global financial crash yay!
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vimothy
yurp
Pretty amusing Taibbi smackdown of the AIG exec whose letter in the NYT I linked to upthread.
padraig (u.s.)
a monkey that will go ape
no, definitely not - I reckon as soon as Zizek gets everyone to sing "The Internationale" the rest of the revolution will just fall into place...
also, a serious question for Vimothy & other economist types (not to typecast you Vim) - & apologies if it's already been discussed ad nauseam upthread, frankly I'm not going to read thru 40 pages to check - ok here it is; is it "better" or "worse" for the world economy that things are so interconnected? or perhaps some of both? really I guess I want to know what advantages & disadvantages such a high level of interconnectivity imparts. of course I'm sure this a rather loaded question that different economists perhaps disagree on but I'm interested in any views more educated than my own...
from my layman's view it seems that it's perhaps a greater risk/greater reward kind of thing?
padraig (u.s.)
a monkey that will go ape
that is indeed quite amusing - Tabibi is always entertaining - but isn't the hype over the AIG bonuses largely misdirected anger?
& just tbc I feel absolutely zero sympathy for assholes like the AIG exec in Tabibi's article - I just reckon that politicians scoring easy points off idiot mid-level Wall Street execs for what is really a drop in the bucket (at least comparatively) has nothing to do with any kind of real solutions to the greater problems.
I really don't understand why you are both being so obtuse about this. It is really fairly obvious that, were the the SWP to become the government of the UK, humanity would be put on the right track to ending all wars and eliminating poverty, which are both, after all, fairly easy things to understand and deal with, that in fact would have been solved ALREADY were it not for the predations of capitalism.
You see, let me explain to you both how this works. First, there is capitalism, and then it starts acting all capitalistically, capitalizing everything, and that everything is capitalized, and...
EDIT: The South Park video is great. I can't decide who is more stupid. You, or them, or me, or the other them...
EDIT 2: Or Ron Paul, or Ru Paul, or my friend Paul, or Saint Paul...
You see, let me explain to you both how this works. First, there is capitalism, and then it starts acting all capitalistically, capitalizing everything, and that everything is capitalized, and...
EDIT: The South Park video is great. I can't decide who is more stupid. You, or them, or me, or the other them...
EDIT 2: Or Ron Paul, or Ru Paul, or my friend Paul, or Saint Paul...
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vimothy
yurp
I believe I have been recuperated.
This is perhaps off-topic, but I think relevant on a deeper level.
Tolstoy writes in the epilogue of War and Peace:
A locomotive is moving. Someone asks why does it move? A muzhik says: the Devil moves it. Another man says the locomotive moves because its wheels turns. A third asserts that the cause of the movement is the smoke blown away by the wind.
The muzhik is irrefutable. In order to refute him, someone would have to prove to him that there is no devil, or another Muzhik would have to explain to him that it is not the devil but a German who moves the locomotive. Only then, by way of contradiction, will they see that they are both wrong. But the one who says that the cause is the turning of the wheels refutes himself, because, if he enters upon the terrain of analysis, he must keep going: he must explain the cause of the turning of the wheels. And until he arrives at the ultimate cause of the locomotive's movement, the steam compressed in the boiler, he will have no right to stop in his search for the cause. The one who explained the movement of the locomotive by the smoke blown back, noticing that the explanation by the wheels did not furnish the cause, took the first symptom that came along and, in his turn, passed it on as the cause.
**
A political-economic system is moving. What is the force that moves it? A hauntological Marxist says: Kapitalism moves it. Another man says that the system moves through the rational pursuit of profit. A third assets that the cause of the movement is moral corruption...
Tolstoy writes in the epilogue of War and Peace:
A locomotive is moving. Someone asks why does it move? A muzhik says: the Devil moves it. Another man says the locomotive moves because its wheels turns. A third asserts that the cause of the movement is the smoke blown away by the wind.
The muzhik is irrefutable. In order to refute him, someone would have to prove to him that there is no devil, or another Muzhik would have to explain to him that it is not the devil but a German who moves the locomotive. Only then, by way of contradiction, will they see that they are both wrong. But the one who says that the cause is the turning of the wheels refutes himself, because, if he enters upon the terrain of analysis, he must keep going: he must explain the cause of the turning of the wheels. And until he arrives at the ultimate cause of the locomotive's movement, the steam compressed in the boiler, he will have no right to stop in his search for the cause. The one who explained the movement of the locomotive by the smoke blown back, noticing that the explanation by the wheels did not furnish the cause, took the first symptom that came along and, in his turn, passed it on as the cause.
**
A political-economic system is moving. What is the force that moves it? A hauntological Marxist says: Kapitalism moves it. Another man says that the system moves through the rational pursuit of profit. A third assets that the cause of the movement is moral corruption...
scottdisco
rip this joint please
back to Christopher Hitchens, i see, Josef.
(to be fair, Peter is also quite a moral man. did anybody see that glorious Newsnight where, in their own way, guests Hitchens brothers, T McNulty and Boris Johnson all stood up for the Rushdie knighthood?
