Blink
Mubarak bails and I suspect the military started losing the rank and file. There were reports of gunfire breaking out in another city (on AlJazeera) just before Suleiman came on TV. The 32nd anniversary of the Iranian revolution has become something more, something different. We are now getting a history lesson from James Woolsey ( former CIA director) on CNN and again I have been fascinated by the different narratives of the different channels as I switch around. I see exactly where Pagan gets his simple views and arrogance and as Ducky continuously reminds us, the media shapes "politics" as such, is the best signifier of the Spectacle.
The nature of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood is the new Death Panels and having been proved wrong time after time after time will not make conservatives question their sources or analysis.
Immediately after the announcement FOX commentators started worrying about Israel and the DOW. They stress all the "terrible problems" which lie ahead and never once mention the role of unions. All very, very interesting. Can't wait to see how Glen Beck turns this ecstatic moment into a downer for his paranoid viewers. Will he stand with the Saudi royalty?
Another worry is the US sending in it's "Democracy Promotion troops, NDI, NRI, USAID etc In the name of Development the Chicago Shock Troops will soon be on the scene.
The "Realists" get to expose their cynicism and fear in the midst of hope and jubilation. We will learn what "stability" means. Will Americans begin to set up their own Liberation Squares?
posted by troutsky @ 9:25 AM
20 comments
20 Comments:
Hey Troutsky, all those people in the streets in Egypt demanding change and reform? We have a word for folks like that over here. We call them "The Tea Party".
Nice to know you've sailed over to the dark side.
Please stop, Pagan.
Where were you when millions were in the street protesting the fiasco in Iraq?
How many did Glenn "Douchebag" Beck get out for his mobilization on the mall. Pretty slim and the initial interest was so poor that he had to pay Sister Sarah to partially salvage the disaster.
Baggers are a fucking joke. There was some initial populist activity but right now you're just kissing Dick Armey and the Koch Bros. asses.
"Where were you when millions were in the street protesting the fiasco in Iraq?"
Bitching about Bush not doing enough to win it, and bitching at Democrats for being two-faced little bitches about it.
Glenn Beck? Sorry, I think the Tower of Babel was a myth, Beck just ain't my speed even though I do agree with him on a lot of things.
And why is it when there are people on the right who I happen to agree with I'm "kissing their asses", but when it comes to your affinity for the Left, you're just one of the many enlightened souls who know The Truth?
Pagan: I would totally be down with people "in the streets" demanding systemic change and refusing to leave until they got it.I could overlook the funny little hats.
Of course the Tea Party is for brighter lipstick on the old pig and they go home after the rally to watch Sarah's show. It's something my uncle would join to get out of washing dishes.
Speaking of Beck, I just visited The Blaze.com. I've been wondering where MENSA did their blogging, wow. The most trenchant comment was "capitalism = freedom".
People there at The Blaze have a different definition of capitalism than you do. You see it in an entirely different way. It's almost like the two of you are talking about two entirely different things with the same name.
As for putting lipstick on the pig, you need to read the Federalist Papers. That's the pig, and the political class has spent the entirety of the country's life trying to undermine it, with help from various entities, from city bosses, to tariff pirates, all the way down to Big Business, government contractors, federal agency bureaucrats, and both liberal and conservative special interest groups.
Do you want me to tell you what the really best thing about the USA is as it stands today and has for a long time? You get to choose between two captors and exhibit your own preferred manifestation of Stockholm Syndrome. The Tea Party is the first real alternative to come along since the country was founded that even comes close to approximating what the Founding Fathers (peace be unto them) intended.
No other alternative comes close. I realize you think your philosophy is the best way, and I enjoy discussing things with you and Ducky, but let's face it, you're as close to the founders as a group of grizzled old Wiccan elders on pot trying to comprehend World Of Warcraft.
I still give you kudos for not being fucking hypocrites like the Democrats.
Pagan: You always surprise me with these flashes of cognizance. We do understand capitalism differently: which is more precise?
We (sorry Ducky) ,I, am a small D democrat and understand Jefferson, if you must relate everything to the Sacred Founders. Federalism vs New World Orderism is not the real debate here.I think states SHOULD deal with state issues but I have a problem with capitalist states. Jefferson and Madison did as well. They were unable to solve the contradiction in their Constitution and we are seeing the results.
Everywhere the world is having the debate between Ideals (democracy) and Realism (needing resources, stability, etc) This debate is all about capitalism but it is not mentioned (Today the New York Times has an article that says Egyptians "reject crony capitalism". WTF? is "crony"?) except in opaque terms.
The only problem Madison and Jefferson had with capitalism, or at least the main problem they had with it, was in the proposed establishment of a National Bank, which Hamilton, another founder, favored. They feared it would give creditors too much power over farmers and small landowners, as they would benefit by setting and imposing interest rates on borrowing on a national scale, and there would be no recourse or alternatives. The national Bank in effect would have a stranglehold on the economy, they feared. But that would not be true capitalism. Neither is the Federal Reserve Act. If there is one President the Founders would have most liked to chop into tiny pieces it would probably be Wilson.
