Society should be organized by...

[lil mike]

I wanted to respond to this but since ekg locked the thread I couldn't in it's original thread, but I thought Chuck made a thoughtful post worth responding to:

When you're ultimate goal is profit, whether a company fails or is successful, you're in it for the wrong reasons.  You're employees are counting on you to have their best interests as part of the overall reasoning for success.  If they're viewed as just a necessary evil that can be expunged if it's more profitable to just gut and collapse their workplace for resale, insurance money, bankruptcy...you're in it for the wrong reasons.

We've decided success is the size of your bank account (or off shore holdings) and that gives preferential treatment to the bottom line, even when by any measure, the bottom line in many cases, is already astronomical...BUT...there's more to be had.  If you're not helping the worker, then you're helping yourself and...you're in it for the wrong reasons.  People should not be stepping stones with expiration dates as they help you accumulate mass wealth.

It really is such a fuckin sad travesty that we've let wealth define every other aspect of humanity now...fuckin sad.

No surprise I disagree with this.  If you're in business for profit, you are in it for exactly the right reasons.  But I think Chuck views it as a bug in the system, rather than a feature.  As Adam Smith said, "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest."

And that's the great thing about Capitalism, it works even if you're in it for your own selfish reasons.  Market economics work because they are based on human nature and function just like any natural system.  A good analogy would be nature.  Nature, as a system, works.  Not because worms, birds, trees, and badgers are all trying to come up with a five year plan to make it work, but because each part of nature, just doing what it does according to it's own nature, together creates a natural system that functions.  

But if you disagree with the basis of our economic system, as it appears that you do, where does that leave you?  Since I've been on the other board, I've been able to debate a wide variety of liberals and leftists, from people who's politics would be at about Clinton "New Democrat" to Communists of differing stripes.  So there are liberals who agree with our system and just want to tweek it, and leftists who want to totally destroy it replace it with an all encompassing Communist state.  You, seem further left than the tweekers, since you totally disagree with the idea of profit centered capitalism, but you don't strike me as a destroy-everything communist either.  The problem is, for leftist who hate Capitalism but also hate communism, you don't seem to have anything to be for, you only know what you are against.

The middle ground for that would seem to me to be a system in which businesses are regulated like public utilities.  So there would be some private property rights, but much more limited than what we have in our system.  However for historical reasons that model has fallen out of favor.

So I know what you are against, but what type of system would you favor?  What is that middle way between free market capitalism, and Communism that you seem to want, but have not really defined?

It's not just you, there are plenty of people on the left who are against what we have, but don't seem to have a system that they favor.

[ekg]

I wanted to respond to this but since ekg locked the thread I couldn't :

 You, seem further left than the tweekers, since you totally disagree with the idea of profit centered capitalism, but you don't strike me as a destroy-everything communist either.  The problem is, for leftist who hate Capitalism but also hate communism, you don't seem to have anything to be for, you only know what you are against.

the assumptions you make are so egregiously wrong that I always have to go back and re-read where you think you came up with it over and over again.. just so that I can try and find where in the hell you come up with this crap... But I simply can't see what would bring you to make such an error..

So I know what you are against,

but you don't know anything of the sort. You read something and it gets so distorted that what you 'get' out of is way off to the other side of what was meant..  I can't for the life of me understand how or why you do that..

It's not just you, there are plenty of people on the left who are against what we have, but don't seem to have a system that they favor.

I don't believe that at all..   The problem 'lefties' have with capitalism the 'greed' factor.. and that's plainly what Chuck is talking about.. Greed to extreme. Some greed is good in a society, extreme greed to point of tipping the balance towards a few at the detriment of the many is not in any way a good thing. My question is,why do you think it is? Why are you happy with this tilt? You must know that it can't benefit a true capitalistic society because once it tips too far to the extreme percent it winds up destroying itself... because the market isn't 'free' if only a select few are playing without rules

[uselesslegs]

I'm not so sure assigning nature based equilibrium, to a man made concept is entirely fitting.  Since we seem to be ignoring, actually encouraging, introducing perturbations into the *environment* of capitalism, which are deliberately influencing the economy in an unbalancing capacity.   

