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Guest Post: Why The Full Faith And Credit Of Governments Is Inferior To Real Assets And How We Can Fix It Once And For All
Submitted by Robert Paulson
Title: How the USA got to where it finds itself, why the full faith and credit of governments is inferior to real assets and how we can fix it once and for all
I used to think like a statist, and I used to agree with them. It's appealing to redistribute wealth, especially when it's not fairly achieved.
But what I've realized is that the solution to creating distortions in the market is not to create more distortions by attacking the symptoms. What ends up happening when you do that is that you create a hugely complex set of rules and regulations that hinder the market, make it inefficient and most importantly makes it ripe for abuse via regulation in favor of those who make the right campaign donations to the right politicians. This is the situation we find ourselves in now: A very broken market setup to benefit those who've made the right political moves.
On the other hand, you can simply end the sole cause of the problem to begin with. That sole problem is bad monetary policy. You might say that we should replace everyone in charge of the Federal Reserve with the "right" people. But even if you were able to do that, it's really a temporary fix. The issue isn't just having the wrong people in charge, but having so few people in charge of controlling the levers to begin with. Not only does it create a situation ripe for corruption and collusion, but it puts the value of money in the hands of people who are thereby expected to perform satisfactorily. They execute insane policies at the behest of a government and people who cry "DO SOMETHING!"
It is because of this monetary system that our government and the public at large have been able to amass such humongous debts. Because our system is based upon continual growth, its very lifeblood and continued existence hinges upon consistent expansion of GDP and inflationary monetary policy. The continually bad policy experienced off and on since the Nixon administration has a reason: It was masking declining economic factors.
The stagflation the US experienced in the 70s came about for two reasons: The final end to the gold standard and ensuing monetary policy attempting to stimulate the economy in lieu of actual economic activity. The badly implemented normalization of relations with China by Nixon began the trend of sending manufacturing jobs overseas.
All of this combined with the explosion of consumer credit and the financial industry. People were being squeezed by real declines in jobs and wages. With credit, they could afford to get by "until things got better." This paradigm shift from saving to spending created the consumer culture, yuppies and the decade of greed that was the 80s. As a people, we bought into this idea that we could spend our way into prosperity, and it worked for a while. Actually, up until 2007.
Stagflation was ended in the early 1980s when we finally put someone responsible in charge of the Federal Reserve: Paul Volker. He jacked interest rates up to the high teens until he tamed inflation, but an inevitable and deep recession ensued as a result. In the process, bad businesses (and some good ones) went out of business, many people lost their jobs, but in the end that creative destruction brought us back to reality and put the market in position to spring back forward, especially combined with heavy use of consumer credit as well as deep government deficits and increasing debt.
Throughout the 90s, monetary policy was relatively restrained but ever too loose near the end. It ended up assisting the dot-com bubble by allowing it to blow up far further than it ever could've by itself, ending in an unavoidable recession that was a long time coming. Further, during this time period, China began to become a bigger and bigger factor in supplying inexpensive goods to the market at the cost of American jobs and paid for partially with debt. This time, however, the debt explosion was in the private sector as government spending was restrained and the budget balanced by the end of the decade. In effect, the stagnant income and rising costs of the American people were being masked by continually growing private debt.
So what did the Fed do in the early 00s? In the wake up the dot-com bust and resultant recession, the Fed opened the monetary floodgates wide and never looked back. When the recession ended, it didn't tighten policy as it should've, and did so for two reasons. First, housing was becoming the new hot sector and they didn't want to stop the gravy train in the middle of war time. Second, the government had not only implemented hundreds of billions in war spending and failed to pay for it, but it also cut taxes and held them there. These massive deficits and and increasing debt could only be maintained with low interest rates. Basically, the Fed and the government made a bet that the deficits and debt wouldn't matter because they would be matched by a growing economy and inflation.
Unfortunately, the housing market couldn't keep growing with just loose monetary policy. That could only do so much. So what did they do? They deregulated the mortgage market and allowed lenders to go hog wild with cheap money and low lending standards. In a free market, this wouldn't have been such a problem. However, through a combination of fraud and ineptness, the banks were able to make terrible loans, package them up into securities and falsely rate them as AAA when they were really junk. This is the key factor that allowed them to continually make horrible loans with cheap money and reap massive profits in the process. They were able to build a ticking time bomb of epic proportions because there was no one able or willing to stop them. No one wanted to be the party pooper.
The ratings agencies failed or were complicit specifically because their continued existence was not dependent upon performance but by the fact that they were deemed by the government as the agencies of choice. They had government endorsements and had zero incentive to rate much of anything properly. As you can plainly see, all 3 of the official ratings agencies are still the official ratings agencies despite their horrendous performance. Why would we expect such a system to work in our favor?
Meanwhile, the American people were high. There were two wars on they didn't want to think about. Their houses were increasingly growing in value. They bought new and bigger houses with cheap loans. The "flipping" phenomenon went into full swing. People took out huge loans against their already paid down or paid off homes to pay for consumer goods. Jobs were growing on trees. Everyone was living the high life on borrowed prosperity. It was doomed to fail and began doing so in 2007, culminating with the credit crisis in the Fall of 2008 in the midst of a terrible recession. All the way along, the government and the people became as indebted as they'd ever been (the government's exception being during WW2, though that debt was largely held by the American people). As things got worse, the debt levels only increased in the face of declining housing values. Even worse, due to bankruptcy reforms made in the mid-00s at the behest of the major banks, many people became essentially trapped in their debt with no way out.
The most important factor that so few people understand is that this approximately 40-year long process of consumerism based on expanding consumer and government debt hid a very big problem: Decline of true wealth production and rising real energy costs.
The overall loose economic policies during those 4 decades fostered the rise of consumerism and the financial industry's increasing share of the market. In a normal economic environment with sound money, the efficient market allocates wealth towards activities which create wealth. This includes manufacturing, mining and energy production. Instead, because the market was distorted by easy credit, we began a 40-year long bubble of consumption and the financial services to make it possible.
For 40 years, our monetary policy enabled our ignorance of a very real and pressing problem: Other countries were catching up to us in technology and we were no longer in the front of the pack by a mile. Instead of doubling down on education and allowing the market to guide the future, we passed the buck. We decided that a continually rising standard of living without interruption was preferable to tightening our belt and delaying gratification.
Now we find ourselves saddled with ginormous debts and no economic infrastructure with which to grow our way out. We are a late-stage kidney failure patient on dialysis, and we are in terrible need of a transplant.
So how do we fix this?
Sound money, debt forgiveness and a truly free market that isn't guided by the hand of the government and is instead determined by what the aggregate investor pool thinks is the right direction. Gordon Gecko was wrong overall, but he was right that greed is good. The profit motive is the key to good decisions and long-term thinking. That doesn't mean we need to be miserly dickheads who only care about ourselves, but self-enrichment and the unfettered ability to be as successful as possible is the only route to a truly higher standard of living.
You might think gold is a barbarous relic, and I would agree that money based upon a single asset is a terrible idea. Putting all the eggs in one basket is too high a risk. However, a currency based on a multitude of assets, especially complimented by commodities that are the lifeblood of wealth creation (oil for instance, and perhaps corn in America's case), is a superior system in comparison to fiat currency backed by full faith and credit of the government. By using multiple assets, we can even out the distortions that will occur from time to time, essentially making our currency as stable as a rock. Those who produce the assets backing the currency will be induced to find the equilibrium which maximizes profit without over-extending. When we have that foundation, we can move forward with a market free of excessive and cronyism-based regulations and maintain a focus on only those regulations which are necessary to prevent harm that we find unacceptable. In other words, instead of using regulation to guide the economy in a specific direction, we can use regulation to make certain things off limits. It's the difference between steering towards something and steering away. It's far preferable to steer a ship away from an iceberg than to presume that you can steer it through the iceberg.
Most importantly of all, we need to take money out of politics. None of this will matter unless we prevent our politicians from being beholden to campaign contributors. Our current system engenders corruption of even our best, brightest and well-intentioned representatives. They begrudgingly accept the standard which says they must compromise their principles in order to get reelected. My solution is a constitutional amendment which requires all electoral campaigns to be paid for with public funds and prohibits any advocacy of a candidate which extends further than displays of support by private individuals, and a requirement that all such displays be transparent by way of indicating who is responsible for them.
I humbly give you these words and suggestions in the hopes that together we can build an America which is stronger, better and freer. I believe that only through freedom can we accomplish what our hearts desire. Thank you for reading this.
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Where's Malcolm X?
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No, no. No needs to call for a dead person. Just looking up at who is in charge in the US, Obama to understand how the classification of Obama as a Black, as a Muslim, as a Marxist are extremelly shallow.
If indeed this guy was bound by some racial concerns to his 'black brotherhood' as US citizens claim he is, well, he would have intervened.
Once again, another evidence that Obama is first and all your typical US citizen president.
Where's Malcolm X?
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No, no. No needs to call for a dead person.
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Malcolm XI, then. <rimshot>
Troubling Trend: Libyan Rebels Are Rounding Up Black Africans
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Made me laugh. So NATO intervention, under US command, aimed at protecting civilians and they end covering for an ethnical cleansing.
Another blatant evidence that Obama is your typical US citizen before everything else.
They want a electro coin now
There's bitcoin.
The Federal Govt has been co-opted and expanded to be the vehicle for Looting US.
Time for the The Several States (all of them) to suspend The Federal Govt and hold in-place representatives and those from 1980 forward accountable for such crimes and treasonous betrayal which may be proved by forensic audit and accounting inquiry. In interim, each state will appoint new representatives and reclaim their privilege of legislature appointed Senators. Federal Government to be restored per Consitution pre-1860. In other words, Fed Govt to collect tarrifs on all imports for revenue and provide border and maritime functions, plus any other Constitutionally delineated powers.
The federal government exists to serve the states and has not done so since it abrogated its duty with federal reserve act.
gold production rises at a 3% a year clip .
whats wrong with a deflationary economic model. prices come down , yet you can still have productivity increases , savings , close to 100% unemployment ,
gold is the perfect item for backing the circulating medium of exchange .
To out line its benefiets here would be a text book of austrian principles .
long forgotten by a gaggle of brainwashed and zit faced consumers ,
many read mad magizene at the expense of hard understanding and repeat wagissms from brain dead people of authority and harvard trained economists now going wrong for 60 years
explain your deflationary reason for not having a gold standard
Prices and wages are sticky downwards. Markets don't clear as fast and economies aren't as efficient in deflationary periods. Best to avoid them. That is the theory behind a flexible currency.
If you had lived through a gold standard you would have supported a flexible currency too. Not a single handwringing socialist who cares about the poor could ever support a gold standard. Many people on zero hedge support socialist solutions and a gold standard at the same time. I get a good laugh out of that.
I don't care about the poor, but I also don't want a gold standard. I would prefer a flexible currency run by perfect men of virtue.
you do not know that from expeerience ..
did you live through a gold standard ,, comeon your just spouting garbage in and out .
with a gold standard markets dont clear as fast lol
that balderdash with a bit of diaper rash thrown in ..
I don't want a gold standard either, but that doesn't mean it isn't in the works, so I trade accordingly.
Kind of like the idea of the "infrastructure bank," myself- though I don't imagine that it would be any better than anything else, just different and maybe useful for.... about 40 years, like the rest of them. After that, maybe we can make a water standard, and then maybe a corn standard.
