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Thread: Evidence We're in a Third--or Fourth--Turning - Page 503







Post#12551 at 12-01-2009 10:39 PM by herbal tee [at joined Dec 2005 #posts 7,116]
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Question Wall Street=Versalles

Quote Originally Posted by Child of Socrates View Post
Unbelievable....or maybe not so much. Anyway, the writing's on the wall.
Buyout business as usual.

Quote Originally Posted by Reuters
Reason #147 that nothing has changed: leveraged buyout private equity shops Carlyle and Hellman & Friedman are tapping the loan market to pay themselves dividends. From Pierre Paulden and Kristen Haunss at Bloomberg…

Carlyle Group, the world’s second-largest private-equity firm, and Hellman & Friedman LLC are seeking to take advantage of a record rally in high-yield, high-risk loans to take cash out of companies they bought last year amid the financial crisis.

Goodman Global Inc., a maker of air conditioner systems bought by Hellman & Friedman, has asked lenders to allow a payment of as much as $115 million to the private-equity firm. Booz Allen Hamilton Inc., the U.S. government-consulting company purchased by Washington-based Carlyle, is seeking a $350 million term loan to finance part of a $550 million payout to its owners, Marie Lerch, a Booz Allen spokeswoman, said last week.

PE can be a great gig. Get control of a company, take cash out, leave bondholders to clean up the mess when the company falls into bankruptcy. A recent example is Thomas H. Lee Partners buyout of Simmons:

For many of the [Simmons'] investors, the sale will be a disaster. Its bondholders alone stand to lose more than $575 million. The company’s downfall has also devastated employees like Noble Rogers, who worked for 22 years at Simmons, most of that time at a factory outside Atlanta. He is one of 1,000 employees — more than one-quarter of the work force — laid off last year.

But Thomas H. Lee Partners of Boston has not only escaped unscathed, it has made a profit. The investment firm, which bought Simmons in 2003, has pocketed around $77 million in profit, even as the company’s fortunes have declined. THL collected hundreds of millions of dollars from the company in the form of special dividends. It also paid itself millions more in fees, first for buying the company, then for helping run it. Last year, the firm even gave itself a small raise.

Wall Street investment banks also cashed in. They collected millions for helping to arrange the takeovers and for selling the bonds that made those deals possible. All told, the various private equity owners have made around $750 million in profits from Simmons over the years.

How so many people could make so much money on a company that has been driven into bankruptcy is a tale of these financial times and an example of a growing phenomenon in corporate America.
Does anyone hear the drums yet?







Post#12552 at 12-01-2009 11:27 PM by Roadbldr '59 [at Vancouver, Washington joined Jul 2001 #posts 8,275]
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Quote Originally Posted by Child of Socrates View Post
Unbelievable....or maybe not so much. Anyway, the writing's on the wall.
Not so unbelievable, Kiff... when you've been mugged, and your neighbors robbed home-invasion-style, by precisely the same sort of scumbags that ended up as Goetz' last straw.
"Better hurry. There's a storm coming. His storm!!!" :-O -Abigail Freemantle, "The Stand" by Stephen King







Post#12553 at 12-01-2009 11:50 PM by Justin '77 [at Meh. joined Sep 2001 #posts 12,182]
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Quote Originally Posted by Child of Socrates View Post
Anyway, the writing's on the wall.
I certainly hope so, but I really doubt it. There's no evidence of it, anyway...
"Qu'est-ce que c'est que cela, la loi ? On peut donc être dehors. Je ne comprends pas. Quant à moi, suis-je dans la loi ? suis-je hors la loi ? Je n'en sais rien. Mourir de faim, est-ce être dans la loi ?" -- Tellmarch

"Человек не может снять с себя ответственности за свои поступки." - L. Tolstoy

"[it]
is no doubt obvious, the cult of the experts is both self-serving, for those who propound it, and fraudulent." - Noam Chomsky







Post#12554 at 12-02-2009 12:07 AM by herbal tee [at joined Dec 2005 #posts 7,116]
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Quote Originally Posted by Justin '77 View Post
I certainly hope so, but I really doubt it. There's no evidence of it, anyway...
True enough.
And to think that some people think that we've been 4T for over 8 years already.

If I may comment a little more. The 4T is going to be about more than building a few windmills and applying a little stem cell research to a few diseases. Then we supposidly can march forward into an early 1T confedent that Fonzie's America has been recreated for 20 years-until the new hippies bust the fat complacency up.