Although, it's fair to say that chaos theory exists, within natural settings that have little or no dramatic shifts that would seem to introduce or attract such.  The chaos that can and does exist in nature isn't a purposeful introduction or purposeful manipulation of the resources and life within the system, with a goal in mind.  It is chaos, for chaos' sake.  Ascribing an *environment* to capitalism suggests a natural order, with changes due to periodic fluctuations and chaos, devoid of intent.  Intent is where any comparison or perceived similarities see the two diverge from likeness.  Intent is control.  The ability to manipulate the environment for desired results.  Volcano's, tsunamis, epidemics, hurricanes, floods, drought, asteroids, comets, out of control fires, enormous solar flares, an exploding star to close to our solar system, mass extinction, ect., ect. have control over us whether we like it or not...THAT by proxy can affect capitalism and that's as close to *natural* as the concept overlaps.  Everything else, the structure, the intricacy, the chaos, is the manipulation of the concept for a desired result.

In our current capitalistic environment there is an intentional restructuring of the system.  A purposeful, mindful manipulation of the system that is creating chaos, for a preferred goal.  Any depicted similarities between capitalism and an *environment*, is again, wishing to assign neutral naturalistic forces ( as when *market forces* are attributed nature like qualities) to a human made, human controlled concept of commerce.  There is no impartiality of the *free market* at work here.  It is anything but.  What we have, at the moment, are lions eating gazelles, not because they're hungry, not because they need to to survive, but simply because they can. The more, the merrier. They can't get enough. One gazelle isn't enough, lets kill 10, 15.  They're life sustaining meat will rot by not being consumed and we sure as hell won't be letting the other meat eaters have any, but who cares. We'll keep taking it, because we can. Not because we need to...but because we can. 

There is no over arching need to accumulate so much against the overall *environments* benefit. There is no impersonal, naturalistic behavior of nonaligned/unbiased *forces* at work.  It is simply out of control greed attempting to morally justify itself, through a perversion of individual freedoms, where the wants of the one, outweigh the needs of the many. (pointy eared, green blooded hobgoblin respects to Mr. Spock)

[Howey]

Volcano's, tsunamis, epidemics, hurricanes, floods, drought, asteroids, comets, out of control fires, enormous solar flares, an exploding star to close to our solar system, mass extinction,

Those are all Obama's fault. Or God's retribution for us electing a buhlack man.

[uselesslegs]

Those are all Obama's fault. Or God's retribution for us electing a buhlack man.

badda bing.

[lil mike]

Those are all Obama's fault. Or God's retribution for us electing a buhlack man.

 

[lil mike]

I'm not so sure assigning nature based equilibrium, to a man made concept is entirely fitting.  Since we seem to be ignoring, actually encouraging, introducing perturbations into the *environment* of capitalism, which are deliberately influencing the economy in an unbalancing capacity.   

Although, it's fair to say that chaos theory exists, within natural settings that have little or no dramatic shifts that would seem to introduce or attract such.  The chaos that can and does exist in nature isn't a purposeful introduction or purposeful manipulation of the resources and life within the system, with a goal in mind.  It is chaos, for chaos' sake.  Ascribing an *environment* to capitalism suggests a natural order, with changes due to periodic fluctuations and chaos, devoid of intent.  Intent is where any comparison or perceived similarities see the two diverge from likeness.  Intent is control.  The ability to manipulate the environment for desired results.  Volcano's, tsunamis, epidemics, hurricanes, floods, drought, asteroids, comets, out of control fires, enormous solar flares, an exploding star to close to our solar system, mass extinction, ect., ect. have control over us whether we like it or not...THAT by proxy can affect capitalism and that's as close to *natural* as the concept overlaps.  Everything else, the structure, the intricacy, the chaos, is the manipulation of the concept for a desired result.

In our current capitalistic environment there is an intentional restructuring of the system.  A purposeful, mindful manipulation of the system that is creating chaos, for a preferred goal.  Any depicted similarities between capitalism and an *environment*, is again, wishing to assign neutral naturalistic forces ( as when *market forces* are attributed nature like qualities) to a human made, human controlled concept of commerce.  There is no impartiality of the *free market* at work here.  It is anything but.  What we have, at the moment, are lions eating gazelles, not because they're hungry, not because they need to to survive, but simply because they can. The more, the merrier. They can't get enough. One gazelle isn't enough, lets kill 10, 15.  They're life sustaining meat will rot by not being consumed and we sure as hell won't be letting the other meat eaters have any, but who cares. We'll keep taking it, because we can. Not because we need to...but because we can. 

