Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

[mesyn191]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

Actually, I did not change any of your words when I quoted you.

I didn't say you changed any, you either aren't reading or understand what I'm saying.

You said explicitly that people should be thinking a certain way, your way, and you specifically labelled "people like cbr and dropthatcash," as "everything that is wrong with this country."

Damn right I did and for good reason. And I explained why I thought that way so what is your point? That holding contempt for people with bad opinions/ideas/facts is bad? Its certainly possible to respect your right to your opinion and freedom of speech and all but I don't have to respect you or your opinion or what you say, particularly when it is harmful to others.

You still show great contempt for opinions contrary to your own and your style of post is a bit of a departure for the decorum of the News forum.

This isn't rant n' rave but this is also isn't a academic forum either, its you know, the news section.

It is clear that you wish to engage in some discussion, but it is also clear that you have no intention of convincing anyone but yourself of anything.

You appear to have missed the quotes, links, and/or huge images I've been posting to back up some of what I'm saying not necessarily to you but all throughout this thread which back up some of what I've been saying to you anyways. If trying to back up what you say with out side and well sourced info. isn't trying to prove things to others than what is?

Perhaps you weren't paying attention on any of EJ's posts.

Really? So why does he talk about all the corruption in the gov. and big finance enabling the FIRE economy do you think?

and they have pushed it onto people that used to know better--the poor, the middle class, and the rich (i.e. everyone).

What if people still know better but can't maintain their standard of living without the debt? We're talking about stuff like homes, health care, and schooling BTW. If you want to argue that some idiots who used their homes as an ATM and bought the jet skis and 60" plasma TV's are the root of all our problems than all I have to say is we have a fundamental disagreement that is probably unresolvable because some but not everyone did that.

Government willingly and gleefully aided FIRE almost the entire time for the past several decades, slowly funneling in new customers (forced insurance, encouraged subprime mortgages, etc.) and widening the doors for FIRE's machinery to go through (any number of unbalanced deregulations can be cited as an example)

OK so we agree that gov. aided and abetted the FIRE economy but you still hold a lack of savers (IOW the public at large) at fault? If the gov. hadn't passed the Gramm, Leach, Blilely Act or had pressed the credit agencies to not be such sell outs or hadn't kept interest rates low for so long or any one of a number of other things the bubble clearly couldn't have gotten anywhere near as big as it did or maybe even have formed. Yet you're STILL gonna blame the lack of savers (again IOW the public at large)? None of them got to make any of those choices nor were they informed of the import of them. Totally unreasonable to blame them.

FIRE is a beast, but can you blame them for doing what every industry does or tries to do, which is acquire wealth and power for itself?

Yes. The government and banks are supposed to safeguard their citizens and/or investors from white collar crime and/or losses. For decades they did just that so where are you getting the idea that they aren't supposed to?

We the people have powers over our own lives

Really? You have little to no power over your life and almost no political power either. Voting D or R is a waste of time, 2 sides of the same pro corporation coin at this point.

We can begin by collectively practicing fiscal discipline--imagine the impact on FIRE if everyone actually started behaving as if their future mattered.

We don't need fiscal discipline. What we need is to tax the super rich and mega corps more, stop spending so much ******* money on the military, and institute means testing for entitlements. That would fix nearly all of our budget problems even in the long term.

We can also put the screws to elected officials and tell them to reject corporate influence in favor of popular influence and to end their naked aid to corporations, especially FIRE.

No D or R politician who has a chance of being elected will do what you want unfortunately. They're all corportist pro robber baron shitlords at this point.

To address your main point, yes, we can place blame people for their mistakes and their behavior.

Even when they were lied to and or mis informed about what was right or wrong by the very agencies that make and enforce the rules? So if a cop tells you its OK to do something and then later says its wrong and puts you in prison for that same thing you're totally cool with that right? Even if it costs you your home, job, car, etc?

The poor and middle class have had the efficacy of as much say as anyone in the political arena for quite some time (and collectively more power since most people are poor or middle class).

Reeeeaaallly? So how come so few of them were against the bubble, or even knew there was one back in 2005/6 while EJ was harping on about it back in what 2002 or 3? How come when so many of them wrote in to their politicians to vote against the bailouts those same politicians went and voted for them anyways? I mean sure one mans vote counts the same as anyone else's and there are more poor and middle class by far than wealthy or outright rich, but they're being misled or flat out lied to by the very same institutions they trust to inform them and/or protect them and have been for years if not decades.

