
The theory of output as a whole, which is what The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money purports to provide, is much more easily adapted to the conditions of a totalitarian state.
John Maynard Keynes
In looking at and assessing the economic paradigm of John Maynard Keynes — a man himself fixated on aggregates — we must look at the aggregate of his thought, and the aggregate of his ideology.
Keynes was not just an economist. Between 1937 and 1944 he served as the head of the Eugenics Society and once called eugenics ”the most important, significant and, I would add, genuine branch of sociology which exists.” And Keynes, we should add, understood that economics was a branch of sociology. So let’s be clear: Keynes thought eugenics was more important, more significant, and more genuine than economics.
Eugenics — or the control of reproduction — is a very old idea.
In The Republic, Plato advocated that the state should covertly control human reproduction:
You have in your house hunting-dogs and a number of pedigree cocks. Do not some prove better than the rest? Do you then breed from all indiscriminately, or are you careful to breed from the best? And, again, do you breed from the youngest or the oldest, or, so far as may be, from those in their prime? And if they are not thus bred, you expect, do you not, that your birds and hounds will greatly degenerate? And what of horses and other animals? Is it otherwise with them? How imperative, then, is our need of the highest skill in our rulers, if the principle holds also for mankind? The best men must cohabit with the best women in as many cases as possible and the worst with the worst in the fewest, and that the offspring of the one must be reared and that of the other not, if the flock is to be as perfect as possible. And the way in which all this is brought to pass must be unknown to any but the rulers, if, again, the herd of guardians is to be as free as possible from dissension. Certain ingenious lots, then, I suppose, must be devised so that the inferior man at each conjugation may blame chance and not the rulers and on the young men, surely, who excel in war and other pursuits we must bestow honors and prizes, and, in particular, the opportunity of more frequent intercourse with the women, which will at the same time be a plausible pretext for having them beget as many of the children as possible. And the children thus born will be taken over by the officials appointed for this.
Additionally, Plato advocated “disposing” with the offspring of the inferior:
The offspring of the inferior, and any of those of the other sort who are born defective, they will properly dispose of in secret, so that no one will know what has become of them. That is the condition of preserving the purity of the guardians’ breed.
In modernity, the idea appears to have reappeared in the work first of Thomas Malthus, and later that of Francis Galton.
Malthus noted:
It does not, however, seem impossible that by an attention to breed, a certain degree of improvement, similar to that among animals, might take place among men. Whether intellect could be communicated may be a matter of doubt: but size, strength, beauty, complexion, and perhaps even longevity are in a degree transmissible. As the human race could not be improved in this way, without condemning all the bad specimens to celibacy, it is not probable, that an attention to breed should ever become general.
Galton extended Malthus’ thoughts:
What nature does blindly, slowly and ruthlessly, man may do providently, quickly, and kindly. As it lies within his power, so it becomes his duty to work in that direction.
Margaret Sanger — the founder of Planned Parenthood — went even further, claiming that the state should prevent the “undeniably feeble-minded” from reproducing, and advocated “exterminating the Negro population”.
And these ideas — very simply, that the state should determine who should live, and who should die, and who should be allowed to reproduce — came to a head in the devastating eugenics policies of Hitler’s Reich, which removed around eleven million people — mostly Jews, gypsies, dissidents, homosexuals, and anyone who did not fit with the notion of an Aryan future — from the face of the Earth.
Of course, the biggest problem with eugenics is that human planning cannot really control nature. Mutation and randomness throw salt over the idea. No agency — even today in the era of genetics — has the ability to effectively determine who should and should not breed, and what kind of children they will have.
As Hayek noted:
The recognition of the insuperable limits to his knowledge ought indeed to teach the student of society a lesson of humility which should guard him against becoming an accomplice in men’s fatal striving to control society – a striving which makes him not only a tyrant over his fellows, but which may well make him the destroyer of a civilization which no brain has designed but which has grown from the free efforts of millions of individuals.
Keynes’ interest in this topic appears to have descended from his contempt for the individual, and individual liberty. He once wrote:
Nor is it true that self-interest generally is enlightened; more often individuals acting separately to promote their own ends are too ignorant or too weak to attain even these.
The common denominator in all of these examples — and in my view, the thing that brought Keynes toward eugenics — is the belief that the common individual is too stupid to be the captain of his own destiny. Instead, the state — supposedly equipped with the best minds and the best data — should centrally plan. Eugenicists believe that the state should centrally plan human reproduction, while Keynesians believe that the state should centrally engineer recovery from economic malaise through elevated spending. Although it would be unwise to accuse modern Keynesians of having sympathy for eugenics, the factor linking both of these camps together is John Maynard Keynes himself.
Keynes’ description of an economic depression — that a depression is a fall in the total economic output — is technically correct. And many modern Keynesian economists have made worthwhile contributions — Hyman Minsky, Steve Keen, Michael Hudson, and Joe Stiglitz are four examples . Even the polemicist Paul Krugman’s descriptive work on trade patterns and economic agglomeration is interesting and accurate.
The trouble seems to begin with prescriptions. Keynesianism dictates that the answer to an economic depression is an increase in state spending. And on the surface of it, an increase in state spending will lift the numbers. But will momentarily lifting the numbers genuinely help the economy? Not necessarily; the state could spend millions of dollars on subsidies for things that nobody wants, wasting time, effort, labour and taxes and thus destroying wealth. And the state can push a market into euphoria — just as Alan Greenspan did to the housing market — creating the next bubble and the next bust, requiring an even bigger bailout. State spending creates additional dependency on the state, and perverts the empirical market mechanism — the genuine underlying state of demand in a market economy — which signals to producers what to produce and not produce. Worst of all, centralist policies almost always have knock-on side-effects that no planner could foresee (causality is complicated).
So Hayek’s view on the insuperable limits to knowledge applies as much to the economic planner as it does to the central planner of human reproduction.
While eugenicists and Keynesians make correct descriptive observations — like the fact that certain qualities and traits are inheritable, or more simply that children are like their parents — their attempts to use the state as a mechanism to control these natural systems often turns out to be drastically worse than the natural systems that they seek to replace.
As Keynes seems to admit when — in the German language edition of his General Theory — he noted that the conditions of a totalitarian state may be more amenable to his economic theory, the desire for control may be the real story here.
Keynesianism brings more of the economy under the control of the state. It is a slow and creeping descent into dependency on the state. As we are seeing in Europe today, cuts in state spending in a state-dependent economy can cause deep economic contraction, providing the Keynesian more confirmation for his idea that the state should tax more, and spend more.
That is, until nature intervenes. Just as a state-controlled eugenics program might well spawn an inbred elite suffering hereditary illnesses as a result of a lack of genetic diversity (as seems to have happened with the inbred elite Darwin-Galton-Wedgwood clan), so a state-controlled economy may well grind itself into the dirt as it runs out of innovation as a result of a lack of economic diversity. Such a situation is unsustainable — no planner is smarter than nature.


Plan as I may, nature outsmarts me at least twice a day.
The Keyensian Hills Have Eyes!
It is only after the economic existence of the last five years that I have realized just how inbred my college economics professors really were. Hayek? I never heard mention of him.
Tell me about it.
Never heard anything about this either, but of course that would make their icon just another evil, bigoted schmuck..
(re. Stopes, Stocks) “…John Maynard Keynes. He endorsed legalised birth control because the working class was too “drunken and ignorant” to be trusted to keep its own numbers down: “To put difficulties in the way of the use of [contraception] checks increases the proportion of the population born from those who from drunkenness or ignorance or extreme lack of prudence are not only incapable of virtue but incapable also of that degree of prudence which is involved in the use of checks.”