It doesn't matter what the standard is, it just seems inevitable that we're going to have to reset it periodically. Sure would be nice if we could have permanent stability until the end of time, but that isn't going to happen, so why not just accept the cycle, and set things up around that. Maybe we could build in jubilee every 40 years, when we spin the big wheel o' currency backing, and reset based on where the arrow lands.
Well, don't want much, do ya? You ain't gonna get those men so you might just as well give up the phantom flexible currency idea. Flexible means it goes both ways. Since 1913 there has only been one way -- down in value, inflation rising. Too much flexing and you get fatigue and breaking. Where DO you get these ideas?
Gold Standards never work out because they too become corrupted.
I think that FOFOA has this one right. Cut the link between currency (for transactions) and gold (for preservation of wealth).
"perfect men of virtue." That's pretty good, top! Not even I, the Mighty and Virtuous Bearing, am one of those. Freegold needs no perfection, and it's coming anyway.
agreed. Not sure why people are so up in arms about deflation. Technological and productivity progression is naturally deflationary. Think about savers. If you worked for 35 years and saved money, that paid no interest, in a deflationary environment, will allow you to retire and buy more with you money over time.
the % we spend on food, clothing, computers etc has, over time, become cheaper. Yes we'd like to earn more, but who wants to earn 10% more each year when your cost of living is going up 15% a year? Only those who believe in the fallacy of 'good' inflation believe that inflation is necessary.
I like the idea of an asset-backed currency. But I don't know what difference it really makes if you end up preserving the current global wealth-inequalities.
The people who own the world rule the world. It doesn't matter if they own gold, oil, land, food, wampum, or water. Unless you change the conception of "ownership" somehow, you're just playing games.
well that why the constitution to restore the rule of law.
But it requires a population that will be steadfast in quest of these ideals
the power brokers will rule it seems because the people are content to be ruled.
To believe that the power people will win is self defeating
why not just start with the standard of monetary affairs . make the fiat worth nothing , Ability and skill something ,
go to the gold standard give it a try.
Agrarian reform! Right on, brah!
(Are you sure you mean what you say?)
Anyway, no. It's bullshit. It's been done. The Constitution has been done. It's ALL been done.
The real problem is you cannot turn the process of justice into a simple formula. All the rules-systems just end up being gamed.
True
Benjamin Franklin said our system of government is only for a virtuous people.
It will not work otherwise.
We can agree on this at least.
Ben Franklin said we have a Republic, if we can keep it.
We have to quit treating money as a commodity, because that means the supply is dependent on the creation of demand, ie. debt. One of the main reason wars and lots of excessive government spending are pushed by the powers that be, is that it creates public debt to maintain large amounts of excess capital.
The Federal government doesn't budget, because the current process is designed to spend as much as possible. Budgeting is to list priorities and spend according to income, but they put together these enormous bills, add enough extras to bribe enough legislators to pass it and the president can only pass or veto it. Resulting in lots of debt.
A possible method of actually budgeting would be to break the bills into their component items, have every legislator assign a percentage value to each item and reassemble it in order of preference. Then the president draws the line at what could be afforded.
This would divide responsibility, with the legislature prioritizing and the president responsible for overall spending. This would likely reduce a lot of Federal spending on the local level, but if there was a system of local community banks, that funded local infrastructure with the profits, rather then sending it to New York, so it could be lent to Washington, this wouldn't be a problem.
People need to understand that money is a community contract, not a form of private property. Not only would this reduce the tendency to hoard it and thus create conditions for its devaluation, but people would naturally be far more careful what value they convert into money in the first place and develop more organic methods of storing and exchanging value. This would create stronger communities and healthier environments.
actually money needs to be treated like a commodity. Competing currencies will do that. Allow the free market to decide which currency people will trust. Supply and demand of the currency will determine the value of it. Much like how nations can debase their currencies and those currencies are less trusted by the market, eg. Argentinean peso, Belarus, zim dollar etc.
the term 'reserve' currency is what allowed the ponzi scheme that is the us dollarstay alive for so long. Countries were forced to accept the dollar for their commodities.
They have to be subject to market forces, but that doesn't make them a commodity. If I had you a piece of paper that says, 'redeemable for one once of gold,' it's not a commodity, it's a contract. This enormous ponzi bubble of derivative contracts and securities based on debt, that is many times the size of the economy on which it is based, is due to capital being treated as a form of commodity.
In the divide between what is public property and what is private property, money falls on the side of public property. I do think there should be an open market for currencies and people will migrate to those which are most stable, which would require fairly broad usage.
We own our houses, businesses and cars, but not the roads connecting them and there are few cries of socialism about that. Money is a similar form of broad economic transportation. Much as government is like the central nervous system of the community, finance is its circulatory system and when it is in private hands, the rest of the economy are sharecroppers to those running it. No one wants to go back to private governments, ie. monarchies. When will we start to develop banking and currencies as public institutions?
if scrip works for the H.S., it can work for the nation!
brodix is very smart & very wrong, as i'm getting tired of pointing out, (and also v. esteemd for his other knowledge, by yoors tooly, moi)
if you want to do a "thought experiment" try this: imagine the fun we could have if we "nationalized" the FED and the Primary Dealers! ["When will we start to develop banking and currencies as public institutions?" (end paste)]
btw, we have already done this, prior to 1913 & the creation from jekyll island; i won't deny that we cheated now & then (to finance the Civil War. e.g. and the Ist & IInd
national banks [Jefferson & Jackson took 'em out]) if you'll agree that we had no inflation overall, but that the "money" (gold & silver) kept buying more and more as we learned new technologies and how to live together/apart more "efficiently". Fair enuf? oh, we (the econom) had it's ups & down, big-time, but people who didn't "buy into" the booms didn't "lose their capital" in the busts, either, now did they? same as today! fools and their money... also, the wheat got harvested, and the cattle got slaughtered and eaten, anyhow, didn't they?
the "market" may have headed south, hard too! but gold was still gold and silver was still silver even when the paper stuff was getting liquidated
your "money" is an intellectual masturbation, my friend. especially since we already have a Consitution which even you might, someday, recogniZe as kinda a "public contract" which says,...
...well, wtf, you're not styoooopid, are you? you can read it for yourself if you have time between PTA meetings. why don't you just give it rest, ok? believe it or not, you might better apply yourself to bigger & better things than this constant re-hash of something you have not yet been able to comprehend, brainiac! S.W.A.Punch, ...yer bro, bro,...slewie...
p.s. to bro_dix: i am "getting" that the real hair up yer whatever may well be taxes and that the "local scrip" idea helps you to avoid them, b/c there is no "money" involved in these transactions: they are, essentially, in your community (ass-u-me-ing you actually have practical experience, ok?) a form of barter and are (almost?) never "cashed out"
they don't appear in any banks w/ yer SSN and on any trading accounts with any "broker-dealers"; they don't get reported to uncle sugar at year-end by the "administrator" nor @ april 15, by...you. if you ever choose to deal w/ "organiZed crime", even on the "legit bidness" level, you will, perhaps find that after a certain period and volume, they no longer are intested in taking your money; they prefer barter, too! same reasons, too!
that's cool, but as a national system, dude,...well, again,...you do the math, ok? maybe sales taxes, excise taxes, transfer taxes, income taxes, you know, the things we do for love... Beware getting too legally tender, bro_X! or at least consider what i'm saying...for the 6th X (at least?) at this point, ok?
i encourage people to do this locally, but don't try to push it past where it belongs, ok? it's a covenantal thing: voluntary, not mandatory, agreeable to like minded folks, but not enforceable by the state, please! it is not that something here could not be for "everybody" but please keep it covenantal and not like "our roads" or "our utilities" so you can take it big time, b/c it won't work "big-time"~~~it's "benefits" will be co-opted by the state, and you will find yourself starting over, with a new scrip locally, and so on... don't get hung up on "commodity" v. "contract" bro. you were kind enuf to explain your gold holdings, too. your horse is neither a commodity nor a contract for a horse. it is a REAL horse!
gold and silver are really money, too! whether someone wants to call them "commodities" or write "contracts" on them, it doesn't matter. just like your horse is what it IS, so are PMs
I orginally wrote basically "let's kill the damn bankers" but that's just my emotions getting the best of me.
No I think it is entirely rational. It would be a good start.
"...I would agree that money based upon a single asset is a terrible idea..."
i knew that an otherwise good article would end badly....it was simply too good to be true.
the above quote is the most enormously fucktarded idea i have heard about money, representing a profoundly moronic understanding of the subjuect....i shall not liberate you from your fucktardedness.....you need to get a clue phone....please do not comment on money until you have removed the cinder blocks and cob webs from your cranium....
I noticed you spent one part of your post saying the author was wrong and the rest telling them they're an idiot.
Maybe you should explain why you think that. Are you under the belief that everyone should just know that you're right and the author is wrong? That's mightily egotistical.
Why do you prefer one very small and easy manipulated egg in your basket as opposed to many eggs?
This is a bit of inspiration in a sea of bad news and ill will... Bravo, sir. <deep breath>
Hey, lets back our money with corn! Brilliant!
would you prefer it be backed by murder of women and children?
Cashohol, bitchez!
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http://maxkeiser.com/2011/09/04/when-congress-borrows-money-on-the-credi...
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When Congress borrows money on the credit of the United States, bonds are thus legislated into existence and deposited as credit entries in Federal Reserve banks.
Posted on September 4, 2011 by maxkeiser| 4 Comments
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here is the con in a nut shell.
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"To finance the appropriation Congress creates the $1 billion worth of bonds out of thin air and deposits it with the privately owned Federal Reserve System. Upon receiving the bonds, the Fed credits $1 billion to the Treasury’s checking account, holding the deposited bonds as collateral. When the United States deposits its bonds with the Federal Reserve System, private credit is extended to the Treasury by the Fed. Under its power to borrow money, Congress is authorized by the Constitution to contract debt, and whenever something is borrowed it must be returned. When Congress spends the contracted private credit, each use of credit is debt which must be returned to the lender or Fed. Since Congress authorizes the expenditure of this private credit, the United States incurs the primary obligation to return the borrowed credit, creating a National Debt which results when credit is not returned." ....
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?People Can Close the Fed, Demand United States Notes
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from bev in comments at max.
"It’s so simple. Stop letting the bankers con you.?
Wake up.?
YOU DO NOT NEED THEIR PONZI SCHEME, DEBT MONEY TO LIVE.?
YOU DO NOT NEED IT TO RUN YOUR ECONOMY!?
But, you DO need WEALTH BASED MONEY.?
Money that did not get created in a debt transaction.?
And, you DO need a robust and safe infrastructure."
I think the author forgot about the millions of guest workers, on the H1-B and L-1 visa programs, that were imported from India to destroy American jobs, and the American way of life for America's best and brightest. Most of whom don't even get the 'time of day' from employers when they apply, especially in the technology sector which constantly claims a need for talent, but ignores 99% of the talent that is offered up.
that is really true.
The only way to get ahead is not be a wage earner no matter what training you have because someone can be imported to do it cheaper than you.
One must be a manager of wage earners or create your own business.
Green, but,
Creating your own business is made extra-difficult in these times of .gov leeaches, looking for every drop...
Mandates. Regulation. Bah!
I am OUT of that part of the system. I collect on my loan to our company in PERU (my their and final shot at business, my other two were failed businesses).
Miserly dickheads is fne as long as there are no other miserly dickheads making the rules, i.e. real free market will take care of the miserly dickheads. Greed is good indeed, dickheads and all. If you can't see this yet, you have a ways to go from being a statist.