As a side note, the term 'cognitive dissonance' is a popular term among 9/11 conspiracy theorists. This is just FYI.

Oh where is that decorum of the News forum you were talking about to be found in this half assed ad hom? Also fuck the 9/11 Truthers. FYI.

[Ghent12]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

It appears that you just have an unnecessarily abrasive way of posting your thoughts, so I will drop any discussion on that subject.

I think the root of this discussion is this:

What if people still know better but can't maintain their standard of living without the debt? We're talking about stuff like homes, health care, and schooling BTW. If you want to argue that some idiots who used their homes as an ATM and bought the jet skis and 60" plasma TV's are the root of all our problems than all I have to say is we have a fundamental disagreement that is probably unresolvable because some but not everyone did that.

The answer to your first question is this: their standard of living must drop. That's really the end of the story. If you can't maintain your standard of living without going into debt, then you can't really maintain your standard of living at all sans some "lucky break." Refusal to acknowledge that fact, reliance upon uncertain increases in income or reductions in expenses, and old fashioned financial irresponsibility all lead down the same road--debt surfdom. People who took risks (increased their debt to maintain an existing quality of life) on assumptions that never materialized (increased income, promotions, etc.) are responsible for the risks they took.

OK so we agree that gov. aided and abetted the FIRE economy but you still hold a lack of savers (IOW the public at large) at fault? If the gov. hadn't passed the Gramm, Leach, Blilely Act or had pressed the credit agencies to not be such sell outs or hadn't kept interest rates low for so long or any one of a number of other things the bubble clearly couldn't have gotten anywhere near as big as it did or maybe even have formed. Yet you're STILL gonna blame the lack of savers (again IOW the public at large)? None of them got to make any of those choices nor were they informed of the import of them. Totally unreasonable to blame them.

In answer to your questions here, yes. People are responsible for their decisions, even when they make decisions with incomplete information (which is to say, essentially every decision). In cases of outright fraud, then clearly that is a matter of legal importance and the fraudsters should also be held responsible. However, blame is not a zero-sum game, and often times people who were defrauded share at least a small part in the blame (call it a "gullibility tax" or a "we-can't-possibly-protect-every-idiot tax" if you will). It doesn't matter if people at large don't control interest rates or certain laws directly; they still can control how they behave within their environment. We don't need a discussion on the power of market forces to understand the power of the masses, do we?

Yes. The government and banks are supposed to safeguard their citizens and/or investors from white collar crime and/or losses. For decades they did just that so where are you getting the idea that they aren't supposed to?


Really? You have little to no power over your life and almost no political power either. Voting D or R is a waste of time, 2 sides of the same pro corporation coin at this point.

The purpose of government is a philosophical discussion and it is not set in stone that governments should protect a given citizen from his own or her own actions. It is, however, a good idea to stop bona-fide crime such as fraud, but Justice is elusive when corruption is high such as now. That is another reason for people to look after themselves instead of relying on the government or others to take care of them.

As for me, yes, I have power over my own life. There are only a few laws of nature and subsequent logical consequences from those laws that must be upheld in order to have life. Essentially you need food, water, and shelter to live, so generally you need some type of occupation that will give you the means to provide for those. Almost everything else is up in the air.


You are right that voting D or R is a waste of time usually; that is why I don't usually vote. Ron Paul and fewer than half a dozen other people have earned my vote on any type of ballot for any type of election. The thing is that everyone has this power. People vote D or R generally out of ignorance (in my opinion), like the anti-war crowd that voted for the current president, or out of fear (again, in my opinion), like the people who voted for the current president because he was "better" than Senator McCain.

We don't need fiscal discipline. What we need is to tax the super rich and mega corps more, stop spending so much ******* money on the military, and institute means testing for entitlements. That would fix nearly all of our budget problems even in the long term.

We don't need fiscal discipline?! I'll assume that you are speaking in rhetorical flourish and don't actually mean what you just said.

Explain to me why we should tax "the super rich and mega corps more?" I can certainly understand reining in the welfare/warfare state, but what justification can you offer for your tax proposal?

Even when they were lied to and or mis informed about what was right or wrong by the very agencies that make and enforce the rules? So if a cop tells you its OK to do something and then later says its wrong and puts you in prison for that same thing you're totally cool with that right? Even if it costs you your home, job, car, etc?

Yes, you are still responsible for your own actions. I don't understand why this is such a hard concept for people. In this case, the agencies that switch rules can also be held to account, but that doesn't mean people should be off the hook for their own reckless decisions even if approved by some rating agency or other agenda-driven entity (read: any and all entities).