Keynes Manuscript on “Population”
http://www.paulbogdanor.com/left/eugenics.html
Wow. I never saw that Guardian article, surprising that they'd publish this kind of stinging critique of 20th century leftism.
Much appreciate Manthong.
"The revered pacifist, disarmer and philosophical titan, Bertrand Russell, dreamed up a wheeze that would have made even Nazi Germany’s eugenicists blush. He suggested the state issue colour-coded “procreation tickets.” Those who dared breed with holders of a different-coloured ticket would face a heavy fine. That way the high-calibre gene pool of the elite would not be muddied by any proletarian or worse, foreign, muck. The New Statesman agreed, explaining in July 1931: “The legitimate claims of eugenics are not inherently incompatible with the outlook of the collectivist movement. On the contrary, they would be expected to find their most intransigent opponents amongst those who cling to the individualistic views of parenthood and family economics.”"
Fuck.
Eugenics was a very popular concept in the early 1900's among both sides of the social elite. IIRC Prescot Bush was a big supporter. But the elites have been inbreeding among themselves forever. We're far enough along that we are seeing complete retards like W or most of the British royals are starting to become the norm among them.
Their concern for being of a better stock has caused them to devolve into Morlocks right in front of our eyes.
Whether you are favor or against, some of the facts regarding the "modern" eugenics movement are interesting:
Charles Darwin was the famous progenitor of the theory of evolution. He directly educated Thomas Henry Huxley, who immediately read Darwin's 'Origin of Species' upon its release and in turn did more than anyone else to advance evolution's acceptance among scientists and the public alike. He was a passionate defender of Darwin's theory -- so passionate that he has been called "Darwin's Bulldog".
Author H.G. Wells soon studied under Huxley in England, absorbing the idea of natural selection and the rejection of a Creator. Wells became a proponent of eugenics, and openly disliked "ugly faced Jews" as well as "those swarms of blacks, and brown, and dirty-white, and yellow people…". He advocated forced sterilization to prevent any further breeding of such undesirable races.
Wells eventually had an affair with a married woman named Margaret Sanger, and heavily influenced her views of eugenics and unbridled female sexuality outside the boundaries of marriage. During this same period of time, Sanger also began an additional affair with Havelock Ellis, VP of the Eugenics Education Society. Sanger then founded the International Planned Parenthood Federation, which has become one of the world's most aggressively vocal proponents of abortion and forced eugenics. She went through multiple lovers and marriages, and history records her as developing addictions to alcohol and Demerol.
Sanger proposed the American Baby Code that states, "No woman shall have the legal right to bear a child…without a permit for parenthood".
Sanger proposed the Population Congress with the aim, "...to give certain dysgenic groups in our population their choice of segregation or sterilization."
This line of thinking pervaded certain levels of U.S. government throughout the 20th century. For example, a total of 31 states eventually had government-run eugenics programs, and by the 1960s, tens of thousands of Americans were sterilized as a result. Some of America’s wealthiest eugenicists included Dr. Clarence Gamble of the Procter & Gamble fortune and James Hanes of the hosiery company.
John, I like your stuff.
The Fabian Socialists are real pieces of work.
Have you seen this one?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WBRjU9P5eo
Bernard Shaw using very clever sophistry there: justifying your existence is a philosophical absurdity. Honestly, I can't stand people like George Bernard Shaw. We studied his plays in school. Collectivist indoctrination. The best answer to the question is probably "I am because I am", which would get his knickers in a twist. I'd love to spend ten minutes debating Bernard Shaw.
Perhaps the "we know best" eugenicists and other such similar thinkers would do well to justify their exist following a century in which democide was the greatest non-natural human killer.
Unfortunately, people think eugenics is a thing of the past. Do you really think these people quit at their plans?
Think about foods (fast), water (flouride and chlorine), air pollution, media and finally medicinal drugs and innoculations. Eugenics has gone underground, but is just as pervasive as ever. Pay attention to the age of the deaths of the people around you. The groups embracing all the crap are dying early.
Walked into a Walmart lately? Look for the zombies- they are as plain as day.
War is one great eugenics experiment and who serves?
The things you mention are population/herd control. They still require a herd to operate. But.
Eugenics is dead. The desire, or need to create a super race is obsolete. The super race, was for the super solier, and the super soldier has been replaced by a pimpled drone controlling geek plied with mountain dew. We no longer need the perfect meat suit to create the perfect army.
Steel > meat.
Actually, the issue of eugenics includes the question on whom should inherit the Earth.
While war can no longer have the same return expectation as in the past when you tend to own and control everything already, the question on whom should inherit the Earth is always topical. More than ever.
US citizen societies are used to run large human selection programs, denying human diversity and putting boundaries to what human being is supposed to be.
AnAnonymous babbled:
Do you care to support this assertion with any examples or other evidence?
Or are we expected simply to bask in your great wisdom and accept everything you say as unmitigated truth?
I can’t say it’s necessarily so, but planned parenthood, the entire government education system and all government employment seem to fit that description.
Which US citizenism's are these? Anglos are pretty close to being a minority.
I'd love to spend ten minutes debating Bernard Shaw.
---------------------------------
That would give US citizen style debates.
When one writes:
Of course, the biggest problem with eugenics is that human planning cannot really control nature.
and illustrates with
As Hayek noted:
The recognition of the insuperable limits to his knowledge ought indeed to teach the student of society a lesson of humility which should guard him against becoming an accomplice in men’s fatal striving to control society
-----------------------------------------------
Confusing a statement made on nature and another on society, it is US citizen promising of a US citizen debate.
Does anyone read your stupidity? Please delete yourself!!
China has netizens who are brilliant, unique idea generating, online commenters and a kind of watchdogs, who work in a chaos/harmony. AFAIK tell we have no parrallel to the netizen in our sterile western online culture.
But of all the clever Chinese netizens, we get you-- You imbecile. You are a dolt. You have impressed no person ever once on this blog. I doubt there are any people who agree with you in China ... You would be laughed off the Chinese blogs
prole, responding to AnAnonymous, said:
Indeed, you are correct on all counts. The Chinese have some brilliant minds, and AnAnonymous is not representative of them. His ignorant rantings and make-believe world of Chinese citizenism are an embarrassment to the Chinese people and bring shame upon his ancestors.
All the eugenicists I have ever met are themselves unfit, like the addicted whore in your post. My response is always, "you first, bitch."
yep. i like to say depopulation starts with you; stops the misanthropist in their speech like raid to a cockroach
With a shotgun. RATM were socialists but they kept the fire alive for awhile.
Got another The Face post coming tomorrow....
Looking forward to it Aziz. Gotta give credit where it is due.
Hybrid vigor
Actually I think they would consider themselves the Eloi. We (the Morlocks) take care of them. Fortunately for them we have not, for various reasons, have not eaten them yet. But some day.....
Miffed:-)
Eugenics was a very popular concept in the early 1900's among both sides of the social elite.
______________________________________________
Eugenics has been a very popular concept among US citizens. It is a US citizenism meme.
Once again, US citizen elite displays no discontinuity from its base.
Rubbish!
Eugenics, as the term is understood these days, got it's start among members of the Royal Society and Lunar Society and their Oxford / Cambridge educated peers. You'd be surprised how many beacons of scientific progress were closet, and sometimes open, advocates of selective human breeding. My particular 'favourite' being James Watt - notwithstanding his undoubted contributions to technology, particularly in the improvement of steam engines and their associated equipment, he would have fit in very well with the current crop of elite scumbags. He notoriously used the patent system to ruthlessly suppress competition, is probably the first 'corporate CEO' that surrounded himself with a phalanx of lawyers, forensic accountants and out and out thugs and generally had no time for anyone he considered beneath him; almost everyone!