1- Counerparty risk in the Credit default swaps and the interest rate swaps are at the root of all big losses.
No bank wants to deal with an other bank when this opague situation of not knowing what the other bank is made of persists!
2- Expansion of consumer and Credit card debt has reached its limits which will slow down consumer demand.
3- Defaulting Home Mortgages.
Solutions:
1- Completely sort out counterparty risk for credit default swaps and interest rate swaps or confidence will not return to the credit markets. - The government is to make creditors and computerized derivatives speculators whole – and will act as collecting agent for the overhead of bad debts. A- This only can be done if the current failing financial Hanky panky dokes are removed from their offices. The real problem continous if these criminal greedy dokes stay where they are right now especially when the whole “Fancy Fair” is Nationalised. B- Make the Illegal FED realy Federal. The Federal Reserve is not realy Federal but a couple of private banks owned by a vew families now! - During this process Skip J.P.Morgan out of the equation.Saves the American taxpayer 3%.
FED–>2%–>J.P Morgan–>4,5%–>Treasury–>1,5%. C- Start publishing real figures again which are “for real” this time.
2 Separate the bad mortgages from the good ones.
- Revalue the mortgage-backed securities accordingly.
- Stop expensive wars.
- Stop expensive bailouts.
3- I know people are allergic for the term”New Deal” but to get consumers on the streets again some sort of new deal has to happen!
Start restoring or renewing your decayed infrastructure (Bridges, Railroads, Roads etc...)
4Reverse the very very bad rules from the past:
Reverse–>1999 Repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act that separated commercial from investment banking by the Clinton Administration.
Reverse–>2000 Derivatives and credit default swaps were excluded from regulation.
Reverse the greatest mistake:–>2004 Setting aside capital requirements by exemping the investment banks from maintaining reserves to cover losses on investments engineered and (market “always knows best.” only if the set of rules by which they play the “Fancy Fair” are fair.)
This allowed the investment banks to:
- Leverage financial instruments beyond any bounds of prudence. (Bear Stearns pushed its leverage ratio to 33 to 1 adviced by crappy computermodels - even 100 to 1 is heared!.)
why does some sort of new deal have to happen?
Let's just get rid of all barriers and disincentives to employment.
The bottom twenty percent of our population is fairly useless in a post industrial society. Those are traditionally the servant class. Every small middle class apartment in South America has a room off the kitchen for a maid. We don't need no stinkin welfare. We don't need no stinkin new deal.
This from a guy whose career has been so dependent upon the institutionalized anti-competitive practices of his professional association--the AMA--and stready income off the government teat pretending to treat those people you so thoroughly devalue.
Why can't you bring your self-image and values in line with any semblence of reality, troll?
Might make you less of an asshole toward those who haven't had the luxury of a hustle like yours.
Bob,
It's fight club. I should stay out of it. I have been following his posts and vibe strongly with what you say. Here is a challenge for you (and me). Why does this reality look so solid to him. He is obviously smart enough, right?
I go to the day to day lived experience. What is in his office, everyday? What is that like hour after hour? Maybe he is serving folks that don't follow his instructions, blame him when things go wrong, and are often just trying to game the system rather than trying to really get better. And so day after day, he gets eaten away at, little by little. And the wonderful impulses that got him into medicine start to look like a joke to him. He is burnt out and disillusioned. He finds himself trapped in something that is nothing like what he thought he had signed on for. He is pissed. A walking container of pissed. He sees the flaws in the system, he looks at what he is confronted with, and he just stops thinking about it because every time he does have compassion he just gets burned.
Just a wild assed guess. Could be I am wrong as hell and just a fiction writer who needs to STFU. Dunno.
you sound like you need a good massage. Lol. It solves a lot of problems. Go long Thai Banzai!
Could be. There is no doubt that the nitty gritty frustrations of treating the underclass greatly try a man's character. It's a difficult life, as I have found in my career doing the same . . . side by side with hundreds of such characters.
I've found that few begin their careers with those attitudes (a short fling with law school revealed the same thing about lawyers, btw), at least not in such a primitively unambivalent way.
And it's widely recognized that doctors are subject to influences from both their peers and the larger environment that cultivate a "God Complex" . . . far beyond what other affluent groups experience.
That said, it seems fair to me that people who enjoy so many advantages themselves must still answer to the dictates of basic human decency--which most of us still consider a fundamental component of the character which they are so quick to find lacking in the unwashed masses.
The hypocrisy of making a very good living off them while holding them in contempt is not inevitable. Nor is it a result of being so very "special" oneself. It's equally common among prison guards and street thugs.
Ultimately, the same case for compassion and understanding could be made for Wall Street's Masters of the Universe. But there's a limit to the obligations of empathy . . . and for me that line is crossed when the putative "victims" are getting rich off the exercise at the expense of all.
Its fun to re-distribute wealth when its not yours.
Oh great, another author outlining the problems and then offering hypothetical solutions. Great. Now how about actually doing something that has a snowballs chance in hell of working in the real world and not just in some utopian pipedream?
eddiebe
You seem like a disillusioned cynic. That's OK. It's understandable. It's hard not to be if one has any semblance of critical thinking capacity. This world makes me want to blow my brains out sometimes, so I can tell you with all sincerity that I feel your pain.
That being said, the author did not just criticize but also put forth ideas. You may think they're impossible, but is the reason you say that because accomplishing them would require real work on your part? Are you expecting someone to do it for you?
Is it the idea farfetched, or is it the idea of you doing something to get it accomplished which is farfetched?
No, the author did not give you a ten-point roadmap for how to do it, but I'll bet everything I have that if you really thought about it, you could figure out a way to accomplish it. The first step is believing that you can. If you won't believe it, it won't be true.
Take that hate and anger that dwells within and use it as motivation to change the world. Your only limitation is your imagination and your will to see it through.
Thanks for taking time to reply, Derpin.You make good points, and I wish we could hash it out a bit. Alas this is too cumbersome a venue. I would just like to point out that while believing that something is achievable does give energy to the process of achievement, but belief no matter how fervent does not make reality. In the end, after all is said and done alot more is said than done.
As far as the issue of the article goes: The true gold and silver standard works and it is what the constitution proscribes. Simple fact, not more moronic ideas about what could or should work.
Belief is the first step. Then comes the hard part: Action. There are no guarantees, but if you don't try, you aways fail.
Also, I might suggest not using terms like "moronic" when criticizing people and their ideas. It's so easy to be condescending, but is it not better to use honey instead of vinegar?
I know it's difficult to overcome frustration with people who you think are wrong. You don't have to tell me about that. But do we accomplish anything by being disrespectful? Are we furthering our goal of change by attacking others, or is it self-defeating?
It is possible to criticize without being mean and rude. It also tends to get people to listen to you more.
"Stalinize" Washington, D.C. - problem solved...
I agree with most of what Mr. Paulson says here, but how to we make fundamental change in our present system when the gatekeepers are captive to it? Seems to me we're going to need some unconventional (to say the least) tactics to make any real change, and that takes a long time (which we don't have), a lot of money (which we don't have), and lots of risk by the action-takers.
Don't mean to be pessimistic, but other than protesting in the streets what can we do?
If you agree with me that societal collapse is staring us in the face, don't despair, prepare: http://www.collapsenet.com/262.html
You can buy gold.
You can save your money.
You can prepare in other ways (buying food, guns & ammo, medical supplies).
You can learn new useful skills.
You said it: Prepare!
The constitutional amendment process is the one action other than voting that US citizens may use to directly effect change on a national level. State representatives may organize a constitutional convention independent of the Senate. They may come together and vote on amendments. If 3/4 of the states agree, it is the supreme law of the land.
Call your state reps and tell them you want a constitutional amendment.
Hey troll, guess what: In the real world those perfect men of virtue are the Bushes, the Geithners and Morgans. That is exactly why we need a PM based monetary system.
uhh. You don't really think they are perfect men of virtue, do you?
I was kinda being sarcastic. Plato said a fiat currency would work if men were as wise as the gods.
We used to have men of virtue who put country first. I don't know where they all went.
No, they put themselves first and believed that they themselves would thrive in a system that protected individual liberty. Generally speaking, of course.
"Gordon Gecko was wrong overall, but he was right that greed is good. The profit motive is the key to good decisions and long-term thinking."
Isn't that exactly how the USA ended up in this mess you are in right now ?
Osama bin Laden's "Letter to America"
makes more sense than the George Soros or Gordon Geckos' of this world all together...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/nov/24/theobserver
No, it isn't. The profit motive must be counterbalanced by fear of loss. The United States government has taken away the fear that balances greed by handing out trillions in bailout money to high and low alike. The result is that the middle class must bear the burden of everyone else's errors. That's the mess the USA is in right now.
It makes no sense.
Fear of loss is accepted by people who are not greedy.
Greedy people are going to act according to greed, that is trying to diminish or eliminate loss possibility.
Government has just been a pawn in this, a tool to achieve a goal.
US citizenism somehow maintains the idea of balance when the whole system is based on imbalance.
Fear of loss can not balance greed for greedy people. Greedy people will always look for the most imbalanced option in the game (that is the most rewarding for the least risk possible) and use the benefit they get from the imbalance to decrease the potential risks of the other options.
If they do not act this way, then it means they relinquish other juicy options, meaning they are not greedy.
Once again, another blatant example how US citizenism is a nest of meaningless self contradictory assertions.
You are a hate-filled, monotonous, one-track idiot who is far past the point of deserving any consideration or respect here.
Are they personal attacks?
Wouldnt it be better to sink me down by sinking my argumentation?
Have you thought one second I am looking for respect or consideration from US citizens? Have you thought one time what it means to be respected or considered by US citizens?
Your attacks on individual liberty are personal attacks on 6 billion people world wide. We want to be free and your tales of how delicious the prison food is won't stop us.
Typical US citizenism.
US citizens usually need to hijack humanity in order to hide their pursuit of selfish best interests.
My attack on personal liberty? Attacks on 6 billion people world wide?
But comical. 5 out of 6 billions people would fare much better if I were the only threat to their liberties than if they had to live into this US driven world.
US citizens has never delivered anything in terms of individual liberty. The only liberty they have spread and enjoyed is the 'liberty' the oppressor enjoys on the back of the oppressed. And that is not liberty.
Funny how the statists have all the ill gotten wealth, don't ya think?
Meanwhile, the American people were high.
Well, He got that right!
Every anti-gold hackster I've ever heard (when pressed against the wall for failing fiat regimes and not gold backing paper) always go back to the "Gold limits the growthrate too much! you're hogtied to the gold supply to grow the economy!"
Well.. I believe year/year gold supply grows at about 3%. World economic growth over 3% consistently, without doctored gov. data or bubbles of the 3rd kind is unsustainable... as it should be
I didn't see the author denounce gold. In fact, I thought it was implied that gold would be one of the eggs in the currency basket.
Irony: Forming a committee to study a ban on further Statism and Central Planning. And, of course, why statism has gotten this far out of hand.
When the motivation to make money comes from government intervention instead of making things, you're going to get more government internvention.
Fuck macroeconomics. Gold as money is INTRINSIC to our basic property rights. I get so tired of the infinite macro arguments about why a gold standard would not work. Governmental macroeconomic "policy" rests on the core assumption that it is okay to manipulte the economy by messing with the size of the fiat money supply. In other words, it is okay to "borrow" from the value of the money already in circulation, via inflation, by creating more money out of thin air. You might as well keep your money in an unlocked piggy bank so the pigmen can just openly steal it. It would much more "honest" this way. If the Tea Party would get its head out of its ass, THIS is really the ONLY issue for the next election. No taxation without representation, enforced by a return to the gold standard, instead of writing 10 million pages of new legislation and regulation to "protect"n us from the pigmen.