Peter launched into some magnificent spiel about the devaluation of medals these days.)
padraig (u.s.)
a monkey that will go ape
so...following this train of logic backwards (forwards?)...if the SWP were to sell more newspapers (tho do they even still sell newspapers? have they gone digital?), which I presume is how they would take power...then it would bring about a utopia on Earth, is what you're saying. seems reasonable enough, I guess.
there is a Irving Welsh quote that I always associate with British Trots, fairly or not; ""I'm thinking, what can I do, really do for the emancipation of working people in this country, shat by the rich, tied into political inaction by servile reliance on a reactionary, moribund and yet still unelectable unelectable Labour Party?," muses Brian. "The answer is a resounding fuck all. Getting up early to sell a couple of [political pamphlets] in a shopping centre is not my idea of the best way to chill out.... I think I'll stick to drugs to get me through the long, dark night of late capitalism" - lifted from this enjoyable SR review of Trainspotting...
The program is really very straightforward, Padraig. I am STUNNED that I have to explain it to you. It is basically a three part strategy.
1) Continue to sell papers.
2) Take power.
3) Appropriate property, eliminate poverty, and end war.
Are you seriously trying to tell me that any element of this program hasn't been carefully thought through? Because if so, we have words for people like you:
1) Fascist.
2) Imperialist.
3) Stalinist.
4) Running-dog.
5) Lackey.
6) Bourgeois.
7) Useful idiot.
8) Reactionary.
9) Right-winger.
10) Liberal.
EDIT: I note in passing that I am myself morally corrupt.
1) Continue to sell papers.
2) Take power.
3) Appropriate property, eliminate poverty, and end war.
Are you seriously trying to tell me that any element of this program hasn't been carefully thought through? Because if so, we have words for people like you:
1) Fascist.
2) Imperialist.
3) Stalinist.
4) Running-dog.
5) Lackey.
6) Bourgeois.
7) Useful idiot.
8) Reactionary.
9) Right-winger.
10) Liberal.
EDIT: I note in passing that I am myself morally corrupt.
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padraig (u.s.)
a monkey that will go ape
so you can still see SWP guys on the street harassing ppl with actual newspapers...fantastic, really...I dunno, I'm trying to think of an equivalent here in the States. maybe Nation of Islam dudes selling bean pies? (I used to be friendly with some NOI guys in Oakland, we trained at the same dojo - they'd take prayer breaks in the middle of class - I'd see them riding around on my bike & they'd hook up the bean pies - good deal really). there is (was?) a great Maoist bookstore in Berkeley - I used to go there every now & then - quite dank & musty, it was always staffed by these two crusty, aging hippies who were forever arguing about the Cultural Revolution...good times good times...
surely you left out an important part of that strategy as well...the bit where they infiltrate & take over other peoples' social movements for their own (dreadfull dull) purposes...surely this would in fact be the linchpin of any SWP rise to power...
as to the rest what can I say...guilty as charged I reckon...may I add Menshevik to the list...an oldie but a goodie...
scottdisco
rip this joint please
The code for that program is "SWP.avi"
vimothy
yurp
This is an omen of doom if ever there was one: Nouriel Roubini is no longer the most pessimistic person in the room.
crackerjack
Well-known member
So now we have two centre-right leaders holding out for greater banking regulation against the objections of two supposedly centre-left leaders.
How did we get here?
How did we get here?
vimothy
yurp
quomodocunquizing clusterfists
Hey padraig, sorry I've not responded to your questions upthread. I'm pretty busy at the moment. FWIW, I'd say that your instincts are correct.
In other news, check out this sentence (by Thomas Urquart):
Exactly.
Hey padraig, sorry I've not responded to your questions upthread. I'm pretty busy at the moment. FWIW, I'd say that your instincts are correct.
In other news, check out this sentence (by Thomas Urquart):
Another thing there is that fixeth a grievous scandal upon that nation in matter of philargyrie, or love of money, and it is this: There hath been in London, and repairing to it, for these many years together, a knot of Scotish bankers, collybists, or coine-coursers, of traffickers in merchandise to and againe, and of men of other professions, who by hook and crook, fas et nefas, slight and might, (all being as fish their net could catch), having feathered their nests to some purpose, look so idolatrously upon their Dagon of wealth, and so closely, (like the earth’s dull center), hug all unto themselves, that for no respect of vertue, honour, kindred, patriotism, or whatever else, (be it never so recommendable), will they depart from so much as one single peny, whose emission doth not, without any hazard of loss, in a very short time superlucrate beyond all conscience an additionall increase to the heap of that stock which they so much adore; which churlish and tenacious humor hath made many that were not acquainted with any else of that country, to imagine all their compatriots infected with the same leprosie of a wretched peevishness, whereof those quomodocunquizing clusterfists and rapacious varlets have given of late such cannibal-like proofs, by their inhumanity and obdurate carriage towards some, (whose shoe-strings they are not worthy to unty), that were it not that a more able pen than mine will assuredly not faile to jerk them on all sides, in case, by their better demeanour for the future, they endeavour not to wipe off the blot wherewith their native country, by their sordid avarice and miserable baseness, hath been so foully stained, I would at this very instant blaze them out in their names and surnames, notwithstanding the vizard of Presbyterian zeal wherewith they maske themselves, that like so many wolves, foxes, or Athenian Timons, they might in all times coming be debarred the benefit of any honest conversation.
