[Cloud9]

Government by its very nature advantages one group to the disadvantage of other groups. Its laws and structure are specifically designed to protect the status quo. We all want to know what the rules are so we can play the game. Those of us who have played it successfully want to keep our success and shut off the avenues to those down below us who would rise up and take our success away. We pay lip service to competition until we have won the fight.

Progressivism was spawned in the last days of 19th century. The movement was created during a time of relative stability and maturing empires. It was predicated on the notion that there was plenty to be had for all. It was believed that poverty was the result of a mal investment of wealth. It was assumed that man could be perfected and with the proper administration of resources and education that poverty could be banished from the society.

We succeeded. The poorest kid in the ghetto walks around in designer cloths wearing hundred dollar shoes with a cell phone in his pocket.

We created a world where individuals were shielded from the consequences of their poor decisions. If a child was violent, he was simply acting out his emotional disability. If a child was promiscuous, we would shield and protect that child and take care of her progeny. In short, we suspended the laws of nature and refused to allow natural selection to select.

That attitude has permeated the whole society and has given rise to the notion of too big to fail. If the welfare state is there to protect the poorest of us, why should it not be there to protect the richest of us? If a businessman makes a rash decision in his pursuit of personal profit and the consequences of that decision has the potential of wiping him out, then we the society must rush in and make him whole. Failure is not an option.

Individuals, institutions and business enterprises go through a natural life cycle. They are born, they grow up, they grow old and they die. Our refusal to accept that process has created a society of zombies. We now have zombie industries. We have zombie banks and we have zombie governments. Zombies feed off the living. Boys and girls, we have run out of other people’s money. Now we have to conjure it out of thin air. Because of our refusal to accept the laws of nature, we will all become the walking dead. In a finite world with limited resources, there is not enough to go around.

[EnergyUnlimited]

Cloud9,
I cannot agree more.
Hence we are now facing an universal ruin of all.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cloud9', 'B')ecause of our refusal to accept the laws of nature, we will all become the walking dead. In a finite world with limited resources, there is not enough to go around.

[Cloud9]

I hope that you note that the logical outcome of globalization and progressivism is for all of us to be as destitute as the poorest of the world's poor. With the exception of course of those that would position themselves to redistribute our wealth

[EnergyUnlimited]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', 'I') certainly hope folks will take notice of these arguments using Social Darwinism as an excuse to get rid of Progressivism. THAT is the goal of the GOP and other "conservatives", spelled out as clear as day.

[PrestonSturges]

That really cuts to the heart of it - the idea of social darwinism only persists because it's such a popular idea among people with inherited wealth. That and the idea that the guy in the room with the most money is also the smartest guy in the room - an idea that rarely gets contradicted until some colichy trust fund baby decides to try to buy a political office, like this election cycle. Then there's those emperor-has-no-clothes moments when we see they are dishonest, stupid, and incompetent.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PrestonSturges', 'T')hat really cuts to the heart of it - the idea of social darwinism only persists because it's such a popular idea among people with inherited wealth.

[efarmer]

The redistribution of wealth phrase is getting a workout lately. There has never been a government that did not power itself without engaging in vigorous redistribution of wealth. Wealth is a surplus created by natural resources and labor and the products that results from their combination overcoming unity.

Something very critical happened to us in 2008. America very publicly and clearly broke the illusion of money and destroyed it's currency globally. The original one to one relationship of abstract money to real resources, goods, and labor had long been allowed by consensus to be exceeded to allow for future growth to create pools of credit to empower economic expansion. But in 2008, it was obvious that the government and industry people tasked with maintaining the crucial belief in the illusion of abstract money had clearly gone criminal and completely abandoned even the most aggressive justifications to the relationship between money and the real underlying goods.

So now the argument is on globally and nationally. How much of our contrived wealth is real, as much of it surely is, and who owns the real portion and who owns nothing?

In my mind, the great struggle in America right now is that the keepers of the illusion of money, have created much more of it, and are sitting on it. And they wish to make a careful process, of starting with themselves and working down the pyramid from the top, and matching assets rounded up by modest leverage with fiat capital until they run out of assets. At that point the portion of the pyramid below their remapping would therefore be worthless and they would have redefined the illusion sufficient to make it operable again.

I find the Republican and Democratic parties to be corporatist puppets to a very large degree. The Republicans have long been the smaller party, constantly working to bolt on an advantage to allow their smaller numbers to allow electoral wins. I am convinced that in this period they have decided to cater to their historic base, the concentrated wealth, and that they will bolt on the populist cover of the Tea Party that offers them new life and renewal of their original conservative and lofty principles, but they will almost certainly go where the money is. The Republican party is going to form up and allow the currency to be redefined to obtain non-fiction status again if possible, from the top of the pyramid down until they run out of assets.

