Capitalism is...Slavery; Democracy is Not

[bripat9643]

The ever-widening income gap in the US is proof of lack of equal opportunity to bribe Republicans AND Democrats for favorable FIRE sector-friendly tax and spend policy.

Remember the $13 trillion bail out that nearly doubled the richest 2% of Americans share of returns to wealth in less than a single generation?

Why do you cling to the delusion the richest 10,000 Americans earn every dollar?

They use government to socialize cost and privatize profit exactly like all economic elites since the Fall of Man have.

There is no such economic quantity as "returns to wealth." No conservative supports bailouts of any kind. Your hero Obama and the Congressional Dims are the bailout kinds.

 

[Contumacious]

Government is Good - Capitalism Requires Government[/url]

Why?

.

 

[Lars]

Would police and fire protection be public or private?

Who would have power of arrest and confinement?

Based on what little I've read so far, it sounds like a legal system designed to segregate and legally insulate the richest members of society from the majority.

Police and fire protection would be paid for on a voluntary basis for those who wanted such protections.

Powers of Arrest and Confinement would be agreed upon by members of the voluntary society, and written down in legal code. I assume a private police force would, though that would vary from society to society.

I suppose individuals could most certainly insulate themselves from legal codes, or form their legal code with other consenting individuals, regardless of their wealth.

Only citizens capable of paying for private police and fire protection would be protected?

Tom Bell's three areas where polycentric law might develop included gated communities and dispute resolution. With regard to those two areas, the privatization of public safety sounds like a dagger through the heart of equal justice before the law.

There seems to have been a fairly consistent if uneven trend over the last few thousand years from slavery toward equality. Polycentric law would reverse that progression, imho.

I guess unless there was some kind of charity, yea. If you want collective protection you ought to pay for it or assume individual responsibility. And police don't provide protection, only individuals can protect themselves, police do clean-up work and sometimes get it right. Most of the time they arrest prostitutes and drug users and occasionally beat the shit out of a random person.

I am not interested in equality, and "justice" is subjective from society to society, and those differences will be outlined in law.

"There seems to have been a fairly consistent if uneven trend over the last few thousand years from slavery toward equality. Polycentric law would reverse that progression, imho."

How is that?

 

[georgephillip]

Democracy is 6 out of 10 people saying slavery is legal and fine.
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.
Democracy is 51 % of the people telling the other 49% what is normal.

What is plutocracy?

What is the title of the thread?
Capitalism is...Slavery; Democracy is Not
Don't like the answers you get don't start a thread about Democracy being a part of freedom. With a Democracy you're only allowed the freedoms 51% of the people allow you to have.

What is slavery in its starkest form?

"...democracy and capitalism have very different beliefs about the proper distribution of power. One believes in a completely equal distribution of political power, 'one man [sic] one vote,' while the other believes that it is the duty of the economically fit to drive the unfit out of business and into extinction. 'Survival of the fittest' and inequalities in purchasing power are what capitalist efficiency is all about. Individual profit comes first and firms become efficient to be rich.

"To put it in its starkest form, capitalism is perfectly compatible with slavery. Democracy is not."

Capitalism and Democracy Don't Mix Very Well ::: International Endowment for Democracy

 

[georgephillip]

Police and fire protection would be paid for on a voluntary basis for those who wanted such protections.

Powers of Arrest and Confinement would be agreed upon by members of the voluntary society, and written down in legal code. I assume a private police force would, though that would vary from society to society.

I suppose individuals could most certainly insulate themselves from legal codes, or form their legal code with other consenting individuals, regardless of their wealth.

Only citizens capable of paying for private police and fire protection would be protected?

Tom Bell's three areas where polycentric law might develop included gated communities and dispute resolution. With regard to those two areas, the privatization of public safety sounds like a dagger through the heart of equal justice before the law.

There seems to have been a fairly consistent if uneven trend over the last few thousand years from slavery toward equality. Polycentric law would reverse that progression, imho.