Let me put it another way: if a street-corner grifter says that the Rolex he's selling is a genuine watch and you buy it, only to later find out that it is a fake, are you in any way responsible for your decision to buy?

Reeeeaaallly? So how come so few of them were against the bubble, or even knew there was one back in 2005/6 while EJ was harping on about it back in what 2002 or 3? How come when so many of them wrote in to their politicians to vote against the bailouts those same politicians went and voted for them anyways? I mean sure one mans vote counts the same as anyone else's and there are more poor and middle class by far than wealthy or outright rich, but they're being misled or flat out lied to by the very same institutions they trust to inform them and/or protect them and have been for years if not decades.

There are two main issues of misunderstanding here: first is the use of the word efficacy and second is the misconception that various agencies have actually protected the public at large "for years if not decades." Efficacy in the sense I used the word meant the capacity to produce an effect. Every vote is equal in our political system, so any given poor person has the same political impact as any given rich person in absolute terms. On the second issue, of your misconception about the "protection" offered by reputable agencies--where were they during any previous bubble, such as the stock bubble or the gold bubble?

There are two main reasons why people must look out for themselves and become largely not reliant upon outside entities: trusted reputations can be outright wrong or they can become usurped. People do often volunteer themselves down any path offered by any source of influence, including off of cliffs (metaphorically speaking for the most part), and this is where you can call a spade a spade. An ignorant person that becomes injured by their own ignorance is at least partially at fault for that.

Oh where is that decorum of the News forum you were talking about to be found in this half assed ad hom? Also fuck the 9/11 Truthers. FYI.

I apologize. I did not think you would take offense to half-assed ad hominems since you use so many full-assed ones.

[mesyn191]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

I think the root of this discussion is this:The answer to your first question is this: their standard of living must drop.

Assuming there is no way to fix the wage or out of control prices on certain things (ie. healthcare, housing, energy, schooling, etc.) I'd agree. I believe the overly high prices on these things could though, or at the very least greatly mitigated.

People who took risks (increased their debt to maintain an existing quality of life) on assumptions that never materialized (increased income, promotions, etc.) are responsible for the risks they took.

Except they were told by those in a position of authority and expertise (who were also supposed to be measuring and weighing risk remember) that they weren't really taking a risk. "Housing always goes up remember" was what they were told. Hell even the Fed chairperson at the time, Greenspan, was pushing crap loans.

In answer to your questions here, yes. People are responsible for their decisions, even when they make decisions with incomplete information (which is to say, essentially every decision).

Except that isn't the case here. People at large did not make these decisions, they were made for them by their politicians who lied to them at the time these things were being voted on or enacted.

However, blame is not a zero-sum game, and often times people who were defrauded share at least a small part in the blame (call it a "gullibility tax" or a "we-can't-possibly-protect-every-idiot tax" if you will).

Ah, good old blame the victim. If you want to play that game then fine, but you better fuck over the banks good and hard before you even come after one home owner since the banks take the lion's share of the blame. Seeing as how after all they were supposed to determine credit worthiness, document everything properly, and protect their investors.

It doesn't matter if people at large don't control interest rates or certain laws directly; they still can control how they behave within their environment.

Their control is limited at very very best if the government and corporations at large collude to impoverish them. I've already pointed out on the first page the wages for most dual income earner families for instance, now factor in the cost for housing, health insurance, schooling, etc. All these people's money is being sucked away, they can't afford to save, even if they rent. And what do you expect them to do, go without health insurance? Not go to college? Live in a van down by the river? What?

This is middle class and poor we're talking about here BTW, the overwhelming majority of the population of the US you'd be writing off as a "solution" to live in utter destitution while the rich get richer. Does that sound like the greatest nation on earth to live in to you? Or even the nation with the best opportunity? It sure sounds like a goddamn 3rd world shit hole to me.

The purpose of government is a philosophical discussion and it is not set in stone that governments should protect a given citizen from his own or her own actions.

If they're being misled it sure is the gov's job to protect them, fraud is not legal, well unless you're a very big bank it seems.

As for me, yes, I have power over my own life. ... Essentially you need food, water, and shelter to live, so generally you need some type of occupation that will give you the means to provide for those.

Whahah you're kidding me right? All of those things can be taken from you if you piss off the right person or break the wrong law or just don't pay your taxes, so your power is very limited at best. Even if you are truly able to provide your own bare necessities that is simply not at all possible for the vast majority of the US since they live in cities and not rural areas.

