Occupy times square

[JohnRoberts]

I am pleased to see that the occupy times square crowd's message was mainly about new year's eve cheer and then they cleared out early on new years day...

On a more serious note, the "occupy movement" that has been lacking a coherent voice may be coalescing on a somewhat rational theme. A variant on our existing separation of church and state doctrine, they are calling for a separation of business and state, and suggesting the corollary that corporations can not have "person"-like rights.  They also say that money isn't speech, which is somewhat less coherent, but we all oppose buying of government favor.

It seems there has always been factions trying to co-opt the power of the federal government for selfish purposes. Finally here is something that isn't clearly partisan as both republican and democrat seem in bed with crony capitalism in an ugly menage a trois. It still reeks of class warfare, but expands that class of undesirable to large business.

As all too often happens, simple answers are suggested for complex problems. Things like "term limits" upon superficial inspection, sounds like a good idea, but there would also need to term limits for the entire bureaucracy, not just the office holders, since term limits for just them would just shift even more power and influence to quasi-permanent staff. 

I am inclined to agree that many of my complaints about government today involve spacial interests having undue influence over government activity. The common currency for influence in Washington is votes, since legislators highest priority is holding onto office so they can wield the power attached for future terms. These votes can be directly bartered as in the case of unions, or indirectly traded in the form of campaign contributions (money). Every time the law changes trying to restrict how money can be contributed to campaigns to prevent the inherent quid pro quo, new vehicles emerge to finesse their way around the new laws.

But IMO this is where the fight is still... control the money flow to political campaigns and we can reduce the corrosive influence of money over those same politicians. If all elected officials were more directly and singularly beholding to their constituents for being elected they might serve us in "our" best interest better, not in a never ending stream of closed door deals to chase campaign funds.

Of course opinions vary

JR

 

[gemini86]

Colbert brought up a good point while playing denials advocate, why should a corporation like viacom be allowed to pay Colbert or any other talking head to say whatever they want to influence the public, but a corporation like monsano, who doesn't own a broadcast company must sit silently. (someone may have already before him) I couldn't quite answer for myself. I know every large corporation has a powerful lobbyist force but when is regulation fair and when does it become censorship? (Something I'm equally displeased by) it really is a complicated issue that there will be no one perfect solution for. Do we discriminate against certain types of industries or do we start chopping civil liberties, or some of both, or nothing at all?

 

[JohnRoberts]

Speech should never be regulated. Since our very beginning the ability to openly express dissent about our government was considered a powerful force to keep government honest. There are rules about concentration of newspaper and TV station ownership to make it more difficult to squash opposing viewpoints or opinion. Today with the Internet we have effectively made it so pretty much anybody can post their opinion on the sundry blogs.

While I'm sure this is only a personal opinion, I don't see the mainstream news organizations as being remotely neutral about their presentation of political "news", nor is FOX, while I see far more liberal views aired and inspected on FOX than conservative viewpoints on MSNBC, or NBC for that matter. But I don't really care, and neither should government regulators, it is what it is, as long as they are held to a high standard of truth, which for politics, means they can't openly fabricate lies, but there is a lot of wiggle room to shade the truth, and editorialize by omission.

The power of advertising was most apparent in Iowa recently. Prior to the Caucus, Gingrich was polling nationally near the top or maybe second place. By the time they were through chewing him up there on local TV he was near last.

It is a sad statement about our politics that a candidate like Romney may be our best opposition candidate, because he has less skeletons in his closet, that can be used against him, than all the rest. But that too is what is is. I am disappointed but not surprised by how easily the sheeple are influenced by such things, but we are a consumer society, led around by our noses since birth to pay a premium for near identical, brands of gasoline, or toothpaste, by advertising. Why would picking a political candidate be any different.

But the rub, as Ii mentioned before, this commercialization of elections cost money... both sides are swinging a roughly $1B ad budget at each other this year.  We need to see the game for what it is, and try to form our own opinions based on fact we know or can easily find, and if we regulate anything it's the campaign but money, but just imagine the opportunity for abuse by the party in power... duh..

Interesting times. 

Happy new year...

JR

PS: I don't watch much Colbert but it's good that he is teaching the audience some civics through his comedy.

