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Are We Headed For Class Warfare?
Over the course of the last few years we have vociferously exposed the growing inequalities and divergences between various elements of the status quo society.
With even the President now seemingly inciting class warfare (which as we discussed here and here is becoming an increasingly new normal "age warfare" issues); we roll out the wayback machine for 150 seconds of clarity from Doug Casey. With roughly half the American people net recipients of government support in some way (and work punished), Casey explains what happens when the entitled elect themselves (as Michael Burry so aptly noted "the party accelerates, and the brutal hangover is inevitable,") and the social and political consequences.
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And that is why I rave against concentrated power, be it held by government, corporations or government. As you say we are the enemy and when gathered in force can do some pretty evil shit. I understand why so many see the power of government as a power for good, and I will never suggest they can do no good, it just the risks of abuse of this power is too great and has always lead to disaster far greater than the results of unsafe food or dirty air. Just my opinion.
Greed and fear. Greed turns too many ethically challenged people into scum. Fear of retaliation prevents the honest worker from rebelling against union tactics. Herd mentality turns individually honest workers into lemings that follow and obey without question. So sad , if corporations would just pay an honest wage and workers give an honest days work there would be no need for unions.
Yeah the unions made a deal organized crime (Jewish and Italian gangsters mainly in the Midwest and Northeast) because they needed the protection from organized goons that were on the payrolls of the local factory owners & along with the local politicians & law enforcement who looked the other way.
My grandfather dealt with that first-hand as wildcat striker in the 30s in the textile mills in Reading, PA. He tried to organized in more peaceful ways and for ultimately for his labor organizing efforts got a huge scar above his right eye from a metal pipe used to beat him that he had the rest of his life & his row house in Reading was firebombed. My grandfather did make a deal with organized crime (Jewish gangster in Reading who had ties to NYC and Philadelphia and could provide local Italian muscle) but it helped to even the odds while ending the beatings and violence the union organizers took while the local police looked the other way.
This revisionist, pollyannaish idea that conservatives have about late 19th century and early 20th century America being some of kind of paradise from most Americans is beyond ridiculous.
And the greed of the unions forced the labor over seas. It's only human nature to find the lowest cost of production. Your fist smells like Obama's rectum.
mofreedom, that's just not true. nothing forced labor overseas. politics, and the two party system in general are constructs in which societies winners and losers negotiate. capital vs labor. think of a pendulum, it might swing too far one way or the other but it corrects itself. that's how we maintain a peaceful society, when clinton signed NAFTA, the negotiation ended. labor got sent home. the rights of a large chunk of the population evaporated. nothing forced this. reagan had just transformed america into a businessman's paradise. clinton was elected to swing the pendulum the other way. didn't work. he was scum.
Americans forced businesses overseas. We were not forced to buy Chinese, Japanese, Korean or anyone else's production. We did that all on our own. Sure, politicians made it rasy for us. They devalued our currency and printed vast amounts of it to loan us, to replace the diminishing earnings we were experiencing, and they never came right out and told us we would eventually go broke if we kept buying the shit. But it has never been a secret either. We have had plenty of people tell us how it would go, but instead we listen to politicians telling us how its just all evil business's fault and all we need to do is punish them with higher taxes. Yeah, thats working great!
Dude... where were you in 1992? NAFTA was Bush Sr.
"In the US, Bush, who had worked to "fast track" the signing prior to the end of his term, ran out of time and had to pass the required ratification and signing into law to incoming president Bill Clinton."
Democrat/Republican=Guilty
thsnk you akarc. my point exactly. bush 1 was just doing what establishment repubs sre supposed to do, clinton was elected to stop it in it's tracks. the two party system ceased to exist the day he signed it.
Do you ever read the articles published on this site about wealth inequality? The meme that unions forced labor overseas is one of the most brilliant pieces of propaganda to catch a segment of the population hook, line and sinker. It is also total bullshit. Research Apple's profit margin and how much they would really lose were they to make the phone here. Pennies.
The greed of the a US population who has no problem purchasing goods built on the backs of slavery and child abuse perpetuates the decline of civilization.
