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New York Times Says "Lack Of Major Wars May Be Hurting Economic Growth"
It is no secret that as the Fed's centrally-planned New Normal has unfolded, one after another central-planner and virtually all economists, have been caught wrong-footed with their constant predictions of an "imminent" economic surge, any minute now, and always just around the corner. And yet, nearly six years after Lehman, five years after the end of the last "recession" (even as the depression for most rages on), America is about to have its worst quarter in decades (excluding the great financial crisis), with a -2% collapse in GDP, which has been blamed on... the weather.
That's right: economists are the only people who will look anyone in the eye, and suggest that it was harsh weather that smashed global trade, pounded retail sales (in the process freezing the internet because people it was so cold nobody shopped online), and even with soaring utility usage and the Obamacare induced capital misallocation still led to world's largest economy to a 5% plunge from initial estimates for 3% growth in Q1. In other words, a delta of hundreds of billion in "growth lost or uncreated" due to, well, snow in the winter.
Sadly for the same economists, now that Q2 is not shaping up to be much better than Q1, other, mostly climatic, excuses have arisen: such as El Nino, the California drought, and even suggestions that, gasp, as a result of the Fed's endless meddling in the economy, the terminal growth rate of the world has been permanently lowered to 2% or lower.
What is sadder for economists, even formerly respectable ones, is that overnight it was none other than Tyler Cowen who, writing in the New York Times, came up with yet another theory to explain the "continuing slowness of economic growth in high-income economies." In his own words: "An additional explanation of slow growth is now receiving attention, however. It is the persistence and expectation of peace."
That's right - blame it on the lack of war!
The world just hasn’t had that much warfare lately, at least not by historical standards. Some of the recent headlines about Iraq or South Sudan make our world sound like a very bloody place, but today’s casualties pale in light of the tens of millions of people killed in the two world wars in the first half of the 20th century. Even the Vietnam War had many more deaths than any recent war involving an affluent country.
Well, that's just unacceptable: surely all the world needs for some serious growth is for war casualties to be in the billions, not in the paltry hundreds of thousands.
Keynesianism 101 continues:
Counterintuitive though it may sound, the greater peacefulness of the world may make the attainment of higher rates of economic growth less urgent and thus less likely. This view does not claim that fighting wars improves economies, as of course the actual conflict brings death and destruction. The claim is also distinct from the Keynesian argument that preparing for war lifts government spending and puts people to work. Rather, the very possibility of war focuses the attention of governments on getting some basic decisions right — whether investing in science or simply liberalizing the economy. Such focus ends up improving a nation’s longer-run prospects.
To be sure, Cowen is quick covers his ass with some quick diplomacy. After all how dare he implicitly suggest that the only reason the US escaped the Great Depression is what some say was its orchestrated entry into World War 2:
It may seem repugnant to find a positive side to war in this regard, but a look at American history suggests we cannot dismiss the idea so easily. Fundamental innovations such as nuclear power, the computer and the modern aircraft were all pushed along by an American government eager to defeat the Axis powers or, later, to win the Cold War. The Internet was initially designed to help this country withstand a nuclear exchange, and Silicon Valley had its origins with military contracting, not today’s entrepreneurial social media start-ups. The Soviet launch of the Sputnik satellite spurred American interest in science and technology, to the benefit of later economic growth.
So what is it about war that makes economic "growth" that much greater. Apparently it has to do with an urgency in spending. As in urgently spending more than the trillions of dollars needed to support the US welfare state now, and spending even more trillions in hopes of, you guessed it, stumbling on the next "Internet" (which apparently wasn't created by Al Gore).
War brings an urgency that governments otherwise fail to summon. For instance, the Manhattan Project took six years to produce a working atomic bomb, starting from virtually nothing, and at its peak consumed 0.4 percent of American economic output. It is hard to imagine a comparably speedy and decisive achievement these days.
What we find surprising is that it took the econofrauds this long to scapegoat that last falsifiable boundary - the lack of war - for the lack of growth. But they are finally stirring:
Ian Morris, a professor of classics and history at Stanford, has revived the hypothesis that war is a significant factor behind economic growth in his recent book, “War! What Is it Good For? Conflict and the Progress of Civilization From Primates to Robots.” Morris considers a wide variety of cases, including the Roman Empire, the European state during its Renaissance rise and the contemporary United States. In each case there is good evidence that the desire to prepare for war spurred technological invention and also brought a higher degree of internal social order.
Another new book, Kwasi Kwarteng’s “War and Gold: A 500-Year History of Empires, Adventures, and Debt,” makes a similar argument but focuses on capital markets. Mr. Kwarteng, a Conservative member of British Parliament, argues that the need to finance wars led governments to help develop monetary and financial institutions, enabling the rise of the West. He does worry, however, that today many governments are abusing these institutions and using them to take on too much debt. (Both Mr. Kwarteng and Mr. Morris are extending themes from Azar Gat’s 820-page magnum opus, “War in Human Civilization,” published in 2006.)
Yet another investigation of the hypothesis appears in a recent working paper by the economists Chiu Yu Ko, Mark Koyama and Tuan-Hwee Sng. The paper argues that Europe evolved as more politically fragmented than China because China's risk of conquest from its western flank led it toward political centralization for purposes of defense. This centralization was useful at first but eventually held China back. The European countries invested more in technology and modernization, precisely because they were afraid of being taken over by their nearby rivals.
The fun part will be when economists finally do get their suddenly much desired war (just as they did with World War II, and World War I before it, the catalyst for the creation of the Fed of course), just as they got their much demanded trillions in monetary stimulus. Recall that according to Krugman the Fed has failed to stimulate the economy because it simply wasn't enough: apparently having the Fed hold 35% of all 10 Year equivalents, injecting nearly $3 trillion in reserves into the stock market, and creating a credit bubble that makes the 2007 debt bubble pale by comparison was not enough. One needs moar!
And so it will be with war. Because the first war will be blamed for having been too small - it is time for a bigger war. Then an even bigger war. And so on, until the most worthless human beings in existence - economists of course - get their armageddon, resulting in the death of billions. Perhaps only then will the much desired GDP explosion finally arrive?
Luckily for Cowen, he stops from advocating war as the ultimate panacea to a slow growth (at least for now: once the US enters a recession with a nother quarter of negative growth, one can only imagine what lunacy Krugman columns will carry). Instead he frames it as an issue of trade offs: "We can prefer higher rates of economic growth and progress, even while recognizing that recent G.D.P. figures do not adequately measure all of the gains we have been enjoying. In addition to more peace, we also have a cleaner environment (along most but not all dimensions), more leisure time and a higher degree of social tolerance for minorities and formerly persecuted groups. Our more peaceful and — yes — more slacker-oriented world is in fact better than our economic measures acknowledge."
And let's not forget that GDP is nothing but economic bullshit, confirmed when in recent weeks Europe - seemingly tired of waiting for war - arbitrarily decided to add the "benefits" of prostitution and narcotics. And there you have all the meaningless growth you can dream of. If only on paper. Because hundreds of million of people in the developed world, without a job, out of the labor force, can only be placated with dreams of "hope and change" for so long. And certainly not once they get hungry, or realize that the biggest lie of all in the Bismarckian welfare state - guaranteed welfare - is long broke.
Cowen's conclusion:
Living in a largely peaceful world with 2 percent G.D.P. growth has some big advantages that you don’t get with 4 percent growth and many more war deaths. Economic stasis may not feel very impressive, but it’s something our ancestors never quite managed to pull off. The real questions are whether we can do any better, and whether the recent prevalence of peace is a mere temporary bubble just waiting to be burst.
That's great. Now all we need is some economist and/or central-planner who actually gets top billing and determines policy to have a different conclusion, and decide that 4% growth is actually worth m(b)illions of dead people.
Judging by recent events in Ukraine and the middle-east that announcement may be just around the corner.
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yeah sure - send yourself, your fcuking wife and kids to the front line first and the troops will follow behind you
great ecomony - body bag industry, how fcuking stupid
GDP - awaits $% mfers
The NYTimes article probably accurately reflects the thinking of a whole layer of imperial elite. This is all so abstract for them because they do not believe that hellish war is anything that could possible touch them personally.
Note the article laments the absence of war in the rich countries. Continual rape and pillage in the poor countries is of no account.
That this type of thinking can be openly expressed may indicate that our world is closer to world war than they think.
the elite are mortal - death wins absolutely
New York Times Investigate this spending equal or Greater to DHS:
what is this spending on an old project that is supposed to be profitable private contractor/corporation?? Maybe this is infrastructure spending??
Total--Tennessee Valley Authority Outlays 2013 = $65.8 Billion (what is happening here)
Total--Tennessee Valley Authority Outlays 2011 = $38 Billion
Total--Tennessee Valley Authority Outlays 2009 = $32.7 Billion
Total--Tennessee Valley Authority Outlays 2007 = $19.4 Billion
Total--Tennessee Valley Authority Outlays 2005 = $20.9 Billion
Total--Tennessee Valley Authority Outlays 2003 = $13.9 Billion
Total--Tennessee Valley Authority Outlays 2001 = $11.3 Billion
Total--Tennessee Valley Authority Outlays 2000 = $8.3 Billion
Total--Tennessee Valley Authority Outlays 1998 = 9 Billion
Rural electrification never ends.