 

[living sounds]

While I'm sure this is only a personal opinion, I don't see the mainstream news organizations as being remotely neutral about their presentation of political "news", nor is FOX, while I see far more liberal views aired and inspected on FOX than conservative viewpoints on MSNBC, or NBC for that matter.

Fox may somehow present more diverse views (I wouldn't know from first-hand experience), but they are certainly lacking in the facts department, and badly so. A recent study

http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/pipa/articles/brunitedstatescanadara/671.php?nid=&id=&pnt=671&lb=

concluded:

"Those who watched Fox News almost daily were significantly more likely than those who never watched it to believe that..." followed by a list of several recent key politcal/economic facts gotten wrong. Fox replied to the study with an ad hominem.

It is a sad statement about our politics that a candidate like Romney may be our best opposition candidate, because he has less skeletons in his closet, that can be used against him, than all the rest. But that too is what is is.

He's also more mainstream in his views than most of the others, has a huge war chest and access to all the special interest money and is psychologically stable and controlled enough not to make obvious errors (like e.g. Perry or Gingrich). But he's just not crazy enough for the radical right and also completely oportunistic. Paul for example has some pretty nutty ideas, but at least he really believes in them.


And with Romney now even the Republicans start to realize how Citizens United and special interest money in general distort their own primaries and elections. John Mccain had some pretty damning things to say, even though he endorsed Romney. Maybe there will come a day when even they have to decide that enough is enough.

 

[JohnRoberts]

While I'm sure this is only a personal opinion, I don't see the mainstream news organizations as being remotely neutral about their presentation of political "news", nor is FOX, while I see far more liberal views aired and inspected on FOX than conservative viewpoints on MSNBC, or NBC for that matter.

Fox may somehow present more diverse views (I wouldn't know from first-hand experience), but they are certainly lacking in the facts department, and badly so. A recent study

http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/pipa/articles/brunitedstatescanadara/671.php?nid=&id=&pnt=671&lb=

concluded:

"Those who watched Fox News almost daily were significantly more likely than those who never watched it to believe that..." followed by a list of several recent key politcal/economic facts gotten wrong. Fox replied to the study with an ad hominem.

I would challenge the wisdom of getting our facts from the other TV networks, too... I sometime find myself talking back to the TV set when people make and repeat openly flawed statements, as "truth".

There is even a paid commercial (not sure paid by whom?) of one of the left leaning cable talking heads, arguing that government does indeed create jobs, just look at all the politician's jobs. --  IMO this may be literally true in some modest fraction, but the vast majority of productive, sustainable, new jobs are created by small business, and government efforts are mostly short term (construction) and have the unintended effect of destroying capital, not creating it.

Government either misunderstands this relationship or chooses to ignore it when they appoint "big" business executives like Jeffery Immelt (GE) to lead the Jobs creation panel. Perhaps this is an attempt to embarrass Immelt into reducing the number of domestic job cuts he has personally been making at GE over the last several years. Kind of odd symbolism to anybody paying attention beyond the superficial window dressing, making a large job cutter the symbolic figurehead for job creation. How dumb do they think we are? 

It is a sad statement about our politics that a candidate like Romney may be our best opposition candidate, because he has less skeletons in his closet, that can be used against him, than all the rest. But that too is what is is.

He's also more mainstream in his views than most of the others, has a huge war chest and access to all the special interest money and is psychologically stable and controlled enough not to make obvious errors (like e.g. Perry or Gingrich). But he's just not crazy enough for the radical right and also completely oportunistic. Paul for example has some pretty nutty ideas, but at least he really believes in them.

Being more mainstream is not a bad thing when choosing a leader for a center-right population.  Obama campaigned in the center, then veered left after he got into office (while there was plenty of evidence about his true leanings to those paying attention). 

Ron Paul has been pretty consistent in his views and many of them are attractive and consistent with my world view (smaller government), I just don't see a way to get from where we are now to his idealistic end point. It just doesn't seem realistic. I hope he doesn't run as a third party candidate as that will help the mainstream candidate most different from him as he splits the sympathetic vote. 

And with Romney now even the Republicans start to realize how Citizens United and special interest money in general distort their own primaries and elections. John Mccain had some pretty damning things to say, even though he endorsed Romney. Maybe there will come a day when even they have to decide that enough is enough.

