in Austin to prop up the struggling nuclear and coal power plants.

That has put him on the opposite side of longtime allies in politics and business, who fear Perry is betraying his free market principles to win a victory for President Donald Trump, who unequivocally pledged to revive the fortunes of coal.

The Energy Department is expected to grant a request by the Ohio power company FirstEnergy Solutions that the agency use emergency powers designed to prevent blackouts to, instead, increase power rates for coal and nuclear plants. Perry last year made a similar proposal, asking federal regulators to adopt rules that would have paid coal and nuclear plants more for their power than other generators.

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Wednesday, May 9, 2018 9:21 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:

So ... what do I propose?
. . .
So, SECOND - here are the questions you need to address to respond to my post: what do you think of re-purposing the military to 1) provide valuable skills to the members, 2) provide jobs, and 3) perform important unaddressed tasks to society and the nation?
. . .
And not only have I NOT proposed a workers utopia, I haven't called for a redistribution of wealth. All I've proposed so far is a re-purposing of tax dollars already collected.

Since, AS ALWAYS, your post neither accurately portrays mine nor responds to it, I will assume that you're strawmanning (lying) and/ or changing the subject. AS ALWAYS.

There is so much wrong with how you write, 1kiki. It is a great, if you were running for political office or for a CEO’s job. You are letting the ‘Verse know what you will do with the power. You show that you are touchy, bossy, and obnoxious. So much wrong. Now I will show you what I want to write about. It is not about you, 1kiki:

A Nobel laureate explains why we get the bad economic policies we deserve
https://qz.com/1140481

“People who voted for Trump, or Brexit, or Le Pen and Mélenchon in France are by and large very concerned about their future with robots, with rising debts, with inequality and unemployment. We have neglected some people, the losers of globalization, and we have a society that’s more and more unequal. It might get worse, unfortunately, with new technology.

When people are afraid or upset, they also tend to dismiss their current governments and the experts. They want a big change, which is often supplied by populists who offer fairytales and the wrong policies. People are trying to grab something that will give them hope.

We get the economic policies we deserve. And as long as a lack of economic understanding prevails among the general public, making good policy choices will take a lot of political courage.”


The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly



Wow. Great article, Nobel Laurette.

Full of critique, but severely lacking in any actual fixes to the problems.

A common theme among Democrats.

No wonder people fall for fairy tales.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, May 9, 2018 10:22 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:

You show that you are touchy, bossy, and obnoxious.- SECOND
Says one of the touchiest, bossiest, and most obnoxious people here?

I noticed, SECOND, that when you run out of articles to kipe, you resort to ... wait for it ... personal attack. Try not to do that in future, OK?

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

America is an oligarchy
http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=57876

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Wednesday, May 9, 2018 11:10 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


AND NOW FOR THE ARTICLE THAT SECOND LOVES, WHICH ONCE AGAIN BLAMES THE VICTIM

Quote:

Over the past decade, reams of research by economists has been devoted to investigating why they failed to foresee the financial crisis, among other things economics has recently gotten wrong. This soul-searching has produced new theories, models, and policies, but it hasn’t fully repaired the reputation of the field. As time passes and the effects of the crisis fade, people still find it hard to trust economists.
OMFG, what a self-important set of excuses.

1) Where ARE those "new theories, models, and policies"? Has anyone heard of them?
2)More importantly, has anyone seen them put into action? Or has it been just more of the same? ... yanno, the theories, models, and policies which nothing but rationalizations which CONTINUE to make the rich richer? Because, yanno, until people see some REAL benefit from these new-all-new theories, they will continue to view them as mere rationalizations.

Quote:

The latest effort to improve public opinion
But not actual performance? The this is just a PR push

Quote:

of economics comes from Jean Tirole, winner of the Nobel prize in economics in 2014. The Frenchman’s latest book, Economics for the Common Good (Princeton University Press), is a 560-page manifesto on how the profession can get back on track.
Tirole_EconomicsForTheCommonGood

The timing of the book—published in English this month after its original release in French last year—is pertinent. The relationship between economics and politics is starting to unravel. Over the past year, many have sought to explain Brexit, the election of Donald Trump, and the rise of far-right and far-left politics in Europe using economic arguments. But it’s becoming clear that economics alone does not explain the situation. If the questions at the root of public life are no longer answered by the famous political dictum, “It’s the economy, stupid,” where does that leave economists?

Because it's STILL the economy, stupid. Just because some incredibly phonied-up figures about unemployment and GDP have been polished up to an incredible shine doesn't mean that people still aren't suffering. After all, just look at personal indebtedness.

Quote:

Amid a general backlash against “elites,” economists must prove their worth. Tirole starts by trying to demystify what they actually do.
Provide rationalizations based on untenable assumptions for the TPTB to get richer and richer?

Quote:

He then addresses the challenges the field should be tackling, from inequality and climate change to labor market policies and the future of Europe.

He also isn’t afraid to turn the tables. “We get the economic policies we deserve,” he writes. “And as long as a lack of economic understanding prevails among the general public, making good policy choices will take a lot of political courage.” This concern shared by the Bank of England’s chief economist, Andy Haldane, who recently said the UK suffers from “twin deficits” in public understanding and trust in economics.

