$2333.33 dollars for every man, woman and child.....

In the world.....

The answer is....

What is $14 trillion divided by 6 billion people.

http://powellriverpersuader.blogspot.com/2011/09/233333-for-every-man-woman-and-child-in.html

I guess it depends on what you see

Nikita Khrushchev famously predicted that communism would bury capitalism. But instead, that job is now in the hands of capitalists themselves -- in the hands of madmen who, insanely, keep doing the same thing over and over even though the same grim results accrue.

Same grim results? Doesn't that really depend on which side of the banking table you sit on? It seems to me like the rich and powerful are getting increasingly so. I think, as with most things political, it is just the peoples' wishful thinking that things are not going as 'planned'.

Leo Panitch has a great segue to this story and the global capitalist crisis, HERE

A quick summary.

Global trading and finance are founded on the US dollar. And all values, the price we affix to things, are essentially based on the price of a US Treasury Bill. Why? Because the America government stands behind it; it essentially insures it.

(Similar to how Germany largely insures its EU member nations but, without the world currency in its pocket, it is far more susceptible to collapse. Hardly news, I know.)

So, for capitalism to collapse, its heart has to give way: that is, the US Empire and its monopoly on the trade currency. As Murray Dobbin states, we need to be talking about what would replace it.

Replacing it must, I believe, be a new economic-political paradigm. Currently the Empire's political economy is the protection of it currency around the world to keep global capitalism alive. That is why arguing 'politic policies' between the Party brands is verging on laughable. They are all committed to the same capitalist cause despite how one varies its structural debt compared to another.

henry ford

just to clarify, Henry Ford introduced the famous "five dollar day," which was about double what was paid in other factories, in order to have a stable workforce. Workers hated the frenetic pace and monotony of Ford's assembly lines so much that his labour turnover was nearly 1000% per year. He had to 'bribe' them to stay with very high wages. The notion that he instituted the five-dollar day in order that his working class employees could purchase Model Ts is a myth, invented by Ford and his hagiographers.

The car salesman

I knew a car salesman who hated unions. He never could equate the fact that union members were the ones buying a substantial portion of the new cars off of him.

Consumption based economics?

"Too bad all the geniuses now occupying the dismal science haven't figured out that a cheap labour economy ultimately means a low consumption economy.
 "

Why is a low consumption economy a bad thing? Certainly the transition period sucks for everyone involved, but we're on a finite plant with finite resources. A high consumption economy assumes the opposite does it not, that growth and consumption can forever continue?

Isn't it then more logical to wind down consumption based economic practices and move towards something else?

Consumption is not necessarily bad

we are consuming the wrong things. When we buy cars that last 5 or 6 years instead of 20 years, we are wasting our money.

I only buy goods that last, that way I won't have to buy them again.

It means I have to do a tiny bit of research and usually end up buying European equipment.

This has to be the wave of the future because the way we are headed now, I call it the Wallmart way, can't be sustained.

Dobbin says my point

Murray Dobbin says in a lot of words what I have been saying in one sentence for years . . . if I don't have any money, I don't buy things. Once the economists finally get that point, then maybe our economy will stat to improve.

Forget nationhood, salute international brotherhood!

Let us not forget that capitalism no longer is connected to any nation!

They are doing so well, because they research which country will allow which loopholes, and fit their transactions to suit --- again without any concern about how the workers survive!

We are the fools for still saluting the flag!
All that nationalism does is dividing us so the rich can sit back and laugh at us.

time to think outside the box

The boom & bust cycle of capitalism is busted.

There is a town in the Basque country of Spain home to a very successful and large worker cooperative called Mondragon. They have an average lowest to highest salary ratio of 6:1, I beieve. They do not seem to be prone to the violent (labour)upheavals of corporate capitalism.

For those interested, there is a good (but older) documentary on youtube called The Mondragon Experiment.

I also recommend Prof. Richard Wolff's talk on the historical context of our latest bust, Capitalism Hits The Fan, found at:

http://rdwolff.com/

Our economy is based on only

Our economy is based on only 1 thing; on borrowing money. If people didn't borrow money then our corporate system would faulter and we would morph back to a truer capitalist system.

Barryeng

You say that you don't spend if you don't have. Yet Murray Dobbin says, "Yet we are still burdened by the gross incompetence of Conservative Finance Minister Jim Flaherty. He wants to pursue a deficit reduction strategy, ...". Just like you Flaherty says don't buy things if you don't have money. Murray suggests this is incompetence.

Neoliberalism is Ford's child

The neoliberal ideology did not spontaneously spring out of someone's evil brain. It is a rational response to the material conditions of capitalism at the end of the 1970s. Namely, capitalism's first post-war overproduction crisis.

Those overproduction cycles are inevitable, as capitalists always - by definition - appropriate more economic value than they redistribute to their workers. Which means that no matter which period of capitalism we live in, the next crisis of overproduction (when workers can no longer purchase the goods they produce) is only a matter of time.

2008 marked the beginning of capitalism's latest crisis of overproduction. This crisis is particularly severe, because both people and governments have no money left to reboot the economy. All they have is debt. The current crisis is, literally, a crisis of overproduction of capital. Too much money, not enough good places to reinvest it.

Ford, unlike the prevailing myth, did not cancel this tendency of capitalism to overproduce. Actually, he massively accelerated it. The fantastic prosperity of the post-war era in rich countries was predicated on the systematic plunder of workers in the South and colossal destruction of the environment using machinery and chemicals produced for the war economy (think Caterpillar and Monsanto). That is precisely why the "Fordist" cycle ended in overproduction as well! No miracle there.

That is also why neoliberalism is the child of Fordism, albeit a troubled one which Ford would no doubt have disowned.

The neoliberals responded in the only way they could: by fabricating an artificial source of income for the working and middle classes to keep them purchasing their own production, by financializing the economy and throwing them into the bondage of debt.

Lawrence...I just bought a

Lawrence...I just bought a new oil filter for my Ford 9 N tractor, many thousands of them still in use. Of course, it is only 72 years old, so it is no wonder.

I also drive a 1980 Chev 3/4 ton pickup. A bit rusty, but goes like anything. We have a large repair shop on our property, run by our partner, a Swiss master mechanic, who says, in 10 years time there won't be any used vehicles, because the computerized systems used in them will die and can not be replaced.

But, of course, all waste increases the GDP and that's all governments and economists want.

Capitalism is the idiot twin of communism, setting up a collectivized world economy, not with bayonets, but with the perceived power of imaginary capital, created from the air.

The capitalist racket will collapse exactly for the same reasons communism has collapsed: people are beginning and will sooner or later realize that they've been lying to, and stolen blind, just to set up a globalized ruling class with unlimited powers, under the guise of "free enterprise" the same "freedom" as preached by the communists .

It could happen tomorrow, or 10 years down the line, the timetable is unpredictable, but we, who have worked on the demise of communism, can see the same unrest and loss of faith, which are the signals for the end of any empire and ruling system, repeated in history a thousand times.

As far the "cheap" imports from Asia are concerned, there's no such thing as "cheap".
The purpose of economic theories is to transfer costs on others, while covering up the facts.

The full cost of those "cheap" imports is paid by the unemployed, the underpaid, the pollution caused by long distance transport etc. etc. until it turns out that those "cheap" imports are far more expensive than if they'd been made locally.

Ed Deak.

"It is well enough that

"It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning." Henry Ford

Many of us have been talking about what must replace capitalism and it's pretty simple: just take control of money and banking out of private hands. Why the intellectual blind spot, Murray Dobbin? Our money supply is loaned into existence by the private banks who demand repayment with the added burden of interest. Why is that crucial reality always missing from your articles? As I suspect you must know, a simple part of the solution is for the government to spend our money supply into circulation.

Money reformers are very active online. I see Will Hutton doesn't mention the UK's Positive Money initiative: http://www.positivemoney.org.uk/

There's something suspicious about writers who decry the brutality of capitalism yet do not educate their readers about the elite's money scam.

A Fast Solution

Time to dramatically increase the minimum wage to at least $15 per hour - with no exceptions. This will primarily benefit the poor who will spend every penny of their increase while only raising prices by a small amount (maybe for MacDonalds 20%? but how many hamburgers does anyone eat in a week?).
But just watch the corporate shills (aka economists) rush in to damn any such solution - just don't believe them - they obviously know almost nothing about the real world (how many small businesses ever hire an economist?).

The Argument for "Reduced Consumption" I...

"Replacing it must, I believe, be a new economic-political paradigm. Currently the Empire's political economy is the protection of it currency around the world to keep global capitalism alive. That is why arguing 'politic policies' between the Party brands is verging on laughable. They are all committed to the same capitalist cause despite how one varies its structural debt compared to another." igbymac

Which is the point that igby and I share... to my great pleasure. The status quo political system is all about "tweaking" what is unsustainable in any case.

Now, I hear, and understand some, those who say, "What is wrong with a low consumption economy?" Which expresses the Green concerns for the waste, pollution and other environmental destruction going on. It is a valid point.

The issue is, in my view, how you achieve that reduced consumption/ economic activity impact on the plant... WITHOUT starving and impoverishing people, while uncritically continuing to allow a special and obscenely rich class to flourish unchecked.

The response of status quo capitalism is, every man, woman and child for his and herself, Devil take the hindmost. Let the capitalist "free market" rule. They of course, being specially positioned in this race to the bottom, are confident of their own success... especially with the aid of the instruments of the State which they control, through the help of political parties. (Army, police, security forces etc.)

Whereas a "rational", considered "radical" even "revolutionary" approach is to say, FIRST economic and political equality... to make everything fair at the front end, and tolerable to the greatest number. (The elimination of "special" class rights.) Then to specifically move in the direction of reduced economic impact, beginning to assess and move to wards "sustainable" human population levels, by means already well known, but not always universally available or understood. (Which means dealing with the male priesthoods of Religion as well, like the Catholic Church.)

Reducing demand this way, by curtailing "growth" and even achieving reductions in human population levels, rather than by driving masses into poverty or even starvation as class divided societies do, with their inherently gross inequalities, is far and away more humane and desirable. True... certainly for everyone outside the iron ring of the super wealthy ruling class.

continued next post...

