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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 08:33 PM
Original message
Iron Sunrise Over America
This is an essay about our economic situation. There is nothing in this essay that hasn't been said before. It has been said forty years ago, in the abstract:

One of the most expensive things an economy can buy is economic trial, error, and development. "Expensive" of course does not mean "wasteful"...

when the development of a formerly strong economy is neglected, so much capital becomes available for unproductive purposes that it is almost an embarrassment. People are hard put to devise ways to use it. The society seems extraordinarily affluent for a time, and in a way it is. For the society is economizing on one of the most expensive things it might buy. All sorts of philanthropies, extravagances, and displays of vainglory become possible.

- Jane Jacobs, "The Economy of Cities" (1969)


The situation has been remarked upon recently by the corporate media as a matter of fact, just part of the normal market cycle:

...the declining dollar is a significant factor. The decline is the result of years of large and growing U.S. trade deficits that should have caused the exchange rate to adjust years ago but didn't because so many of our trading partners in Asia and the Middle East were intent on linking their currencies to the dollar. In the process of maintaining those dollar pegs and reinvesting those surpluses in Treasury bonds and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac securities, they created a surfeit of cheap credit that spawned all those bubbles.

Now that the process is reversing itself, the overvalued dollar is being repriced.

- Stephen Pearlstein, "The Mirage Economy", Washington Post, May 28, 2008


A less sanguine view of the situation is presented by environmentally and economically aware writers (often called "Cassandras" for being realistic):

Notice how many of the things we had in 1933 are gone now. Our cities, with a few exceptions, are imploded husks. Our small towns and small cities (Schenectady, home of G.E.!) are gutted, especially in terms of locally-owned business. Our passenger rail system is worse than anything a Soviet ministry might produce (while the airline industry that replaced it is dying of a kind of financial hemorrhagic fever). Our local transit hardly exists anymore. Family farms have all but disappeared. We have plenty of manpower earnestly eager to become American Idols (but certainly not for heavy labor). Our oil industry now supplies only a fraction of the world's daily supply (and not even enough for half of our own needs).

- James Kuntsler, "Anxious Hiatus" (5/26/08)


And last, but not least, politically aware writers have dared to point out that these actions are NOT natural and have dared to place the blame on the culprits:

What has overtaken America's working people is not a natural disaster like "globalization," and not even some kind of societal atavism in which countries regress mysteriously to their 19th-century selves. This is a man-made catastrophe, a result that proceeded directly from the deliberate beatdown of organized labor and the wrecking of the liberal state.

It is, in other words, a political disaster, with tax cuts, trade agreements, deregulatory measures, and enforcement decisions all finely crafted to benefit one part of society and leave the rest behind.

- Thomas Frank, "Our Great Economic U-Turn" (WSJ, 5/14/08)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121072656227790335.html


What follows, then, is merely my personal sci-fi metaphor for the awful fate that has overtaken America. I am strongly in the unnatural/Cassandra camp. So, pop a Paxil, and "let's roll".

------------------------

just outside the expanding light cone of the present a star died, iron-bombed.

Something—some exotic force of unnatural origin—twisted a knot in space, enclosing the heart of a stellar furnace. A huge loop of superstrings twisted askew, expanding and contracting until the core of the star floated adrift in a pocket universe where the timelike dimension was rolled shut on the scale of the Planck length...An enormous span of time reeled past within the pocket universe, while outside a handful of seconds ticked by. From the perspective of the drifting core, the rest of the universe appeared to recede to infinity...The stellar core cooled and contracted, dimming...by the end of the process, a billion trillion years down the line, the star was a single crystal of iron crushed down into a sphere a few thousand kilometers in diameter...

Then the external force that had created the pocket universe went into reverse, snapping shut the pocket and dropping the dense spherical crystal into the hole at the core of the star, less than thirty seconds after the bomb had gone off. And the gates of hell opened. When the guts were scooped out of the star and replaced with a tiny cannonball of cold degenerate matter, the outer layers of the star, held away from the core by radiation pressure, began to collapse inward across a gap of roughly a quarter million kilometers of cold vacuum. The outer shell rushed in fast, accelerating in the grip of a stellar gravity well...Then the hammerblow of the implosion front reached the core . . .

The hammerfall was a spherical shock wave of hydrogen plasma..., by the time it slammed into the crystal of iron at the heart of the murdered star it was traveling at almost 2 percent of lightspeed. When it struck, a tenth of the gravitational potential energy of the star was converted into radiation in a matter of seconds. Fusion restarted, exotic reactions taking place as even the iron core began to soak up nuclei, building heavier and hotter and less stable intermediaries. In less than ten seconds, the star burned through a visible percentage of its fuel, enough to keep the fires banked for a billion years. ...a respectable shock front, almost a hundredth as potent as a supernova, rebounded from the core.

A huge pulse of neutrinos erupted outward, carrying away much of the energy from the prompt fusion burn...they deposited a good chunk of their energy in the roiling bubble of foggy plasma that had replaced the photosphere...The dying star flashed a brilliant X-ray pulse like a trillion hydrogen bombs detonating in concert: and the neutrino pulse rolled out at the speed of light.

- Charles Stross, "Iron Sunrise"


It is hard to comprehend the sustained level of upper class loathing of FDR and the middle class his policies brought into being. Sickeningly, the evidence shows that that class is willing to snuff out the entire US economy to be rid of those uppity laboring folks and pointy-headed policy wonks. From the minute that they October Surprised Carter out of the White House (a Carter who willingly appointed the first economic Darth Vader: Paul Volcker and willingly deregulated the S&Ls), the GOP executed their murderous strategy of "money uber alles".

To follow the star metaphor, from 1945 to 1980 America's middle class economy was a robust, "main sequence" star, burning its fuel at a steady rate. There were good jobs at good wages, mass production and energy production were "on shore" and well-regulated, the government represented people more than ever before.

But since 1980, the GOP "iron bombers" have created a series of financial bubbles which artificially carved the core out of the economy and accelerated the concentration of wealth in the top 1%. The good jobs were sent to sweatshops overseas, and the increased profits from that off-shoring went into the pockets of the stock manipulating elites. The growing vacuum at the manufacturing core of the economy manifested itself as increasing middle class indebtedness. But, there was a lot of distance for the day-to-day "surface" economy to fall through that debt vacuum, before it hit bottom.