I guess unless there was some kind of charity, yea. If you want collective protection you ought to pay for it or assume individual responsibility. And police don't provide protection, only individuals can protect themselves, police do clean-up work and sometimes get it right. Most of the time they arrest prostitutes and drug users and occasionally beat the shit out of a random person.

I am not interested in equality, and "justice" is subjective from society to society, and those differences will be outlined in law.

"There seems to have been a fairly consistent if uneven trend over the last few thousand years from slavery toward equality. Polycentric law would reverse that progression, imho."

How is that?

How much would it cost to assume individual responsibility for an earthquake?

If you're not interested in equality, what's the alternative?

Moral relativism based on the amount of money a person controls?

 

[editec]

Maybe the sheep need to practice a little divide and conquer against the bulls and bears?

In my wildest fantasies when millions of Americans are poised to FLUSH hundreds of Republicans AND Democrats from DC during a single 24 hour November news cycle, it's easy to imagine the RNC and DNC combining to swamp the polls from Cook County to Dade County with authentic voter fraud on a scale never witnessed before in this country.

Flush then FOR WHAT or WHO? Aye, there's the rub.

I'll just remind you that the Gov of Maine got 38% of the vote but 100% of the power granted a governor.

Mostly our political system is not set up to SHARE power, but rather it is set up with a winner take all REGARDLESS of how marginal the win.

European voters would respond with an equally massive general strike if their governments resorted to that level of deception.

Here in the USA, thanks to recent history we now know that the SCOTUS makes that kind of populist event unnecessary, eh?

In this country I'm not sure the smerfs and serfs would have the balls.

Think back to recent history, GP. You absolutely KNOW we don't.

I think you're right about a tipping point rapidly approaching.
The gap between the rich and the rest will soon become a vacuum:
Nature abhors all vacuums, and 200 million private US guns will fill it.

The only thing Americans will do (in the unlikely event of complete social breakdown) is turn on their closer neighbors.

Corporate elites are definitely leaning toward global feudalism.

Here's the thing...NOT all "CORPORATE ELITES" are in on the game. IN fact, mahy of them are as much victimized by the criminal cabals as we are, only they're well heeled enough that it doesn't so dramatically effect their lives as it does most Americans

It, therefore, behooves people like us NOT TO PAINT with too broad a brush.

Leave that kind of guilty by association act to the clueless idiots.

They don't know any better. You do!

My point here is mostly that the criminals have names. Be a bonhomme, citizen.... Stick to your knitting

Whether the sheep follow willingly depends on whether the bulls and bears (pigs?) are unified in their response, in my opinion.

Things TRULY have to get much much worse before people take up arms against a cleverly disguised cronny system that has captured a society's civil authority.

I do not see that happening on a massive scale in this nation.

 

[georgephillip]

Well said as usual, ed, we were on exactly the same page until you had to go and bring up knitting.

When I first began volunteering at a local ADHC center one of the Alzheimer's clients spent nearly thirty minutes trying to teach me how to knit.

Eventually she gave up, patted my shoulder gently and suggested I try gardening; however, you're probably right about my tendency to use a broad brush. I suspect it comes from hanging out with too many small town conservatives during my formative years.

I also suspect many of the economic problems afflicting this country this very minute were ancient when Betsy learned to knit.

What if the accumulation of vast private fortunes was impossible without imposing chattel slavery?
Could that event be the source for the Fall of Man?

There appears to be no shortage of US elites unable to grasp the misery their lifestyles inflict on the majority. Those whose sense of self worth requires fortune and fame are among the biggest offenders, imho.

The criminals and their cabals have ruled this world for thousands of years.
Elected Republicans AND Democrats are their slaves.
Take a political leap of faith in 2012 and FLUSH them from DC by the hundreds.
Worry about WHAT and WHO in 2013.