No. This 4T is going to see a continuation of the current trend of the insider establishment hording resources. For example, I'm beginning to believe that all of the hype about entitlement reform is nothing more than an attempt to justify siphoning off the FICA revenue to at least partly keep the banksters flush.
Last edited by herbal tee; 12-02-2009 at 12:17 AM.







Post#12555 at 12-02-2009 09:50 AM by Child of Socrates [at Cybrarian from America's Dairyland, 1961 cohort joined Sep 2001 #posts 14,092]
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Quote Originally Posted by Justin '77 View Post
I certainly hope so, but I really doubt it. There's no evidence of it, anyway...
I'm not talking about the 3T/4T debate, for whatever it's worth (and that ain't much ).







Post#12556 at 12-02-2009 10:42 AM by pbrower2a [at "Michigrim" joined May 2005 #posts 15,014]
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Quote Originally Posted by herbal tee View Post
Buyout business as usual.


Does anyone hear the drums yet?
Such people -- people who got rich by devouring capital that could have been better used for investment in productive industry (no socialistic idea of dispossessing the rich and turning the wealth to the poor or Commie idea of giving it all to the government which runs industry in the name of the proletariat that it $crews) -- are the sorts who would have been among the first put before a firing squad or to have found the sharp edge of a blade of the guillotine trained upon their throats and a basket awaiting their severed heads.

In a 4T, the people deemed rightly or otherwise to have been the rogues who created misery are wise to find other places to live, if necessary after divesting themselves of their (supposedly) ill-gotten wealth. In any event, dirty money has a way of disappearing. Thieves usually are dreadfully incompetent at investing.
The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid "dens of crime" (or) even in concentration camps and labour camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered... in clean, carpeted, warmed and well-lighted offices, by (those) who do not need to raise their voices. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the office of a thoroughly nasty business concern."


― C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters







Post#12557 at 12-02-2009 02:11 PM by Justin '77 [at Meh. joined Sep 2001 #posts 12,182]
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Quote Originally Posted by Child of Socrates View Post
I'm not talking about the 3T/4T debate, for whatever it's worth (and that ain't much ).
That's not what I was talking about, either.
"Qu'est-ce que c'est que cela, la loi ? On peut donc être dehors. Je ne comprends pas. Quant à moi, suis-je dans la loi ? suis-je hors la loi ? Je n'en sais rien. Mourir de faim, est-ce être dans la loi ?" -- Tellmarch

"Человек не может снять с себя ответственности за свои поступки." - L. Tolstoy

"[it]
is no doubt obvious, the cult of the experts is both self-serving, for those who propound it, and fraudulent." - Noam Chomsky







Post#12558 at 12-02-2009 02:49 PM by takascar2 [at North Side, Chi-Town, 1962 joined Jan 2002 #posts 563]
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Quote Originally Posted by Biddy5637 View Post
Hello all,

I hope you're all well! Though I don't often post here anymore I knew you'd be interested in this article (some of you may have read this already):

http://www.time.com/time/nation/arti...Top+Stories%29

I think in a decade or two we'll probably note 9/11 as the catalyst, with this whole decade beginning the 4t, although it's been hard to be definitive--the good news is, while we were wondering whether we're 3- or 4t, the regeneracy is now right around the corner!

Happy thanksgiving, friends.

EEKELSEY
The problem is that I don't see a regeneracy. We are still polarized, squabbling with each other. The health care debate is a classic example. The only reason to be opposed to a public option is because you are in the pockets of the insurance companies. Who else would want to stifle competition?

I don't know about you, but I don't think we are taking this crisis at all seriously yet, judging by the attitudes out there (pictures of dead bodies at Dachau as a replacement for real debate on health care, etc).

Quick historical question: After the 1929 crash, how long did it take for the pols and society to get serious? Was there this much crap for years after 1929?

I'm sorry, but Obama is NOT FDR, not even close. He doesn't exude the sense of purpose and willingness to make everything malleable like FDR did. Case in point, his appointment of Geithner and Summers, two Wall St. insiders who were cheerleaders for the repeal of Glass-Steigel (sp) and who were in policy positions as Rome burned. It breaks my heart to admit that Obama appears to be no better than any other pol, in fact maybe worse due to his inexperience.