Have you ever seen what working conditions were like before unions in this country? Did you think that the wage gap between the CEO and the line worker may or may not have some impact on profit margin. Ah yes. But the CEO deserves it because why he can build all them cars all by himself.
Sniff my fist please.
"The Civil Rights Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the Violence Against Women Act are three huge stinking piles of horseshit that have done more to divide the country than just about anything else."
Do you have sources that back that assertion up as fact? It maybe that what you refer to "artificially elevating" could be defined as the granting of equal rights. Then again, maybe the Americaan declaration of independence was a buch of crap.
Why must we always assume that a world of "better" people can only come about through the force of law? If you paint by numbers does that make you an artist. If there is no crime because everyone is absolutely in fear of their lives, is that a truly peaceful society? Every tyrant in the history of man has believed they could mold a society into something they saw as perfection. Its not to suggest there should be no law, only that the law should be blind, unbiased, and not written to favor or invoke justice for past wrongs. Especially when it spans generations of people who have no culpability what so ever. Many conservatives have resisted many of these progressive laws specifically for that reason, but they will be cast as evil by those who oppose them regardless of reason. Every worthy cause that exists has been corrupted by government, from education to global warming. We see constant vetching about red vs blue, but the real issue is justifying corruption because it advances personal goals, regardless of ideology. The glorious ends justifying the despicable means.
Since only an individual man can possess rights, the expression “individual rights” is a redundancy (which one has to use for purposes of clarification in today’s intellectual chaos). But the expression “collective rights” is a contradiction in terms.
Any group or “collective,” large or small, is only a number of individuals. A group can have no rights other than the rights of its individual members.
A group, as such, has no rights. A man can neither acquire new rights by joining a group nor lose the rights which he does possess. The principle of individual rights is the only moral base of all groups or associations.
Any group that does not recognize this principle is not an association, but a gang or a mob . . . .
The notion of “collective rights” (the notion that rights belong to groups, not to individuals) means that “rights” belong to some men, but not to others—that some men have the “right” to dispose of others in any manner they please—and that the criterion of such privileged position consists of numerical superiority.
The notion that “Anything society does is right because society chose to do it,” is not a moral principle, but a negation of moral principles and the banishment of morality from social issues.
ayn rand
+1
"Any group or “collective,” large or small, is only a number of individuals. A group can have no rights other than the rights of its individual members."
In the past I would have agreed. However, FEC vs. Citizens United tells me I am not allowed to agree with that concept today.
Every time they pass one of these bullshit laws it's all about sliding in some pork that benefits their real" constituents" the banks and corporations.
I have resisted surrendering our rights for years. It has cost me. But I remain defiantly happy. And ready to recoup. See you on the other side.
"I have resisted surrendering our rights for years. It has cost me."
BRAVO! Resistence is costly. But as you note, the result is happiness. To many do not understand that. Thank You!
It's in the blood.
From my perspective, the worst is the impact this has had on our sons (I have 2, 25 & 29, and yes they are white). The subliminal message for the last 30 years has been the characterization of white males in mass media as stupid, incompetent, unqualified for anything, racist, sexist, homophobic, and only good to laugh at. My sons' accomplishments are exceptional, yet they still have this "guilt" for being what they are--what they had no choice about being. The effort I have put in to reinforce their self esteem in the face of all of this has been amazing. So many other parents of boys haven't even recognized this phenomenon--believe me I have tried to talk with them about it. Thanks Oldwood, for bringing this up.
What they have done is despicable. They divide us into camps. One camp is white males who are imbibed with guilt from birth and all the others who are indoctrinated with a belief they cannot succeed on their own and NEED government to derive any hope of achievement and reinforce their demands for entitlements. Can you imagine a society any more dysfunctional and self destructive?
"What they have done is despicable."
Them mean ol "they's". Question, do you stand up for yourself?
Every fucking day. You?
Ditto. So you know then that in so doing it usually cost us.
As an older white male of Irish descent I have no feelings of being stupid, incompetent, unqualified for anything, racist, sexist, homophobic, and only good to laugh at.