 

[georgephillip]

Nice try. All who do not participate in the lottery, have no interest. Therefore they are out not a penny.
There is no "system of distribution"....
Once again, you've posted a passage from a blog that supports your "victim" status.
Instead of bitching and moaning about how unfortunate you feel about yourself, DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT......All you've done here is whine about capitalism. Perhaps if you'd elected to participate rather than sit on the sidelines and whine, you'd be in a better position.
Look, the Padre is waiting at the door. He'll punch your ticket for you.
Stop whining and get off your ass and help yourself.

If there's no system of wealth distribution in this country, how do 10,000 "earners" acquire 30% of total US income every year?

You continually fall back on the conservative default position of attacking me for whining while ignoring the issue of rising income inequality in this country and the threat it poses to democracy.

Maybe you should step out of the echo chamber?

Here's how they do it. They produce something that everybody wants. They charge a buck for it. 100 million people think they just have to have it. They're out a buck and the producer has 50 million bucks after manufacturing costs. That's how it's done junior. No slavery, no victims, just people making things that other people want.

And when "They" have their bets in Wall Street's casino go bad "They" call on taxpayers to bail them out.

I don't really give a shit whether slaves like you supported the bail outs or not.

"They" did and "They" will do it again.

That's how it's done, slave.

Now go FLAP your FLAG.

 

[Lars]

Only citizens capable of paying for private police and fire protection would be protected?

Tom Bell's three areas where polycentric law might develop included gated communities and dispute resolution. With regard to those two areas, the privatization of public safety sounds like a dagger through the heart of equal justice before the law.

There seems to have been a fairly consistent if uneven trend over the last few thousand years from slavery toward equality. Polycentric law would reverse that progression, imho.

I guess unless there was some kind of charity, yea. If you want collective protection you ought to pay for it or assume individual responsibility. And police don't provide protection, only individuals can protect themselves, police do clean-up work and sometimes get it right. Most of the time they arrest prostitutes and drug users and occasionally beat the shit out of a random person.

I am not interested in equality, and "justice" is subjective from society to society, and those differences will be outlined in law.

"There seems to have been a fairly consistent if uneven trend over the last few thousand years from slavery toward equality. Polycentric law would reverse that progression, imho."

How is that?

How much would it cost to assume individual responsibility for an earthquake?

If you're not interested in equality, what's the alternative?

Moral relativism based on the amount of money a person controls?

Depends on the earthquake, but if you aren't willing to take responsibility through some kind of insurance, no one has an objective moral obligation to pay your way through some kind of absurd universal house insurance program. All Government insurance does is encourage poor behavior, kind of like FEMA encourages people to build irresponsibly right on the Mississippi River.

Liberty is the alternative, that's what I prefer.

"Moral relativism based on the amount of money a person controls?"
That's contradictory, moral relativism is base don the premise their is no objective overlying morality or moral marker.

 

[westwall]

Here's how they do it. They produce something that everybody wants. They charge a buck for it. 100 million people think they just have to have it. They're out a buck and the producer has 50 million bucks after manufacturing costs. That's how it's done junior. No slavery, no victims, just people making things that other people want.

That's one way they 'do it'. But there are others. Like, for instance, taking crazy speculative risks and leaning on taxpayer money for a bailout when their plans fall apart. Or lobbying congress for mandates to insure themselves as steady supply of customers, even as their products cost more and more, and become worth less and less. Or pushing for unnecessary wars and foreign policy that will enrich military contractors and manipulate overseas markets to favor their interests. Or blackmailing communities to demand special favors and tax breaks. Etc, etc, etc...

There are plenty of success stories to validate the ideal view of capitalism, but there are plenty of examples where people and businesses enrich themselves via corrupt political influence rather than by providing products and services people want. I see nothing wrong with acknowledging that and taking action to stop it.

And universally those same individuals are intimately intertwined with our government. No conservative was ever in favour of a single bailout. that was the liberals and the unionists whining about the jobs they would lose. Conservatives were all for letting them fail and they should have been allowed to fail. Also those involved should be sitting in prison right now.