Buying ammo for insurrectionist hillbillies?
That's a lot of booze Senator!
"You went full Krugman, man. Never go full Krugman.”
not my quote, but worth repeating.
It's articles like these that remind me that even the Tyler's have bad days.
Many ZH'ers say war will bring jobs.
Plenty of new undertaker jobs. Bullish on casket makers. MIC is hiring.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSRIm5IIDdM
"I Can Sign For 1, 2, or 3 or 4
Get 3 Weeks off In A Year Or More
Save Up And Get My Very Own SLR
'Cos I Can Drive (Drive) My Very Own Tank
Yes I Can Drive (Drive) My Very Own Tank
Yes I Can Drive (Drive) My Very Own Tank
Yes I Can Drive (Drive) My Very Own Tank
Can You Seen The bullet's high velocity
It Can Blow A Man's Arm Off At The Count Of Three
If I Get My Hands On One Of Those
I'm Something To Watch Out For
I Can Drive (Drive) My Very Own Tank
Yes I Can
Yes I Can
Don't care whereabouts They Send Me Now
Send Pictures Postcards To My Own Mother And Father
So When I get Home Then I'm someone to be proud Of
I Can Drive (Drive) My Very Own Tank
Yes I Can Drive (Drive) My Very Own Tank
Yes I Can Drive (Drive) My Very Own Tank
Yes I Can Drive (Drive) My Very Own Tank
Me ! (Me !)"
It just ellminates the need for jobs since 90% of the casualties are citizens. And since there are alot of unemployed desperate young they shouldn't have a problem filling the ranks.
2008 Recovery from the Recession between Individual Tax Revenue & Corporate Tax Revenue. How is it Individual Taxes took a Dive, then recovered - but Corporate Taxes Did not??? (Fiscal Year Data from Monthly Treasury Report)
Corporate Income Taxes Receipts 1998 = $ 188.7 Billion
Corporate Income Taxes Receipts 2002 = $ 148.0 Billion (Recession)
Corporate Income Taxes Receipts 2006 = $ 353.9 Billion
Corporate Income Taxes Receipts 2007 = $ 370.2 Billion
Corporate Income Taxes Receipts 2008 = $ 304.3 Billion
Corporate Income Taxes Receipts 2009 = $ 138.2 Billion (Recession)
Corporate Income Taxes Receipts 2012 = $ 242.3 Billion
Corporate Income Taxes Receipts 2013 = $ 273.5 Billion
Corporate Taxes end of 2013 = 273.5 Billion (Treasury data end of Fiscal year Sept 2013)
Corporate Profit end of 2013 = $1.9045 Trillion
$273.5/1,904,5 = 14.4% Corporate Tax (hm either not so unusual OR Some Corporations Pay Dick Squat)
$370.2/1,285.3 = 28.8% Corporate Tax in 2007.
10% loss of Corporate Taxes since 2007.
Individual Income Taxes Receipts 1998 = $ 828.6 Billion
Individual Income Taxes Receipts 2002 = $ 858.3 Billion (Recession)
Individual Income Taxes Receipts 2006 = $1.044 Trillion
Individual Income Taxes Receipts 2007 = $1.163 Trillion
Individual Income Taxes Receipts 2008 = $1.146 Trillion
Individual Income Taxes Receipts 2009 = $ .915.3 Trillion (Recession)
Individual Income Taxes Receipts 2012 = $1.132 Trillion
Individual Income Taxes Receipts 2013 = $1.316 Trillion
So Corporate Profits are up:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/Cp
And Dividends are up:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/DIVIDEND
BUT Somehow Corporate Tax Payments are still down???!!!
cudied_smoke: yeah sure - send yourself, your fcuking wife and kids to the front line first and the troops will follow behind you
Amen brother, been sayin that for years.
Send the extended Clinton family, the Rumsfeld family, the Extended Bush family, the Kerry Family, the McInsane family right to the front fukken lines. Throw in all the menbers of the Tribe too....and their extended families.
Pronto.
Amen
Well, whaddya know. The jihadists in Iraq are just trying to boost their economy.
Kind of Looks like we are at War if you look at the Budget, Dumb Ass. In fact if the USA, France, Germany, UK, Russia, and China weren't selling arms, munitions, & Weapons all over and giving away military technology & training it would look a lot more peaceful. But that is Capitalism without Controls.
- Corporations need control, more rules, more limits
- Governments need checks & balances
- Congress needs Policing, and Financial Conflicts of Interest Rules, and an End to Money & Gifts in Politics
- NYT & MSM & Press need Anti-Trust Rules
- Banks need Regulations, Standard Accounting, Standard Ratings, and Standard Financial Instruments
- Federal Budgets now need more auditing, curtailment, checks against increase in federal power over the states
-----
Total—Department of Defense—Military Outlays 2013 = $609.4 Billion (Down from $650 B)
Total—Department of Defense—Military Outlays 2000 = $283 Billion
Total—Department of Defense—Military Outlays 1998 = $257.9 Billion
-----
Total--Department of Homeland Security Outlays 2013 = $66.5 Billion
Total--Department of Homeland Security Outlays 2000 (FEMA) = $3.9 Billion
Total--Department of Homeland Security Outlays 1998 (FEMA) = $2.9 Billion
-----
Total—International Assistance Program Outlays 2013 = $48 Billion
Total—International Assistance Program Outlays 2000 = $25.7 Billion
Total—International Assistance Program Outlays 1998 = $26 Billion
-----
Total—Department of Veterans Affairs Outlays 2013 = $143.6 Billion
Total—Department of Veterans Affairs Outlays 2000 = $50.1 Billion
Total—Department of Veterans Affairs Outlays 1998 = $45.6 Billion
-----
2013 VA Medical Care = $44.7 Billion
1999 VA Medical Care = $17.8 Billion
-----
Total--Interest on the Public Debt, under Treasury, 2013 = $415.7 Billion
Total--Interest on the Public Debt, under Treasury, 2000 = $362.1 Billion
Total--Interest on the Public Debt, under Treasury, 1998 = $363.8 Billion
Hm... If you add up the most obvious Military Costs you get = $867.5 Billion, so you might as well say = $1 Trillion a year when all the hidden or more indirect costs for intelligence and security and personnel are added in.
Can any Nation Stand against the US on US Soil? I don't think so.
---------------------------
Mayor of Venice resigns amid corruption probe
Mayor of Venice Georgio Orsini has quit amid an investigation into allegations of corruption over the city’s new water barriers. He was released from house arrest on Thursday after agreeing to serve a four-month sentence in a plea deal. Orsoni was arrested along with 30 people in connection with a 25-million-euro ($34 million) slush fund that was allegedly used to bride officials.
Tyler!
With such extreme theorizing getting into the NYT, I say that YOU owe it to civilization to give big visibility to this ignored content:
The Public Be Suckered
http://patrick.net/forum/?p=1230886
Jidah is a holy war - TO ALL SHIITE AND SUNNI - both sides are fighting a holy war based on the same Qu'ran and same Allah
there is no limits to greed nor insanity
and of course the usa fat bastards and their xbox joystick drones - real brave of you - mfers
They kill themselves, we kill 'em...
What's the difference..
They're jihadi ass muslims.
Nobody cares.
Sunnis and Shiite killing each other en masse is not necessarily a bad thing if it takes raghead nutters out of the gene pool. However, the fact that they are hell bent on doing sounds suspiciously like that old "divide and rule" adage (implemented adeptly by the MIC).
just above 3 low level langley jews listing tired memes.
no mention of the filthy jew or his goy gay childe rape robots in washington
Nazi catamite, haven't you got a swastika in your Fuhrer's collection that needs polishing? Another goat's anus to lick out?
.............../´¯/)
............,/¯../
.........../..../
...../´¯/'...'/´¯¯`·¸
../'/.../..../......./¨¯\
('(...´...´.... ¯~/'...')
.\.................'...../
..''...\.......... _.·´
....\..............(
......\.............\
Who let you back in here, you knob-gobbling goose-stepper?
"Economy is looking bad
Let's start another war"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_t7EsOx-Pd8
"Are you believing the morning papers?
War is coming back in style
There's generals here, advisors there
And Russians nibbling everywhere
The chessboard's filling up with red
We make more profits when we blow off their heads
Economy is looking bad
Let's start another war /when ya get drafted
Fan the fires of racist hatred
We want total war /when ya get drafted
Drooling fingers
Panic buttons
Playing with missiles like they're toys
There's easy money, easy jobs
Especially when you build the bombs
That blow big cities off the map
Just guess who profits /when we build 'em back up
Yeah, what Big Business wants Big Business gets
It wants a war /when ya get drafted
Trilateral Commission goonies laugh
and scheme for more /when ya get drafted
Call the Army!
Call the Navy!
Stocked with kids from slums /when ya get drafted
If you can't afford a slick attorney
We might make you a spy
Forget your demonstrations
Kids today sit on their ass /when ya get drafted
Just a six-pack
And you're happy
We're prepared
For when ya get drafted"
How about any country iusing the NY Times as ground zero?