Dealing with one master is better than dealing with two masters.
Get rid of one of Federal Reserve and put control of the money system in charge of one master the govt. This parnteships of bank and govt will come to an end anyway. Ursury is the sin that needs to be elimanated. Why is the govt paying interest on money? to banks this is bullshit. This money should be non profit. Get rid of the parasites, ( I have six Wells Fargo Banks on my street here in Texas, and no mortgages?) The law of supply and demand cares not for mankinds wants and needs, and it will exact a toll on all of us.
Where is the presidential candidate who will get rid of the present banking system, and end Ursury?
this shit is unfixable....
The worst failure of all is acting on a fear of failure. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
If you really believe that, kill yourself now and get it over with. Otherwise, choose to accept that the change you seek will not be delivered to you on a silver or golden platter. No sir. You must put in blood, sweat and tears and risk the possibility that you will fail no matter how hard you try. You might even die.
But would you rather arrive at Slaughterhouse 5 and watch your death approach knowing you wimped out, or would you prefer to die knowing you did everything you could?
Real heroes die quickly, quietly and with little fanfare, but they die with a clean conscience, a good heart and knowing their death is noble.
Well said!
I only regret that I have but one 'up' arrow to give you.
as far as i know, slaughterhouse 5 was the actual name of where kurt vonnegut was held prisoner, after he was captured by the germans in WWII. they locked him and a few others in slaughterhouse 5
it was in dresden, and after the fire-bombing of same and the incineration of the entire ciry and almost all its innocent german civilian inhabitants, vonnegut got out, looked around, and was never the same, again, imo
of what war are you are a veteran, derpin "USA"? when did you (not?) "wimp out"? in american lit class? where did you learn abt "heroes"? in church?
I am not and have never claimed to be a hero. I hope to one day become one. That time has not yet come for me.
You can attack me if you want, but that's just an excuse to ignore what I say.
I was using Slaughterhouse 5 as a rhetorical tool, and by doing so intentionally made the name more literal for the purposes of going inside it.
If my attempt was clumsy and caused your confusion, I sincerely apologize.
When the economy increases GDP under a gold standard with pretty much a constant amount of gold, prices just go down. Might want to read some Austrian economics.
Moot point now isn't it?
FDR to be reincarnated Thursday night, Check your local listings.
Fuck anybody who says gold isn't a currency. Not only is it a currency, it is the only currency that is not a Ponzi.
And silver is a currency too. Both gold and silver always were currencies, and dickhead Nixon didn't change that
fact by taking us off the gold standard. Like it or not, we are back on, bitches, and you can put that in your pipe and smoke it.
It is not about dollars or Euros or Yen anymore, it is about Ounces, and that's the fact, Jack.
Proper campaign finance reform would mandate that ONLY constituents who are natural persons could contribute to a particular candidate.
The solution, of course, is simple... Let the people choose WHATEVER FORM OF MONEY THEY WANT!!!!!! NO LEGAL TENDER LAWS! Come on people, the answer is so simple and elegant. Gold and silver were selected as money in the FREE MARKET BECAUSE OF THEIR SELF REGULATING INTRINSIC PROPERTIES!!!!!
Come on, please tell me the light bulb is going off for some of you.
For those who still don't get it. Allow me to clarify:
FREE ....PEOPLE...... CHOSE......GOLD
GOLD....IS....SELF.....REGULATING
PEOPLE.....CHOSE......REGULATION ON THE FREE MARKET!!!! IT DOES HAPPEN !!!!
If people chose their own medium of value storage, and converted at the POS for the chosen value storage of the person they are buying from (I pay you with gold, and at transaction you convert it into silver, or a .0289 fraction of Apple or Netflix (ha!) stock, or oil future...) then this problem of currency devaluation would end. Too bad TPTB have too much tied up in making sure the dollar stays powerful!
This thread and everything on it is either wishful thinking or drivel. Man is inherently greedy and evil, thus TPTB will never acquiesce to the wishes or needs of the masses. Silver and gold, bitchez.
Dude! I thought you were totally erased back in the '80s!
They certainly won't acquiesce to your impotent rage and belief in nothing. That's what they want you to do actually. They want you to rage and believe you are worthless and incapable. Stop buying into their propaganda.
this article was good, until the point where the proposed solution to a cadre of men in charge of monetary policy be replaced by a basket of commodities, but doesn't state WHO will be defining, controlling and mandating what's in this basket. Multiple competing currencies should be the solution. That way 100 or 1000 different groups can define their own currencies, be they gold only, silver only, copper, oil, corn, or a basket of commodities defined by an institution, bug the key rule being NO currency is MANDATED to be used as legal tender. It is accepted or rejected by the free market and will live or die in the free market. No legal tender laws should be allowed.
governments only role in issuing gold and silver coinage would be an assuming type role, guaranteeing the weight, content and purity of the coin. Nothing more.
I think you misunderstand the mechanics of a representative democratic republic.
The market is people right? If those people elect representatives to their government, and those representatives act to create a money system based upon the desires of the people (market), is that not a form of the free market making its choice?
No I think you miss the point of a 'democracy'. You don't vote once every 4 years for a president or once every 2 years for an elected representative. You vote daily. Every dollar you spend is voting on what your needs and wants are. You don't need to elect and vote in a representative to the government for them to tell you that you want gasoline.
Your dollar vote has made apple successful and rimm unsuccessful. It has made ford successful and GM unsuccessful. It is not the role of government to try and pick losers like solyndra or winners like apple.
Why do we elect government? To fulfill the limited roles that the constitution allows them. I.e. To define weights and measures (that includes the definition of a dollar as a specific weight and fineness of silver), to enforce private property rights, to protect the nation (and not invade other countries), and to arbitrate between states on matters of commerce.
We do not (or more should not) elect government to redistribute wealth, allocate resources, create entitlements or worse, remove the rights of other individuals for the sake of our 'security', 'welfare' or other lies that are used to justify coercion.
So you acknowlege this:
To fulfill the limited roles that the constitution allows them. I.e. To define weights and measures (that includes the definition of a dollar as a specific weight and fineness of silver)
But you argue against the suggestion of redefining the dollar as a basket of commodities by saying we should let the market decide what is and isn't currency instead of the government?
Are you for or against the government exercising the role of dollar definition? I'm thoroughly confused by your apparently juxtaposed statements.
The problem with Free Market Currency is tax collection..
Part of the fiat currency game is taxes. As a free American, you are not "free" to avoid trade in the "dollar". How else do you pay your taxes?
If you raised 50 cattle on your farm and had to give uncle sam 30% of the herd, You, like I, would say "fuck that!" .
But when your tax bill comes in dollars, and Sam wants his 30%, you just pay it because it is a bill and we are trained to pay our bills if we want to be honorable. Of course it really isnt a bill to which we agreed.
If the Government came and stole your land because you would not give it the cows, your neighbors, fearing the same fate, would become outraged.
But " he didn't pay his taxes" in fiat dollars for some reason outrages nobody and he got what he deserved.
strange thinking....We are all forced to use dollars to pay our taxes. Correct me if I am wrong.
Of course you should be able to raise cattle, or do whatever, and not pay taxes ... as long you don't mind having no roads, no bridges, no water supplies, no schools, no hospitals, no protection from rustlers .......................etc.
If you want to argue against waste, corruption, etc. in the tax system, OK. But no taxes!! Come on ... you would never have been born in the kind of world you yearn for.
The question should be more like: how much of the economy (or GDP) should be controlled by the state?
Example: if you live in a state/country that spends 30% of the GDP, eventually you'll have to pay for the 30%. By taxes or inflation or...
So what is the "correct" level of government spending? This is the most befuddled Political Question.
No, because gov't should be able to create credit for worthwhile projects, that debt must not be put into the private banking system, and thus with the monies received from it after construction, it is retired. It needs not be perfect, a little leakage for a worthwhile project is fine if that project adds to the economy in major ways and helps much more economic wealth be created to soak up those dollars.
So you don't have huge inflation, but a tame amount, where shit actually gets done, and mankind moves forward. With credit created for WHATEVER LEGITIMATELY NEEDS TO BE DONE....fusion..check..waterways..check...nasa...check...so on and so forth.
Or we can have one way where some stuff gets done, but then it all gets stolen, until we have a shit ton of debt until hyperinflation.....then continue on with Keynesian monetarism
Or we can have the other way where no shit gets done (just like the endgame of keynesian) because no one has the money to pay for any of it, no credit is creatred, and if anyone does have money to fund something they alone at the top reap the spoils, thus collecting more of the coin leaving everyone else with less, and thus very few if anything moves us forward and we collapse due to nothing getting done and/or technological progress virtually stops. If we want that then we switch to Austrian monetarism. (of course beyond all the throwing people onto the highway going 80mph type things). It's not equilibrium they get to, it's a standstill.
Either way the banksters win...just not all the banksters both ways.
No way anything we need actually gets done (or 1 out of all of the things) through any form of monetarism. Keynesian, Austrian, or other.
Glass-Steagall
American Credit System (the non-austrian, non-keynesian, non-monetary dogmatic CHOICE...that is truly...well American)
and so begins the slippery slope. Who, pray tell, define's what a 'worthwhile' project is?
Solyndra?
Government Motors?
Chrysler?
Fannie Mae / Freddie Mac
all of these were 'worthwhile projects', to some politician.
Why on earth do people want to convert themselves into slaves? That is EXACTLY what you are doing the moment you say a bunch of predators can deem whatever they wish to be worthwhile, then steal you and everyone else blind to fund it. Absolutely EVERYTHING people in government have done to destroy the world has been done because they deemed it worthwhile. Give us a break! LEARN. And get real. If ANY institution exists that has power, the predators of this world will find a way to take it over. Isn't that as obvious as anything could possibly be?
I think you are incorrect in your assumption that the only and right way for a government to fund massive projects is through credit creation.
On numerous occasions throughout US history, and while under an asset-backed monetary system, the US government issued bonds which were largely purchased by US citizens. They did not need a fiat money system to accomplish this. What they needed was the will of the people. The people voted by buying the bonds.
The problem I see with giving the government the power to create credit out of thin air is that it gives far too large an incentive to abuse it and takes the free market element of voting with our pocket books out of the equation. If the paradigm is sound money and we always insist upon it, we have a phenomenal check and balance on government largesse and waste.
Keynes was not a monetarist. You've swallowed too much propaganda.
Any resemblance to Keynes' ideas ended during the 1980s, e.g. Chicago School, Milton Freidman, Reagonomics, MONETARISM, "economic rationalism", etc.
Don't know who this Paulson guy is, but I feel like I just got slimed by a pied-piper establishment mole blasting out edgy and almost agreeable prose from some corner cubicle in the basement of the UN. Reminds me of Limbaugh or Beck or Buckley. They get you noddin' your head so they can drop a turd in the punch bowl at just the right time.
Where have we heard this "basket of commodities" scam before? This Novus Ordo Seclorum Plan Bravo. Sell the suckers some new centrally planned (manipulated) monetary "standard" that includes some real-sounding shit like GOLD and OIL; and let the ponzi run for another 70 years.
Until there is a free market in money, there will be no money. There will just be more ponzi.