The Bank of England is one of the major promoters of debt as a way of life, an enforcer of "interest rate apartheid", and a principal architect of "the way things are", so go suck on it, Haldane.

Quote:

Tirole’s book is ultimately a defense of economics, although it acknowledges that it needs to reconnect with other social sciences like psychology, anthropology, history, and political science. This is something Tirole encourages as chairman of the Institute for Advanced Study in Toulouse, where experts from a wide range of disciplines work together.

Quartz spoke with Tirole in London about what goes wrong when we believe what we want to believe at the expense of good economics. The conversation has been edited and condensed.



Well, since the intro was just one giant fawning rationalization, I can hardly expect the article to be any better.

Quote:

Quartz: This book is a big departure from your previous work on industrial organization, regulation, and finance. Why write it?

Tirole: I’ve been involved in public policy for a long time but I’d never engaged directly with the public. The tipping point was the Nobel prize. You become a public intellectual whether you want to or not.

An ex-post rationalization is also populism. It’s useful to communicate with experts and governments, but if the wider audience don’t get it because they don’t have enough of an academic education, it’s very hard for politicians to get the right policies through.

Academic economics is the problem. What this man is saying that if people aren't sufficiently propagandized, it's hard to jam the stick up their ass.

Quote:

And politicians are like everybody else, they react to their own incentives, such as an election.
And the donors which make their election possible. My god, this guy is an ass.

Quote:

Q:Do you think enough economists do enough to make their work more accessible to the public?

A: There are economists who do that, but economists also react to their incentives. The main things for them are the judgment of peers, quality of research, and quality of teaching. Doing wider audience work is like a distraction. That doesn’t mean that we can’t do better.

Q: The Nobel prize meant you reached the pinnacle of peer recognition, so that must free you up to write about other things.

A: Getting the Nobel prize is wonderful, but at the same time it’s a bit dangerous. I talk about the Nobel syndrome and I feel that myself.

Q: What is “Nobel syndrome”?

A: The Nobel syndrome is when you are being asked about many things you have no expertise in. You have your common sense and what you learn from colleagues but there’s always a gray zone where you don’t know if you should answer or not. People expect because you won the Nobel prize that you know everything, but the truth is we don’t.

Isn't this entire discussion about the Noble Prize merely an attempt to polish his reputation so that people will take him more seriously?

Quote:

The relationship between economics and politics has been particularly messy lately. Economic arguments don’t seem to be informing better policies.

Well, first we have to make sure people respect intellectuals. For that, the intellectuals have to do the right thing. Then, you have to limit frustrations. People who voted for Trump, or Brexit, or Le Pen and Mélenchon in France are by and large very concerned about their future with robots, with rising debts, with inequality and unemployment. We have neglected some MOST people, the losers of globalization, and we have a society that’s more and more unequal. It might get worse, unfortunately, with new technology.

So, what is his solution to the problem? "Educate" people more, so that they accept their insecure station in life with more meekness?

The reality is the roboticization/ unemployment doesn't HAVE to be the policy, but it WILL be if the main driver of economics is PROFIT and "efficiency" is the excuse. As long as PROFIT is the main goal and people continue to believe in the fairy tale of "efficiency", people will continue to be screwed. So far, he hasn't addressed that.

Quote:

When people are afraid or upset, they also tend to [RIGHTLY] dismiss their current governments and the experts. They want a big change, which is often supplied by populists who offer fairytales and the wrong policies. People are trying to grab something that will give them hope.

Q: Is it getting any better?

A: No, we are not moving in the right direction.

So, what IS the "right direction"? Enquiring minds want to know.

Quote:

Q: You argue that the state has changed from a provider to more of a regulator. But as politics becomes more polarized, support has risen for heavier state intervention by the likes of Jeremy Corbyn in the UK, Bernie Sanders in the US, and Jean-Luc Mélenchon in France.

A: It also applies to the National Front in France [a far-right party], which has a similar economic program. People see the market as this anonymous entity that is running ruining their life. Governments have a role to play, but not what they think. They want someone to rescue them and they think the government is going to protect their job. I am for a welfare state but

I am NOT for a "welfare state". A state that gives handouts to people puts them in a condition of dependency. People don't want to be dependent. They feel the need for some agency in their lives and control over their own future.
Quote:

for example, not the way it works now in France. You want to protect workers; you don’t want to protect jobs.
Why not? Why not construct an economy in which people have meaningful jobs which help them ensure their own future? We need to reduce our global CO2 emissions, right? So what not substitute some human labor for energy-driven production? It will provide people with a basic human need for control over their future, and at the same time reduce our CO2 emissions.

You see why people don't trust economists? If I can up up with these ideas, why can't he? (HINT: It's because he's speaking from a purely ideological position.)

Quote:

Q: So how can inequality be tackled more effectively?

A: There is the issue of inequality within a country but there’s the issue of inequality across countries. We need incentives to innovate and we need entrepreneurs. The five largest market caps in the world are two-sided market platforms created by just a few people. If in continental Europe we don’t succeed in keeping our talent, then the jobs won’t be created here and that’s going to increase inequality. It’s a nice thing to redistribute, but there needs to be something to redistribute.

