"Capitalism? It's finished, Mac"

[Joe Chi Minh]

The above heading and brief item below it, written by Suzanne Moore, appears in today's (UK) Mail on Sunday, of all papers.

Like Peter Hitchens, she can be as mad as a meat-axe or very insightful and sometimes very witty with it.

"WHAT an unremarked-upon revolution the end of capitalism turns out to be - America, not North Korea, nationalises the world's two largest financial institutions, the charmingly named Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac, in a Soviet-style coup.

The government simply took over, or 'appropriated', private property and funds. The huge banks we know have been greedy, corrupt, ruthless, not answering to their shareholders or caring about their effects on the housing markets or elsewhere.

A Republican government goes straight for nationalisation. Amazing.

No wonder our unions are restless. The end-of-history thesis told us there was no alternative to capitalism anywhere in the world.

It now turns out there is, right in the midst of the country that boasts most proudly of its success."

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1055544/Yes-insulate---gloomy-Gordon.html

Where's McCarthy when you need him, eh.....?

[Turbineguy]

1. This wasn't supposed to happen

until well after Bush left office so it could be blamed on the Democrats. But since he's still in office, it's Clinton's fault.

[cui bono]

5. LOL. So sad, yet still true

in their little minds.

[bulloney]

20. When I worked for a farm organization in the early 90's the Republicans blamed everything on Carter.

It's so refreshing to see a party practice what they preach on accepting responsibility.

[Enthusiast]

19. LMAO! And it is truely amazing

It is amazing how the Clintons STILL control financial institutions long after they have been out of office.

[DCKit]

27. If they'd gotten their hands on Social Security...

the fat, rich bastards would have been in the clover for another decade. Maybe less, depending on how advanced their plan for liquidation has become.

Then again, this is the same crew that's been planning the Iraq invasion for nearly 30 years, and we all know how well that's worked out. "FUBAR" and "SNAFU" don't begin to describe the maladministration.

[Uncle Joe]

32. I believe this is why Al Gore wanted to put Social Security in a lockbox.

Something of which was derided at the time.

[earthboundmisfit]

2. Do you mean Christopher Hitchens? Though admittedly -

he can be quite a "Peter"...

[Joe Chi Minh]

4. No. It's his native -based, English brother.

[earthboundmisfit]

10. :)

B-)

[kristopher]

3. This is simple

And perfect for bringing back those drifting toward choosing based on personality and culture.

"A Republican government goes straight for nationalisation. Amazing."

Simple.

It deserves to be on the greatest page.

[UK populist]

6. Capitalism has to fail sooner or later

I know this sounds simplistic but Capitalism only sustains itself with growth ? Answer= yes
So for growth the world constantly needs more people (markets) with buying power ? " = yes
The world is becoming overpopulated and global warming is shrinking habitable land mass ? " = yes

Now I'm no economist but if you combine the answers to the 3 questions above what can be the only logical answer=
Mine would be wars over oil and other fossil fuels = check
" " minerals i.e. gold, silver, aluminum, copper = check
is fresh water or arable land next
How much devastation would have to be created for the population and stability to get to a point where capitalism could be restarted.

[starroute]

7. Right - capitalism is not a sustainable system

The problem is that capitalism is based on investment and the prospect of a profit to investors.

Without investment, any enterprise only has to bring in enough money to pay for supplies and equipment and support its owners and employers. There's a balance there. At most, if the owners take out a loan to try something new, they will have to earn extra for a time to pay it back -- but if the loan means the creation of additional value, the equation remains in balance.

But to create a constant, ongoing surplus for the investors -- even in the absence of additional value -- somebody or something has to be exploited. Employees have to be underpaid, or the environment has to be degraded, or the value of the product has to be compromised. That throws the entire system out of whack.

More than that -- the very existence of those surpluses creates a pressure to find new things to invest them in. That means more useless products, more exploitation -- and, increasingly, more hollow financial vehicles. The global financial system is awash in meaningless investments whose only value is on paper.

In every way, we need a system that is based on value and not on profit. If we had that, I think it would solve a lot of our problems. It could even look a lot like free enterprise -- it just won't be profit-based capitalism.