Meanwhile, the lack of investment in the real economy was matched by a concomitant increase in extravagance, just as Jane Jacobs predicted. Corporate execs blew millions on birthday parties and tens of millions on trophy homes. For thirty years, the cut-off financial core concentrated wealth to the point where billionaires had enough cash to buy the mass media and the political process entirely. Meanwhile, the suckers in the middle class bought fat, sloppy McMansions and fat, sloppy SUVs - mostly on credit. For twenty years, we head a one-time blowoff of assets. Everyone looked great and partied hard.

In keeping with Charles Stross's estimate, we have burned through over 9 Trillion dollars of assets during the Bush regime nova event - a substantial fraction of America's total financial assets, past and future. Finally, within the last year, the shockwave of US economic implosion has finally begun to impact upon the "crystalline" economic core of concentrated finance and wealth. All the bullshit valuation of sub-prime mortgages has vaporized like a stellar photosphere, irradiated by the hard impact of economic reality upon the financial core. Now, the over-leveraged US banks and brokerages are coughing up real assets to sovereign wealth funds. This is the equivalent of a nova star ejecting the heavy elements from its core.

As James Kunstler enumerated, America doesn't make anything anymore (except trouble). When the afterglow of the "party at the end of the universe" fades, it is going to get very dark in America - because we don't have the means to rebuild our factories.

But, the elites will be just fine, thank you. The iron sunrise they engineered is in the process of blowing the American middle class to atoms. (You think its a little dangerous now? Give it a moment, and it will become lethal.) Meanwhile, the elites have banked enough from the mass looting of the economy over the last thirty years to wall themselves off, and buy enough loyal guards to protect them in the coming continent-sized Haiti that they will construct. If necessary, they will move to their overseas houses until the radiation levels in America subside, secure in their crystalline core of looted assets.

Welcome to crime on a planetary scale.

arendt
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 09:15 PM
Response to Original message
1. Front page kick n/t
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Wednesdays Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 05:36 PM
Response to Reply #1
62. Well, after a slow start you've got 54 recs and heading to the top
of the Greatest Page. Congratulations...justice has prevailed, after all. :)
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 10:02 PM
Response to Original message
2. Geez. I connect Jane Jacobs, Charles Stross, and Thomas Frank, and no one even notices.
While some thread like "how about that Snotty Scotty?" gets ten recs.

This site is sooooo frustratingly captive of the "shiny object of the day".

When you are all looking for your next meal, you might want to consider the economic predicament we continue to be in.

arendt
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BeHereNow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 10:20 PM
Response to Reply #2
5. American Idol politics knows no party line.
Are you really surprised?
It's very much part of "how we got here."

BHN
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:04 PM
Response to Reply #5
14. No, just "puzzled" and "saddened". n/t
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Fire Walk With Me Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 01:08 PM
Response to Reply #2
41. Your thread title immediately invoked Charles Stross and drew me in.
Well said, well-written.

The first quote reminded me utterly of the Reagan years and the call to irresponsible spending.

It's important that people realize that they're being laughed at by the rich, who are getting richer. Laughed at.
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 01:51 PM
Response to Reply #41
44. Stross has some interesting stuff to say...
The two books with the semi-omnipotent galactic/temporal entity lurking around (of which IS is the second) are the most entertaining for me(really liked the idea of bombarding a police state planet with cell phones).

While Accelerando had some interesting concepts, the teensy spaceship was a bit tedious.

Thanks for being drawn in.

arendt

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trof Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 05:19 PM
Response to Reply #2
61. I couldn't agree more with "shiny object of the day".
K&R, BTW.
Not that this thread needs more recs.
I've been reading Kunstler for a while.

But somewhere in this despair there must be hope.
Otherwise we just say 'fuck it' and party on to the end.
:-(
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BeHereNow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 10:16 PM
Response to Original message
3. I think you and I are the only people to have ever mentioned Volcker on DU.
Edited on Thu May-29-08 10:16 PM by BeHereNow
As always, you have outdone yourself with this post.
I mentioned PV here today on another thread.
I don't think most people have a clue as to who he is.
K&R.
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:01 PM
Response to Reply #3
11. Many thanks for five replies, BHN. Is PV really that obscure? That is "saddening".
Maybe when all those credit cards are cancelled, people will start paying attention to economics.

Thanks again (for all five).

arendt
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BeHereNow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:19 PM
Response to Reply #11
20. Many on DU still think the Trilateral Commission a "conspiracy theory."
That would be because they are completely ignorant or
working for the trolls.

It aint a conspiracy if it's documented.
Trouble is, most, even DUers, would prefer to read the
MSM shit shoveled to them than spend an hour
reading something factual.

BHN
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:22 PM
Response to Reply #20
21. If you are under 30 and without a guide, finding facts amid this shitstorm is...
Edited on Thu May-29-08 11:23 PM by arendt
very hard work.

To give them the benefit of the doubt, there is a huge contingent of trolls and bs artists pushing the corporate party line, even on DU.

How does a 20-something know that you or I are telling them the truth, anymore than Joe Troll?

That is why things are so messed up. Truth has become a scarce commodity.

arendt
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BeHereNow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:30 PM
Response to Reply #21
25. As someone I respect once told me- DON't TAKE my word for it, do your own RESEARCH.
Which is exactly what I did.

I don't have super powers or anything.
Anyone can read.
Most can't be bothered with more than one line quips
or a few paragraphs, and GOD forbid anything they read
require a dictionary or further research to comprehend the full
implications of what they have read.

Conduct a poll on DU and ask how many DUers have
actually READ the entire Patriot Act...
BHN
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StClone Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 08:58 PM
Response to Reply #21
70. The Truth Movement
Edited on Fri May-30-08 08:59 PM by StClone
Scottie sells his wares and the already known is profitable. Scottie's is a shiny thing of the day but of historical import as it presents truth.

WE need a Truth Party! One whose first priority is finding and moving truth to the populace that has become too disorientated, ignorant and distracted.

Economic truths you present are part of the needed movement.
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Ghost Dog Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 04:23 AM
Response to Reply #21
75. That's also why you can't have a true Democracy
(or anything approaching the ideal) without truly dedicated Education (of the masses).