I hope I'm wrong and he redeems himself, bigtime, for the sake of our country.

And, I hope we as a nation get serious about these crises that face us and stop the polarized behavior. We'll only destroy ourselves faster by being apart.







Post#12559 at 12-02-2009 04:27 PM by herbal tee [at joined Dec 2005 #posts 7,116]
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Quote Originally Posted by takascar2 View Post
The problem is that I don't see a regeneracy. We are still polarized, squabbling with each other. The health care debate is a classic example. The only reason to be opposed to a public option is because you are in the pockets of the insurance companies. Who else would want to stifle competition?

I don't know about you, but I don't think we are taking this crisis at all seriously yet, judging by the attitudes out there (pictures of dead bodies at Dachau as a replacement for real debate on health care, etc).

Quick historical question: After the 1929 crash, how long did it take for the pols and society to get serious? Was there this much crap for years after 1929?
Good post, I have the same problem with considering 911 as the catalyst at this point.
after all, what did it catalyize?
An ill advised middle eastern crusade to save moslems from themselves?
The creation of a new Federal bureaucracy called Homeland Security?
There was no lasting change in American life after 911.


As per the 1929 crash, there was a "fool's recovery" in the first half of 1930. After that fell apart, everyone quickly realized that there was no going back to the roaring 20's.
Quote Originally Posted by Taka
I'm sorry, but Obama is NOT FDR, not even close. He doesn't exude the sense of purpose and willingness to make everything malleable like FDR did. Case in point, his appointment of Geithner and Summers, two Wall St. insiders who were cheerleaders for the repeal of Glass-Steigel (sp) and who were in policy positions as Rome burned. It breaks my heart to admit that Obama appears to be no better than any other pol, in fact maybe worse due to his inexperience.

I hope I'm wrong and he redeems himself, bigtime, for the sake of our country.

And, I hope we as a nation get serious about these crises that face us and stop the polarized behavior. We'll only destroy ourselves faster by being apart.
A 4T beats the hell out of people. We haven't had a million men plus smaller numbers of women and children riding the rails looking for work. There aren't mile long breadlines in our big cities everyday. Some of the remaining safety nets from the last 4T such as Social Security have softened the blow from last year's crash upon families. These protections have also given a lot of people who should know better the illusion that somehow they are going to be able to avoid change. As a result, we haven't reformed our banking system and all of the parasites that feed off of our various systems are as voracious as ever.
The other shoe will drop, it's just a matter of how and when.







Post#12560 at 12-03-2009 02:09 AM by Roadbldr '59 [at Vancouver, Washington joined Jul 2001 #posts 8,275]
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Quote Originally Posted by takascar2 View Post
The problem is that I don't see a regeneracy. We are still polarized, squabbling with each other. The health care debate is a classic example. The only reason to be opposed to a public option is because you are in the pockets of the insurance companies. Who else would want to stifle competition?

I don't know about you, but I don't think we are taking this crisis at all seriously yet, judging by the attitudes out there (pictures of dead bodies at Dachau as a replacement for real debate on health care, etc).

Quick historical question: After the 1929 crash, how long did it take for the pols and society to get serious? Was there this much crap for years after 1929?

I'm sorry, but Obama is NOT FDR, not even close. He doesn't exude the sense of purpose and willingness to make everything malleable like FDR did. Case in point, his appointment of Geithner and Summers, two Wall St. insiders who were cheerleaders for the repeal of Glass-Steigel (sp) and who were in policy positions as Rome burned. It breaks my heart to admit that Obama appears to be no better than any other pol, in fact maybe worse due to his inexperience.

I hope I'm wrong and he redeems himself, bigtime, for the sake of our country.

And, I hope we as a nation get serious about these crises that face us and stop the polarized behavior. We'll only destroy ourselves faster by being apart.
Bottom line: If Mr. Obama ends up going from exclaiming "Let's Go Change The World" in 2008 to garden-variety politician by 2011... he won't get my vote in 2012. And I don't believe I am alone.
"Better hurry. There's a storm coming. His storm!!!" :-O -Abigail Freemantle, "The Stand" by Stephen King







Post#12561 at 12-03-2009 02:11 AM by 85turtle [at joined Dec 2009 #posts 362]
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Quote Originally Posted by Roadbldr '59 View Post
Bottom line: If Mr. Obama ends up going from exclaiming "Let's Go Change The World" in 2008 to garden-variety politician by 2011... he won't get my vote in 2012. And I don't believe I am alone.
I wouldn't be surprised if you voted for Bush twice.