The Argument for Reduced Consumption II...

From previous post...

The problem is, of course, that reductions in growth rates, in population, consumption, cheap labour supply and wealth creation, undermines capitalism. We are seeing that already in this environment of declining worker/consumer wage and purchasing power share (the same thing) as Murray has correctly pointed out. It is bringing global capitalism to its knees, fostering class warfare (Greece and elsewhere), this class warfare which is destined certainly to get much worse, and driving competition between the great global powers of capitalism leading again to world war between them. (Looking for the "lebensraum" access to resources etc., that sent German capitalism into Russia, at the start of the last WW.)

Indeed the issue is posed today, essentially the same as it was in the historical Depressionary period that led to World War 2, but did NOT get resolved: The need to quickly get moved beyond capitalism into a quite different, more "co-operatve" and rationally long term sustainable socio-economic paradigm. (Of which igby speaks.) And the longer it takes to achieve this, overly relying on the "loyal opposition" mindset of ALL the fundamentally ruling class accommodating political party system, the more this is all destined to deteriorate.

In short, an argument can be made, needs to be made, for "reduced consumption rates", what I would call "reduced exploitation rates" as a consequence of our unsustainable economic activity levels. The issue is, do you mean by that this driving down the "share" to the working class in the direction of poverty and widespread starvation... in a kind of gruelling "death march" into your brave new Green/Aryan future? If so, I, and a growing mass of the working class, will reject it and fight you. Make no mistake.

No. In short, there is another way. And that is by dealing with this issue of the class and capitalist order of society and the economy, moving away from its endless growth, fear and greed driven dynamic impulses, and struggling to create a more rational, egalitarian, truly democratic and sustainable social and economic order...That does not mean our submission to growing poverty and starvation.

Otherwise, you Greens can stick your goody two shoes into a place where the sun never shines.

Say what?

". Just like you Flaherty says don't buy things if you don't have money. Murray suggests this is incompetence." But Flaherty is trying to stimulate the economy buy making sure people have less money. That is the incompetence.

As for Murray Dobbin, another good piece Murray.

The Gordon Gecco and Berni Madoff models have run their course

Capitalism was built on trust, not theft. End of story.

realistic man

If you think Flaherty and his cohorts aren't buying when the shelves are thin think again.

With the amount of corporate tax credits being given out for dubious action canada projects Flaherty is buying time until the next election when we will witness one of the largest tax shifts from corporate to you and me this nation has ever seen.

Democracy or Idiocracy, the stupids are in control!

an awesome article that makes it so abundantly clear thats its obvious to anybody that the global economic problems we're facing can be specifically pinpointed to our nihilist global leaders and their puppet-masters.

The story of Joseph and Pharaoh in the bible was the first to teach us this lesson ... we must save during the good times to use during the bad times and it seems that we once again forgot what we already knew from our past experiences, which is...

...that wealth begets wealth and if you have a few imbeciles that decide to hoard that wealth then you will eventually have no wealth to circulate in order create more and keep the wheel turning...

which in real terms means that it keeps all economic activities moving and is the main reason why we have & need taxes...
we citizens must relearn & realize that all forms of governments are non-profit entities that serve us all.

the tragic flaw in human nature

is the greed for more power which undermines all goals and hopes for success. Somewhere in human development we took a wrong turn and based our wealth on the capacity to control others. Those in positions of power feel aggrandized, powerful, when they see others suffer. If ideologies were based on true wealth we would understand that it is irrevocably linked to the shared power and greater good of all.

Communism failed because power was centralized rather than shared. Capitalism has failed because consumers wanted status symbols that elevated their sense of superiority (power. America failed because it channelled its wealth into world hegemony. Europe failed because its sense of civilized organization devolved into military conquests.

Power demands more power. Power consumes intelligence and has no use for insight. Civilization has repeatedly been sabotaged by the greed for power-over throughout history.

We may call it 'economics' or 'religion' or 'politics' but all our violence and failure as a species has been about the raw greed for power over, and so we prove, generation after generation, that we are primitive animals who have created ideologies in order to avoid seeing ourselves as we really are: vulnerable, mortal, beings.

Beware the Cubicle Geek

The most frightening thing of all is that corporations don't have any real control either.

Every CEO of every public corporation in the world is accountable to one person, and one person only; not the customer, not the chairman of the board, not even his or her spouse.

The CEO is accountable to the stock analyst/investment fund manager. The CEO's business vision, strategy and operational decisions are all designed to satisfy the analysts who decide (during the regular quarterly conference call) whether the company should be ranked as "buy" or "sell".

Yep, a pencil-neck cubicle geek gets to decide the future of the global economy.

And, sadly, that's "our" fault ... all of us who own mutual funds or individual stock investments. We have let the geeks inherit the earth.

A Boast

I can confidently claim to be completely ignorant of "economic" theory.
None of it ever made any sense to me.
Good for Murray and all the posters for attempting to imagine a next step.

First, a Hearty Thank-you! Then let the work begin.

While I have over the years much appreciation and respect for Murray Dobbin's work, thanks to Tyee article, it is with much pleasure I came upon three posts, amazingly listed sequentially, to which I offer my thanks with much appreciation. Namely
ulysse31 in “Neoliberalism is Ford's child”;
Ed Deak under Fiat lux in “Lawrence...I just bought a” and
Cynic in "It is well enough that”
for providing with such clarity what is so systemically wrong in ?our? economy.

However the value system and the "democratic" levers of power in the hands of those who socialize the wealth into the hands of the few while outsourcing the risk to everyone AND everything else on planet earth needs to be stated with equal clarity. Here follows a first pass.

Regarding values, with some calculations for making a quick buck, a parasite minded orientation does not need to do much deep thinking to understand how much easier it is to profit from burning down someone else's barn than from being part of growing the pie by building a barn.

Democracy is like a public barn raising, always vulnerable to barn razings. ONE root democratic lever of power by which the "public" is duped into believing an election was democratic (and not to speak of the many one-side rules favouring the quisling insiders over the public) is how the will of the majority is so easily divided in order for the rule of government to be transferred from the will of the people to the will of a few willing to do the elites bidding.

To deplore and do no more is not enough. Or as another wise sage has stated "It is not your responsibility to finish the work of perfecting the world, but you are not free to desist from trying." Towards such beginnings for a paper method please see http://www.eduardhiebert.com/ereform/v123p.htm

For an online method currently diverted thanks to some hackers, where some steady alternative visible steady hands would be appreciated, please see www.vote123.ca

Real wealth?

The belief that real wealth is a function of high wages needs examination. Real wealth resides in energy and resources. Wages are nothing more than a proxy for real wealth. High wages do not create more wealth they simply make access, use and possesion of energy and resources easier. And in the process of making life easier high wages accelerate the rate of resource and energy depletion. The increased rate of depletion is directly proportional to the increased rate of population and technological growth.

It’s no surprise that, now that the bottom of the Horn of Plenty is in plain view, the reduction of workers wages is seen, by some, as a logical outcome.

Whether it’s capitalism or communism, as long as we fail to address technological change, population growth and economic globalization, the outcome is the same: “a really ugly death”.

The unfortunate part of addressing technological change, population growth and economic globalization is that it will require a complete acceptance of political interference in every aspect of living (interference that wants EVERYONE to reduce, reuse and refuse) or a complete shift in thinking (an understanding of the learning process that determines our behaviour).

If there’s a replacement for capitalism that will lead to a society more in tune with the limits to energy supplies and resource use it won’t be found if we continue to focus on growth, increased wages and technological change.

Flaherty's incompetence comes

Flaherty's incompetence comes in by taking a pay cut in the form of reduced corp taxes. They created their own mess and now want us to pay for it. Raise the damn taxes on corporations and do away with many tax loopholes designed to pay nothing towards the upkeep of this nation.

Murray, you forgot to mention ...

How could you mention Henry Ford's recognition that his employees couldn't afford to buy his cars without referencing Walter Reuther's famous comment?

It was when Henry Ford was showing off a prototype robot assembly line that Walter Reuther asked him something like "and how many cars are those robots going to buy?"

The New Paradigm of Interference....

"Whether it’s capitalism or communism, as long as we fail to address technological change, population growth and economic globalization, the outcome is the same: “a really ugly death”. KWD

Agreed. But while what you say is true, I also generally support working class attempts to maintain "decent" wages within this order of the system. There first has to be a social/class, democratic and "power share" deficit solution arrived at within society and the economy, before I or any sane working class person certainly, should aqree to any wholesale or arbitrary "adjustments" in our share. (And one needs to be clear about this, not fuzzy.) And one can talk piously about the good of the planet etc ad nauseum. It does not impress me, nor will it any other working class person aware of their interests, and where we stand in the socio-economic order of things... at the bottom of the shit pile. From here, everything tends to roll down hill onto us.

"The unfortunate part of addressing technological change, population growth and economic globalization is that it will require a complete acceptance of political interference in every aspect of living (interference that wants EVERYONE to reduce, reuse and refuse) or a complete shift in thinking (an understanding of the learning process that determines our behaviour)." again KWD.

Now, as this entire discussion does, we are getting down to the nitty gritty. And I only deal with KWD's remarks here, not as a personal thing, but because I detect that "talking down" perspective that is too often typical of Greens, when addressing we in the working class.)

I very much disagree with the "political interference" submission part of this view. The working class has always had to submit to "political interference" in near every aspect of his/her life, under every social and political system since the rise of "civilization". And it has resolved nothing.... poverty and inequality, and the power share deficit... are all still with us and the crisis of endless growth capitalism continues, abates and returns in endless cyclical crises. Only now it is we AGAIN, the working class, that the focus of submission to the green mantra of making do with less is placed on. (Again, always from a position that tends to talk down to us in the common herd.)

I, and my bet is that the working class generally, understand well enough where this dynamic of endless growth capitalism is headed... as well as we understand who is already being expected to lay down before the bus and offer up their bodies and the well being of their families. You folks on the more or less "well to do" Green end of this discussion, all need to get your asses back to the drawing boards. There needs to be a change in YOUR group think.

continued next post...