[Joe Chi Minh]

8. In its purest expression, an eternal empire, endless resources to steal; and open-ended greed,

all in order to be the Alpha male in a dog-eat-dog pack; something that doesn't occur in nature.

[bulloney]

21. Without regulation, capitalism is also cannibalistic.

The big fish in the markets eat the little fish to the point where you have a monopolistic or oligopolistic system where one or few large companies control the market. With no competition to hold them accountable, they abuse the system, get into trouble and demand taxpayer bailouts because they're "too big to fail."

[GliderGuider]

25. I would argue that there isn't a sustainable economic system anywhere on the planet today

In fact I have argued this recently, in the article "Political Will, Political Won't".

The point of that article is that the underlying growth paradigm of modern civilization (at least the last 5000 years' worth) cuts across all lines of political, economic and social ideology. Different political or economic systems amount to little more than different mechanisms for implementing the same growth process.

At one point in the article I say:

In light of this analysis it is obvious why we are repeatedly failing to address any of these wicked (GG: ecological, energy and economic) problems. The only permanent "solution" to any of them is the secession of growth and the relinquishment of ownership. That idea is anathema to our guardian institutions. And as the occupants of the pinnacle of power, our politicians have every reason to derail efforts in that direction, no matter how small.

Politics, regardless of party or ideology, is part of the problem and can never be part of the solution. While it may be easier for the average person to live under the rule of a more humane parcel of rogues, at its heart politics is the primary guardian institution of modern civilization. The role of all politics is to manage power, and power is always managed for the benefit of the holders of power. It doesn't matter whether the power managers are Democrats, Republicans, Tories, Grits, Social Democrats, Communists or a military junta. They all fulfill the same role in service of the same beneficiaries.

In order to fulfill that role they unite with the other guardian institutions – the economic, industrial, legal, religious, educational and communications organizations. Together they create, maintain and guard a noetic milieu (a globalized intuitive, non-rational consciousness) in which any values that challenge the two fundamental preconditions to modern civilization are seen as incomprehensible, self-evidently absurd, dangerous or even insane. Since the primary value system these guardians protect is the paradigm of continuous material growth, the most dangerous of all radical ideas are any proposals to limit, halt or reverse that growth.

On the question or resource efficiency:

There is a public perception that growing efficiency allows us to maintain economic growth with less resource consumption per unit if output (however you measure "output", which is trickier than it appears). Unfortunately the economic theory of rebound (the modern, more sophisticated restatement of Stanley Jevons' observations) implies that the overall level of resource consumption can never be diminished by the amount that the magnitude of the efficiency improvements suggest. In fact, overall resource consumption may even increase in the face of increasing efficiency, as general economic growth allows more consumption in resource-intensive areas of the economy as well as the more efficient ones.

Dethroning capitalism will not "solve" the problem of growth, since the growth paradigm is embedded throughout our global culture. As long as that paradigm persists, any increases in efficiency in specific aspects of the global economy are unlikely to have more than minor local impacts.

[Odin2005]

14. I'm no defender of Capitalism, but I think your conception of what ECONOMIC growth means is flawed.

If you develop a way to use resources more efficiently, for example, you could get more use out of a fixed amount of material. Your usage of resources hasn't gone up you have still have economic growth. Mercantilist "zero-sum-game" thinking is an intellectual trap.

Also, once we start colonizing the solar system we can start mining asteroids and getting a lot more resources then we extract now without damaging the environment.

[UK populist]

24. Yes you are right in saying

that advancements are made that make resources last longer, but with capitalism they are generally only made when a financial crisis makes it profitable to make them advancements and not when they need to be done for the sake of saving the planet or humankind itself. Without the kind of initiative shown by JFK saying we will be on the moon in the next decade what chance do we have of being able to colonize other planets before it is too late to save the majority of the population on this planet. Lets just look at the LHC project at CERN started this week that has taken 30 years to develop and even the scientists admit it will have no short potential for the good of the world, but the long term implications could be beyond the anyone's comprehension of what has been achieved in the last 100 years. Do correct me if I am wrong but didn't the US congress shut down a similar project in America a while back saying it had no short term benefits and was a waste of money.
The rest of the world are looking for advancements that benefit all mankind while the US only spends money to benefit it's benefactors I.e. Military, big pharma, telecoms and banks in the short term.

