By EconMatters
Extremism & Democracy
The Republican Party has been hijacked by the right wing Christian conservatives, the gun toting NRA extremists, the Tea Party extremists and the racially and culturally narrow-minded factions across the country. The party is a complete mess, it really has lost its way, and is destined to lose the Presidential Election to Hillary Clinton. The emergence of front runners in the Republican campaigning season of Donald Trump and Ben Carson speaks volumes regarding how far this party has lost its way.
Donald Trump
Pictures of Christian evangelicals putting their hands on Trump`s forehead during prayer make baby kissing look respectable on the campaign trail. Trump obviously got into the race as the attention whore that he is just because there are cameras involved, and this is what he does. The fact that he started polling well probably shocked this branding clown more than anybody, and then he started getting serious in pandering to every worst-case extremist tendency that so aptly defines the Republican party today. He basically has done the Democrat`s job in converting any remaining Republican moderates to the other side. Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party should send Donald Trump a large thank you note after the election, he has made their job a lot easier. Donald Trump`s incessant pandering to every extremist group and their requisite views has basically confirmed what the Democrats have been saying and portraying about the Republican party for years. That they are a bunch of racist, homophobic, right-wing, gun-toting, tea-party simple minded extremists.
Ben Carson
Ben Carson could have been a breath of fresh air for the party, but no he had to start opening his mouth on the campaign trail. And he has said some pretty stupid things on the campaign trail. Things I thought a competent neurosurgeon was incapable of thinking or enunciating, let alone speak in public. The guy is basically an incompetent, senile idiot who if the Republican Party had any real platform with legitimate candidates would have been marginalized months ago on the campaign trail. I never realized how specialized competencies can be until this guy opened his mouth, and the incongruence between the thoughts rattling around this man`s brain, and what he did for a profession is astounding. I am not sure how one can make it through basic medical school with such thoughts. He may have early stage Alzheimer’s or dementia of some sort. At any rate just another of the long list of un-electable Republican Party candidates.
Fiscal Conservatism
The Republican Party needs an overhaul, they need to get back to the core values of pro-business and job creation, entrepreneurial beliefs that once made this party a formidable political entity. They need to concentrate on fiscal conservatism as this will be sorely needed in about three years when all the entitlement spending really starts hitting the accounting books of the government. They need to focus on promoting lower taxes, simplifying the tax code, and cutting waste from bloated governmental programs like the military. In short, the government needs to be much more efficient in where and what they spend the taxpayer receipts on. The US has spent so much money supporting the military industrial complex over the last 20 years that the overkill factor is off the charts. I know the importance of having a strong military but the current spending is just comically ridiculous given the juxtaposition of the United States Military capabilities and the next nearest competitor.
Inefficient Capital Allocation
It is obvious that a large portion of this spending needs to be reassigned to more productive and efficient uses in the economy. This is where the Republican Party needs to steal a Democratic idea and really overhaul the healthcare industry. It doesn`t take rocket science to realize the quality of healthcare for the average citizen in the Scandinavian countries versus the United States and what these countries spend on the Military to realize poor capital allocation policies.
There is no reason that every American shouldn`t be able to walk into any healthcare facility at a moment`s notice and have all their medical needs met free of charge given the immense resources of this country. It is obvious that the entire healthcare system needs to be overhauled, costs are out of control and have been for decades; most of this is due to structural inefficiencies and the interplay between drug companies, insurance companies and the government – this relationship structure is broken.
It will require a lot of money and focus but this is going to happen by necessity if for no other reason as the current system will eventually implode. Since this is going to happen eventually, the Republicans might as well adopt this issue from the Democrats now that they have really screwed up the healthcare system with their failed attempt to fix it. Ideas go back and forth between the Party Platforms all the time, the Republicans need to steal this issue back from the Democrats.
The party needs to be much more inclusive from a sexual orientation, cultural values, and ethnicity standpoint. This is a no-brainer, it is an election after all, and sheer numbers count. But the real reason is that wake up Republicans America isn`t like your grandfather`s age, and that era ain`t coming back. Cities are multicultural landscapes with large populations of culturally and ethnically diverse people often with common goals of seeking a higher quality of life. In short, to be simplistic here good capable hard working, smart people come from many diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds – yes even illegal immigrants. Get over it Republicans by giving this issue solely to the Democrats, you are essentially committing political suicide – you have become a stereotype, a caricature of a political party that is destined to lose elections.