Most of the population were happy to ignore government, as long as it ignored them and took care of it's real business (border security, etc).  Only in the recent terms has the reach of government grown to the point where it is becoming impossible to ignore  them doing what they now define as their "job". This will be difficult to get government back into their box as defined by the constituion, and there are huge powerful constituencies with lots of money on the line, trying to keep government expanding into the private economy so they can leverage their influence over government into profit in their businesses, or union coffers, or whatever special interest. 

Of course opinions vary.

JR

 

[living sounds]

Obama campaigned in the center, then veered left after he got into office (while there was plenty of evidence about his true leanings to those paying attention). 

This I don't buy. I think Obama campaigned to the left (that's where he got a huge chunk of his votes) and then immediately turned to the right, by inviting Larry Summers and all the other Wall Street friendly people in, by constantly trying to appease Republicans and find "middle ground". There still are no higher actual taxes for the top earners, Guantanamo is still open, people can still be held without a trial ad infinum (this may be one of the worst things long-term), military spending is ever increasing. At the same time he cut the size of government (less government employees over the time of his presidency) and even allowed oil drilling despite campaign promises. The health care bill was a sellout, as was the watered-down Wall-Street bill, and so many other instances where he needlessly and prematurely conceded, at least in my view and many other's.

Republicans however have definitely moved to the right, and they fight their own ideas now - cap and trade, the individual mandate, the automatic defense cuts... There was something else recently I cannot remember right now. But basically, as soon as Obama wants to use one of their ideas - they're against it.

 

[JohnRoberts]

Obama campaigned in the center, then veered left after he got into office (while there was plenty of evidence about his true leanings to those paying attention). 

This I don't buy. I think Obama campaigned to the left (that's where he got a huge chunk of his votes) and then immediately turned to the right, by inviting Larry Summers and all the other Wall Street friendly people in, by constantly trying to appease Republicans and find "middle ground".

As bizarre as it is to debate the US campaign with a non-national. I'll play along for a while.

Politicians always appeal to their base in primaries, but to get elected in the US they must also get the independent voters on their side. Politicians are notorious for making different speeches and even promises to different groups. I heard many of Obama's major campaign speeches and on the surface they were all centrist and not suggestive of his behavior since. (Note: I didn't see his campaign speech in Berlin, perhaps I should have read it.) One thing I am disappointed about in this internet age that there is less critical inspection of public statements. I've half joked that the minute a politician announces for public office they need to be sworn in and all public statements be subject to perjury (both parties, and independents).  Campaign promises should be verbal contracts.   

There still are no higher actual taxes for the top earners,

I bet you hate that...

IMO the problem is not taxation but spending too much.  Raising taxes diverts private capital from constructive private use, into the public feed trough where they pick their own winners and losers (these days mostly losers), but the tax payer is the real loser since we get to pay the bill.

Guantanamo is still open,

GITMO sucks, but there is not a good alternative.  I was disappointed to read that the administration is negotiating a deal to release some high level Taliban combatants in some kind of a power sharing deal in Afghanistan between the Taliban and elected government (while that election was a farce too). I was always a little uncomfortable with the confusion between Alkeida and Taliban as official targets that needed to be eliminated. The former are the real bad guys, while Taliban are just very unpleasant, with very un-western ethics, whose main mistake was co-operating with akeida and allowing them safe haven.  When you decide to pull out, no matter what the situation is on the ground, you need to deal with the reality. 

people can still be held without a trial ad infinum (this may be one of the worst things long-term),

yes that was just recently passed (or renewed) by congress with pretty much no mention by the mainstream news, who these days are mostly apologists for the administration. I am uncomfortable with the expansion of executive branch power, and he is taking even more if no push back is raised against his past increases. 

military spending is ever increasing.

It can't increase, no more money... The military budget is discussing where the cuts will impact most.

At the same time he cut the size of government (less government employees over the time of his presidency)

Huh... You could fool me...

from a quick google

Using the same Bureau of Labor Statistics figures, we found ---clip---- a 129,900 gain, or  6 percent -- from January 2009 to October 2011. That’s based on preliminary numbers posted as of late November.

In fact there have been many government workers cut by state and local governments who can't operate on deficit spending. 

and even allowed oil drilling despite campaign promises.

Perhaps because he couldn't legally stop it or slow it down any more than he already did.

