Posted on 11/09/2008 4:57:34 AM PST by Perdogg
I am already getting angry after reading the first 14 pages. I had I started this book before election day I might have stayed home.
One question: The stockmarket fell on October 28th, 1929, from 299 to 261, then from 261 to 230 on October 29th, 1929. Why was this considered a crash?
"As soon as A observes something which seems to him to be wrong, from which X is suffering, A talks it over with B, and A and B then propose to get a law passed to remedy the evil and help X. Their law always proposes to determine what C shall do for X, or in the better case, what A, B, and C shall do for X.... [W]hat I want to do is to look up C.... He is the man who never is thought of."
"The type and formula of most schemes of philanthropy or humanitarianism is this: A and B put their heads together to decide what C shall be made to do for D. The radical vice of all these schemes, from a sociological point of view, is that C is not allowed a voice in the matter, and his position, character, and interests, as well as the ultimate effects on society through C's interests, are entirely overlooked. I call C the Forgotten Man."
William Graham Sumner - 1883
Read the book and have given it to friends.
My final take is that we turned left in 1932 ( much like the rest of the world ) and now that force is being spent. The command economy will die. But it’s death will be hard and ugly. I see BO as an American Gorbachev. He will try to keep the system intact. But will fail.
You are right that we carried too much water for GWB. So , in that sense, we are damn luck to have lost the election to BO. Now we are free to be the people we really are....anti socialism and anti big government.
H. L. Mencken stated it quite nicely:
“Whenever ‘A’ attempts by law to impose his moral standards upon ‘B’, ‘A’ is most likely a scoundrel”.
1932 and 2008 have this in common:
The American Electorate was not so much voting for FDR or Obama. They were voting AGAINST Bush and the Republicans who supported his War and econmomic policies.
It the stock market were at 14,000 and not 8800 today, McCain-Palin would have won in a landslide.
I strongly recommend Burton Folsom's new book, "New Deal or Raw Deal." It covers all aspects of how FDR extended the depression.
agreed. And your point about the war is on point also.
To Serve Man
Writer: Rod Serling, based on the story by Damon Knight
Director: Richard L. Bare
Apparently benign alien emissaries show mankind how to end the misery of war, plague and famine.
CAST: Richard Kiel, Hardie Albright, Robert Tafur, Lloyd Bochner, Lomax Study, Theodore Marcuse, Susan Cummings, Nelson Olmstead.
Watch it online for free at:
(see Season 3, page 2)
http://www.cbs.com/classics/the_twilight_zone/
Barack Obama received at least some instruction in the Islamic faith of his father and went with him to the mosque, but the importance of this experience is vastly overstated by conservative commentators who seek to portray Obama as a Muslim of sorts. Radical anti-Americanism, rather than Islam, was the reigning faith in the Dunham household. ...
Barack Obama is a clever fellow who imbibed hatred of America with his mother's milk, but worked his way up the elite ladder of education and career. He shares the resentment of Muslims against the encroachment of American culture, although not their religion. He has the empathetic skill set of an anthropologist who lives with his subjects, learns their language, and elicits their hopes and fears while remaining at emotional distance. That is, he is the political equivalent of a sociopath. The difference is that he is practicing not on a primitive tribe but on the population of the United States.
There is nothing mysterious about Obama's methods. "A demagogue tries to sound as stupid as his audience so that they will think they are as clever as he is," wrote Karl Krauss. Americans are the world's biggest suckers, and laugh at this weakness in their popular culture. Listening to Obama speak, Sinclair Lewis' cynical tent-revivalist Elmer Gantry comes to mind, or, even better, Tyrone Power's portrayal of a carnival mentalist in the 1947 film noire Nightmare Alley. The latter is available for instant viewing at Netflix, and highly recommended as an antidote to having felt uplifted by an Obama speech. ..."
Article: Obama's women reveal his secret
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page/JB26Aa01.html
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page 10, 3rd paragraph
” If so much of the New Deal hurt the economy, why did Roosevelt win reelection three times?...in case of the third and fourth Roosevelt terms..the threat of war and war itself. Roosevelt, unlike his narrow-minded Republican opponents [Willkie and Dewey] understood the dangers that Nazi Germany represented.”