And I mean education not only in the sense of supplying information; but most importantly in the sense of "Teaching people to Think for Themselves".
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maryf Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 05:57 AM
Response to Reply #75
77. Which is why Public Education is being undermined
NCLB was designed to keep people from being able to think for themselves, learn facts only, and be able to fill in bubbles (micro coordination skills). Critical thinking skills and creative problem solving skills are lost as teachers are forced to teach to the tests or be accountable; schools that fail are placed under "state review". Its part and parcel of the plan to keep the workers in their place, put their thoughts in their heads, stop the thinking process, and in conjunction with the media, its working.
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Ghost Dog Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 04:34 PM
Response to Reply #77
87. Yes, precisely so, I'm afraid. UK too, of course. n/t
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Selatius Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 10:00 PM
Response to Reply #3
72. I remember Paul Volcker. I happen to think his jacking up interest rates helped in the long-run.
When he came into office, the inflation rate was 14 percent or higher, but he started a program of disinflation by increasing interest rates to bring the growth of the supply of money back under control. It meant a lot of short-term pain as higher interest rates essentially represent a tightening of credit, but that's the cost of taming inflation at least within the current banking system.
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BeHereNow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 10:10 PM
Response to Reply #72
73. Volcker-
"No one is quite sure why the Trilateral Commission exists, and less clear about what it does, but critics from the lumpen (non-elite) Right as well as the scholarly Left are certain that it's important. If you feel that the Democrats and Republicans are two wings of the same party, and that someone else is pulling the strings and laughing all the way to the bank, then Trilateralism is your cup of conspiracy tea. When Reagan pointed out on February 7, 1980 that 19 key members of the Carter administration were Trilateralists, George Bush gingerly dropped his membership. And by 1992 some observers were getting curious about Bill Clinton's membership.
The Commission is an alliance of top political and economic leaders from North America, Japan, and Western Europe. Their aim is to manage global interdependence between these Big Three in a way that allows the rich to stay rich -- probably by discouraging protectionism, nationalism, or any response that would pit the elites of one against the elites of another. The anticipated economic pressures will be deflected downward rather than laterally. Trilateralist Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker put it more bluntly: "The standard of the average American has to decline."

http://www.eurotrib.com/story/2006/10/20/62240/899

BHN
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Selatius Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 12:04 AM
Response to Reply #73
74. How else could inflation be brought under control without raising interest rates?
Edited on Sat May-31-08 12:05 AM by Selatius
Should he have used the same policies as the Fed chairman before him with the inflation being as high as it was in the 1970s?

I'm not disputing his membership or not in the Trilateral Commission, and I don't question its existence. (For that matter, Bill Clinton was a false friend of the worker; always was, always will be) My question is one of policy only: How do you bring down inflation without tightening the money supply by restricting its growth?
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 10:20 AM
Response to Reply #74
81. Your focus on inflation is overly tight...
First, the inflation was largely the result of oil price rises and the recycling of petro-dollars through US banks. The banks made a fortune on that recycling, despite the inflation - because banks get to spend the money into existence, before inflation gets a bite of it. Their control of interest rates allowed them to always be at the front of the line. Inflation didn't hurt financial speculators, which is what the banks morphed into in the late 70s.

As to your question about alternatives, different (but politically unpalatable) ways to fight commodity inflation do exist. One way would be to tax windfall profits to the oil and banking industries. Another way, which Carter half-heartedly tried, was to promote energy conservation and energy efficiency. A third way would have been more extreme rationing of heavily inflated commodities that were driving the overall inflation.

Remember, we are talking the 1970s, when Nixon instituted price controls, and closed the gold window. Massive government intervention in the economy was still possible then.

Another approach would have been for the Fed to have curbed the eearly 80s stock market bubble. That bubble inflated because the rich speculators had nothing better to do with their money. As George Brockaway put it (paraphrase) "tax cuts gave the rich a trillion dollars, which they put in the stock market where it was all flushed in the 1987 crash." That was real money which vanished into the "stellar core" of my Iron Sunrise analogy, and was literally vaporized in that market correction.

But, no. We got this narrow "pain must be inflicted upon the people" attitude from our financial lords and masters. MIlton Friedman was pushing his now thoroughly discredited monetarism; so fiscal solutions were completed ignored. Ideology won then, and it has never looked back.

I would also suggest that the rushed and flawed deregulation of the S&Ls contributed to the length of the inflationary period. People were gaming the S&L system, putting their money into long term, FICA-guaranteed accounts at unsupportable (in the long-term) rates. Those locked-in interest rates contributed heavily to the later 80s inflation. Then the taxpayer got the final bill with the S&L bailout.

To summarize: there are more ways to fight inflation than "price rationing". The problem was structural (oil prices, top bracket tax cuts, and deregulation), and it was never dealt with (except insofar as people accepted being robbed by the oil majors and their Saudi co-conspirators). The Bush family was in the thick of this extortion then, both on the oil and the S&L robbery; and it still is today.

I repeat, your focus on inflation is excessively narrow.

arendt
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BeHereNow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 10:18 PM
Response to Original message
4. K&R because it is a "MUST READ" post.
Been thinking about you Arendt.
As usual, you show up just in time.

BHN
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:03 PM
Response to Reply #4
13. I was out of town, taking a break from DU.
I thought I could counter-program against Scotty.

Doesn't seem to have gotten beyond my core audience.

arendt
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BeHereNow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:13 PM
Response to Reply #13
17. Think "quality," not "quantity..." if I may be so bold.
Some of DO appreciate the magnificent contributions
you make to our community.

I, for one, look for YOUR posts first every time I tune in
to the board.

BHN
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:17 PM
Response to Reply #17
18. Appreciated, but we need some quantity or we will be murdered where we stand. n/t
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BeHereNow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:24 PM
Response to Reply #18
22. As we have discussed in the past...
I hold no hope.
The masses are willfully ignorant.
What can we expect?

It's looking like door number two to me "murdered where we stand."

Just take a gander into the GDP threads.
AS IF one of the corporate owned asses, right or left,
Dem or Puke, is gonna save us from the very people who
own them?

Not likely.

Meanwhile, do you know who won American Idol last week?

I hope to stand shoulder to shoulder with the likes of you
when the shit hits the fan Arendt.

At least I can say I knew someone who got it and still
remained hopeful, which is more than I can say for myself.

BHN
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:27 PM
Response to Reply #22
23. I can count the turds in the oncoming shit. Any day now. Nice knowing you...
yeah, Obama - our savior. He will mend fences with good ol' Hillary. And they will carefully convince Ameica that they are a modicum better than Bomber John. Meanwhile, Darth Cheney will nuke Iran.

Maybe I should just go stand in the traffic.

Where is a supernova when you need one?

arendt
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bread_and_roses Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 03:09 PM
Response to Reply #23
47. that's how I feel these days
Just saw this, a K& R from me...

I'm old enough to know who Volker is and to have watched Democrat after Democrat on the local, state, and national level sell out to de-regulation, globalization, out-sourcing, privitization, and all the wealth accrued to the upper 5%; watched them demonitize the poor, ignore the existence of a working class (I am so sick of hearing only about "the middle-class" though goddess knows the middle class is in big trouble too, these days....)