The Boulton and Watt business model entailed trawling through the ledgers of competitors to find discrepancies in their taxes, accounting methods and company ethics - anything at all, including personal quirks that could be used as blackmail levers, that could be used to kick them in the crotch and prevent them from freely competing with B&W. And he was quite open about his views on eugenics, though I doubt he ever openly used the word - probably not, as it only really gained fluency in later years. If you dig a bit, though, there are references (though anecdotal, I admit) to him making statements that his steam engines would increase the efficiency and profitability of those that used them, primarily by reducing the pool of 'brute, base labour, which must needs be supported in it's vices and trivial interests, if good work is to be expected' (I might not have that right, word for word - it's a long time since I researched Boulton and Watt - but it's pretty much what he reportedly said) that would be required. A charming man, I think you'll agree! I'm surprised Boulton could stand to be in the same room as him, to be honest. By all accounts, Matthew was a decent fellow, so long as you didn't give him too much cause for offence. Though whether he, too, was an advocate of eugenics is debatable - he practically ran the Lunar Society after William Small died in the late 1770s. And most of the members seem to have been believers in it, to some degree or other.
So modern eugenics is a British construct, though it has roots in lines of reasoning (the term used advisedly, of course) that go back to the Ancient Egyptians and possibly even further. There was also a strong sentiment for what we'd recognise as eugenics in ancient China, for your information. You can look it up pretty easily, if you care to. Assuming the information is freely available, given Chinese government suppression of things they'd sooner you didn't know.
Mitzibitzi, in response to AnAnonymous, said:
You could place original source documentation in front of AnAnonymous and not only would he not consider it, he would deny its very existence. His stunning ignorance is the product of a diseased mind. He gleefully embraces ignorance, wallowing in it like he has found the fountain of youth.
He lives in a crackpot world of "US/Chinese citizenism", a world of his own making. To him, modern eugenics from Britain and ancient eugenics from Egypt and China are all examples of "US citizenism". His self-imposed regimen of ignorance is complete; that these examples involve other nations, cultures, and even ancient times are, to him, trivialities of no consequence.
good points made in your post Mitzibitzi, extending the somewhat "new" meme of corporate sociopathy back, giving it more depth, more history - can it be denied that what you are describing has just been repeated as a successful model, bringing us to our current state?
decades, centuries even, of admiring the ones with money, which results in power over others, it's almost encoded in our DNA (though not, it's just a really bad, reinforced habit) has left us with the mess we're acknowledging now - a bunch of power-hungry creeps and their foot soldiers, pulling the strings and paying out pallets of fiat for "loyalty" (with the threat of blackmail in the back of their tiny reptilian minds). . . until people stop putting all their respect onto those who deserve none, this cycle will continue.
and some of the quoted opinions in your post? not so far removed from those posters here, herd-like dropping the word "nigga" into their posts for attention - this type of behaviour seems harmless, "funny" amongst their similars here - but it undermines critical thinking, and does a disservice to all.
No mudbloods...only pure borns.
They actually did make procreation tickets. I believe they are called hundred dollar bills..........
Birth control should be so freely available that even the stupid can get it.
That is just basic common sense. One of the few things keynes got right
I don't know why you're getting junked. It's much cheaper to pay for us taxpayers to pay for birth control than it is to pay for a lifetime of welfare.
I lurk at daily kos
There are a large number of people who believe all people have equal talents and intelligence but its differential expression is the result of racism and class oppression
These people do not believe that intelligence and talents might be genetic to a significant degree. They consider any such comments as mine to be fascist and racist. To those peoPle it matters not who does all the breeding. They dont think it harms society and they are horrified by people who suggest otherwise
Of course there's the issue of who decides who is "stupid" but hey, I guess that's for "smarter" men than me to decide..........ROFL
It gets rather messy depending on who is making the decisions and drawing that arbitrary line.
IQ of 80, 90, 120?
Is your knowledge of CDS more valuable than your knowledge of how to grow beans?
thing is, we don't even have a cogent guage for what intelligence is.
look at rain man (kim peek), he was able to memorize entire books. yet he couldn't care for himself in the way that a 'normal' person can. is he unintelligent?
fuck if i know...
i think that sums it up
humility bitchez!
@Joe The Plumber
+1 for your re-con.
I dropped lurking out at "alternative" sites such as Kos and the vapid "Newser", as I found it a tremedndous waste of time, and, knew the predictable comments and facist mind-set of the denizens on them.
If anyone dissents from the scripted mantra, they are automatically scorned, name-called and bashed.
NO room for any discourse. They do not see how their own one-way thinking is what they themselves think as "bad".
Locally, the intelligence level and awareness of the true problems we face is lost on the zombie public.
It is no wonder then that we have the "leaders" of this country that we do here in the US; all style, talk and utopian bullshit.
I am working for the day when I can leave here permanently, and rid myself of having to associate with such people.
There are far better places on this earth to dwell.
To me, it's my own "eugenics"; self-preservation by eliminating idiotic people around me.
Of course the Kos-ites don't want to see genetics as being determinative, because intelligence limited by genetics would mean that however smart or stupid they are, they will remain so as the case may be.
As for the fascist/racist thing, remember that it was socialist H. G. Wells who coined the term liberal fascism -an idea that he promoted. Fascism and eugenics are Frankensteins of the leftist statists, not the small-government people.
Fascism and eugenics are Frankensteins of the leftist statists, not the small-government people.
_______________________________________
So a slaver can not practise eugenics on his own plantation?
No, eugenics is a US citizen thing. The size of the state does not matter.
Like claiming that censorship is a big state thing.
Anywhere they go, US citizens will try to control speech in order to avoid being challenged on US citizenism.
AnAnonymous, unsupported assertionist, said:
Utter ignorance, from the Chinese citizenism world of AnAnonymous.
Yes, of course, because the biggest fear of all US citizens is being challenged on "US citizenism", a make-believe concept which exists only in the fantasies of your diseased mind.
"So a slaver can not practise eugenics on his own plantation?"
You know nothing of history. Let's remember that Jefferson and Jackson founders of the leftist Democrat party were devoted to slavery. The same leftist Democrats voted about 99% in favor of preserving slavery in the 1860 US presidential election. These same people were the original eugenicists.
"No, eugenics is a US citizen thing. The size of the state does not matter."
No, eugenics is a brain-child of the large government progressive/socialist/fascists of the 20th century (WIlson, FDR, Sanger, H.G. Wells, Bertrand Russell, and on and on -not conservative, small government, or if you will -non-statists)
"Like claiming that censorship is a big state thing."
Censorship is a big-state thing. Woodrow WIlson didn't send out his goons to brutalize and imprison people who disagreed with him because he was a non-intrusive small-government guy. It's big-government statists who set up "free-speech" zones where the US, when it was small, was one big free-speech zone.
"Anywhere they go, US citizens will try to control speech in order to avoid being challenged on US citizenism."
That's just childish.
These people do not believe that intelligence and talents might be genetic to a significant degree. They consider any such comments as mine to be fascist and racist.
_______________________________________________
They are US citizen style comments.
The best bit from US citizens on the topic of intelligence, race and the rest is they keep promoting the perception they were pushed into the current situation by the stupid, the weak, the lower races.
While everything screams that the current situation is the result of intelligent Indo Europeans ruling.
In a finite world, to get rich, you need poor. Noticeably, the reciprocal is not true.
It is quite good to read that the intelligent US citizens consider a sign of intelligence to suggest that with a 140 IQ Indo Europeans only population on the Earth, the proposition could be beaten.
But hey, US citizenism is as US citizen does.
No person is reading your posts, as it should be. I am not reading your posts.
Your posts are evidence of a stupidity so profound you have got me seriously re-considering my personal views on eugenics and post-birth abortion.