I think an asset-backed currency is the solution to ending the ponzi. It prevents unmitigated credit creation.
Why would a commodity basket be inferior to a single commodity? Would it not engender stability and make it more immune to manipulation?
The problem I see with using gold alone is that the market is too small and illiquid. The price can be manipulated by those with enough purchasing power, and history has shown it can and does happen. It also heavily depends upon the rest of the world using it as their currency for stability, whereas a broad basket is not dependent upon anyone else's use of any such system.
Whether to use gold or a basket of commodities is not even the question.
The question is whether or not to allow TPTB to create yet another monetary ponzi scheme under the control of national (or, even worse, international) government. If you do that, it will make no difference whether it is "backed" by gold or some basket of commodities. It is a confidence game. Only a sucker is going to place his confidence in another group of bureaucrats and financial elites. The temptation is entirely too great to manipulate the monetary system in a "crisis."
If we allow a free market in money, then I don't care who you want to place your "confidence" in. Personally, I will stick with gold until something better comes along.
I think you are confusing the similar but distinct concepts of money and currency.
Money is a store of wealth. Currency is a means of exchange. They both have similar bases and functions, but money is naturally occurring in the market while currency is, by definition, a controlled mechanism. Currency is superior for everyday use because of its ability to represent a large value in a small, compact vehicle. For instance, is it not easier to carry a $10,000 bill than 5 ounces of gold? Is it not more easily divisible with smaller denominations, whereas with gold change would be given in even more cumbersome silver?
I think what you should really suggest is the removal of the requirement that currency be accepted for all private debts. The monopolistic nature of currency is the issue. By forcing currency to compete with real money, those in control of the currency are naturally forced to maintain parity.
How do we fix this? Death penalty for corruption. A citizen council is elected every year outside of congress/senate/supreme court. They select who to prosecute. A special tribunal is set up to investigate the people targeted.
Too harsh dude. Let's just go back to Ostracism. Worked for the Greeks (back in the day).
If you step back, most of our "modern" approach to justice has been some kind of way of automating the ostracism mechanic.
And most of the commercial-exchange system has been a way of automating the evasion of the justice system.
Simple. The USSR solution. Let the evil empire that the USSA has become simply vanish, just like the USSR did. Then sure, hang all the scumbags who tried to enslave us all. Finally, recognize that individual human beings are sovereign, have zero obligations to others, and only participate in those aspects of "society" they choose to contribute to.
As long as there is anything remotely resembling government, we most certainly do need a system wherein any individual can charge anyone in government of violating any right of any individual, and if found guilty, is hung. The notion that once you are "in government" you can do anything without negative consequences must go. Fact is, all "fictitious entities" must go, which is no loss, since they don't exist anyway (except as mass delusions).
A nation state where there are as many Saint Justs, as there are individuals, will become a nation of Torquemadas. Don't fall for that anarchistic cum individualistic uber-alles, Ayn Randish, honey trap. Governance is unfortunately the framework of collective living we call civilization. The worst form of cohabitation barring all others!
History teaches us that Nation Building and collective sustainance is based on a compromise bewteen 'Top down logic', pure power play of the Oligarchs; the movers and shakers of society; AND, 'bottom up logic'; the desires of the common people. Reconciling the logic of power and the logic of reason, of justice, is the crimson thread of our civilization; the fragile bond between Alexander's and Aristotle's legacy to our way of life.
Break that bond, imperious necessity for national cohesion, and you go to totalitarian rule or to anarchy. History repeats itself in entropic tailspin. What this article highlights, in the Industrial age, is the vital role of the money line and the fair market, expression of price discovery and risk return trade-offs. This crimson thread to perceived value creation, must SERVE both the Oligarchs; the Rockefellers and JP Morgans; AND the Joe Does. Social cohesion and innovative progress is at this price. Labor and capital can cohabitate and the real issues of rampant demographic growth and resource restraints can be collectively addressed, as they ARE the GLOBAL reality of our age. We can never survive if we don't face the real issues of our age. Theoretical, rhetorical discussion in a vacuum is futile and pure sophistry.
ANother aspect this article does not address is the hubristic construct of US hegemonic power play since 1945, which has been the basic world driving force since a "day in infamy" days to Cheney's blatant avowal during 'clash of civilization' days : "The American way of life is NON NEGOTIABLE'. When a civilization is at this point of navel gazing in imperial arrogance, 'right or wrong WE must survive', becomes the Karma for collective downfall. As all reference to human decency and regard for the OTHER guy's perspective goes out of the window. We are never alone on earth...and we can't kill them all! Its been tried since the Crusades, for ideological reasons, and it didn't work. It back fired! The Holocaust its last manifestation of collective debased madness.
"You are for us or against us" is a formula that damns a civilization to ruin. House of Atreus, blind to the needs of humanity. Deadwood days are here again. Play it again Sam...
Nice FP, you are a tonic to the endless mantras repeated by the supposedly enlightened here.
your point about capital and labour is important for these times of out sourcing jobs.
in the last 100 years there has been a struggle for labour to get a bigger slice of the profit from the holders of capital. labour was steadily going well until globalisation where it has been undone and the holders of capital again can take the lions share.
'we are on this planet together'
what are your thoughts on the future of europe? - i feel it has that tinderbox feel again..... maybe 15 years and they will go nuts again.
your point about capital and labour is important for these times of out sourcing jobs.
in the last 100 years there has been a struggle for labour to get a bigger slice of the profit from the holders of capital. labour was steadily going well until globalisation where it has been undone and the holders of capital again can take the lions share.
'we are on this planet together'
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Blatantly outrageous.
Globalization is not a 40 years old phenomenum. It is much older than that.
Even when denying this aspect, labour through globalization is taking a bigger slice of the profit from the holders of capital. And this is exactly what US citizens want to resist as labour a bigger slice of the profit means more consumption to labour. US citizens are primary consumers of finished producted (rentier type) and consider consuming as a priviledge that should not be spread.
Reading the paragrah, it is utterly impossible to understand something like 'we are on this planet together' because, well, the paragraph tells "there are US citizens and the others"
BD6...Lets see the big picture and the big levers :
1° Western civilization at tipping point in its current US capitalistic model.
2° EU tried to create an alternative participative Nation State model, based on past experience, Armageddon fed; now trying to create an equlibrium between democracy, social economy and capitalistic innovation. Its a five legged animal as we can see. They consolidated too many fragments of nation states, too fast, slap bang when Reganomics launched the globalised, Oligarchic, outsourced model, making ALL social protection of 'middle class', bedrock of democracy, fragile. This is a crazy experiment, capitalistic "syncretism" à la Alexander the Great, between culturally, economically hetergeneous continents; we know how THAT ended! MAd assymmetric play that benefits 0.1% of the population.
SO now the EU has NO choice. Either the Germans try and save the world integrated model as best thet can, by creating at the eleventh hour a United States of Europe, as Schroeder is now saying, or they suffer the mayhem created in this financialised global model created by the US oligarchs and their own EU private sector banks who bought into it. (Herd instinct of the worst type from those who pretend to create a new frontier in finance!) And all of the West slides down the shute.
3° If we go down the Federated EU route, they will have to IMPOSE on Corporate USA a new financially regulated model. A la FDR, Glass Steagal, you name it, no derivative plays, much to the ZH crowd's chagrin as it will mean the current financial centers of the world will lose their hegemony. As they did under FDR. But as for FDR days, the Oligarchic collapse of that age caused the fall back to centralised statist play. As today. Its pure CAUSE and EFFECT; so don't crib about the medecine.
4° If the EUropeans do not find consensus, the Us model will take us down to chaos and worse : WW3. I don't see these Oligarchs either giving in to the people's claims or to state controls. They'll grab what they can and it'll go from bad to worse.
Quite frankly, the 4° scenario is return to a black age that is not even worth discussing. Its beyond all rational debate.
We are now between Charybdis and Scylla...
So my own feeling is that however painful and risky the federated gamble may appear to the EU given their past bickerings, its the only option open to them. China and BRICS are too strong to assume they will NOT make a power play for control of world resources if the West collapses.
As the US Oligarchs have no intention of either cooperating or cutting back, EU will have to consolidate and defend ITS continent and hope that on the other side of the pond, the USA will come back to sanity.
We will all be in attrition mode for sure for many years; lets hope there is no world war...
I'll tell you what is non-negotiable. I own my life, lock, stock and barrel (as the old time saying goes). Up yours. And all the predators who believe they can sling fancy words about the mass of humans being a single organism can drop dead.
Yours are fighting words, crafted for you by your predator-masters. If anyone actually faces me and like you, deems part of my life or the fruits of my labors "necessary for society" or "necessary for the public good", or "necessary to keep the predators/oligarchy happy" will soon be pushing up daisies.
Only an absolute, compute utter moron or blatant liar doesn't understand how this works. The instant someone but ourselves gets to decide how much of our lives is required to "benefit society/oligarchy", we are 100% abject slaves. Only a moron can fail to see the 100% certain lessons of history - that every single time, without fail, that any fictitious institution AKA mass delusion is created to claim and justify power over individuals, the predator-class (oligarchy) invests all their time and effort to take control of that institution and become our complete masters. We have reached that situation again for the zillionth time.
No more. Those of you who wish to suck off others better start liking the taste of lead and dirt, because that's what you will taste soon enough. Rather than having us as highly productive friends who are happy to trade with you, happy to help you voluntarily when we can, and wishing you a good life, we will become your adamant aggressive enemies. We greatly prefer peace and production. If you choose to advocate our lives belong to you and/or your wet dreams AKA the plans of the predator-class AKA oligarchy, we shall defend against you, your masters, and your plans. You are destroyers and terrorists, and funders of destroyers and terrorists. You painted a crosshair on your forehead buddy, I hope you know that, and want that.
You are so laughable! It is YOU who says "you are either with us or against us", and WE who say "each to his own". You say we MUST accept the chains of bondage to predators and parasites, and by doing so, you and your ilk have converted the majority of human beings from producers to parasites and predators in a mere two generations. You say if we the producers do not accept bondage to your authority... well, you claim there is no alternative, that we MUST accept bondage. I'll tell you what you must accept --- that crosshair you painted on your forehead will remain indelible as long as you promote ideas such as these.
The day of reckoning is coming all you mealy mouth, mealy brain thieves and apologists. You have a chance for a glorious world of constant advancement. You rejected that, and assured the descent into predatory-parasitic gluttony that now overwhelms the ever-increasing productivity created by those of us who think, create and work towards a better world. Well, soon we will turn our attention and talents against all of you - the predators themselves, the endless parasites, and those of you who apologize and support the predators. You leave us no choice. And to say "you asked for it" is the most blatant understatement in the history of mankind.
He hasn't capitulated, he is simply honest and realistic. Any candidate who claims they are a shoe-in is just a liar. Is that what you want? Another blatant liar?
Another day, another shippment of US cheap propaganda.
So, what have we learned?
-That the US standards of living have not truly increased in the US.
-That redistribution of wealth has been on the table while figures show concentration of wealth.
-that the investors, profiteers should be let free to make their own choices to determined what is best for them but they should not be let free to choose to invest in politics because, because, because free is free.
The US world order has been destroying the capability to think out of facts. Propaganda is everywhere and the base for any thought process.
I've seen many posters, here and in other forums, beat a dead horse until they're blue in the face, but you are the very first poster to not only beat their favorite dead horse, but to stomp it into an unrecognizable pulp, shit on it, stomp it in rage even more, incinerate it, grind the ashes into powder, encapsulate them and launch them into orbit, then attack the capsule with multiple nuclear weapons, before finally breaking down its scattered remaining atoms with terawatt gamma-ray lasers and focused anti-quark beams.