"So many other parents of boys haven't even recognized this phenomenon-"
Maybe because it only exists in those who are guilty or impotent.
If you truly are "older" then you escaped the worst of the guilt indoctrination that has been happening for the last forty years or so. The progressives have so wrapped themselves in the concept of protecting ones self image while they have effectively been destroying it. They simultaneously press for school with no grades, sports with no scores and life with no insult, while convincing everyone that they cannot do it on their own, they need government or even big unions to protect their interests from evil at all levels. If human contentment or happiness is contingent on self image, what kind of self image can this level of dependency create? A nation of subsets, all supposedly separate and distinct, yet equal. And all looking at each other with contempt and suspicion with a massive percentage of people who despise their own country and culture. How does this ever workout without violence in a world full of hate for others as well as themselves?
"A bundle of sticks is hard to break."
62 day before yesterday. Grew up graded, scored, insulted, sterotyped and chained. Experience enabled me to see much hypocrisy at all levels. None, including myself, are totally innocent. It has has always been about power and control. Usually in regards to that which we fear which is usually that which we do not understand. Change staarts within each of us individually. The moral deterioration of character begins when you see others being screwed over and blame them as opposed to standing with them.
BULLSHIT! Still longing for the days of whites only water fountains huh?
So you should move to South Africa so you can enjoy true equality with your brothers. No sane person wants institutionalized racism, but most do not want institutionalized reverse discrimination either, through affirmative action and wealth redistribution. The actual costs in money are not the issue, but the bitterness that is pushed into our society. We should be progressing towards a peaceful and harmonious society (as much as is possible) rather than one based on social justice that only creates a greater sense of injustice. Robbing Peter to pay Paul will never end well and justice will forever be in the eyes of the beholder.
'White man's burden' is the single dumbest thing that conservatives rail about. If you think growing up white in the US especially you older sons caused them some kind of difficulty, your pretty delusional.
Yeah racism unforunately in this country is still represented in overwhelming Black-White terms because of the overwhelming historical baggage and history. In some cases and areas largely due to demographics or particular cases, it is still very relevant but the reality is that due to the changing rapidly demographics of America it is a much more nuanced case and this isn't discussed. It is also quite possible for Blacks to the racists and a smaller majority be the target of racial predujice. Certainly happened in the Philly school districts a few years ago with attacks on certain Asian immigrants by Black kids. Also quite possible that it doesn't even involve blacks or whites either. In San Jose, one of the biggest issues is between SE Asians and Mexicans in the school system.
"We could learn form them instead of finding another group to demonize because they are doing what they think is in their best interest."
Damn man you just got most of them. What other groups you think deserve to be demonized? Or should I say be blamed for the poor white christians problems.
Karmas a fucking bitch. You spend years claiming to be the country of freedom while you engage in imperialism, wage war, oppress those who do not believe the way you do based on any freaking excuse you can think of. And if that isn't enough you call y our self God and create shit like manifest destiny as an excuse to rob and kill some more and then go, "gee, people don't like me."
Damn, wonder what the words "reape what you sow" mean anyway?
You seem to get pretty much what you want from everything you read. I'm not demonizing anyone except those who use other people's issues to advance their own agenda. It is the divisive way in which they impose their social change. Social change needs to come to pass voluntarily, not jammed down people's throats. Do you not see the vitriol everywhere? Do you think its just because of evil Americans? Genetics or geography? People are manipulated. Don't you ever wonder why democrats were the worst of the racists until one day, BOOM! they are the black American's saviors? Or why many were all about closing the borders, even to the point of militarizing them and ten years later they are pushing for amnesty and courting the Hispanic vote as their protectors? Its about using identity politics to advance THEIR power. Its about creating misery to advance THEIR power. Its about using the power of the State, the largely unaccountable power to impose their will upon everyone. They will use a woman, a child, a black person or a snail darter to leverage ever greater power. You are concerned about imperialism? What greater force can be achieved than what they are and have been doing for decades? And all most all of it was done because they cared about others, the oppressed.
