A quick overview of the financial crisis

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Profile Robert Waite
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Message 1011955 - Posted: 5 Jul 2010, 2:34:58 UTC

This is a clever little piece of film.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOP2V_np2c0


I do not fight fascists because I think I can win.
I fight them because they are fascists.
Chris Hedges

A riot is the language of the unheard. -Martin Luther King, Jr.
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Message 1011969 - Posted: 5 Jul 2010, 3:21:12 UTC - in response to Message 1011955.  

Very interesting and well thought out. He pretty much hits it out of the park. I don't think people are going go for it just because he says the magic name of Karl Marx.


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Diogenes Of Sinope
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Message 1011979 - Posted: 5 Jul 2010, 3:45:40 UTC
Last modified: 5 Jul 2010, 3:45:59 UTC

I agree. The elites have done a very good job of making the public fear public ownership.
Somehow, if the profits are going into the overstuffed pockets of the wealthy all is well.
If the profits are going toward public services, utilities and infrastructure then that is evil.

Eventually, the world will awaken from this fever dream and realize what rubes we the public have been played for.
I do not fight fascists because I think I can win.
I fight them because they are fascists.
Chris Hedges

A riot is the language of the unheard. -Martin Luther King, Jr.
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Message 1013262 - Posted: 7 Jul 2010, 16:52:29 UTC - in response to Message 1011979.  

I agree. The elites have done a very good job of making the public fear public ownership.
Somehow, if the profits are going into the overstuffed pockets of the wealthy all is well.
If the profits are going toward public services, utilities and infrastructure then that is evil.

Eventually, the world will awaken from this fever dream and realize what rubes we the public have been played for.



Indeed so, until my 'favourite fascist' came to power in the UK, what many people forgot, was that the revenues from the rather numerous nationalised companies, were flowing into the Exchequer, rather than into some excluse bank accounts. Utility costs were not insanely high, costs for water distribution/useage and sewarage were included in the local rates paid to the local Council - all those people working in those companies and industries, were literally paying their way and adding to the whole. Now, we have French (and German) owned power companies making huge profits from electricity (for example), and seemingly using some of those profits to keep the costs down to their consumers in France (in particular) as they are limited by the French Government as to what they can charge!!! So many people in the UK, swallowed the blatant lie about the Private Sector and it's benefits (to whom, but a few at the very top), that eventually, every time someone complained about an increased bill, I just used to say "thats what YOU wanted and thats what you've got". They just couldn't see how it all worked.... Was it too simple for their greedy little brains to comprehend?



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Message 1013427 - Posted: 8 Jul 2010, 14:22:37 UTC - in response to Message 1013262.  

Heh you have power cost problems. We have every kind of problem. Every conservative believes in Privatizing Gov't work. When this is done the Gov't then pays the private organization to do the exact same job it was doing. Perhaps I'm a bit to dumb but couldnt the Gov't take the exact same work plan that the private organization uses, eliminate the profit motive, and in return save the tax payers that additional bill. I think this is the big lie about privatization. It still costs us money it just has profit added to it.


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Message 1013431 - Posted: 8 Jul 2010, 14:31:56 UTC

One of the big driving forces for "privatization" in this country has been plain and simple union busting. The federal, provincial and municipal civil servant unions have mostly forgotten their original purposes, and are now out to get the membership and the leadership rich at the public's expense. The union protective laws enacted over the years make this impossible to stop, without getting rid of the union. This is also a big driver in private firms moving work out of the country.

Not sayin' I always agree with privatization, just sayin' the alternatives sometimes suck too.

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Message 1013469 - Posted: 8 Jul 2010, 16:32:18 UTC - in response to Message 1013431.  



I've gotta disagree with you Bill.
Unionized working people are not getting rich by any definition of the word, unless you compare us to those working overseas for a buck or two a day.

The pockets of poverty where these people are forced to work for such low pay is the reason private firms are moving production and manufacturing overseas.
None of the executive types making the decisions to move production seem to be taking any reductions in their own salaries or stock options.

Unions are not the problem. Unions help protect working people from the abuses of the wealthy pampered elites who strive to increase their own bloated incomes by forcing working people to do more for less.

I do not fight fascists because I think I can win.
I fight them because they are fascists.
Chris Hedges

A riot is the language of the unheard. -Martin Luther King, Jr.
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Message 1013487 - Posted: 8 Jul 2010, 16:54:33 UTC - in response to Message 1013469.  