The NYT will be bankrupt within 5 years.
Smash the Media. They are the Enemy.
NYT has a point. Major wars are the only known way to clear out all the deadwood that every political system accumulates over time.
The biggest dead wood would be the Times owners (Pinch and co.) their extended families, all the executive employees and then start on the power brokers and their families..
the dead wood are the banking mafia and their media smokescreen
And you guys expect these banksters and their journalist lackeys to see the error of their ways and peacefully step away from the levers of power?
.
Seriously?
In the past century and a half the US has been through a civil war and two world wars, and yet over that time the parasitic deadwood of Wall Street and Vichy DC has accumulated and grown.
However, in the interest of science, I believe the validity of your hypothesis can be determined experimentally. It should be pointed out that none of these wars reduced NYC or Vichy DC to a heap of smoldering ruins. This may explain why the US deadwood has never been cleared out.
If Vichy DC were to be subjected to the combined inhuman brutality of the firebomb raids on Dresden and Tokyo, it would be possible to determine if indeed the resulting effect on the political system could be called a clearing of the deadwood.
Of course, it would be advisable to start the firebombing at a perimeter (such as the I-495 beltway) and proceed inward. This would prevent the experimental subjects from leaving the test environment, enhancing the reliability of the study. To see if the results were repeatable, a second experiment involving simultaneous testing of Wall Street and the Hamptons would be advised.
I'll admit that losing a major war is even more effective at clearing out the deadwood. Germany and Japan thrived after WW2 because there was no government to cripple their economies with special-interest carve-outs.
But even the threat of losing the family farm is a powerful motivator for government to do what it must and stop doing all the useless (and counter-productive) busywork that governments dream up when they're not in mortal danger.
If, during the war, anyone at the Department of Agriculture had fined a farmer for producing too much food, the department would have been shut down right quick and all its bureaucrats drafted.
This has got to be a Peak Stupidity moment....
"YOU KNOW WHAT DA PROBLEM IS! WE DONT BLOW ENOUGH SHIT UP!!!"
Nevermind the fact we spent the entire last decade blowing shit up and it caused an economic crash... nevermind the hundreds of years of history showing war is a short term solution to a bad economy and always ends up destroying them, and the nation, from within.... yea nevermind all that... MOAR WAR!!! DERRRRRR!!!!!
if you want it so bad - get over to Iraq and dont forget your postcard to ZH
wow speaking of peak stupidity...can you not finish reading more than two lines? Do we really need to sarc tag everything? Is giant caps and quotes not enough?
we are boarding sir - please fasten your seatbelt - your safety is our first priority
fcuk you
what was dat my yiddisha boy..
we have cia,mi6 and mossad wars all over planet manic innit.
late false flag bbc news for simple foks and dislaxics
in ukrainia today
an nudder sad day to day 49 newest members of the newly con figured seal team 6 where shot down today in a chopper.
chatham house details
a black hawk down pentagon gift providings for the kosher clan in kievs crashun team usa burnings including ribs and john waynes guts.
charles bronson not well.
the cia in a state munt said look we had nuttin to do wid it this time or the last ok.
Wasn't their a yidish Princeton professor that said something in the same context about an "Alien invasion"?... Something about being physically assaulted until resperation and pulse no longer exists is a turn on for any one who's name ends in "en", "on" or "stein"...
What would you expect from an decrepit whore of a Gray Lady that pitched the ultimate lie in 2003 on behalf of the Government she works for that ended up killing more than 2 million and may still end up killing many more?...
They should finish the read with Orwell's 1984 epitaph!
soon enough they will tell us we have to die to increase the GDP.
Any long time tinfoil hat wearing ZH reading nutjob please make your shocked face now. Like we didn't see this one coming next....
it's aluminum, my hat is made of aluminium.
I think you are misreading Cowen's point.
Cowen is a supporter of Libertarian Economics. It seems to me, after reading the article, he was using empirical evidence, something Libertarians rarely rely on, say "even if you support Keynes and accept these 'facts' at face value, all that growth comes with a severe price which you are overlooking."
In essence, he is using Bastiat's unseen points to make a larger argument AGAINST war as an engine if growth.
I can see how a quick analysis may think otherwise, but his conclusion firmly seals this point.
Yeah IB, I particularly like this passage in context to what we've witnessed the last 69 years in Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Chernobyl and now Fukushima...
Just think where we might be if the West had never decided to touch off those weapons, not once but "twice" and all of the money that has been spent that followed that promoted the arms race the United States unilaterally started that has bankrupted us several times over to pay for it along with the countless deaths that have followed -weaponized or not!...
Way to go Mr. J. Oppenheimer and friends!
I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic or you understand what he's writing there.
I agree with your point that the Manhattan Project's long term 'value' is very questionable (though I'd argue Fukushima and Chernobyl were likely to have occurred WITHOUT the Manhattan Project as atomic piles were already pretty advanced and moving along toward energy generation before the Manhattan Project started).
I think Cowen does, too (if you've ever read him). He has shared a view that war does not enhance value, since war destroys value. I think he'd take a look at the cost of the Manhattan Project, the loss of 2 cities and its inhabitants, and say "economically speaking, this was a net loss due to lost value and lost potential value."
However, since this article was addressing the concept (which he seems to agree with - but it's a theoretical rather than an actual acceptance of) that war can enhance growth in a Keynesian economy, he has to address the claim from a Keynesian (and uniquely American) viewpoint.
As a result, at face value and in an empirical way, the 'value' of the Manhattan Project was developing a bomb which could theoretically end the war. From that POV, his point is 100% correct. Even if the overall result was morally repugnant and costly.
"In essence, he is using Bastiat's unseen points to make a larger argument AGAINST war as an engine if growth.
I can see how a quick analysis may think otherwise, but his conclusion firmly seals this point."
You're correct, he isn't proposing war as a growth source, only stating we may need to accept a 2% GDP in peaceful times.
Though I disagree that we can't exceed 2% without war, the larger dilemma here is how incredibly misunderstood (unread) the article is by commentors here.
He has an interesting (and disturbing) observation that needs intelligent debate, but that requires reading his article and understanding his point.
The flat Earth society has concluded this article does not revolve around the Earth as center of the universe, therefore heretical and must be banished.
I agree that 2% is a theoretical point he's making which is unsubstantiated, but it seems he makes this point to make his larger point (that growth, if generated due to massive death and destruction is NOT a logical way to view the creation of productivity) have more impact. Who wants 4% growth if there's a chance you or your kid is going to get killed? Isn't 2% growth, even if that's all you will have, BETTER if NOBODY is being killed?
More importantly, and Cowen didn't seem to address this, though perhaps I missed it, if you read his other works, he's pretty firmly on the side that war DESTROYS value. In other words, while he's correct that the 'payout' from the Manhattan Project was 'good' (in the sense that it generated a pretty solid result for money spent, and in a very short period of time), I'm sure he'd agree that the destruction of 2 full cities as a result of this expenditure did very little to improving life or the economy overall. There was a vast amount of lost value AND potential value in those cities - items Cowen would know does not enhance productivity or growth.
There is another problem, aside from the misreading of Cowen's work here, and that problem is that it's the New York Times. I'll be the first to admit if it's in the Times, I will question its value 90% of the time. After all, they let Krugman write for them regularly and he's wrong on a massive scale with almost everything he writes.
But every now and then the NYT gets a gem, kind've like that blind squirrel and his nut. I think this is one of those gems, if you have the intellectual capacity to understand Cowen's point.
No it is simplier than that. Midterms are coming up this a trial balloon article to try to take the temperature of team D's constituents and the readers in general in the comments section, etc. That and the fact unless you are totally ignorant asshole, low information voter or not the economy is going to be a big issue and in turn economic ideology and direction. I think Brat unseating Cantor basically cemented it as we have to talk about it now along with the nothing to see here move along everything is sunshine and lolipops is bubble is about to burst.
They also need an excuse why the next cooked GDP number comes in at 2% or less before the election besides the weather since people ain't buying the sunshine and lolipops recovery meme they keep pushing and they know it also.
Bullshit. I read the whole thing. He speaks nothing of empiricism here. He probably has in other articles.
His argument that he's attempting to support with "evidence" from history and anthopology papers is that government that prepares for war because of a real threat is more apt to make better decisions on how it spends money. Even using the completely circular argument from China of how the centralization helped but then ultimately didn't as a reason for their lack of economic development.
A true Bastiat argument would gone something like this "you might get some useful things from war spending, but ultimately you can never know if those things wouldn't otherwise have been developed or developed better. And you can never know what could have also been developed."
This argument assumes that if the government just made better decisions with stolen tax loot that the economy will grow faster. This is the least libertarian argument one can make. Tyler Cowen is a sellout.
Well, that's the point, isn't it? Everything is context, and knowing Cowen's work is integral to understanding what he's saying here.
As I (and Frilton) said, he chose his words poorly, but his point is still very clear.