Where's your apology for electing a leader that destroyed the USA (economy, Iraq, Gitmo/torture, debt)?

Pass the blame/debt/wars onto us, shows you what your generation really is, cowards.
MBTI: INTJ (rational-mastermind)

"Don't Freak Out" - Yvonne Strahovski (Gen Y), Sarah Walker on Chuck

Sexy Bitch - Sarah Walker fan video (not mine)

Chuck vs. the Nacho Sampler (3x06)
Clip from the 1st scene
Clip from the 2nd scene

Chuck vs. the Honeymooners (3x14)
Southern Accents

"I hope to inspire everyone and ask, where is our march? Where are our petitions? Where the fuck are our minds? I know there are a few petitions out there that I have signed, but it's not enough." -Sasha Grey







Post#12562 at 12-03-2009 02:25 AM by Roadbldr '59 [at Vancouver, Washington joined Jul 2001 #posts 8,275]
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Quote Originally Posted by 85turtle View Post
I wouldn't be surprised if you voted for Bush twice.

Where's your apology for electing a leader that destroyed the USA (economy, Iraq, Gitmo/torture, debt)?

Pass the blame/debt/wars onto us, shows you what your generation really is, cowards.
Well, how's that for a debut post! Welcome to the board, son.

No, I voted against Bush not once, but twice... and was quite enthusiastic about voting for Mr. Obama last year. I'd sooner fall on my sword than support the rantings of those whom Dave Kaiser calls "hysterical yahoos".

However I am disappointed in both the quality and quantity of "change" the President has embarked upon, now that he's been elected. There was the stimulus package, which even benefited me personally. However the bailed-out banks and companies have for the most part been allowed to continue business as usual, with few if any strings attached. And nothing whatsoever is even being talked about, let alone done, about the economic and National Security threats posed by offshoring. Geez, if I'd wanted Bush-lite I'd have voted for John McCain!

And to add to our woes, what on Earth was this business of our President-- the so-called "leader of the free world" -- bowing before the f*cking Emperor of Japan (and without a return bow, at that)? I understand the need to mend fences with our allies... but the President of the United States simply cannot kowtow to a fellow Head Of State, even (especially?) a figurehead!

I haven't given up on President Obama... not at all. I mean, the man has only been in office ten-and-a-half months and is still growing into the job. But I am... deeply worried .
Last edited by Roadbldr '59; 12-03-2009 at 02:40 AM.
"Better hurry. There's a storm coming. His storm!!!" :-O -Abigail Freemantle, "The Stand" by Stephen King







Post#12563 at 12-03-2009 02:41 AM by 85turtle [at joined Dec 2009 #posts 362]
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Quote Originally Posted by Roadbldr '59 View Post
Well, how's that for a debut post! Welcome to the board, son.

No, I voted against Bush not once, but twice... and was quite enthusiastic about voting for Mr. Obama last year. I'd sooner fall on my sword than support the rantings of those whom Dave Kaiser calls "hysterical yahoos".

However I am disappointed in the amount of "change" the President has actually embarked upon now that he's actually been elected... if I'd wanted Bush-lite I'd have voted for John McCain. And what on Earth was this business of our President-- the so-called "leader of the free world" -- bowing before the fucking Emperor of Japan (and without a return bow, at that)?

I haven't given up on President Obama yet... I mean, the man has only been in office ten-and-a-half months and is still growing into the job. But I am... deeply worried.
Nixon bowed to the Emperor of Japan (yes the same one that bombed the United States). That's right, you didn't care then, when it mattered. Your generation didn't call out Tricky Dick.

It's pretty hard to tear down a police state (Gitmo, PATRIOT Act, Iraq/Afghanistan wars) without a few nuts critiquing every single move in this age of instant everything. Politics does not work instantly, unfortunately.

I laugh pretty hard when Republicans claim job produced and paid by the Stimulus when they voted against it.

Investigative news has gotten trivial since they did not question Reagan's involvement in Iran-Contra. It pretty much was the First and Second Triumvirates (Iran-Contra) and Caesar/Augustus (Reagan). When I read about Reagan, I just think he was lucky. His policies have squandered America (Bush used them).