In other words, really, enough already.
I am only reacting.
This site provides much material that you choose to call a dead horse.
As such, I deal with it the same way.
If it changes, I change.
The most important point is that your analysis is unsurprisingly wrong, as led by US citizenism:
as I react, there is action so there is somehow other people who match my effort, who are at least beating 'dead horses' as much as 'I do'
And with no surprise, your tolerance of those 'dead horses' have not let you to claim "in other words, really, enough already"
Double standards is US citizenish, isnt it?
Another failure.
And of course, you were incapable of disclaiming any point made in my previous posts... Hard when they are factual, huh?
hey, A,A_mous! i think Akak is talking bout the bloggers and you are talking about the articles, m/l
tyler puts up all kindsa stuff. when was the last time you called tyler out for his +++ "intro" to something you didn't think should even BE here? (no link, pls, that's a rhetorical Q, ok?)
tyler may answer you, junk you, or take it from you. any way, go for it!
robert paulson is a fight club "character"! Robert 'Bob' Paulson: Go ahead, Cornelius, you can cry.
Narrator: [V.O] This is Bob. Bob had bitch tits.
[Camera pans to a REMAINING MEN TOGETHER sign]
Narrator: [V.O] This was a support group for men with testicular cancer. The big moosie slobbering all over me... that was Bob.
Robert 'Bob' Paulson: We're still men.
Narrator: [slightly muffled due to Bob's enormous breasts] Yes, we're men. Men is what we are.
Narrator: [V.O] Eight months ago, Bob's testicles were removed. Then hormone therapy. He developed bitch tits because his testosterone was too high and his body upped the estrogen. And that was where I fit...
Robert 'Bob' Paulson: They're gonna have to open my pecs again to drain the fluid.
Narrator: [V.O] Between those huge sweating tits that hung enormous, the way you'd think of God's as big.
or: Tyler Durden: It's getting exciting now, two and one-half. Think of everything we've accomplished, man. Out these windows, we will view the collapse of financial history. One step closer to economic equilibrium.
and: Tyler Durden: We're consumers. We are by-products of a lifestyle obsession. Murder, crime, poverty, these things don't concern me. What concerns me are celebrity magazines, television with 500 channels, some guy's name on my underwear. Rogaine, Viagra, Olestra.
Narrator: Martha Stewart.
Tyler Durden: Fuck Martha Stewart. Martha's polishing the brass on the Titanic. It's all going down, man. So fuck off with your sofa units and Strinne green stripe patterns.
unhh: Tyler Durden: Hey, you created me. I didn't create some loser alter-ego to make myself feel better. Take some responsibility!
or: Narrator: On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
hiya! Marla Singer: I've been going to Debtor's Anonymous. You want to see some really fucked-up people... [free coffee, BiCheZ!]
or:Narrator: You're fucking Marla, Tyler.
Tyler Durden: Uh, technically, you're fucking Marla, but it's all the same to her.
and: Tyler Durden: I want you to hit me as hard as you can.
RIP: Members of Fight Club: In death, a member of project mayhem has a name, his name is robert paulsen.
robert paulson pics: fight+club+robert+paulson ;479958665_77fdffa2e6.jpg
Fight Club Soundtrack - Intro song (Stealing Fat) - YouTube
Pixies - Where Is My Mind? Fight Club Soundtrack - Footage Montage - YouTube
then...: In one city, a Project member greets the narrator as Tyler Durden. The narrator calls Marla from his hotel room and discovers that Marla also believes him to be Tyler. He suddenly sees Tyler Durden in his room, and Tyler explains that they are dissociated personalities in the same body.Tyler controls the narrator's body when the narrator is asleep.
The narrator blacks out after the conversation. When he wakes, he discovers from his telephone log that Tyler made calls during his blackout. He uncovers Tyler's plans to erase debt by destroying buildings that contain credit card companies' records. The narrator tries to contact the police but finds that the officers are members of the Project. He attempts to disarm explosives in a building, but Tyler subdues him and moves to a safe building to watch the destruction. The narrator, held by Tyler at gunpoint, realizes that in sharing the same body with Tyler, he himself is actually holding the gun. He fires it into his mouth, shooting through the cheek without killing himself. Tyler collapses with an exit wound to the back of his head, and the narrator stops mentally projecting him. Afterward, Project Mayhem members bring a kidnapped Marla to him, believing him to be Tyler, and leave them alone. The explosives detonate, collapsing the buildings, and the narrator and Marla watch the scene, holding hands.
above is from wiki (less than a week til 9/11~~the decade of WAR, too! remember, cantor fitzgerald had some [allegedy very notorious] Treasury trades and dealings. them terrorists used planes, not detonating explosives, right? life? art? war? goobermint? internationalists' intel agents? crazies? got debt? got a good S&P rating? got euros? L0L!!!)
truly free market would apply STARVATION FORCE to inefficient masses of people who would then simply die-off as often happens in wild nature. Depopulated Greece, Eastern Europe is that what you want free market for ?
Where do you people get this stuff? Is your brain utterly and completely destroyed in public school, or what? I really don't understand how so many people can be so clueless to the simple and obvious facts of reality.
Like, for instance, the fact that man has invented and developed ways to produce more and more efficiently over the centuries. Therefore, humans today have the means to be vastly... and I do mean vastly... more productive than humans just a couple hundreds years ago.
And you say people can't survive today? Are you serious? You must have zero ability to think at all to believe such clap-trap nonsense. The fact is, people today do have a difficult time being highly productive, but it is entirely caused by the oppression by the predator-class that makes this true. To say people will die off in an honest, free society is so completely and utterly counter to ALL evidence and logic that a rational mind boggles.
it's just standard doomerism, h_ann. where do they get this stuff?
maybe from falak_penis and the "mytho-dualists" for whom "ORI" advertiZes, constantly? or the "destroyers and haters" one of whom you tagged, nearly unerringly (imo) below and who then "felt" attacked and then postulated (of course) that you might be "crazy" if you think you have the "solution to all our problems" which is right up there w/ the projections he put me thru when i called his styooopid ass out, a few days ago
there are others who 'post' here, one, with never-ending lists of "what he said" is very violent and insane, but then, generally "reasonable and friendly" too, of course. you are absolutely correct! they can't understand: not what a "normal" person can see, but what a more real individual can see. they like zH! they can act tough, talk about shooting people, and go off on political rants that "everybody understands" too. people who adjust to the normal don't even blink; people who adjust to the real are constantly appalled
he (below) may rehabilitate himself, yet. but, he is very violent, hate-filled, and, un-real. at least this time he recognized your superior argument, knew when he was beat, and didn't invite you to "meet him in nyc" where he could "beat you up, properly"~~a vast inprovement. trust me
reality? when one is clinically insane, one just.doesn't.understand.ever. like you can't protect yourself, here, from these toy-boys? fuk em all!
I'm not sure I mean the following literally, but I'm also not sure I don't either. But your post makes me wonder if one of the most important reasons to NOT have a welfare state is so natural selection can work. Maybe I'm wrong, but I just can't believe people before the welfare state handouts and non-productive pointless federal jobs could be so utterly and completely blind to the simple facts of reality in front of their faces... and still survive.
I mean, I don't want people to suffer. Not even the ones who need a mercy bullet through their brain to protect the rest of us. But the state of affairs has gotten so far out of hand that LITERALLY the entire world is getting close to spiraling down the toilet for lack of simple honesty and common sense. Given the technologies that exist today, the incredible danger is, the predators-that-be and predator-class will have the influence and power to drive the masses of humanity soooooo far over the edge of the cliff, that the animators of WileyCoyote couldn't even figure out how to present it.
You may not have meant your last 3 words to be the solution, but I think it probably is. That pretty much sums up my personal approach. A few years ago I decided that I will no longer produce and exchange in any way that feeds wealth and power into the hands of predators, parasites or slackers. This makes like quite a bit less "simple" in certain ways, but at least I feel clean and not part of the problem. Hopefully this is the solution, though I have my doubts because so few will take extraordinary steps to practice what they preach. Hell, I'm only able to do so because I have a lifetime of practice at being frugal, creative and unconventional (and never borrowed a penny, and saved my liquid assets in gold, which has helped the past several years).
What the world so desparately needs is a new frontier. A place where those of us not afraid of reality, but instead anxious to "make it on our own" can go and be free of the predators and parasites. Unfortunately, the predators have fairly well thwarted space exploration, which has cut off (or at least greatly delayed) the most promising "new frontier". I've tried to find others willing to "go for it"... to create new frontiers where governments currently do not run terror over everyone (on-or-under the ocean, on-or-under antarctica, etc), but nobody but me seems willing to "pull the trigger". This is exceedingly unfortunate, because any such endeavor needs to be on a moderate scale (a few million dollars up), which is beyond my personal scale of savings.
Anyway, you are right, the solution is to get away from them, let them crash and burn all they want, and get out-of-sight, out-of-mind and fluorish on our own.
I'm not sure why people "just don't understand" the notion of a "gold standard". Please note that a gold standard is simply honesty + liberty, plus a simple "standard practice". In the true, honest gold standard, which is all I will discuss here, NOBODY is required to save their wealth in gold, and NOBODY is required to exchange gold for the goods they wish to obtain.
In fact, anyone who has accumulated more than a little wealth will not save the majority of their wealth in gold, because, as gold-haters always point out (correctly), gold does not pay interest. Therefore, a very significant percentage of the wealth of mankind would be invested in productive activity. That's why the USA grew like a freaking weed when it was on the gold standard, people were free to invest their savings in whatever they wished, and by far they chose productive endeavors. And anyone who was not ready or inclined to invest in productive endeavors could save silver, copper, platinum, seeds, forests, farmland... or any of thousands of other choices - whichever he though was currently most undervalued and likely to appreciate in the timeframe of interest.
In a gold standard, nobody is required to exchange gold for goods. Any two individuals can exchange anything they wish.
So what is the gold standard? Simple. These two things:
#1: It is the "standard convention" for how we determine the nominal exchange rate of "any good whatsoever" for "any good whatsoever". The number of combinations of goods is astronomical, and thus impractical. However, look what happens when we make a single list of the "exchange rate between gold and all other goods". In a manner of speaking we say "this is the price in grams of gold", but this is no more than an exchange rate. Once we have this single exchange rate list, we can easily compute the nominal exchange rate of any combination of goods by looking up the exchange rate to gold for both goods, then performing a simple divide.
#2: The main purpose of this gold standard is to assure honesty, at least on a mass scale. Here is precisely what I mean. When you exchange the goods you produced (at great investment of time, effort and resources on your part), and you exchange/sell them for gold coins, you have exchanged one good that has real value for another good that has real value. There are ZERO points in the transaction where ANYONE other than the producers of goods can grab or trick the value out of others, because the goods pass directly between the hands of the producers (gold being one good). This is also true of you directly exchange goods you produced for goods produced by others, and only determine exchange rates for your goods by reference to the gold standard prices. The crucial fact is, no NON-VALUE exists in the process. The MOMENT any government or bankster convinces you to accept a piece of paper (even a gold certificate), you and everyone are massively defrauded, and the predators are strengthened. And if paper standins for value are widely accepted, you have financed and supported your own destroyers and enslavers.