Cowen is no fan of government involvement in the economy, and he'd agree that there are other methods to use Bastiat to make this point, but he still did use Bastiat in his cost analysis. Bastiat isn't just "you don't know what might have happened otherwise," as you suggest. That is a key point, but it Bastiat would still agree wiith Cowen's analysis that the COST of war, the unseen cost, outweighs the many benefits. He did this kind of analysis with the Negative Railroad.
You assume Cowen sold out by viewing this article without surrounding it with context.
If you want to defeat Keynesians, you have to speak their language. It is precisely this reason I studied for my Master's in Economics at The New School - prepare to face your opposition. Speaking their language may never convince these idiots to change their views, but you can add context and value to the discussion so others don't fall for their lies.
Cowen did this very effectively, in my view. If you accept, at face value, that growth is increased by warfare (and yes, there is empirical evidence of this which Cowen used whether he mentions it is empirical or not), then you need to analyze the overall benefits of that warfare. Cowen analyzes those benefits by pointing to the many great things which were seemingly created by concentrated focus and money. The question, in this discussion, isn't whether they could have been created anyway (chances are they would have), but "Was it worth it?"
You are correct - there is another way to fight this claim that war generates growth. But it is a bit obtuse to argue to a true believer "this stuff would've been created anyway" because you can't prove that, can you? It's an assumption, a very good assumption, but still purely hypothetical. Cowen simply focuses on real world facts, which is what the Keynesians want and desire. So feed them their high carb diet of 'fact' as Cowen does.
Then show them the proteins they've ignored, and which make their argument weak and inefficient. Lives and value lost.
Cowen makes a clear case. Growth is not the be all to end all when you consider the costs. That ends the Keynesian argument, and shuts this discussion point down.
Sure, others will use it and not care about lives or lost value (like Krugman, who loves a good broken window). But most of us are a bit smarter than this. MOST of us. So rather than eviscerating a guy, like Cowen, who is on our side - let's focus on doing what he's doing by defeating a Keynesian with their own 'facts'.
I'm not going to argue with you. You're reading into this article something that simply isn't there. There is no evidence here. He's not using defeating Keynesians with facts. He's not really even making a point. Nor are his "facts" that. They're his own analysis of historical events.
You can think this guy is on your side. But he sold out 15 years ago to beltway libertarianism. Which is the "taxes are ok, so long as the government spends the money wisely" argument.
"Which is the "taxes are ok, so long as the government spends the money wisely" argument."
That's an open ended statement, far too generalized.
If rush hour for highway "X" adds two hours per day to 100,000 commuters round trip, how much economic impact does that lost 200,000 hours per day have?
Who decides to add a lane or another route?
Who pays?...Who benefits?
We know politicians will seek to benefit those who benefit them, corruption.
We also know the highway won't build itself.
While there's no question of corruption & cronyism in government, the opposite extreme isn't an answer.
Should we not focus on the problem of cronyism?
http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2014/06/is-the-lack-of-...
I consider this vindication of my viewpoint - Cowen himself points out his focus is simply on the fact that growth is increased dramatically in wartime, not that war is inherently 'better'. Something that isn't there? I think you need to read more into his work. He may not have presented his case very well enough for many on this thread to understand it, but anyone familiar with him simply has to understand the nature of the point he is making.
What is particularly intriguing is that his cohort (and equally fine economist) at GMU, Don Boudreaux, has not taken him particularly to task, except to post this singular comment (which I agree with and points to the major flaw in the concept that war makes things happen faster and better):
http://cafehayek.com/2014/06/from-the-comments-section-of-marginal-revol...
"Jet aircraft were developed prior to the war by Britain’s Frank Whittle and Germany’s Hans von Ohain in the 1930s. Working turbojets and jet engines had already been built by the time war began as well as several prototypes actually flying. Britain was probably the world leader in jet engine technology at that time although Germany was close.
Britain and the United States both correctly predicted that the design and mass production of jet warplanes would come too late to have a decisive impact on the war, so the decision was to concentrate on producing conventional aircraft that could be deployed during the time frame of the war. Germany however diverted huge amount of resources to bring jet aircraft into production sooner; something most historians consider to be a blunder. Germany would have been better off with more conventional aircraft. The Me-262 looks great, but had no impact on the war when it was introduced in April 1944. The Allied jets came out shortly thereafter. British Gloster Meteor was introduced several months later in July 1944, and the American P-80 Shooting Star in 1945.
At best, the war lead to a quicker production of existing technology by several years. However, in terms of development of new technology, there might have been no impact at all. Maybe no P-80s being mass produced, but a single prototype that looks just like it. Perhaps even the opposite could happen – without the need to produce thousands of conventional B-24s, P-51s, etc., immediately perhaps the resources would have existed to introduce jet aircraft much sooner.
Most of the “wonder weapons” and “new technologies” that appeared in World War II were of a similar nature – they were concepts and technology known in the 1930s, but simply not put into production because there was no need. Wars tend to accelerate the time technology is put into production, but kills the long term research for future development. There are only so many engineers and scientists to go around so if they’re working on immediate war time applications, they aren’t developing new concepts."
IB, I'm going to stir the pot, relative to this -
" Sure, others will use it and not care about lives or lost value (like Krugman, who loves a good broken window). But most of us are a bit smarter than this. MOST of us."
(Keep in mind, I am NOT endorsing war here, only parsing Cowens observation.)
Relative to Bastiat's Broken window, "seen" and "not seen" - What did Bastiat say about Moore's law and the effects of the internet, smarphones & GPS on the efficiency of trade and consumption relative to the cost of the "broken window" of defense spending?
Again, I'm not endorsing defense spending here, just looking at a bigger point, cause and effect.
If we go back 50 years, where defense spending & the debt first began to soar, while at the same time technology did as well, we might conclude that Bastiat's "not seen" is now "seen".
Inversely, while WW2 and the Cold War may have yielded positive longterm results in technologic growth, there is absolutely NO debate that the inverse is true of Afghanistan & Iraq.
(We're drowing in debt, thousands dead, with nothing to show but fatter corporate cash holdings)
I think the answer lies in parsing the priorities of government expenditures, I suspect the goals of the last decade were more geared to (crony) corporate profits, while past expense was focused on real technological goals.
I'm not a purest of any economic school, IMO this is why we're so polarized, each school of economics refuses to acknowledge the slightest merit of the others, which closes doors to new (hybrid) concepts. (as with Friedman)
Each school's followers behave almost exactly as Plato's allegory of the cave predicted, angry and insultive when a source of light is revealed.
It also bears mention that Bastiat's theories were formulated in the early to mid-1800's, the infancy of Democratic free markets, I don't think it's a good idea to strictly adhere to his theory, but to factor it into what is now "seen".
I agree tepidly.
But very tepidly. The assumption, as the commenter from Cafe Hayek points out, is that these gains carry with them net losses.
I got my first PC in 1982 and even then my friends and I were talking about "linking" them. We had never heard of, nor were aware of, DARPA or ARPAnet. The idea was foreign to us - so the concept that 'war' created this great thing is absurd. It was simply sped to production.
As anyone who knows what it takes to speed things to production TAKES, you'd realize the diversion of resources is GREATER THAN the overall resources required to let it develop on a normal time frame. If I have 6 projects going, each one with substantial opportunity for net gains, but 2 are looking to be 3 years out, 2 are 5 years out and 2 are 7 years out, I can choose to shift the resources from the 7 year programs to the 3 year programs, extend the time line on those 7 year jobs to 10 while shift the 3 year jobs to 1 or even 2 years. That's an overall net long term loss.
Cowen's point is legitimate (from a Keynesian argument perspective) if the only thing you want or need is economic growth NOW. But in reality, economic growth NOW is never really necessary (except in time of war, in which case speeding things up and getting those gains is useful for a short term perspective) because economic growth is usually a long term necessity. Why speed up something today when it means a net loss tomorrow (think Cash for Clunkers, which only moved forward car purchases by a number of months and diverted tax money into a useless adventure to boost growth yesterday and has had substantial long term losses afterward with the growth of channel-stuffing to maintain the mirage of growth over time).
I disagree that the schools fight so viciously to maintain position rather than finding good common ground. The common ground is well recognized. Krugman would never argue that supply and demand curves don't exist, though he's hard pressed to put them to any kind of meaningful use, instead using them as hammers when they are more likely simply X Rays (momentary glimpses at the body of the economy). Austrian Economists like Don Boudreaux and Russ Roberts are nothing if not complimentary of the real advances Krugman has made (and from which he earned his Nobel), but point out clear and obvious flaws in his logic to support his macroeconomic positions. Krugman, on the other hand, offers no similar compliments and is quite full of himself.
That's just one example, but they abound.
So I disagree with you that polarization exists at such a high level between these schools. Since the Austrian School is based on Praxeology, which are precepts that are indisputable, it's hard to disagree with MOST of the work done in it. However, even the Austrians have their varied branches and "disagreements". As one commenter noted, Cowen is a "Beltway Libertarian", which is fair to say. He is. But that doesn't mean he is a BAD Libertarian, and Boudreaux and Roberts (both more firmly in the Austrian School of thought than Cowen) quote Cowen regularly.