Inequality is also linked to climate change. Is there enough thinking about how we can address this?

No, there are not enough resources devoted both in terms of pollution and R&D. It’s not going to be a solution either to exonerate developing countries from a carbon price because most of the pollution will come from China, Brazil, India and so on… and maybe the US if Trump continues as he is. The only solution, and it’s not an easy solution, is to transfer money to change the rules of the game for those countries and then they have to be accountable for their pollution. don't have to compete on our playing field Collective promises, like the ones made in Copenhagen and Paris, never happen.

Q: Are people ready to admit that solutions will be hard?

A: The phrase you always hear is green growth. Green growth is about believing what we want to believe. I would love to have green growth but if we could have higher rates of growth, more purchasing power and be greener at the same time, we would be doing it already or we are completely stupid. No, we have to accept that we have to incur costs to be clean.

Q: Lastly, let’s talk about Europe. A lot of Europeans seem to want more integration

They do??? Along what lines???
Quote:

and more sovereignty at the same time.

A: Again, that’s about people believing what they want to believe.

Q: What can Europe do to get out of its current situation, caught between two ideals?

That presumes that the question is correct.

Quote:

A: Europe is not a federation, in the way the US can be or many countries can be, because we don’t have a shared budget, a common debt, common unemployment insurance, or common deposit insurance. Europe would need systematic transfers and currently it’d be from the north to the south.

You also need to have some common laws. In Europe we have centralized banking supervision,

Which is their biggest problem. It is a non-democratic bureaucracy which controls debt creation and the currency. Another point that our so-called economist failed to notice
Quote:

so in principle we could have common deposit insurance because we have the same rules of the game for banks in Spain, Italy, Germany, etc.

But for unemployment insurance we don’t have the same rules. We have labor market policies and education, but the unemployment rate varies from below 5% to 15-20%. A common unemployment insurance would make that more in sync. I’m not saying we should make people unemployed just for fun, but still we have lobbies that resist change. Whether you resist the lobbies depends on whether you will pay yourself or whether it will be shared with the others. In order to move towards a common budget

ASSUMING that's what people want and/or is a viable solution
Quote:

and debt, we need to have common rules of the game.

Q: Is this likely?

A: I’m pessimistic. If you look at the populist movement—but not just populists— they always offer more sovereignty. If you look at the broader scale, it’s ridiculous. The French are going to defend against Germans and vice versa. But as a narrative it works, and the trend is towards more sovereignty and less federalism.



SIX was right, this was an INCREDIBLY stupid article, it's really just a rehash of Yanis Varoufakis, and I gave up listening to HIM after one or two readings. There are a lot better better books out there on the failures of modern economics. I'll see if I can find those titles and post them; it's a lot better than reading this drivel.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

America is an oligarchy
http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=57876

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Wednesday, May 9, 2018 2:25 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Trump has no Plan B on Iran beyond "not Obama’s Plan A."

Plan B’s Step 1 is terminating the Iran Deal.
Step 3 is Iran complying with all Trump’s demands.
Step 2? Step 2 is a wee bit hazy.

There are at least two possibilities for Step 2:
A) Starve Iran into submission, just like with North Korea.
B) Bomb Iran into submission, just like with North Vietnam.

Those both worked great! There are other possibilities too, like encouraging the entire Middle East to engage in a brutal war of Sunni vs. Shia. Really, there are loads of options here. Just ask John Bolton.

www.washingtonpost.com/news/posteverything/wp/2018/05/09/there-is-no-p
lan-b-on-iran/?utm_term=.5b715861c63d


SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL TWO: We’re in constant conversations with the Europeans on this.

QUESTION: But you don’t know at this point? You don’t know? You didn’t get to that in your discussions, what’s going to happen?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL ONE: We did not talk about a Plan B in our discussions because we were focused on negotiating a supplemental agreement [to the JCPOA], so we did not — we did not talk about Plan B.

In other words, the Trump administration has no idea what it is doing other than “not Plan A.”

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, May 9, 2018 2:31 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:

Originally posted by SIGNYM:

SIX was right, this was an INCREDIBLY stupid article, it's really just a rehash of Yanis Varoufakis, and I gave up listening to HIM after one or two readings. There are a lot better better books out there on the failures of modern economics. I'll see if I can find those titles and post them; it's a lot better than reading this drivel.

I am eager to know what authors on economics you recommend. Why did you not immediately give your authors rather than spread contempt? Once you get around to it, you ought to stand behind your recommendations, not just throw some names out there that you haven't read. I want to know who you get your ideas from about how economics works.

I find on my shelf the first book I every bought on economics: "Almost Everyone’s Guide to Economics" – Printed 1978, by John Kenneth Galbraith, the famous liberal. My copy is the Consumers Union Edition for Consumer Reports Readers. The book remains true for me, if not for you.
www.amazon.com/Almost-Everyones-Economics-Kenneth-Galbraith/dp/0395271
177
/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, May 9, 2018 3:41 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:


SIX was right, this was an INCREDIBLY stupid article, it's really just a rehash of Yanis Varoufakis, and I gave up listening to HIM after one or two readings. There are a lot better better books out there on the failures of modern economics. I'll see if I can find those titles and post them; it's a lot better than reading this drivel. - SIGNY

I am eager to know what authors on economics you recommend. Why did you not immediately give your authors rather than spread contempt?- SECOND

Because I wanted you to know that not only do I have different ideas than his, I have also considered - AND REJECTED- his. In other words, my ideas encompass his.

