Renewable Revolution

Quote from: Eddie on January 13, 2016, 04:19:40 pm

It has always been my contention that the reason northern European countries have been willing to be so heavily taxed is because they perceive that they get what they're paying for...that the government has, for most of the last half century, lived up to its promises, and a workable, fair social contract has existed.

I have also believed that this has come about, or has been possible largely because the population of those countries is ethnically homogeneous, or has been until fairly recent years.

I contrast that with the way we in the US have not done so well with universal health care, old age pensions, and disability benefits. A lot of that is a real or perceived unfairness that some people pay more than their share and others, who may not pay anything receive more from the social welfare system.

I predicted that this would happen in Sweden and Norway and Finland if they allowed immigration to create a permanent underclass with a different language and different values from the mainstream.

Guess what? I was right. I can't help but feel the slightest bit of schadenfreude, since those Nordic countries have always been so adamant about their lack of racial discrimination and their PC stance on diversity.

Welcome to our world, y'all.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-11-30/sweden-no-apartments-no-jobs-no-shopping-without-gun

No you weren't right. The TRUE welfare queen caused expenses that are undermining the economies of the Western world are NOT the social costs you have been propagandized to believe (along with the cleverly disguised racist notion that only ethnically homogenous populations can "support" a social safety net).

If you ever bother to compute the visible and INVISIBLE (but easily quantifiable) SUBSIDIES to VARIOUS industries (NOT just the fossil fuel industry, though they are one of the BIGGEST recipients of WELFARE from the BIGGEST welfare queen system - the USA corporate giveaways - in the world ), you would then start to see that the social safety net cost numbers are PEANUTS compared with the corporate welfare.

People like you REFUSE to see how ALL government research on almost EVERY invention out there, and the R & D needed to make them technologically and financially SUCCESSFUL, have been HANDED OFF to connected elite corporations for a song, ALWAYS bypassing we-the-people, who paid for all of this, when the time to sell the product to us arrives. 

Frankly, your ideological blinders are fascinating in their sturdiness and amazing ability to discount and discard real expenses that we-the-people are charged for. 


Good luck with your "real world".  Now I understand why MKing frequently tries to ingratiate himself with you. Scratch the surface, and under your apparently Guru inspired sympathy for the downtrodden of the world, you agree with MKing's "real world" Predators 'R' US world view.

AND, you are always looking for material to "fix the facts" in support of your ideology.

I'm going to be prick here, Eddie. I think, though I may be wrong  , that I have finally figured out how you tick. You, at some point in your education, were convinced of the efficacy of game theory in human relations.

Game Theory, as you know, is what the Defense Department AND Wall Street uses to justify excluding absolutely any altruistic behavior in competitive strategies. It was created by an autistic mathematical genius IDIOT who worshipped Spencer and did not understand Darwin.

The problem with game theory in the REAL real world is that it fails to model it properly. By totally excluding altruistic behavior (except as a ploy to sucker the opponent into a position of weakness   ), it is doomed to, not just fail miserably, but to degrade the sine qua non conditions the species engaging in it requires for perpetuation.

YOU DO NOT understand that, Eddie. YOU are sold on Game Theory, as are most Capitalists, Libertarians, Wall Streeters and, of course, the Military Industrial complex.

You ALL are WRONG. But you talk a good game (theory). 

Every time you fine fellows try to finger social safety nets as "welfare queenery" or "someone else's money" (Thatcher greed is good idiocy) OR "bad for the economy", while WILLFULLY ignoring the MASSIVE corporate welfare queenery, you just want brainwashed average Americans to act against their best interests, AND BE HAPPY ABOUT IT (see below).

Darwin would not be amused with Game Theory.

Forget Survival of the Fittest: It Is Kindness That Counts
A psychologist probes how altruism, Darwinism and neurobiology mean that we can succeed by not being cutthroat.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/kindness-emotions-psychology/

The FACT is that we, as a species, WILL NOT SUCCEED if we CONTINUE to exclude altruism (involving ALL LIFE, not just our family!) from our modus vivendi.