There is no over arching need to accumulate so much against the overall *environments* benefit. There is no impersonal, naturalistic behavior of nonaligned/unbiased *forces* at work.  It is simply out of control greed attempting to morally justify itself, through a perversion of individual freedoms, where the wants of the one, outweigh the needs of the many. (pointy eared, green blooded hobgoblin respects to Mr. Spock)

Well see, that's interesting too.  You don't see economics as a system, but more like chaos.  And of course, if you have chaos, you need someone or some thing to establish order.  So clearly within your worldview, there really isn't such thing as "market forces" or Smith's invisible hand.  It's all anarchy of strong against weak until someone comes in and does something about it.

I'm not sure where you are going with the statement, "a perversion of individual freedoms."  You've dropped hints that liberty is at best a secondary consideration when it comes to what's an important social good.  I'm just not sure how far you go with that.  Is that something you're still working out or do you know and don't want to say?

Oh, and by the 3rd movie they had completely dropped the idea of the needs of the many...blah blah blah. 

[uselesslegs]

Well see, that's interesting too.  You don't see economics as a system, but more like chaos.  And of course, if you have chaos, you need someone or some thing to establish order.  So clearly within your worldview, there really isn't such thing as "market forces" or Smith's invisible hand.  It's all anarchy of strong against weak until someone comes in and does something about it.

I'm not sure where you are going with the statement, "a perversion of individual freedoms."  You've dropped hints that liberty is at best a secondary consideration when it comes to what's an important social good.  I'm just not sure how far you go with that.  Is that something you're still working out or do you know and don't want to say?

Oh, and by the 3rd movie they had completely dropped the idea of the needs of the many...blah blah blah. 

Well, it's not *natural*.  It's neither neutral nor benign on it's own.  It is what we decide it is.  If we decide commerce will benefit few, at the expense of many...that's what it is.  If we decide commerce is more beneficial to society at large...that's what it is.  It's not naturalistic.  If it were, the lions would be starving right now, because their gluttony depleted their resources, yet they can operate outside of capitalism using a specific form of engineered commerce, outside of the *environment*, and are doing pretty fucking good.  They can do this, because our commerce allows and rewards them to get more, for less, regardless of the cost at home.  Now we're pretending we're going to re-engineer other elements within capitalism to try and mop up the mess, but in reality, it's a parlor trick and they'll drag this conversation out until doomsday and won't address anything until they absolutely have too.  I mean why would they? Some people are making incredible fucking fortunes

They take their work abroad, pay little, reap much but their homeland suffers.  This is not seen as a deficit, but rather astute business acumen.  This is not seen as counter productive to the homelands stability, but rather as the obvious business choice.  It circumvents the touted theme of commerce/capitalism, which always insists that it's good for everyone involved.  Our current reality suggests otherwise, and a more accurate description might be, "it's good for some, a crap shoot for everyone else."  Life has no guarantees, this is true...but a concept is what we decide it is...no more, no less.  If you make it more gamble oriented, that's what it is.  If you make it more oriented towards societal benefits, that's what it is.  It doesn't move in any direction, other than the direction we steer it.  This is true the world over.  Otherwise, there wouldn't be other countries free of our predicaments. They chose the path their commerce would take, they are not stagnate nor closed off and they chose not to chase King Solomon's wealth for an unstable society.

And actually, by the end of movie number two, Kirk was already giving the finger to Spock's comment, because you know that muther f'er was already plotting for his own desires.

[lil mike]

Well, it's not *natural*.  It's neither neutral nor benign on it's own.  It is what we decide it is.  If we decide commerce will benefit few, at the expense of many...that's what it is.  If we decide commerce is more beneficial to society at large...that's what it is.  It's not naturalistic.  If it were, the lions would be starving right now, because their gluttony depleted their resources, yet they can operate outside of capitalism using a specific form of engineered commerce, outside of the *environment*, and are doing pretty fucking good.  They can do this, because our commerce allows and rewards them to get more, for less, regardless of the cost at home.  Now we're pretending we're going to re-engineer other elements within capitalism to try and mop up the mess, but in reality, it's a parlor trick and they'll drag this conversation out until doomsday and won't address anything until they absolutely have too.  I mean why would they? Some people are making incredible fucking fortunes

