Capitalism Has Failed!

I realize this post will not sit well with those individuals that have more money than brains…….but let’s look at it….capitalism has failed.

The truth is that the “economy” is booming according to some….then why are most Americans are overworked and underpaid and the future looks no brighter than now……

Let’s look shall we?

Some years ago, I faced up to the futility of reporting true things about America’s disastrous wars and so I left Afghanistan for another remote mountainous country far away. It was the polar opposite of Afghanistan: a peaceful, prosperous land where nearly everybody seemed to enjoy a good life, on the job and in the family.

It’s true that they didn’t work much, not by American standards anyway. In the U.S., full-time salaried workers supposedly laboring 40 hours a week actually average 49, with almost 20% clocking more than 60. These people, on the other hand, worked only about 37 hours a week, when they weren’t away on long paid vacations. At the end of the work day, about four in the afternoon (perhaps three in the summer), they had time to enjoy a hike in the forest or a swim with the kids or a beer with friends — which helps explain why, unlike so many Americans, they are pleased with their jobs.

https://www.rawstory.com/2019/01/american-capitalism-failed-us-overworked-underemployed-powerless-ever/

Now we see a debate taking hold should the US embrace socialism over the soul sucking capitalism we have today?

In 2016, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders ran on a platform that many thought would’ve ruined his political chances. He ran as a democratic socialist, disavowing America’s longtime capitalist consensus and proudly wrapping himself in a label pundits considered political poison. And it worked.

In American politics, and particularly in the Democratic Party, the primacy of capitalism is, for the first time in ages, an open question. Sanders is expected to run again in 2020, and to run with the support of a grassroots movement that thrills to his break with capitalist convention. He’ll face, among others, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who says one key difference between her and Sanders is that she’s “a capitalist to my bones.”

https://www.vox.com/the-big-idea/2019/1/7/18167691/what-is-socialism-capitalism-sanders-warren

Personally I do not care what we call it…..as long as the children get educated, people make a living wage, health is for everyone, etc……so can a bit of socialism help capitalism?

Larry Fink, the chief executive and founder of BlackRock, published his annual letter to the chief executives of all the companies around the world in which it invests last week.

And Fink’s message was: don’t put profits first. Put “purpose” first. “Purpose is not the sole pursuit of profits, but the animating force for achieving them,” Fink explained.

“Profits are in no way inconsistent with purpose – in fact, profits and purpose are inextricably linked.”

This corporate purpose, he went on, means investing for the long term, serving a community, developing the talents of a workforce. And so on. BlackRock also says that bosses’ pay should not rise faster than that of the firm’s workers and has threatened to vote against remuneration committees that agree to excessive awards.

It’s enough to make the libertarian epigoni of Milton Friedman, the economist who famously asserted “there is one and only one social responsibility of business – to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits”, choke on their cornflakes.

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/blackrock-socialism-capitalism-stock-market-sacha-romanovitch-grant-thornton-a8737131.html

We need some help……this deal is just not working the way it was intended…..reform NOW or face the consequences.

Return Of The “S” Word

The 2020 election will see a rise in the use of the “S” word, Socialism……the Right will be using it more and more until the actual candidate is chosen…..it is all they have to attack the policies from the Left…..then there are those cowards the Democrat Centrist…they too will jump on the “S” word train.

Even the dolt in the White House has been using it….but don’t call him a f*cking fascist that would be “fake news”……..but the old farts that cannot move into the 21st century will resurrect the lies and the bullsh*t for a lack of any real policies to advance……

There are a lot of people talking about socialism these days. Senator Bernie Sanders, who on Tuesday launched a bid for the Democratic nomination for president, calls himself a democratic socialist, and so does Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Public intellectuals are debating the label anew. And then there’s the most high-profile participant in the discussion: Donald Trump.