Therefore, the gold standard alone is perfection. No need for multiple commodities to be the standard, since NOBODY is required to save or exchange with gold. It is nothing more than a single real, physical good that provides a point of reference to determine exchange rate between other goods. And if you happen to hold on to your gold coins for a while, they simply hold their value, just like holding silver, titanium, platinum, copper... or any other good that does not decay or degrade. In practice it is indeed convenient to keep a modest quantity of our wealth in gold in such a system, because this is the easiest way to obtain the day-to-day goods we want and need without carrying around more cumbersome and less universally desired goods to exchange.
If people understood the purpose of the honest "gold standard" (namely #1 and #2 above), they would not need to worry about "problems" of the gold standard, and they could just get on with honest, productive life without the predator class enslaving us all.
note that a gold standard is simply honesty + liberty, plus a simple "standard practice"
Fantasy-land, Peter Pan.
Rainbows and unicorns shitting skittles.
Actually, the (utopian) rainbows and (authoritarian) skittle-shitting unicorns are the almost exclusive purview of power-mad statists and other sociopaths with their sweeping, one-size-fits-all Orwellian dreams, as well as those naive, lazy and/or ignorant followers of said statists and other sociopaths. The honest, true advocates of liberty never promised anyone Utopia or paradise on earth, merely an optimized (but not "perfect") social and moral order.
The honest, true advocates of liberty never promised anyone Utopia or paradise on earth, merely an optimized (but not "perfect") social and moral order.
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Oh, and who are they? Names required here...
An optimized social and moral order? But any social order is moral and optimized for people living at the top.
"honesty and liberty + a simple practice"
In other words, a gold standard is all things good and noble and just and true and pure.
Duh. It's a fantasy.
There's no perfect system, because people aren't perfect.
There have been gold-standards in the past. They do some things very well, and other things not so well. They CERTAINLY are no simple formula for "honesty and liberty."
You have the mind of a destroyer. You trash anything honest, ethical and productive... because you are desparate to retain ways to steal from producers, so you don't have to produce. Nobody has ever said switching to a gold standard would eliminate disease or prevent people like you from being predatory creeps. The gold standard simply helps us producers succeed, and incidentally raise production and the standard of living for everyone else too.
I know you hate that, though, because food is so utopian.
There's no reason to attack me. If you know your history, you know that what I say is true. There have been gold-standard monetary systems in the past. There has never been an honest and truthful economy in the past.
The idea is fine, but you're crazy if you think it's the solution to all our problems.
There is no one action that is the solution to all our problems. But the gold standard enables all producers to persue the thousands of other actions that are the solutions to our problems. And that is why the gold standard is important, and all fiat, fake, fraud, fiction, fantasy, fractional reserve scams thwart our attempts to implement solutions.
In fact, anyone who has accumulated more than a little wealth will not save the majority of their wealth in gold, because, as gold-haters always point out (correctly), gold does not pay interest.
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Ummmmmm... Expansion is drawing to its end.
With finite money material as gold is, hoarding money might produce interests.
When one hoards gold, it withdraws from the economic activity that could be potentially supported, everything else being equal.
By diminishing the level of activity, one decreases the opportunity of jobs creationg. As people can less and less work, they might be compelled to sell their other assets to make ends meet.
So what? If hoarding gold is done on a sufficient scale, one can litterally starve people. With the expected consequences on deflating prices.
It is interests paid on gold in one form.
This is just crazy talk!!! This is ready-made fiat-debt-spewing predator-speak, whether you realize it or not.
This is so simple that it is embarrasing to have to say out loud. People don't "hoard" gold, people "save" gold. Why do they do that? To "withdraw from economic activity"? Give us a break! The honest, ethical kind of human producer who saves gold doesn't want the freaking gold --- he wants a new automated milling machine for his machine shop, or 640 acres of farmland to expand production.
However, we don't produce enough in short period of time to afford another expensive machine for our machine shop, or another 640 acres to establish another crop. We earn slowly. So, how can we EVER get those large items we want to expand our productivity? Let me think... let me strain my brain. Oh wait, I just invented a new idea!!! I'll hold my gold coins (or any other durable good) until I have enough saved up to trade for my new machine or farmland.
What a concept!
I have never taken a loan in my life. Never. And by being frugal and productive, I have gradually been able to produce and save, then buy to expand my productivity, then repeat again and again. But I'm sure that you believe the federal-reserve bankster scam-PR that says everyone should just borrow a shitload of money and start out with a new factory of their very own. What total bullcrap! This is the new "economic theory"?
It is IMPOSSIBLE to starve ANYONE by hoarding gold. If anyone tried that, people would simply save platinum, palladium, rhodium, silver or any other durable good... or perhaps even buy up farmland or other assets. You didn't even read what I wrote apparently, because you would have noticed that anyone who is greedy will recognize very quickly that they can grow their wealth VASTLY faster by converting their static pile of non-productive gold into a machine shop, or a productive farm, or a shoe factory, or any other of thousands of productive endeavors. Nobody in their right mind would try to corner the gold market, and they could NOT corner the gold market --- unless they live in a world with a central bank that creates absolutely unlimited free cash (at 0% interest currently) for their co-predator buddies in the financial industry, which then multiplies that by untold multiples via various kinds of fractional reserve scams and then 20x to 40x leverage on the fraudulant commodity markets which is controlled by their captured revolving-door buddy-system.
Outstanding reply to more egregiously statist bullshit from AnonymousAsshole!
You, Honestann, are one of my favorite posters here. I always look forward to your comments. Keep up the good work!
Outstanding reply to more egregiously statist bullshit from AnonymousAsshole!
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Outstanding from a US citizen's POV then.
This guy based his fantasy on a macro expansion scenario (when I warned macro expansion is becoming less and less possible)
This guy is still stuck in the US 19th fabled past, which neglects that Indians sponsored the welfare of the US citizens promotion to middle class.
World is running out Indians. Or actually, the best Indians left are the Western middle class.
I have not read your post? More than you have read mine in all case.
Your scenario reeks of expansion. You state about acquiring a new productive farm, add another machine etc, growing their wealth vastly faster...
That is expansion.
Money supply is a two way street. Supply might be achieved by adding or withdrawing.
People have never tried (and succeeded) in starving other people by hoarding gold? Really? Just check people who discussed with Smith and the causes that led Smith to advocate colonization.
Your comment, just as one from a typical US citizen, is a web of fantasies, unable to address the situaition at hand.
Expansion rate is going to slow down. Later times might be about a contracting economy even. So what? You are basing your fantasy on an macro expansion scenario?
In a contracting or even slow growing context, people learned long ago that hoarding gold (when it is used as a currency) is excellent as it starve people around and can force deflating prices, allowing people with large amount of gold to buy cheap.
Like most people, you have no idea what "money" means. Frankly, this concept is impossible to talk about any longer, because no two people share the same meaning for that concept, and in most brains the concept is just about as fuzzy as any concept can get.
For practical purposes (they way most people sorta mean "money"), what we need is a world without money. That's what I said. People should exchange one real good for another real good. As currently understood, "money" is nothing but a scheme for predators to rape everyone, especially producers.
Think about it. When you produce something, you have something valuable. Ditto for everyone else. When you want something someone else produced, you trade something you produced for it. At no time did you need "money", you exchanged goods. There is only one problem. Often another producer doesn't need what we produced when we need his goods. What is the solution? Simple. A durable and divisible commonly accepted good. Then you can exchange your goods for gold, then exchange your gold for other goods you want and need. No need for anything except real goods, gold being one of them.
So, "what about expansion"? Simple. Expansion is simply all production minus all destruction and degradation. Period. If everyone stops producing, the aggregate would suffer "contraction". If everyone starts producing twice as much, the aggregate would enjoy "expansion". What the facts are is not a "policy" or a "goal" or a "mandate" --- it is simply the result of billions of individual choices, plus a modest degree of natural degradation and intentional destruction.
I do not assume expansion or contraction. I do not decide how much people want to work and produce, I do not decide how efficient people are at production, I do not decide any of the factors involved in "expansion" except in my own tiny domain.
You keep repeating nonsense as if that will make it true. It won't. The fact is, people do not eat gold, and gold is not fertilizer required for growing food. If some government or mad scientist somehow captured ALL the gold on earth, that would starve nobody. People would simply start trading the goods they produced for silver and/or platinum and/or palladium and/or rhodium and/or any other good. Read what I wrote. Even with no gold remaining in circulation, the gold standard would continue to work fine. That people exchange other coins (or other goods) for goods they want and need is perfectly compatible with a gold standard. What matters is that nobody ever exchange real goods for some piece of paper, because predatory scumbags will ALWAYS gain control over the control and proliferation of that paper.
the problem of today is lack of payable demand. Lack of it even with paper money (nobody even thinks people would have gold to pay for food)
When there are too many jobless people they will not demand to be paid in gold - they will work for any paper that entitles them to get some food.
Freedom to hoard all the wealth will leave billions without any freedom because they will have no capital to be free
Everyone who produces anything HAS capital. What they produced IS their capital. To pretend "pieces of paper" is capital is absurd. It is equally absurd to pretend that only "gold coins" are capital... though at least gold coins are one kind of capital, while paper is nothing more than fraud and mass delusion.
People just don't understand. Why? What you call "capital" is produced. If you want "capital", all you need to do is "plant some fruit or veggie seeds", or "convert strips of leather into shoes or jackets", or any other productive activity. In a free world, the vast majority of human beings can become wealthy, whether they hold any of that wealth in gold or not. All their capital might be in farmland, or machine shop equipment and tools. It matters not, and in fact productive capital is the most effective multiplier of real wealth that mankind has ever found.
Everyone who produces anything HAS capital. What they produced IS their capital. To pretend "pieces of paper" is capital is absurd. It is equally absurd to pretend that only "gold coins" are capital... though at least gold coins are one kind of capital, while paper is nothing more than fraud and mass delusion.
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Mass delusion? Fraud?
But pieces of paper are produced? Producing the framework for a legal tender to be legally accepted is production. And therefore by your own standard capital.
It is another non sense brought to you by US citizens.
Dear AnonymousAsshole,
You constantly babble in cryptic sentence fragments, making no demonstrably logical points, and with no facts other than your burning, blind and blanket hatred not for the US government (which would be understandable and well deserved), but for US citizens themselves. You add nothing to the conversation here, ever, and in fact routinely subtract from it. Kindly fuck off.
Gold in lift off. 1893.80
Charts and Data point to a bloody September: 20% opportunities are setting up
http://capital3x.com/?p=711
"The profit motive is the key to good decisions and long-term thinking"
Complete and utter rubbish. Banks had profit in mind when they made the decision to package up crappy mortgages and sell them on as 'quality' loans.
Banks also had profit in mind when deciding to lend to trailer park rednecks who had no hope of paying off the mortgage.
Banks also had profit in mind when buying Government bonds at low rates and flipping them back to Government for a profit weeks later.
AIG had profit in mind when it sold insurance it could not possibly fulfill.
When will you free market idiots give it up? The free market CAN NEVER WORK. Look at the meat market in London in the middle ages for your reasons why.
Intervention is INEVITABLE in a free market due to the profit motive not being in line with humanity. The idea that a businessman won't kill all his customers because "it's bad for business" is total crap - he just makes sure he gets what he thinks he will get from them before dicarding them.
Free market idiots are so fucking dumb, a child of 4 can see why the free market cannot work, and yet every defence is to return to the very thing which failed in the first place.
Remember the FED was created in response to a 'ECONOMIC CRISIS OF THE FREE MARKET' - who are you going to blame for that crisis Free Marketeers?