Ironwood, I agree with you on much. My experience and observation would be that significant social change does not come peacefully or voluntarily, e.g. Civil rights movement, getting out of Vietnam, workers rights, religious tolerance, American Revolution............It would seem that change does not occur until until those who want change hit the streets.
I see the vitriol everywhere and have found that trying to reason with individuals who hate a person based soley on religion, color of skin, religious preference is, more often than not, an exercise in futility and, more often than not, they just go underground with their thinking. Then pop up on sites such as this where they can spread their venom anonymously.
And yes, genetics and geography play a large role. I often ask myself, how would I feel about issues were I born a chinese peaseant or on a backwoods mississippi sharecroppers plot.
You are correct. Certain people of wealth understand all to well the politics of idenity and culture and have manipulated masses of Americans to focus on everything and anything other than the corrupt political machine that depends on ignorance to survive.
Imperalism has nothing to do with the "oppressed". We say we are going into a country to stop human rights violations. Funny how we pick and choose which Human Rights violators we go after and which ones we ship our jobs to so they can be even more violated. We, like other countries, have referred to ourselves as the defenders of Freedom and individaul rights while exporting slavery and recreating economic slavery here at home.
Both parties are guilty of this. And we as citizens must assume the greater responsibility for allowing it to get this far.
Oh what fucking bullshit. It's a fact that pretty much anything of value in the last 500 years was created by white, male, western civilization.
It went off the rails in the 20th century thanks to the fucking socialists (fascists and communists). Especially the communists who made the fascists look like pikers.
you're clearly just another racist prick that's never read a history book. the "socialists" that you don't like - unions and other progressives - are the main reason you don't work in a factory for 70 hours a week for subsistence wages. but then, like most trolls you're probably a 30-something juvenile teabagger living in mommy's basement.
Wow, that is some perspective. Almost had chills run up my spine.
The big race to the bottom.
"Heading for"?
Pretty sure it's been "on" for quite a while.
Not to mention the decades-long race war, in which whites have yet to return fire.
I won't even get into the war on REAL marriage and heterosexuality (AKA NORMAL).
And like you really think the money folk care about the color of your skin, marriage and who you fuck? They do love it when you focus on it because then you miss the real action.
Only to the extent that they can use your color or sex or identity to advance their power.
I miss nothing.
Unlike a low IQ, trolling, shit disturber such as yourself, I can multitask and fight this war on multiple fronts.
"Old Irish Guy" my ass.
Contempt prior to investigation maybe?
Part of the age old "divide and conquer" meme.
Unfortunately, all too easy.
Seeing past labels and seeing oneself and other people as individuals regardless of all the societal labels, monikers, and Sneetch stars takes a great deal of effort.
Yeah but is it really a war when the losing side continues to embrace losing?
Listen up! Obama's a hand-picked puppet, just like Bubba and the Chimp and the Wimp. They're all goddamn fucking friends with each other. And they all fucking hate you.
So, you people that loved Clinton and hated W, or loved W and hate Obama - you are too stupid to post here. Fuck off!
Why don't you fuck off? What have you done for anyone lately, beside residing in an elevated sense of selfworth?
A ventriloquist is doing his act in front of a big crowd, making jokes about blondes, one after the other after the other. Finally a blonde woman stands up and yells "I've had enough with your jokes about blondes. It's not only demeaning to blondes, but to women in general. You're just inciting discrimination and it's got to stop!"
The ventriloquist stammers "uh, I'm sorry miss. I didn't mean to hurt anyone's feelings"
"You stay out of this!" she interrupts him. "I'm talking to your little friend".
You, sir, are the blonde and Obama is the dumbie.
Why do blondes like tilt steering?
More head room.
While I enjoyed your joke, try not confuse the fact that I dislike your attitude while still generally support your point. This is a forum to express ideas, good and bad, as well as opinions. So feel free to go on...contribute something.
Obama is indeed a hand-picked puppet, but as far as hand-picked puppets go, he is especially evil and despicable.
Lol. If you can still get downvoted 3:1 on a place like ZH for stating the blatantly obvious there truly is no hope.