The president, of course, is not a proponent. But he has moved “socialism” to the center of his lexicon in February, deploying it in discussions of foreign policy as a weapon against domestic political opponents. He does so at a time when his political messaging has faltered and when the left wing is more energized than it has been in generations. How successful Trump’s attempt to revive an old but often successful line of attack is will be an important test, both for his reelection hopes and for the future of socialist ideas in this country.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/02/trump-socialism-venezuela-bernie-sanders-ocasio-cortez/583135/

Bernie needs to worry about trashing by the media and Right leaning pundits that cannot move into the 21st century and still fight the Cold War…..in other words..”Old Farts”……

Some people are attached to the idea that the Democratic National Committee will “rig” the presidential nomination against Bernie Sanders. The meme encourages the belief that the Bernie 2020 campaign is futile because of powerful corporate Democrats. But such fatalism should be discarded.

As Frederick Douglass said, “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.” Of course top Democratic Party officials don’t intend to give up control. It has to be taken from them. And the conditions for doing that are now more favorable than ever.

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/03/04/big-obstacle-bernie-isnt-dnc-rigging-its-media-trashing

Let me help those people that do not know what socialism is…….for one socialism is not communism….but communism is a form of socialism…..confused? I can help…….https://lobotero.com/2012/02/07/just-what-is-socialism/

I know that is a bit much for some of among us……so maybe this short video will do a better job than having to read……

https://youtu.be/XD94UUTvMts

https://youtu.be/FrtDZ-LOXFw

The Right hates any thing that would move society forward….but yet when it comes to their big donors they have a special type of “socialism”…..

“America will never be a socialist country,” Donald Trump declared in his State of the Union address. Someone should alert Trump that America is now a hotbed of socialism. But it is socialism for the rich. Everyone else is treated to harsh capitalism.

In the conservative mind, socialism means getting something for doing nothing. That pretty much describes the $21 billion saved by the nation’s largest banks last year thanks to Trump’s tax cuts, some of which went into massive bonuses for bank executives. On the other hand, more than 4,000 lower-level bank employees got a big dose of harsh capitalism. They lost their jobs.

Banks that are too big to fail – courtesy of the 2008 bank bailout – enjoy a hidden subsidy of some $83 billion a year, because creditors facing less risk accept lower interest on deposits and loans. Last year, Wall Street’s bonus pool was $31.4 billion. Take away the hidden subsidy and the bonus pool disappears.

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/02/12/trump-wants-socialism-rich-brutal-capitalism-rest-us

Trump is NOT alone…it is a typical and a predictable policy of the GOP and its aging minions……even those conservs that oppose the Trump policies will jump on the “S” word bandwagon and they are not alone the media is also on-board…..instead of debating policies and ideas they resort to the typical BS of name calling…….the old farts are running scared.

Giving the wealthy free stuff is more in line with GOP politics than helping those in our society……but they will not see it and neither will those old farts that are still living in the Cold War.

Is it “Socialism” if it is what the people want?

“Socialism,” snarled Donald Trump at a recent pep rally of far-right Republicans. And the obedient crowd of faithful Trumpistas snarled back in unison: “So-shull-izz-ummm!”

And there you have the entire intellectual content of the GOP’s 2020 re-election strategy under Generalissimo Trump—slap Democrats silly with a scurrilous campaign branding them as Lenin-Trotsky-Stalin reincarnate. It’s not just Trump hissing out the socialist label in a frantic McCarthyesque attempt to make it stick by mindless repetition, but also Mike Pence, cabinet officials, Republican lawmakers, right-wing pundits and, of course, the extremist choreographers of Fox News.

Their incessant babbling has already turned clownish, with many babblers bumbling over their own ignorance and making ridiculous attempts to overplay their weak hands. Texas Sen. John Cornyn, for example, compared Democrats who support ideas such as “Medicare for All” to Mussolini. Apparently, Cornyn is unaware that the brutish Italian dictator was no socialist, but a fascist! Mussolini’s ideology of ultranationalism, promotion of masculine authoritarianism, domination of society by big business and the wealthy and suppression of democratic rights is the opposite of the Democratic agenda. Indeed, it describes the policies of—guess who—Trump and his acolytes, including Cornyn!