They take their work abroad, pay little, reap much but their homeland suffers.  This is not seen as a deficit, but rather astute business acumen.  This is not seen as counter productive to the homelands stability, but rather as the obvious business choice.  It circumvents the touted theme of commerce/capitalism, which always insists that it's good for everyone involved.  Our current reality suggests otherwise, and a more accurate description might be, "it's good for some, a crap shoot for everyone else."  Life has no guarantees, this is true...but a concept is what we decide it is...no more, no less.  If you make it more gamble oriented, that's what it is.  If you make it more oriented towards societal benefits, that's what it is.  It doesn't move in any direction, other than the direction we steer it.  This is true the world over.  Otherwise, there wouldn't be other countries free of our predicaments. They chose the path their commerce would take, they are not stagnate nor closed off and they chose not to chase King Solomon's wealth for an unstable society.

And actually, by the end of movie number two, Kirk was already giving the finger to Spock's comment, because you know that muther f'er was already plotting for his own desires.

Well that does seem to confirm that you do regard the market as chaos rather than a system.

So... how would you like society organized, at least as far as economics goes, if not one based on a free market driven by the profit motive?

Maybe it's a lack of imagination on my part, but the alternatives that have actually been tried have not worked out so well.  So getting past what you are against, what are you for?

[uselesslegs]

I think you misunderstand me...or perhaps I'm just shitty at communication (which is probably the case).

I'm all for making every stink'in dime you can possibly make...but don't do it at the detriment to the community, both locally and nationally.  I'm against destructive capitalism, not capitalism.  Capitalism that forsakes everything for the bottom line is just out of control greed, no matter how it's dressed up.

[Howey]

Capitalism that forsakes everything for the bottom line is just out of control greed, no matter how it's dressed up.

See...Mike thinks different. His definition of capitalism is that it, like Spock, a corporation cannot have human emotions, like greed. If a capitalistic entity had human qualities, it would be able to direct stuff like elections and donate huge sums of capitalistic money to candidates who's sole intent is to further the greed.


Oh.

Wait.

Nevahmind!


Speaking of greed and corporate personalities, guess who Goldman Sachs is sleeping with? Kinda makes Newt's whores pale in comparison, huh?

When Bain Capital sought to raise money in 1989 for a fast-growing office-supply company named Staples, Mitt Romney, Bain’s founder, called upon a trusted business partner: Goldman Sachs, whose bankers led the company’s initial public offering.

When Mr. Romney became governor of Massachusetts, his blind trust gave Goldman much of his wealth to manage, a fortune now estimated to be as much as $250 million.

And as Mr. Romney mounts his second bid for the presidency, Goldman is coming through again: Its employees have contributed at least $367,000 to his campaign, making the firm Mr. Romney’s largest single source of campaign money through the end of September.

No other company is so closely intertwined with Mr. Romney’s public and private lives except Bain itself. And in recent days, Mr. Romney’s ties to Goldman Sachs have lashed another lightning rod to a campaign already fending off withering attacks on his career as a buyout specialist, thrusting the privileges of the Wall Street elite to the forefront of the Republican nominating battle.

Wow. $367k? It's actually $369 now. To put that in perspective, that's waaaay more than the second place finisher, the esteemed Kirsten Gillibrand, at 52k, or the third place Marco Rubio (he of many dubious financial dealings himself) at 51k, or the president at a little over 50k.


Mittens 2012. Candidate for the 1%

[lil mike]

I think you misunderstand me...or perhaps I'm just shitty at communication (which is probably the case).

I'm all for making every stink'in dime you can possibly make...but don't do it at the detriment to the community, both locally and nationally.  I'm against destructive capitalism, not capitalism.  Capitalism that forsakes everything for the bottom line is just out of control greed, no matter how it's dressed up.

I think you're right, I'm not really understanding you.  I'm trying to connect this statement, "When you're ultimate goal is profit, whether a company fails or is successful, you're in it for the wrong reasons" with this one, "I'm all for making every stink'in dime you can possibly make."  You're caveat, "but don't do it at the detriment to the community, both locally and nationally," is maddenly vague.  So how do those guidelines apply in the real world?  Make a profit, but never fire anyone or try to make your operations more efficient...  That's why I said at the beginning of this thread that it's much easier to tell what you're against than what you're for.