If you would like to provide some actual useful info, which you have never done once in your many posts, you could tell us something about how Chairman Mao eugenicized Chinese People in the "Cultural Revolution" How many people were killed and what was the criteria for who got to live and who got killed?
AnAnonymous embarrassed his relatives when saying:
Everything may scream this to you in your fantasy world of Chinese citizenism. To everyone else, this is an unsupported assertion.
Good to read? Where exactly did you read this? A scientific journal? A respected publication? A comic book?
Chinese citizenism unsupported assertionism is as Chinese citizenism unsupported assertionism does.
with respect, genuine respect, the "white folks high IQ breeding stock to improve the state of amrka" has been a popular topic on these threads in the past, circa Trav and those who admire his opinions. it's also evident on other sites where white male posters are in the majority - this has been my experience online, usually it comes embedded in threads that are lamenting the lack of "scientific" thinkers, and blame the lack of rational vs. emotional, and continues with the whine that "amrka is being feminised, emasculated" etc.
really, that's just an embedded longing for a history when men all hung out together, partied on the side with the young boys or girls as sex slaves, and didn't bother with the messy business of "family" or "relationships" beyond perhaps a marriage of combined resources to get ahead, and bestow an heir. this is the European model we're familiar with, is it not?
the "high IQ" only happens to those blessed with fairer skin, be it "white" or "asian" - this is taken as a truth - and whether it is true or not doesn't matter to me, what it's showing is a bias towards those who exhibit a lack of empathy, and desire a respect for control of others.
seriously, who invented the test? and what exactly is it measuring?
Cathartes Aura said:
So then he did read it in a comic book, or at least the online intellectual equivalent of a comic book.
Too bad for AnAnonymous that he then extrapolates that to be a defining characteristic of all people born in the United States.
lol, yeah, a comic book pretty much describes the storyline - nice 50's culture, then "bad" guys happen, and a superhero saves their ass, sorry, the day. . . *grins*
but that's an interesting parallel, the story of some "superMAN" who always saves the day, and it plays into the "father figure" thing too, someone who looks over (overlooks ^^) us all, protecting. . . except, it's broken now, who will we look "up" too??
(Waiting for Superman ~ The Flaming Lips
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JY_L1AzSmhU&feature=youtube_gdata )
I still read AnAny as using the "US citizen" meme as a label that can be applied to anyone who plays the role - I think it was applied to Israel now too? - and like I've said before, I don't identify with the descriptive, so I find it less provoking - but yeah, I can see how it irks, this is the role of trolls, to annoy, and the downvotes prove it. . . but definitely sensing a different "voice" lately, occasionally - whether the troll-cap is slipping, or there's personality bleed-through - who knows?
in my own humble opinion, I'd rather have a poking-you troll than a back-slapping head nodder, currying favour with a bouncy pair to get the boys attention, and a "bitchez!!" to drive the point home - "hey dudes, we's cool, and I'm one of YOU, not them" kind of thing - I can scroll by with the best of 'em - but it often jacks any possible conversation on threads. . . if I see a bunch of one-liner posts, it's pretty much a scroll-through, been-there-read-that kind of thing. it gets old, and does do the ZH "rep" any favours. . .
which kinda sucks, 'cause even tho' I don't fit in, I rather like it here!
been saving this guy with you in mind, no particular reason beyond he's a crazyass songwriter / storyteller:
Fred Eaglesmith ~ Time To Get A Gun (album version)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlEb3Zxhuwg&feature=related
the live version shows his, um, eccentricity *har har* check the gear he's wearing. . .
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAnOPcINj8g&feature=related
take care 4th, stay Stoogin'
Why not just remove the taxpayer from the equation? And then without the State support, the so-called "stupid" would need to spend much more time working to survive than having apparently too much time making babies which seemingly no one can afford. Without the taxpayer we also wouldn't have this welfare state which perpetuates the poverty and stupidity.
Capitalism created poverty, and needs poverty to exist. Failure to grasp this fundamental tenent is the failure of modern economists.
What you really mean is the illusion of capitalism and instead more like fascism and feudalism has created poverty.
There has really never been free-markets and capitalism just as you never really had private ownership of your land. If you're still paying taxes for the land you bought and have paid off, do you really own your land? If markets were free why does a privately-owned central bank control our money supply and set our rates to borrow?
The power hungry elites who run our world want MORE governance and PUSH socialism and the welfare state! Check out the book "The Naked Capitalist" (1970) by W. Cleon Skousen.
"Poverty is that state and condition in society where the individual has no surplus labour in store, or, in other words, no property or means of subsistence but what is derived from the constant exercise of industry in the various occupations of life. Poverty is therefore a most necessary and indispensable ingredient in society, without which nations and communities could not exist in a state of civilization. It is the lot of man. It is the source of wealth, since without poverty, there could be no labour; there could be no riches, no refinement, no comfort, and no benefit to those who may be possessed of wealth." ---Patrick Colquhoun, a merchant who set up England’s first private “preventative police“
http://exiledonline.com/recovered-economic-history-everyone-but-an-idiot...
Read this and get back to me.
You are right regarding poverty; I stand corrected. I should have known that which I knew before as we do in fact live in a finite world.
However, it is NOT capitalism that has created poverty, nor socialism or any other form for that matter. From a moral standpoint, the welfare state of forced redistribution of wealth (of outcomes) and socialism has no place and certainly is no better and will always fail. Where has welfare gotten us for the better or worse? And exactly how often and by how much should one "level the playing field?" It's impossible and it will always fail. What we should seek is equality of morals NOT equality of outcomes.
So yes, you are right that there must be poverty to some extent. However that also does NOT mean that the same people must remain in poverty all the time. There is such a thing as income mobility in which poor do become richer as well as rich do become poorer (assuming the system is not rigged with bailouts for certain ones who fail). Poverty is a part of the reality of finite worlds even though the elites have so far forced us into a world of infinite money (debt/credit) which does not correspond to a finite real world.
Made me laugh.
That is a good one indeed. No, he is not right. That is the way it is. Him being right or wrong wont change the fact.
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So yes, you are right that there must be poverty to some extent. However that also does NOT mean that the same people must remain in poverty all the time. There is such a thing as income mobility in which poor do become richer as well as rich do become poorer (assuming the system is not rigged with bailouts for certain ones who fail).
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Sure, sure. So far, US citizens have masqueraded large transfer wealth programs as being the evidence of poor getting richer and social mobility.
They have stolen entire continents, the environment, the resources to redistribute to their constituency and give the illusion of social mobility.
So what? Nothing more than the US citizen propaganda in an attempt to legitimize their theft binges.
How wonderful you enjoyed a laugh. If you actually read my post carefully I did mention it twice (2x).
Poverty is a part of the reality of finite worlds.
And what the hell did anything I have mentioned have anything that would even "legitimize any theft binges?" Even if that was the case, I would have argued against theft of any kind as I believe in private property.
I used to be a believer in government only to evolve into a believer of minimal government (constitutionalist) and then only to become an anarchist. It's not that I don't care. I do. However I began to question the status quo approach, the how to. If one does not seek the best for him/herself as an individual who lives first-hand (as Rand would call it) and produces, I cannot thus provide without taking what someone else has produced. You might argue what about those rich who seem to hoard money? Well, are those particular rich happy? No, and thus they must constantly seek more and more money. That is because these rich also do not live and experience life first-hand because their hoarding of evermore money is not their end goal but instead is in order that they can have more second-hand living through other people in the form of more recognition form and power over other people. An individualist does not need this and only lives for him/herself and would understand that money is only a means to an end and that more does not equate to true happiness which is the end goal. The welfare state tends to focus on providing instead of teaching/guiding how to provide. Having the welfare state to supposedly eliminate poverty has and will by nature always fail just as having government (a ruler, central planning) has and will by nature always fail. Even if the Constitution was supposedly the best way to have a government which would best protect individual rights, it has failed as we have only seen our government grow. Anarchy might not be the best answer but it's the moral answer.