You are right that voting D or R is a waste of time usually; that is why I don't usually vote.... The thing is that everyone has this power.

So you acknowledge there isn't anyone viable for people to vote for if they actually wanted some real reform? That is a sign of a broken political system, not power.

We don't need fiscal discipline?! I'll assume that you are speaking in rhetorical flourish and don't actually mean what you just said.

Keynesian economics says in a recession, assuming the gov. has the cash or interest rate room to work with, that the gov. should spend to make up the difference and support the economy. Now our gov. has zero interest rate room to play with but if they taxed the mega corporations and rich more while reforming entitlements and spent less on the military they'd have plenty of money for New Deal -esque programs. Which is what we really need to revamp our energy and road/transportation infrastructure at the very least.

Explain to me why we should tax "the super rich and mega corps more?" I can certainly understand reining in the welfare/warfare state, but what justification can you offer for your tax proposal?

Its simple, they don't pay their fair share. Effective tax rate for the very rich is something like 17% since most of their wealth comes from capital gains and not wages, and is thus taxed differently. Raise it up to at the very least what it was during Regan's years (around 30% IIRC), or better yet Truman's (waaay higher).

The mega corporations are also not paying their fair share. In some cases effectively paying _zero_ taxes or even getting PAID by the government, like GE did recently. Tax them so that their effective tax rate works out to be the current peak regulatory rate of around 40%, which BTW is a tax on profits and not principal, so they'll still make plenty of billions in profit.

Yes, you are still responsible for your own actions.

Woooow, really? You think its perfectly fine to be lied to by people in authority and then punished for doing what they say? W. T. F.

Let me put it another way: if a street-corner grifter says that the Rolex he's selling is a genuine watch and you buy it, only to later find out that it is a fake, are you in any way responsible for your decision to buy?

Bad analogy. The street corner grifter is not in a position of authority. The cop one I gave was dead on.

first is the use of the word efficacy and second is the misconception that various agencies have actually protected the public at large "for years if not decades."

Wait what? So you don't believe it was the media's job to act as a public watchdog and inform the people about the gov's and corporation's failures? And you don't believe organizations like the OCC or SEC were created to police the credit companies or Wall St? Just what did you think they were supposed to do anyways?

Every vote is equal in our political system, so any given poor person has the same political impact as any given rich person in absolute terms.

BS. A rich man can spend money on a given cause or give it away directly to a politician of choice to help him win, and money is effectively speech in this country. The wants and needs of the middle class and poor get drowned out in multi million dollar PR campaigns funded by the rich or the mega corporations to sway or distort opinions and facts. So while a rich or poor man's vote is counted the same way the rich have far far more political impact.

On the second issue, of your misconception about the "protection" offered by reputable agencies--where were they during any previous bubble, such as the stock bubble or the gold bubble?

They were hamstrung or sabotaged by the politicians. During the S&L blow up you had people like Black who were still in a position to do real reform. This time around all the people like him were slowly forced out of power or told quite plainly to shut up, or if they were low enough on the totem pole, just plain ignored.

There are two main reasons why people must look out for themselves and become largely not reliant upon outside entities: trusted reputations can be outright wrong or they can become usurped.

This is great in theory but in the real world it doesn't work out. At some point everyone is stuck relying on someone else, be it a politician or the guy who keeps the city's water flowing.

An ignorant person that becomes injured by their own ignorance is at least partially at fault for that.

What if they're kept ignorant and kept from informing themselves?

I apologize. I did not think you would take offense to half-assed ad hominems since you use so many full-assed ones.

I wasn't offended, I was pointing out what a hypocrite you were, and I think I'm being pretty blunt in my posting. You sure seemed to have picked up on that.

[Chris Coles]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

Perhaps it is a good moment for the both of you to take a moment of time out to calm down. Certainly you have highlighted that this is a very polarised debate and certainly I could add my own thoughts that differ from each of you by degree, one way or another. But no one finds a workable solution by attacking the others around them; the answers will only stem from a reasoned and polite debate.

[Thailandnotes]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

Perhaps it is a good moment for the both of you to take a moment of time out to calm down. Certainly you have highlighted that this is a very polarised debate and certainly I could add my own thoughts that differ from each of you by degree, one way or another. But no one finds a workable solution by attacking the others around them; the answers will only stem from a reasoned and polite debate.

"Bill Moyers’ retirement from weekly television last year may not last long. He has received preliminary approval for a major grant to return to PBS with a half-hour show with the working title “Something Different With Bill Moyers.”

