Knew there was something odd about the fucker
Fucking hell. Here we go again. Dancing our jig and tugging our forelock.
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Idealism, and I use the phrase pejoratively, is something you display the worst of every time you post. Sanders on the other hand called the financial crash spot on while youâre still stuck in a truly bizarre delusion as to the causes.The libertarian fantasy of the âmagic of the marketâ is just that, a fantasy. Itâs idealism of the worst kind and really not worth talking about outside of an economics tutorial.
Moodys, Fitch, Standard and Poors - private ratings agencies, effectively self-regulators of financial trading, all were asleep at the wheel.
The abolition of the Glass Steagall act (introduced almost immediately when FDR took over as President) was mentioned earlier as a cause of the 2008 crash. That is deregulation, the banks all wanted it, we saw what happened as a result.
Free market zealotry market always ultimately leads to disaster in economics, because the banks are not populated by altruistic Randian super heroes as you believe, they tend to be populated by short termist, quick-buck-making spivs who donât give a shit what ultimately happens as long as they get rich. And the ordinary people are the ones left carrying the can.
You canât let the banks simply fail as libertarians always suggest, because that leads to anarchy and societal disaster when peopleâs life savings are wiped out. Thatâs what happened after the 1929 crash and led to the Great Depression, and was effectively sorted out at the stroke of a pen under Roosevelt.
The very same Fed you cite as the cause of the crash was populated with those self-same Randian utopian capitalists, such as Greenspan, whose entire economic philosophy was based upon hers.
State regulators everywhere were understaffed, a direct result of the influence of the financial industry and its ideology, youâd almost think it was deliberate.
Sweden had its own brush with deregulation of the financial markets in the late 80s and early 90s and came close to disaster when they had a banking crash. The situation was salvaged through strong government action and now Swedenâs banks are both the strongest regulated in Europe and amongst those in the best financial position.
The New Deal was the bedrock of the US economic recovery. It more than halved unemployment. The US had gone a long way towards full recovery by the time it entered World War II because of it and as the philosophy that underpinned it held firm in the levers of over for the next 30 years, the US entered an unprecedented period of sustained growth and economic prosperity. Newsflash: recovery from depression takes time. 1932 and 1933 were clearly the worst years of the depression and to suggest anything else is just deliberate historical inaccuracy. After steady years of growth, there was another downturn in 1937/38 because Roosevelt reined in deficit spending for a time, which again only shows how effective the other years of deficit spending were and would be again from 1939. Where was the market in planting the seeds of economic recovery when Roosevelt did? Nowhere.
Similarly in Britain, the Labour government of 1945-51, the greatest government in the history of the country, massively expanded the stateâs role in the economy and Britain prospered hugely as a result.
And then the New Right got in in both the US and Britain and dismantled it bit by bit and progressively deregulated financial markets, leading to the utter mess there is in both today.
Funny how you talk about being stuck in the 19th century, given that Socialism was a phenomenon that had its advent in the 20th century whereas the laissez-faire quali-religious nonsense you preach was left behind in the 19th century where it should belong, at least by most sane people.
Yeah I know, weâre class at it.
Apparently his favourite hobby is crab fishing
Thereâs only one answer to that cut and paste job.
The Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engels, 1848 (note the century). The greatest ideological plague to ever infect the human mind. European socialist parties all started in the second half of the 19th centrury, but of course you are right, they didnât reach their glorious zenith until the âadventâ of the Soviet Union and China.
I didnât cut and paste any of it because itâs all common knowledge.
Thereâs a single answer to your free market thought experiment zealotry. Somalia.
Iâm not a communist, though I do think Marx was a superb thinker who gave much insight which is still highly relevant today, so if you want to bring up the Soviet Union and China, find a communist.
You are very confused, you donât seem to know what you are
The M9 could do with a Tim Kaine Plaza
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This years presidential race is like the 2013 hurling championship semi finals and final . Substandard contenders providing entertainment . The winner a one term winner .
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Are you saying Hillary will have an asterisk next to her presidency?
Look, she can only beat whatâs put in front of her.
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Itâs terrible some of the stuff posted here this past few weeks. Hillary and Trump have to get up for work in the morning.
Five Thirty Eight forecast latest. This pivot to the centre thatâs going to win Trump the election had better come soon.
Clinton leading by 15 points in one of the latest national polls.
Sheâs leading by 11 in Pennsylvania and by 6 in Florida.
And she leads by 4 in a poll in Georgia.
As an ideology socialism is sound. The problem with its implementation was unfortunately human nature namely greed and a lust for power. Socialism forms a large part of everyday life. Equal acess to healthcare and education are obvious example in Europe and many other countries around the world. The USSR China etc were corrupt states built on the corruption of socialist ideals. For the most part countries have varying degrees of socialism built in to their systems.
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All taxation is a form of socialism.
communism
Actually they donât. Both of them are wealthy enough to buy a couple of nursing homes and post on TFK all day
The ideology that all taxation is a form of communism or âtheftâ is rather stupid when you consider it for about two seconds.
It presupposes that there should be no such thing as inheritance tax, gift tax or capital gains tax.
The rather cliched line, one that has been used on here on several occasions, to criticise any kind of welfare state policy is that the problem with the US and other places is âpeople getting things for freeâ (they donât, pretty much everybody who isnât a small child pays tax whether theyâre employed or not).
But the âtax is theftâ people are the ultimate âI want things for freeâ brigade. Inherited wealth is a huge part of why societies grow more unequal by the year, even with inheritance tax, gift tax and capital gains tax as they are. Wealth concentrates in the hands of the few and lies unproductive. Those who grow up in wealthy families have their odds in life stacked in their favour due to inherited wealth, and with every passing year this wealth accumulates more in the hands of the few, while the odds for everybody else get worse. The âtax is theftâ narrative presupposes that this situation is actually too redistributive and that the odds should be stacked more in favour of the wealthy than they already are.
The irony is the no or low tax people are guilty of the exact same thing they accuse others of - wanting things for free.