Thank you - drowning in bipartisan hagiographies of a mediocre general who promoted Iraq invasion by shaking a bottle of anthrax at UN...
While another soldier is brutally punished -- now even by solitary confinement.
Drone Whistleblower Daniel Hale Imprisoned In “Communications Management” Unit Designed For Terrorists == effectively in solitary confinement
Already Alexis de Tocqueville was consternated with use of this torture in the US - several centuries ago !!!
Daniel is the first person convicted for an unauthorized disclosure of information to the press to be incarcerated in a CMU, which the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) claims is for terrorists and “high-risk inmates.”
Brutal punishment is for spoiling St. Obama's legacy of “killing only militants”- with truth of mass killings by drones by Obama redefined terminology -- “militant” as any male above 18 year of age
..."the damaging consequences of free trade, out-of-control militarism, increasingly expensive health care, rising student debt, and stagnant wages."
My only concern is Thiel's relentless attack on China -- which simply manufactured what thousands of greedy US CEOs and Boards beg them to do -- even protesting and sabotaging China's wage increases and labor protection laws.
We are, I believe, in stage 4 - hunt for the guilty. I sorta see this like the old question of Who lost China? The answer, of course, is nobody. China was doing its own thing and trying to sort itself out after a long and trying period in their very long history. The question now is who lost the United State's preeminent position? The correct answer, of course, is WE did. In the US today, however, reality is not an option. Any success we have is our doing alone and any failure is due to some nefarious action from one of our "enemies".
I suggested in my response to part 1 that you were looking in the wrong place looking at economics. I will do so again but I will note that President Xi said that one of the major threats to his country was an increasing wealth gap. He didn't rack that up to an economic problem but to a problem of regulation. While the US has a regulation problem, I don't think that it has all that much to do with our decline. I would attribute our decline to (1) our continuance of the ideological wars of the early 20th century - socialism vs capitalism. While the US has wasted much blood and treasure fighting totally unnecessary wars, the real culprit is the inane belief (not backed up by any objective proof) that the pure application of either ideology will work or achieve a desirable end product society. And (2) to our waging war on the rest of the world using our currency and our technological achievements as weapons. Unfortunately, both those weapons can and are being taken away from us. If the world stops using the US$ as the major reserve currency, we will be in serious financial trouble and the Chinese, who already boast the fastest super computer (with no US parts) are also going full speed ahead to make chip forges capable of making the 5-7nm trace based chips. The Chinese with a population three times the US and an all out effort to produce advanced degree holders will take our technological achievements lead away from us as swiftly as we took it away from England when they refused to sell us Jacquard looms. We are foolish to be doing these things.
There are other, better ways to interact with the rest of the world.
> Thiel: "crypto is libertarian and AI is communist"
Bitcoin has been around since 2008 and hasn't left the realm of speculation and fraud. Its descendents also fail to do so, or end up sacrificing decentralization only to reinvent things like distributed data stores and settlement banks.
Also in 2008, artificial neutral networks began outperforming traditional expert systems in handwriting recognition. Since then, deep learning has proven to be a technological breakthrough on par with the internal combustion engine and other world-changing developments.
Libertarianism is a totally bankrupt ideology in the 21st century. So it's no surprise that arch-libertarian Thiel's remedy for America is more hate-spewing demagogues.
This article is right on the money, though. The oligarchs, including Thiel, are the drivers of America's decline. And the solution, according to economist Michael Hudson (a rare realist), is quite clear: eradicate the debts. Only then will the creditors (oligarchs) lose, and everyone else wins.
If you are going to blame the billionaires, why start with the 21st century ones?
American oligarchy came to the fore by the late 19th century and established its rule with that particular public/private partnership, known as the Federal Reserve, where the rewards of banking are privatized, while the risks are socialized. That's the elephant in the room.
Markets need money to circulate, but capitalism sees it as a commodity to mine from society. So ever more has to be added and ever more metastatic methods of storing what has been extracted have to be devised. Which creates an ever more powerful centripetal effect, as positive feedback draws the asset to the center, while negative feedback pushes the debt to the edges. Since the function of the financial system is to circulate value, like the body's circulation system circulates nutrients and energy, the effect is like the heart telling the hands and feet they don't need so much blood and should work harder for what they do get. Which has gone on since the dawn of civilization, as the Ancients devised debt jubilees to reset the process and sustain a functioning society, but our systems of indoctrination don't cover that.
Econ 101 says money is both medium of exchange and store of value, but a medium is dynamic, while a store is static. Blood is a medium, fat is a store. Roads are a medium, parking lots are a store. The hallway is a medium while the hall closet is a store. The average five year old understands the difference, but the economists do as they are told.
Government was private once, but as those in control of it lost sight of its civic role, they were usurped. Private banking is now having its own, "Let them eat cake." moment.
Thank you - drowning in bipartisan hagiographies of a mediocre general who promoted Iraq invasion by shaking a bottle of anthrax at UN...
While another soldier is brutally punished -- now even by solitary confinement.