Of course we want a revolutionary type of reform, but that will never happen because of the 1% controlling 90%. I would take slow change over revolutions.
MBTI: INTJ (rational-mastermind)

"Don't Freak Out" - Yvonne Strahovski (Gen Y), Sarah Walker on Chuck

Sexy Bitch - Sarah Walker fan video (not mine)

Chuck vs. the Nacho Sampler (3x06)
Clip from the 1st scene
Clip from the 2nd scene

Chuck vs. the Honeymooners (3x14)
Southern Accents

"I hope to inspire everyone and ask, where is our march? Where are our petitions? Where the fuck are our minds? I know there are a few petitions out there that I have signed, but it's not enough." -Sasha Grey







Post#12564 at 12-03-2009 02:53 AM by Roadbldr '59 [at Vancouver, Washington joined Jul 2001 #posts 8,275]
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Quote Originally Posted by 85turtle View Post
Nixon bowed to the Emperor of Japan (yes the same one that bombed the United States). That's right, you didn't care then, when it mattered. Your generation didn't call out Tricky Dick.
OK, look here son... I don't recall whether Nixon bowed to the Emperor or not. However, I was twelve years old when Nixon went to what was then referred to as Red China... and if I recall correctly I didn't like that very much either. At any rate, don't you think it's rather silly to criticize ME for what went on back then, back when I was a child to be seen and not heard? I mean... think about it .

You're a newbie here, know not a thing about any of our posters, and as such have not yet earned the right to criticize anyone on this board. If you have something constructive to add to the discussion, young man... particularly as it involves the subjects of generations, turnings, and the rhythm of history... by all means speak your mind.

OTOH if you're merely looking for an outlet to vent about things you know nothing about, my advice would be to have a Coke and a smile, listen and learn... and shut the f*ck up.
Last edited by Roadbldr '59; 12-03-2009 at 03:04 AM.
"Better hurry. There's a storm coming. His storm!!!" :-O -Abigail Freemantle, "The Stand" by Stephen King







Post#12565 at 12-03-2009 11:06 AM by KaiserD2 [at David Kaiser '47 joined Jul 2001 #posts 5,220]
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Quote Originally Posted by 85turtle View Post
Nixon bowed to the Emperor of Japan (yes the same one that bombed the United States). That's right, you didn't care then, when it mattered. Your generation didn't call out Tricky Dick.

It's pretty hard to tear down a police state (Gitmo, PATRIOT Act, Iraq/Afghanistan wars) without a few nuts critiquing every single move in this age of instant everything. Politics does not work instantly, unfortunately.

I laugh pretty hard when Republicans claim job produced and paid by the Stimulus when they voted against it.

Investigative news has gotten trivial since they did not question Reagan's involvement in Iran-Contra. It pretty much was the First and Second Triumvirates (Iran-Contra) and Caesar/Augustus (Reagan). When I read about Reagan, I just think he was lucky. His policies have squandered America (Bush used them).

Of course we want a revolutionary type of reform, but that will never happen because of the 1% controlling 90%. I would take slow change over revolutions.
85Turtle, may I suggest you spend a little more time figuring out who is who around here before making personal attacks. You missed the target by about 180 degrees on that one and really should apologize.







Post#12566 at 12-03-2009 12:46 PM by pbrower2a [at "Michigrim" joined May 2005 #posts 15,014]
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Quote Originally Posted by 85turtle View Post
I wouldn't be surprised if you voted for Bush twice.

Where's your apology for electing a leader that destroyed the USA (economy, Iraq, Gitmo/torture, debt)?

Pass the blame/debt/wars onto us, shows you what your generation really is, cowards.
You don't know enough about the poster Roadbuilder to make that inference. There are some (nutcases and political extremists) who legitimately get that treatment, and they usually get savaged by ordinarily-placid people.

Not all of us Boomers supported Dubya as a "fellow Boomer". Heck, he ran against Al Gore and John Kerry, two fellow early-wave Boomers who were quite different from George W. Bumbler, and we are as capable of rendering harsh judgment of our own against our contemporaries.

If Americans knew now what they now know about Dubya they would have voted strongly enough for Al Gore that Al Gore would be #43 -- or would have voted for McCain in the South Carolina primary after the fraudulent "black baby" smear. One way or the other, the Twin Towers would still be standing. But that's alternate history now.