Quote:

Once you get around to it, you ought to stand behind your recommendations, not just throw some names out there that you haven't read. I want to know who you get your ideas from about how economics work.- SECOND
A book that I have recommended many times on this website already is "The Worldly Philosophers" by Heilbroner. It's a classic about the history of economic theories which not only presents the theories but also the issues of the day and the social and political problems that the theories were trying to address. From Adam Smith thru Karl Marx and Keynes. I read it when I was 12 (in the early 60's) and there have been many editions since then. I can't speak to later editions, but the one I read was profoundly interesting. I recommend it highly.

There's another book that I liked really well; unfortunately I can't remember the title or the author and we're in a midst of a home renovation so our bookcases are all in boxes. But it was written by an "academic" economist, who went through the tenets of basic modern economy theory and showed how each fundamental assumption was flawed. For example, one of the tenets is that economic actors are atomistic, rational, and all-knowing (or indeed prescient) participants. These characteristics are the basis of the modern supply-demand-price curves. But each one of those characteristics (atomistic, rational, prescient) are fundamentally wrong: humans are herd animals and tend to to what others are doing (including panic-buying and panic-selling), we are clearly not rational, nor are we possessed of all of the facts/ ultimate outcomes surrounding our choices. ALSO, economic theory mathematics rests on supply-demand-price reaching equilibrium, which it never does. In addition, while it's easy to calculate the equilibrium for a single item, it's much more difficult to calculate equilibria when multiple items are competing against each other. So Nobel Prize-winning advances in economics, such mathematically "solving" general equilibria matrixes, are in reality pretty meaningless. And finally, modern economists don't take "bank money creation" into account. So overall, academic modern economics is pretty pointless.

That second book was also a great book, I just wish I could find it.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

America is an oligarchy
http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=57876

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Wednesday, May 9, 2018 4:58 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Academic economics is the problem. What this man is saying that if people aren't sufficiently propagandized, it's hard to jam the stick up their ass.


Propoganda = Lube. I love it.

Quote:

So, what is his solution to the problem? "Educate" people more, so that they accept their insecure station in life with more meekness?


Why do I get the feeling that if our government actually ever got around to finally teaching our kids important things like economics before they went to college that this is EXACTLY what the main take away from these classes would be?

Quote:

The reality is the roboticization/ unemployment doesn't HAVE to be the policy, but it WILL be if the main driver of economics is PROFIT and "efficiency" is the excuse. As long as PROFIT is the main goal and people continue to believe in the fairy tale of "efficiency", people will continue to be screwed. So far, he hasn't addressed that.


Six Sigma. I've been speaking against it for years now. The Six Sigma Doctrine: "Take away everything that once made a job enjoyable. All perks, and as many financial bonuses as possible. Catalyze hard work not through rewarding merit, but through fear of losing their jobs. But always be sure to use big, happy sounding words that usually mean the exact opposite of what you're saying. After all, the people are merely cattle. You're doing this all for their own good."

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, May 9, 2018 5:48 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:

Originally posted by SIGNYM:

A book that I have recommended many times on this website already is "The Worldly Philosophers" by Heilbroner. . . . I read it when I was 12 (in the early 60's) and there have been many editions since then. I can't speak to later editions, but the one I read was profoundly interesting. I recommend it highly.

There's another book that I liked really well; unfortunately I can't remember the title or the author . . . So overall, academic modern economics is pretty pointless.

That second book was also a great book, I just wish I could find it.

Signym, take this as a strawman if you want, but I am out of time:

Heilbroner wrote The Worldly Philosophers as young man for the 12 year old Signym.
https://thepiratebay.org/torrent/12143671/The_Worldly_Philosophers_._R
obert_L._Heilbroner_._epub

www.amazon.com/Worldly-Philosophers-Economic-Thinkers-Seventh/dp/06848
6214X
/

As an old man, Heilbroner's preferred capitalist model was the highly redistributionist welfare states of Scandinavia; he stated that his model society was "a slightly idealized Sweden." The typical Democrat, including me, has no objections to America following Scandinavian examples. But Republicans have many violent objections, making impossible America becoming a big Denmark with a low poverty rate, healthcare for everyone, and not at war all around the world.
www.salon.com/2010/06/15/conservatives_economics_european/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Heilbroner

Then Signym read another book, that can’t be found at the moment. Now Signym rejects most economics theories as unrealistic and replaced them with what? With nothing! I am sure that Scandinavia, especially Heilbroner’s slightly idealized Sweden, did not achieve prosperity by rejected the same economic explanations rejected by Signym. Scandinavians are not tweeting "NO EVIDENCE", which is very dissimilar to Signym, Trump, and the Republican voters.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Thursday, May 10, 2018 1:00 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:

As an old man, Heilbroner's preferred capitalist model was the highly redistributionist welfare states of Scandinavia; he stated that his model society was "a slightly idealized Sweden."-
It doesn't matter what Heilbroner likes, or doesn't like. As HISTORY book and an explanation of what various economic theorists were trying to solve, it was very informative. you wanted to know what I recommended. I STILL recommend the book. Pick any edition you like: you'll know infinitely more than you do now.