This is going to cause chaos and and an untenable political force against them, from the bottom up, and I think that it will include the Tea Party acting on their true principles as well. In response to the Democrats pandering in wanton government waste, the Republicans are pandering in conservation of hierarchical wealth to the utter destruction of their nation.

Of course both parties are totally ignorant in reconciling our national pursuit to the real natural wealth available to us long term to be sustainable.

We smashed the illusion of American money, this is an argument about how it gets decided whose chits are worthless. Top down, bottom up, proportional?

A Democrat will of course sell bottom up redefining of money value, but settle for proportional, and take corporate bribes to salt in as much top down as they can possibly get away with. A Republican will give lip service to keeping the incentive alive to preserve the wealth concentration pyramid, but they will be hopelessly led by concentrated wealth to make it a largely top down process because it represents the life blood and base of their political system.

I am convinced at this point that the system is going to reboot and collapse before either party gets to play out their charade and real processes. This is because the rest of the planet earth is not going to be subject to our political whims defining their own realities. A central truth will be borne out.

The United States of America does not rule the world.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('efarmer', ' ')I think that it will include the Tea Party acting on their true principles as well.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('efarmer', '
')We smashed the illusion of American money, this is an argument about how it gets decided whose chits are worthless. Top down, bottom up, proportional?

[efarmer]

The wealth owns the bulk of the land based on the present valuation of abstract money if it is in corporate or trust ownership rather than direct personal ownership Ludi. My opinion is that for tax purposes, the wealthy have put a large portion of their land ownership squarely into the illusion of abstract money because they have had almost complete control and comfort in that realm.

In a chaotic condition, corporate land reverting to the government ownership that preceded private ownership and then being reallocated is quite possible.

At some point the real asset of the United States in arable land is going to be seen as a strategic domain of any reasonable government to attempt to exploit and manage, rather than our past 70 year experiment of providing billions of dollars in defense for foreign petroleum and gas mining, or being a geopolitical cop for multinational corporations. We have leveraged the worlds natural resources by military leverage for 70 years with good, national, and often corporatist intentions, but this is only allowed by our money being the best that can be acquired on a global basis. If and when it is not, we need a new exploit in a very big hurry, and it changes everything in rapid fashion.

[Ludi]

efarmer, are you claiming they are not "really" wealthy because this land somehow falls into the "illusion of money" category? Are you claiming this land is worthless somehow?

[efarmer]

Not at all Ludi. I am suggesting that international corporations who own huge swatch of American farmland could face the same winds that blow as have American petroleum corporations who have their foreign holding nationalized out from under them in return for "just" compensation by host nation.

At some point when the political hacks peter out on spinning whose imaginary money is declared real and who has lost or is to be denied entry into the imaginary money system, it is going to be required that we reconcile national assets with needs.

I believe we will see an OFEC, Organization of Food Exporting Countries in order to barter for the petroleum that we could not simply conquer with force and retrain to be strategic allies, as the Neocon strategy seems to have consisted of.

[PrestonSturges]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('efarmer', ' ')I think that it will include the Tea Party acting on their true principles as well.

[Plantagenet]

duplicate post--deleted

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PrestonSturges', '
')They see everything in terms of "The Enemy Within," which is inevitably poor people and religious minorities.

[PrestonSturges]

Still, win or lose, it will be fun to watch the tea Party fracture after the election, which will be a slow motion train wreck that unfolds over many months.

[efarmer]

I think the Tea Party is a mixed bag with some of that Preston.

You have to realize that many Americans measure their own self worth by the position in society they hold versus black and Hispanics. It is natural that these people would latch onto the Tea Party to attempt to air their notions out in the light of day and see if they fly on a wider basis.

The Tea Party has not had time to sort things out. The Republicans desperately need a new face to put their machine behind and they are rushing their new face into political battle before it is trained or equipped. To me it indicates that they see the Tea Party division as expendable cannon fodder.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('efarmer', 'i')t is going to be required that we reconcile national assets with needs.

[efarmer]

By that I mean that a nation that has defined it's foreign policy by providing military security umbrellas, favored trade status to access it's voracious consumer market, and financial power from it's place as the world reserve currency, is going to have to take stock of what it actually possesses internally in order to prioritize what it offers externally to trade and negotiate.

By needs I mean national needs, and I believe that what we have to trade for meeting them is going to be defined by natural resources and hopefully somewhat by the human capital.

I am not suggesting that the wealthy are going anywhere or that the poor are not going to be joined by many new converts.

I.E. The American Bluff is over, we are going to have to show the cards all the time, and have some damn good hands.