So no, I'm not really buying your discussion point here. Boudreaux himself is a HUGE Friedman fan - though he disagrees with Friedman on money. If that's the whole point of polarization you're thinking of, then it is pretty tepid indeed.
On the other hand, there is no value whatsoever in Keynesianism or Chartalism, or any other school of thought. Keynesianism has been terribly abused by politicians, for sure, but even if it hadn't been, you can't get me to agree that it's realistic application would have led to better long term outcomes. Simply because the old adage "filling the pool by pumping water from one end to the other" is the BEST description of Keynesian thought.
IB, see my humor, I think you just busted your own premise for disagreement of my observation of economic/political polarization -
"... there is no value whatsoever in Keynesianism or Chartalism, or any other school of thought. .."
This certainly looks like a complete defiance of anything Keynesian, seems you're aligning it with "charlatism".
Friedman, a monetarist (NOT Keynesian), admitted that Keynesian policies were what got us out of the great Depression, but argued that cronyism & corruption and the government's inability to pay down debt, made Keynesian policy infeasable. (as do Austrians, Classic Liberals)
However, Friedman also argued (after 1961) that a gold standard was too simplistic & contributed to the Great Depression by not allowing monetary expansion when it was needed most.
To the current Austrian/Classic Liberal view, there seems to be a conflation of monetary and Keynes as one and the same.
That all said, let's say we decided to revert to Reagan's suggested taxation of cap gains & increase cap gains by 5% or 10% to fund infrastructure spending that would directly enhance productivity & growth while creating jobs.
There's no denying our metro area highways need expansion (try driving rush hour traffic in the beltway, NYC, L.A. or Boston), while you could argue the worthiness of such spending, it's inevitable that we have to do something with a highway system that was largely planned when the population was substantially smaller.
If you and I were to hash out the details, and maybe finally agree on just a smigeon of spending with reciprocal taxation to fund it, that would be a Keynesian solution.
Hopefully I've illuminated my point about absolutism in economic ideology, I can't see how it's possible to not acknowleedge there is at least some degree of utility in both Keynesian and Monetarist ideology.
What really baffles me, is how, knowing Austrians primary objection to Keynes is out-of-control government, crony spending, it has occured to them that focusing on solving that problem isn't possible.
I liken it to closing the whole police department after learning a few of the cops were taking bribes from local criminals to look the other way.
To be clear, I agree with dissensions over corruption in Keynsian & monetary policies, but I can't buy the idea there's no solutiion but to "shut down the department".
fcuk it - l'm gonna HAARP Godzilla into hardon mode
burger eating, eggball throwing fat bastrds get creamed
Isn't this NYT claptrap simply straight out of Keynes' early 20th century book titled, "The Economic Consequences of the Peace" ??
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economic_Consequences_of_the_Peace
Of course there is always the so-called "Report from Iron Mountain" that the NYT could be drawing inspiration from (a book wihch just so happened to make it onto the NYT's bestseller list in the 60's only to be debunked as a hoax years later):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Report_from_Iron_Mountain
From wiki:
"The heavily footnoted report concluded that peace was not in the interest of a stable society, that even if lasting peace "could be achieved, it would almost certainly not be in the best interests of society to achieve it." War was a part of the economy. Therefore, it was necessary to conceive a state of war for a stable economy. The government, the group theorized, would not exist without war, and nation states existed in order to wage war. War also served a vital function of diverting collective aggression. They recommended that bodies be created to emulate the economic functions of war. They also recommended "blood games" and that the government create alternative foes that would scare the people with reports of alien life-forms and out-of-control pollution. Another proposal was the reinstitution of slavery."
Tyler Cowen, take a gun and go to Iraq, there you can have your fucking war. I hope you never come back!
He doesn't have a gun.
And he is out getting a bikini wax.
And to make the economy soar, pick a war in a place with dreadful weather
To the NYT, Wa-Po, LA Times, Chicago Tribune USA TODAY, FOX, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS... And all the "alphabet soup" of letters of meaningless wasteful pukes in the Federal Government that get paid to make this shit happen...
Say when guys!
We know how badly you want that paycheck... Even if it means your cold dead hands may be holding the only one that will matter for the rest of us!!!
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/06/14/366882/us-warship-ready-in-pg-am...
http://www.presstv.com/detail/2014/06/14/366966/us-must-press-ukraine-to...
and this is how it will play out - usa will wait like cowards behind their monitors until the ISIS arrive in Baghdad - full concentration of every population within the city and drone everything and everyone
bloodbank headlines whore media to sell their stories - ugly genius morons
The author isn't suggesting war. (but he did walk into this one with his wording, i.e. - you have to read the full article to get his point)
He's noting the factually empirical, accomplishments from the competitive drive of the threat of war are much greater than peacetime.
This is true, whether we like it or not.
Each of these was the direct result of war or cold war: Jet propulsion, space travel (the space race), nuclear power, Satellites, GPS, cellphones, the internet . (and more)
He then concludes his article by stating that we should acclimate ourselves to a 2% peacetime GDP, and he specifically says this peacetime effect is a good thing in the article's conclusion.
His mistake is concluding we should accept GDP growth @ 2% as long as there's peace.
I disagree, there ARE ways to induce competition, to promote growth in peace.
The cold war induced some of the greatest technological advances in human history, yet yielded little or no casualties.
There's a lesson there, that a competitive threat can be just as powerful as a real war.
I see no reason this can't be induced without war, I actually think we're in the middle of this "cold war" effect with China as we compete to technologically surpass eachother.
Frilton Miedman;
You have humanity, you have logic, and you seem to read pretty well.
But you missed the mark here on cold war casualties. Probably I am looking at 1) covert US Actions for Regime Change 2) Covert US Actions in Latin America, Caribbean 3) Vietnam War 4) The True Costs to Culture, Businesses, Economies, Homes, Families, Rape, Torture, Refugees, Disease, and US Land Mines & Unexploded Ordinance which accompanied the Vietnam War to Thailand, Laos, & Cambodia.
Only a couple of sources on my mind
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covert_United_States_foreign_regime_change...
1945–49 – Post-World War II occupation of South Korea; North Korean insurgency in Republic of Korea[6
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Foreign_Military_Financing#B...
------------------
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Committee
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MKUltra
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Gladio
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_Permanent_Select_Commi...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_President%27s_Commission_on_...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_Jewels_%28Central_Intelligence_Agen...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_experimentation_in_the_United_States
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nedzi_Committee
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plausible_denial
-------Below are rules that apply and probably were broken----
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hughes%E2%80%93Ryan_Act
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hughes-Ryan_Act
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Assistance_Act
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clark_Amendment
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boland_Amendment
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Oversight_Act
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Assistance_Act_of_1974
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Case%E2%80%93Church_Amendment
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Werner_Spitz
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shadow_Factory
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BCCI_Bank (just used for an era) Funding to criminals and dictators, BCCI handled money for Saddam Hussein, Manuel Noriega, Hussain Mohammad Ershad and Samuel Doe.[9] Other account holders included Medellin Cartel and Abu Nidal.[10]
CIA funding to the Afghan Mujahideen and the Contras
Frilton is right, but you're correct on the Cold War casualty count. HOWEVER, this just makes Cowen's REAL point all the more meaningful. In other words, you can't have a deathless "Cold War" to boost growth. There are costs to any kind of war, and they are substantial.
Which, from my POV knowing Cowen's other writings on the topic and after reading this article, is his primary point.
While war MAY generate economic growth, it carries massive costs which go generally unseen, except to those who lose loved ones and property in the process.
In other words, Cowen is saying if you believe war can generate growth, sure - IF that's ALL YOU WANT. However, you have to ignore lost property values due to destruction and lost potential economic value due to lost lives (and, if you really know Cowen's work, then you'd likely realize he'd argue the money spent on all the 'great stuff' generated by war is really misallocated resources, and therefore is not really growth at all).
I think he did this pretty well, though as Frilton points out his wording left much to be desired and he walked into a buzzsaw as less well-read types took him at face value, rather than realizing he was using the Keynesians' own logic against them.
Reponding to you (Inspector), but to Teeth as well.
My reference to a "cold war effect" is meant to say we can (definitely) find ways to evoke mass competition and unification against a common threat without the associated casualties of a traditional war.
To Teeth's point, I would agree on covert casualties, but those casualties occur regardless. (As you, Teeth, elaborate on)
The CIA and other U.S. extensions actively over-extend their authority by imposing regimes and dictatorships around the world, in oil and commodity based economies in our own economic interests in the name of price stability. (ask me another time about that oxymoron in how the CFMA has effected price stability)
Most 3rd world nations despise us for this reason, another topic for another time.
You are on track to the solution. I wanted to say earlier that we have a new economy in many ways based on Weapons Technology.
We get spinoff I'm sure, but if it is not seen as Military Applicable in some cases research may not be done.
Probably I over stated that as we have tons of consumer products, gadgets, gizmos, perks on our toys.
As we transfer Weapons and all other Technology to Asia and... well it makes you wonder.