[ekg]

I think you're right, I'm not really understanding you.  I'm trying to connect this statement, "When you're ultimate goal is profit, whether a company fails or is successful, you're in it for the wrong reasons" with this one, "I'm all for making every stink'in dime you can possibly make."  You're caveat, "but don't do it at the detriment to the community, both locally and nationally," is maddenly vague.  So how do those guidelines apply in the real world?  Make a profit, but never fire anyone or try to make your operations more efficient...  That's why I said at the beginning of this thread that it's much easier to tell what you're against than what you're for.

try taking that quote in the context it was given...

When you're ultimate goal is profit, whether a company fails or is successful, you're in it for the wrong reasons.  You're employees are counting on you to have their best interests as part of the overall reasoning for success.  If they're viewed as just a necessary evil that can be expunged if it's more profitable to just gut and collapse their workplace for resale, insurance money, bankruptcy...you're in it for the wrong reasons.

and then apply it to the other

'm all for making every stink'in dime you can possibly make...but don't do it at the detriment to the community, both locally and nationally.  I'm against destructive capitalism, not capitalism.  Capitalism that forsakes everything for the bottom line is just out of control greed, no matter how it's dressed up.

if you cannot see that he is saying the same thing in both, that out of control greed is not capitalism and it's not 'good' for anyone, then you're simply arguing for arguments sake. .. or more likely trying to get a 'a-ha' statement out of him that you can use out of context against him in the future..

[FooFa]

The chaos that can and does exist in nature isn't a purposeful introduction or purposeful manipulation of the resources and life within the system, with a goal in mind.  It is chaos, for chaos' sake.  Ascribing an *environment* to capitalism suggests a natural order, with changes due to periodic fluctuations and chaos, devoid of intent.  Intent is where any comparison or perceived similarities see the two diverge from likeness.  Intent is control.

uselesslegs

The press, the machine, the railway, the telegraph are premises whose thousand-year conclusion no one has yet dared to draw.
Friedrich Nietzsche

But assuming the same premises, to wit, that all men are equal by the law of nature and of nations, the right of property in slaves falls to the ground; for one who is equal to another cannot be the owner or property of that other.
William H. Seward


JFK also said that pursuing a false premise is more dangerous than the pursuit of a lie, to paraphrase.

Crony capitalism is closer to crony monopolization. Greed and human nature failed the ideal that the people should choose these things through the elected. A graph of productivity of American's from the 1970's until present would show a steady rise which equals a great profit for those who employ them. The commensurable hourly wage and salaries would show an extremely disproportionate line.

One example of how I observe the abominations of so called facts spouted by the corporate controlled media.

I don't have a good answer except that the people of each country should run that country along with the vast wasteful departments of gov being completely eliminated. An outside org that could be transparent in having no political ties could develop software to the various devices where people use the internet for the people to have a regular yay/nay on everything. Completely possible. Nothing close will ever happen.

[uselesslegs]

I think you're right, I'm not really understanding you.  I'm trying to connect this statement, "When you're ultimate goal is profit, whether a company fails or is successful, you're in it for the wrong reasons" with this one, "I'm all for making every stink'in dime you can possibly make."  You're caveat, "but don't do it at the detriment to the community, both locally and nationally," is maddenly vague.  So how do those guidelines apply in the real world?  Make a profit, but never fire anyone or try to make your operations more efficient...  That's why I said at the beginning of this thread that it's much easier to tell what you're against than what you're for.

If it comes off disconnected or idealistic, it's because you're applying absolutes to what I'm saying.  Of course people can and will be released (fired) from companies/businesses.  If it's what's required as the only alternative of mismanaged practices or an ever turbulent part of commerce not expected.  Heck, it could be the employee themselves (and is quite frequently) that signs their own walking papers through ineptness or douche baggery.

You're equating all aspects of profit (motives, origins, pursuit of) as one defining single paradigm that ultimately has no other purpose than the bottom line, *whatever* that entails...as if its a sentient force unable to be anything other than what it is...and we're all along for a ride on the tail ...subject completely to it's whim.

That's the type of static rhetoric that excludes all other realities, even when you're living it and its brought us to this point...as it has before.  It's just barely a 100 years and we're fighting tooth and nail to repeat our previous financial explosion...except now, it's global.