[mesyn191]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

But no one finds a workable solution by attacking the others around them; the answers will only stem from a reasoned and polite debate.

There really isn't much debate to be had these days though. People like Ghent, cbr, etc. are ideological purists. If its not libertarian its crap in their eyes. I don't expect to change their minds, but I hope others learn something, though I doubt it.

[Thailandnotes]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

The scary thing is how more and more people are pinning their hopes on impasse-then collapse, as if we'll be resetting a router and society will simply adjust to a twenty percent pay cut. JK sited David Brook's alarming conclusion to his blog with Gail Collins. America is more vulnerable than I thought, not to a doomer collapse, but to twenty years of insanity.

[WildspitzE]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

Except this is basically corporate propaganda that you and others are repeating. The problem isn't that they're being paid too much, its that private non union workers are getting paid to little and under compensated. This is trivial for anyone to see. You need only note the cost of insurance, housing, and goods vs. wages and/or productivity. Also its not the same for job for more money.* (edit: that is gov. workers obviously, but still, people are bitching about them too and their "overcompensation" is similar) The anecdotes on the previous page or what you see on say Fox news of the lazy over paid union/gov. worker are just that, anecdotes.

So, the government is better suited at determining the cost of labor in an economy? Given how it derives its funds to pay those salaries I'm not so sure. Especially since its spending drives its funding requirements, which we know mostly comes from inflationary sources that lead to higher costs.

[dcarrigg]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

So, the government is better suited at determining the cost of labor in an economy? Given how it derives its funds to pay those salaries I'm not so sure. Especially since its spending drives its funding requirements, which we know mostly comes from inflationary sources that lead to higher costs.

I've given quite a bit of thought to just the issue you bring up. It seems to me that the private sector does not do better or worse at determining the cost of labor in the economy, but it does do it differently. It also seems that given a sense of community, the private sector behaves more like the public sector, and that without it, it behaves very differently. The private sector can also react much more quickly to booms and busts - it's fatter in the fat years, and leaner in the lean.

There was a time not all that long ago that established social norms created a situation that an adult (to be accurate, usually a male adult) working full time would be able to feed and shelter a couple of people regardless of occupation. Now prices for labor at the top are astronomically high, with seemingly no upper bound. On the other side of the coin, there is a waning sense of community between managers/owners and the lower-rung workers.

It seems that there was a time, maybe not all that long ago, that the boss would give the employee a bonus when they got married, or a raise when they had kids - that they generally wanted the community to be successful. The worker likely (but not necessarily) worked harder because of it. Lots of modern tech companies still offer perks for this reason.

This is not that everything was rosy, but losing that sense of community has led to wage bifurcation - superstars and disposable labor. Superstars need a few really smart, professional people around to make them look good. They'll pay for some of them, but not too many. It seems that now there is never enough money for superstars and never too little for 'throw-away' labor.

Gov personnel rules tend to put an upper and lower bound on pay - meaning that people with a high school education or less make out much better in the public sector, but people with a professional degree (MBA, JD, etc) generally make out worse, and there are no superstars (top bound of pay is $400,000, which is less than half of what it was 40 years ago in real terms - before civil service was widespread, the old patronage system actually had pay that moved up and down with revenue - more akin to the private sector today).

So in most of the public sector, a janitor who has been around for 30 years can quite possibly make more than a fresh MBA, which will never happen in the private sector. This is why .gov has been outsourcing cleaning, cooking, etc. jobs to the private sector where it can. The savings are substantial. Of course, the old janitor never stole computers and probably instead coached little league, but I digress.

In life, as in economics, there are trade-offs in everything.

[chr5648]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

There was a time not all that long ago that established social norms created a situation that an adult (to be accurate, usually a male adult) working full time would be able to feed and shelter a couple of people regardless of occupation. Now prices for labor at the top are astronomically high, with seemingly no upper bound. On the other side of the coin, there is a waning sense of community between managers/owners and the lower-rung workers.

I wonder what destroyed those social norms?

This should make for a good laugh.

[Ghent12]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

There really isn't much debate to be had these days though. People like Ghent, cbr, etc. are ideological purists. If its not libertarian its crap in their eyes. I don't expect to change their minds, but I hope others learn something, though I doubt it.

Your sense of a lack of debate is almost entirely due to you reading what you want to read instead of what is posted, apparently. I will not take the time to go line-by-line and correct every instance where you did not interpret what I had said in the way it was intended and worded (i.e. in the 'discussion' about decisions being made, I was rather clearly referring to debt engorgement while you interpreted it to mean the decision to change interest rates), but if you were to take the time to read your own quote-forest you would realize that you addressed precious little of what I was talking about.