Maybe I see things in too simplistic terms, but I see capitalism as the best way to grow an economy, provided there is a free flow of resources. Without that free flow of resources, it becomes more like a series of private fiefdoms. And when an entity grows large enough and prosperous enough, that natural competitive spirit metastisizes until the quite natural urge to extinguish the competition takes on ominous forms, including but not limited to bribing politicians and influencing legislation.
You have big business entities that not only can adapt to oppressive government regulations, in some cases they prefer this, or at least they learn to take advantage of them to suit their own interests.
When it gets to the point that a handful of entities control specific areas of the market, then you no longer have what I would call true capitalism, because there is no true competition, which is a vital component of any successful economy.
The conundrum becomes, how best to provide for the free flow of capital so vital to economic health, without granting the government more powers than the Founders wished it to have. At some point you risk veering over to the territory of planned, centralized economies, which is what Democrats prefer, and which is only one reason I call them Stalinist Lite.
By the way, come over to my blog when you get the chance and take a look at Herman Cain, who might well be the next prez.
I've been to your blog, Pagan but I have to say your posting mechanism is a bit too involved.
Posting mechanism? Are you talking about Intense Debate? Crap, its head and shoulders above bloggers shitty little comment system. You just have to start an account and that's it, other than signing in, same with here.
You watch too much television.
"When it gets to the point that a handful of entities control specific areas of the market, then you no longer have what I would call true capitalism, because there is no true competition, which is a vital component of any successful economy."
Has there ever been true capitalism, then? Much as I love the FF, and all their Enlightenment brothers, you should read Adam Smith. And BTW, nobody then talked about 'capitalism.'
To say that the Tea Party represents a force for change is, to me, an hilarious aside. It is so riven with contradiction, racism, and plain old magical thinking, that it cannot be a force for anything but disruption. Witness the Republican dilemma in the House as TP members push for something akin to economics 1910-style. Gold Standard anyone?
Your discussion of capitalism is utopian and ahistorical, as is Troutsky's Marxism. In a curious way, you both share a desire to ignore the realities of power. Pagan thinks that capitalism guarantees political freedom (cf. Uncle Milton Friedman) and Troutsky thinks freedom is assured in the destruction of capitalism.
Pagan is funnier, because he seems to think that the FF would have been happy to see their ideas applied without change to the 21st century. They were a lot smarter than that.
I don't think capitalism or anything else guarantees freedom. The only thing that guarantees freedom is the willingness to fight and die for it.
As for the supposed racism in the Tea Party, either prove it or shut the motherfucking hell up.
Since we've all forgotten Wikileaks it might be a good time to review the memos which indicated that Suleiman was the American and Likud choice for successor.
The memos did not mention an endency for democratic reforms.
Still a long way to go.
I go two steps closer, she moves two steps away. I walk ten steps and the horizon runs ten steps ahead. No matter how much I walk, I'll never reach her. What good is utopia? That's what: It's good for walking.
--- Eduardo Galeano
"...but I see capitalism as the best way to grow an economy."
And this is the fundamental problem with the entire dialogue on this blog; the underlying assumption is not only not sustainable, but is the root cause of global collapse. But, unfortunately, the entire premise of our global hegemony is unrestrained growth. So the solutions will forever elude us... the human race!
Kulture, there are going to be down times in any system, capitalism, socialism, etc. That's as true as one of the other. There can't and never will be long periods of interrupted growth and progress without an intervening period of stagnation and decline. That's the problem politicians have never honestly dealt with in a comprehensive way, and in an honest way. They treat people like children, which to an extent is understandable. Most people think the good times should just roll right along. They might say they know better than that, but they still get pissed off when the bad times come and look for somebody to blame.
The up and down graph has been mankind's history since the beginning, and its going to remain the history of man from now on. The best politicians and governments can do is devise the best way of dealing with it, they'll never change it, because its actually a part of nature itself.
PT - I was not clear enough, perhaps. The assumption of growth, any growth, is the problem (or at least a driving force. But, our entire industrial culture (civilization) is grounded upon that assumption.
Kulture-I knew what you meant. My point was that nobody faces the reality of the up and down cycles in life, and so nobody is ever really prepared for them. Nobody really knows how to deal with them. And when they come, everybody goes apeshit over it, when it is something that is just to be expected. Industrialization compounds the problem, but even then, it does so just because, again, nobody factors it in to the equation. How many politicians do you recall who have ever said, "now every now and then we're going to go through some rough periods." Well, they might, but they don't run their campaigns on that, other than during bad times maybe when they are trying to avoid taking the blame for it.
WTF? is "crony"
Try reading Aristophanes "Plutus". When you spend all your time fashioning legalistic eyeglasses for a blind god (as our Congress seems to enjoy doing), you'll begin to comprehend what the term "crony capitalism" (aka - socialism) means.
-FJ
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