How far do you need to go back in order to prove that market intervention came before market failure?
Typical free market fools - blaming Government, blaming market participants, blaming international issues - anything but admit the truth which is the free market has, and will always fail.
Please, please, please show me a working free market that is likely to stay free - just one will do.
As per history, when faced with the FACTS that free market capitalism is a fraud which only assists in making the wealthy, weathier - and that profit motive is not condusive to a functioning society - the Free Marketeers will revert to type and start blaming immigrants, foreigners and anyone who they do not see 'as themselves' for causing the problems.
Fucking retarded - the lot of them.
I think you fail to consider one very important fact: The profit motive is terrible and atrocious if it's accompanied by no fear of failure.
The banks have been able to hold us hostage because they got rid of the ring-fence that was Glass-Steagal.
I think you are under the false impression that the US is a free market. Nothing could be further from the truth. It hasn't been a free market since the most dastardly of regulations was enacted: The Federal Reserve Act.
That one reguation spawned the era of regulation and control. It has only become more and more prevalent.
A free market has sound money.
A free market has failure as a risk.
A free market has ratings agencies that have a profit motive to be correct and not government mandated legitimacy.
A free market does not take taxes from some corporations and give it to others.
A free market does not give tax breaks to corporations that others do not get.
A free market lets the market decide who wins, not the government.
What you are against is what I am against. You are against favoritism, cronyism and corruption, and so am I.
Where we differ is that you accept the paradigm of regulation and control when the truth I see is that it is this very paradigm which has brought us to where we stand currently.
Once again the free market supporters troll out their usual crap.
"if it's accompanied by no fear of failure"
So pre-2008 the banks knew they would get bailed out? - Total crap.
In the middle ages, the meat sellers sold bad meat - did they have no fear of failure?
You lack the basic understanding of man's relationship with 'winning' - the more man wins the more he thinks he's invicible. The bankers are an extreme demonstration of that.
We are both against cronyism and Corruption it's true, but where you THINK that the free market offers this, you are wrong. Cronyism has been a part of JPM longer than the FED or any other major Government interference has been enacted.
We agree the cure of interventionism is not a good cure, in fact it's not a cure at all. However you can't see the original disease that brought us here. You think (without any working examples) that if the Government stepped away then all would be fine.
Good luck buying you meat in future then.
Lets look at your claims.
A free market has sound money.
True
A free market has failure as a risk.
True
A free market has ratings agencies that have a profit motive to be correct and not government mandated legitimacy.
Correct, and this is what happened - the PROFIT MOTIVE was provided by the banks who PAID the agencies to rate their crap better. There was no market inteference in the ratings agencies pre-2008 was there?
A free market does not take taxes from some corporations and give it to others.
No, but a free market would allow failure - so all your cars would be built in Japan by now as the US car industry is inefficient. In fact all manufacturing would be done in China because Americans won't (quite rightly) work for slave wages.
A free market does not give tax breaks to corporations that others do not get.
True, a free market gives no tax breaks to anyone.
A free market lets the market decide who wins, not the government.
Wrong, a free market allows the winners to manipulate it and enhance their chances of winning.
Don't you know anything about free market history? Show me a free market in history that worked and did not result in instability or collapse - or more importantly - a failure to deliver goods and services to those that need it.
Most free market ideals completely ignore the role of humanity. It's a theoretical subject which some clown thought was good enough to work in real life.
Apparently not.
I'd like to discuss this topic with you further because I believe the passion and fire with which you are motivated is wonderful. I like that.
I feel, however, completely turned off by your approach to discussion. I do not see how we can ever see eye-to-eye if you are disrespectful, condescending and arrogant in your style.
I would be happy to continue this discussion if you recognize the vile nature of the behavior you've exhibited and are open to treating me with the dignity I deserve and the honor you should seek to exhibit.
If I'm wrong, I very much want you to prove it to me. The last thing I want is to be wrong. However, there is no way I will subject myself to further mistreatment for the mere act of disagreeing with you. I am not a masochist.
Apologies - but after 30 years or arguing the free market doesn't and cannot work fatigue has set in.
Also I am most concerned about the fact that we're debating this as the economies of the world collapse. Really this is not a discussion that you and I need to be having - it's one our politicians should have had many, many years ago.
The real problem is 'marketing' - most Americans associate Marx (incorrectly) with Communism. Whilst Marx did write the manifesto, 95% of what he wrote was about Capitalism, not Communism. This is a misconception spread by the combination of state and wealthy forces in America. it's nice and convenient to scare Americans away from Marxism by incorrectly pointing at Stalinist Russia and persuading them all that "capitalism is the best option"
I bet you own shares - and do you think it's wise to own shares when you don't fully understand the consequences of that?
Would you play Poker in a casino for money when you only know the order of betting and hierarchy of card sets? - I suspect not, but there are millions of shareholders around the world doing exactly that.
As time ticks on and the sheepeople finally realise that "nobody is controlling captialism, it's controlling us" as the intervention of Governments fails and the reality of "letting them fail" becomes less and less paletable - the sheepeople will panic.
My only hope is that they don't panic and run into the arms of someone offering 'solutions' - because that's exactly how this twat got into power.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitler
You can already see the beginnings of this - the Tea Party Economic 'minds' have already proposed a complete cessation of paying US debts - these sorts of actions usually start wars - if you're going to default you have to do it gradually for least immediate pain and least adverse reaction.
However 'simple' solutions proposed by 'simple' people are often popular - to simpletons...and the more scary the crisis we face - the more people will think like simpletons.
You might be surprised, but we're more on the same page than you realize.
Please understand that I am not suggesting unfettered, unregulated capitalism. That is obviously incorrect, and anyone who thinks otherwise is a fascist or an ideologue who can't use logic but thinks they're logical despite failing to account for human imperfection.
My approach to regulation is simple though: Is this a problem the market truly cannot solve, and if so, is the cure worse than the disease?
I find most economic regulations completely unreasonable and counter-productive, but as you noted earlier, I am in favor of Glass-Steagal and a stable and secure S&L system ring-fenced from Wall Street.
Where I diverge from most libertarians most greatly is in regards to protection of the environment. One not even need make an emotional case for that. Destruction of the environment destroys wealth by requiring expending liquid capital to clean it up, making previously valuable land worthless, shortening the lives of people (human capital) and expending liquid capital by necessitating the use of lawyers and the courts after the fact. I find that reasonable approaches to prevention cost less and make our lives better. However, I conversely find that many environmentalists are prone to believe any hype regarding threats to the environment and quick to call for regulation without carefully considering the matter.
I share your fear that the people will, in a time of crisis, listen to the words of bad men and put them into power. We are so close to destroying ourselves it's scary. Regardless, I'm on a mission to change minds, one at a time, and to refine my own mind along the way.
Your trying to cherry pick the free market - and it won't work.
I would love the free market to work - but it clearly cannot (well not without human consequences)
Those who think they can 'tinker' with it to 'solve' the problems are time wasters - you call these "successive Governments"
For any market to operate for any length of time you need rules, rules require 'policemen' to enforce them - and instantly you have produced your market interference. This inevitably ends in fascism (merger of corporation and state)
We need a controlled market - but one that;s controllled by ALL people, freely and fairly - and free markets cannot achieve this.
The only way I could see this working is where there is forced discontinuation and corporations cannot grow and are forcibly destroyed.
...however this is not neccessarily efficient - and it's still prone to corruption as someone has to decide "who gets broken" and who survives.
Anarchy is the way forward - the moment you put someone in charge 2 things happen.
1) The power corrupts the power holder
2) The people being 'controlled' absolve themselves of responsibility
You can see this in evidence right now as banks use corrpt methods to ensure survival (bailouts from Governments) and Governments assist in order to maintain their own power (no economy, no power).
....and the absolution of responsibility for the disaster by the masses is also evident. Both in the making and the fixing of the crisis - all society wants to do is point fingers and blame.
People who are led expect to be led.
How does order through anarchy/chaos not occur, and how does it not allow the same corruption you speak of to occur?
You're saying I'm the one ignoring human nature, but your idea seems to suffer the same fate. I fail to see how order through chaos will fully and completely mitigate human nature.
Let's just say the governments of the world were disappeared off this planet. Everything else was left but the governments were gone. Now we have anarchy, right? What happens?
People group together locally. Those local groups form agreements and alliances with eachother as time goes on. Eventually they agree to live under an umbrella organization while maintaining the most control locally.
So what we have is government arising from chaos.
If you say that you're fine with local control and agreements with other local groups to enforce shared beliefs, I'm with you. I'm totally in favor of bottom-up governing with almost all control locally and very little control as the group governed becomes bigger.
Did I misunderstand you?
Anarchy does not mean chaos - you need to get that imprinted thought out of your mind (it's the state abusing our language) - anarchy merely means "without ruler" - this is deliberate confusion designed to put people off anarchy (interpreting it as chaotic)
What you describe is almost perfectly accurate of what will happen. However the 'enforce shared beliefs' does not work, because it's very difficult to impose on another without the full support of everyone.
A good example is the world itself - we currently live under an Anarchic system of 'world Governments' - there is no 'leader' and all decisions have to be done by diplomacy. Lack of full support means that imposition cannot happen (see Syria, see which nations still support it) - rightly or wrongly (and lets be fair, neither you nor I know for sure) there is a policing going on.
The same will work at a local level - try to imagine Arkansas coming up with a plan to provide water for all - it needs help to build it - if it's arguments are convincing enough then it gets built.
A much better decision maker than the current system of "what kickbacks will the mayor get" - or "how much profit can I make from the neccessary supply of water"?
It's leading by example rather than leading by force through appointment of leaders.
Too much is placed on the individual in all societies - and they consequently make mistakes.
However the 'enforce shared beliefs' does not work, because it's very difficult to impose on another without the full support of everyone.
It's not difficult to impose at all. That's how all self-governed nations work. The problems arise when a small majority impose their will on others. That's the wisdom behind the 3/4 requirement for amending the Constitution.
I still am failing to see how starting from an anarchic state will change that as I think that human beings will naturally agree to such arrangements provided they are not too majorly inconvenienced. We take the path of least resistance. A vast majority will agree to policing the group at large so long as the initial burdens are tolerable.
We are inclined by our biology to group together and enforce group standards. I don't see how anarchism changes or mitigates that.
Lack of full support means that imposition cannot happen (see Syria, see which nations still support it) - rightly or wrongly (and lets be fair, neither you nor I know for sure) there is a policing going on.
I think it's lack of enough support that is preventing incursion into Syria.
If you think full support is necessary, I point you to Iraq and George W Bush. All it takes is a balance of power and fear.
It's leading by example rather than leading by force through appointment of leaders.
I think you overestimate peoples' disdain for the government police function. Democratic governments are not formed by slim majorities. They are initially formed by a much larger contingent. It is only after they are initially formed that a smaller majority becomes able to process further legislation. The answer to this is to, as part of the initial formation, require more than a slim majority to pass laws.
free market is a market where everyone has equal opportunities to compete that means
1) no monopolies (at least several independent competitors in each product)
2) no exclusive rights on resources and raw materials and all semi-products down the line and all the end products
3) full information disclosure about the products so that the buyer has full information he may need to make educated decision
THERE HAD NEVER BEEN TRULY FREE MARKET ANYWHERE ANYTIME
even if you honestly tried there would immediately appear groups of interests and alliances that would try to drive competitors out, make exclusive deals etc.