Quote:

Then Signym read another book, that can’t be found at the moment.
But I recapped some of the arguments in the book for you, and if you were interested in actually being informed instead of bitching endlessly, you would have learned something from that too.

Quote:

Now Signym rejects most economics theories as unrealistic and replaced them with what? With nothing!
Not true. I've posted extensively about what I think America needs to do. Apparently, you "forgot" it.


Quote:

I am sure that Scandinavia, especially Heilbroner’s slightly idealized Sweden, did not achieve prosperity by rejected [sic] the same economic explanations rejected by Signym. Scandinavians are not tweeting "NO EVIDENCE", which is very dissimilar [???] to Signym, Trump, and the Republican voters.
Norway is making a lot of money from North Sea oil. Sweden exports arms, machinery, motor vehicles, paper products, pulp and wood, iron, steel products, chemicals. Denmark is self-sufficient in energy producing oil, natural gas, wind and bio energy. Its principal exports are machinery, chemicals and food products. Iceland went thru its own financial crisis and is busy digging out of its previous debt by exporting fish.

ALL of the nations are exporting nations, with a positive or neutral balance of trade,
NONE of the nations adopted the Euro, which says something about sovereignty.

You can't have a "redistributive" economy if you don't have any production to redistribute.


-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

America is an oligarchy
http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=57876

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Thursday, May 10, 2018 4:21 AM

JEWELSTAITEFAN


Quote:

Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Quote:

As an old man, Heilbroner's preferred capitalist model was the highly redistributionist welfare states of Scandinavia; he stated that his model society was "a slightly idealized Sweden."-
It doesn't matter what Heilbroner likes, or doesn't like. As HISTORY book and an explanation of what various economic theorists were trying to solve, it was very informative. you wanted to know what I recommended. I STILL recommend the book. Pick any edition you like: you'll know infinitely more than you do now.

Quote:

Then Signym read another book, that can’t be found at the moment.
But I recapped some of the arguments in the book for you, and if you were interested in actually being informed instead of bitching endlessly, you would have learned something from that too.

Quote:

Now Signym rejects most economics theories as unrealistic and replaced them with what? With nothing!
Not true. I've posted extensively about what I think America needs to do. Apparently, you "forgot" it.


Quote:

I am sure that Scandinavia, especially Heilbroner’s slightly idealized Sweden, did not achieve prosperity by rejected [sic] the same economic explanations rejected by Signym. Scandinavians are not tweeting "NO EVIDENCE", which is very dissimilar [???] to Signym, Trump, and the Republican voters.
Norway is making a lot of money from North Sea oil. Sweden exports arms, machinery, motor vehicles, paper products, pulp and wood, iron, steel products, chemicals. Denmark is self-sufficient in energy producing oil, natural gas, wind and bio energy. Its principal exports are machinery, chemicals and food products. Iceland went thru its own financial crisis and is busy digging out of its previous debt by exporting fish.

ALL of the nations are exporting nations, with a positive or neutral balance of trade,
NONE of the nations adopted the Euro, which says something about sovereignty.

You can't have a "redistributive" economy if you don't have any production to redistribute.

I look forward to when you find your 2nd book title.
Perhaps you could start a thread on Economic Theories or Practices, Policies. To make a repository of reference material to be found?


Kinda funny how second posts whatever was read a few minutes before, claiming it as the the best idea ever, but whines if you don't procure an entire bulletproof theory at the drop of a hat.

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Thursday, May 10, 2018 6:53 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:

Originally posted by SIGNYM:

. . .
ALL of the nations are exporting nations, with a positive or neutral balance of trade,
NONE of the nations adopted the Euro, which says something about sovereignty.

You can't have a "redistributive" economy if you don't have any production to redistribute.

Robert L. Heilbroner's book does mention "the political leadership, the diplomatic skills, and the social inspiration that must play crucial roles in preventing these strains from undoing the workability of capitalist societies." Trump’s unilateralism and isolationism were not mentioned.

American greed and American indifference to the poor, which are two features of Trumpism, were mentioned. Also: "difficult challenge of reducing climate-warming emissions in the richer nations that are their source". Trump unilaterally withdrew from the Paris Agreement to handle that "challenge". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Agreement

From Chapter XI, "The End of the Worldly Philosophy?" from The Worldly Philosophers, 1999

And so our discussion leads us to consider the second of the larger questions I posed at the outset of this chapter—namely, the “end” of our subject in terms of its purpose, its aim. If economics is not to be a science of society, what is to be its ultimate social usefulness?

My answer is that its purpose is to help us better understand the capitalist setting in which we will most likely have to shape our collective destiny for the foreseeable future. Having for many years endorsed the ideas and objectives of democratic socialism, that is not an easy assertion for me to make. But given the experience of socialism in its twentieth-century forms, it is difficult to expect its benign rebirth in the century to come. Indeed, taking into account the strains and stresses clearly visible in the decades ahead, it is all too likely that any prospective socialism, especially in the less developed areas where its advent is most likely, will again develop tendencies for political megalomania, bureaucratic inertia, and ideological intolerance.