Our government is more socialist then it is capitalist if you havn't figured it out. I do agree that any "ism" run amock is bad whether it be capitalism, socialism, or nepotism. Capitalism is the most "fair" system that has ever been devised. It is far from perfect but georgie here wishes for less freedom for the masses so that the governement will take care of him cradle to grave because he is too lazy to work.

You are arguing one thing. he's arguing something else.

 

[westwall]

If there's no system of wealth distribution in this country, how do 10,000 "earners" acquire 30% of total US income every year?

You continually fall back on the conservative default position of attacking me for whining while ignoring the issue of rising income inequality in this country and the threat it poses to democracy.

Maybe you should step out of the echo chamber?

Here's how they do it. They produce something that everybody wants. They charge a buck for it. 100 million people think they just have to have it. They're out a buck and the producer has 50 million bucks after manufacturing costs. That's how it's done junior. No slavery, no victims, just people making things that other people want.

And when "They" have their bets in Wall Street's casino go bad "They" call on taxpayers to bail them out.

I don't really give a shit whether slaves like you supported the bail outs or not.

"They" did and "They" will do it again.

That's how it's done, slave.

Now go FLAP your FLAG.

No, that's how crooks do it. And just like a bank robber they should be in prison. Most capitalists agree with that sentiment. You equate crooks with capitalists and that is the disconnect. A crook is a crook. There are far more capitalists then there are crooks.

 

[bigrebnc1775]

What is plutocracy?

What is the title of the thread?
Capitalism is...Slavery; Democracy is Not
Don't like the answers you get don't start a thread about Democracy being a part of freedom. With a Democracy you're only allowed the freedoms 51% of the people allow you to have.

What is slavery in its starkest form?

"...democracy and capitalism have very different beliefs about the proper distribution of power. One believes in a completely equal distribution of political power, 'one man [sic] one vote,' while the other believes that it is the duty of the economically fit to drive the unfit out of business and into extinction. 'Survival of the fittest' and inequalities in purchasing power are what capitalist efficiency is all about. Individual profit comes first and firms become efficient to be rich.

"To put it in its starkest form, capitalism is perfectly compatible with slavery. Democracy is not."

Capitalism and Democracy Don't Mix Very Well ::: International Endowment for Democracy

You don't get it do you? You fail to understand what a Democracy is.

In a Democracy the majotiry of the people could say it is illegal your children george and anyone with the name geroge must change it or face a fine and imprisonment. It would be legal and there would be nothing you could do about it.

 

[georgephillip]

Here's how they do it. They produce something that everybody wants. They charge a buck for it. 100 million people think they just have to have it. They're out a buck and the producer has 50 million bucks after manufacturing costs. That's how it's done junior. No slavery, no victims, just people making things that other people want.

And when "They" have their bets in Wall Street's casino go bad "They" call on taxpayers to bail them out.

I don't really give a shit whether slaves like you supported the bail outs or not.

"They" did and "They" will do it again.

That's how it's done, slave.

Now go FLAP your FLAG.

No, that's how crooks do it. And just like a bank robber they should be in prison. Most capitalists agree with that sentiment. You equate crooks with capitalists and that is the disconnect. A crook is a crook. There are far more capitalists then there are crooks.

For the last five hundred years the only thing worse for any politician than getting caught doing business with organized crime has been losing control of the revenue streams produced by organized criminal activity.

For the last five thousand years all governments have enabled the biggest crooks in their society by socializing cost and privatizing profit. Today the most successful capitalists are the biggest crooks in existence.

Just look at Wall Street and Pentagon contractors if you're confused.

 

[westwall]

And when "They" have their bets in Wall Street's casino go bad "They" call on taxpayers to bail them out.

I don't really give a shit whether slaves like you supported the bail outs or not.

"They" did and "They" will do it again.

That's how it's done, slave.

Now go FLAP your FLAG.