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/03/13/its-not-socialism-its-what-people-want

https://lobotero.com/2009/02/16/socialism-for-the-rich/campaigns fire up and get serious

ith the “S” word..

Not to worry……we have heard the “S” word more in the last month than in 10 years and we will hear it a lot more as the campaigns fire up and the election gets more serious.

Try to remember that there is NO blueprint for a socialist society….so the talk of socialism by the GOP and their master, Trump are just cowards running scared.

The GOP is still living in the 1950s and any progress will be equated with the “S” word…..equated falsely I might add.

When The “S” Word Is Okay

The 2020 election is quickly approaching……and we have the usual word in the debate….socialism…..

Soon we will be bombarded with the “S” word as the Dem field starts to take its final shape……Trump will be out front with the accusations followed closely by the GOP and their lies that they do so well.

The problem is they are not against “socialism” just not for the people of the nation…they prefer that corporations get the “free stuff”……

This news report of 7 years ago helps understand just how bad “corporate socialism” can be……

A proposal to spend $250 million of taxpayer money on a retail project here illustrates the damage state and local subsidies do by taking from the many to benefit the already rich few.

Nationwide state and local subsidies for corporations totaled more than $70 billion in 2010, as calculated by Professor Kenneth Thomasof the University of Missouri-St. Louis

In a country of 311 million, that’s $900 taken on average from each family of four in 2010. There are no official figures, but this one is likely conservative because — as documented by Thomas, this column and Good Jobs First, a nonprofit taxpayer watchdog organization funded by Ford, Surdna and other major foundations — these upward redistributions of wealth keep increasing.

http://blogs.reuters.com/david-cay-johnston/2012/06/01/how-corporate-socialism-destroys/

Fast forward to the Trump presidency…….

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/02/12/trump-wants-socialism-rich-brutal-capitalism-rest-us

After over a 100 years of demonizing socialism is now what the GOP tells their child-like followers to send them hiding under their beds…..

And while they are hiding democracy is slowly slipping from their grasp……

This growing animosity toward the greed of the immensely wealthy is not merely symptomatic of a popular presidential candidates’ rhetoric, but indicative of the harrowing economic inequalities existing in American society and politics. The 62 richest people in the world have as much wealth as the bottom 50 percent of the world, roughly 3.6 billion people. The wealthiest 1 percent of the global population have as much wealth as the other 99 percent of the world’s population. For decades, wages of the middle and working classes have remained stagnant in the United States while the top earners have seen their wages grow exponentially. In the United States since the 2008 recession, nearly 99 percent of all new generated income has gone to the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans. Current trends suggest these enormous disparities in wealth are expanding.

https://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/economy-budget/268947-a-democracy-lost-to-corporate-socialism

Political lies have replaced knowledgeable discourse and the specter of socialism taking over and people will lose all their rights……under these lies that is exactly what is happening and socialism did not have anything to do with that loss.

Leon Remembered

This post should have been written and posted on 03 September but I was lazy and worried about a doctor’s visit to pay attention….

This is the 80th anniversary of the 4th International…..this will mean very little to most people but as a student of political history I feel that he, Leon Trotsky, needs to be remembered….if not for his life then for is contribution to political discourse.

…the 80th anniversary of the founding congress of the Fourth International, held on September 3, 1938. The establishment of the Fourth International, under the leadership of Leon Trotsky, was an event of great historical significance and contemporary relevance. During the next three months, the World Socialist Web Site will be celebrating this anniversary with a series of publications and events explaining the significance of the Fourth International.

…..

