Posted on 12/10/2019 11:39:15 PM PST by knighthawk
Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro has a new national goal: He’s going to expand his massive private army to 4 million gunmen by the end of 2020. Another triumph of socialism!
And never mind that the policies of Maduro and his late predecessor, Hugo Chávez, have brought the nation to ruin, with all but the rulers and their clients facing slow starvation and “health care” without any medicine. Well over a tenth the population has fled, with more leaving all the time.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Socialism works very well from the collectivism standpoint. It’s the redistribution part that is always the problem. After the government takes its cut, there’s nothing left.
It’s hard to make a case for the superiority of capitalism when the Federal Reserve creates dollars amounting to 23% of GDP and hands them out. Capitalism failed, folks. It failed utterly and completely in 2008.
So when money itself is exposed as a substance created from nothingness on a whim buy a central bank then capitalism or socialism or any other ISM associated with money loses all of its meaning. There can be no superiority of one ISM over another ISM if money itself is exposed as a whimsical
Substance.
And no oh, don’t leave to think that this is supposed to be another gold worshipping presentation. Gold also means nothing. This is not physics. It’s not gravity. It’s not measurable electricity. It’s imagination. The substance has value only because you believe it does. Gravity exists whether you believe it does or not.
Let’s offer up another example of why Maduro’s evil needs redefining. We’re running a 1 trillion dollar deficit. GDP is between 20 and 21 trillion. That’s an external injection of about 5% of GDP into the economy. And what does this get us? 2% growth. Its fiscal stimulus of 5% of the size of the entire economy and all that generates is 2% growth. Capitalism erases 3% of the money injected. How is this admirable? How is this worthy of our praise?
The left don’t hate guns they hate you and you having the ability to protect yourself from them.
Call me harsh, but I detect a touch of crankiness about matters monetary.
The left are not interested in your bitching and complaining about crime in your city town or state ,the are interested in taking what you need to protect yourself an family only because it will eventually be used against them as they continue to poke the tiger
Thats why NOAA, the IRS and the dept of Ed all have Fully automatic weapons, and you dont. Its also why your locaal PD has been militarized and authorized outside of their jurisdictions in a possee commitatus work around.
Spot on Ronnie. I have to believe that the only thing stopping them atm is the armed citizen. It is obvious from what is happening in Washington that they will resort to anything to take control
That wasn’t capitalism, that was corporatism. Capitalism died with the income tax.
And to think this is what the Democrats envision for the USA
I don't recall who it was who observed that "capitalism" is the only major economic system that was named by its opponents. Karl Marx invented (or at least popularized) the word as a term of opprobrium for what was then known as economic liberalism. Economic liberalism was itself defined in opposition to the feudal and mercantilist systems that had preceded it. It represented the assertion of free markets against the power of the state.
Since this position evolved slowly and organically in Britain and parts of northern Europe in the 17th-19th centuries, there are many variants on the pattern. There was a great deal of trial and error. It is an evolving thing. But it is rooted in the idea that people should be able to make their own decisions, trade freely with willing partners, enjoy security of property against thieves and predatory governments, be able to rely on the rule of law as opposed to arbitrary political diktats, and retain the fruits of their labor for their own use and enjoyment (which implies low or moderate taxation and, again, security of property and the rule of law).
The capitalist system/aka economic liberalism incentivizes initiative, creativity, hard work, savings and investment, personal responsibility, moderation of habits and prudent lifestyles, etc. It has proven to be the only reliable formula that our imperfect species has found for raising the mass of people from poverty and enabling long-term growth.
None of this has anything to do with fiat money.
And when you say that "capitalism" has failed, what system, pray tell, would you hold up as superior? Government dominated cronyism seems to be the alternative now on offer. This is guaranteed mainly to enrich members of the political class while suppressing opportunity for other sectors of society. Which to the government class, motivated by envy and resentment, is a feature, not a bug.
Hard to make a case for superiority? What flag is on the moon again?
The Federal Reserve is not capitalistic, it's not a market force and it does not produce anything. The fed is a major defect in our system and should be entirely abolished.
Capitalism did not fail. It had worked for years but people realized they could vote things for themselves and stopped working for it.
When the government only existed to do the things it was told in the constitution to do, defend the country and move the mail, it did very well. Whenever it tries to do other things, it starts siphoning money out of the public realm, which is what kills capitalism.
Addressing comments:
>> When the government only existed to do the things it was told in the constitution to do, defend the country and move the mail, it did very well. Whenever it tries to do other things, it starts siphoning money out of the public realm, which is what kills capitalism.
>>
You need to revisit the last paragraph of my original comment. Govt is not siphoning this year. It is pouring $1Trillion INTO the economy. 5% of GDP being poured in. The result of this is the economy grows 2%. Capitalism eats 3%. Go have a look at the GDP equation in the wiki. Govt spending increases and tax cuts both are stimulative. That’s what a deficit is — especially when the debt incurred is loaned by your central bank from money created by whim.
>>The Federal Reserve is not capitalistic, it’s not a market force and it does not produce anything.
>>
I don’t think you understand where money comes from. There was none in the Garden of Eden. It’s an invention of mankind. It’s created by whim. And it’s how we measure isms. We declare all sorts of morality things to be determined by this substance that comes from nothingness. How can there be some worshiped something capitalistic when you measure it with a substance created from nothing.
How can you want to go to war and kill people because of an ism defined by a substance created from nothing?
>>And when you say that “capitalism” has failed, what system, pray tell, would you hold up as superior?
>>
This isn’t OJ’s trial. I don’t have to go find the real killer. If something is a failure, it doesn’t stop being a failure for lack of an alternative. Early pre Wright airplanes that crashed and killed their pilots were not successes because they were better than other failures.
That was cool stuff about the evolution of economic thought, but improving airplanes in the late 1800s that still crashed and killed their pilots doesn’t make them successes.
The world was saved by Bernanke in 2009. People would have flat out died when ATMs stopped handing out cash in Nairobi or Jakarta. He took action and saved lives, but in so doing he exposed the reality that capitalism had failed. Only creating money in overwhelming quantities kept the wheels turning. The philosophy of capitalism did NOTHING to save those lives.
Consider . . . a young married couple with kids borrow money from a bank. They lose a job and can’t make the payments. Stress builds. The kids witness fights. Divorce evolves. The kids are horrified and can’t understand what’s happening. You might even get a kidnapping or murder thrown in there.
All this happened because a substance created from nothing, which could have had more created from nothing, inflicted all that stress and loss of life demanding they repay something that came from nothing.
"Capitalism" is the economics of free choice. As Milton Friedman used to say, "I believe in capitalist acts between consenting adults." If I grow apples and you want to buy apples, we shouldn't need a government planner, or a government license, to do business. That's capitalism.
But as soon as you use the word “buy” you move right back into the substance created from nothing.
Now . . . you can say “trade” and have it mean something, but nowadays even trade is measured in dollars, which were created from nothing.
Visualize scarcity. That is where the education arrives. You have food. Someone else has a billion dollars. There is no other food anywhere else. He wants to buy your food.
Clearly, you refuse to sell. Scarcity exposes all the silliness of defining morality with money.
No trade still means exactly what it has always meant, is still broadly used, and is seldom discussed in public where it might lead to tax authority investigations.
“All this happened because a substance created from nothing, which could have had more created from nothing, inflicted all that stress and loss of life demanding they repay something that came from nothing.”
Reading your response it’s clear you don’t understand the difference between money and wealth. Your example of the young couple who buys a house on a loan and can’t pay it back makes no sense whatsoever.
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