j_b

Your failure to answer my question suggests that I am right about who you are. Why do you always stop at snide little comments instead of taking me on?

Keep showing your disgust for middle America nattering nabob of negativism! What? You must be some kind of pro-establishment democrat for never wanting to tell the truth by fear of offending those you'll never convince anyway. Noticing that a significant fraction of americans will keep voting for the pirates no matter what they do, isn't showing disgust for middle america but stating a reality that has to be confronted.

I am curious whether Conway is the same coward who used to have an unpronounceable handle on this board a few years ago and kept mouthing about me behind my back? Anybody knows the dude I am talking about?

You mean late 70's. The perfect stage is set for the shock doctrine: [video:youtube]ki227rUFf_k

Just imagine how much more fun we'd have if the pirates had succeeded in privatizing social security by investing accounts in the market. Not only would it ensure that at long last the pirates' wet dream would become reality, social security would finally be bankrupt after decades of their announcing it, but it may make us forget the 2+ trillion dollars the fed "borrowed" from the social security fund.

In these times of election demagoguery almost nobody is discussing how much more than the financial sector has been fatally affected by the myth of the free market and deregulation. Let's not forget that in the past 30 years, free-marketeers have gutted every piece of consumer, environment, worker and investor protection they could get their hands on in the name of the supposed efficiency of the free market. Whole industries have slashed wages and benefits, filed for bankruptcy to default on their obligations such as pension plans to pass the buck to the taxpayer, consolidated into quasi-monopolies to manipulate "supply and demand", etc .. all in a drive to bottom costs and maximize profits with vast negative implications for consumers, workers, farmers, and the environment. I could bore you with nasty examples but it shouldn't be difficult for anyone to think of the horrors that can be perpetrated, as it has throughout history, in the name of economic efficiency.

Regulation is necessary to prevent the crooks from cooking the books as shown by the on-going financial collapse and the countless frauds of the last 3 decades. Regulation is necessary to manage resources and ecosystems services that would otherwise be plundered by barbarians as shown by the sorry state of the planet. Regulation is necessary to account for all kind of externalites not considered in "supply and demand" and about which greedy bastards really don't care. Without regulation it is impossible to know what is the supply so prices surely won't take it into account. Free-marketeers cannot be counted on not to kill the golden goose because they'd rather cash in now and move on to another plunder. Free-marketeers cannot be counted on to do the most basic algebra to balance a budget and make sure there is enough for tomorrow and future generations. It really isn't rocket science. The immense majority of us were much better off when there were real jobs, pension plans, savings, etc .. which was BEFORE deregulation so I suggest that you bring a little evidence to the table before you keep reciting your gospel about "centralized bureaucracy" (I guess you had to think of something since you couldn't seriously invoke "big government" and "nanny state" without looking silly)

here you go: gXAACXUh7yI&

It is going to be difficult to avoid a hard landing for many, including because of peak oil so their "catapulting the propaganda" may not be as effective in the future. I guess this is where the Chinese model comes in. I see that you are a fan of Ms Naomi Klein.

This is a huge blow to market fundamentalism. The free-market rhetoric is religion that isn't supported by a shred of evidence. All administrations since 1978 are guilty of pushing the deregulation of economic activity that led to the current crisis as well as other bubbles of recent decades.

Yep! 30 years of reaganite counter-revolution and propaganda for anti-regulation, small government, and the invisible hand of the free market without surprise turns out to be just a scam to privatize profits and socialize losses. The largest transfer of wealth in history from the midddle class to market speculators goes on unimpeded while the corporate talking heads distract the rabble with lapel pins, the war OF terror and other head spinning orwellian goobly gook. No jelly beans, but billions, for these queens who are certainly not on welfare. We are so fucked! No, no, I am not coming out of retirement but again I wanted to witness Peter Pisspot, JayB and other cheerleaders of the great robbery again shy away from acknowledging the results of their feudal-age politics.

yep, it has indeed been my experience with this forum that quite a few people think it is fun when right wing goons smear other posters they can't get to shut up.

well, you certainly have managed to elevate this "discussion", another area in which you haven't changed.

Contrarily to you I have always known Hillary Clinton wasn't a dangerous leftist, so please spare me your twisted sense of political realities that you masquerade as commun sense. You are really not quailified to know what I stand for.

Funny how the moderate veneer peels off pretty quickly, once a far right goon, always a far right goon! And quit making shit up about me, I don't want to overthrow anything, capisce Attila?

KKK used to be to the right of Attila the Hun, but he may have grown tired of looking bad considering pretty much everything he defended in this forum has turned out to be a bust.

Sure, there are ideologues but I was talking about the financial interests behind the "free market" think tanks responsible for the way the issue is framed by corporate media: "big government", "nanny state", "death tax", "statist", ... I am not for one system or the other. I am for a mixed economy. I fully believe that public policy should express the need of most and protect their livelyhood against irresponsable financial practices.

The free-marketeers don't want less government control on the economy, on the contrary they want government to set economic policy that will enable them to make a buck even if it isn't in the interest of the country and its people.

BTW, you'll have to explain how to obtain greater government control on the economy than when the fed pumps trillions of dollars toward the militari-industrial complex and implements record setting debt/credit policy to keep consumption going, and ends up pumping 100's of billions of public dollars into financial markets? How come you guys always accuse others of what you are precisely doing?

I note that you didn't deny it and I recall you as being pretty far to the right. An independent moderate looks far to the right to someone as far out in left field as yourself. If you took off your hood, KKK, you'd certainly see better.

what if it was Gengis Khan? huh? huh? any government with as much power in the executive branch as bush wants would be a failure. I note that you didn't deny it and I recall you as being pretty far to the right.

You're suggesting we eat babies for breakfast with ketchup? Wow ...

I never said I wanted Bush to run the economy; however, you probably voted for Bush twice so why are you now invoking his incompetence?

I didn't claim any expertise but I don't need any to know that you are trying to spin the facts: the housing bubble is just another layer to the crisis. It is in fact a gigantic castle of cards that is teetering after decades of rampant speculation and growing debt, all enabled by lack of transparency, and government credit policy.

Why don't you stop regurgating the free market bible, and address what is being said to you? No "enforceable contracts, notion of patents, and all of the rest of it" were broken in this case, yet we have to pump trillions of dollars (in one form or another) of public money to bail out the greed pirates or they'll take us down with them. Your quasi-religious incantation to "volontary exchanges" won't change any of it, so quit pretending that this situation resulted from someone breaking the existing rules or that "helping the market function better" and getting rid of a few bad apples will take care of it.