Never Going to Attain Unanimity of Thought
Americans have diverse views on many issues, it is hard getting two people to agree on anything these days. All Republicans are not going to agree with each other on all the issues, some may be sympathetic to some issues and vehemently opposed to others. The key is to move to the center and have enough of the issues that are really important to voters to broaden the appeal of the party. Focus on policies promoting economic growth, lower taxes, and spending tax receipts more efficiently and not on one`s sexual orientation in the bedroom. The Republican Party has too many extremist views on far too many issues to be electable right now on the presidential stage. Right now it appears that Hillary Clinton is going to be our next President, and that means another four years of underachieving from a pro-growth business standpoint. And frankly, she is the only candidate I have seen who is even remotely qualified to run for President in this circus show of a campaign.
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“And next week, I will be joining President Hollande and world leaders in Paris for the Global Climate Conference. What a powerful rebuke to the terrorists it will be when the world stands as one and shows that we will not be deterred from building a better future for our children.”- Obama
Cuz...its well known ISIS drives Toyota p-up trucks dammit!...and and and...after getting back from flying my corporate jet all over the south Pacific...I'm flying across the Atlantic to France...so there!
Or-fucking-something!
If I had a choice bewteen Evangelical Christians and Mulsim Jihadists at this time in history.......
He should be writing..... correction, SHOULD HAVE BEEN writing this crap about the Democratic Party as it would have been much more salacious than this dribble...
Obviously the author of this article is on Tyler's JV team...
Standard Disclaimer: and he needs to be benched for the rest of the decade.
Forget about it. Automation and outsourcing = not enough jobs to go around. We need a whole new system. Shuffling a few things around ain't gonna do it.
Well well well we have a little birdie selling left right divide and conquer.. You swallowed the Hegelian Dialectic hook line and sinker. The Anti-Human Principle. U.S. Pavlovian Conditioning. Revolutionaries in government have created economic chaos, shortages in food death and destruction and dislocations.
Operation Mockingbird
Operation Mockingbird was a bit of a two-pronged approach to dealing with the media: on the one hand, journalists were routinely employed by the CIA to develop intelligence and gather information, or to report on certain events in a way that portrayed the US favorably. On the other, there were actual plants within the media—paid off with bribes or even directly employed by the CIA—to feed propaganda to the American public.
Just substitute globalist DNC/RNC (all Rockefeller CFR evil authoritarian PNAC nut jobs) for Rothschilds just continuing democide clan.
"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
Mr
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History
10 Dirty Secret CIA OperationsMike Floorwalker May 25, 2013
We’ve always loved to discuss some of the shadier dealings of the government and the military—and no organization provides more fodder for these discussions than the American Central Intelligence Agency.
The CIA has a way of very publicly blowing their cover—seeming to pop up wherever turmoil, strife, and political unrest materialize. Despite being almost synonymous with dirty tricks, the Agency has essentially been given free rein, permitted to use whatever tactics they see fit to deal with any (real or perceived) threat to American interests.
If there’s one thing we know about absolute power, it’s that it corrupts absolutely; and if there’s one thing we know about the CIA, it’s that the astoundingly unethical and criminal projects highlighted in this list are probably just the tip of the iceberg.
10
Operation PBSUCCESS
PBSUCCESS was the code name for a CIA-backed coup led against the democratically elected government of Jacobo Arbenz, the President of Guatemala, in 1954. It’s one of the first in a long line of suspected or acknowledged CIA interventions in the governments of foreign countries, and it was indeed a tremendous success from the Agency’s point of view.—the first indication that such a feat could be accomplished relatively smoothly.
Elected in 1950, Arbenz set about instituting reforms aimed at making his country self-sufficient, by giving huge chunks of government land back to citizens. This rubbed the US Government the wrong way, as much of this land was “owned” by the United Fruit Company, a truly evil corporation with which the Eisenhower administration was snugly in bed at the time (CIA director Allen Dulles and his brother John, the Secretary of State, both had strong ties to the company).
The Agency snidely referred to Arbenz policies in internal memoranda as “an intensely nationalistic program of progress colored by the touchy, anti-foreign inferiority complex of the ‘Banana Republic.’ ” In other words, non-dependence on the US and its allies was not to be tolerated.