Have a nice day.

Yeah, AG. You have me all figured out. Not.

I actually agree with almost everything you said. I understand that we could have a much better safety net here if we didn't **** away all the money on wars and corporate welfare. But, strictly speaking, that doesn't bear here.

I am skeptical about social engineering. I have watched it fail for my whole lifetime here, Now it is failing in Europe. Fact.

I have no interest in game theory. I'm not into competition. I'm not a racist or an elitist. I'm a realist. You, on the other hand, are a dreamer. Nothing wrong with that, other than it seems to be related to your penchant for making personal attacks on me, occasionally.

Because I say that widely disparate cultures have difficulty living together in harmony, no matter what "programs" the statist central planners try to force us to participate in, pisses you off.  I can live with that. Don't get so steamed up.

I get along with MKing to some degree because I understand who he is, what his roots are, and what his values are. I've known a lot of guys like him. I'm not exactly that type, though.

I'm gong to walk a tightrope here and offend both of you.   


Far as AG's arguments, he always looks at the very worst that a Diner offers up, and then attacks that without recognizing the good parts of that Diner.  We are all mixed bags with some good aspects and some bad ones, with some Diners having more good than bad, others more bad than good.

Far as Eddie's arguments, although he has great sympathy for the downtrodden of the world, he does hold similar feelings to Moriarty that if you just have enough gumption and intelligence you can bootstrap yourself up, and socialism/communism is anaethema to him.  He certainly doesn't like anything socialist in the world of medicine or dentistry, that is for sure!

Eddie is similar to Moriarty in his class and income, the type of vacations he takes, cars he buys and so forth.  Much in common there.  They differ in that Eddie has a conscience and understands the problems the majority of the population has, Moriarty willfully ignores it and further belittles those who suffer these problems.

It is unfortunate IMHO that AG will go on the ATTACK on so little provocation on some Diners, I don't think either Eddie or Roamer deserve some of the opprobrium that AG has heaped out on them here.  It is unfortunate also that Eddie buys the portion of Moriarty's arguments that he does, and doesn't hammer down on him harder than he does periodically, but this is a function of class and belief and not too surprising overall.

I write analysis like this so that I am certain to be hated by everybody.   


RE

It seems to me that a factor often overlooked in discussions of "overextended welfare systems" is the matter of priorities. That is apparently why God made lobbyists: to instruct Congress on what their priorities should be, and to whom to direct the boodle extracted from us "tax donkeys and debt serfs."  AG makes it quite clear with his graphs about subsidies. Doesn't seem that we need a great deal of further instruction on how the agencies charged with regulating industry have been captured by those industries via lobbying and the subsequent revolving door.

The most successful lobbying has been done by military-industrial complex, who've elevated the notion of military spending to a sanctified level of received wisdom, in service to that elusive chimera, "national security."  Underwriting the success of the European social welfare state has been the fact that, in the 60 years after the end of World War II,  defense costs for Europe have been born by the American taxpayer. And for the Pacific rim as well, especially Japan.  And our client states get churlish when we ask them to open their wallets and take on more of the burden.  Given the fact that American "military" priorities have been given over to execute political aims concocted in the fever-dreams of neocons, I would expect more rather than fewer conflicts with our vassals in the future along these lines. Israel, of course, is a special case. But then the Zionist apartheid state is always a special case. Lobbyists see to that.

But lets talk about priorities.

http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/defense_spending

Quote

In peace time, the US government used to spend very little on defense, about one percent of GDP. But that changed after World War II when the United States found itself in a global contest against Communism. Ever since, defense spending has never been less than 3.6 percent of GDP. In wartime, of course, the United States spends as much as it can command. In World War II defense spending exceeded 41 percent of GDP in 1945.
At the start of the 20th century, defense spending averaged about one percent of GDP. Then it spiked to 22 percent at the end of World War I. Defense spending in the 1920s ran at about 1 to 2 percent of GDP and in the 1930s, 2 to 3 percent of GDP.
In World War II defense spending peaked at 41 percent of GDP, and then declined to about 10 percent during the height of the Cold War.