No, that's how crooks do it. And just like a bank robber they should be in prison. Most capitalists agree with that sentiment. You equate crooks with capitalists and that is the disconnect. A crook is a crook. There are far more capitalists then there are crooks.

For the last five hundred years the only thing worse for any politician than getting caught doing business with organized crime has been losing control of the revenue streams produced by organized criminal activity.

For the last five thousand years all governments have enabled the biggest crooks in their society by socializing cost and privatizing profit. Today the most successful capitalists are the biggest crooks in existence.

Just look at Wall Street and Pentagon contractors if you're confused.

You're partly correct. Kings are merely the best crooks that came along and survived for the most part. Roman history is replete with cases where the ruling elite controlled everything till the wheels came off and for whatever reason were not able to appease the mob and rioting broke out with the concurrent killing of the ruling elite who couldn't get away.

That's called human existence. It has no political orientation, it just is. Criminals exist and you need to realise that. Also, criminals exist in all social strata, the unfortunate thing is the real masters at the art also protect themselves by buying the government. You are railing at a system, but the system is not the fault, it is the people who take advantage of the system who are at fault.

You can yell and scream all you want but till you figure out how to make relevent comments the majority will continue to ignore you. You aren't telling us anything we don't allready know. We just don't care enough to do anything about it. Why should i go out and get killed to make a political statement that no one will care about?

You need to wake up and figure out a way to work within the system. Eventually there will be a revolution and after thousands have died the next band of crooks will take over and the cycle will begin again. Nothing you write will alter that one iota.

 

[Truthmatters]

Pareto principle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


The original observation was in connection with population and wealth Pareto noticed that 80% of Italy's land was owned by 20% of the population.[4] He then carried out surveys on a variety of other countries and found to his surprise that a similar distribution applied.

Because of the scale-invariant nature of the power law relationship, the relationship applies also to subsets of the income range. Even if we take the ten wealthiest individuals in the world, we see that the top three (Warren Buffett, Carlos Slim Helú, and Bill Gates) own as much as the next seven put together.[5]

A chart that gave the inequality a very visible and comprehensible form, the so-called 'champagne glass' effect,[6] was contained in the 1992 United Nations Development Program Report, which showed the distribution of global income to be very uneven, with the richest 20% of the world's population controlling 82.7% of the world's income.[7]

 

[dblack]

No conservative was ever in favour of a single bailout.

Demonstrably untrue. Unless you're defining conservative as 'someone who isn't in favor of a bailout'. History reports differently.

You are arguing one thing. he's arguing something else.

Yeah, I get that. And if it's not already obvious I don't agree with the thread title or the article linked to in the OP. Capitalism isn't slavery. Neither is Democracy.

However, this:

For the last five hundred years the only thing worse for any politician than getting caught doing business with organized crime has been losing control of the revenue streams produced by organized criminal activity.

For the last five thousand years all governments have enabled the biggest crooks in their society by socializing cost and privatizing profit. Today the most successful capitalists are the biggest crooks in existence.

Just look at Wall Street and Pentagon contractors if you're confused.

makes perfect sense to me, and I'm not going to dispute it out of some knee-jerk left/right mentality.

In my opinion, the problem isn't Capitalism, or Democracy (or Socialism or Monarchy, for that matter). The problem is a particular insidious form of Corporatism where government ceases to be an impartial arbiter of justice, and instead assumes the primary function of distributing power - divvying up the spoils - to the various interest groups and power blocs that make up society. Corporatism can exist with or without Capitalism, with our without Democracy. Under such a system, any successful endeavor depends on the ability to navigate, and most often manipulate, the political/economic power structure. There is virtually no difference between political and economic power, as the battle for control over labor and resources is fully integrated with the compulsive force of the state.

In my opinion, the 'money masters' have been looking for a reliable replacement for slavery since it went 'out of fashion'. In Corporatism, they've found it. The system exists to keep as many of us as possible in a state of dependency for our every need. It is designed to keep us in debt and dependent on the corporate state for our very health and sustenance, and in fear of running afoul of ever more oppressive and intrusive laws.