Four hundred and eighty CIA-trained mercenary soldiers, led by exiled Guatemalan military officer Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas, forcibly wrested Guatemala from Arbenz’ control. While he and his aides were able to flee the country, CIA documents show that “the option of assassination was still being considered” right up until the day he resigned on June 27, 1954.
9
Operation Mongoose
After the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba, the Agency’s public image was worse than ever. President Kennedy famously proclaimed that he would “splinter the CIA into a thousand pieces and scatter it to the winds” (shortly before getting shot, but we digress). But to deal with Cuba, he turned to the only person he knew he could trust: his brother, Robert, who organized Operation Mongoose. This operation was conducted by the Department of Defense in conjunction with the CIA, under Robert Kennedy’s supervision. He told his team at its first briefing that deposing Castro was “the top priority of the US government—all else is secondary—no time, money, effort, or manpower is to be spared.”
Among the dozens of extremely silly methods of assassination proposed: infecting Castro’s scuba gear with tuberculosis; planting exploding seashells at a favorite diving site; slipping him a poisoned fountain pen; and even even poisoning or slipping a bomb into one of his cigars. Castro’s bodyguard asserted that there were hundreds of CIA schemes on Castro’s life—and they all ended in failure, a gigantic waste of time and money. Castro was Cuba’s dictator for forty-nine years, stepping down in 2008 due to failing health, and appointing his younger brother as his replacement.
8
CIA-Produced Pornography
President Sukarno ruled Indonesia from 1959 until 1966, when he was deposed by Suharto, one of his generals. Sukarno had been deemed pro-Communist by the CIA, which meant there would inevitably be an attempt to oust him or at least make him look bad—but the plot they actually came up with was truly laughable.
The CIA produced a porno film starring a Sukarno look-alike, titled “Happy Days”, for distribution in Indonesia. Not that the culture generally frowns upon such things, but as the CIA understood it, “being tricked, deceived, or otherwise outsmarted by one of the creatures God has provided for man’s pleasure cannot be condoned” in Indonesian culture, and “what we were saying was that a woman had gotten the better of Sukarno.” The film went as far as production, and stills were made, but for some reason (perhaps common-sense) it was never deployed.
Bizarrely enough, this idea resurfaced shortly before the Second Gulf War, when the CIA suggested that a fake gay porno featuring Saddam Hussein or Osama Bin Laden be produced in order to discredit these men in the eyes of their followers. This went nowhere—at least one official claiming that nobody would care. “Trying to mount such a campaign would show a total misunderstanding of the target. We always mistake our own taboos as universal when, in fact, they are just our taboos.”
7
Pakistani Vaccine/DNA Collecting Drive
The May 2011 raid that killed Osama Bin Laden was the result of an insane amount of intelligence collecting and planning; regardless of his crimes, conducting a US military operation to kill a foreign national on Pakistani soil was bound to have myriad consequences. A courier had been tracked to an Abbottabad compound, where it was pretty damn certain Bin Laden was hiding. But before conducting the raid, they had to be absolutely sure—and one method of collecting this proof was shady in the extreme.
The CIA recruited a respected Pakistani doctor to organize a fake vaccination drive in the town, and in the process collected thousands of blood samples from children in the area children—among them, as it turned out, Bin Laden’s children. Since theirs was a fairly upscale section of town, the campaign began in a poorer area to make it look more authentic, then moved on to the neighborhood housing the Bin Laden compound a month later—without even following up with the required second or third doses in the poor area. The whole thing worked—with consequences.
For one thing, Dr. Shakil Afridi—the doctor involved—has been convicted of treason by the Pakistani government and given a thirty-three-year prison sentence (“Wouldn’t any country detain people for working for a foreign spy service?” one Iranian official helpfully pointed out). For another, the campaign has caused irreparable damage to organizations that carry out legitimate vaccinations. There are deep-seated suspicions in many Middle Eastern regions about those who provide vaccinations, and this gambit to assist in finding Bin Laden has only bolstered those suspicions—particularly in Nigeria, India and of course Pakistan, where efforts to eradicate polio are ongoing.
6
Muammar al-Qaddafi
February 2011 saw the beginning of the Libyan Revolution, which would culminate in the August ousting of Libyan dictator Muammar el-Qaddafi, followed by his capture and killing in October. There was little mention at the time of any potential involvement by foreign interests—but about one year later, an incident occurred which shed a curious light on the entire Revolution.