I call it the Attack of the Killer Algorithms, wrote over posts on every day events where algorithms (most outside the markets attack us, running on servers 24/7and you can't see, touch or talk to them.
There's links at the Algo Duping page and that's what gives the folks the power is that we get duped and duped and duped so I try to let all know that politicians and what they say doesn't mean much as they don't write code and unless they have those folks ready to change to back up what they say, nothing happens.
Algo Duping 101...videos created by people smarter than me...I just curate and try and find the ones that the layman can understand as best I can.
http://www.ducknet.net/attack-of-the-killer-algorithms/
As you can see, the Matrix system is breaking down quite rapidly. In case you don’t know about this.. see below,
Problems of Matrix Organizations
http://hbr.org/1978/05/problems-of-matrix-organizations/ar/1
Creating Alignment - Matrix management
Shit is spiraling out of control. This is a good thing.
The problem is choice| The Architect
"Call me when you got no class."
"Are We Headed For Class Warfare?"
How are we not? Things are way out of balance.
And just how long have they been out of balance and how did they get that way? An American citizenry who arms themselves with bravado and shrinking balls.
Are you using your condescension to goad others into action or just compensating for the lack of your own? Or do you just hate America and look for any opportunity to express it?
Good question. I wonder what conclusion you will arrive at.
I'm an equal opportunity hater. Bitchez
Yen: Much easier to just hate everyone right out of the gate.
"Don't mind Harry, he hates everyone... micks, kykes, spics, niggers"... as I recall from the Dirty Harry movie. Not sure of the accuracy of my recall.
You forgot Leprechauns and Shitcoiners Angus. /s
Fuck man, cut me some slack... my brain only hates at one speed. /s
Will Do. lulz
The non-payers can't win, because the defeated payers will reduce production and become non-payers. The elite need the payers to produce, because wealth without product to buy is like having Midas' golden touch. Class warfare is opportunity for a Napoleon and a destructive to any elite. The elite have failed to build and maintain impenetrable fortresses for their survival in class warfare. What guard force will stop thousands of hungry non-payers who know where the food is stored?
e.g. deblasio......http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-12-11/manhattan-apartment-rents-drop-for-a-third-straight-month.html
Exactly. Well stated. Let’s use Apple as an example. This link below will fire thru the Apple evolution progress. It reminds me of how clothing goes through fades, then repeat the process so no one will notice.
iPhone 5S Official
Most of these companies have fucked themselves over. That is the fall to crony capitalism. Good riddence.
Because the needs of the elite are stored nowhere where hordes will look.
Because numbers of hungry hoardes with hunting technology are no match for well trained, well armed, well paid mecenaries, who consider killing profitable sport.
To believe the elite do not have impenetrable fortressses is folly and demonstrates a lack of understanding as to what "real money can accomplish".
True enough. We can only defeat them by completely dropping out of the system. I know this will inflame LTER, but Galt's gulch is all that is left to us. It will not exist as Ayn Rand portrayed it. Galt's Gulch will only exist as an underground and likely labeled extremist group that dedicates itself, not in terrorism or even material destruction, but the systematic denial of productivity to the ruling elites by removing ourselves from the camp. It will require immense sacrifice, but it is a sacrifice that we will end up enduring regardless, either by our own hands or by theirs. Our continuing dedication to debt as our only source of prosperity ensures our future enslavement. Slavery has always been a choice. One made from a list of lousy options, but a choice none the less. The longer we wait the worse the options become.
Only have to get rid of about 40 billionaires, the FED, Washington D.C. traitors and a gang of banksters and we are good to go.
The new urban Siri will help guide you to never before experienced moments of utopia.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3a3uFD2du78
/sarc
"Sins of the Father" was a liability concept that was done away with quite some time ago because it lead to endless fueds/wars.
However, it seems to be back.
I was wondering how much I owe and can I write a check?
It appears they won't take fiat and only a pound of flesh will do.
"Over the course of the last few years we have vociferously exposed the growing inequalities and divergences between various elements of the status quo society."