Oil is good for the economy and jobs creation... If he wants to get re-elected, he needs to ignore the hard left and do whatever he can to create jobs.

The health care bill was a sellout, as was the watered-down Wall-Street bill, and so many other instances where he needlessly and prematurely conceded, at least in my view and many other's.

Opinions vary... while they definitely welcomed the crony healthcare power brokers (and lawyers) into the rule making tent, it is still not doing the truly needed work of reducing healthcare costs by promoting competition.

Republicans however have definitely moved to the right, and they fight their own ideas now - cap and trade, the individual mandate, the automatic defense cuts... There was something else recently I cannot remember right now. But basically, as soon as Obama wants to use one of their ideas - they're against it.

Perhaps you are unfamiliar with our form of government, but primary elections are always about appealing to the base, which in the case of the republican primary is always to the right of center. After the primary and a candidate is chosen, the appeal will move more to the center, in an attempt to actually get elected by the independent swing votes. 

It is incredibly difficult to unseat a sitting president, so if obama does no more damage to the economy, it's natural recovery may give him enough of a tail wind to get re-elected. People will often stay with a leader they know, rather than jump to one they don't know, unless there is compelling reason to change.  It is his election to lose, and he seems to be trying with pipeline review delay and other job killers.

Of course I could be wrong..

JR

Edit- You didn't even mention one of my pet peeves, the expansion of the drone program into several different countries. This is another genie that can't be put back into the bottle easily. One of the arguments for the military draft was that spreading the cost in lives lost to war across the entire population would serve as natural negative feedback. The painless, remote control warfare of drone attacks is even more subject to abuse...  /edit 

 

[living sounds]

As bizarre as it is to debate the US campaign with a non-national. I'll play along for a while.

Well, from my point of view we live in a global village now and elections in the US have consequences for the rest of the planet, economically and otherwise. And nobody over here has forgotten Bush yet. But it's your thread, so if you don't want me to comment I'll respect that.

 

[Paultec]

Without meaning to derail this thread on a quantum tangent, but I will ask a serious question...

Have any of you ever considered removing this media circus from your lives?, it clearly makes you all "debate" things that you think are relevant...

Then, ask yourself the question, "When has this charade ever benefited me?".

Welcome to the real Muppet Show.

 

[JohnRoberts]

As bizarre as it is to debate the US campaign with a non-national. I'll play along for a while.

Well, from my point of view we live in a global village now and elections in the US have consequences for the rest of the planet, economically and otherwise. And nobody over here has forgotten Bush yet. But it's your thread, so if you don't want me to comment I'll respect that.

I do not have the right to decide who can and cannot respond. I can only not respond myself.  I just find it difficult sometimes to be lectured about things I actually experience (like domestic election campaigns) by somebody who doesn't (I assume you don't live here so don't experience this first hand).

I tried to open some discussions about something different (the separation of business and state as raised by the occupy movement). I am not looking for a monolog, I already know what I think, or a dialog (i pretty much know what you think), or re-arguing the same old partisan talking points.  It's truly a shame that Obama can't run against Bush again this election, while I suspect they'll try.

Regarding our global village, yes were are economically linked for better and worse as well as share political and military alliances. Our relationship with Europe goes back to before our founding. Right now another election concern (for the incumbent) is the economic linkage with Europe and the expected recession there (due to sovereign debt related austerity.) That recession if it plays out as expected, could further slow our shaky recovery, which will directly affects the election outcome.

But this is the reality of the internet, I only get to talk about what other people think is important. Or not.

JR

PS: I appreciate that you invest more thought into your posts than the simple bomb throwing we used to have here in political threads a few years ago. I should shut up while I'm ahead.  8)

 

[JohnRoberts]

Without meaning to derail this thread on a quantum tangent, but I will ask a serious question...

Have any of you ever considered removing this media circus from your lives?, it clearly makes you all "debate" things that you think are relevant...

Then, ask yourself the question, "When has this charade ever benefited me?".

Welcome to the real Muppet Show.

Apparently many have...  ;D

I try to ignore the circus, but I am interested in knowing how the circus works.

JR

 

[Paultec]

I applaud you for your intrigue...

Government and banks side step this equation...

You'll find the real truth in Rome and Greece....

....i'm such an eaves dropper....