On September 11, 2012, an American diplomatic mission in Benghazi came under attack by armed militants. The response came not from within the mission itself, but from half a dozen CIA agents deployed from a hidden base within the city. More reinforcements arrived from Tripoli, and diplomatic personnel where whisked by convoy to chartered aircraft which carried them out of the country.
This betrayed a CIA presence in the city, which had hitherto been unknown. The Agency was forced to admit that it had maintained a fairly strong presence in Libya since about February 2011—right around the time the Libyan Revolution began. The annex which had housed the secret base was scrubbed clean and abandoned after the incident at the mission.
5
Operation Mockingbird
Operation Mockingbird was a bit of a two-pronged approach to dealing with the media: on the one hand, journalists were routinely employed by the CIA to develop intelligence and gather information, or to report on certain events in a way that portrayed the US favorably. On the other, there were actual plants within the media—paid off with bribes or even directly employed by the CIA—to feed propaganda to the American public.
How the fuck did this article get HERE?
Anyone delusional enough to think the elephantjackass party sock puppets will change anything needs to watch reruns of Lucy holding the football for Charlie Brown.
Agreed! The Republicans won't change things but an outsider may! Or Ted Cruz.
This isn't "analysis" - just name calling. A third grader can do that!!
Thank you! The first sentence told me everything I needed to know about the article and the cretin that wrote it, so I left it there.
Not the same party of the old. New and improved criminal puke faggot jackasses just like the clowns that call themselves democrat. I say we have a nationwide vote to cordon off DC and consider it enemy territory.
So Far Left Marxist Tweedeldee thinks plain old Marxist Tweedledum is just not inclusive enough to win. So what ?
Trump needs to form a new party and kill off the Cuckservative Republican fakers and neocons. Without Trump The Bitch will be the First Bitch for sure.
"There have barely been worse people in our public life then [sic] the clintons." --bourbondave
Exactly. Who might give them a run? Well, McCain for sure. Kerry and Biden both, based on the Ukraine debacle alone. All the goddamn Bushes are right in league with the Clintons. After Iran-Contra, Panama, Guatemala, etc, you have to put Reagan on the list of competitors. Carter was a NWO fabrication from the start, so you can't leave him off. Ford survived long enough to keep the Rockefellers out of the Oval Office, but they already run the show anyway, so we might as well include his impotent ass (oh, and then there was that whole East Timor thing). I seem to recall Nixon suspending "temporarily the convertibility of the dollar into gold," while assuring "your dollar will be worth just as much tomorrow as it is today;" ie, he makes the list and might be number one with a bullet.
Well, we could go on and on here all the way back to the genocidal, slave-owning, mercantilist elite who founded this fraud of a country, but it's safe to say the utterly venal Clintons have plenty of company as the worst our public has to offer.
LIBERALS ARE FUCKING PIECES OF SHIT AND THEY KNOW IT
They aren't liberals, they're neoliberals... every bit the pieces of shit the neoconservatives are.
"Right now it appears that Hillary Clinton is going to be our next President, and that means another four years of underachieving from a pro-growth business standpoint. And frankly, she is the only candidate I have seen who is even remotely qualified to run for President in this circus show of a campaign."
lmao!!!
Her qualifications being, a do-nothing to hurt Bill first lady or a do-nothing carpetbagging senator or a do-nothing secretary of state?
another globalist just like the last 7 presidents... things will only get worse with another one in there
I'm sure if we just let people in who have never tasted freedom before in their lives this would seem like a paradise, a nirvana, just happy campers..."Oh thank you Daddy State!"
To those of us who have seen our freedom stripped away, year after grinding year, its completely different.
It all has to do with ones perspective ;-)
The Republican Party jumped the rail with Bush.
The Palin response to Barrack sealed the deal.
She is the poster for Republican Family Values.
I'd give this effluvium some merit if they mirrored the criticism with the same focus on the Democrats - whose own "party" is a fucking dumpster fire.
Cuntarly may very well be "selected" (Hey Econo...still think voting matters? It's ALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL Kabuki)....but Trump has a shot - a LONG shot....but a shot.
BOTH parties are fucked up. I mean, FUCKED up
It's not what Trump is, it's what he isn't that matters. He's not a lawyer, he's not a politician, he's not poliitically correct, and most importantly he's not liked by the Democrats,Liberals Republican establishment or the social justice warriers. He's win win win as fars as those of us who arn't deluded into believing the president actually has any power. Bring it down. Im mean "pull it".