II The New Paradigm of Interference

from previous post...

Yes, there does need to be a solution to this problem of endless growth and the poisoning of the planet, no friggin' doubt. BUT, you are not going to get to there with this endless talk of "interferences", political or whatever, in working class lives, our wages and standard of living. You want me on-board, and I suggest you "should" want me and the rest of the working class on-board, you better get your high and mighty asses down here into the mud, the blood and the beer, and talk to us and include us AS AN EQUAL PARTNER, in this so-called new paradigm of yours. Or it won't be on... only ongoing and deepening class conflict.

Again yes, there needs to be a new social and economic paradigm,. but it sure as Hell isn't going to be one that continues to cut us out in the lower class orders. I want in on the "paradigm", with an equal power and economic share, or there ain't going to be any new paradigm... and certainly not one that arbitrarily seeks to impose a new regime of "political interferences." Been there and done that... and it ain't on, brothers and sisters.

Love, Peace and Revolution. :-) lol

Listen to David Suzuki - Capitalism Must be Burried Now

Sorry Murray, what you are recommending would be suicidal for human society. And it is ordinary folk that would suffer the most and soonest.

The consumption you want to stimulate to feed cancer-like economic growth entails overheating the planet even more. Attempting infinite growth on a finite planet is suicidal, as David Suzuki has been repeating for decades.

We need Prosperity Without Growth, not a more equitable sharing of deck chairs on the Titanic. See http://www.sd-commission.org.uk/publications.php?id=914

Jerry... it is the so called

Jerry... it is the so called working class that keeps capitalism alive and growing by voting in the worst examples of it into power.
Ie. Campbell and now Harper.

Here in the Cariboo, Reform swept the polls from the beginning, and still does, under the Conservative banner, now with Dick Harris elected umpteen times in 4 union towns.

At one time Reform swept the whole province and Western Canada, advocating the abolishment of unions and replacing old age pensions with RRSPs, yet the working class voted them in and still does.

When I had my shop in Vancouver and Richmond, I, the boss, was the only one who didn't vote Socred, or PC.

So, what's the answer ?

Ed Deak.

If you read Murray to the end...

...you would have read

"in the hands of madmen who, insanely, keep doing the same thing over and over even though the same grim results accrue. I would happily cheer the demise of that capitalism. But it would be a really ugly death. And we need to be talking about what would replace it.
"

I guess the big question is what to do when you are on a runaway train and the bridge is out somewhere up ahead. Murray points out that there is real urgency to the discussion that needs to happen.

Good Ole Murray

According to Murray every thing wrong these days is a result of capitalism and every thing right is a result of government intervention.
Isn't it possible that the crisis that the western countries are experiencing is a result of governments having to borrow more and more just to keep spending money on their citizens? And, the reluctance of lendors to continue subsidizing the folly.
That's not a result of capitalism.

To Mr Snert

You be surprized how many people think like that, and I enclude alot of union members or now ex-union members. The stupid and out and out moronic coments i use to hear. I wondered how some people use to get throught life.So it's going to be along bitter and bloody road back, if we make it back.

Stop Capitalism

"it will require a complete acceptance of political interference in every aspect of living (interference that wants EVERYONE to reduce, reuse and refuse) "

I realize you used the word "unfortunate' to preface your comment, kwd, but still, I think what's needed is the reverse of this.

It is we that must 'interfere' with every aspect of the political process.

Otherwise, 'their' idea of reduced consumption, 'their' idea of whatever, will be used as one more con game to control the masses.

While those in the Middle East are fighting against torture, we can't seem to get it together to even fight smart meters.

If those who want things to change can't even put a sign up on their present meter refusing and prohibiting the installation of the new so-called smart meter on their home, (that our tax dollars are paying for, and that we weren't consulted on), then forget the revolution. We are all talk and no action. We don't need another referendum on smart meters, no big campaign that will distract and waste our time. Just bloody well, say 'NO' - tell them what they can do with their stupid smart meter. It's actually quite simple.

Or have we become so wimpy that we just applaud 'stop signs' but we don't have the spunk to put them up ourselves.

The hypocrisy is not one-sided.

The hypocrisy is on all sides.

So when realisticman asserts:

"Conservative Finance Minister Jim Flaherty. He wants to pursue a deficit reduction strategy, ...". Just like you Flaherty says don't buy things if you don't have money"

Well, what r/man isn't saying is that what Flaherty really means is that those who have money 'deserve' to continue to buy, and will do so, apparently without guilt that the intentionally designed imbalance of wealth has caused many to not be able to even afford food or shelter....or medicine for their children. In other words Flaherty doesn't give a damn about anybody who doesn't have money....and as Skywalker noted Flaherty's policies will ensure who has money... and who doesn't.

I would suggest that is the one and only protectionist policy of the neo-liberals - ensuring and protecting their own stolen booty.

So every move they make on us to protect their interests, we have to stop them.

That's how we bury capitalism. We stop rolling over. We "interfere" in their game, again and again...until Park Place falls.

I wanna give a shout out to "janetvickers", who I always enjoy reading, great comment above.

the collapse and ensuing revolution are intrinsically connected

Skywalker: "...I guess the big question is what to do when you are on a runaway train and the bridge is out somewhere up ahead."

Vote NDP, right Skywalker?

JC, capitalism its going as planned

John Corman quote:

According to Murray every thing wrong these days is a result of capitalism and every thing right is a result of government intervention.
Isn't it possible that the crisis that the western countries are experiencing is a result of governments having to borrow more and more just to keep spending money on their citizens? And, the reluctance of lendors to continue subsidizing the folly.
That's not a result of capitalism.

Sorry, good ol' John Corman, but that is exactly the result of capitalism. :)

Maybe not the vision of 'capitalism' you have been sold, but it is precisely what the controlling powers of capitalism desire. Read my post above for a little more insight into the matter.

The BIS et al and the US Empire are instructing the nations to 'spend' by providing credit, no longer primarily concerned with providing easy credit to keep the mass consumer flush so as to keep driving their debt-slavery forward, for that ship has sailed, but in order to protect the elites political-economic interests.

Now as the smaller banks and weaker nations are getting up to speed about the bigger picture of the capitalist game and how it is really played, how their own existence is in trouble due to their debt obligations, their own debt has them under the boot of the authorities above. And when they are told to provide credit or spend, they act accordingly.

Competition means a winner and lots of losers. Guess who the losers are, John Corman -- everyone but the controlling power-broker cartel on top.

cart before horse..?

"Isn't it possible that the crisis that the western countries are experiencing is a result of governments having to borrow more and more just to keep spending money on their citizens? And, the reluctance of lendors to continue subsidizing the folly.
That's not a result of capitalism."

But it looks like a result of capitalism in cahoots with governments. Ever since there were corporations, 'government contracts' have been an attractive thing to achieve. Why? because governements are spending other people's money. They ain't haggling as hard as my kids do when they buy bikes and such. Governments get involved in many things they never should've, and when they do, they aren't wise with the money. It seems that when you look at it closely, governments are mostly serving some people the best conditions for fleecing the rest of us, a role that used to belong to the church, and I'll besurprised if the time of relative prosperity does not coincide with the time betweem where organized religion majorly lost its grip on the folk soul, and Hollywood/Fox/Disney/the military-industrial complex hadn't picked it up yet.. If you listen to the grand sum of all the TV ads (there is help to be had with the aftermath), you will see that the overarching evangelium isn't so different from any of the 'world religions' (those that aren't really religions, but organizations to aid some politcal/economical agenda. What stroke of genius cooked up poverty as a virtue?!) This is because they basically serve the same purpose. Get critical. Think for yourself. Be utterly pragmatic in everything you do with your own personal economy. There are three things worth investing in: Capability, turf, and means of self-reliance. Everything else is candy and toys, and somebody is fooling you into acquiring it, and they're fleecing you in the process. Get serious about your life. Stop playing. it's so easy to keep on - and so expensive. The matrix is all around you. Swallow the red pill, get yourself flushed; see the truth. It's all there still. Just waiting for you to take a grip. What's your grievance? You have the power!

janetvickers, I enjoyed your comment

...so would it be wrong to conclude, after reading this snippet of your comment

we are primitive animals who have created ideologies in order to avoid seeing ourselves as we really are: vulnerable, mortal, beings

that your ideal world-view, i.e., your personal ideology, entails that fact?

"If ideologies were based on true wealth we would understand that it is irrevocably linked to the shared power and greater good of all."

Evidently our collective ideology needs a shift :)

Still the bitter pill remains -- how our own hypocrisy and self-delusion prevent us from doing what is in our own best interest.

Again, thanks for the post.

Share price Driven economy

This is the greed economy, also fueled by the ease of trading stock. Why does one invest in a company? To obtain some of the profits (dividends) or through an increase in share value (through increased value of the company) and when you sell you reap the profit of a company that grew in value through investments of profits.
Share value inicentive is a greed mentality if it is in the short term. How can this company appear to be worth more? Short term profits? Gut the organization selling off or not reinvesting for the long term to improve the bottom line.
Convince others to buy the stock because it looks good for the next 10 minutes on the TSE?
The 5 minute internet traders of both the institutional and individuals and expecting 15-20% growth annually drive these unrealistic demand.
Perhaps the concept should be trading time limits. NO selling of shares purchased for at least 30 or 90 days (1 year minimum like a GIC?). Investors may look for longer term value, CEO's may then be encouraged to look at long term viability and real value on the stock market and share value will result from profits and wealth generation. Tax cuts don't do this for corporations or investors.
Let's rethink economic system.

@ igbymac

Anything other than Liberal. That bridge is still there, don't see the current government changing anything. How about you? Other than provide more of the same. What is you solution. Green? Conservative? Liberal? Other?

Futhermore Igbymac..

...you are great at posing questions but not so at providing a sense of direction. I guess because it leaves you open to a few comments from others like yours. I'm with lynn on this one. THe bridge is out and the train is still on the track, what is your solution, "Stay the course!" Right, that will work.

igbymac

Haha. You boot their asses out akin to the 77-2 wipeout in 2001! That's what.