To be sure, these strains and stresses will exert their destructive force on capitalist societies as well. Ecological dangers, foremost among them global warming, will bring not only the need to contain the damage of climatic change in the poor nations, but the even more difficult challenge of reducing climate-warming emissions in the richer nations that are their source. Add to this the alarming spread of nuclear weaponry on the one hand, and ethnic, racial, and religious hatreds on the other, and the stage is surely set for problems and tensions from which the capitalist powers cannot be insulated. Finally, there is the fast-growing problem of a globalized economy that arises largely within individual capitalisms, but then escapes their control to become a supranational presence that threatens the sovereignty of the wealthiest of them. In sum, here is a prospect as threatening, if not as desperate, for the rich capitalist world as that which confronts the poor precapitalist or presocialist one.

What could be the purpose of vision and analysis under these conditions? It must be evident that there is little for economics to offer with respect to the political leadership, the diplomatic skills, and the social inspiration that must play crucial roles in preventing these strains from undoing the workability of capitalist societies. Nonetheless, a worldly philosophy has a unique potential to provide the visionary guidance that will help at least some capitalisms make their way as safely as possible through the coming decades.

Let me stress some capitalisms. To say it one last time, the distinctive properties of all capitalisms are the drive for capital, the guidance and constraints of a market system, and the blessings—admittedly, often mixed—of a bifurcation of power into two interpenetrative but still independent sectors. To this, however, must be added a capacity for adaptation and innovation that results in a spectrum of capitalist performances, a spectrum that is visible in the intensity of the drive for capital, the degree of freedom accorded to market dispensations, and the location of the boundary between the public and private realms. Thus we have a considerable variety of capitalist societies despite the general similarity of their economies—witness the gulf between the socially, if not always economically, successful capitalisms of Scandanavia and Europe, and the economically successful but socially disastrous capitalism of the United States: consider, for example, that executive compensation in the top corporations in the United States is twice that of France or Germany, whereas the upward mobility of the American poor is half that of those countries and but a third that of Sweden. The first comparison points to a culture of greed; the second to one of social indifference. The combination hardly suggests the institutional adaptability that will be needed by any nation seeking to minimize the strains of the decades ahead, much less serve as a model for world leadership.

It is with respect to these social aspects of capitalism that a reborn worldly philosophy can play its most useful role. Economic analysis, by itself, cannot provide a torch that lights our way into the future, but economic vision could become the source of an awareness of ways by which a capitalist structure can broaden its motivations, increase its flexibility, and develop its social responsibility. In a word, in this time of foreseeable stress, the purposeful end of the worldly philosophy should be to develop a new awareness of the need for, and the possibilities of, socially as well as economically successful capitalisms.

No doubt it will be objected that the realization of such a far-reaching program would require prodigies of political leadership, and that much of the learning needed to give substance to such a vision belongs properly within the boundaries of other fields of knowledge, from psychology and sociology through political science.

All true, all true. Economics alone will not guide a country that has no vital leadership, but leadership will lack for clear directions without the inspiration of an enlightened as well as an enlarged self-definition of economics. Assuredly such a new economics will incorporate knowledge from the domains of other branches of social inquiry, but if the usefulness of the worldly philosophy of the twenty-first century is to match that of the nineteenth and early twentieth, it will need to be both deepened and enlarged, above all compared to the desiccated residue with which we are left today. Bearing in mind the two meanings of “end” in our title, it is to this hopeful vision of tomorrow’s worldly philosophy that this book is dedicated.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Thursday, May 10, 2018 7:27 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:

Originally posted by SIGNYM:

A book that I have recommended many times on this website already is "The Worldly Philosophers" by Heilbroner. It's a classic about the history of economic theories which not only presents the theories but also the issues of the day and the social and political problems that the theories were trying to address. From Adam Smith thru Karl Marx and Keynes. I read it when I was 12 (in the early 60's) and there have been many editions since then. I can't speak to later editions, but the one I read was profoundly interesting. I recommend it highly.

Chapter VIII - "The Savage Society of Thorstein Veblen" has much to teach Signym about Trump as the saboteur of capitalism.

The new book The Theory of Business Enterprise came out in 1904. It was even more coruscating and still more curious than his first. For the point of view that it advocated seemed to fly in the face of common sense itself. Every economist from the days of Adam Smith had made of the capitalist the driving figure in the economic tableau; whether for better or worse, he was generally assumed to be the central generator of economic progress. But with Veblen all this was turned topsy-turvy. The businessman was still the central figure, but no longer the motor force. Now he was portrayed as the saboteur of the system!

Needless to say, it was a strange perspective on society that could produce so disconcerting a view. Veblen did not begin, as Ricardo or Marx or the Victorians, with the clash of human interests; he began at a stage below, in the non-human substratum of technology. What fascinated him was the machine. He saw society as dominated by the machine, caught up in its standardization, timed to its regular cycle of performance, geared to its insistence on accuracy and precision. More than that, he envisaged the economic process itself as being basically mechanical in character. Economics meant production, and production meant the machinelike meshing of society as it turned out goods. Such a social machine would need tenders, of course—technicians and engineers to make whatever adjustments were necessary to ensure the most efficient cooperation of the parts. But from an overall view, society could best be pictured as a gigantic but purely matter-of-fact mechanism, a highly specialized, highly coordinated human clockwork.