The author thinks there's a difference between the 2 parties. Buahahahahaha!!!
Say "End The Fed" or shut the fuck up!
one of them follows a 'borrow and spend" policy: Republicans from the Fed/Big banks, and the Democrats like to 'tax and spend'
Repubicans used to cut taxes-and then borrow even more money (to be paid back by the US Taxpayer)
Now they TAX AND BORROW from the FED and their pals at the Big Banks
BOTH parties are taxing us to death-they cant quit spending 'other peoples money' its an addiction
You notice this tool said spending should be reassigned, not cut. You, Senor Douche are why lifetime Republicans are splitting the party.
P.S. I have been called much worse names by much better people, it really has no effect coming from a pajama boy
This is not consistent with ZeroHedge editorial standards, Tylers. We have put up with a lot of biased blather from EconMatters on these pages in the past, but this direct proselytizing bullshit is way beyond the pale. I expect better from you guys, and if you hope to keep your significant readership, you will curb this drivel.
Fishhawk
I think Tyler likes to post drivel like this so he can watch the commenters slice it to pieces.
+1
article quote: "The Republican Party has too many extremist views on far too many issues to be electable right now on the presidential stage"
counter : "The Democrat Party has too many extremist views on far too many issues to be electable right now on the presidential stage"
if you would find a supermarket or a mall that has only two brands for each product, you'd be slightly... puzzled, wouldn't you? I guess you would ask... questions
The American healthcare system is a complete fucking mess, but it benefits a lot of vultures with deep ties to both parties: insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, hospital companies, and unethical doctors. Any serious national healthcare reform would cut deeply into their profits and captured customer base, and they're not about to roll over and die. The Democrats learned the hard way when Clinton sought reform in the 90s, and the ACA was shot through with corporate influence (read "corruption") from Day One. Neither party is likely to combat these interests on behalf of ordinary people.
Congress controls the number of doctors produced every year as medical residencies are funded by Congress. Artificial shortages make current doctors' lives harder and controls supply therefore f'ging every American who isn't wealthy enough to easily afford the health insurance scam
"They need to focus on ... cutting waste from bloated governmental programs like the military."
That's why we need to elect Rubio. The US is too heavily armed to be destroyed by another state. Marco has the answer: raise military spending by a trillion dollars a year. Foreign powers can't bring the US to its knees, but bankruptcy can.
"There is no reason that every American shouldn`t be able to walk into any healthcare facility at a moment`s notice and have all their medical needs met free of charge given the immense resources of this country."
Is it just me or am I the only one believing that free healthcare will not be free for me. I mean I love organic unicorn steak as much as the next guy.
"There is no reason that every American shouldn't be able to walk into any healthcare facility at a moment`s notice and have all their medical needs met free of charge given the immense resources of this country."
Aside from the fact that nobody has a right to somebody else's labor.
And these "immense resources" that he speaks of? What? A currency that is only worth anything because if you decide to reject it you end up in a cage? What? Since we terrorize the world to maintain the hegemony we should take a smidge of that paper and pay for everybody's health care and that'll fix everything?
Get the fuck outta here.
END THE FED.
Must be a joke article ... or Econmatters is a progressive... It's the DemocRAT party that's been pushing the neverending LGBTFLCWZRW agenda on us for the last 30 years or so ,, trying to normalize gay sex, Gender Benders like Bruce Jenner and the whole anti-religion movement with "same sex" "marriage" ...
Does anyone have a good definition of "Conservative", or are we still using that nebulous term the way William F. Buckley did when he and his fellow aristocrats usurped the Old Right?
This isn't about the current election, it is about the fracturing of the American nation. Republicans are the white party and the Democrats are the anti-white party. Eventually there will be a breakup.
Republicans are red,
And Democrats are blue,
And neither one of them,
Gives a fuck about you.
All these clowns are on the same bus.
Vote for me so i can keep my job, and fuck all you little people over some more.
Then, pension, medical, security for life, board chairs for companies I was bought by, lecture tours and books lying about what I did, then a bullshit library and non profit so I can keep on fucking on.
Thanks, Murican Sheeple.
Neither party represents me.
Neither party will roll back the "Patriot Act" or NDAA.
"America isn`t like your grandfather`s age..."
Well that's for sure. We no longer have many, if any, shared values. The Constitution and Bill of Rights are only historical documents with no implementation whatsoever.