The Big auto Unions made a mess for themselves. The Big 3 car manufacturers basically caved on every issue. Now they get very well paid and remarkable they pretty much en masse started voting Republican during the 60's-70's which was basically voting against their best interest. is that Irony or an Oxymoron. My dad is a retired republican union member which I know is an Oxymoron


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Message 1013533 - Posted: 8 Jul 2010, 19:13:39 UTC - in response to Message 1013487.  

The Big auto Unions made a mess for themselves. The Big 3 car manufacturers basically caved on every issue. Now they get very well paid and remarkable they pretty much en masse started voting Republican during the 60's-70's which was basically voting against their best interest. is that Irony or an Oxymoron. My dad is a retired republican union member which I know is an Oxymoron


I understand where you are coming from. My room mate was a life long Democrat and union member along with being a member of the military. She is now mad at Obama the unions and the Democrats, thinking about changing party registration to Republican but still looks back fondly at her union membership and the Democrat party. By the way, she was the one who got me interested in Fox News.

I on the other hand have always been a small government leave me alone type person. Go figure.
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Message 1014149 - Posted: 10 Jul 2010, 5:07:05 UTC - in response to Message 1013427.  

Heh you have power cost problems. We have every kind of problem. Every conservative believes in Privatizing Gov't work. When this is done the Gov't then pays the private organization to do the exact same job it was doing. Perhaps I'm a bit to dumb but couldnt the Gov't take the exact same work plan that the private organization uses, eliminate the profit motive, and in return save the tax payers that additional bill. I think this is the big lie about privatization. It still costs us money it just has profit added to it.

Everyone forgets one simple thing. The government does not "do work." The government hires private contractors to "do work." Now the government is very good at shuffling paper from pile A to pile B and adding tons of red tape to the paper as it shuffles it, but that is "anti-work."


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Message 1014339 - Posted: 10 Jul 2010, 16:19:59 UTC


The only thing Bernie Madoff did wrong was he didn't become a Congressman first.

Martin
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Message 1014945 - Posted: 12 Jul 2010, 10:50:32 UTC
Last modified: 12 Jul 2010, 10:54:57 UTC

The problem with government running anything is precisely that there is no profit motive. Hence anything goes. Long lines at the post office and at the car licensing bureau are the normal way of doing business. 30,000 case backlog in the courts is also tolerated. State government is worse than federal, local government (county and city) is worst of all. Financial institutions and monopolies should be regulated and the regulations should be enforced, and the crooks should go to jail --we can't even get government to do that,

In addition to a lax work ethic, the dollar spent in government operations is another dollar and another job taken out of the private sector. 38% federal tax, new york 13% state tax
Self employed social security tax 18% there is little incentive to work with such confiscatory taxation. 2/3 reduction in federal employees would be a good start.
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Message 1015023 - Posted: 12 Jul 2010, 16:22:18 UTC - in response to Message 1014945.  

good luck with that since a good portion of those "gov't workers" are in servitude to the military


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Message 1015163 - Posted: 12 Jul 2010, 22:12:26 UTC - in response to Message 1015023.  

Indeed. I was in the RAF when 'Thatcher the Milk Snatcher' came to power....30% cuts in Defence spending etc etc. Lots of people leaving the services, totally demoralised - why take a bullet in NI for the same sort of money as selling someone a pint of milk, at the local Co-Op? Then, soon after, when 'The Snatcher' was in 'difficulty', the Falklands conflict came along..... All those lives lost. To this day, I still believe that HM Forces, 'bought' that evil woman her next election victory. I said to my mother, when Thatcher became PM, that she was evil and I've never heard her disagree. My mother voted Conservative....not since then, though.



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Message 1015306 - Posted: 13 Jul 2010, 10:20:41 UTC - in response to Message 1015023.  
Last modified: 13 Jul 2010, 10:25:07 UTC

Right you are, I meant to, but neglected to, say that the military should be expanded drastically or we should shut up and go home around the world. I doubt we are ready to occupy, British Empire style, which is what it would take in a good part of the world to stop the insanity and killings in the middle east, Africa etc. This is not an errand that America or the world wants us to pursue. Sending inadequate forces to do this type of military/political job just results in a lot of wasted lives and treasure and the support of corrupt governments.
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Message boards : Politics : A quick overview of the financial crisis


 
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