And for some us so engaged since the 60's have noted, those who are being screwed over by the top continue bow down and say, "yes sir massah."
Primarily because they have found it easier to engage in the politics of those least able to defend themselves that to grow enough balls to take on the real enemy. Which is why the real enemy has and will continue to win!
"Class warfare's" a red herring.
Even left-right is irrelevant, as to
this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slTF_XXoKAQ
that viral video again:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slTF_XXoKAQ
So upper and upper middle class people
SOLD the mortgage bubble that exposed
the extent of privatization and monopolization
of policy and institutions, the endpoint
of so many puppets today, some more later,
and ultimately what we have today.
Many of those bubble sellers have gone on
to buy the recovery meme, let alone
the story that the bailouts were a
right thing to do and TBTF's hunky
dory.
They've done so to the extent of
losing some of their proceeds which
should have received a market return
instead of a bank-supportive liquidity
trap based return, and now they've lost
important parts of their real safe money,
thanks to being snookered into a casino
economy just as if they were diamond
panners in Sierra Leone.
The others have simply budgeted around
getting income on their homes' proceeds,
knowing the austerity imposed on everyone
and the shakedown of those who sold the
bubble, including for loss sharing, when
they're precisely the engine of recovery
more properly, will not neutralize the
fact of millions underwater unable to sell,
still, or the still many properties held
back from the market.
The financial crisis has always been
about a mortgage scheme essentially
petty in its conception.
Create the adversity and profit from it,
then blame the government and whoever
vulnerable is available, and then
cry class warfare when someone doesn't
like it.
This system is so fragile that as soon as any substantial insurrection starts, or probably before, the financial house of cards comes crashing down. Then every mofo for himself. No class warfare. Total anarchy. Boy will the anarchist cheerleaders get the smile wiped from their faces when they see the reality of it.
No anarchy. Our government is well established and supplied. We have significant domestic forces and a well armed and trained military currently looking for a mission. Any insurrection will result in marshal law and a complete clampdown on all liberties, especially the right to arm and defend one's self, as per Katrina. Dreams of an anarchy revolt that sweeps all of this aside for some idealistic vision is wrong. Uprising and violence will play directly into their hands and accomplish everything in a very short time that would have otherwise taken years and decades.
I wonder. 5% of the population exceeds all armed forces and law enforcement. Would not supply chains break down? Who is protecting and feeding the domestic forces families?
In any case, will be good to be mentally, physically and otherwise prepared.
But the "population" does not have the weapons nor the "want to" military and LEO do. Most especially LEO. Them fuckers scare me cause they enjoy it so much.
I dunno. The FSA seems to be faster than a Minuteman to hit the streets a'looting. With systemic collapse, they will do more than loot. And "the population" will be invigorated when the lights are off and the fridge is empty. I believe that if this high wire walking world ever slips, it's gonna be like humpty dumpty.
Look at how the Soviets and Maoists handled it and they had much less to work with. Not only did they lack access to unlimited money and weapons and military, but we have a media that is infected into everything and tuning an massaging the message constantly. Anyone, regardless of how well armed and justified in their actions, would immediately be portrayed as an enemy of law and order...and we all love order you know. Anarchy is a hard sell, especially when the FSA will be standing directly behind the armed soldiers who have come to take you away for resistance activities and turn a blind eye while the FSA strips you of everything you thought you owned, but was only on loan from the state. Those in the ivory towers will be safe and sound however as we know them to be Too Big To Fail.
Don't misunderstand me to think we should all just lay down and accept our fate. I am well armed and prepared, but not from our government but from those subliminally "entitled" who will roam the streets seeking "justice". I do not see this as anarchy, only as a continuation of current policies of arbitrary law enforcement based on agendas rather than actual law.
sex warfare, family warfare, brotherhood warefare, age warfare, psychological warfare, physical warfare, racial warefare, ethnic warefare, class warfare...
are you subtly implying life is war and that only the strongest, fittest, smartest survive?
Class warfare has been going on for decades and the rich have already won
It's hard to win once technology cannot be filtered.