 

[mitsos]

I agree. I haven't lived in the US for the past few years, and since my daughter was born, we don't have TV in the house. I never really liked it anyway.  I think the news should be called "The Bad News," that's all they ever show.  Floods, fires, political fiascoes, and war. 

Campaign promises should be verbal contracts.

agreed 110%.  but what then? The problem then becomes spending too much time and money with televised impeachment hearings to get to the bottom of things.

You'll find the real truth in Rome and Greece....

You'll find even more truth in post-WW2 Greece if you read things other than mainstream news that show the problem as caused by Greek corruption and lavish living in recent years being the cause of "their" economic problem. 

The problem is that this is not a new problem, nor is it easily solved, but at least people are talking about it. 

 

[JohnRoberts]

I agree. I haven't lived in the US for the past few years, and since my daughter was born, we don't have TV in the house. I never really liked it anyway.  I think the news should be called "The Bad News," that's all they ever show.  Floods, fires, political fiascoes, and war. 

Campaign promises should be verbal contracts.

agreed 110%.  but what then? The problem then becomes spending too much time and money with televised impeachment hearings to get to the bottom of things.

The court of public opinion should give them all the trial they need. What is missing is an unbiased media, to hold their feet to the fire, as de facto prosecutors for this public perjury.

You'll find the real truth in Rome and Greece....

You'll find even more truth in post-WW2 Greece if you read things other than mainstream news that show the problem as caused by Greek corruption and lavish living in recent years being the cause of "their" economic problem. 

The problem is that this is not a new problem, nor is it easily solved, but at least people are talking about it.

I won't be so arrogant to preach to  Greeks about Greece, but from a distance it appears the fruits of many years of entitlement largess, and toleration of an underground economy that avoids taxes, has come home to roost. I expect a painful period ahead as (tax) revenue and expenses must be brought into some kind of balance.  Besides Rome, I think we can probably add Ireland to the list who are already into their austerity program for a while. Even the larger and relatively secure EU nations need to watch their spending, as they can't count on growth to bail them out, like it did in the past.

We (the world, or specifically the western world) will start growing again, but we need to correct for the period of false economic expansion, from the derivative based credit ballon, that has since collapsed. Since that past false growth wasn't real, it will be subtracted from the real average growth over the longer term.  Housing in the US is getting close to finally bottoming, but there are still issues due to government meddling into that market.

Good luck this will be a tough period for many.

JR

 

[mitsos]

The court of public opinion should give them all the trial they need. What is missing is an unbiased media, to hold their feet to the fire, as de facto prosecutors for this public perjury.

I think it would still end up a matter of who has the most money for commercials.  But, think about what would happen if one of us lied on their emplyment application.. immediate termination at least, maybe criminal charges in certain cases (medicine, law enforcement).  Seems the only ones immune are the politicians.  Funny thing is I thought this only happened in Brazil (where they actually have an immunity law for elected officials, so that officials who have open cases against them keep running for office so as not to have to answer for those charges, even when it is something like stealing from public coffers.).

I won't be so arrogant to preach to  Greeks about Greece, but from a distance it appears the fruits of many years of entitlement largess, and toleration of an underground economy that avoids taxes, has come home to roost.

Of course, but  remember that it is mostly the same media you can't trust to tell you about elections that is telling you this though.  It is much deeper of course, and I think stems mainly from the marriage of business/state both in Greece and out and goes back to the destruction of the country by the Nazis, and the subsequent rebuilding by the marshall plan, etc.  Greece had huge growth since that time (comparable to japan) but racked up huge debt as well, which tells me that capital was funneled out instead of being to keep debt in check and/or invested in the country.  So while those who are really to blame for the current situation (large/rich greek businessmen and the govts/banks who lent them money) are living it up on their yachts, the ones left to pick up the tab are the everyday workers. The kicker is that instead of really helping the people, merckel and sarkozy make them raise taxes AND cut salaries, which makes it seem like no one studied economics before setting up the Euro.  How big do they want this hole to get?

We (the world, or specifically the western world) will start growing again, but we need to correct for the period of false economic expansion, from the derivative based credit ballon, that has since collapsed. Since that past false growth wasn't real, it will be subtracted from the real average growth over the longer term.  Housing in the US is getting close to finally bottoming, but there are still issues due to government meddling into that market.

I wish the media would spend time researching who illicitly benefitted from situations such as these so they can be brought to justice and return what they stole. 