Just out of curiosity, has this little speech ever be submitted to the slightest reality check?
US citizens have this knack at vomiting out one thing and its opposite in the same breath.
The beauty of it, they also have the capacity to introduce things that are not exclusive as being mutually exclusive.
In other words, they are rebuilding the physical world on a whim.
Hoarding money prevents from living first hand?
Second hand living?
Another brilliant idea by a US citizen thinker, who once again epitomizes the genius achievements from the segment of humanity who has managed the era of abundance.
With that story, and freedom, and the rest, how one experiences first hand living through proxies?
A voyeur experiments a first hand experience one can only experiment by being a voyeur.
First hand living? Second hand living? What are those failed concepts?
Ah, yes, the production of a US citizen thinker.
So if he produces, that is all fine.
No person is reading your comments imbecile. You are also too stupid for the Chinese blogs as well.
AnAnonymous shamed his ancestors thusly:
It's quite clear that none of your little speeches have. The unsupported assertions you spout are fantasies from your make-believe world of Chinese citizenism.
This is quite amusing, because it is an accurate description of your behaviour. Are you admitting to being a "US citizenism citizen", or are you merely projecting your contemptible traits onto others?
Well excuse me as I get off my "as you call it" US citizen high horse. As I have read you must be sitting pretty on your Chinese citizen high horse. In case you are not aware, citizenship of ANY kind is still only an evolved form of slavery. Apparently you delude yourself into believing your enslavement is better than mine. Bravo! Did you expect a fucking star? The collectively created construct we call countries was designed precisely to "divide and conquer" us.
I will explain and correct myself regarding Rand's concept of first-hand versus second-hand living on another thread below. But for now excuse me for vomiting upon your arrogance. I hope I do not turn into your arrogance as the day I do and the day I believe I have full superiority is the very day I have stopped myself from listening to and potentially accepting new ideas and learning.
I think you poked the AnAny into a different voice, very interesting!
The Story of Your Enslavement
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xbp6umQT58A
I first saw this a couple years ago, and it stuck with me from the first watch. . . as it continued to sink in, and I continued reading "here" and elsewhere, it's grown to be a favourite. . . hope you find it of interest.
would that all were tuned this way. . .
Marginal call-
Capitalism created poverty, and needs poverty to exist. Failure to grasp this fundamental tenent is the failure of modern economists.
You are a Commie and you just outed yourself. Please change your little icon to a Hammer and Sickle, or maybe Lenin in a 'heroic' pose.
In America, which was only partly to mostly Capitalist in the 20s and 30s, we had a boom and a bust, the bust of which sucked, and much poverty existed, but I don't think any American actually starved, as in: to death. They lived through it, then jumped into a big dumb-ass war. This was a manifestation of the state and slavery (the draft) and so an example of the non-existence of Capitalism. But still, aside from the war, semi-Capitalist, IMO.
In the Soviet Union, during the same time, they (Comunist Party Leadership) stole the great majority of the agricultural output of the Ukraine, causing some millions of persons there to starve, to death. And die. That is the fruits of the Command Economy. You can find a similar paradise today in North Korea. It is possible you would be welcome there, why not ask at a North Korean Embassy if you can relocate there?
British did the same thing using free market trade in Ireland during the famine. Used the "Free Market" to buy up what was left of the potato crop. Yeah the reds used "Command Economy" to take food away from areas that needed it but if you ask me thats inefficent. Better to move markets to do it for you with a profit incentive.
In the end its all about power Capitalism can't save man from this shit nothing can........
I almost walked out of my first day of economics 101 when the general thesis was posited: rational choice theory
i see very little evidence for that
The National Socialists are all for this.
Fiber is good for you.
"Such a situation is unsustainable — no planner is smarter than nature."
No, but it certainly doesn't stop many ignorant and arrogant fools from trying. More now than ever do I come across those who think they are more intelligent than the facts. Nature dispenses all rules and laws, and is always correct. But as usual humanity comes along and attempts to fuck it up.
Humanity attempts to become God. That never ends well.
Humanity attempts to become God. That never ends well.
So true. Despte it being a bad idea, some never tire of trying.
sschu
It's also a key mantra of various forms of occultism.
"no planner is smarter than nature" - maybe.
But I dont understand what 'nature' has to do with a state controlled or other economy. Perhaps the author means 'human nature'?
Reread the sentences before that line. Aziz is saying that when the elite try and control nature (through selective breeding), that genetic anomalies will occur and still corrupt the process. He then shows how the same scenario happens when you try to control an economy. It becomes corrupted.
At least that's how I understand it.
We're (buzzed and) curious about the large collar.
It's Derek Zoolander, one of my favorite fictional characters from a movie. You see, he is a superficial model, a complete pussy. I'm a construction worker, with the scars to prove it.
I thought the irony of my screen name combined with my icon picture would mess with a few minds. Thank you for affirming that premise.
I also appreciate your affinity for the sauce. However, I am a few levels above buzzed. I consider this stage of drunkenness time traveling, because I'm going to forget a lot of what I do tonight. That's what "I'm sorry" is for I guess.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoolander
Ironic indeed. I'm a construction worker that actually looks like a superficial model pussy in real life. Very disconcerting on the job site.
Nature meaning the totality of all things in the universe and their interactions. Human nature is one part of that
blindchicken, there's a saying where I come from - if you want to get God to laugh just tell him your plans.
You can not outwit nature in the long run, to think the opposite is nothing short of hubris.
And putting this in an economic perspective, bear in mind that economy has it's own cycles. Understanding these cycles means they're as necessary as the economy itself, so that any attempt of a controlled or planned suppression of some process leads to a disruption of the whole system.
The cycles are not natural. They are created by the state to be smarter than the average bear. Basically what the article was all about. Let's just say it is unintended consequences or maybe to get certain politicans elected. The Fed has a habit of fucking up the economy and tries to fix it and fucks up some more. So how many times do we have to get fucked?
But I dont understand what 'nature' has to do with a state controlled or other economy.
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You should take a US citizen pill or something.
There is indeed a confusion between society and nature (which tend to indicate that the US citizen author does not even care about the disctinction between culture and nature)
But if a US citizen, and being able to spot that kind of oddity, well, that is not such good sign on the vitality of your submission to US citizenism.
AnAnonymous vomited up:
Would that be similar to the Chinese citizenism pill, the one made from dead infants and aborted fetuses that have been dried and powdered?
State sanctioned eugenics was practiced By the spartans. Infanticide was allowed in the first 24 hours and their standards of perfection were such that toward the end it was estimated there were only 1000 male spartans and they drifted off into irrelevance
Interestingly, the infanticide argument helped prove that the Hawaiian Allende was not a Muslim; even the muzzies don't support infanticide as the Hawaiian Allende has done.
Certain current clutures, mainly in Africa, allow infanticide up to about 2 years of age.
i wish kenya did the same thing but make it 40 years....
no one's exempt -- the irish euthanized their cripple, as did all of the periphery pacific isle's -- in fact, all water-locked countries cannibalized their neighbors. but, mother nature is the great equalizer in the long haul - shit happens,.. as does human nature - which one is actually the evil hand?
No planner is smarter than nature; but man is not just nature, he does have a mind and he does use it to plan ahead, its called managing the future and controlling the uncertainty, existential quandry and driving force; its written in our destiny and nature. Its all then a question of balance between society and individual. Don't blame the innovative for having found an insight into society that is a huge lever. We can't blame capitalism for being what man makes it, nor the gun nor the bomb. Its all in the mind that the great or little scheme of things are hatched.