But where would the businessman fit into such a scheme? For the businessman was interested in making money, whereas the machine and its engineer masters knew no end except making goods. If the machine functioned well and fitted together smoothly, where would there be a place for a man whose only aim was profit?

Ideally, there would be none. The machine was not concerned with values and profits; it ground out goods. Hence the businessman would have no function to perform—unless he turned engineer. But as a member of the leisure class he was not interested in engineering; he wanted to accumulate. And this was something the machine was not set up to do at all. So the businessman achieved his end, not by working within the framework of the social machine, but by conspiring against it! His function was not to help make goods, but to cause breakdowns in the regular flow of output so that values would fluctuate and he could capitalize on the confusion to reap a profit. And so, on top of the machinelike dependability of the actual production apparatus in the world, the businessman built a superstructure of credit, loans, and make-believe capitalizations. Below, society turned over in its mechanical routine; above, the structure of finance swayed and shifted. And as the financial counterpart to the real world teetered, opportunities for profit constantly appeared, disappeared, and reappeared. But the price of this profit seeking was high; it was the constant disturbing, undoing, even conscious misdirecting of the efforts of society to provision itself. . . .

Examples of Trump style financial chicanery followed by . . .

In the light of the times, Veblen’s theory does not seem so farfetched. It stung because it described, almost in the terms of a savage ritual, practices that were recognized as the ultimate of sophistication. But his essential thesis was all too well documented by the facts: the function of the great barons of business was indeed very different from the functions of the men who actually ran the productive mechanism. The bold game of financial chicanery certainly served as much to disturb the flow of goods as to promote it.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Thursday, May 10, 2018 7:59 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


I see this thread has devolved into pure philosophical bullshit territory now.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Thursday, May 10, 2018 8:58 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
I see this thread has devolved into pure philosophical bullshit territory now.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

6ix, when elderly adults write, you sneer at them for being too philosophical or too rich or too SJW or living in an ivory tower, not practical like yourself. That is a bone-headed attitude of yours.

Signym brought up a book, The Worldly Philosophers by Robert L. Heilbroner, as a common reference point. 6ixStringJack can read the same book for free:
https://thepiratebay.org/torrent/12143671/The_Worldly_Philosophers_._R
obert_L._Heilbroner_._epub


I recognize the America and the economics Heilbroner describes. Maybe that gives Signym and me something in common, for once. Maybe not. Signym's usual descriptions of America and economics are ignorant fantasies from my view of America, unlike Heilbroner's. I believe Heilbroner knows what he writes about while at the same time everything Signym writes smells unreal. Maybe unreal because Signym hasn't read Heilbroner since she was 12, so that is enough time for her to invent her own highly articulate, yet completely imaginary version of America. Too bad Heilbroner is not alive to straighten out Signym. He wrote 20 more books: www.amazon.com/Robert-L.-Heilbroner/e/B000APQA7M/
https://thepiratebay.org/search/Robert%20Heilbroner/0/99/0

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Thursday, May 10, 2018 10:28 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:

A book that I have recommended many times on this website already is "The Worldly Philosophers" by Heilbroner. It's a classic about the history of economic theories which not only presents the theories but also the issues of the day and the social and political problems that the theories were trying to address. From Adam Smith thru Karl Marx and Keynes. I read it when I was 12 (in the early 60's) and there have been many editions since then. I can't speak to later editions, but the one I read was profoundly interesting. I recommend it highly.- SIGNYM

Quote:

Chapter VIII - "The Savage Society of Thorstein Veblen" has much to teach Signym about Trump as the saboteur of capitalism.

The new book The Theory of Business Enterprise came out in 1904. It was even more coruscating and still more curious than his first. For the point of view that it advocated seemed to fly in the face of common sense itself. Every economist from the days of Adam Smith had made of the capitalist the driving figure in the economic tableau; whether for better or worse, he was generally assumed to be the central generator of economic progress. But with Veblen all this was turned topsy-turvy. The businessman was still the central figure, but no longer the motor force. Now he was portrayed as the saboteur of the system! ...

So the businessman achieved his end, not by working within the framework of the social machine, but by conspiring against it! His function was not to help make goods, but to cause breakdowns in the regular flow of output so that values would fluctuate and he could capitalize on the confusion to reap a profit. And so, on top of the machinelike dependability of the actual production apparatus in the world, the businessman built a superstructure of credit, loans, and make-believe capitalizations. Below, society turned over in its mechanical routine; above, the structure of finance swayed and shifted. And as the financial counterpart to the real world teetered, opportunities for profit constantly appeared, disappeared, and reappeared. But the price of this profit seeking was high; it was the constant disturbing, undoing, even conscious misdirecting of the efforts of society to provision itself...