In aggregate, the style and content of your posts have combined to produce very little meaningful insight into this topic. You are speaking past me and therefore I recommend that you never address anything I post until you are willing to actually address what I post and not some strawman or some comment that was never made. If you want to keep making statements against strawmen that were never stated or to bring up inane points that are in separate philosophical discussions (i.e. "the media's job," which has different meanings in different political, social, and economic philosophies), then you will find yourself in an echo chamber.

[dcarrigg]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

I wonder what destroyed those social norms?

This should make for a good laugh.

Eh, I'll feed the troll this time. I don't know if there will be any laughs, though.

I don't think that anything destroyed social norms. They just changed over time for many reasons. It's impossible to be exhaustive, but I'll give a quick narrative.

After WWII it seems that there was a brief time where promoting maximum employment, production, and purchasing power was a national priority. The Employment Act of 1946 stated this outright. It was also a bad time for farmers, but employees and owners generally did well.

The expansion to suburbia, accelerated by the interstate system, probably laid some of the groundwork for a reduction in geographically-based community interaction. For a long time, the United States was more dominant than it is now. There was less competition. There were less resource pressures to deal with. It is not that I am saying that things were better for everyone, but economically, it was a relatively good time in the U.S.

International competition already heated up by the time the 70s stagflation period started. The Great Society and Vietnam caused social strife. There began to be more labor supply with a wider array of skills in the world market - much of it is in areas where the cost and/or standard of living is lower. This naturally leads to lower wages and a race for capital investment. The fall of the Soviet Union opened up just about any markets that remained closed to competition.

The rest of the recent history is well documented throughout this site. We now have an economy reliant on domestic debt expansion and foreign good consumption. More than 20% of it is FIRE with an additional equal portion of consumption reliant on credit. Credit - even though taking it is generally a bad personal decision - has become a societal norm in a way that it was not previously. Debt service functions as an additional tax on disposable income.

Capital is now instantly created, mobile, deregulated, and to a remarkable extent, malleable. Labor is not. Companies are formed more quickly, are bought more quickly, and go under more quickly than they once were. The pace has quickened. Committing to anything for 30 years is no longer the norm.

I'm not making a value judgement here. I did not intend to do so in the last post either. I am just explaining a situation where trade-offs have occurred. They did not have to occur this way, but they did. Things are different. Here we are.

[mesyn191]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

So, the government is better suited at determining the cost of labor in an economy?

Not in general no. Its just a fluke that the gov. is actually paying people closer to what they should be getting to maintain a middle class standard of living.

[mesyn191]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

(i.e. in the 'discussion' about decisions being made, I was rather clearly referring to debt engorgement while you interpreted it to mean the decision to change interest rates)

Nope that wasn't how I read it. Rates were something I tossed out as one example of what the gov. could've done differently that would've had a huge impact on bubble's creation and size in response as a way to illustrate that people in general really had very little control or effect on the situation. The problem wasn't all the homes sold for stupid high prices, though bad as that was, it pales in comparison to all the artificial debt instruments that Wall St. and the banks were able to generate with it.

In aggregate, the style and content of your posts have combined to produce very little meaningful insight into this topic.

Funny I feel the same way towards your posts.

You are speaking past me and therefore I recommend that you never address anything I post until you are willing to actually address what I post and not some strawman or some comment that was never made.

The problem isn't I'm jumping at strawmen of my own creation, its that we one or more fundamental disagreements about what was the cause of the bubble, how it was handled, etc. This is where ideology steps in and screws everything up. FWIW I don't really have one myself per se. I'm not a D or a R or a L or whatever, etc. I'd go with what ever works best.

If you want to keep making statements against strawmen that were never stated or to bring up inane points that are in separate philosophical discussions (i.e. "the media's job," which has different meanings in different political, social, and economic philosophies)

See what I mean? We can't even agree on the media's role used to be or is now in our society, and this is one of those things that supposedly everyone knows. Discussion is impossible.

[Andreuccio]

Re: Proposal to Strip Corporations of Constitutional Rights Gains Momentum in Wisconsin

Total pay for one of Detroit's 199 Librarians? $67,000 a year. Average total compensation for a Barns and Noble floor employee; $24,000 !

Total pay for Wolfgang Puck? Over $12,000,000 a year. Average pay for a cook at McDonald's: a little over minimum wage!

They both make food, right?

Makes about as much sense as comparing a librarian to a Barnes and Noble floor employee.