[GliderGuider]

26. See post #25 above

Rebound theory says this perception of efficiency is flawed.

[mile18blister]

9. "Soviet-style coup?"

:wtf:

Freddie Mac was created under FDR in 1938 and was a government-run entity until LBJ needed money for the Viet Nam war in 1968. If the taxpayers have to bail out these organizations, then they should be owned and run by the government.

[Mesteryo]

11. economics goes over my head..

Except general theory but I don't think govt. nationalization of money production was supported by our founders who were capitalists.

[Wednesdays]

12. Yeah, we shouldn't have moved our economy one iota since 1791

Yup, we would have been perfectly fine if we just stuck to plantations and slave labor. :eyes:

[Winston.]

15. Isn't that Ron Paul's plan ?

"Property rights are the foundation of all rights in a free society."
- Ron Paul, September, 2007

Now if that statement isn't Orwellian, I don't know what is !

[Mesteryo]

30. Paul is just..

Antigovernment. Obama believes govt. can work for us if we maintain control of it.

[UK populist]

16. Do you seriously think the humans stagnate without capitalism ?

Many cases have shown the exact opposite. I will highlight the current one which has had and will continue have the largest affect on all mankind.
There have been viable alternatives to fossil fuels for energy around for at least 50 years but they have been denied their chance to blossom simply because the Capitalist backbone of oil and coal has dominated and permeated every facet off our everyday lives to a degree that (1)Too much money is made for our financial systems to change every quickly without devastating collapse. (2)Whoever controls the flow of these resources has power over the globe.
Capitalism is purely about fulfilling greed. So why would anybody stop making easy money on the risk trying something new simply for the sake of human advancement or saving the planet for future generations if they cannot guarantee a better profit weighed against the risks in the short term.

[Mesteryo]

28. not what I meant..

I was just saying that our founders wrote nationalization of money production into the Constitution and they were far from socialist.

[The Traveler]

18. Actually, that is completely unclear

The Founding Fathers were pioneers ... explorers of a new paradigm of social and political organization. It is completely inaccurate to suggest capitalism as such was at the forefront of their consciousness. To them, Capitalism == the British Far East India Company, which was the empitome of everything they loathed.

They had not reached any conclusions on these matters. In fact, they crafted a system they hoped would be adaptable to experience and knowledge gained in the future. They did this because they were far more wise than we. We often start our journies from a conclusion ... they stated theirs from a set of questions.

Trav

[Mesteryo]

29. not at all..

The British Tea merchant system was mercantilist in their eyes. Adam Smith was a critic of that system. The Boston Tea party was a protest against British policy of taxing imports of non-British tea into the colonies. The founders were also businessmen and merchants who were being hurt by British mercantilism.

I'm not a laissez faire capitalist but back then it was beneficial.

[patriotvoice]

13. Since the government now "owns" FM & FM, the government now "owns" many homes. EOM

[The Backlash Cometh]

17. Hey, I want to get an honorable mention for pointing out that we were

bankrupted into socialism.

[Joe Chi Minh]

22. One of my favourite paragraphs of all time is this one, which appears in the interview

with Nassim Talebon you can read on the site linked below it:

"He points out, chillingly, that banks make money from two sources. They take interest on our current accounts and charge us for services. This is easy, safe money. But they also take risks, big risks, with the whole panoply of loans, mortgages, derivatives and any other weird scam they can dream up. 'Banks have never made a penny out of this, not a penny. They do well for a while and then lose it all in a big crash.'"

... meanwhile, of course, the sharks responsible have salted away a personal fortune. You can almost hear them say, "I love the smell of burst bubble in the morning..."

"http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2008/06/talebs-harsh-assessment-of-bankers.html

[GOPBasher]

23. Capitalism is still here for most of us, but it's socialism for the richest corporations. n/t

[Joe Chi Minh]

31. Precisely.