Our perspective of where the balance is is a sign of our understanding of civilization, as it evolves over time, cos we do change as we move along; all the while staying the same in terms of our inability to dominate the existential challenge.
I would modify your contentions by saying that man does use his mind to try to plan ahead, to try to control uncertainty, and to try to manage the future. Adam Smith's invisible hand then enters into the equation - or maybe some other factor, like a hurricane, a new invention, etc. - and can ruin all those carefully laid plans. Mankind can only try, and I've not yet met any individual or group that is anywhere near being sufficiently competent to succeed 100% of the time.
On a lighter note, while in college I tried using Plato's bit about "the best men must cohabit with the best women in as many cases as possible" a few times while in college (1960s), with very limited success. I guess it was the wrong time, or maybe it was just me.
Living beings trying to impose their will on others by force is part of nature. Living beings fighting to protect themselves is equally as natural.
I don't forsee this conflict as one that will ever go away.
The problem is the intervention of the State on behalf of those who would impose their will by force in order to promote the objectives of the State itself. To protect oneself; be it bodily, economically, morally, or socially is no longer acceptable...................
Freedom will win until it loses, then it will win again until it loses again.
Huh yes?
Better to say that the targets of the State are no longer those they used to be (and now include you) and therefore it must cease.
The State is not ethereal. It is people, therefore they should be allowed to follow your pattern of thought (and they do not need to care about your thoughts as the strong is to naturally impose one's will on the weak)
The State is a tool and therefore it is normal that the strong preserve this tool to naturally impose their will on the weak.
So by your own pattern, it is bodily, economically, morally and socially acceptable.
Here we stand at this juncture in history caused by the inferior genetic composition of TPTB.
They are alamingly inbred.
Hybrid vigor is well documented
Inbred populations of any type lose vigor
If you're willing to cull then line breeding works.
The problem lies in what determines vigor? Who determines vigor?
Great minds are the cause of war, pollution and abuse of resources to the point of extinctions and loss of habitat. They created the nuclear bomb. Shall we eliminate intelligence from the breeding cycle?
Aggression? Charity? Greed? Socialbility? Athleticism? Cleverness?
Wouldn't it be better to focus on living life, learning from life rather than attempting to control what will always be bigger than any one or all of us?
Although not one of the more well developed philosophical works of totalitarianism, especially when compared to Marx, Stuart Chase articualated 18 totalitarian tendencies in "The Road We Are Traveling" as a set of milestones for the totalitarians in our midst.
All of the social sciences in the era of Keynes were producing "General Theories" of this and that... A General Theory of Social Action... structural / functionalism in sociology (Robert Merton of LTCM was the primary advocate of functionalism)... and on and on.
Apparently none of these men or their students ever read Thomas Kuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions. The gist is this, paradigms (Kuhn coined the word) arise in science, which incorporate models, sets of data, methods for accumulating data (to fit into the model), techniques of calcution, and so forth. Over time, however, data anomalous to the pardigm begins to accumulate and the real world does not function as the model in the paradigm predicts it should (Newtonian physics / Larmarckian evolution). The paradigm collapses, and a new one is formed by the younger generation of scientists.
The problem is... what happens when the paradigm is your whole civilization, which has been run according to an incorrect social scientific paradigm?
You get significant structural changes. Those tend to be a bit unpredictable.
Personally, I'd say they're what you would call "whimsical" or "arbitrary."
Very often, some outgroup with the wrong X takes one for the team.
'Over time, however, data anomalous to the pardigm begins...'
ergo, concorduntly, Vis-à-vis ....wait ...i think i know what you mean.
I believe the phrase you are looking for with your final question is "Crash and Burn".
The problem is... what happens when the paradigm is your whole civilization, which has been run according to an incorrect social scientific paradigm?
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That is the story of US citizenism.
My two front baby teeth didn't fall out until four years ago and my eye teeth came in so I look more like daracula than Daracula. I have strong reason to believe that my teeth aren't my only genetic anomaly as I'm prone to receiving messages from a black wall with rectangluar patterns somewhere in the region of the medulla oblongata. The messages have told me not to sweat the small stuff and that human population would take care of itself. Hope that helps.
star trek already did this story...! man doesnt need gods any longer so they flew away to other galaxies.
Mankind - or at least much of it - may think is doesn't need gods any longer, but based on what I observe mankind isn't doing all that great on its own.
Hear, hear!
If God is your co-pilot, you're sitting in the wrong seat.
Creation comes before distribution -- or there will be nothing to distribute.
- Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead
I QUIT.
- Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged
Never underestimate the will of men who are tired of being fucked with.
No planner is smarter than nature? When you forego vaccinations and antibiotics and start running mustangs against thoroughbreds in horse races, you might have a point. Nature is brutal in its criticisms. Most human enterprise is the exercise of planning to avoid its tender attentions. The free market works because it harnesses the plans of many to avoid the fate nature prescribes... many of which still fail. But it is planning that allows those that succeed to succeed. What we need to avoid is central planning, which puts all eggs in a single basket, and calls upon the planning talents of a relative few. And rarely punishes them sufficiently when they fail.
Very few fail because of nature in the market. Your fellow man is your adversary. But, when it is nature's fault, it's usually spectacular.
Nature is a tamed lady 99% of the time.
Nature is neither smart or dumb.
how many of you, like myself, lack the guts to comment on this topic?
Zed: You stink of despair. Fight back! Fight for death, if that's what you want.
All the eugenicists I know stink of this as well.
Use the Force, Luke.
Look, if you're that scared of getting torn to pieces by the shrieking freaks around these parts, there's really no chance that what you think could possibly matter, eh?
Men have been taught that their first concern is to relieve the suffering of others. But suffering is a disease. Should one come upon it, one tries to give relief and assistance. To make that the highest test of virtue is to make suffering the most important part of life. Then man must wish to see others suffer -- in order that he may be virtuous.
- Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead
What an excellent understanding of the welfare state! By creating the welfare state to "help" the poor, means that there must be many/more poor in order for the welfare state to continue. Government must create the problems for which they can claim they are going to solve and never will in order for them to have a purpose in society. Anarchy, bitchez!
Those who want and think they want the welfare state must also want their fish to be handed to them when they need help. The REAL way to help people is to not given them handouts in which they would lose their own self-respect and dignity and then become a dependent to their master which is the hand which feeds them. Instead, the REAL way to help people is to "teach them to fish" instead of handing them the fish!
Rand really sets up some terrible logical fallacies. The notion that because I might feel good by helping somebody, I desire others suffer so I can feel good about myself by helping them is sociopathic.
It is at the same time both simplistic thinking, and wrong.
I wonder if anybody felt good helping her on the dole.
In this case, Rand was talking about those who set up such systems in order to acheive their goals of being second-handers (ie those who require other people so that they can live their lives through others, their praise, their dependence). What you are saying is slightly different because you are voluntarily offering what you believe is help and thus your goal/motive is different from say the government's. And you are right, government is sociopathic.
I normally don't bother with Rand. She is a distraction tool of the parasite class to get us to focus on a mosquito while a vampire bleeds us dry.
It is the money changers, has always been the money changers, and will always be the money changers. I am not for a second going to be bother about by some poor sap that uses his snap card to buy a couple cans of four loko to get through his miserable fucking day, that was brought to him by the money changers.
I fully agree about the money changers as they are in effect government after all.
However, I disagree regarding Rand being a distraction. Quite the contrary as Rand provides the moral philosophy behind which everything else is then decided and built upon. At the very base of the problem and perhaps all problems lies the issue of moral equality. It is basically the Golden Rule and virtually all other rules/laws become debateable as to whether or not a law then impeds on another's moral right to pursue his or her own happiness.