The people have one great shared value- they despise slavery because they are all individualists at heart. Whether they know it or not.
America has a unique and valuable culture in the history of the world, and it will play a part in moving the human race forward out of the age of slavery. We are nearing that end now.
Poaster,
No slavery has existed in America in a long time, but Islamic sex slavery is presently alive and operating in the Middle East and Africa?
It certainly has. Just without the chains and whips. We're basically all financial slaves to this system now.
I don't know whether I just read satire or someone trying to be serious. Of course, the author is right that republicans have pretty ridiculous nominees at this point but you lose any claim to being a serious person when you declare that we are rich enough to provide all citizens with free top quality health care and that Hillary Clinton of all people is the most qualified candidate for President. There have barely been worse people in our public life then the clintons.
I just had that very "conversation" with a couple Progressives.
They were going batshit about Trump being crazy.
I pointed out via a series of questions the relative sanity of Trump v Clinton.
And it was a UgottabeFngKiddingMe what their responses were. Made no sense. At all. Incomprehensible.
Like this.
Why U no like Trump-ie?
Because he hasn't got any policies.
Whaddu mean?
He's negative on government, immigration, funding, spending, terrorism , muzzies, yadda yadda yadda
Oh, well, sounds to me like you know his policies that he ain't got!
He ain't got none.
Then why not an open mind?
Because he scares me.
Why?
He's negative on government, immigration, funding, spending, terrorism , muzzies, yadda yadda yadda
Well, what are Hillary's polices on the same.
She's good for the country.
You know about her banking connections, offshoring jobs, electoral fraud, tax avoidance, list of felonies, Arkancide, Mena drug running, etc, etc, etc
Yeah! That's why she's better than Trump!
Wait... all that's worse than Trump!
Trump would get us into all the Bush's wars that Obama got us out of
Are you playing golf tomorrow?
Yes
It's supposed to rain
Well, I'm playing anyhow
Did you ever realize that you'll be playing golf in a downpour? It's kinda like voting for Hillary to win the Special Olympics. You'll still be retarded when it's done..
See.... That's what talking to a Progressive is like
And the Republicans are just as bad. Try talking to a neo-con.
Same shit, different wing of the same party.
They are all progressives, they just can't understand it.
Always progressing to the left.
from your vantage point, everything is to the left, isn't it?
let's try the most basic of all "progressive" or "left" or "equalist" tenets: "Everybody ought to be equal in front of the law"
do you disagree or are you too slightly progressive?
That's what you get for talking to progressives, Knuks. I'd rather discuss quantum physics with Snoop Dogg.
I actually read Quantum Physics for fun. Honest.
Now, if he was stoned enough, you could really wrap his head around some shit and brain fuck with him for a while ... which could be fun....
Start with Bells Theorem and flow into some serious Non-Locality dropping lines referencing the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen paradox, Schrodinger's Cat, spookiness at a distance, God playing with Dice, Mark Dice (see where I'm going there .....), S complexes and getting him thinking that he's got a tail ....
"We" can provide everything that people need to live without any stress at all, as evidenced by the fact that 330 million people are living but only about 10% of the people need to work to produce it all. The rest have shitty useless jobs, or are unemployed. The scarcity is jobs- not food, material goods, or even medicine (as opposed to this weird recently invented term "health care"). And that means the scarcity is artificially induced by restricting the currency available to the American peasantry.
The only reason doctors and hospitals are so expensive the skim induced by currency printing, which causes malinvestment up and down the ladder. We have entire parasitic industries grown up to siphon off the productivity of the work that actually gets done. None of this could occur without the blessing of "government" and the master class that owns it, and none of it could happen without their policy of endless currency printing.
@Poaster:
I think that you are right in that a very small fraction of the population is needed to produce the goods and services we need and even mostly want. The exact number is irrelevant, but it is certainly no where near the number of people we have who want to survive. Even if you double the number needed so that a lot of the stuff we don't need or even want still gets produced, what the hell does everyone else do?
Certainly they could all find something to occupy time, but unless we massively increase our welfare state or somehow create an economic system that values time and interests differently, we are heading to a break point.
I do take exception with your assertion that medical care is so expensive because of fx manipulation. What the fuck is more valuable than your health? And yes I fully agree that current spending isn't even a good proxy for health or its advancement, but that is another discussion.
~ Odatruf