What we need is Great Management Techniques in the US Auto Manufacturing Industry.(Bailout City, Right)
Look for where we got Bailouts for US Businesses & I will show you "Epic Fail"
Thanks. I'm not familiar with Cowen and I seem to be a slow read.
I took to long to post correction to list of links.
Above links were for different purpose.
Look up Stay Behind, Stay Behind Networks, Operation Gladio, Gladio, Strategy of Tension, Operation Condor, Operation Paperclip, Ratlines of WWII, Luxemburg PM Resigns this year as a result of gold & money not accounted for in Spy Scandal, P2 Lodge, ODESSA.
Anyway there are lots of US Programs and influences with Nazis and Fascists after WWII for Stay Behind Armies and a Strategy of Tension all under NATO and said by BBC to have had a heavy hand of CIA
All nato countries recruited right wing nazis and fascists to form an army to fight any invasion of communists. But this lead to Right wing bombings, assassinations, kidnapping, and many nazis were rewarded by being able to do what they wanted to do even within Germany.
Greece still has the Golden Dawn and there is a story of Spanish Assassins and Italian Assassins with US Involvement in the 1967 Greece Coup, General Coup.
One enterprising German Nazi was able to Train people in Spain and the Middle East in Terror operations.
Dirty Wars in the Cone of South America including Chile & Bolivia also were linked.
No Inflation without War.
Complete Fing MORONS!!!!! Period!
calling the Whitehouse
Waging war for the West is not going to be easy, or even possible. Unless some horrific outrage, some atrocity on a scale that blows everyone's hair back occurs, people simply aren't all "rah rah!" for war anymore.
Of course, the non-Western countries have no such problems. They DO believe in their various and sundry "causes", and so will always be able to recruit true believers willing to sacrifice everything for the cause.
OUR military has turned into a bunch of glorified Rent-A-Cops, very similar to what happened to the once-great military of Rome. The citizens no longer wanted to get their own hands dirty (ie: sending in their OWN sons..) so they "outsourced" to the various barbarian tribes, and PAID them to go do it for them...They got a military full of the kinds of folks that kill for money, instead of for more noble reasons.
But I'm sure those Romans were high-fiving each other for their clever idea back in 410 when Alaric and some of his army-buds paid them a visit to break shit and piss on their azaleas...
I completely agree with your comparison to Romans.
Their zeal for conquest exceeded the returns, meanwhile, they ignored infrastructure in place of convenience, such as favoring aristocrats by taking farm land from farmers for the affluent to build lavish villas - the formerly productive GDP of farmers then become a deficit for the bread & circus and Rome had to dilute their hard currency to pay the military, in turn the military became exasperated fighting for lowered wages.
As a result Rome just dissapated.
The banksters see that war is coming and they need the lapdog press to make the case that this is GOOD for the economy.
BULLISH!
its not so much the banksters see it coming, they always have a hand in creating the situation in the first place and finance both sides - therefore it doesnt matter who wins, dies, finds god etc
its a no lose situation for the banksters, so yes, l agree, its bullish for them and associates
All the shit that's fit to print...
ringing out - must all be at the buffet
Oh great - it's the "It could be worse" argument.
Shameless manipulative bastards.
The NYT and their closely assorted psychos are bringing about their own demise. Try and see the big picture.
http://www.na-newyorkcity.com/fracking-impact-hits-close-to-home/
One of many concerns about the proposed pipeline is that it would intersect with a proposed underground high-voltage transmission line just a few hundred feet from the Indian Point nuclear power plant’s spent fuel pool, and in close proximity to the Ramapo fault. The project would also involve replacing its existing 26-inch diameter pipeline with a 42-inch high pressure pipeline between Ramapo and Fairfield County, Connecticut.
Nostradamus laid it all out also.
Garden of the world near the new city, In the path of the hollow mountains: It will be seized and plunged into the Vat, Drinking by force the waters poisoned by sulfur.
Edgar Cayce predicted apocalyptic events before the earth would once again be ruled by God. This was roughly to be accomplished by a force field of energy shifting and changing human consciousness. Edgar Cayce predicts the destruction of New York but only after Los Angeles and San Francisco. This also correlates with Nostradamus and predictions of those in the New City being forced to drink sulfur when to great rocks war with each other.
________________________________________________________________________
It should be evident now to all, the Sumerians considered us earthlings as a plague upon the earth and looked favorably on the deluge as a solution.
https://dublinsmick.wordpress.com/2012/05/10/who-are-the-nefilim-where-d...
Bad ain't here yet but it is coming
"It is the persistence and expectation of peace."
The persistence of peace? He must be joking. When, in his lifetime, has he seen the absence of war and the aggresive machinations of empire on this planet?
What comes out of Princeton is retardonomics...
I'm absolutely convinced there are no people more idiotic than "economists". Real growth comes from cheap energy. Driving up gas prices hurts growth. Shutting down nuke plants hurts growth. When there's no more cheap energy the economy will whirlpool in a death spiral. The only hope for ordinary people is to make sure they own genuine assets and not worthless deposit slips and stock certificates in the fractional reserve ponzi.
I traversed through the Florida State School of business and nobody, I mean nobody ever mentioned the Federal Reserve was not Federal.
"The Rothschilds, and that class of money-lenders of whom they are the representatives and agents -- men who never think of lending a shilling to their next-door neighbors, for purposes of honest industry, unless upon the most ample security, and at the highest rate of interest -- stand ready, at all times, to lend money in unlimited amounts to those robbers and murderers, who call themselves governments, to be expended in shooting down those who do not submit quietly to being robbed and enslaved." by: Lysander Spooner
(1808-1887) Political theorist, activist, abolitionist Source: "No Treason #6" (1870)
This asswipe outfit is going down fast financially.
I get desperate begging e-mails from them about once a week.
Fuck you, tribe journal.
1) Widespread war in middle east = sky-rocketing price of oil
2) Oil to the moon = Collapse of industrialized societies via hyperinflation
Have a nice day.
I welcome hyperinflation, my portfolio and retirement are betting on it, saw this coming from NY in 2007 (I live in CA).
Bailout maga-fail blowback.
So many people to kill, so little time.
Russian embassy in Kiev under attack. Potentially as cover for the use of chemical weapons agains the east.
vineyardsaker.blogspot.com/2014/06/russian-embassy-in-kiev-under-attack.html
War is coming.
Russia’s Embassy, by international agreements, is Russian territory. And in the clip you provided, there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that the Ukrainian government is putting an immediate stop to this lawlessness.
I would think Ukraine would come down hard to stop this if it's what it appears. They know that if they don’t, Putin will come down just that much harder on them. Putin, in such circumstances, legitimately could roll tanks in. If it is a working embassy, there are Russian nationals inside the building; if they are in danger Russia is within her power to go in and get them.
Thanks for the heads up, Prisoner.
Edit: More details are revealed on Stragetic Culture Foundation's front page article: “Protesters turn over Russian diplomats’ cars, drag down flag at embassy in Kiev” (PHOTOS)
… including the following comment:
Moscow, Washington demand to stop violence in Kiev
The Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement condemning the attack on the Russian embassy and demanded that Kiev provide security for Russian diplomats.
“Moscow is extremely outraged at the provocative actions of fascist-like thugs in Kiev against the Russian Embassy. Moscow demands the Ukrainian side take all necessary security measures to protect Russian diplomats in Kiev,” the statement said.
No such measures have yet been taken by Kiev, which is a “fragrant violation of Ukraine’s obligations,”the ministry said.
Washington on Saturday spoke out against the violent action and called on Kiev to ensure the security of Russian diplomats.
“The US condemns the attack on the embassy of the Russian Federation in Kiev and calls on the Ukrainian government to fulfill its obligations under the Vienna convention to ensure the necessary security measures,” US State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said, as quoted by RIA Novosti.
RT
http://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2014/06/14/protesters-turn-over-russian-diplomats-cars-drag-down-flag-embassy-kiev-photos.html
Reports surfaced that the separatists are treating Slavyansk as a new Stalingrad, where they intend to simply resist and take the brunt of the Ukie nazi's offensive while combat units flank the Ukie army and chip away, taking down a chopper here, a plane there, a artillery unit elsewhere.
As the white phosphorus didn't do the trick, I do think chemical weapons will be their last gambit in trying to get Putin to impose a no-fly zone. That's why the US is quiet, as they are still hoping to drag Putin in. Russia is showing remarkable restraint.
Putin doesn't need to go to war under any circumstance, he just has to make a phone call and turn off the gas, end of discussion, "pull back or we cut off the gas and oil forever, we don't play war or donate bodies anymore."
This bullshit narrative of Putin's restraint is a crock of shit, a phone call stops the war yet he lets hundreds or thousands of civilains get murdered.
The guy that gassed terrorists and his own citizens to rescue a few hundred Russians won't pick up the phone and forgo some revenue?
The man is a greedy spineless pig.
What's going on in Ukraine is a culling of all resistance to Eurostan, Putin is in on it.
Gas and oil can be used domestically to increase employment, you can literally trade energy for jobs (in CA we trade jobs for solar energy).
US doesn't care about gas for Europe...
At some point some asshole will use this a reason to go nuclear!