I just got here for a few minutes break and read this - sorry I can't do more than K & R the discussion, maybe I can get back later.

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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:28 PM
Response to Reply #22
24. Bedtime for me. See you in the AM - if there is one. n./t
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BeHereNow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:32 PM
Response to Reply #24
26. Oh, it will come and you can ask yourself as I do...
"What fresh hell is this?"

LOL

:loveya: and nighty night.
I'm signing off too.

Good to "see" you, as always.

BHN
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lonestarnot Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 10:23 PM
Response to Original message
6. K and most highly R
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some guy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 10:25 PM
Response to Original message
7. thanks for the first couple kicks.
As is typical of the things you post, it's pretty complete, and doesn't leave much left for any one else to say. :)

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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:08 PM
Response to Reply #7
15. Thank you, but its possible to talk about how to survive the coming trainwreck...
at a level somewhat above grunting savagery.

If DU was a real community, we would be organizing at least for local survival. I admit I'm as guilty as the next for blowing off my state forum. But, it might behoove us all to start to meet our fellow DUers face to face, to get ready to work together in the coming chaos.

arendt
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druidity33 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 05:51 PM
Response to Reply #15
63. a reply i had stored in my journal...
the title of my reply was "some suggestions".

i don't know how to link to the post, but it was your OP i believe...


-Create a regional Resource guide. Who are the producers in your area? The workers? Identify the needs and skills of neighbors.

-Investigate creating a Local currency. EF Schumacher Society is a good source of info here. http://www.schumachersociety.org /

-Or consider starting a Time Bank in your area. Time Dollars is a tested and exciting way of valuing members of a community and bringing them together. http://www.timebanks.org /

-Insulate your home! Get a free energy audit from your utility company and take advantage of any and all rebates and subsidized programs to install solar panels, upgrade insulation, make Energy Star, etc.

-Reduce Consumption! Use a laundry line. Use power strips. Use CFLs. Practice sharing. Carpool. Walk or ride a bike or take a bus when you can. Whittle a stick on your porch instead of turning on the TV.

-Volunteer at a farm nearby! start your own garden. join a community garden.

-Start building cold-frames (i've grown winter Kale in 2 feet of snow)!

-Be a seed-saver! Know your local foragable greens! (dandelion, purslane, chickweed, early poke, etc)

-Find the nut trees in your area, compete with the squirrels (they're taking over the parks anyway)!

-Test your soil... plant appropriate (native) berry bushes and fruit trees in abundance.

I've harvested beach plum, black cap raspberry, salmonberry, mulberry, blackberry, blueberry, strawberry, black walnut, elderberry, sour cherry... all in the wilds of Western Massachusetts. And the plants that grow naturally in their own domain are much more power packed with flavor and nutrients. Yeah, it's work. But it's fun work... and you get to know your local eco-systems real well. I'm compiling my own regional resource guide... it will be a years long project for me and my child (she's six now)... but she'll know plants and will get wilderness training, and she loves the heck out of picking wild berries and fruits. Not all food needs to come from the store.



If we all try to act like "survivalists" we won't survive. We will need cooperation, not competition in order to rebuild after the fall.

Some good books:

In the Absence of the Sacred by Jerry Mander
Cradle to Cradle by McDonough/Braungart
The Unsettling of America by Wendell Berry
Dwellers in the Land by Kirkpatrick Sale
Timeless Way of Building and A Pattern Language by Chris Alexander
Walden Two by BF Skinner
No More Throw-Away People by Edgar Cahn
Understanding Money by Tom Greco
Mortgage Free by Rob Roy
Small is Beautiful by EF Schumacher
Gaviotas by Alan Weisman



btw, i enjoyed the OP Arendt, and i agree in most every aspect.


Anyone in Western Massachusetts wanna hang out?
:)


K&R

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Ghost Dog Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 04:42 AM
Response to Reply #63
76. All good. OP on its own, please.
... The dishwasher and laundry dryer surely have a lot to answer for. The washing machine itself, of course, gets a pass as the very useful and quite necessary thing it is. But detergents need to be much improved or replaced.

... There's a British (Wales-based) book "Food For Free" by Richard Mabey that is considered seminal over here: http://www.off-grid.net/2005/04/18/wild-food-for-free-3/
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druidity33 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 07:54 AM
Response to Reply #76
79. i've tried that...
It sinks like BIG stones.

Maybe you've got some catchy title that'll convince people to click the link before they realize i'll be talking about things they could DO instead of things they can whinge about?

Off to plant some celery and water my greens... and see if the wild strawberries are up!

:)

peace to you... and i'll check out that book.



Also apt would be Rob Roy's classic book Mortgage-Free!


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BeHereNow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 10:41 PM
Response to Original message
8. Only SIX votes of recommendation? Sometimes I wonder...
Who the hell is on DU?

BHN
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Zodiak Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 10:47 PM
Response to Original message
9. I thought this was great
An interesting analogy...very interesting. I would wager, though, that the minutiae of stellar events do not connect on a visceral level with a large swath of people. But for those of us that appreciate it...thumbs up!
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BeHereNow Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 10:51 PM
Response to Reply #9
10. Talk to the Hopi and Kogi about how things connect...
Our complete dumbing down and lack of awareness of
the law of the universe, as it relates to our place in the grand scheme
of life, have brought us to where we now stand.
http://www.taironatrust.org
BHN
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:02 PM
Response to Reply #9
12. I had hoped there were a lot of sci-fi folks on DU who would appreciate Stross....
clearly that needs a rethink.

Thanks for your support.

arendt
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Zodiak Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:13 PM
Response to Reply #12
16. No problem; I enjoy your posts
And I thought the analogy was great in macroscale as well as microscale. The blow-off of the star's collective energy in a great burst comparison to our recent extravagant credit bubble was very apt.

To be honest, I am more of a fantasy fella, though. I'm only a science guy in my day job.
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu May-29-08 11:18 PM
Response to Reply #16
19. I just never got fantasy. Walked away from Dungeons & Dragons even tho I knew Gary Gygax...
its just not who I am.

Fantasy can get solipsistic (sp?) real fast. Glad it works for you.

arendt
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nashville_brook Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 12:15 AM
Response to Original message
27. bookmarking for later...
can't wait to spend more time with this...!
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 07:27 AM
Response to Original message
28. Morning kick. Any fans of Jacobs or Kunstler here? Or just us Cassandras? n/t
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blindpig Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 07:45 AM
Response to Original message
29. It's not abuse of the system

It's the system itself.