BC Disposable Income/Capita 1990:
(Chained to 2002 dollars) Socred Gov't
$28,271

BC Disposable Income/Capita 1996:
(Chained to 2002 Dollars) NDP Gov't
$26,282 (-~$2,000/capita from Socreds)

BC Disposable Income/Capita 2000:
(Chained to 2002 Dollars) NDP Gov't
$27,726 (-~$500/capita from 10 years earlier)

Yep, BC Disposable Income/Capita shrunk during the 1990's BC NDP government and BC consumer confidence was the lowest in Canada. Remember?

I still remember picking up a few $30,000 condos in Nanaimo during 1999, which sold brand new for over $60,000 earlier in 1991. Sold them in 2005 for over $100,000/per. The NDP government did provide good opportunities for those like myself... but good for consumer confidence and the economy?

BTW, BC Disposable Income/Capita 2008:
(Chained to 2002 Dollars) Lib Gov't
$32,834 (an increase of over $5,100 since the NDP left government!!!!)

Don't need to be a rocket scientist to figure that one out.

Skywalker, my answer would be ....

Other. :)

How can I claim that our politics offers neither democracy (sorry, no matter how you honestly add it up, 39% is not a majority) nor representation of the will of the people at large (hypocritical Party dictatorships directed by plutocrats and failed economic ideologies doesn't cut it with me) AND then support that model of governance by participating in it? That's not how I roll.

I take my politics outside of the 'voting is your civic duty' meme and 'vote' with my money and my time in my community.

I may not have answers, but I do sincerely try to recognize when I am operating at cross purposes to my principles and beliefs.

The Late Great Anna Russell

And it's very very funny
When you've lots and lots of money
To be horrible to those with none!

According to the theory,

According to the theory, people who have no money are not "investors", are not "competitive" and not "productive"

The most productive people are "investors" who have programmed computers that can buy and sell stocks after holding them only for a few seconds.

This is the basis of today's "wealth creation" only some "godless, lazy socialists" can argue against.

Ed Deak.

The crap about capitalism

igbymac replies to our resident VI John Corman:

"Sorry, good ol' John Corman, but that is exactly the result of capitalism. :)"

And that's not just igbymac saying that, but Niall Ferguson too in his excellent 2008 book "The Ascent of Money". He detailed the ruin of the economic system over hundreds of years with ever-widening Ponzi schemes run by lazy schemers, destroying the best efforts of honest workers and entrepreneurs as the economic system became more and more complicated.

Of course, he's eating his own words by the plateful now, having finished the book just prior to the meltdown, insisting all the way that globalization would be good for Western economies because they had all the rules set up to keep money pouring into their coffers from poorer countries, poorer peoples, and anybody dumb enough to fall for the status quo. Of course, that's not quite how he said it, but it certainly is the gist of what he said.

And now, of course, money is still pouring out of Western economies at an accelerating rate, moving to where the wealth is - where the people are. Countries with lots of people and few assets have lots of growth. Countries with few people and lots of assets have little growth. Why? Because assets depreciate (even asset-bubble assets like real estate in Vancouver), and investments in people pay off exponentially.

Darned few in the West appear to have figured this out, despite repeated application of the same lesson over more than twenty years.

No, if there's any saving grace about capitalism at all, it's in the power of the cooperative, which invests in capital (not money!) for the benefit of all, not the few.

Sorry Corman, I don't think you'll ever understand. But you do serve as the perfect "bad example" for others to learn from, so don't despair - you're not a complete waste.

zalm notes

Of course, he's eating his own words by the plateful now, having finished the book just prior to the meltdown, insisting all the way that globalization would be good for Western economies because they had all the rules set up to keep money pouring into their coffers from poorer countries, poorer peoples, and anybody dumb enough to fall for the status quo.

Well, its sad he could not see beyond the perceived merits of globalization.

As I've said elsewhere, just what did the plutocrats think was going to happen when their economic orchestration begins playing a sour tune on virtually all fronts? Did they expect that labor, the possession of each individual, was going to be swapped for a bunch of unsecured, fraudulent pieces of paper forever?

Raising wages won't solve a damm thing...

Wages isn't the problem. Our workforce is dated and their skills are not in demand -- that's the problem. While other countries have a learn to build and design modern electronic gizmos, we still are still selling raw logs and materials. Its hard to pay your employees top dollar when your skills aren't the top skills in demand.

reef....People are not

reef....People are not machines that can be turned on and off.

We're born with certain talents that used to be examined years ago by agencies to direct them into professions and occupations they're suited for. No any more. Now it is all "demand".

I've had the education to be almost anything, but never wanted to be anything else but an artist and cabinetmaker. I got into the trades at 28 and never looked back.

As I wrote before, sometimes, when I was working on something in some high rise, fancy executive office in Vancouver, I thought, if I had to work there, I would throw a chair through the window and go after it. Can't imagine working in an office.

I can do all kinds of mechanical, woodwork, metal fabrication, and have used computers for over 20 years, but still don't know a damn thing about them, because electronics and hi tech bore and turn me off.

I've known many people in my life, who were born to do certain kinds of work, but anything else would have destroyed them, as it does billions. Over the years I`ve had many fancy job offers, but stayed in the trades, probably lost close to a million bucks, but remained poor and productive in work that made and still makes me happy.

Work 7 days a week at 84 and the last holiday I remember having was 3 days of camping in 1968.

Right now, my wife and I are working on and art exhibit for next year Sept. when we'll give away thousands of dollars worth of artwork to save an artist owned gallery in Williams Lake, ruined by government cuts, while driving a 1980 truck.

When I look at the interiors of the prize homes advertised on TV, they make me sick. If I`d win one, I would burn the lot of that machine made, ugly, disgusting junk, without any sign of any human touch. I could never live with automated, machine made furniture.

Yet, people all over the world are forced to become programmed automatons, and live in a machine made, artificial environment to kill all human feelings in them to serve the Masters of the Universe.

With technology and automation, freeing people from mindless lives, people`s talents should be enhanced and be permitted to do work they`re best suited for and not forced into dead and jobs "demanded by the economy".

Some of the "professionals" I've known were the most unhappy and incompetent assholes imaginable, because they were miseducated, misled and were wasting their and the lives of others. Many admitted openly that they were unhappy, but had no choice .

Who knows, even Harper might have become a useful producer, if he'd been permitted to become one ?

Now I have to go back to my welding .......

Ed Deak.

Is Capitalism Preparing to Bury Itself?

The roots of the global financial crisis have to do with excessive leverage and the global savings investment imbalances between the West and Asia. The West i.e. the US (and Canada too perhaps) has long been consuming too much and getting overly leveraged & in debt. Asia in general, and China in particular has been too dependent on US consumption and mercantilism to generate growth. This process reached its apogee in the financial crisis of 2008. The next chapter of the crisis is now unfolding in Europe. The final chapter will be played out in Asia as China experiences its own unique ‘crisis of capitalism’.
Asia needs to develop their middle class, and consume more and save less; the west needs to become the supplier of Asian demand.
In a sense you can already see this process developing. House prices in Detroit have hit rock bottom, labor is cheap and infrastructure is going to improve. Coming to a Wallmart near you is the label : made in the USA.

Capitalism

The roots of the global financial crisis have to do with excessive leverage and the global savings investment imbalances between the West and Asia. The West i.e. the US (and Canada too perhaps) has long been consuming too much and getting overly leveraged & in debt. Asia in general, and China in particular has been too dependent on US consumption and mercantilism to generate growth. This process reached its apogee in the financial crisis of 2008. The next chapter of the crisis is now unfolding in Europe. The final chapter will be played out in Asia as China experiences its own unique ‘crisis of capitalism’.
Asia needs to develop their middle class, and consume more and save less; the west needs to become the supplier of Asian demand.
In a sense you can already see this process developing. House prices in Detroit have hit rock bottom, labor is cheap and infrastructure is going to improve. Coming to a Wallmart near you is the label : made in the USA.

Capitalism

The roots of the global financial crisis have to do with excessive leverage and the global savings investment imbalances between the West and Asia. The West i.e. the US (and Canada too perhaps) has long been consuming too much and getting overly leveraged & in debt. Asia in general, and China in particular has been too dependent on US consumption and mercantilism to generate growth. This process reached its apogee in the financial crisis of 2008. The next chapter of the crisis is now unfolding in Europe. The final chapter will be played out in Asia as China experiences its own unique ‘crisis of capitalism’.
Asia needs to develop their middle class, and consume more and save less; the west needs to become the supplier of Asian demand.
In a sense you can already see this process developing. House prices in Detroit have hit rock bottom, labor is cheap and infrastructure is going to improve. Coming to a Wallmart near you is the label : made in the USA.

Not for long...

"investments in people pay off exponentially."

consult this source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_pyramid

So, not for long. Few people are growing 'exponentially' any more. We DO get smarter. What, by the way, does 'investing in people' mean? People can invest in themselves, but others? what is the payoff from? Slave-trade? Human 'products'(hair, organs)?, what?? or, maybe we should put TAXES on existence, i.e. head taxes, and this would be the return? Please clarify.

Ed and others I.

"Jerry... it is the so called working class that keeps capitalism alive and growing by voting in the worst examples of it into power.
Ie. Campbell and now Harper.... So What's the answer?" Ed Deak

There are certainly problems with the working class understanding of politics, Ed. We both know that. On the other hand, as igbymac and I both keep pointing out here, all the parties to capitalism are really only different from each other by relatively minor degrees of major content, including the NDP. In short, what passes for democracy, and the opportunity for real working class participation, wherein our collective understanding can contribute and grow in experience, is so narrowed down and dumbed down that nearly half of us do not even bother to vote or otherwise participate. And I don't disagree with that broad working class consensus.

You folks who think like Ed in this regard, really do need to be cognisant of this working class reality, and thunk on it to some more depth than simply plumping for the status quo party and electoral system... that has not and will not substantially or for long change anything. (Which includes the old, now defunct, never to return Social Democratic State of Capitalism. It's history, not unlike the old USSR.)