Perhaps you have misunderstood Rand. And I'd even say that perhaps too many (perhaps 99%?) just haven't considered that it is possible that their entire "learned" (brainwashed) belief in the State or government is completely ass-backwards and just unimaginable to them? No offense, just saying. You as an individual could survive in a society with other morally equal individuals without the State (welfare state included). However, the State could not survive without you and all other individuals.
So which entity exactly is the parasite? I say the parasites are the State and all their supporters which includes everyone who donates and supports them. It includes of course the banks, the corporations who benefit from the laws and regs the State writes for them that eliminates their smaller competition, to the government school system and the unions (which in effect are smaller versions of governments which coerse their workers into them). Now if some of these entities had opt-out options allowing for free choice and voluntary membership then I would consider otherwise.
Was Rand merely a tool, a mouthpiece for the occultist Rothschilds, presenting their version of morality?
http://www.rense.com/general78/ilumm.htm
She was angry at the parasite class that you mention. Her anger was not aimed at the bum getting drunk to keep going.
No, she served that class, was one of Rothschild's mistresses, and wrote the book on his direction.
I fully agree too.
Just take Greece for example, fraudulent double the GDP of the rest of the euro zone for thirty years following WWII didn't really lead to the Greek population enjoying a significantly higher lifestyle than otherwise would have been afforded, but they didn't make out the most-the banks did.
Kind of like sub prime lending, they put nothing down, had no credit to be destroyed,
left with something, sometimes more than the NPV of their lives but somehow the banks are the winners while the sub prime folks who had unbridled access to money like never before and like never again are the victims.
People who came into the game with nothing and left with something cannot be losers.
Come into the game with hundreds of trillions of unfunded social obligations and leave with something-you're not a loser of the game.
From my POV the only losers thus far, are those paying 99.5% tax on interest income. No one else has paid beyond slightly higher inflation. Guess who that makes the biggest losers thus far? A hint-those who have money to earn interest.
Further can't possibly hold it against anyone for being used as a shill by the rich and powerful to grow governance. Afterall people were born to be shills to grow goverment. It isn't obvious the rich and powerful have erected gargantuan governance to their own benefit the last centuries, if it was half the world wouldn't still believe they grow the governments to benefit the people.
BTW the rest of largely unadulterated academic bullshit like peak food was unadulterated bullshit 30yrs ago. Have you not heard of nuclear power or just like to pretend? Brilliant stuff, the earth is finite, why stop there? The sun is immature so who gives a shit about the earth?
Are you saying there are no limits on nuclear? Like there is uranium lying around everywhere?
Or that nuclear is a good idea? I don't know where you're coming from so I'll just lay it all out. Our entertainment system runs on electricity, our life support system runs on oil. Very little of our power runs vital systems-refridgeration, hospitals, not much else.
That's why risking the future ability of the planet to support life ala Fukushima and fuel rods everywhere so we can watch tv and post on facebook is lunacy.
Sorry, usually my posts are crystal clear.
I am saying in 1970 I was told out of food by 1990 instead the first world is obese and hunger has been eradicated in most areas.
I am saying in 1976 I was told no more oil by 1995 instead three times the reserves currently exist.
I am saying in 1979 I was told TMI would melt me.
I am saying excluding the financial sector and the delusional, poverty of the imagination is the problem and continuuing down the same road via oppressive governance, conformist education, governmental dependence et al that is not going to change and that is far greater of an imminent peril than finite resources.
I find it fascinating that same rationale behind such brilliant logic as the flaws with infinite growth models can see right past the obviousness of nuclear power being the future to the point that virtual zero resources are currently being spent moving forward, but save that for another day.
The notion of general, extended to universality (a common to US citizen) is amazing.
It is usually achieved after removing counter examples.
I wonder how one can reach a point when one submits to drivel like first hand, second hand lifes.
Trade requires other people to be. Traders are second handers?
A mother can be a mother without children, biological or adopted? A second hander?
What leads US citizens to submit to such drivel? US citizens have wealth, where is the element of coercion here? and why US citizens keep harping about freedom while they feel such a urge to submit?
Apparently, you have not read Rand because you should have corrected me differently regarding first-handers versus second-handers. When Rand refers to first-handers versus seconder-handers she meant that from the standpoint of those having a self or an individual ego and mind versus those who are selfless and don't make up their own minds.
Please excuse me for my mistaken drivel as I make the corrections to comment on your drivel. Your counter example of the traders is in fact about 2 individuals living in the first-hand as each has voluntarily engaged, calculated with his/her own mind and agreed to a trade. The contrasting example would be someone who does not (has not) recoginized (figured out) one's self and is dependent on others (or even the collective) for their opinions and decision-making. Someone like this could be one whose entire livelihood is dependent on the goal to seek fame (acceptance from others) and not understanding that one's greatness really comes from within.
It seems that you must be a slave who willingly submits. Congrats to you.
The comparison between economics and eugenics, Keynes style, is interesting. I weakly disagree with the statement that "the biggest problem with eugenics is that human planning cannot really control nature." I think there are bigger problems. Whether humans can control nature, or whether they can merely change its course, is irrelevant. Humans routinely do change nature. The main disagreement between individuals involves the extent to which people should allowed people to change nature. In economics, this is roughly the extent to which government should intervene in capital markets. Most people accept some forms of intervention, such as the prevention of private monopolies, and reject other forms of intervention, such as 100% taxation. On the other hand (maybe I'm being overly optimistic here), for most people, genocide is off limits. In Azizonomics, it seems to be on the table, and it might make sense for a smart group of humans to plan most everything, if they were sufficiently capable. Maybe if the velocity of money improved, the end would justify the means. Plato, Hitler, etc., would probably agree, but it wouldn't excuse the immeasurable damage to most people's quality of life that results from the Keynesian totalitarian slavery.
The most important question is not whether humans are smarter than nature. The more important question is whether humans should be enslaved during attempts to control nature or the economy, regardless of the consensus outcome estimates or the metric used to measure the happiness of the slaves.
how is it, then, that almost every country in the world is increasing its debt to unsustainable levels.
Are they hoping that there won't be a banking crisis? Oooops, too late.
They go into ridiculous amounts of debt (even Germany) and then they let private
banks create money out of thin air, leverage it, and then those banks lend
money to the country. Easy peasy profits, instead of a real central bank and printing press.
And then they go and tie their wagons to the Euro.
Keynes and Aziz are just proving that humans, individually (most voters) and groups of humans
are too stupid.
Capitalism is not turning into a eugenics experiment. Money means you live. no money, no livey.
Keynes as a sociologist understood quite well that debt, and money are a faith system. Only the physical matters.
Gold bugs understand this too. The only limits in life or economics are physical. The debt isn't unsustainable, debt is a imaginary creation. There is no shortage of imagination. There is a shortage of physical oil which powers the debt system, as well as powers people on a unsustainable 10 calorie input to one calorie of food ratio.
All economic theory that doesn't account for physical limitations on spaceship earth is pollyanna hokum. We've plowed head first into the resource wall and it matters not what Keynes or Rothbard thinks because the physical limits of nature, unlike economics, don't require you to believe in them to exist.
I am observing the mind of a Communist:
Keynes as a sociologist understood quite well that debt, and money are a faith system. Only the physical matters.
Gold bugs understand this too. The only limits in life or economics are physical. The debt isn't unsustainable, debt is a imaginary creation. There is no shortage of imagination. There is a shortage of physical oil which powers the debt system, as well as powers people on a unsustainable 10 calorie input to one calorie of food ratio.