The 'greed' is institutionalized, not an aberration. The New Deal was a mass of half-measures, at best. The beast was muzzled but it's teeth were intact. But it was not tamed, it was biding it's time, and here we are again. Nothing short of ending Capitalism will put an end to these abuses.

And the natural, only, alternative is socialism.
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 07:54 AM
Response to Reply #29
30. Telling the truth in those words will get you Gitmo'd...
Edited on Fri May-30-08 07:54 AM by arendt
...you need to prepare the ground slowly - the way the right wing did it. Put it in the atmosphere, let people breathe it for a decade or two, slowly crank up the volume.

Slow change is the only sustainable change in politics. Do it fast and it gets noticed; you get backlash. Its too obvious. Do it slow and its "the will of the (manipulated) people".

I think we must begin with the death penalty for corporations. Try them and convict them, for the sociopaths they are. Then sell their assets off in an auction that real people, instead of more corporate banking ghouls and sovereign wealth funds, get to bid on. Take the sale proceeds and give them first to the employee pension fund of the dead company. Send the officers to jail. Confiscate the stocks of all the major stockholders as compensation - the same way they treat some poor sod in whose car the cops found three marijuana seeds.

You need more nuance in your language. We must end "Corporatism", not capitalism. The only natural alternative is "regulation".

arendt
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blindpig Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 10:34 AM
Response to Reply #30
36. You are advocating a New Deal

whereas I have said that the New Deal, though providing relief for the working people of the time, was a failure in the long run, as is apparent now. It was a half measure designed to preserve capitalism, in that it worked, but it's justice is all but stripped away. Regulation has and will fail, as long as they have the power(means of production) they will do what they do, accumulate money by means fair and foul.

The term 'corporatism' implies that what we are experiencing is an aberration, rather what we are experiencing is the evolutionary development of capitalism with the next step likely being full blown fascism. There ain't no fixing this thing, it was wrong from the beginning.

As per Gitmo, there's only one way to deal with that, solidarity. They can't jail us all, whose with me?
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 11:08 AM
Response to Reply #36
37. No. I am advocating sounding like I am advocating a New Deal...
Edited on Fri May-30-08 11:12 AM by arendt
my disagreement with you is entirely tactical and about choice of wording.

The other side has taken bought politicians to a whole new level of deceit. It is simply unbelievable that so many people find Hillary or Barack to be "agents of change". Hillary is Joe Lieberman in drag. Barack is backed by the Chicago political machine. But, we have to go with the electorate we have; and they are pretty well bamboozled.

We are back to the old argument about gradualism versus revolution. My point to you is that we need a whole media campaign to restore capitalism as a dirty word and socialism as a good word, in the eyes of the bamboozled. Saying those words right now, the way you want to say them is like walking into an airport and saying "I am a hijacker." My point is: I don't want to be a martyr; I want to be successful.

It seems that your gripe about the New Deal boils down to the fact that, thirty years and two wars after FDR was in his grave, what he put in place got stomped because everyone was thoroughly distracted by Viet Nam, Watergate, Oil Shocks, and Roe v Wade. There is plenty of room to argue that it is the rise of the Military Industrial Complex (i.e., the warmonger side of corporatism), which was never put in the cage, that has engineered the destruction of our democracy; and that a regulated/subsidized market economy can deliver social justice.

So, I would certainly agree with any effort to dismantle our bloated, dangerous military/police/prison repression apparatus. I would also agree with any effort to de-globalize the corporate structures (the price of oil will de-globalize trade without any intervention).

My take on capitalism/corporatism is that there is a difference between a capitalist economy (a few big players, with market-setting power, contrary to economic "theory") and a market economy (lots of small players, with no market-setting power). This take comes from the French Annales school (Fernand Braudel, et al). A little too busy right this minute to go any deeper.

arendt
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blindpig Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 12:54 PM
Response to Reply #37
40. I understand your feeling a need for caution

However, these times, the ecological disaster which is largely the creature of capitalism, requires urgent action. Sacrifice will probably be necessary. I'm not a masochist, but times a wasting.

I think disagree with your differentiation of capitalism/corporatism vs market economies. Define 'small'. If we're talking about private ownership of the means of production with the owners living off the labor of others it's still capitalism. As long as disproportionate wealth is in the hands of the few the injustice is still there, and the potential for much worse. Only a stake thru the heart will do, otherwise that sumbitch will keep coming back.
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 01:44 PM
Response to Reply #40
43. Eco-disaster will loosen the death grip of capitalism, only to replace it with a die-off
frying pan, fire, oh shit. I agree with you on this.

----

Regarding "small", here is the most succinct version of what I am talking about:

Several things follow from Braudel s distinction between market and capitalist institutions (or as he calls them antimarkets ). If markets and antimarkets have never been the same thing then both the invisible handers as well as the commodifiers are wrong, the former because spontaneous coordination by an invisible hand does not apply to big bussiness, and the latter because commodity fetishism does not apply to the products created by small bussiness but only to large hierarchical organizations capable of manipulating demand to create artificial needs. In other words, for people on the right and center of the political spectrum all monetary transactions, even if they involve large oligopolies or even monopolies, are considered market transactions. For the Marxist left, on the other hand, the very presence of money, regardless of whether it involves economic power or not, means that a social transaction has now been commodified and hence made part of capitalism. It is my belief that Braudel s empirical data forces on us to make a distinction which is not made by the left or the right: that between market and antimarket institutions.

- Manuel DeLanda, "Markets, Antimarkets, and Network Economics (1996)
http://www.cddc.vt.edu/host/delanda/pages/markets.htm


This is a deep debate, which I do not have time for right now.

In outline, if you look at the work of non-ideological-hack economists (damn few of them, mostly Western European), you find that the job of markets is to coordinate prices (not to set social policy). Markets are just a tool in a larger system that encompasses the public good and other things. All the trouble and name calling about capitalism and socialism comes from confusing the part with the whole (as hinted at in the excerpt above).

There must be some kind of rules, or there will be chaos. Rules/complexity emerge out of non-linear media. For example, road traffic segregates to one side or the other (but different sides in different countries). Markets are just that kind of emergent phenomena; so to ban them is to fight nature.

However, anti-markets, or capitalism are nothing but authoritarian conspiracies to manipulate the law and the currency in favor of monopolists. Both the market (small business) and governmental components of that "larger system" I mentioned above must be constantly on guard for anti-marketers slipping out of their cage. This happens because you need some large project done, like a bridge or a tunnel or a road network. In the past, people chartered corporations for this kind of thing and wound up being devoured by them.