We need a new paradigm, which includes, not excludes or heaps contempt on the broad working class, which frankly, is going to need a whole new approach to politics... including outside the "Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition" Party system. Relying on it "exclusively" or majorly is a bit like pissing into the wind. It will only come back on you negatively.

Basically, the only real time the working classes of capitalism are able to get on the political scales, to any serious effect at all, is during times of the cyclically reoccurring crises of capitalism... especially its collapse prone economy. Such as we are now moving into again, for the first "major" time since the last Great Depression.

I don't give a fuck how the working class votes or doesn't... I don't vote myself anymore. ...it's inconsequential as a useful short or long term tool for working class interests in any case... by and large right now anyway. (And though you all may not think so, even though most of my class are probably afraid of the "timbre/ implications" of a lot of things I have to say, I understand the popular mindset of my class pretty well. They are the sea in which I have swam, fed, partied, raised a family and toiled my entire life... all 73 years of it. And I know the contempt in which "the class", generally, hold ALL politicians, again as a rule, with few exceptions, and the opportunities available to them, to really "change" things within the status quo electoral system. We know we don't have any real power... save some for what we get through trade unions. Even there...)

continued next post...

Ed and others II

from previous post...

The Social Democratic State of Capitalism period was an anomaly, to which most working people are just now awakening. (Which period had won their loyalty to capitalism, after the Depression and War.) And one hears that reality all the time in their conversations. As for Harper, Ed, as many of us keep saying here, but you social democrats and liberals keep ignoring the significance of... Harper got elected with 39% of a gerrymandered vote... and of those, certainly very, very many will not be working class votes.

STOP CAPITALISM, as Lynn says above. With which I agree. Only to do that, it is going to take more than a simple vote for this or that political party, all of which are tied to the apron strings of capitalism... whatever the light show, pop and fizzle they put on at election time. It's this which even working citizens understand; that they are really just like a rock concert, but about which they really need to draw the appropriate conclusions. Which is where a "revolutionary Left" comes in, now still largely defunct, to "assist" them in doing so... in my view.

A long "answer" Ed, but more or less true.

Jerry....I've left all

Jerry....I've left all ideologies behind many years ago, because, like religions , they all can be twisted into pretzels to legalize colonization, extortion and mass murder. And I have seen them all.

The reason I brought up the mutual hate of social democrats by both communists and capitalists, was to show the relationship between the two ruling rackets.

Social democracy, if used as it was originally intended, is the least evil of them all and has a chance to become something useful. We must have governments, so the last thing we can do is contemplating who can do the least damage ?

As far economic theories are concerned, I believe in physical laws used in economic calculations and activities, plus in democratic, human rights, which are very close to the original intentions of social democracy.

Ed Deak.

follow the money

Jerry, sorry about the delayed response. Yesterday’s wind and rainstorm knocked out power ‘till late last night.

The “revolutionary Left”, like the “environmentalist”, as well intentioned as they are, seem to be damaging that which they seek to protect and enhance. In the case of the revolting Left it must be obvious that the actions of those protesting gov’t cuts in the Eurozone are unlikely to improve working class living conditions. Strikes, marches and protests may enhance solidarity but the writing is on the wall for those that fantasize about shifting wealth from the rich to the poor. Those controlling the flow of capital aren't about to let that happen.

Yesterday’s As It Happens, on CBC radio, had an interesting interview with a market trader. His take on gov’t and its influence on the direction the global economy heading is worth a listen. Go to the link below and scroll along to 17 minutes on the time bar.

Try not to get hung up on the minutiae of market crashes or who’s making money in the market. What is important is the overall attitude of the players in the financial world (specifically this market trader) and his statement about who actually runs the show and who will benefit.

http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/Radio/As_It_Happens/1492126828/ID=2145022714

Ed and Social Democracy

"The reason I brought up the mutual hate of social democrats by both communists and capitalists, was to show the relationship between the two ruling rackets." Ed Deak

And that message was received... and at least not disagreed with, given what happened to the Russian Revolution and what passed for a "Communist" Party. :-) (ALL parties, without exception, are an elite creating problem, but especially in the conditions that then prevailed in Russia. Such as we have some discussed before.)

But while I certainly do not hate "official" Social Democrats, in our country the NDP, we are not agreed on their at least longer term usefulness in the transformation of society and the economy that I want, as a working class person. And that's just me. :-)

We are in a global and national economic and political situation, to be brief, where to be a "lesser evil" is not good enough... again, just my view.

Though I do agree with you re the "original" concept of Social Democracy... which was at its founding more inclusive and yes, "radical", even "revolutionary" than it is today. Where it once called outright for the overthrow of capitalism, it has been corrupted and mutated into what Tony Blair is today, just another tepidly reformist party of capitalism at best, more or less content with the status quo "tweaked".

Though whilst I'm here and on the subject, do let me say that I think the position taken by the NDP in the House yesterday, calling for the ouster/banning of Dick Chaney from the country (for his sanctioning of torture), was outstanding. Not quite enough, for he should have been arrested on the spot and charged in the Hague, but still very good for the times.

We are some disagreed Ed, but we are also much agreed... enough that I am certainly prepared to work with it. :-)

KWD

KWD,

I'm busy here, so I don't have a lot of time to respond, except briefly. And I will check out that link you provide.

That there are problems with the current working class movements everywhere, NO LESS the depth of the understanding of more specifically "environmentalists", is obvious enough. There is an urgent need on both sides for linkages in their analyses, or the full import of what is happening, AND the opportunity, will not be realized.

Society, its political institutions, and those of the economy must all change radically, in my view. Yes, there does need across all this, and all the class elements of society, to be a major change in their level of understanding as part of it, or we are headed for a major economic AND environmental collapse. I accept that and understand it.

But that said, the old boom and bust paradigm that denies power to ordinary citizens and keeps throwing them under the bus whenever there is a crisis of any sort, needs to be "transformed" and "overthrown" as part of the laying the groundwork for the "new paradigm". So-called. If there is ever going to be reductions in population and rates of resource and overall environmental exploitation, the working class needs to be brought in from the cold and made part of the solution, rather than isolated, creating more resentments, that make it part of the problem.

For all the obstacles in the way of it, there will be no brave new paradigm that does not take into account working class needs and interests. We will do what we always do... drag our feet, not co-operate, go on strikes, engage in class warfare, whatever is needed.

So, like I say, again just my view, environmentalists coming at us from relatively privileged positions and circumstances themselves, need to stop preaching to us, go back to the drawing board, and take us into account.

A new understanding AND real "power to the people" is needed, to get this right, and a critical mass onboard.

They Will Not Allow It???

"In the case of the revolting Left it must be obvious that the actions of those protesting gov’t cuts in the Eurozone are unlikely to improve working class living conditions. Strikes, marches and protests may enhance solidarity but the writing is on the wall for those that fantasize about shifting wealth from the rich to the poor. Those controlling the flow of capital aren't about to let that happen." KWD

This is where we really fundamentally disagree, the Green intelligentsia and I. I think that in fact there is a very important value to the revolts occurring across Europe, and indeed the rest of the world right now... They are bringing this crisis of "the system", the current paradigm of which ye all so fancifully speak in isolation from real people, to a head. It is going to work to "force" a resolution in the end, as this economic crisis deepens. It will certainly not be resolved by hoisted pinkies, book readings, or polite discussions and manoeuvring. (And sometimes we all learn by and in the process of doing... which is what is going to happen here.)

And "you" may think that the ruling class is not going to allow any transfers of wealth or power "share" from themselves to the working class of Europe, and that it is all a fantasy, and the ruling class may even think it is not on, but reality, especially in such a time as this, may just not fully be what anyone "thinks" right now. They may have no fucking choice in the final analysis.

Just because much of the time, the working class acts as if, even thinks that it is powerless, and the ruling class are all powerful, does not mean that once set in motion and motivated, that they ARE in fact powerless. And the working class is NOT just a mindless blob or collection of flesh bits. We learn too.... believe it or not, and contrary to other perceptions.

What is cannot continue... on any level. And though the ruling class is positioned with control of the instruments of the State and the economy, all that can turn in a moment, where there is the will and the critical mass to see it through.

We shall see, my friend. No doubt it is all unfolding as it should... at least will. :-)

there's a better world outside that box

"By 2010 Mondragon was providing employment for over 80,000 people working in 250 companies in four areas of activity: Finance, Industry, Retail and Knowledge. The co-operatives operate in accordance with a business model based on People and the Sovereignty of Labour, which has made it possible to develop highly participative companies rooted in solidarity, with a strong social dimension but without neglecting business excellence. The Co-operatives are owned by their worker-members and power is based on the principle of one person, one vote."

There are "better" models out there, if one looks. Of course, the apologists for the Vanguard out there don't like the one above.

Nothing will change, the

Nothing will change, the people may jump up and down, demonstrate and revolt, as long as the present , criminal economic theory is being taught in our universities, legalizing the exploitation, colonization and enslavement of the human race.

It is not the filthy rich, the mega corporations, politicians. stockmarkets and pimp governments who are doing the damage, but the universities.

The same way as religions have licenced, and to a certain extent are still licencing, destruction and mass murder, claiming to represent God's Will.

Today it is the Will of the Money God, represented by his priesthood the so called "economists" who are leading the biggest crime wave in history.

At the same time, all fundamentalist religions are also dead set against any kind of social services, protection of humanity, and are strongly supporting economic destruction and exploitation, again as part of God's Will and Predestination that sentences some to serve, some to rule, with social services interfering with Divine Orders. Ask Harper.

So there's no point in blaming the politicians, without looking for the origins of their actions.

Ed Deak.

Zalm et al

Is it possible to vocus on one issue such as Greece?
I'd love to know why you think that country is technically bankrupt.
Capitalism or socialism?

The present government of

The present government of Greece, regardless what ideology they represent, was elected 2 years ago, in 2009.

Therefore they didn't cause the present mess.

It would be interesting to know how much the Olympic theatricals have contributed to the country's problems?