On September 3, 1938, the Fourth International held its founding congress in a suburb of Paris. The conference agenda allowed for only one day of official proceedings, owing to—according to the minutes—“the illegal circumstances under which the congress was held…” The “illegal circumstances” to which the minutes referred were those created by the relentless persecution of the Trotskyist movement by the police of the bourgeois-democratic state in France, the armed gangs of fascists acting with legal impunity in much of Europe, and above all, the ruthless assassins of the Soviet secret police, the GPU, working to carry out Stalin’s instructions that Leon Trotsky and his closest collaborators be physically eliminated.

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/09/03/four-s03.html

Like I side mean little to most people but to students it is a study in political discourse…..

Just felt I could drop some history on my readers….enjoy your day….chuq

Sicilian Fasci Movement

This will be your final history lesson for the week…..enjoy.

About here some person will read the title and immediately set off schooling me about the Godwin Law because they will assume that I am aiming this at the their fearless leader in DC.

As usual they would be WRONG!

This post is not about Mussolini or even his patron Hitler…nope….it is about a movement in Sicily in the late 19th century.

During the 1860s and 1870s, workers in Sicily supported each other through mutual aid societies, which claimed the right to strike and to lobby for wage increases. This precedent of organized labor, along with a recent history of peasant uprisings against feudal aristocracy and the spread of socialist ideology, set the stage for the Fasci Siciliani movement. A trade war affecting the main components of Sicily’s economy (fruit, wine, and sulfur) led the Sicilian elite to institute higher rents and taxes, transferring the economic hardship to the working class. Fasci, meaning “bundle” in Italian, were associations of laborers that advocated for workers’ rights constituted Sicily’s first social movement.

Source: Sicilian Fasci movement, 1893-4

For those that like history and politics it is always a joy to find out about how the world looked at society back in the day.

I hope that you, my reader, enjoyed your small slice of history for the day…..

Class Dismissed!

Is Trump A Socialist?

Did you hear that? That was the sound of millions of Trump supporters asses slamming shut!

Please read the post and not just the title like so many do…..

Ever read something that makes sit back and have a good chuckle? Well I found one over the weekend……

Surely you have heard about the deal the Trump made with Carrier (UTC)…..the one about the jobs….ring a bell yet?

Don’t strain that sleeping brain……

With his deal to keep Carrier’s factory in Indianapolis open, Donald Trump has fulfilled a big campaign promise, saved 1,100 highly paid American jobs—and, once again, created an enormous controversy. Carrier, which had planned to shift production to Mexico, will receive at least $7 million in financial incentives from Indiana. Critics say this sets a dangerous precedent, and wonder whether Trump is planning to make deals with every company that threatens to move jobs overseas. A round-up of coverage:

Trump praised the deal in a visit to the factory Thursday, CBS reports. “Companies are not going to leave the United States anymore without consequences. It’s not gonna happen,” he said.

United Technologies, Carrier’s parent company, “took Trump hostage and won. And that should send a shock wave of fear through all workers across the country,” Bernie Sanders writes in a Washington Post op-ed. With the deal, he writes Trump has endangered previously safe jobs by signaling “to every corporation in America that they can threaten to offshore jobs in exchange for business-friendly tax benefits and incentives.”

White House press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters the deal is “obviously good news,” but hardly comparable to the 804,000 jobs in the manufacturing sector he said President Obama created, the Guardian reports. Trump would need to “make 804 more announcements just like that” to equal what Obama did, Earnest said.

Trump revealed to Carrier workers that despite his promise to keep jobs there, he hadn’t really been talking about that particular factory. “I said Carrier will never leave,” he said. “But that was a euphemism. I was talking about Carrier like all the other companies from here on in.” He said he decided to get on the phone to execs anyway “because of the love affair I’ve had—this has been a very special state to us.”

Jimmy Pethokoukis, an analyst at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, didn’t pull his punches in an interview with CNBC. He said Trump’s remarks were the worst economic speech since Walter Mondale’s attack on Reaganomics in 1984. He says it is “absolutely chilling” that American corporations will now have to make business decisions based on “fear of punitive actions based on who knows what criteria exactly from a presidential administration.”