Now let's explain why we could have gotten so dreadful a President as Dubya -- as I see it, the latter part of a 3T creates a political climate in which people want the government to leave them alone and let them act out their worst tendencies (short of theft, rape, and murder, of course), and they gravitate to do-nothing leadership that well serves entrenched elites who want anything but an activist government. People who want to reform things are "limousine liberals" and "tree-huggers". The weak-leadership interests present themselves as "pro-growth" even though their "growth" is best described as either the acceleration of the sell-off of natural resources, raids on asset-rich entities, or gambles so rigged that the gamblers get all the gain if they win and no real loss if they lose. Anti-intellectualism runs rampant, as shown by the official endorsement of creationism as a valid alternative to rational science.

The current decade looks much like the 1920s, another "slum of a decade" with some shared characteristics: weak, incompetent, inattentive leadership (Harding/Coolidge makes a good analogue for Dubya); intensifying inequality (look at the Gini coefficient, a measure of economic inequality, in 1929 and 2005); "reform" best described as "tax cuts for the Right People (the politically-connected super-rich)"; depraved mass culture; a speculative bubble that eventually went bust; corruption within the financial industry on a huge scale (Stanford "Fund", Bernie Madoff); deregulation as "reform"; and vile invective from media that get increasingly hostile to "losers" identifiable by their ethnicity. To be sure, it's not in perfect phase; 2007 -- not 2009 -- corresponds to 1929. But that's close enough. The fictional George Babbitt of a Sinclair Lewis novel of the 1920s, who sold people houses that they really couldn't afford, was alive and well in this decade. Look at the results in foreclosures and unmarketable real estate.

After eight years of Dubya and twelve years of a right-wing Congress, Americans voted in record numbers for the Presidential nominee who seemed least like Dubya. The jury -- History -- is out on Obama. The judgment of Dubya seems very harsh and unlikely to change.
The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid "dens of crime" (or) even in concentration camps and labour camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered... in clean, carpeted, warmed and well-lighted offices, by (those) who do not need to raise their voices. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the office of a thoroughly nasty business concern."


― C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters







Post#12567 at 12-03-2009 01:13 PM by The Wonkette [at Arlington, VA 1956 joined Jul 2002 #posts 9,209]
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Quote Originally Posted by pbrower2a View Post
You don't know enough about the poster Roadbuilder to make that inference.
You don't either. He goes by Roadbldr and hates the spelled out version, as I found out to my grief.
I want people to know that peace is possible even in this stupid day and age. Prem Rawat, June 8, 2008







Post#12568 at 12-03-2009 04:16 PM by herbal tee [at joined Dec 2005 #posts 7,116]
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Right Arrow The wealthy are "getting ready"

This is well worth a full read. But below is an excerpt.

Quote Originally Posted by American Politics Journal
At financial centers around the world bankers, brokers, and “the other rich” are getting ready to handle those people who might decide that enough is enough and attack them or their edifices. This is either a sign of good thinking on their part or overreacting to the realization that the “proles”, often throughout history, get pretty worked up when they find themselves without jobs, homeless, working for slave wages, or burying their kids. Alice Schroeder wrote a significant piece at Bloomberg on the number of gun permits being issued to high rolling investment bankers...

...That aside, it appears that the boys and girls at Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch and other investment houses are still not about to share much of anything with those of us who earn little or nothing in comparison. Instead they are paying fifty thousand dollars for impenetrable armored gates opening onto their pebbled driveways in Connecticut which lead to impenetrable eight thousand square foot homes, used only during the school year or less often, while the owners are away in Kitzbuhl, Bermuda, Palm Beach, or speeding along in their Rivas on Lake Como.

I once knew a man who inherited his fortune from a chemicals giant family. He was so rich that his family virtually owned land enough to form a small state in The Union. He kept a World War II tank in a barn with a collapsing side which acted as a ramp when he fired up the machine and rolled into his 8,000 acres of woodland firing the turret gun just to get his jollies while two or three hundred year old trees went down under fire. I was with him once when he did this. He was a conservative in the truest sense. He feared being poor or even middle class, but he didn’t really have a tank to hurt anyone about it. Today, I’ll bet his grandsons wish they still had that tank – for more utilitarian purposes...

...Where do those the ten thousand yachts of all sizes in Miami come from? Who could own them, what do they cost? Why doesn’t anyone use them more often? What if the same innocently poor observer knew that the interest paid on the yacht was tax deductible in the United States as interest paid on a “second home”?