Ed Deak.

Aside from narcissism and greed...

One of the many problems plaguing the global economy is the presence of the mutual funds. A few mutual fund managers control trillions of dollars and they are sheep, all bleating in time. They run in the same direction and they affect the entire world economy with their peripatations.

In a more true capitalism, individuals would be in full control of their own funds and they would make their on decisions.

John Corman

By all means John - Ed points out - as I have previously - that the government which was in charge for the period that things went so seriously sideways was A RIGHT WING CONSERVATIVE GOVERNMENT headed by Kostas Karamanlis. This government came to power in 2004 when it defeated the Pan Hellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK).

IN fact, it is the current government, led by George Papandreou, that has been doing all it can to try and recover from the mess Karamanlis (whose term would not have expired until, wait for it, September 2011) left when defeated in the October 2009 election.

You really ought to do a little more research John...for your information, the elections marked the worst defeat the right wing party has seen in more than 20 years.

According to figures posted on the Greek Interior Ministry's Web site, the Socialist party received 44 percent of the vote, compared with Karamanlis's New Democracy's 34 percent, with 87 percent of votes counted. This margin was the largest seen in a Greek vote in decades.

I'd say that's a pretty clear indictment of the right wing creators of the Greek bankruptcy.

However, my friend, if you want to keep bringing it up, I'll keep demonstrating how utterly wrong you are.

GWest - You're not addressing the issue

So, you're saying they had a "Right Wing" socialist government that got them into difficulties and the new "Left Wing" socialist government is trying to offset the damage done.
Where does Capitalism come into the picture?

You and others refuse to address this fundamental problem.
Governments have spent and borrowed to much money. It is that simple.

Here is a clip from a Trader ...

who foresees a massive economic collapse coming '
because government's do not control the world, Glodman Sachs does'.

For me, he epitomizes what is wrong with our world view. He talks about making 'money' on the con-game while contributing ZERO to the world.

I figure its time for some sound principles to govern our conduct, not fairy tales spun from above by those disinterested in the peoples well-being and exacerbated by their intellectual converts.

John Corman, try turning your field glasses around :)

Perhaps 'capitalism' is not so much the 'everyday, interactive system of commercial theory' we in the Western World are schooled to believe, but the 'force of capitalist rule' imposed from the very top by the power brokers of our global-economic world.

Start with this premise -- capitalism is grounded on competition. That is, under capitalism there will be one, and only one, ultimate winner. The twist to the plot is that these power brokers commenced their competition with a grossly unfair advantage - they were filthy rich and they were organized. They were composed of the captains of industry and the owners of banks acting in collusion.

In order to win, the power brokers of this 'force of capitalist rule' decided long ago upon a scheme: It was the debt enslavement of us all.

In order to accomplish that, these power brokers of 'capitalist rule' fostered an environment, largely through propaganda and anecdotal success stories, where the economic ideology of free market capitalism became beyond reproach to the masses. This became the power brokers bludgeon of our times.

At the same time they systematically picked their victims using the tried and true tactic of divide and conquer. They started by making debt slaves of the weakest. And nobody is more vulnerable than the individual. And the demise of one individual will go unnoticed because the number of success stories remains overwhelming. Or so the rhetoric went.

As time progressed, and using the meme of free market capitalism . The capitalist 'winners' one day (championing the glories of capitalism) are soon the 'losers' of the more successful 'capitalists' the next.

One by one they fall -- the individual; the 'mom and pop' enterprise; the local cooperative; the smaller regional corporation; the small sovereign yet dictatorial nations, or the non-compliant democratic ones; the weaker capitalist sovereigns like Ireland or Iceland or Greece; and now we see 'force of capitalist rule' marching toward larger, more stable sovereign nations, Germany for example, and penultimately economic multi-national organizations like the EU.

Suddenly clarity begins to surface. The 'force of capitalist rule' works to make everyone and everything go into debt to itself, the elite banking cartel of power brokers with designs to control all the globe's capital.

This is capitalism. So you tell me, what's to blame?

Igbymac, Lowlife. and Hog Swill...

"Get over yourself, lad. Add to the discussion, expand upon it, analyze it. Do something other than echo your various 'social-democratic' pundits' views." Igbymac

There are "some" social democrats, not all, who seem to think they have some divine claim to alternative political and economic ideas, and if you do not agree with them, you are a fraud or something. In any case, I thought you handled that very well.

Interesting to hear your history, my friend. I have been in and out of agriculture all my life. Now, I have only a horse and a cat... the horse, a quarter horse paint, which I ride almost everyday, and take on periodic excursions into the back country. The cat is just a joy to have around in the barn. :-) My health is good, and I'm full of piss and vinegar. :-)

impudent lowlife. I very much enjoyed your "co-operative" story, and much agree. There are better alternative examples out there. Mind, what KWD and other "environmentally concerned" folks have to say about all this is not untrue either. Which has to be integrated into future "co-operative" models. Thanks for your take here.

"because government's do not control the world, Golddman Sachs does'." And yet, in the face of this simple truth even the lowly traders for capitalism know, social democrats think they alone have the answer in the parliaments of capitalism. Hog swill.

Murray Dobbin, from what I

Murray Dobbin, from what I understand you support pay raises because you somehow think they will magically raise the standard of living of everyone in the country. Yet, somehow you disagree with tax cuts... Dohhhhh. What are you smoking?

First of all, Pay raises will do nothing at all to raise the standard of living of the people in a nation. If you had any sort of a proper education you would understand that salaries are based off of supply and demand. If there is a higher supply of workers, you would expect that the wages of the workers would fall, as there is less of a need for them. Similarly, wages cannot be arbritrarily raised in hopes of raising the quality of life of the workers. There would still be excess supply of workers, and now what have you done to solve the problem? Nothing at all, it got even worse. Now with corporations forced to pay more money to their workers, they have less money to spend on reinvestment and growth. See where this goes? Less money on growth and that leads to fewer new jobs created. Interfering and meddling with the basic laws of supply and demand do nothing but worsen the situation. I agree that the current government system does not work. But is the current system anything close to capitalism? No, there are simply too many regulations and rules destroying the already fragile economy.

What happened to personal responsibility? Instead of whining that you should get paid a higher salary, why not add some value into society and earn more money. People who are rich earned their way to their wealth through hard work, determination, and being more clever than the guy next to them. Wealthy people deserve their wealth just as much as poor people deserve their poverty.

Time for a little plain talk John Corman

The government which was the proximate 'cause' of the current Greek problem was a RIGHT WING neoconservative government. You know this John Corman because:
a) it is a simple and demonstrable fact;
b) a fact which has been pointed out to you several times here at Tyee and which is easily confirmed by many readily available independent sources; further,
c) in Canada, the reputation of NDP governments is more fiscally conservative and less associated with deficit financing than either Conservative or Liberal governments in this country – another fact that is both clear and easily confirmed.

I’d say, on the contrary, that you are the person who refuses to actually address the shortcomings of the system you support and further that you throw around ‘ad hominem’ attacks directed at ‘socialists’ and ‘unions’ in an entirely irresponsible fashion.

The fundamental problem we have in the west is not simply one of out of control government spending - it is, as others have pointed out, a consequence of far too many financial 'resources' being:

1)Over leveraged;

2)Concentrated in too few hands; and

3)Improperly regulated, managed and taxed by governments who have more allegiance to big business than they do to the citizens of their countries.

Do you have any idea how bloated the financial markets in the western world have become and how utterly devoid of any connection to real work and productive capacity they are?

Apparently not.

And a little more...

We have, for the past 30 odd years, seen the growth of a capitalistic nightmare that started with the creation of ridiculously bloated conglomerates and a variety of so-called ‘financial innovations’ such as derivates, hedge funds and credit default swaps which were touted as ways to improve economic performance.

In fact, these ‘innovations’ and the relaxed regulatory atmosphere which permitted their proliferation have contributed, if not created the current economic crisis while rewarding unproductive capital and imposing greater burdens on middle class taxpayers. These were not ‘socialist’ programs.

To look at just one example, in the United States, the need for the bailout of insurance giant AIG (which was also very active internationally) was caused directly by a direct linkage to ‘financial innovations’ at a cost of almost $200 billions to date. This was supposed to be an insurer – not a crown and anchor game. The record is also clear that ‘innovations’ in the accounting, regulatory and tax arbitrage business have also been used to generate corporate profits without doing anything positive for the economy as a whole.

In fact, the regulatory and reporting black hole of the capitalist ‘free market’ system has allowed banks, brokers, advisors, accountants and auditors to conceal real ‘financial activities’ from taxpayers, genuine investors (pension plan holders including unions) and shareholders. The people who have benefited from these lies and obfuscations are the same people YOU tout as capitalistic heroes, the same people who are being bailed out once again and who are still profiting huge unearned profits and paying little or no tax on them….at the same time that society as a whole loses.

In fact, that chunk of corporate profit (about 40% ) which came from the financial sector was about as real as the fictitious results of Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme – the same one he operated with impunity for more than ten years.

Greece is not the victim of too many hairdressers retiring on a government pension at 53, as much as you might like to think it is. The Greek people, like the rest of us, are being asked now to pay for the hubris and mendacity of a capitalist system that has been allowed to play with peoples lives and futures as if they were dice.

And Canada's and British Columbia's problems are not the result of rampant socialism and minimum wage scales that are out of control.

Fiat Lux- I enjoyed this post the first time, too:

"As I wrote before, sometimes, when I was working on something in some high rise, fancy executive office in Vancouver, I thought, if I had to work there, I would throw a chair through the window and go after it. Can't imagine working in an office."

Couldn't agree more~ I thank my lucky stars every day I'm able to do work that I enjoy, that is meaningful. So many people around the world don't have that luxury.

Recently from Chris Hedges at the Wall Street Occupation

Chris Hedges at Occupy Wall Street: They are creating a neo-feudalistic corporate city

FYI, its a six-part interview; it's going to devour an hour, but its a great meal.