NPR notes that United Technologies makes a lot of money from government contracts, suggesting “strong-arm” tactics played a role in the deal. Analysts including George Mason University professor of economics Tyler Cowen, a libertarian, warns that “crony capitalism” could prevail under Trump, with plenty of rewards flowing to companies that please the president.

But at the Carrier plant itself, the mood is unsurprisingly jubilant—and pro-Trump. The announcement was a “Christmas miracle,” Jeffery Blackford, who was worked for the company for 25 years, tells the Indianapolis Star, which reports that under the deal, the average wage will be $30.91 an hour. “Hopefully this right here will be a start of a new beginning, where we can stop manufacturing from leaving this country.”

That should catch you up…..

A leading conservative writer has stepped up and given what Trump has done a name……

GEORGE WILL: So far Donald Trump’s style is personal, not to say visceral, and ad hoc. And what that adds up to is a kind of use of presidential power absolutely unconstrained by law and statute and all those other niceties. The problem is when you have, in the Carrier case, political power used to bring pressure upon a privately held corporation that has a fiduciary duty to maximize shareholder value and drive them off with political pressure from making economic decisions about economic assets, you are, in effect, at the end of the day, getting the federal government involved in capital allocation. There is a name for that, it’s called socialism.

This ought to put the conservative writer on the shit list of all those slobbering Trump supporters……

After accusing the Left for decades of being a socialist group and plotting to somehow install a socialist government….we find the Trump is more socialist than the Left…..according to Will.

I cannot wait for the mindless dribble that should come my way…..but…….

Please before you slugs on the Right have anything to say….leave me out of it…..your point of contention is with George Will, a fellow conservative….all I did was show that not all conservatives are willing to kiss his ass like you.

Frederick Douglass on Capitalism, Slavery, and the ‘Arrant Nonsense’ of Socialism

Yes I know…I am a history nerd and I am proud of it.

One of my favorite people from around the Civil War time was the abolitionist Frederick Douglass…..I recent did a press of an article in slavery and capitalism and I saw another related article in Reason ….I thought I would pass it along….

Understanding the political philosophy of the abolitionist leader.

In November 1848 a socialist activist gave a speech at the 13th annual meeting of the Rhode Island Anti-Slavery Society. “Mr. Ingliss” began his remarks well enough, reported the abolitionist leader Frederick Douglass, who was present to give a speech of his own that day, “but strangely enough went on in an effort to show that wages slavery is as bad as chattel slavery.”

Douglass soon became infuriated with the socialist speaker. “The attempts to place holding property in the soil—on the same footing as holding property in man, was most lame and impotent,” Douglass declared. “And the wonder is that anyone could listen with patience to such arrant nonsense.”

Frederick Douglass heard a lot of arrant nonsense from American socialists in those days. That’s because most socialists thought the anti-slavery movement had its priorities all wrong. As the left-wing historian Carl Guarneri once put it, most antebellum socialists “were hostile or at least indifferent to the abolitionist appeal because they believed that it diverted attention from the serious problems facing northern workers with the onset of industrial capitalism.” The true path to social reform, the socialists said, was the path of anti-capitalism.

Source: Frederick Douglass on Capitalism, Slavery, and the ‘Arrant Nonsense’ of Socialism – Reason.com

Douglass is a fascinating individual that does not get the attention he should in our educational system….read an learn about a true American hero….a hero that some would just as soon forget…..but that will not happen as long as I breath….period.

You may thank me later…..

Russia: Back To The Future?

In am old enough to remember the days of the USSR….the days of hiding under desks in case of a A-bomb attack…..the days of HUAC….and the days of a communist under every rock…..kinda like the rocks that ISIS is hiding under these days.

We were told that the communism/socialism was a bad thing…..that you would be oppressed if it were instituted….and they gave the Russian peasants as an example…..all that propaganda has lead to a situation today in Russia……

A recent poll revealed that most Russians would like to see the return of the Soviet Union and socialism.

