Bernie Sanders

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Parodite
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Parodite »

A long speech by The Bern:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5h7Cxz_vV9E

He calls his political views "democratic socialism". In Europe these are called social democrats, usually center and center-left political parties. The Bern's ideas are here even found in center-right political parties. In no way I can see him as an old school socialist. He is a social democrat who fights for a more decent, just and stable society.
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Doc
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Doc »

Parodite wrote:A long speech by The Bern:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5h7Cxz_vV9E

He calls his political views "democratic socialism". In Europe these are called social democrats, usually center and center-left political parties. The Bern's ideas are here even found in center-right political parties. In no way I can see him as an old school socialist. He is a social democrat who fights for a more decent, just and stable society.
"Democratic Socialism" is a contradiction in terms.
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Nonc Hilaire
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Nonc Hilaire »

Reich has valid points, but they are as thin as Bernie's 74 year old skin. The man is a brilliant but cowardly team player.

The real issue is that American capitalism has morphed into financialism, and there is very little product left in our GDP. Now financialism has ponzi'd out and we are reduced to abject counterfeiting and militarily extorting gold from other countries just to maintain the illusion.

Both Bernie and Trump are talking about moving away from financialism towards mercantilism, but using different language. The rest are just bobbleheads.
“Christ has no body now but yours. Yours are the eyes through which he looks with compassion on this world. Yours are the feet with which he walks among His people to do good. Yours are the hands through which he blesses His creation.”

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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Typhoon »

Nonc Hilaire wrote:Reich has valid points, but they are as thin as Bernie's 74 year old skin. The man is a brilliant but cowardly team player.
An apt description.
Nonc Hilaire wrote:The real issue is that American capitalism has morphed into financialism, and there is very little product left in our GDP. Now financialism has ponzi'd out and we are reduced to abject counterfeiting and militarily extorting gold from other countries just to maintain the illusion.

Both Bernie and Trump are talking about moving away from financialism towards mercantilism, but using different language. The rest are just bobbleheads.
From 1982 to 2014, US manufacturing has declined from about 30% to 17% of the economy, so you do have a point.

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R42135.pdf

FIRE now dominates the US economy.

On the other hand, it's something of a global problem as automation and robotics are ever reducing the number of people required for manufacturing.
I think that we have become too efficient in making stuff to require a population of 7 billion.
Not clear to me what the solution, if any, will be.

As for the gold market, it is far too small to be relevant to the global economy.
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Simple Minded »

It will be interesting to see if Bernie is the first "honest" POTUS candidate advocating Socialism. After all, it is nothing more than insurance.

Rather than attempt to sell social benefits as "free," the effort to discuss and actually disclose costs and who actually pays.... may be found to be refreshing and received well by some potential voters. Might be the change some can believe in.

"We can all get college and health care at no cost by burying the cost of those services, in the cost of staple products we all buy each day. My experts say we only need to pay an additional $1 a pound for meat, $0.75 a gallon for gasoline, $2 for a pair of shoes, $2 for a pair of pants...... Its' like signing up for the Christmas clubs we used to have at the banks in the 1970s. Nobody gets nuthin free. We simply discipline people to save money that they normally would not save."

Would it turn off the idealists or convert the non-believers?
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by manolo »

Nonc Hilaire wrote:
Both Bernie and Trump are talking about moving away from financialism towards mercantilism, but using different language.
Nonc,

There could be some truth here, if I get you right. I have held that commerce is an essential lubricant in human affairs, but 'financialism' is something different. When people talk fondly about capitalism they seem to be connecting with the goods of commerce, but rarely address the financialism bit, which is commerce without the goods.

Alex.
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by manolo »

Simple Minded wrote: ...who actually pays....
SM,

You have wisely hit on an age old truth, that there is no such thing as a free lunch.

Alex.
Simple Minded

Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Simple Minded »

manolo wrote:
Simple Minded wrote: ...who actually pays....
SM,

You have wisely hit on an age old truth, that there is no such thing as a free lunch.

Alex.
I'd vote for Bernie if he promised to set up parallel systems in health care and education. The public sector will be like the Post Office and the public school system. The private sector will be like FedEx, UPS, DHL, and private schools.

The catch is he needs to completely deregulate the private sectors (at least to the level of veterinary medicine in the medical sector). No FDA, no malpractice lawsuits or insurance, no government oversight. If my veterinarian agrees to perform my vasectomy or other surgery, that is between me and them only. Buyer beware, personal responsibility rules. Wild West creativity. No income taxes on investors or participants.