In the future, we may be able to use the internet to coordinate many small companies to do large projects without the corporate dominators being able to slip in and grab control. I recall some big waterfront project in San Francisco a while back, in which the city put each and every tiny piece of the job online for just-in-time bids. That meant that, if a plumber was scheduled to finish his job at 2 PM, the next phase, say the electrician part would go up for bids at 1 PM. That way, small contractors could instantly fill in the cracks in the schedule. IIRC, the project was done way faster than conventional top-down contracting and with much less graft.

That's my idea of how a non-capitalist market system could work.

arendt
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Tech 9 Donating Member (179 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 03:55 PM
Response to Reply #43
51. Regarding that quote
commodity fetishization does not mean the same thing as 'commodification'. Further, your idea on markets don't even make any sense. What are you claiming drives markets if not demand? And we know that demand means "effective demand" which is exactly synonymous with money. Come on, its just as naive to say that markets are really only about pricing as it would be to say that Marx's Capital advances a theory about prices.

Money as some kind of valueless token under capitalism? Markets as a scientifically definable natural order ("emergent")? You've wrapped yourself up in knots here.
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 04:03 PM
Response to Reply #51
52. Give me a clue where you are coming from...
Edited on Fri May-30-08 04:04 PM by arendt
there are more sects of economic religion than of theological religion.

1. What is the difference (to you) between "commodity fetishization" and "commodification"? Is one good and the other bad?

2. What is the difference (to you) between "demand" and "effective demand"?

Are you saying that any kind of "demand" is bad because all demand equals money? Are you against barter too? How do people signal their needs to each other without "demand"? (If you can't answer that, then withdraw the crack about how markets can't be emergent.) Are you also against division of labor? Does each individual have to supply all his own needs?

3. Walk me slowly through your chain of reasoning about how I have declared money to be "a valueless token"?

I haven't a clue what kind of social distribution arrangements (i.e., economies) would pass the smell test with you.

arendt
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Tech 9 Donating Member (179 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 04:47 PM
Response to Reply #52
55. Where I'm coming from
is that under capitalism, everything is produced for profit. That's not just an academic observation or generalization, that's the imperative of capitalism. Further, the material means of subsistence for almost everyone lies in the hands of a select few who use that stranglehold to extort more and more value from the workers.

If you acknowledge that, and you can't really talk about socialism otherwise, the rest falls into place on its own.

Its seems to me that most of what you call "need" is not so at all. If I use dollars to signal to someone that I "need" a new speed boat, what is that an example? Did the market do its job by effectively pricing speed boats out of the reach of those without enough money? If so, does that conform to your theory that the market is only a mechanism for regulating prices? If the answer is no, then has your theory not self-destructed given that this is the simplest possible example of how prices are regulated?

Withdraw my comment about markets being "emergent"? Please, its borderline sophism you've got going there not to mention being ahistorical to the point of obliviousness.

As for commodities:

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch01.htm#S4
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 04:49 PM
Response to Reply #55
57. Get off your soapbox and answer my questions. You haven't defined your terms. n/t
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Tech 9 Donating Member (179 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 05:02 PM
Response to Reply #57
59. ..
I just quoted you Chapter 4 of Capital and you're still struggling to "peg" me?

A very crude one sentence summary is something like this: commodification is the turning of goods/services into commodities. Commodity fetishization is assigning the value of the commodity to the commodity itself rather than the labor that produced it. In this way societal relations seem to be mere economic transactions especially monetary.

But you should look it up for yourself..
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blindpig Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 04:09 PM
Response to Reply #43
53. For all of that

it seems you're still leaving the capitalist in place, leaving room for him in any case. Allowing a few to live off the labor of many is unacceptable. Leaving the economics of forever growth in place guarantees it's gonna come back and try to consume all if chastised, as you propose. Perhaps some of these market ideas could work in some sort of syndicalist model.
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 04:19 PM
Response to Reply #53
54. More details...
Edited on Fri May-30-08 04:21 PM by arendt
Herman Daly talks a lot about including the environmental and social costs in economics. He invented an index that does that. If such an index were put in place, then money becomes just one dimension of an overall optimization problem, and profit can be traded off (by law and regulation) against environmental and social well-being.

My question to you is: does mathematizing something automatically make it evil? I mean, all kinds of scientists use mathematical models. Some people say that such models are merely elaborate means of argumentation (loaded assumptions, suppressed data, etc.). Still, can I use math without being denounced?

If yes, then, at what point does a mathematical calculation become the dreaded "monetization"?

I hope you see that, to some folks (including me), you can't get to justice and fairness for huge numbers of people simultaneously without some kind of calculation. The laissez faire crowd want that calculation to be a one dimensional addition of arbitrary (or market-based) valuations, called money. I want that calculation to be a search for an optimal point in a high-dimensional and highly-coupled space. In case you don't know me, I have this affection for high-dimensional space as having innate properties of pattern recognition (i.e., the basis for intelligent behavior).

Over to you

arendt
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blindpig Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 05:01 PM
Response to Reply #54
58. Don't know about mathematazing and monetization,

too theoretical for this worker. The question is, under the system you propose, would owners of the means of production be able to steal the labor of workers? If so, it is unacceptable, as justice will not be achieved. And without economic justice there will no solution to our environmental woes, which like the economy require planning.

Good evening
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 05:03 PM
Response to Reply #58
60. But without math, how do you decide what is "theft"? what is a "fair" price? n/t
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Tech 9 Donating Member (179 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 05:57 PM
Response to Reply #60
64. Because there is more to the equation
(sic) than only exchange value ;)
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maryf Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 06:02 AM
Response to Reply #36
78. I'm with you.
And when its realized what strength there is in our numbers, there'll be more...thanks bp.
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blindpig Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 10:52 AM
Response to Reply #78
82. Thanks

It's simply a matter of realizing which side you are on. That will become more and more obvious as the economy implodes and the rich circle their wagons. There's gonna be a lot of shame when many realize that they've been used.
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maryf Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 02:36 PM
Response to Reply #82
86. and when they came for me...
Edited on Sat May-31-08 02:37 PM by maryf
Out of context but same idea. Plus not only shame, but rage and despair will be ruling many minds, best to get it out now, thanks again, Mary

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Echo In Light Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 07:58 AM
Response to Original message
31. Interesting...thanks for posting
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dawgman Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 08:05 AM
Response to Original message
32. Excellent
K and R
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elizfeelinggreat Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 08:48 AM
Response to Original message
33. k & r
Have you read Charles Kelly's online book? I've had this site bookmarked for a while and I've been meaning to spend more time reading it.