There are three social classes that cut across all income levels: producers, protectors, and parasites. Where none may starve and all may vote, the parasite class eventually grows into an outright majority. The other two classes, upon realizing they've been disenfranchised (because 49% = 0% in a democracy), decide to cut a side deal: Low taxes for producers, secure paychecks for protectors, and nothing for parasites.
Obama is leading America to another September 11. No, not THAT 9/11, the one in 1973.
I see you have all the oligarch vocabulary down. "Producers, protectors, and parasites." The oligarchs blow the dog whistle and your dick gets hard. You're a fucking idiot. Grandmothers collecting "$13,000 a year in Social Security benefits are not the problem.
A class war has been raging for the last 40 years, and the middle class is getting its ass kicked. The major reason for this trouncing is we have tools like you who are too stupid to understand causality.
.. and grandma getting $13,000 of meds per year. 42 year old, 300 lb grandmas getting dialysis.
And those fucking meds are killing grandma. I am 67 years old and hope never to take another big pharma med for anything but an acute trauma accident for the rest of my life. So exactly who is profiting from grandma's condition? As the movie goes, she is fat, sick and nearly dead. And never given the tools of critical thought to escape. Dumbed down by the fluorine in the water, the SSRI's, and the cipro. Just as they love to sell us $400 igadgets to spy on ourselves, they love to sell us these chemicals to turn us into zombie junkies, just alive enough to fog a mirror. Exactly who are the parasites?
Good God the comments on Zerohedge have gone all to hell. Did someone post a link to this site on some megachurch facebook page? Whats with the Sarah Palin level of discourse concerning Islam?
Capitalism has hit a wall. It needs a growing resource pool to exploit, and seeing as there really isn't an energy supply (or much of a material supply) to allow for further expansion, it has begun eating itself. This is why the uber wealthy are going full monty and pulling out all of the stops driving the middle class into oblivion to shore up their own accounts. Shits about to get real economically and ecologically, and yes, this will mean massive social upheaval.
"Class war" is a phrase only bandied about when the poor get uppity. The rich are always waging a war on those who do EVERYTHING for them. Good luck growing a sweet potato or an ear of corn fuckers.
Pray for Calamity.
The comments on ZH are stale and capitalism has hit a wall. Let me know what part of TARP or TBTF or QEI constitute Capitalism and maybe you can revive the comment section with something more insightful than Pray for Calamity.
I could give a fuck about reviving the comments section, but as to your question, let's see: Serfs get milked for their surplus labor value, the capitalists suck this up and the state keeps the fence wires hot so no one can escape, and for this they get their cut. This is the essence of capitalism. Millions of workers doing the lifting, building, hauling, growing, and a pocketful of owners get a cut of every bit of it, making them billionares.
Without the state, there is no capitalism, because there is no legitimized violence enforcing the private property claims of the rich. Just because the whole thing is falling apart, and the state needs to fudge the accounting to keep it going, doesn't mean this isn't capiatlism. Who owns the means of production? The worker?
ZH : the libertarian and anarchist alliance against big government and big business !
Karl would be proud of you.
He ALWAYS said : The Plebes have to take over the power of means of production (and financing) to ensure that Power becomes a MEANS to and END: the End being no STATE and to each according to his needs. The Means being a Centrally planned economy without OVERPRODUCTION, cause of boom and busts and human disgust and exploitation in dire distress.
The market is but the SMALL lever in a sociopolitical construct where the BIG LEVER is matching production to demand so that there is no slack or wastage.
LOVELY in theory, but it did not take into account the Heisenberg principle of Uncertainty of Human nature and the Enropy principle of Newtonian science; aka all power is corrupt and absolute power of a Stalinist Politburo running the State in name of people is absolute corruption as we end up in total rigidification to avoid the bogeyman of total anarchy à la Trotsky.
So....how do we square this circle of human uncertainty and this historical determinism that power excercise leads us to absolute monopoly of power which always leads us down the shute!
Progress and harmony don't seem to rhyme with human knee jerks and prejudices.