 

[GHook93]

Confused about the fundamental conflicts regarding proper distribution of power?

"Listen, for example, to liberal economist Lester Thurow who writes that 'democracy and capitalism have very different beliefs about the proper distribution of power.

"'One believes in a completely equal distribution of political power, "one man [sic] one vote," while the other believes that it is the duty of the economically fit to drive the unfit out of business and into extinction. "Survival of the fittest" and inequalities in purchasing power are what capitalist efficiency is all about.

"'Individual profit comes first and firms become efficient to be rich. To put it in its starkest form, capitalism is perfectly compatible with slavery. Democracy is not.'"

Capitalism and Democracy Don't Mix Very Well ::: International Endowment for Democracy

Democracy in it's purest form is MOB RULE...

You have very little concept of human nature and incentive, do you?

What do you expect T, the guy fully admits that he worked for minimum wage his entire life and now is retired living under the poverty line on social security. A lazy scumbag like that has no choice but to be a communist. Misery love company!

 

[Steelplate]

You don't get it do you? You fail to understand what a Democracy is.

In a Democracy the majotiry of the people could say it is illegal your children george and anyone with the name geroge must change it or face a fine and imprisonment. It would be legal and there would be nothing you could do about it.

That's bullshit propaganda... and you know it.

By the same token... in a Capitalist Society... the Board of Directors could trademark the name George(and other popular names) and people who want to name their kid George would have to pay them a sizable sum for the license. Those who can't afford the license, are stuck with Poindexter.

You see how ridiculous you guys get with this stuff?... No matter what you guys see... you see an agenda to turn America into a Communist Country.... that's what you see, and that's ALL you see.

 

[georgephillip]

Confused about the fundamental conflicts regarding proper distribution of power?

"Listen, for example, to liberal economist Lester Thurow who writes that 'democracy and capitalism have very different beliefs about the proper distribution of power.

"'One believes in a completely equal distribution of political power, "one man [sic] one vote," while the other believes that it is the duty of the economically fit to drive the unfit out of business and into extinction. "Survival of the fittest" and inequalities in purchasing power are what capitalist efficiency is all about.

"'Individual profit comes first and firms become efficient to be rich. To put it in its starkest form, capitalism is perfectly compatible with slavery. Democracy is not.'"

Capitalism and Democracy Don't Mix Very Well ::: International Endowment for Democracy

Democracy in it's purest form is MOB RULE...

You have very little concept of human nature and incentive, do you?

What do you expect T, the guy fully admits that he worked for minimum wage his entire life and now is retired living under the poverty line on social security. A lazy scumbag like that has no choice but to be a communist. Misery love company!

Are you ignorant enough to believe you've been fully paid for all your labor?

Cultural inheritance is the knowledge, technique and processes that have been handed down incrementally to humanity since the beginning of our civilization. Some believe the cultural inheritance of society is the prime factor of production along with land, labor and capital.

Obviously capitalists and soul-dead shit stains like you prefer the golden rule.

Social Credit - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[georgephillip]

You don't get it do you? You fail to understand what a Democracy is.

In a Democracy the majotiry of the people could say it is illegal your children george and anyone with the name geroge must change it or face a fine and imprisonment. It would be legal and there would be nothing you could do about it.

That's bullshit propaganda... and you know it.

By the same token... in a Capitalist Society... the Board of Directors could trademark the name George(and other popular names) and people who want to name their kid George would have to pay them a sizable sum for the license. Those who can't afford the license, are stuck with Poindexter.

You see how ridiculous you guys get with this stuff?... No matter what you guys see... you see an agenda to turn America into a Communist Country.... that's what you see, and that's ALL you see.

That's all they are allowed to see.
Twenty years after the wall came tumbling down.
I'm not sure the rich could savage this economy badly enough for many conservatives to care.
But I'm guessing more than a few of us will live long enough to find out.