And no, we can’t afford to pay a few hundred dollars each to get every American decent health insurance each year.

You might notice this week that the poorest and most liberal of us will be cheering on the Democrats who want to provide a less expensive way for people to gain health insurance, but you will also hear the richer among us cheering the Democrat President to spend a billion a year more on the war in Afghanistan.

The “least” of us want to be insured or for our poorest neighbor’s kids to be insured from treatable illness or accident. We with the “most” want the war to continue so we can continue driving our $100 thousand Porsche convertibles without fear of being blown up by a human bomb while in line at Dean & Deluca or Harrods’s Food Hall. Not only that but many of us with “the most” will profit from all this spending on war, yet not profit very much by all this spending on health...

...We have to ask the question – “How much is too much?” – and we must also answer it within the rule of law.

Most important, we have to do this together, not one against the other. It’s not the Democrats and the Republicans that can be trusted to look at some new way of being – it’s the poorest and the richest of us that must sit down and draw up a new set of rules that takes our natural greed into account and keeps that itch under control without destroying anyone’s chance to someday, by luck or not, to own that beautiful house, that wonderful car, and parent those well-educated healthy kids.

This is a tall order – but one that must be addressed, and soon.

If not, then I advise us all: Go out and arm yourselves to the teeth for the end is near.

Don’t believe me?

Well take the word of Henry “Hank” Paulson – one of the richest of us: “Henry Paulson who was the U.S. Treasury Secretary during the bailout and a former CEO of Goldman Sachs, told the Congress last year:

“People “were unhappy with the big discrepancies in wealth, but they at least believed in the system and in some form of market-driven capitalism. But if we had a complete meltdown, it could lead to people questioning the basis of the system.”
Forget the drums, the plagues are coming.One by one.







Post#12569 at 12-03-2009 06:46 PM by Brian Beecher [at Downers Grove, IL joined Sep 2001 #posts 2,937]
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12-03-2009, 06:46 PM #12569
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Mother of revolutions

Quote Originally Posted by 85turtle View Post
Of course we want a revolutionary type of reform, but that will never happen because of the 1% controlling 90%. I would take slow change over revolutions.
I always thought that it was the 1% controlling 90% that actually was the mother of most revolutions. And there is 9% MIA in this calculation. Are that 9% the stooges for the 1%? Right now I am beginning to feel as if a full-blown revolution is the only thing that would dismantle the status quo. After all, we have pretty much tolerated BAU for three decades now. There are now more and more people seeking supposed advice from self-proclaimed financial gurus(Loral Langemeier et al) and most that fall for these end up being sorry.







Post#12570 at 12-03-2009 11:53 PM by playwrite [at NYC joined Jul 2005 #posts 10,443]
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12-03-2009, 11:53 PM #12570
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These folks are well into the 4T.

Read not only the post but the comments on the post. Heavy stuff.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/1...g-To-Freak-Out

I'm Starting To Freak Out
"The Devil enters the prompter's box and the play is ready to start" - R. Service

“It’s not tax money. The banks have accounts with the Fed … so, to lend to a bank, we simply use the computer to mark up the size of the account that they have with the Fed. It’s much more akin to printing money.” - B.Bernanke


"Keep your filthy hands off my guns while I decide what you can & can't do with your uterus" - Sarah Silverman

If you meet a magic pony on the road, kill it. - Playwrite







Post#12571 at 12-04-2009 02:36 AM by pbrower2a [at "Michigrim" joined May 2005 #posts 15,014]
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12-04-2009, 02:36 AM #12571
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Quote Originally Posted by herbal tee View Post
This is well worth a full read. But below is an excerpt.



Forget the drums, the plagues are coming.One by one.
Good advice. We are 4T and we are far from the worst of the invective. The Hard Right has been licking its wounds and planning its return. Rove/Bush/Cheney was Dictatorship Lite; the next one will be a full-blown dictatorship that could bring America under the sort of full-blown fascist dictatorship that we thought happened only in failed societies and depraved cultures. The "majority of a majority" lost its majority of Americans due to insufficient ruthlessness. This one will have its Night of the Long Knives and Dachau if it gets its chance. Political opposition will be cowed, co-opted, or culled. We will have a Failed State much as Germany was in 1932.