The majority of Russians polled in a recent study would prefer living under the Soviet Union and would like to see the socialist system and Soviet state restored.

According to the latest poll conducted by the Levada Center, over 50 percent of Russian citizens believe the collapse of the Soviet Union was bad and could have been avoided. Only 28 percent of the population surveyed feels positive about its collapse, while 16 percent were unable to answer such a complex question.

Source: Poll: Most Russians Prefer Return of Soviet Union and Socialism | Informed Comment

Does that surprise you?

It shouldn’t! You see there was a study here in the US and the ages between 18-29 were polled and they said that they would have no problem living with socialism.

Millennials are simply not that alarmed by the idea of socialism. For instance, a national Reason-Rupe survey found that 53 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds view socialism favorably, compared to only a quarter of Americans over 55. A more recent January YouGov survey found that 43 percent of respondents younger than 30 viewed socialism favorably, compared to 32 percent thinking favorably of capitalism.

It is an interesting stat….the problem, for me, is I am not sure that those polled have any idea just what socialism is and how it effects the country.

Back to Russia…..what are the chances of a return to the days of yore and the days of the USSR? Could Putin make the adjustment?

If communism returns to Russia, just how contentious will the world become?

This is like any other “survey” it will probably change tomorrow….take it with a grain of salt….but it was an interesting survey.

But what does it matter? Most will wait and see what happens then go about bad mouthing someone….I just think ahead not in reverse.

Why Is Bernie So Popular?

For some time now the media has been asking that very same question…..they cannot grasp the reason why someone who fights special interests and refuses PAC money could possibly be getting the crowds he, Bernie, is getting.

The MSM answer to this phenom is that he is the anti-Clinton candidate or that he was just in the right place at the right time for all the anger the voter is having over our political process……there is a wealth of other possible reason for his popularity. All I can say is that if the journalists had been reading IST this whole time I have answered that exact question with a poll that they were too good to pay attention to when it came out……

What poll would that be?

I did a short post back in 2009 that answers their question…….

Source: Many Americans Prefer Socialism | In Saner Thought

Bernie is talking about the issues that the American people care most about….he is not playing the same game as the GOP with their accusations and blame……

But check it out for yourself……

14 things Bernie Sanders has said about socialism – Michael Kruse – POLITICO.

If the American people stay angry and keeps on message and does not fall prey to the attacks….then the possibility of a better government is just a vote away.

The problem is….the longer Clinton is exposed to the public the more her numbers slide…….

Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, took a nosedive in a new Reuters poll released four days before the first Democratic primary debate, the Hill reports. Clinton lost 10 points in just five days, dropping from 51% on Oct. 4 to 41% on Friday. According to Newsweek, Clinton’s loss amounted to gains for Bernie Sanders (28%) and Joe Biden (20%), who has yet to say whether or not he’s even running. The Hill points out Clinton’s slide in the poll comes amid ongoing coverage of her personal email account and Benghazi. But it’s not all bad news for Clinton. Despite dropping 10 points overall last week, her lead over Sanders actually increased over what it was in September, according to Newsweek.

There is a good possibility that her slide is thanks to the news cycle and the fixation on her by the media…..that bids well for Bernie……as long as she is the news story du jour then Bernie’s star will shine.

There are some news sources that paint a better picture of Bernie….the media and the little dictator of the DNC, Wasserman-Shultz and are doing all they can to make Clinton the nominee…..but Bernie is popular where he should not be popular…..

Source: The media’s lying to you about Bernie Sanders: This is why a socialist can win the Fox-loving red states – Salon.com

I wish that I could say that the prospect of Bernie getting the nomination looks good ……….I am not optimistic…….I feel the American people will dumb it down and vote for tweedle dumb or tweedle dumber for prez……sad……we have a chance at some real change and we will blow it….like always.

All said…I still Feel The Bern!

In Saner Thought

"It is the duty of every man, as far as his ability extends, to detect and expose delusion and error"..Thomas Paine

Tag: Socialism