Exactly.
The Financial crisis is ridiculous
One thing which is interesting about the financial crisis is that a) nobody understands it, and b) one of the reason why nobody understands it is there still remains this persistent sense that the economy is somehow something other to humans. It isn't... The economy is us, we are the economy, humans create the economy - the economy is an expression of human activity, and we control the economy (we, humanity) to the extent that we control ourselves, to the degree that we do, and in the ways that we do.
The financial crisis is ridiculous. A logic of speculation on what is literally shit (or at least, metaphorically shit) - bits and pieces, derivatives, very small differentials, producing a crisis of confidence and the following question, now being posed everywhere, by our statesmen and leaders: Backwards or forwards, upwards or downwards, twirling, and twirling... The world is now setting-up trade barriers, in an effort to protect its domestic industries... The sense is that the outgoing logic, everything on the table, everything potentially subject to trade, went too far. Did it go too far?
What is really at stake in this strange opposition "free trade" and "protectionism"? What are "domestic industries" and - if it is true that the economy is finally us, what are "domestic industries" in the context of everyday life? How does the free trade, protectionist dialectic play itself out on a everyday level. How does humanity wish to organize itself - on what principles, based on what values, based on what ethical stance towards the Other, the East, Africa, money...
Anti-capitalism - pure rejection of capitalism, blanket hostility to all forms of capitalism - cannot work. You can't absolutely privilege use value over exchange value, because use is found in exchange - the machine part means nothing to me if I fill-up my bathtub when them, I have to put it out there somehow... But humanity needs to decide what kind of relationship to exchange, and to money, and to the economy, it wants to have. I think this:
1) You cannot organize your life, your economic life, the economy as a whole, humanity as a whole, on the principle of pursuing profit. It is clear that the profit-motive is one motive amongst others, but the raising-it up to the status of King of the Affects is a recipe for insanity, or indeed, greed, which on a fundamental level is perhaps what much of this is about.
2) You cannot "reject greed" - this is one pressure amongst others; the question is: how do you decide to negotiate with. How to face Satan? I think, with your boots on, and calm, and patient and ironic.
3) I am optimistic.
I believe in a race of mutants.
One thing which is interesting about the financial crisis is that a) nobody understands it, and b) one of the reason why nobody understands it is there still remains this persistent sense that the economy is somehow something other to humans. It isn't... The economy is us, we are the economy, humans create the economy - the economy is an expression of human activity, and we control the economy (we, humanity) to the extent that we control ourselves, to the degree that we do, and in the ways that we do.
The financial crisis is ridiculous. A logic of speculation on what is literally shit (or at least, metaphorically shit) - bits and pieces, derivatives, very small differentials, producing a crisis of confidence and the following question, now being posed everywhere, by our statesmen and leaders: Backwards or forwards, upwards or downwards, twirling, and twirling... The world is now setting-up trade barriers, in an effort to protect its domestic industries... The sense is that the outgoing logic, everything on the table, everything potentially subject to trade, went too far. Did it go too far?
What is really at stake in this strange opposition "free trade" and "protectionism"? What are "domestic industries" and - if it is true that the economy is finally us, what are "domestic industries" in the context of everyday life? How does the free trade, protectionist dialectic play itself out on a everyday level. How does humanity wish to organize itself - on what principles, based on what values, based on what ethical stance towards the Other, the East, Africa, money...
Anti-capitalism - pure rejection of capitalism, blanket hostility to all forms of capitalism - cannot work. You can't absolutely privilege use value over exchange value, because use is found in exchange - the machine part means nothing to me if I fill-up my bathtub when them, I have to put it out there somehow... But humanity needs to decide what kind of relationship to exchange, and to money, and to the economy, it wants to have. I think this:
1) You cannot organize your life, your economic life, the economy as a whole, humanity as a whole, on the principle of pursuing profit. It is clear that the profit-motive is one motive amongst others, but the raising-it up to the status of King of the Affects is a recipe for insanity, or indeed, greed, which on a fundamental level is perhaps what much of this is about.
2) You cannot "reject greed" - this is one pressure amongst others; the question is: how do you decide to negotiate with. How to face Satan? I think, with your boots on, and calm, and patient and ironic.
3) I am optimistic.
I believe in a race of mutants.
If protectionism was the final solution... yes
but some kind of protection, or care, is important; otherwise we end up in a state of total psychosis. People need to be controlled, and they need to control themselves. How, why? We need a structured play. Play nicely, children.
but some kind of protection, or care, is important; otherwise we end up in a state of total psychosis. People need to be controlled, and they need to control themselves. How, why? We need a structured play. Play nicely, children.