Then he needs to be honest about who is going to pay for the public sectors. None of this "we are going to build a better society because we care" bullshit. "This is who benefits, this is who pays. Don like it? Screw you!"

The first honest POTUS candidate, who actually discusses details and costs rather than meaningless platitudes in my lifetime.......

ring, ring WTF! oh the alarm is going off....
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by NapLajoieonSteroids »

Doubt and trust are the essential affairs of human commerce.

"Financialism" has been the bane of every whacky political and political-economic theory over the last 200 years because it requires a very high degree of trust. A degree so high as to be naturally beyond the capabilities of a certain non zero segment of the population, and these people go out to agitate their natural auxiliary- the lukewarm and confused- who can't tell their asses from an asset. They are usually fortified by those, due to the vicissitudes of life, have genuine gripes with a host of facts regarding mismanagement or shenanigans in that area. What those specific facts are change by the generation; because they are so wedded in malady of human error, they tend to be buried along with the perpetrators and the perturbed.
Simple Minded

Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Simple Minded »

NapLajoieonSteroids wrote:Doubt and trust are the essential affairs of human commerce.

"Financialism" has been the bane of every whacky political and political-economic theory over the last 200 years because it requires a very high degree of trust. A degree so high as to be naturally beyond the capabilities of a certain non zero segment of the population, and these people go out to agitate their natural auxiliary- the lukewarm and confused- who can't tell their asses from an asset. They are usually fortified by those, due to the vicissitudes of life, have genuine gripes with a host of facts regarding mismanagement or shenanigans in that area. What those specific facts are change by the generation; because they are so wedded in malady of human error, they tend to be buried along with the perpetrators and the perturbed.
I think I agree. Asset - a collection of asses? :P

If one looks back, at the beginning of an industry, there are hundreds of little Mom & Pop shops producing bicycles, cars, farm tractors, motorcycles, computers, etc. In time, the good products/efficient producers push the bad off the market. Creative destruction. Some see that as mean or Darwinistic. seems like........ "progress" to me.

The flip side is regulation prevents competition. If I have the skill set to build an automobile, and if meets the basics (lights, turnsignals, brakes) why should I not be allowed to do so? But cost of compliance to register is too high to meet. Done in the name of the "common good." at what cost? That cost is never discussed. Lack of progress in industry X, or what causes costs to stop decreasing is no too hard to understand.

The subtleties are what are/should be controlled and what are not, are infinite. Where the lines of demarcation are drawn will be discussed forever.

"If it saves just one life....... it is worth it!" Only if cost is not calculated. It would be easy to design and build aircraft that would not result in any fatalities if crashed, but if the cost of flying from NYC to DC exceeds $X, there will be no buyers.

Cost to the end user plays a huge role in when Fred decides "I have to have ______." Divorce costs from the situation, and Fred truly can have it all.
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by noddy »

yeh dont blame the governments and people who sucked up debt they had no intention of paying off for the last 20 years and did nothing except make housing and living costs more expensive.

blame the money lenders! its brilliant, for certain personality types.

their is untold riches sitting around doing nothing at the moment, its not "financialisms" fault, they would love to lend it, love to invest it.

its the fact we dont have anything to do - globalisation, automation and digitisation have rendered most of the factories producing stuff redundant.

whats left of the factories do 3-5 year upgrade cycles on whitegoods and transport, hardly a growth industry.

china produced more crap than the world needed with less than 30% of its people employed
china produced more crap than the world needed with less than 30% of its people employed

if you say that enough you start to grok whats going on right now.
Last edited by noddy on Tue Feb 16, 2016 3:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by NapLajoieonSteroids »

once the factories go, the 'smart guy' jobs will be next.

Why hire a team of fallible humans when a robot could be programmed to do the experiments and search for solutions? :)
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by noddy »

how many smart guys do we need ?

globalisation only needs the double cream, regular cream can get turned into butter.
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by NapLajoieonSteroids »

Right.

I believe the crash in Argentina was informative. The last guys to fall were the creative types, at first; they were the ones cleaning up because they were needed more than ever to advertise that Joe the Plumber or Dave the dentist was trustworthy enough to do a job. And of course, people will always pay for distractions. But even they went.

That's one of the primary reasons I can't get behind the "even more schooling" solution or the (conservative) counter- let them be carpenters!