"There's another reason for working inside the system. Dostoevsky said that taking a new step is what people fear most. Any revolutionary change must be preceded by a passive, affirmative, non-challenging attitude toward change among the mass of our people. They must feel so frustrated, so defeated, so lost, so futureless in the prevailing system that they are willing to let go of the past and change the future. This acceptance is the reformation essential to any revolution."[2]
[2] Saul Alinsky, The Latter Rain
http://latter-rain.com/ltrain/alinski.htm
_______________________________________________________
Statement from Communist Party USA (CPUSA):
"The Communist Party USA views the 2008 elections as a tremendous opportunity to defeat the policies of the right-wing Republicans and to move our country in a new progressive direction.
The record turnout in the Democratic Presidential primary races shows that millions of voters, including millions of new voters, are using this election to bring about real change. We wholeheartedly agree with them."
http://cpusa.org/article/articleview/907/1/4/
_______________________________________________________
FDR was a failure. He kept taxes high and made war against corporate America. His policies kept the Depression (high unemployment, no economic growth) alive for a decade. If the US had not industrially geared up to fight WW II, the Depression would have lasted even longer.
FDR attacked the Constitution, and set the stage for the current Welfare State. Obama’s National Socialist Party will repeat FDR’s stupidity, turning this recession into another depression.
You couldn’t be more right. If we had stood up to him more often (as in the Harriet Myers fiasco) we would have been far better off.
I found it an excellent book. It’s a bit chilling to think of what he (FDR) would have done if he was successful in packing the Spreme Court. His heavy-handed methods, and skillful utilization of the new electronic media are very similar to modern Democrats.
1913 - Income Tax instituted. Less than 2 percent of the population had to pay it. Income up to $20,000 was taxable at 1 percent, and above $500,000 at 7 percent. It exempted the first $3,000 earned by a single person and the first $4,000 by married couples. Since the overwhelming majority of Americans supported families on less than $1,000 a year, most were exempted from the tax.
1916 - Income tax, top rate: 15 percent.
1917 - Twenty graduated steps established for the income tax. Top rate on income over $2 million: 67 percent. Under $2,000: 2 percent. Exemptions reduced. Number of returns from 1916 to 1919 will climb from 437,000 to 4.4 million. Even so, 95 percent of all Americans will pay no income tax.
World War I - Income tax, top rate at 73 percent. Capital gains, top rate: 77 percent.
1921 - Capital gains, top rate: 12.5 percent. Income tax, top rate: 56 percent.
1924 - Income tax, top rate: 46 percent.
1926 - Income, top rate: 25 percent. Income tax on first $4,000 lowered from 2.0 to 1.5 percent. Estate tax, top rate, lowered from 40 to 20 percent. Abolished gift taxes.
1930s - Increased capital gains tax rates in the 1930s. For a short period, realized gains were taxed under a complicated schedule that taxed gains from very short-term investments in full, but excluded as much as 70% of gains from sales of assets held for more than 10 years. This system was widely criticized as unwieldy and complex, and in the early 1940s it was scrapped.
1932 - Income, top rate: 63 percent
1936 - Income tax, top rate: 79 percent. Roosevelt also institutes an inheritance tax, estate tax, gift taxes, dividend tax and progressive corporate tax.
Early 40s - capital gains taxed at half the regular rate or 25 percent, whichever is lower.
World War II - the bottom income tax rate climbs from 4 to 19 percent between 1940 and 1943. Top income tax rate climbs to 88 percent by 1943. By 1945 it hits 91 percent, where it remains until 1964.
1964 - Income tax, top rate: 77 percent.
1965 - Income tax, top rate: 70 percent.
1950s - Corporate tax: 52 percent.
Late 60s - cap gains start rising from 25 percent.
Mid 70s - cap gains reaches 39 percent.
1977 - Social Security Act Amendment of 1977 passed. With Social Security in trouble, Congress passed a schedule of Social Security tax increases, ending in the year 2030, that would gradually raise the combined amount paid by employers and employees from 11.7 to 15.3 percent. Also raised the maximum taxable income from $16,500 in 1977 to $42,000 in 1987. This schedule would be accelerated in 1983.
1978 - Revenue Act of 1978 makes unemployment benefits taxable for first time. Capital gains, top rate: 28 percent (enacted November, 1978).