Drone Whistleblower Daniel Hale Imprisoned In “Communications Management” Unit Designed For Terrorists == effectively in solitary confinement
Already Alexis de Tocqueville was consternated with use of this torture in the US - several centuries ago !!!
Daniel is the first person convicted for an unauthorized disclosure of information to the press to be incarcerated in a CMU, which the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) claims is for terrorists and “high-risk inmates.”
https://thedissenter.org/drone-whistleblower-daniel-hale-sent/
Brutal punishment is for spoiling St. Obama's legacy of “killing only militants”- with truth of mass killings by drones by Obama redefined terminology -- “militant” as any male above 18 year of age
Thank you -- bot parts of this seminal article are OUTSTANDING !! On my third re-reading now ;-))
..."the damaging consequences of free trade, out-of-control militarism, increasingly expensive health care, rising student debt, and stagnant wages."
My only concern is Thiel's relentless attack on China -- which simply manufactured what thousands of greedy US CEOs and Boards beg them to do -- even protesting and sabotaging China's wage increases and labor protection laws.
Enthusiasm
Disillusionment
Panic, hysteria, and overtime
Hunt for the guilty
Punishment of the innocent
Reward of the uninvolved
We are, I believe, in stage 4 - hunt for the guilty. I sorta see this like the old question of Who lost China? The answer, of course, is nobody. China was doing its own thing and trying to sort itself out after a long and trying period in their very long history. The question now is who lost the United State's preeminent position? The correct answer, of course, is WE did. In the US today, however, reality is not an option. Any success we have is our doing alone and any failure is due to some nefarious action from one of our "enemies".
I suggested in my response to part 1 that you were looking in the wrong place looking at economics. I will do so again but I will note that President Xi said that one of the major threats to his country was an increasing wealth gap. He didn't rack that up to an economic problem but to a problem of regulation. While the US has a regulation problem, I don't think that it has all that much to do with our decline. I would attribute our decline to (1) our continuance of the ideological wars of the early 20th century - socialism vs capitalism. While the US has wasted much blood and treasure fighting totally unnecessary wars, the real culprit is the inane belief (not backed up by any objective proof) that the pure application of either ideology will work or achieve a desirable end product society. And (2) to our waging war on the rest of the world using our currency and our technological achievements as weapons. Unfortunately, both those weapons can and are being taken away from us. If the world stops using the US$ as the major reserve currency, we will be in serious financial trouble and the Chinese, who already boast the fastest super computer (with no US parts) are also going full speed ahead to make chip forges capable of making the 5-7nm trace based chips. The Chinese with a population three times the US and an all out effort to produce advanced degree holders will take our technological achievements lead away from us as swiftly as we took it away from England when they refused to sell us Jacquard looms. We are foolish to be doing these things.
There are other, better ways to interact with the rest of the world.
> Thiel: "crypto is libertarian and AI is communist"
Bitcoin has been around since 2008 and hasn't left the realm of speculation and fraud. Its descendents also fail to do so, or end up sacrificing decentralization only to reinvent things like distributed data stores and settlement banks.
Also in 2008, artificial neutral networks began outperforming traditional expert systems in handwriting recognition. Since then, deep learning has proven to be a technological breakthrough on par with the internal combustion engine and other world-changing developments.
Libertarianism is a totally bankrupt ideology in the 21st century. So it's no surprise that arch-libertarian Thiel's remedy for America is more hate-spewing demagogues.
This article is right on the money, though. The oligarchs, including Thiel, are the drivers of America's decline. And the solution, according to economist Michael Hudson (a rare realist), is quite clear: eradicate the debts. Only then will the creditors (oligarchs) lose, and everyone else wins.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt_jubilee
If you are going to blame the billionaires, why start with the 21st century ones?
American oligarchy came to the fore by the late 19th century and established its rule with that particular public/private partnership, known as the Federal Reserve, where the rewards of banking are privatized, while the risks are socialized. That's the elephant in the room.
Markets need money to circulate, but capitalism sees it as a commodity to mine from society. So ever more has to be added and ever more metastatic methods of storing what has been extracted have to be devised. Which creates an ever more powerful centripetal effect, as positive feedback draws the asset to the center, while negative feedback pushes the debt to the edges. Since the function of the financial system is to circulate value, like the body's circulation system circulates nutrients and energy, the effect is like the heart telling the hands and feet they don't need so much blood and should work harder for what they do get. Which has gone on since the dawn of civilization, as the Ancients devised debt jubilees to reset the process and sustain a functioning society, but our systems of indoctrination don't cover that.
Econ 101 says money is both medium of exchange and store of value, but a medium is dynamic, while a store is static. Blood is a medium, fat is a store. Roads are a medium, parking lots are a store. The hallway is a medium while the hall closet is a store. The average five year old understands the difference, but the economists do as they are told.
Government was private once, but as those in control of it lost sight of its civic role, they were usurped. Private banking is now having its own, "Let them eat cake." moment.