 

[JohnRoberts]

The court of public opinion should give them all the trial they need. What is missing is an unbiased media, to hold their feet to the fire, as de facto prosecutors for this public perjury.

I think it would still end up a matter of who has the most money for commercials.  But, think about what would happen if one of us lied on their emplyment application.. immediate termination at least, maybe criminal charges in certain cases (medicine, law enforcement).  Seems the only ones immune are the politicians.  Funny thing is I thought this only happened in Brazil (where they actually have an immunity law for elected officials, so that officials who have open cases against them keep running for office so as not to have to answer for those charges, even when it is something like stealing from public coffers.).

Even more bizarre, in the US you go to prison for lying to the government or congress, but they are not held to the same standard when talking to us.

I won't be so arrogant to preach to  Greeks about Greece, but from a distance it appears the fruits of many years of entitlement largess, and toleration of an underground economy that avoids taxes, has come home to roost.

Of course, but  remember that it is mostly the same media you can't trust to tell you about elections that is telling you this though.  It is much deeper of course, and I think stems mainly from the marriage of business/state both in Greece and out and goes back to the destruction of the country by the Nazis, and the subsequent rebuilding by the marshall plan, etc.  Greece had huge growth since that time (comparable to japan) but racked up huge debt as well, which tells me that capital was funneled out instead of being to keep debt in check and/or invested in the country.  So while those who are really to blame for the current situation (large/rich greek businessmen and the govts/banks who lent them money) are living it up on their yachts, the ones left to pick up the tab are the everyday workers. The kicker is that instead of really helping the people, merckel and sarkozy make them raise taxes AND cut salaries, which makes it seem like no one studied economics before setting up the Euro.  How big do they want this hole to get?

Without completely dismissing the history, the sovereign debt crisis is all about borrowing to support deficit spending. The math is pretty simple, if any government spends more that it takes in as taxes that is unsustainable, and lenders stop lending when the prospect of getting paid back looks bad.  The EU monetary union, without complete fiscal union, has distortions some of which benefit a large exporter like Germany. The pending debt situation in italy more than Greece (due to the amount), will raise serious questions about keeping the common currency, and how to make that work. I don't see the EU countries giving this up lightly, so there will be more give and take, but at the end of the day entitlement spending must be paid for from current accounts, not future borrowing our children will have to deal with. 

We (the world, or specifically the western world) will start growing again, but we need to correct for the period of false economic expansion, from the derivative based credit ballon, that has since collapsed. Since that past false growth wasn't real, it will be subtracted from the real average growth over the longer term.  Housing in the US is getting close to finally bottoming, but there are still issues due to government meddling into that market.

I wish the media would spend time researching who illicitly benefitted from situations such as these so they can be brought to justice and return what they stole.

This is common populist theme, but as I've written before, the credit bubble rippled through the entire world economy, and raised all boats, so for a while the entire world benefited from the false prosperity... After that credit bubble burst, there is no way to claw back at every manufacturer who sold some extra gear because of the good times. The ethereal wealth ballon has burst and 99.9% of that fake wealth is long gone. It makes people feel better to focus on a few wealthy bank executives as the villains who received ill deserved gains, but the reality is gains and subsequently losses were spread much more widely though out the economy. If there was a huge pot of money sitting somewhere, that could be clearly identified as illegal profit, I'd lead the charge to recover it. In fact the largest identifiable piles of money that can be tied to this, are from a very small group of investors who saw the bubble for what it was, before everybody else did and made contrary bets. But they did noting illegal, they were just smarter than the supposedly smart guys, who mostly lost their ass when the music stopped.

JR   

 

[r2d2]

Kill the 1% before it kill All Others ?

 

[Paultec]

Kill the 1% before it kill All Others ?

Good luck!

 

[r2d2]

sherwood forest ?
where's robin hood ?

killed by the 1% ?

peace ! ... & war ...

Kill the 1% before it kill All Others ?

Good luck!

 

[JohnRoberts]

I see question marks, but no questions. No emoticons.

i prefer to engage in constructive exchanges of ideas.

I believe words have consequences so don't even like joking about killing people I don't agree with, or don't like.

I understand some are frustrated but individuals have more control over their destiny than they admit.

Of course opinions vary...  Do you need a hug?

JR