1981 - The Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981 (ERTA) passes. Otherwise known as Reagan’s supply-side tax cuts. They included: An across-the-board reduction in individual income tax rates of approximately 23 percent, phased in over 33 months. A reduction in the maximum top rate from 70 percent to 50 percent, beginning in 1982. (Only unearned income - from interest and dividends - had been taxed at 70 percent. Wage and salary income was already taxed at 50 percent.) Inflation-indexing for the individual income tax brackets, the zero bracket amount and the personal exemption, beginning in 1985. The accelerated cost recovery system (ACRS), which provided depreciation write-off periods ranging from 3 years for equipment to 15 years for structures. Reduction of the maximum tax rate on capital gains to 20 percent.
http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/TaxTimeline.htm
I found this while researching some info on google....
1931
Credit Anstalt Bank Collapses
When Credit Anstalt, Austria’s biggest bank, failed in the spring of 1931, Germany was badly affected as well. This resulted in the strengthening of the anti-democratic Fascist and Nazi movement in Austria and Germany respectively.
Credit Anstalt faced troubles when it swallowed a debt-ridden rival bank, but found it could not solve dissolve the debts during the era of Depression. 70 percent of Austrian trade and industry was dependent on the bank but the government could not help because it was also facing financial woes itself.
Nervous customers of Credit Anstalt and other Austrian banks rushed to withdraw their funds. Fear spread to Germany, causing a bank crisis over there. In July, the giant German Danat-Bank collapsed; other banks followed before the German government had to declare a two-day bank closure, to prevent further withdrawls. In fact, most of the banks remained shut for weeks. Millions lost their life savings.
Meanwhile, Austria had obtained international loans, but in exchange for French help, Austria had to cancel its planned customs union with Germany. This dash both countries best hope for economic recovery.
In Germany, the financial panic led many to join the Nazis, from youths bitter about the failure of old-style politics to middle-class Germans, afraid of a communist takeover sparked by the country’s failures.
Mencken’s Law was similar to this: “Whenever A takes money from B under the pretense of helping C, A is a scoundrel.” It’s scoundrel time and in a very big way. Obama has swarms and hoards of morons to take care of, and with other people’s money at that! A typical liberal, always generous with other people’s money.
I think that’s a good point. In 1932, Germans weren’t voting for Hitler so much as they were voting against the Weimar Republic and the economic collapse.
thanks for the book tip........
I'm going to assume the following unless you can evidence to the contrary that I am mistaken:
1. You have learned the vast majority of your information regarding the Iraq war and what Iraqis think or feel about America's defeat of Saddam from the main stream media (networks, magazines, daily newspapers).
2. You have never been to Iraq, before or after the war began there.
3. If you have traveled to Iraq, it has not been within the last 6-10 months.
4. You have never spoken directly to, or more importantly you have never LISTENED TO any of the “Iraqis” that you project as not being “grateful in any way” for the sacrifices made by America and our military sons and daughters. If not how were you able to form such a solid assessment of how Iraqis feel?
4. You have never spoken directly to, or more importantly LISTENED TO any members of the United States military who have bravely served in Iraq... like my son who is a Marine Gunny....and you have especially not spoke to those militarily personnel who have experienced multiple tours over time so that they can bring into context for you and others like you how completely inaccurate statements that you have made in your post really are. The best way to find true perspective may best be found in speaking specifically to those wounded men and women who have been and are seeking to be redeployed to Iraq after their wounds have been mended.
5. You are unfamiliar with and have not studied the lead-up to this war, the mistakes made on the ground that inhibited early successes that would have shortened this conflict considerably, and lastly, the politics from Washington that were imposed on our fighting forces in the way this war was managed until the surge.
And by the way, also keep in mind as you post here in the future newbie (you've only been here since 5/2008?)that “we” here at FR are not as dumb as you may think.
If you want to argue statements like those you make in this post, it might help further your cause if you provide some support and first hand perspective for your rhetoric.
“The type and formula of most schemes of philanthropy or humanitarianism is this: A and B put their heads together to decide what C shall be made to do for D. The radical vice of all these schemes, from a sociological point of view, is that C is not allowed a voice in the matter, and his position, character, and interests, as well as the ultimate effects on society through C’s interests, are entirely overlooked. I call C the Forgotten Man.”
Great quote! I haven’t read the book yet, but I heard Amity on some media mention a concept I had not heard of that was in use during GD1: “capital strike.” Meaning, folks decide to take their chips off the table during times of confiscatory taxes.
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