( Economic absurdities that Democrats must expose )

http://www.kellysite.net/contentscw.html

Class War in America:
How Economic and Political Conservatives Are Exploiting Low- and Middle-income Americans

By

Charles M. Kelly




Part 1: Class Warfare: Strategies and Their Effects

1. Traditional Conservatism:
To Keep Wages Low, Quietly Manipulate the Prime

2. The “Wage Inflation” Con:
It’s Not Wage Inflation, It’s Profit Inflation

3. The Great Debate,
and a New Conservative Strategy

4. Economic Growth: The Conservatives’ Catch-22

5. Unmanaged “Free” World Trade

6. Guess What: You* Are Now a “Worker” :
*Engineer, Ph.D., computer programmer, scientist, :
professional—and the usual others

7. All Power to Investors; :
Absolutely None for Workers

8. The Victimization of American Workers:
and the New American Morality

9. The Coalition from Workers’ Hell: :
Republicans and Conservative Democrats

Part Two: The Conning of America

10. How Conservatives Lie with Statistics

11. Taxes, and the 1993 Lesson in Econ. 101

12. Taxes, Republicans, and Working Americans

13. The Conservative Takeover of Social Security

14. Corporations Should Run Our Country?

15. Who Protects the Freedoms that Count?

Part Three: The War Against Traditional Values

16. How to Destroy Traditional American Values

17. The New American Royalty

18. Time Is Getting Short

19. Workers of America, Unite!
Because Conservatives Already Have, and
They Own Congress and the Presidency


"Chuck Kelly is the author of THE DESTRUCTIVE ACHIEVER; Power and Ethics in the American Corporation (Addison-Wesley, 1988); THE GREAT LIMBAUGH CON, and Other Right-Wing Assaults on Common Sense (Fithian Press, 1994); and CLASS WAR IN AMERICA; How Economic and Political Conservatives are Exploiting Low- and Middle-Income Americans (Fithian Press, 2000).

He holds a Ph.D. in industrial communications from Purdue University, was a management consultant for 40 years, and is now retired. He taught courses in communication, ethics, and management at Syracuse University, Cal State University, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Institutes of Management. "


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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 09:45 AM
Response to Reply #33
34. Thanks for the book pointer. I had read "The Great Limbaugh Con"...
but the author, himself, never got on my radarscope.

This is certainly worth an online look.

Thanks again,

arendt
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malaise Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 09:47 AM
Response to Original message
35. Great post K & R n/t
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Quantess Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 11:43 AM
Response to Original message
38. Looks like a worthy read.
Bookmarking for later perusal. Thanks.
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Blue_Tires Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 12:35 PM
Response to Original message
39. ttt
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Raksha Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 01:20 PM
Response to Original message
42. Brilliant - K&R, bookmarked to read again. n/t
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Uncle Joe Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 02:00 PM
Response to Original message
45. Physics, history, economics and what seems like poetry all wrapped in to one.
Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, arendt.:thumbsup:
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Hannah Bell Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 02:17 PM
Response to Original message
46. kr
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HCE SuiGeneris Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 03:16 PM
Response to Original message
48. Two words...
Excellent essay!

:kick:
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pscot Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 03:46 PM
Response to Original message
49. Wonderful stuff
But what's the plan? When do we take to the barricades?
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 03:55 PM
Response to Reply #49
50. The bad guys are already behind their barricades. Yours are about to be vaporized...
Edited on Fri May-30-08 03:55 PM by arendt
Its like those movie lines:

Independence Day:

Humans: What do you want us to do?
Alien: We want you to die.

Goldfinger:

Bond: Do you expect me to talk?
Goldfinger: No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die.

--------------

The game is already over. They stole everything.

arendt
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conscious evolution Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 04:49 PM
Response to Original message
56. K&R
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bluesmail Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 06:02 PM
Response to Original message
65. I've often wondered WHY would Elites want enormous wealth?
It finances the 'dig' to get them the answers to ETERNITY/LIFE FOREVER. Thank you for this philosophical thread. The more I know, it turns out the less I know.:hi:
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Wednesdays Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 06:46 PM
Response to Reply #65
66. It's all about power.
At some point, it is no longer about how many expensive things one can stuff in their china cabinet or garage...but rather is a quest for global domination.
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warren pease Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 06:56 PM
Response to Reply #65
67. It's how they keep score. n/t
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 01:13 PM
Response to Reply #67
85. Since they "won" when they were born rich; the sickos among them have to hurt people...
to have any fun.

Winners with no talent need losers to have any self-esteem.

arendt
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warren pease Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 07:13 PM
Response to Original message
68. A few more elites who will weather the storm in fine shape...
One more large flip-off from our elected representatives. Please take something to keep your stomach from revolting before reading.


Congress Has Wealth to Weather Economic Downturn

As Americans worry about their own finances, their elected representatives in Washington -- with a collective net worth of $3.6 billion -- are mostly in good shape to withstand a recession


WASHINGTON -- Economists say the United States may be in a recession, but the personal finances of members of Congress suggest they will be able to weather the storm far better than most Americans, according to a new analysis of three years of lawmakers' personal financial reports by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

U.S. senators had a median net worth of approximately $1.7 million in 2006, the most recent year for which their financial data is available, and 58 percent of the Senate's members could be considered millionaires. In the House of Representatives, the median net worth was about $675,000, with 44 percent of members with net worth estimated to be at least $1 million. By contrast, only about 1 percent of all American adults had a net worth greater than $1 million around the same time.

Before the American economy showed signs last year of slowing down, lawmakers had enjoyed an extraordinary run in their personal investments and other finances. Members of Congress, who are now paid about $169,000 annually, saw their net worths soar 84 percent from 2004 to 2006, on average.

"Like a lot of Americans, as the economy did well, Congress did well but lawmakers did especially well," said Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics. "Now that the nation's economic road is turning rougher, members of Congress have a far more comfortable cushion than most Americans have to ride it out. If their constituents experience economic hardships, policymakers, who are in a position to help boost the economy, generally won't feel the same pain."



I don't know about you, but I was having kind of a shitty day, worrying about money and bills and all that nagging stuff that seems to occupy more and more of my time and energy these days.

But when I saw that my elected representatives, for whom I have the highest regard, were likely going to make it through the tough times ahead without having to endure the misery that awaits the peasantry, I got a little flush of national pride just thinking how, after centuries wasted trying to live the false ideology of government by the people, we've finally got our priorities straight.