(OK I agree that debt is BS) But where is the physical shortage of oil-- Read ex paneful's comment that we were supposed to run out of food/oil etc ten years ago, what happened? I went to fill up my Pinto yesterday and every gas station I went by was full up on gas and no lines, looked more like a bounty to me not a shortage? As far as eating meat, which I think is your point-- if something is "unsustainable, how come the non-boutique, grocery store for the masses places I shop are chock full of meat? Price is going up that is scary, but no shortage. And over all no shortage of food in my entire lifetime, an abundance is what I see on the shelves. (brought to you by Capitalism, ie: Free market dude. Check the shelves in North Korea)
All economic theory that doesn't account for physical limitations on spaceship earth is pollyanna hokum. We've plowed head first into the resource wall and it matters not what Keynes or Rothbard thinks because the physical limits of nature, unlike economics, don't require you to believe in them to exist.
Hmm, you say resource wall, my eyes tell me "cornucopia abundance" Somebody is lying to me, is it you or my lying eyes?
Prole, we are drilling for oil in the harshest environment imaginable. Why are we drilling ultra deep water wells like the Macando that blew out in the GOM? Because that's where the rest is.
The demand goes down because the price going up destroys discretionary usage. The same is true with food products. I don't eat steak once a week anymore because the good stuff is over $25 a pound now. Yeah, they can keep the shelves full at high prices while people seek out cheaper and cheaper food options. That's just how supply and demand works.
And that's what is happening with oil, the demand goes down, but the price doesn't. Because supply hasn't been able to rise to meet demand, demand must be destroyed. We are witness to the plateau and first stages of decline. If you can't see it, and prepare for it-that is your own issue.
For the record, I'm no commie and I understand the free market quite well. Including that supply and demand cuts two ways, not just one.
Supply and demand in this country is severely interfered with by Socialist Command economy controls.
Even with all that, even with the unimaginable waste of food (Ethanol? Shiploads of foodstuffs dumped for free in Africa and N. Korea) the grocery stores are full to bursting. Your 25$ steak I find to be exaggerated by 5X. You can buy beef anywhere for 5 or 6$ per pound. Chicken 1 or 2$ per pound, all you want.
Oil running out? We (and be we I mean our sickening masters) are wasting tons of fuel waging phoney wars by the dozen. Imagine all the fuel wasted just on the drug war alone, one of the sillier more wasteful fake wars? Imagine the fuel wasted on wars in Iraqnamistan. Can't blame that on Capitalism. If we didn't have to pay for ten gallons of fuel every time we bought one, I guess the US Dollar would buy about two gallons per dollar right now. That would be capitalism.
Make it 11. Every time you buy one gallon of gas you also have to pay for the welfare queen's SUV, that thing needs alot of gas, and it is not going to pay for itself.
I figure we still have about the same freedom as the Irish had under Britain, we have just figured out how to make do better with less, while the vultures that eat our flesh take more of everything, forever.
I don't know where you're buying your groceries, but I'm guessing it's not in a metro area. The good steaks do cost $25 a pound in Seattle, or in SF. NYC was no cheaper last time I was there. Notice the qualifier, good. Like a prime grass fed 28 day aged Spencer or tenderloin. Yeah, that's no exagerration on price. $6 will get you a package of Oscar Meyer weiners. Another $4 for buns.
Chicken is $3-5 a pound, at Costco, and if you buy 10 chickens worth.
I agree with you about the drug war, but it's almost funny that you cite the oil wars as an example of oil abundance. Well, your depth of thinking lives up to your user name, that's for sure.
And the SUV driving welfare queen, that's a nice touch. Anymore talking points you'd like to add?
you are perhaps not arguing from the same point of view when you counter with,
sure, one can get pink slimed hamburger for less than a dollar a pound, and a steak from the same sickly bovine for fewer fiat bucks - but if you want a piece of quality, grass-fed, drug free, GMO corn fed free, feedlot pumped full of pharma free, beef - then you'll be paying substantially more than $5 a pound. the same with chicken - if you want a factory farmed Tyson or Fosters "chikken" with all the attendant cruelty in the ways they are bred, raised and slaughterd, yeah, you can pay a couple $s for that too - to eat meat raised as it was say, 100yrs ago, you pay for the privilege - everything else is feedlot food for "human livestock"
here's a tidbit: the supermarkets may be "full to bursting" in display, but their hold over consumers is slipping - people are "downsizing" to the resale outlet bargain stores, the ones who bulk buy foodstuffs that aren't moving fast and are nearing their sell-by dates. what the "dollar stores" are to WalMart, WinCo & Grocery Outlet, etc. are to Safeway's, etc. I do volunteer work at food pantries, and similar places, you'd be amazed at the huge amounts of perishables that get dumped there - used to get canned & boxed foods, but not so much any more, as those corporate stores now sell that onward down the food chain, squeezing every penny out that they can.
this cannot, will not last.
EDIT: ahh, I see you've also had a good reply from Marginal Call, while I was posting. . .
You two just have me shaking my head and laughing. You come up with "Capitalism causes poverty" I debunk that entirely, and I'm the one with talking points?
Here is a talking point-- Capitalism, has got my grocery store, Major Metropolitan Mordor area, full to bursting, veggies, meats, 1.29 per pound chicken, etc etc. This I use as a comparison to Socialism/Communism which leads to mass starvation, and death. I wonder if the Ukrainians who starved to death and Died because Moscow party leaders stole all their food, I wonder if they actually starved to death becaue highly specialised boutique gourmet meat was not available?
You are giving me grass fed Kobe beef? I'm just trying to not be hungry and not end up on the street (course I have a few equities and etc investments that should delay that eventuality) but it is there on the event horizon. I can't afford to worry about Kobe beef.
Yeah I agree that grass fed beef is much better, but I am citing the example of Capitalism = Stores bursting with food, for your pleasure. And you give me Kobe beef and I'm spouting talking points? Whatever
Hasta La Victoria Siempre Comrades!
The irony of Keynesian ism is that it has in fact had the opposite result of what the head priest himself seems to have intended.
Through increased government interventions, and redistribution of the wealth through government spending, socialism has created a permanent dependent underclass of welfare families. Some of whom have more than one generation of government dependency.
The problem for Keynes is that government spending is controlled largely at the ballot box and therefore is targeted at the "needy"who in many cases have a high birth rate.
Keynes gained influence with the PTB simply because he provided a form of intellectual cover for increased government control over our society.
In this way he is no different than the AGW "Scientists" who clamor for even more intervention from Government to "solve global warming".
The destructive symbiotic relationship between "scientific research" and vested government interests is one of the challenges that future civilizations will have to come to terms with, or be undermined in the same way that our society has.
It appears to me those who propose eugenics have never observed their ideas in action. After having purebred dogs and horses for many years and dealing with their many problems, I have much more respect for heterosis. Proponents of eugenics seem to commonly be from the intelligentsia, the PTB, the elite. Perhaps they need to study hemophilia and the Russian royalty.
Miffed;-)
if the government gave successful high IQ families tax credits for each additional child they had, would you consider that practicing eugenics?
The real catch would be with the "successful high IQ" selection process.
You'd be giving tax breaks to a lot of smart rich criminals. Consider the names from the ZH headlines who'd be getting massive bonuses for spawning like roaches.
i wasn't supporting the concept. it was just a question. does the practice of giving a group, with certain identifiable genetic traits, additional money for having children, fall within the definition of practicing eugenics?
I say no, but my recollection was that eugenics was more specifically focused on breeding out negative traits than breeding in positive ones.
Breeding in positive traits, to my mind, is called husbandry.
regardless of what it's called, would you agree then that providing this type of financial benefit to a subgroup with identifiable genetic traits will, over a period of several generations, result in a different distribution of traits within a population, than would have occurred had the benefits been withheld?
In any totalitarian or desperate enough state, sure, government could EASILY impact the traits of the population over time.
China ain't got enough girls, right?
Mars needs Women...
Thanks for the timely topic, John. I'll vote against Keynes the Eugenics in the next election.