Enter Montesqiueu who defied both Machiavellian power logic and dogmatic top down control by elites.
Jefferson and Monstesquieu would have been a good team. But thats dreaming...reality is the bitch!
As for technology it is a means to serve general good; Period...but it has become a means to serve powerful oligarchy in a non Montesquieu spirit of the laws world.
I love all the ZH's articles with the premise that all people getting some support from the gov't are all lazy and unwilling to work.
Great fucking premise.
You never see articles on here talking about the wealthy exploiting slave labor across the globe or moving jobs out of the country to avoid taxes.
Maybe you could do that cartoon again but have group A be "Corporations that pay taxes" and group B "Corporations that don't pay taxes".
It seems more politicians are getting elected by allowing corporations move from A to B.
But yeah, ZH is nothing but a shill for corporations and the wealthy, because if you're not wealthy then its obvious you're LAZY and want the gov't to support you. And will vote accordingly.
Where were you on Nov. 6th?
http://www.zerohedge.com/contributed/2013-11-06/us-jobs-outsourcing-para...
We are witnessing energy draining out of the system. Cheap oil is being replaced by expensive oil and that simple fact is reversing the growth trends that we have seen over the last 200 years. The prosperity that washed across the country after WW II was to a large extent based on the fact that we were the world’s largest oil exporting nation. Combine that with the simple fact that we had the largest, newest industrial base in the world and you begin to understand why the late forties and early fifties brought legions into the middle class. High finance and manipulation combined with a surge in world oil production kept the party going into the first decade of this century.
Now we because of rising prices in energy we are in an irreversible decline. The infrastructure, economic and political systems based on the paradigm of exponential growth reached their limit in 2008. The collapse brought about massive deflation. Exponential digital fiat creation is maintaining the failed system on life support. Nobody is going to pull the plug because when the host dies the parasites die.
All of us are too young to remember, but class warfare was the root cause of the Progressive Movement. The teaming squalid working classes organized to redistribute the wealth. Income tax was sold as a tax on the wealthy. What happened was that the upper class bought the votes of the lower class with taxes on the middle class. That worked as long as the middle class was vibrant and growing.
Now that taxation and the great contraction are killing the middle class, the Progressives have turned their focus on the wealthy. The wealthy know this, that is why the Patriot Act initiated a fascist coup. The Occupy Wall Street crowd was beaten to a pulp and every effort was made to marginalize the Tea Party. The inner circle of both major political parties have joined hands and shredded civil liberty and consolidated their police state.
The sad thing is that all the central planning and all the attempts at control will not and cannot reverse the trend. The failed efforts at control will destroy hundreds maybe thousands but it will not reverse the on going contraction.
Detroit is the model of our failed system. Fifty other metropolitan areas with declining tax bases and swelling pension funds are lining up. States will follow the cities.
Ethnic cleansing is already taking place in our major cities and in some of our states. The affluent are heading for their gated communities. Whites are heading back to the hinterlands.
Rancor between the races is on the rise. The knock Out Game is not going unnoticed in polite society. While horror movies of the slave era are attempting to reestablish the victim status of our black brothers, even the less critical thinking are starting to wonder how is it possible for down trodden victims to hold the most powerful offices in the land.
Any time in our history when contractions took place race relations plummeted. I expect this time to be no different.
Pretty much although I would disagree about the extend to the level of racial violence and overall violence right now in the U.S. You can rig all kinds of crime-related stats but you can't rig homicides since a body (as long as it is found) is still a dead body. Violent crime, including homicide rates, have dramatically decreased since the mid-80s at the height of urban drug-fueled violence and no one really has the definitive answer.
We've been in a class warfare for 200 years. History - learn it, know it, live it.
Longer than that. The rich are only so by virtue of robbing from everyone else. It just gets dressed up in academic language and backed by the guns of the state.
I love the pretense that the state is so bad for capitalism. By all means, abolish the state. I'll help! Then we'll see how many people spend their days repeating banal tasks to rent a house that was built and paid for thirty years ago.
Class Warfare?
Only me and mine...
...And everyone else.
Don't kid yourselves.