You've got to admire a nation that rewards its political masters with lifelong security for simply occupying a fancy leather chair for a couple of years. And it's "hurd wurk" speechifying at weird hours to an empty chamber and a lone C-Span camera because they needed to be on record supporting a resolution to designate the third Saturday in May as "National Mayonnaise Appreciation and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Readiness Day." Not to mention working 16 hour stretches on the phone to scrounge up enough money from their civic-minded corporate contributors to get re-elected.

Yup, it's a great, great country alright that has such people in it.


wp
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pretzel4gore Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 07:50 PM
Response to Original message
69. when McDonalds and Harveys/Wendys and Pizza Hut close up
the people will suddenly recognise the price of their hohum complacency....the 60's era gulf/tonkin resolution was a con, used to inflict death on hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese- and i recall reading about it being a conjob about the time of the ongoing Appollo moon landings, yet the simple truth was an affront to the 'hard hats' and bizmen...now their grandchilden/great grandchildren are getting stuck with the expense of putting up with the bald faced-lies and the perversity those lies required of the entire political system. How could the old men/women then not know it had to end badly, and scream bloody murder? To party for a couple idiotic generations, then cash in like drunk touristas! And fukk the consequences? The fact is, they knew, just like the old people today know full well 911 was staged, like a cheap fx movie, to make the idiot youngster bush's time in office a big omfg drama, and rip off the economy while at it.....jesus h christ! 30 years ago, i told people it was mathematically unlikely there'd be life on the planet in a huundred years; i was a stupid kid then but lookit what them belly cracker assholes allowed petty thieves to do, to the country, the world; and they were the most powerful voting block humanity has ever seen! And not one of them will ever just say "dammit, we have been lied to since JFK was murdered, by the very guys who murdered him. And to make matters worse, we thought the antiwar, the hippie, the lib/leftists, the union boss 'commies' etc were trying to screw us outta the good times we was having and outta spite we supported the very guys who now have doomed our grandchildren to a dead planet'! (i think civilization will collapse due to economic ruin and rich or not, the environment will become unlivable)
the least we can do is run the pig down, and enjoy a porkchop barbacue
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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 01:07 PM
Response to Reply #69
83. "not one of them will ever just say "dammit, we have been lied to since JFK was murdered"
Yeah, it all began with the lies and (cover your ears) the conspiracies (uncover). When things are working right, these rats have to scuttle around in the dark. But they are smart enough to gnaw at the wires that make the lights go on. But why is the current population so clueless? Is it TV and media? Is it that they are/were momentarily well-fed and well-sheltered so they don't feel the hardship so much? Is the corporate-subsidized recover of "family values" religion a cause or an effect of this social justice stupidity?

AFAIAC, you can burn down all these fast food joints. They make you sick (see "Supersize me"). They require massive feedlot operations which pollute the planet and transmit icky stuff like BSE. They colonize childhood and commodify family meals. They run mom and pop stores out of business or force them to buy a franchise, like 7-11.

Screw the fast food industry.

Hope you homecook that porkchop.

Humans, the new white meat.

arendt
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Radio_Lady Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri May-30-08 09:45 PM
Response to Original message
71. arendt, I'm too late to recommend, but giving it a kick anyway.
Have you read "The Shock Doctrine," by Naomi Klein? Now out in paperback this month.

http://www.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine

Not sure if she is on exactly the same wavelength as you are, but both of your predictions are pretty direct. I am feeling very overwhelmed tonight. Perhaps it is the realization that so much of what we do is just worthless, although Portland, Oregon is a good place to start. We have family farms and we have land that will produce; we have enough water -- for now. I'm going to take your suggestion -- perhaps other DUers here will refresh my memory on where we have the meet-ups. I'll have to go to the Oregon forum.

Tomorrow, May 31st, is my 69th birthday. It is all very sad and quite difficult to contemplate. I've read a good deal of your post and will continue with it at another time -- bookmarked.

Thanks so much for your efforts in posting this.

Cordially,

Radio Lady Ellen in Oregon


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arendt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 01:10 PM
Response to Reply #71
84. Oh, I know Naomi. I have mentioned her several times in essays.
69 is a really tough age to be at this horrible moment in history. Too old to write off the old way of life and start completely over. I would agree about Portland. Low population density (outside the city core), access to farms, lots of water and hydropower. You might be part of a lucky spot that makes the transition to a sustainable lifestyle.

Best of luck. I'd network with you, but I'm on the other coast.

arendt
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Radio_Lady Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Jun-01-08 12:24 AM
Response to Reply #84
88. Hi again arendt. Just saw your post this PM. Actually, we are from Boston, and were
Edited on Sun Jun-01-08 12:34 AM by Radio_Lady
supposed to be there May 22 - June 1 to visit family. My husband was born in Brockton, MA and we lived in Sudbury for almost 30 years before following our daughter and son-in-law out here. We've been here ten years this August and I'm glad we made the move.

I'm already involved with a food coop (although I have to cross the river in my car to get to it), Farmer's markets, recycling, driving very little because we are retired and have a pretty good MAX system. My religion, if you want to call it that, is with a good group of Unitarians-Universalists -- main office in Boston, as you may know -- who are in touch with many exceptional things going on in Washington county where we live. Thrifty shopping at Value Village/Savers, Salvation Army, Goodwill, garage sales, craigslist -- tops it off. We'd love to buy new hybrid cars, but we wouldn't make out very well and they would outlast us, I'm sure. I drive a 1997 Mercury Sable and husband Al has a 2000 Mitsubishi Eclipse.

We worked for 50 years each, retired in 2001, because of the technology crash. We're in an HMO that is pretty reasonable, although medical and dental care are the biggest item in our budget ($15,000 a year). On the positive side, we go on travel, enjoy other places in the world, and I guess we're taking it day by day. My husband teached English as a second language to foreign-born residents. I have just become involved with a group that helps disabled people learn to cope through therapy equestrian activities. They lease stables and 60 acres of land just two miles from here. If you're curious, go to: www.forwardstride.org

I haven't had to sell my gold jewelry yet. I do work with consignment shops to buy and sell. Remainders go to a good cause called the Good Neighbor Center, in Tigard, Oregon. They are working with low-income families setting up housing.

We're lucky to have this connection. CU@theDU -- I'll look for you in the future. Oh, I put you on my Buddy List.

Are your essays in your journal, or elsewhere?

Peace, love and happiness,

Radio Lady in Oregon

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Altean Wanderer Donating Member (202 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat May-31-08 08:02 AM
Response to Original message
80. Wow - great essay! n/t
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