We are reaching a serious rethink of how we organize this carnival, and its probably not going to look like yesterday's solutions because we don't have any good solutions today.

EDIT: let me throw the techno-futurist guys in there too.

A lot of people are high off the "gee whiz" phase of our techno kick we are on right now, and that we can incorporate everybody by encouraging them to adopt the same techne. And obviously, it is to a point successful- but old crafts die hard in no scarcity situations (Betamax was still being manufactured until this summer or fall!) and it ultimately encourages the sort of fragmentation that will be a constant irritant.

When that fragmentation was roughly along the lines of hunter&gather and agriculturalist the solution seems to have worked itself out with one group killing the other [see: The Americas] or living symbiotically off one another, with constant low level conflict [see: Sub-Saraha Africa/(would the gypsy situation fit here?)] ...what happens when you have hunter-gatherers, farmers, and all sorts of industrial-techno niches?
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by noddy »

indeed.

small point of order - smaller companies like mine thrive in the techno fragmentation, only the big boys like unified standards, it means they can pump out the entire ecosystem and dictate all the usages ;)

as for berny, he seems destined to be an also ran or a one term wonder to me.
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by NapLajoieonSteroids »

noddy wrote:indeed.

small point of order - smaller companies like mine thrive in the techno fragmentation, only the big boys like unified standards, it means they can pump out the entire ecosystem and dictate all the usages ;)
hey, I'm out to sea in a small craft too- betting big on smaller and smaller niches. Yet I find it hard to imagine we aren't participating into the complexity of these ecosystems...so, here's to bottom feeding? :)
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Simple Minded »

My fellow Americans,

For decades I have consistently and unselfishly transferred milk from my own teats to the collective teat. Often putting the interests of "we" ahead of the interests of "me."

Well in the interests of my changing self-interest, er uh, I mean change you can believe, it is time for me to..... uh... cough.... cough....... gag...... hack.... um change.

That right, it is time for the young, supple, round, bouncy teats that don't need no bra supports to step up to the plate ( or back up to the milking machine as the case may be) and do their part.

I implore you to think of my self-interests ahead of your own for a change, cause I'm sick of being your wet nurse. Trust me, you will sleep better, and you'll just feel better knowing I'm well cared for.

Fell da Bern! Vote early and vote often.

thanks in advance,

Fred
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by NapLajoieonSteroids »

Simple Minded wrote:My fellow Americans,

For decades I have consistently and unselfishly transferred milk from my own teats to the collective teat. Often putting the interests of "we" ahead of the interests of "me."

Well in the interests of my changing self-interest, er uh, I mean change you can believe, it is time for me to..... uh... cough.... cough....... gag...... hack.... um change.

That right, it is time for the young, supple, round, bouncy teats that don't need no bra supports to step up to the plate ( or back up to the milking machine as the case may be) and do their part.

I implore you to think of my self-interests ahead of your own for a change, cause I'm sick of being your wet nurse. Trust me, you will sleep better, and you'll just feel better knowing I'm well cared for.

Fell da Bern! Vote early and vote often.

thanks in advance,

Fred
that's alright, your tits were never that nice anyway. We'd have said something earlier, but you're such an exhibitionist, there was no stopping you. :)
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by NapLajoieonSteroids »

Simple Minded wrote:
NapLajoieonSteroids wrote:Doubt and trust are the essential affairs of human commerce.

"Financialism" has been the bane of every whacky political and political-economic theory over the last 200 years because it requires a very high degree of trust. A degree so high as to be naturally beyond the capabilities of a certain non zero segment of the population, and these people go out to agitate their natural auxiliary- the lukewarm and confused- who can't tell their asses from an asset. They are usually fortified by those, due to the vicissitudes of life, have genuine gripes with a host of facts regarding mismanagement or shenanigans in that area. What those specific facts are change by the generation; because they are so wedded in malady of human error, they tend to be buried along with the perpetrators and the perturbed.
I think I agree. Asset - a collection of asses? :P


Would be a nice collection too if only it didn't come with so many @ssholes. :)
If one looks back, at the beginning of an industry, there are hundreds of little Mom & Pop shops producing bicycles, cars, farm tractors, motorcycles, computers, etc. In time, the good products/efficient producers push the bad off the market. Creative destruction. Some see that as mean or Darwinistic. seems like........ "progress" to me.