Here is a little taste of the interview:

... because most Americans are passive consumers of information and very few are proactive, and the internet is only useful if you are practive. I would say we are the most delusioned society on the planet ...

dorothy

Educating and training people pays off exponentially. Reduces the birth rate too as a side effect. Not sure how what I wrote sent you off in a different direction than the one I intended.

Circumventing circumlocutions

John Corman asks:
Is it possible to vocus on one issue such as Greece?
I'd love to know why you think that country is technically bankrupt.
Capitalism or socialism?

If I really truly believe with all my might that my personal saviour will take me up to heaven with him when I die, which do you think I should follow? Jesus or Mohammed? Or Buddha?

Makes as much sense as your own question. No economic system is an absolute, no matter how hard you might wish it so. The whole world is a mess of blended systems of different kinds, and I'm beginning to think you're trolling, not inquiring.

"Wealth can not be created,

"Wealth can not be created, only taken".

People are beginning to wake up to the capitalist fraud, as they woke up to the communist fraud, all over the world.

This is from the USA.

Ed Deak.
=========================================

Finally, a progressive who knows how to fight back hard against the ridiculous "class warfare" charges from the GOP. In one fell swoop, Elizabeth Warren delivered a powerful knock-out blow against this GOP nonsense.

Warren's point was simple: Nobody gets rich on their own. Here's the key part:

"I hear all this, you know, 'Well, this is class warfare, this is whatever,'" Warren said. "No. There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own ­ nobody.
"You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I want to be clear. You moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate. You were safe in your factory because of police-forces and fire-forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn't have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory ­ and hire someone to protect against this ­ because of the work the rest of us did.
"Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea. God bless ­ keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is, you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along."1

Progressives take note: THAT is how it is done. THAT is how you fight back hard. And THAT is how you defeat Fox News talking points.
.
Matt Lockshin, Campaign Manager
CREDO Action from Working Assets
1. "Elizabeth Warren On 'Class Warfare': There Is Nobody Who Got Rich On His Own (VIDEO)," Eric Kleefeld, Talking Points Memo, 09-21-2011.

This is a message from CREDO / Working Assets. © 2011 CREDO. All rights reserved. Questions? Send us an email or write us at: 101 Market Street, Suite 700, San Francisco, CA 94105.

Legs and Wall St.

Well, this discussion certainly has legs. It has obviously tapped into a sensitive issue that more and more are feeling. Good. We need the diversity of "progressive" opinion here.

""I hear all this, you know, 'Well, this is class warfare, this is whatever,'" Warren said. "No. There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own ­ nobody.
"You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I want to be clear. You moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate. You were safe in your factory because of police-forces and fire-forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn't have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory ­ and hire someone to protect against this ­ because of the work the rest of us did.
"Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea. God bless ­ keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is, you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along." posted by Ed.

While we might disagree about just how "un-ideological" you are :-) Ed, this quote you provide focuses on the point, more or less, around which we "progressives" can at least in our majority rally... The need for new levels of social responsibility in the economy of capitalism.

The "fightback" has already begun on Wall St., if you have been watching the news lately. And while there are many approaches gathering there, coming from many diverse "progressive" perspectives, it is the fact of a beginning that is important and needs to be focused on.

Time, further developments or lack thereof in the economy and political institutions of capitalism, will take care of proving who is right, who is wrong, who has or has not the "more or less" correct analysis of where this is all headed. But it is again, organizing and beginning the struggle that is important... And letting the political/ideological issues take care of themselves. And they will. These kinds of developments always start off chaotic.

I am not young anymore, but in quite remarkable good shape, all things considered, and isolated geographically where I love to be. BUT, if I can be useful in any way, to folks that are beginning the fightback (Most likely in the large urban centres.), let me know. I will attempt to be there physically, or any otherwise, and be of use to you.

Once it starts in the heartland of the Empire and starts to grow, you know its not going to be much longer here... given the more timid nature of Canadians, at least of recent times.

Seriously, pay attention to what is developing in these Wall St. demonstrations. It is, in my view, the opening drum roll here in North America.

re: G West & Gorman & Greece

Every day, all around Canada and the USA, people go into banks, large and small, and have a conversation with their creditor. Many will give their creditor a choice: It's either bankruptcy or 50 cents on the dollar because I can't pay back my loan in its entirety.

Germany went bankrupt twice in the last century and Argentina, Ecuador and Iceland, among others, have also been down that road.

The Greeks will get their financial house in order at some point but I doubt they need to impliment draconian IMF measures to do so.

To put things into perspective, the US has a deficit of about 1.5 trillion dollars. There is no political will to either rein in spending or raise taxes to balance the books. The US is not to far behind the Greeks (which is why they were downgraded).

...the US has a deficit of

...the US has a deficit of about $1.5 trillion dollars"

Yet, a 5 52 , one of many, just flew over a few minutes ago, here in the Cariboo, as I was coming back from my shop, at probably $15, or 20,000/hr., while their capitalists are piling money and factories to the new superpower they're practicing to bomb one day.

Politics have always made a lot of sense.

Ed Deak.

A "democratic" lever of power is like a public barn raising

Democracy as a "democratic" lever of power is like a public barn raising

Is there evidence of a "democratic" lever of power here at the Tyee?

For starters, among the various Tyee threads, this one is for me among the most informative I have seen and much appreciate the constructive, rational and fact based correctives to Dobbin’s article.

Simultaneously, its no secret that farming communities which conducted barn raisings had a building floor plan and an integrated organisational floor plan, both long term and short term (day of construction) well before either blue prints or the concept of critical path were ever literally invented. However, no barn raising ever occurred spontaneously or was undertaken by actions limited to articulating a by gosh and by golly.

Surprisingly, unless I am missing something, despite the exceptionally good by gosh and by golly found in this thread there are very few voices here calling for or suggesting something beyond the rhetorical take place “While those in the Middle East are fighting against torture, we can't seem to get it together to even fight smart meters.” However continuing with that post, effective progressive action is much more than “We stop rolling over. We "interfere" in their game, again and again...until Park Place falls” but actually doing the positive as well, as in developing a magna carta floor plan and then doing the organizational thing of carrying it out.

Who can do this? Putting some bite to the earlier quip "It is not your responsibility to finish the work of perfecting the world, but you are not free to desist from trying" leads directly to "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." -Margaret Mead

Should you be interested in taking meaningful steps towards the “Taking back our democracy” as a modern day barn raising, please come by for a virtual coffee http://www.eduardhiebert.com/ereform/v123p.htm And through my public background, I give you my word I will not “out” any personal information. I am simply too much of a public person in advancing the common good to begin playing those games to the advantage of those feeding off the common good.

hmm

Wasn't it Karl Marx who said: What capitalism does best is to create its own grave diggers?

Caseys

You stated"
"Germany went bankrupt twice in the last century and Argentina, Ecuador and Iceland, among others, have also been down that road."
============================================
But, isn't one thing in common with those countries. Their currency was devalued. The Greeks can't do that.

"The Greeks will get their financial house in order at some point but I doubt they need to impliment draconian IMF measures to do so.

To put things into perspective, the US has a deficit of about 1.5 trillion dollars. There is no political will to either rein in spending or raise taxes to balance the books. The US is not to far behind the Greeks."
=============================================
There are a number of differences between the US and Greece. The US can print money, implement an HST and a variety of other taxation measures. The Greek tax rates are already so high that cheating is endemic.

The elephant in the room is demographics. The birth rate in Greece, and the rest of the PIIGS is so low that any socialist model is unsustainable. I read the other day that in Greece, for every 80 grand parents, there are 24 grand children. You're seeing the end of some cultures with numbers like that.

The US doesn't have that problem. Their birthrate is at replacement levels and the young, bright, ambitious fellows from these bankrupt states are moving there. (and Canada, we hope)

H Brown

A more appropriate quote given the times we live in is from the great Lady herself.
"Socialism works just fine until you run out of other people's money"

That appears to be a more accurate assessment of what's happening in Europe than anything Mr Marx had to say. Mind you, it seems to me that Marx has been proven wrong on just about everything he said.

re: fiat lux & political sense

The total US debt is about $14.5 trillion. In fact, the US, the beacon of free enterprise capitalism, is the world's largest debtor nation. Communist China, I believe, is the world's largest creditor nation. The Chinese hold about $1.5 trillion of US debt. The interest payments on that amount alone help China build its Red Army.

The Chinese commies and the US capitalists have a symbiotic relationship of gargantuan proportions.

The US debt is not $14.5

The US debt is not $14.5 trillion, as claimed officially, but, according to many experts , it is close to $70. trillion.

If the Chinese and Japanese would stop buying US bonds, keeping the US economy to drag along, the country would be broke in weeks.

The relationship between communism and capitalism is based on the "competition" of which one can collectivize more of the world's resources and economy and which one can enslave and steal more from more.

Our capitalists are more comfortable in dealing with dictatorships, and they make no secrets of it, because they don't have to worry about pleasing the people, only to buy the governments, who can then supply the slaves for "economic efficiency".

As I told one of my stockbroker customers in Vancouver some 40 years ago, if Canada had been under communist dictatorship for 70 years, by then, the same people would have been living in Shaughnessy and on Angus Drive.

He never spoke to me again.

As far the accounting system on debts is concerned, private debts are, and should be accounted as part of the national debt, and foreign investment accounted as foreign debt, yet neither is, because the facts would ruin the lies told by economists and politicians.

Ed Deak.

What 'great' lady John?

Surely you don't mean Baroness Thatcher?

What exactly did she do that was positive and why would anyone quote her as an authority about anything?

Perhaps you liked her role in destroying the unions, increasing poverty, denying the role of society and tearing her own country apart? She exhibited the absolute worst of the British character with her purblind ignorance of and hostility toward Europeans and the continent. At the same time she managed to find a way to lick Ronnie's hand at every opportunity and buy into the Friedman/Greenspan bullshit that created the nightmare we're living through today. She was an ignorant clod - leaving a legacy of rising unemployment and negative equity; she decimated public services and began the destruction of British education. The recent riots in Britain are a suitable memorial to the Iron Lady and her dreadful legacy.

Bring on some honest socialists and lets create a real country here in Canada.