Most economists don't understand inflation as it relates to daily items we all buy and need. If they really think inflation is around 2-3% then they will miss the entire picure. I tried explaining to a manager of mine who doesn't see how the cost of beef distorts what some call growth or profit.
If a burger joint sells 1000 burgers a month and the cost of beef is $5lb then after costs you make a 3% profit based on the sales of burgers. If the next month you sell the same amount of burgers, but the cost of beef is now $7lb there by forcing you to raise prices, on paper it looks like your sales are up.
However when you subtract the increase in the cost of beef adjusted for inflation, being 40% from $5-7, your actual profit will be much less if any at all. This doesn't even include energy, wheat for buns, cheese, toppings, and the property it resides on.
The business then has to adjust for this loss and make up for it from other areas that it might be relying/depending on as a source funding or other committments.
This is lost on all these economists and gov't types and not all of them are naive about this reality.
The 'Yalta (2/11/45) Conference' pictured in the above piece was ~ two months before FDR dies Apr.12,1945 and Truman takes the reigns (btw, Churchill loses to Attlee 7/26/45 in the throes of negotiation?). The Potsdam (7/17- 8/2/1945) Conference, the Potsdam (7/26/45) Declaration were initiated. Stalin didn't sign the Potsdam Declaration but instead as agreed (verbally?) upon with Truman's incessant prodding invaded (Stalin had amassed a million+/+ troops on the border without Truman's knowledge?) Japan via Manchuria (Russo-Japanese War 1945) the same day the US drops 2nd A-Bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. Coincident?!?
Why is this important?
The Japanese didn't sign the Treaty of San Francisco until 9/8/51, and wasn't officially enforced until 4/28/1952! The war with Japan had been unconditional as was Germany, but, it took ~7 years after the original surrender to formalize the treaty.
Here's where it gets tricky for Truman? WWII, and VJ Day were history now. But, the american public wanted payback for a decade+/+ of depressed wages brought on by the great depression and then the war. Unions and Large Industry Manufacturing Industries (Steel/ Rubber/ Auto, etc., etc.,) wanted wage increase for labor and higher prices for Industry's Bounty of Production. There was a communist scare and political malfeasance in the entire congress (all houses incl. the WH?).
Well, while Truman was taking care of business... getting the country in order, the US/UN designate Gen. MacArthur gets assigned to a limited war in Korea. North Korea has invaded South Korea, June 25, 1950 and ending in a stalemate July 27,1953-- never was there a peace treaty signed other than North Korea getting independence from the USSR and the USA reciprocating in kind with South Korea... getting their independence also. The Korean war could have been over in six months, but was a costly and deadly protracted war that almost brought the USSR/China v. USSA/ Europe (Europe was unprepared for another World War never mind the cost financially and human death toll into a Nuclear War! Yes, a Nuclear War!
Needless to say MacArthur was eventually relieved of his duties and replaced with Gen. Ridgway. Thank God!!! America was broke from the Korean war with our Military licking its wounds of what was to be a cakewalk?!? Truman was, "had" by BigMac, and Big`Mac paid dearly with Truman exacting maximum negative polital alchemy-- using Mac's open revelations (SIGNET).
Moving on? Eisenhower is elected 1953 and wants out of the forgotten-war-- aka, 'the unknown war', called Korea! The USSR had bogged down the entire US military on a peninsula with little strategic value other than China worried about USA nefarious anti-rapproachment(?) on the Mao's CCP/PLA fledgling government... still in it's infancy since late 1945 (Note: Big Mac used Japaneses Imperial soldiers and Police along with Chiang Kai-shek Taiwanese military to fight the NK and Chinese)!
Ike gets his way and the war ends, but Vietrnam is now on the radar periphery in Asia. The Pacific is going to become a problem, but the USSA must regroup and build-up our own country.
Home becomes the top priority. The public has had enough wars! The USSA goes on to become warless for a (~1953- 1964) decade building out our infrastructure and reaping the dividends of FDR/Truman's Marshall Plan in Europe!
But, eventually Nixon (Ike's VP? elected as a commi hater and called Truman a traitor as a congressman while he was totally financed by Millionaire Califorian's on the sly!) gets in office after LBJ says enough is enough...'
But that's another story with a sad ending, period?
jmo Thankyou Tyler
They'll never admit that faggot in the white house is the problem, will they?
He is the puppet - the problem is the banksters - we must end the fed -
effective money supply = money supply * velocity of money
excessively concentrating wealth thus replacng a middle class society with a minority rich / majority poor society reduces the velocity of money**
ergo excessively concentrating wealth creates a hidden deflationary spiral as the effective money supply shrinks
(**the poor have a many to few relationship to the velocity of money, the rich have a few to many relationship to the velocity of money, only a large middle class has a many to many relationship to the velocity of money)
an excellent point!
they themselves are creating the problem they want to solve with war
yeah, too many asterisks.
How about "lack of Constitutional Federal Judiciary", for 2, Alex?
sorry,
you just used constituent component of velocity of money in part of an equation for money supply???
Like MZN = MZM * MZMV
Put motherfucking Tyler Cowen right in the middle of a war and see if he changes his mind. Douchebag.
All Hail Rupert Murdoch!
The catalyst for war has not been diminished as many people have hoped it would once the world matured. National pride, political agendas, religious and ethnic hatreds are some of the biggest roadblocks to world peace. Often we seem to forget as we look back to World War II and past a dozen "lesser Conflicts" peace has been the exception rather then the rule for hundreds and thousands of years.
Governments are not dependable to serving the people and protecting the rights of people. Government is more attuned and geared to serve the agendas of special interest. That is why we are lead into wars, the argument that human nature leads us to war is pure folly or people would rush spontaneously towards it and joyfully kill their neighbors.
War is not a positive driver of the economy but more money wasted. The true reality is that across the world few mothers want to see their children killed and most farmers want to be left along to raise their crops and earn a living. More on the subject of war as a solution to conflict in the article below.
http://brucewilds.blogspot.com/2014/05/war-and-what-is-it-good-for.html
This song is a prophecy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHQFmBrjLCM
Somewhat taken, a Portuguese blogger suggested that the exit to Portugal would become a state of Brazil beyond the sea.
That was the beginning of the crisis, the guy swore at me.
Alright.
Some posts ago, someone said that "in prease speak English."
The "prease" (or "please" - inglesado) is typical Brazilian.
I wish to inform that person who read blogs in Russian, German, English, French, translated it on Google, I also read something about Canton Chinese and Arabic but do not comment on these because my keyboard is Latin, and I do not fucking Manjo nenuma of characters different to mine.
The network is important in expressing the opinion, the language does not matter, the idea yes.
Buster caught my attention in my view is excellent, expert English speaker without intelligence, a sellout to the banksters, unfortunately the guy is Brazilian and I can not shoot him in the face, do not kill brothers (for now) Kkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk.
Sorry for the outburst.
Enjoy the music and the idea of ??Portugal becoming a state of Brazil from beyond the sea (and be part of the BRICS).
hehe.
Actually it's "greedy, war-mongering New York Jews that are hurting the economy".
The Jewish bankers always make money funding both sides in a war. War is not hell for them.
Sieg heil to you too, Stormfaggot.
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boring old shtick
You are not disagreeing with me, you are just pissed that I am pointing what everyone knows but only a few are allowed to speak. Who's the Nazi?
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Dude it was unsaid, they ain't fooling anybody
The banking cartel message that's filtering down to the people - that without war we must expect slower growth - translates: Socialism is dissolving the American system and the oligarchs’ subjects need to adjust in this interim before feudalism kicks in.
Henry Hazlitt, long ago in The Conquest of Poverty, outlined how it is capitalist production and not government programs and central planning that enriches a nation.
Hazlitt warned that socialist proposals bent on legislating permanent equalization of income by distributing the wealth of the country equally ‘once for all,’ so as to give everybody an even start, could not long endure.
“It is not merely that everybody would continue to earn different incomes as the result of difference in ability, industry, and luck, but difference in thrift alone would soon reestablish inequality. Society would still be divided into ‘spenders’ and ‘savers.’ One man would quickly go into debt to spend his money on luxuries and immediate pleasures; another would save and invest present income for the sake of future income.
"It requires only a very small degree of saving or spending to lead to comparative wealth or poverty, even in one generation."
And to continue to force wealth equalization can be done only under slavery.
“’Even Communists have now learned that wealth and income cannot be created by merely alluring slogans and utopian dreams. As no less a figure than Leonid I. Brezhnev, First Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party, recently put it at a Party Congress in Moscow (The New York Times, May 29, 1971), 'One can only distribute and consume what has been produced; this is an elementary truth.'
“What the Communists have still to learn, however, is that the institution of capitalism, of private property and free markets, tends to maximize production, while economic dictatorship and forced redistribution only discourage, reduce, and disrupt it.”
It is telling that the media and the culture that it controls keep Americans’ attentions constantly on the memory of the Nazi years, 1933-1945, in order to divert their eyes from Lenin’s failed system of Communism and its sister socialism that still are alive and well in America and failing, just as they did in the U.S.S.R. and Mao's China.
How long will the West endure this tyranny over markets?