The flip side is regulation prevents competition. If I have the skill set to build an automobile, and if meets the basics (lights, turnsignals, brakes) why should I not be allowed to do so? But cost of compliance to register is too high to meet. Done in the name of the "common good." at what cost? That cost is never discussed. Lack of progress in industry X, or what causes costs to stop decreasing is no too hard to understand.

The subtleties are what are/should be controlled and what are not, are infinite. Where the lines of demarcation are drawn will be discussed forever.

"If it saves just one life....... it is worth it!" Only if cost is not calculated. It would be easy to design and build aircraft that would not result in any fatalities if crashed, but if the cost of flying from NYC to DC exceeds $X, there will be no buyers.

Cost to the end user plays a huge role in when Fred decides "I have to have ______." Divorce costs from the situation, and Fred truly can have it all.
You are wading much further into the weeds to go tiger hunting, (and bringing your Joseph Schumpeter buckshot it seems, ) than I was going to go.

We have some pretty significant disagreements when it come down to the nitty gritty.

What I was getting at is that as despicable the financial sector is, and there's no doubt that there is a den of vipers attached to it, they are still an invaluable part of what helps to facilitate greater and greater circles of trust when it comes to exchanging goods. There's a reason they sprung up to begin with.

And if they are no longer working properly, there is something along the assembly line that is giving us fits- it's not some sort swindle from the get go (even if you believe every banker were a swindler; the most successful swindlers know how to ingratiate themselves into solid establishments.)

The problem is, the "next step" if there is one, either involves a full throttle Mr.Roboto future- what better way to handle an economy than to eliminate humans from it?- which doesn't quite make sense for us meatbags. And/or it involves even more "financialism" and a full jump into some new paradigm and system where everything is based on credits (similar to a suggestion Nonc brought up in another thread.) There are obviously many, many problems with that solution too- one being that it gets so abstract, it may be missing the point on why we 'do' economics in the first place. (Of course, that could just be cave dweller speak for "fire bad! I don't understand the imagined future!" So if you're reading this in the 24th and a half century, go easy on us!) I'm getting daffy here- because obviously we aren't close to this point- can't say I'm not a bit touched in the head.

The reason I relate it to Sanders is that outside of the magnitude, nothing being suggested is particularly progressive. It's rather small c- conservative in that it's more of the same, with more of it. Maybe we can afford it, maybe we can't. But I'm finding it hard to wrap my mind around the idea that it is movement in any direction. "Give us what Europe has!" is not a very impassioned rallying cry. Europe doesn't even seem to know what Europe has....
Simple Minded

Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Simple Minded »

NapLajoieonSteroids wrote:
that's alright, your tits were never that nice anyway. We'd have said something earlier, but you're such an exhibitionist, there was no stopping you. :)
:lol:

thanks for not being a bitter clinger...... :D

Please don't forget to burp me often...... ;)
Simple Minded

Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Simple Minded »

NapLajoieonSteroids wrote:

We have some pretty significant disagreements when it come down to the nitty gritty..
Maybe, I'm still not sure how we got from titties to nitty gritty....... :lol: Titties on ole bitties?

NapLajoieonSteroids wrote:
What I was getting at is that as despicable the financial sector is, and there's no doubt that there is a den of vipers attached to it, they are still an invaluable part of what helps to facilitate greater and greater circles of trust when it comes to exchanging goods. There's a reason they sprung up to begin with.

And if they are no longer working properly, there is something along the assembly line that is giving us fits- it's not some sort swindle from the get go (even if you believe every banker were a swindler; the most successful swindlers know how to ingratiate themselves into solid establishments.)

The problem is, the "next step" if there is one, either involves a full throttle Mr.Roboto future- what better way to handle an economy than to eliminate humans from it?- which doesn't quite make sense for us meatbags. And/or it involves even more "financialism" and a full jump into some new paradigm and system where everything is based on credits (similar to a suggestion Nonc brought up in another thread.) There are obviously many, many problems with that solution too- one being that it gets so abstract, it may be missing the point on why we 'do' economics in the first place. (Of course, that could just be cave dweller speak for "fire bad! I don't understand the imagined future!" So if you're reading this in the 24th and a half century, go easy on us!) I'm getting daffy here- because obviously we aren't close to this point- can't say I'm not a bit touched in the head.