Yes, our economic elite is little more moral than the financiers of the Weimar Republic who backed the Devil Incarnate. It sees a moderate reformer who addresses the needs of people not already rich and a threat to class privilege which has never done good except for the privileged. That privilege expresses itself in the example of a domestic servant being told to take great care of a porcelain plate that costs more than a week's salary for the domestic.

The Hard Right has done everything possible to impose failure on all but themselves politically only to ignore their own moral void. Obama is not the problem; any moderate-to-liberal Democrat would face the same difficulties. That includes John Kerry, Al Gore, and Hillary Clinton. Don't be fooled by its antics and the callow ignorance of its hangers-on; it is as rich, well-organized, and media-savvy as it is amoral.
The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid "dens of crime" (or) even in concentration camps and labour camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered... in clean, carpeted, warmed and well-lighted offices, by (those) who do not need to raise their voices. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the office of a thoroughly nasty business concern."


― C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters







Post#12572 at 12-04-2009 12:04 PM by MJC [at joined Apr 2007 #posts 260]
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12-04-2009, 12:04 PM #12572
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Quote Originally Posted by playwrite View Post
These folks are well into the 4T.

Read not only the post but the comments on the post. Heavy stuff.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/1...g-To-Freak-Out

I noticed that the Kos diarist (as well as a lot of commenters) are from California. That state's economy is in a much worse crapper than most of the rest of the country. In the midwest, things are bad, but given that the rust belt has been hit hard economically for decades now, people here are used to enduring lean times. Things will be a bit tough for awhile, but most of America's regions will recover, and intact communities will help us hang in there.

I don't think it's so much true for the Sun Belt.







Post#12573 at 12-04-2009 04:51 PM by Brian Beecher [at Downers Grove, IL joined Sep 2001 #posts 2,937]
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12-04-2009, 04:51 PM #12573
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I live in the rust belt, but Chicago is for the most part thriving in comparison to the rest. Because it has always had a more diversified economy it was spared from suffering the fate of Detroit or Pittsburgh, cities whose economy rose and fell with the domination of a single industry. Yet not far removed from Chicago is Gary, which was dominated by steel but if anything suffered an even worse fate than did Pittsburgh or even Detroit. Not even the success of the Jackson family could save that town. I still believe that the working person in this country has been at a strong disadvantage since Reagan busted the unions nearly three decades ago.







Post#12574 at 12-04-2009 05:15 PM by Justin '77 [at Meh. joined Sep 2001 #posts 12,182]
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12-04-2009, 05:15 PM #12574
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Quote Originally Posted by playwrite View Post
These folks are well into the 4T.

Read not only the post but the comments on the post. Heavy stuff.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/1...g-To-Freak-Out
Hah!

Suck it, Californians!
"Qu'est-ce que c'est que cela, la loi ? On peut donc être dehors. Je ne comprends pas. Quant à moi, suis-je dans la loi ? suis-je hors la loi ? Je n'en sais rien. Mourir de faim, est-ce être dans la loi ?" -- Tellmarch

"Человек не может снять с себя ответственности за свои поступки." - L. Tolstoy

"[it]
is no doubt obvious, the cult of the experts is both self-serving, for those who propound it, and fraudulent." - Noam Chomsky







Post#12575 at 12-04-2009 06:17 PM by MJC [at joined Apr 2007 #posts 260]
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12-04-2009, 06:17 PM #12575
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Let me just say that

1) "As California goes, so goes the nation"

and

2) "Ha ha ha suck it, California!"


are two extremes of opinion, both of which I find equally distasteful and irresponsible.

On the point of (1), California's economy is not the U.S. economy, much less the world economy. More importantly, the political system in Cali is outrageously screwed up and needs fixing, and there's no other way about it: It's the citizens of that state who have to do the fixing. It's decades overdue, and it will be hard, but goddammit, you have to pay your dues. Every other region in the U.S. has, and now it's your turn. You've benefited from a major influx of population and wealth for over half a century--now it's your task to make it all work, and iron out your social and economic inequities.

As for (2), I don't feel a lot of glee over seeing a major economy and population center, not to mention our cultural gateway to the Pacific, fall into this kind of crisis. There won't be any winners in a total meltdown of California. Even if you're not predisposed to sympathize with the people of that state, and wherever you come from politically, if nothing else consider the potential for mayhem such a destabilized situation could have on the rest of the world.


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