Socialism does not benefit the masses. Most socialist theory is based on the desire to transfer wealth to a tiny minority of the financial elite - to oligarchs. Take away the U.S.A. superpower bully club wielded by the banking oligarchy and they are helpless in their quest for world economic and political control.
The only way the Soviet Union and its failed communist economic system with its slave-labor force and concentration on armament production survived as long as it did was with the help of the United States.
Alexander Solzhenitsyn told how it was done: “It is American trade that allows the Soviet economy to concentrate its resources on armaments and preparations for war. Remove that trade, and the Soviet economy would be obliged to feed and clothe and house the Russian people, something it has never been able to do. Let the socialists among you allow this socialist economy to prove the superiority that its ideology claims.”
America is now seeing the deficiencies expanding in the American economy, not because of the weather or lack of wars, but because of socialism and cental planning; and unlike America standing by to aid the Soviets and Mao, there is no benefactor waiting in the wings for America.
No problem was too small or too large for America’s free market to solve. Now, all small problems grow into insoluble national crises.
The book "human achievement" correlates all progress before about 1900 and finds no coorelation one way or the other with war- If I recall the author says that war is such a constant over longer time periods that progress cant be driven by it or against it.
These bloody neo-cons have gone completely mad. The sheeple must awake before they kill us all.
They're on a rocket sled to their reconing day, if there was anyway faster to get there they'd do it, sick fucks, flat learning curve.
"Counterintuitive though it may sound, the greater peacefulness of the world may make the attainment of higher rates of economic growth less urgent and thus less likely."
The Clinton era boom proves this clown wrong.
The 1920's and 1990's were peacetime booms.
The problem is a record global credit bubble, not a lack of war.
*Cough* Kosovo *Cough* Sudan *Cough* Iraq *Cough*
Smedley Butler would very much disagree.
http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/warisaracket.html#c1
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_United_States_military_operati...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_United_States_military_operati...
this latest outburst from a college educated asshole who worships mammon and his satanic overlords on wall street is disgusting beyond belief. i would rather stay in a depression than wage war to escape it. and it is a damned lie to suggest that ww2 got the usa out of the depression - what vile filth.
the broken window theory appeals to the simple unimaginative and squalid mind. all wars of the usa have been strictly for the plutocrats and academicians and politicians. they are designed to line the pockets of the elite and they are started by the elite - every one of them.
another reason why a vote for democrat or republican is a vote for war, poverty, and totalitarianism.
Capital Punishment against Warmongering Profiters. Minions get same treatment. Funny, I always thought Americans were Christians and thus better than this...............allas..........nope, even less morals than I thought. The last thoughts that leave with the soul will not be pleasant with some, little peace in that? If the soul wonders for eternity there will be many Elitists that I hope suffer that Hell.
Apparently, the cunt lick MSM journalist have forgotten about the warning.
Eisenhower warns us of the military industrial complex
What more do you need to prepare for your job detail responsibility?
Down voter, I wasn't even born at the time of this video. Go fuck yourself shithead..
I hope every single person at the New York Times gets the worst kind of fucking cancer and dies a slow lingering painful death right in front of their fucking families.
What if it's a cold war?
No one with a brain pays attention to NYT. My brain doesn't give them the time of day. Marxomedia.
The NYT has always been highly noted for wrapping up fish, absorbing cat piss and cleverly monitoring a bird cage. Your media punter’s haven’t figured out society advancements. The paywall will bankrupt you. Blows a kiss.
Well, a total global nuclear war would be fantastic for growth. Having to rebuild everything from Scratch -- fantastic.
Come on all you big strong men,
Uncle Sam needs your help again.
Get out there and get maimed or dead
so the war pigs can be better fed.
Hey, it's not their kids who are the cannon fodder.
Come on all you big strong men,
Uncle Sam needs your help again.
Get out there and get maimed or dead
so the war pigs can be better fed.
Hey, it's not their kids who are the cannon fodder.
Our future
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2013/09/11/fukushima-equals-6000-hiroshima-...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3W7-ngmO_p8
I feel like I am fixing to die
Destroy wealth and then rebuild it all afterward makes no sense even if the GDP rises 20% year over year.
GDP doesn't capture all that is needed to make a people prosperous and free.
They don't care about the total quantity of wealth. They care about the percentage of it they own and they are always aiming to increase that percentage. For them causing war and destruction is more changing the ownership of wealth not the quantity as the quantity follows from the percentage.
For example, they get the US to attack a country and blow up a power plant and then afterwards they lend the original owners the money to rebuild it for a 20% stake.
It's not just war. They are using the economic crisis they created in Greece to loot Greek national assets.
It's what the banking mafia do.
There is room for more wealth, there are still pockets in the ocean that are not dead filled with plastic and waste. There are still parts of the planet not yet paved. Let us push on.
If they just were clueless, but no it's not enough, they are too simply dead dangerous. Shouldn't be bad weather even have it's virtues? Like one needs to buy more gas, oil insulation. Bad for those with PVS modules on their roof. But you know they told us it will get warmer - maybe later maybe sooner maybe not at all. But we have to to everythng to keep the temperatur at our current rate, otherwise the world will come to an end, and you see it's even so bad that even the weather alone is sufficient to hinder "recovery".
I wish this economists that they are send to war first. Suggestions on where we should them to "drive the economy"?
Moar war! So fucker, why don't you go and fight yourself? And take your family members with you.
"that leave with the soul will not be pleasant with some, little peace in that? If the soul wonders for eternity there will be many Elitists that I hope suffer that Hell."
Red Elk Speaks
http://www.gnosticliberationfront.com/red_elk1.htm
Red Elk: Each tadpole, in it’s own tiny little sack, within this great mass of sack, is an individual being, a soul, a human being—that will be cast out of God’s Mind. There is the FINAL DEATH. There is the eternal hell. Though you be in a mass of other tadpoles, you will not be aware of any other tadpole in this great mass. You will be aware of only yourself, separated forever from God, and no more to ever, ever have a chance to repent. You’ve done it all. THERE, my friend, is a hell worse than Hades is now.
Gail Cortright: I know what the question was, everybody talking about how this is a play.
Red Elk: Oh, I’ll tell you, this is a very serious play. You’d better play it right.
I propose a new broken window theory for all bed wetting progressives who believe in the Keynsian myth... Step 1) Find a tall building Step 2) Jump through the glass of the tallest floor Step 3) Watch GDP improve with each thunk/squish heard...
Proposed amendment: insert Step 2 after step 1 and before jumping, put on a white wedding gown.
Black Sabbath live in Paris 1970
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_V-afAs1gwk
A popular number during the vietnam war
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ec0XKhAHR5I
Why the war ended
http://kennysideshow.blogspot.com/2008/12/soldiers-revolt.html
Comparing mankind to a series of a few bacterial strains in a single petri dish, the only way war can benefit one bacteria in the dish opposed to another is if that bacteria managed to kill all competing bacteria and has complete access to all resources available in that petri dish.
There comes a point, where the petri dish eventually , starts to compete with itself for resources and the population of that bacteria will decrease in order to fit in that dish and still maintain life.
The earth being a petri dish, we have occupied about 60% of the earths carrying capacity, we have different strains (races) of human, competing for apparently scarce resources (Oil), the bacteria (nation) that losses cheap access to oil will die off and the winning strain (nation) will secure those resources for its population.
over the past few decades, the USA has had un-challenged access to oil, via the petro dollar, now that the USA is lossing control (as it became a house divided and had in-fighting causing it to lose petro dollar status) due to poor foreign policy, the USA will have to re-prove itself in a major conflict to re-secure its access to oil (energy).
If it fails, it will die.
The primary bacteria (nations) fighting for dominance of resources (usa,china,russia, u.k.) the U.K. 's evolutionary plan is to finance everyone and manage to enforce a debt system over the prevailing nations of a conflict in order to stay alive.
The U.K. is a monetarist state, and is parasitic in nature, the vulture nation.
The U.S. is technology based, and is a puppet of the monetarists, it is intended to have a boastful military to be used for forced resource extraction.
Russia, is the bear, and the image of the bear suites it, as it is ravenous yet patient , it waits, hibernates and looks for the opportune moment to strike, much like a bear hunting fish in the upstream, it does not rush to move, but rather waits for the fist to come to it.
I think Russia is the best positioned to win.
The only chance the USA has of winning is by using technology to over-come its need for oil.
I think the nation that develops ultra deep drilling 100 mile + deep barrier into earths crust , is going to be the winner.
If that doesn't happen, its going to come down to a world war in one form or another.
Recent discoveries have been made of a new form of water that exists 400 + miles into the earths crust.
Hydrogen with one oxygen, in some kind of new form more vast than the oceans, if we can get it out of the ground and use it for energy, oil will look like some kind of toy in comparison.
Fascinating. Some upstart is in need of a thorough nuking.
I'm gonna laugh when TPTB try to impose a draft on Mexican Americans, biggest fail ever, the Israel welfare train is going to get cut off too right at the worst time in their history.
Saddam was the best friend they could have hoped for, too bad they had to go to war with him.
Live by the sword....