The reason I relate it to Sanders is that outside of the magnitude, nothing being suggested is particularly progressive. It's rather small c- conservative in that it's more of the same, with more of it. Maybe we can afford it, maybe we can't. But I'm finding it hard to wrap my mind around the idea that it is movement in any direction. "Give us what Europe has!" is not a very impassioned rallying cry. Europe doesn't even seem to know what Europe has....
Napster,

:? I have no idea what you think I think, but your posts are always interesting and thought provoking. I appreciate the effort. I really have no idea if we have significant disagreements, but I will take your word for it. ;)

IMSMO, normal gets defined between age 5 and 25 for most of us. What the heck is common is a great discussion.

Probably just my dinosaur brain effect, but "banksters" seem to have replaced "Commies" as the chic dark threat. Also, "robots" taking over the world seem very similar to the fear of Japan Inc. taking over the world from the olden days, or the same fear of China just a couple years ago. No doubt, my database is now dating me. Can you speak 8088? ;)

Oddly enough, I can remember when borrowing money was not only considered imprudent/stupid, but un-American. Then just a few years later, buying a house that costs less than 6X your annual gross was considered foolish/stupid and un-American. It was so American, and such a great idea, even the wise in Congress decided to "help." Cause "everybody knew" that real estate only goes up! due to dinosaur programming, I always blame borrowers not lenders. Especially when the lender does not hold a gun to the head of the borrower.

Perhaps "robotic produced goods" will become so uncool, that it will be like buying foreign products in the 1980's, or buying GMO food or furs in some circles. Social pressures can change markets at the drop of a hat. Remember when wearing a fur coat was a status symbol, or smoking was considered sophisticated? Or being obese was kind of rare?

True that change is always happening, and that culture is always in flux. Too much for my puny brain to try to grasp all the constantly changing terminology, or the subjective definitions, Liberal, conservative, left, right, rich, poor, fair, just, compared to what or determined by whom from what region?

People, cultures, countries, industries, etc. going insane for years or decades at a time is one of the oldest stories in the book. As "they say," the crowd (I prefer herd or mob) is always right about the trend, but wrong at both ends.

I have great confidence in humans continuing as they have for a long time, regardless of how often they try to convince me otherwise, or that they are "better" than those with whom they disagree. A couple bucks here, a couple years, a few miles in the other direction, and suddenly they disagree with the opinions they formerly were writing in stone.

I really don't think there is a Europe as common experience or idea any more than there is an America as common experience or idea. Too many cooks.
Last edited by Simple Minded on Sat Feb 20, 2016 3:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Parodite
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Parodite »

ymMfQUJY_BA

:D

Anyways... I think The Bernnn is making a big mistake attaching the word socialist/socialism to what he wants. Cause it aint socialism and it creates a negative Pavlovian reaction in many Mericans who don't have a clue either.

Ymix, with your knowledge of history, mastering a perfect English, Romania as a first-hand witness sandwiched between the terrors of USSR Communism in the East and the gang-raping Capitalism of the West... you should tour the US and lecture the poor Mericans bout true socialism of ol' and new... a virgin territory! In its slipstream you could make a good case against monopolistic bankster-gangsters; of how the Commies took over Wallstreet and the USGvt under the guise of deregulation ;)
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by YMix »

Parodite wrote:Ymix, with your knowledge of history, mastering a perfect English, Romania as a first-hand witness sandwiched between the terrors of USSR Communism in the East and the gang-raping Capitalism of the West... you should tour the US and lecture the poor Mericans bout true socialism of ol' and new... a virgin territory! In its slipstream you could make a good case against monopolistic bankster-gangsters; of how the Commies took over Wallstreet and the USGvt under the guise of deregulation ;)
I would be 'uge. 'UGE!
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by manolo »

Folks,

My gripe with Bernie is that he says the same things all the time. It is kind of wearing. :(

OK, Potus did that "Yes we can!" stuff, but at least it was vague, which lends interest. My interpretation was "Yes we can!" get rid of the GOP in power for a while. Others will have had a different interpretation, which is fine with me.

But listening to Bernie banging on about the 1% for 8 years would turn me into a social libertarian.

Alex.

Oops, I already am a social libertarian. :)
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Re: Bernie Sanders

Post by Nonc Hilaire »

Bernie and Trump both want to convince us they can change tires while still driving the car, but at least they see the need for change.
“Christ has no body now but yours. Yours are the eyes through which he looks with compassion on this world. Yours are the feet with which he walks among His people to do good. Yours are the hands through which he blesses His creation.”

Teresa of Ávila
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