Perhaps one could suggest another, much more honest Englishman, George Orwell, who has, thankfully, left a more useful legacy than has Margaret Thatcher:

In his 1946 essay Why I Write - you can find it reprinted as the preface to the first volume of the Collected Orwell, he states that ‘...every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly and indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic Socialism, as I understand it.’

Or, if you prefer, Einstein's words:
"...(t)his crippling of individuals I consider the worst evil of capitalism. Our whole educational system suffers from this evil. An exaggerated competitive attitude is inculcated into the student, who is trained to worship acquisitive success as a preparation for his future career.

I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy, accompanied by an educational system which would be oriented toward social goals. In such an economy, the means of production are owned by society itself and are utilized in a planned fashion. A planned economy, which adjusts production to the needs of the community, would distribute the work to be done among all those able to work and would guarantee a livelihood to every man, woman, and child. The education of the individual, in addition to promoting his own innate abilities, would attempt to develop in him a sense of responsibility for his fellow men in place of the glorification of power and success in our present society."

The current state of advanced corruption and mendacity which surrounds government, finance, accounting and auditing and business generally is all the evidence one needs to see that it is time to stop practicing socialism only for tiny wealthy elites and begin to make the blood suckers start paying for the damages they've done to their fellow human beings AND the environment.

Ed - I'm sure you've seen this

I believe the total unfunded liabilities of the United States is now more than 115 Trillion dollars which is almost double the total US assets - I reckon that's where the $70 trillion comes from...Is that correct?

John Corman

"There are a number of differences between the US and Greece. The US can print money, implement an HST and a variety of other taxation measures."

You should call this tactic what it is - a Ponzi scheme. The world doesn't care if the US is broke and whining as long as we all hold hands together and walk past the graveyard together while whistling Dixie. But as soon as one of us cracks, then the rest follow, and the giant house of cards founded on a US dollar that is essentially worthless, comes tumbling down.

I'm not wishing for this, but I recognize that our desire to "gold-standard" the US dollar has caused US inflation to be exported wholesale to other countries around the world - notably China and Canada, its two biggest trading partners.

I don't consider exports of US inflationary pressures to be abusive in a relative sense, as the US economy is still powerful enough to pay its debts, should the rest of the world decide they don't want to play that game any longer - as compared to, say Greece or Turkey, which have total indebtedness approaching 400% of GDP. But in an absolute sense, yes, it is abusive. Only, who's going to do something about it?

The dollarization of global indebtedness has the unique effect of improving the financial position and wealth of the US domestic economy, to the detriment of all others. We now face an additional risk in that deflation is threatening the US economy, which means that inflationary costs will continue to be exported to the rest of the world, but without the added domestic demand necessary to compensate. We'll all have to chew and swallow that US debt much faster.

And that's not right either. This snake has two heads.

Edward Hiebert

As a member of a church that has historically participated in barn-raisings (though not me personally), I can tell you that there's a healthy dose of "by gosh and by golly" in them, along with a bunch of drunkenness; overeating; lax or nonexistent safety practices and consequent injuries and even deaths; arguments and fights over the "right" way to apply sheathing; laziness and self-aggrandizement; lack of recognition for those who truly keep the group together and moving in the same direction; and much much more.

Rather like the rest of the world, in fact. And that should come as no surprise.

Henry Ford a great supporter of workers? Laughable.

There is a famous bridge outside the main offices of Ford. Its a famous walkway where many ford workers were killed the workers at the Ford plant tried to unionize in 1937. The company hired thugs to intimidate them. You should really check your facts when you talk about Fords pro-worker stance. Fords record for workers rights is dismal.

John Corman, if you so disagree with Marx

perhaps Mikhail Bakunin is more your cup of tea?

I mean, he's pretty much nailed it bang-on in terms of predicting both the red states and the liberal democratic states emerging and what would transpire, no?

I suspect it is the word 'socialism/socialist' that throws us all a curve ball. There is the Marxist socialist definition (the one I associate with the word). And, of course, the politicized definition which is more widely used, and for the worst of reasons. Understandably, when both of the world's leading propagandists of the 20th Century (Russia and America) are both claiming Russia to be socialist, both with completely different purposes for stealing the namesake and both bastardizing the word in the process, its pretty tough for the people to conclude anything else.

So, for clarity, can you tell this reader what you mean when you say 'socialism or socialist'? Obviously your opinions of Marx and his predictions, or Greece for that matter, are going to vary depending on your definition.

re: Corman

All the Greek govt, left, middle or right, has to do to solve their "crisis" is start to taxe the wealthy in their society - the rich, large corporations, etc.

And before you react to this by stating that taxing the rich will scare any and all investors away, I leave you with the wonderful words of Warren Buffet:

"“I have worked with investors for 60 years and I have yet to see anyone shy away from a sensible investment because of the tax rate on the potential gain. People invest to make money, and potential taxes have never scared them off.”

re: being broke

There are quite a few economists and analysts that state that if the US govt were to tax the rich and corporations at the same levels they were taxed at in the '50s and '60s, the US deficit and debt would vanish.

But... the rich and large corporations make money off US debt because they lend money to the US govt. It's not the greatest rate of return but it's safe.

General Observations

Many interesting and some really actually "enjoyable" pieces in the latest contributions to this thread:

Zalm gave me a good chuckle re "the barn raising", which was certainly my "secular" experience with them, in so far as the food, booze (even the odd furtive joint) and lax safety measures. Though I don't really recall anyone getting hurt, oddly. It was always amazing how much work got done with many hands, with so much laughter and enjoyment going on. Followed by dancing late into the night. But then, we were young.)

And my friend igbymac's comments about Marx... about spot on. You and I must have somewhere, sometime crossed "experience" paths. (Russia, Stalin and those around him especially, in my view, hid its/his "building capitalism" agenda behind the Red Flag of "socialism", about the same as Hitler hid his "saving corporate capitalism" agenda behind the "National Socialism (NAZI)" cause. And the proof of this was, that it was first the original "communists and anarchists", such as Bakunin, Trotsky and many, many others "within" the Party at the time, who were the first victims of his purges. Those communists and anarchists who actually wanted to build socialism and what Marx defined as "communism" were the greatest threat and were the first to go. Which was the same "purge project" carried out by Hitler before even turning on the Jews. And before turning on the rest of the Russian population, both of them.)

And, of course, Ed Deak with this:

"Any country, or society, especially Canada , that build their economies on the hope of exports is going to go broke, sooner, or later.

Just watch what will happen in China when their export bubble bursts. They may even have to sell their houses and condos in Vancouver."

Export based economies, particularly raw material shipment dependent, are typically "colonial" economies, there primarily for the enrichment of a local "bootlick class" and of course, the recipient "motherland". In our case, the primary motherland is Amerika of course, though we will sell out to anyone. What has blessed us better than most is, we have had so much of a natural resource base, and to now at least, the US Empire was in the ascendancy, with so much room to grow in the postwar... with the collapse of the Old World colonial system etc.

Now, however, US capitalist growth has hit the virtual "saturation point" on all fronts, with declining growth potential, and the rising costs of Empire maintenance (i.e. colonial wars.) In short, it is driving it's own face into the proverbial brick wall. And as it and the rest of the capitalist world goes, so will we... indeed, already slowly but surely are.

Breaking free of the old colonial paradigm entirely and finally, is "part" of the new paradigm that has to be built in this country. Though there is certainly more to it than this as well.

In order of appearance

Thanks Ed Deak for taking notice of my input. With your lifelong study of how societies fail, need I tell you I am all ears in waiting when you conclude “Now I have to go and load a cow for shipping to the market, but would be interested in continuing this trend later”? When you do, concerning your study of “history's ever repeating tragedies” might you differentiate on whether you believe these tragedies are predictive? prescriptive? or descriptive? depending on which choice of forks in the road are still before us?

Jerry Munro, you are correct. You will not find a bio literally. Does not this thread’s revelation reveal in spades that bios may be quite suspect even as in Ford’s case when widely endorsed by many many people, even among the well-intentioned as was here the case? Not finding a literal bio I appreciate your affirmative observation concerning my work that “I will say that I find you interesting. I visited your site..., I found no significant disagreement with its content”. Thanks for the welcome! By the way, what does “a bit too much head on type face” mean? And proposed improvements would be welcomed!

Zalm, you have a way with words I can only dream of. “Circumventing circumlocutions”! The slag? reproach? invitation? you extended earlier to another when you concluded “Not sure how what I wrote sent you off in a different direction than the one I intended.”

Concerning your post to me, having read some of Soren Kierkegaard, an apropos quip would be that “the subtlety of sin is to speak of one’s humility with pride”. Its therefore without hesitation I can agree/accept everything you wrote to me. However, appealing to your own last just quoted words, what does what you wrote about your people (and I do not mean this disparagingly have to do with the spirit of what I wrote?

To collapse what I wrote earlier, I see the way forward through democratic community building barn-raising, though these are always, always as Ed Deak could likely underline in spades vulnerable to barn razings. Not predictively I would add, but descriptively. With all that is written in this thread we are in much distress and after metaphorically having lost a barn, we can jump in an raise another. With this being part of your people’s history “though not me personally”, with the power of the written word at your command, while we are still able, might you as I concluded earlier suport a modern barn raising? For if not, does not your post to me and addressing the wider community become predictive? instead of simply descriptive? depending on choices made going forward?

Casino Capital

Jim Stanford's empirical analysis in 1999 (Paper Boom, CCPA) predicted the crisis in casino capitalism...growth in financial capital 1990-97 61%, growth in real fixed capital 13%, growth in after tax profits of banks 101%, decline in real disposable income of Canadians 7%. Thats Canada, the global economy is plagued by derivative financial instruments that triple the real value of productive assets and reward only the speculators. Casino capitalism is going to fail. Community economic development investments are now essential to repatriate capital to local real assets and the production of goods and services, but that wont address the underlying corruption of the economic system by usury and speculative capital. BC needs a CED or "social economy" strategy like those in Quebec, Manitoba and Nova Scotia to address at least a part of this crisis.