-SECOND



Yes, I read about Thorstein Veblen. As best I recall, his big grotch was the "rentier economy" ... people who made money simply by charging "rent" on the resources that they owned: land, minerals, NATURAL GAS [THAT WOULD BE YOU, SECOND], other natural resources, housing, bank credit etc.

In his view, this "rent" was "unearned income". Broad-brush, the concept covers MANY resources for which "rent" can be charged, but Veblen came to focus on the "rent" charged for "money", which is what we would call "interest on loans". (By contrast, Marx felt that "ownership of the means of production" was the only REAL ownership that counted. In Marx's view, human labor was the only source of real wealth, and so ownership of the means of production was the wellspring of real wealth creation. I suppose I could make Marx and Veblen compatible by saying that while production is the wellspring of real wealth, ownership is the wellspring of theft/concentration of wealth. But I digress...).

Now, here's the funny thing: WHICH ENTITIES CAN BE SAID TO "OWN MONEY"? Again, in broad brush, you "own money" to the extent that you have money in your bank account.

BUT WAIT! The G20 has agreed that the money that you put into "your" bank account ISN'T YOURS. It's an unsecured loan to the bank, so in reality YOU DON'T OWN YOUR BANK ACCOUNT, THE BANK DOES.

Looking even further, however, YOU DO NOT HAVE THE LEGAL RIGHT TO PRINT MONEY. BANKS DO. They create money by loaning money that THEY DON'T HAVE. They plop $100,000 into your bank account; of that $100,000 NONE of it is required to be backed by cash in the vault. Only transactions greater than $16 million are required to have any reserve at all. So the REAL owner of money is any entity (bank or shadow bank) which can "create" money by loaning money that it doesn't have, and demand REAL money back PLUS INTEREST. That is called "fractional reserve banking".

The "bad guys" in Veblen's world are rentiers (that's you, SECOND) , and the worst of the bad guys are bankers and financiers (today we would call them hedge funds dealing in derivatives) who "rent money". Worse, they legally "rent money" they don't even have. Veblen points out the conflict of interests between "producers" and "financiers", which is just as active today as the conflict of interests between the "nationalist" and "globalist" elites.

*******

Thanks for finding an online version of Heilbroner. I think I'll re-read it. Assuming that I unearth that other book, I'll post about it.

But SECOND, do you see the difference between the major economic theorists in the book, and today's academic economists? Most academic economists today limit themselves to an excessively narrow field of study, refusing to come out of a narrow world of mathematics which is bounded by assumptions already shown to be untrue. As far as I can tell, their activities can best be described as "polishing a turd".

*****

As far as Yanis Varoufakis is concerned, his activities can best be described as "whinging for money". Now, I agree that Greece was done hard by Goldman, the ECB/EC/IMF ("troika") and its own dirty politicians. But urging overextension is just what banks do, because when they come to collect they not only get the money that you already paid on your too-big loan, they ALSO get the collateral on which the loan was based. Real property for pennies on the dollar! Austerity for the population, as the lenders squeeze out that last possible Euro from Greece, short of bankrupting the entire nation!

Yanis' argument, as best as I can tell, was that Greece needed more money for further development so that it could compete more effectively (in the EU? In the world?) and pay back its loans. But he overlooks the fact that is not a solution for ALL national debts: That simply raises the overall level of productivity, but in the resulting hyper-competitive world there will STILL be winners and losers, and the losers will STILL have unpayable debt. So Greece may come out better than Portugal, but Portugal will be left in even worse shape than before because it's income production will be relatively less, having been "out-competed" by Greece. So what is Yanis' solution for Portugal? Or Brazil? Or the USA?


-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

America is an oligarchy
http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=57876

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Thursday, May 10, 2018 11:00 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:

I look forward to when you find your 2nd book title.
Perhaps you could start a thread on Economic Theories or Practices, Policies. To make a repository of reference material to be found?

Good idea.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

America is an oligarchy
http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=57876

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Thursday, May 10, 2018 11:13 AM

CAPTAINCRUNCH

... stay crunchy...


Quote:

Originally posted by second:Signym's usual descriptions of America and economics are ignorant fantasies from my view of America, unlike Heilbroner's. I believe Heilbroner knows what he writes about while at the same time everything Signym writes smells unreal.


+1

I also note for the record that Consumers are rarely, A) mentioned as being an involved party, or B) held responsible for their actions in the Kiki/Signym anti-corporate, anti-bank, anti-younameit fantasy world they talk about.

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Thursday, May 10, 2018 11:26 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:

Signym's usual descriptions of America and economics are ignorant fantasies from my view of America, unlike Heilbroner's. I believe Heilbroner knows what he writes about while at the same time everything Signym writes smells unreal. - SECOND

+1
I also note for the record that Consumers are rarely, A) mentioned as being an involved party, or B) held responsible for their actions in the Kiki/Signym anti-corporate, anti-bank, anti-younameit fantasy world they talk about.- GSTRING

Well, thank you for bringing your vast intellect and excellent sense of "smell" to the discussion! Clearly, you know what you post about!



-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

America is an oligarchy
http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=57876

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Thursday, May 10, 2018 1:14 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


I moved almost this entire page to here http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?bid=18&tid=60986&mid=1
052623#1052623
for continued theoretical discussion of economics

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

America is an oligarchy
http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=57876

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