Currently, the FSoA spends more on military expenditures than the next 13 countries combined. Such are the costs of empire, and maintaining 1000-plus overseas bases, black sites, etc.



[And none of this counts the so-called "black budget," the off-the-books rathole that finances the Deep State.]

Quote

Defense spending declined in the 1990s after the end of the Cold War and increased in the 2000s during the War on Terror.

Of course it did.


Here's a broad overview:


site: http://www.cbpp.org/research/policy-basics-where-do-our-federal-tax-dollars-go

Here's another way to look at priorities. The U.S. Treasury divides all federal spending into three groups: mandatory spending, discretionary spending and interest on debt. Mandatory and discretionary spending account for more than ninety percent of all federal spending, and pay for all of the government services and programs on which we rely. Debt payment is self-evident. A snapshot:



Here's how military spending dominates all discretionary spending:


By far, the biggest category of discretionary spending is spending on the Pentagon and related military programs.
https://www.nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-budget-101/spending/

And a roll-up:


Since the great majority of federal spending is "mandatory spending," the privatizers and other thieves of the commonweal have set their sights on Social Security, Medicare and the like, and are licking their chops to get their hands on that big wad of expenditure. IMO, the charts reveal that we can actually afford to do any damn thing we want if we can summon the will to reorder our priorities. A prospect about which I am not optimistic.

Now I'm going to wrap this up before RE pastes a "Captain Obvious" sticker on me.

Interesting thread.   


Nobody wants to talk about Game Theory's OBVIOUS failings. I wonder why. 

Excellent points by Surly AND RE.

Howevah, I am just a bit tired of RE always wanting to categorize my rants as "attacks", while deliberately ignoring the passive aggressive style used by Eddie in defending the indefensible. Eddie is GOING ON THE ATTACK every single time he throws out a quote from Thatcher or makes a context free post like he did at the start of this thread.

Normally, I just play dead because I do not possess Surly's wordsmith skills or his patience for putting data together or a rebuttal presentation. But, I'm only human. Selective blindness, for the purpose of defending a 'greed is good' ideology disguised as fiscally responsible practicality, pis ses me off, PERIOD.   

When someone want to crow about "BEING RIGHT", it is customary for an educated gentleman or lady to clearly present all sides of the issue. I did not see that here so I stepped in with, granted      , about as much finesse as YOU, RE, use when you disagree with something or somebody.

RE, I understand your message. I will endeavor to play dead more often when I read fecal coliform filled, greed is good propaganda. Whether you wish to admit it or not, any attack on the, already too threadbare, social safety nets in the countries of the world in general, and the USA in particular, is a frontal attack on common decency and a defense of empathy deficit disordered, predatory elitism/capitalism/fascism, fu ck you buddy-ISM.

Simon and Garfunkel once said something about Christianity in one of their songs. Although that was not their intent, that phrase PEFECTLY fits in regard to a 'greed is good' ideology disguised as fiscally responsible practicality.
Laugh about it, Shout about it, When you've got to choose, Every way you look at it you lose.
They were wrong to mock Christ and Christianity. Heaven DOES hold a place for those who pray.

Howevah, they were right to mock the hypocritical "Christians" who are anything but Christian in thought, word and deed.

The common ground between 'greed is good' ideology disguised as fiscally responsible practicality and fake Christianity is HYPOCRISY used to manipulate, fool, dominate and disingenuously profit from your fellow man.

IOW, it is a VICIOUS AND HARMFUL REJECTON OF THE FOLLOWING!!!!


Have a nice day.