Global Revolution!

[ralis]

 

 

I see ralis still hasnt used the link I gave him and discovered that the definition of propaganda contains both yin and yang...

 

 

I really don't need to be lectured by you as to the definition of propaganda. My remarks are in regards to the insidious use of propaganda produced by the right wing and it's media shills to create division and therefor create a mass movement of weak minded fools! Given the fact that I know a few things about propaganda, here is a You Tube link (starting at 1 min.) of Dr. Joseph Goebbels, Minister of Propaganda for the Third Reich and his use of so called "good propaganda." That was a bald faced lie that led to the destruction of Europe. Linked here is the death toll in Europe for WWII which includes U.S. military.

 

http://www.angelfire.com/ct/ww2europe/stats.html

 

The main problem I see with your narrative is that you want to be absolutely right and never wrong.

 

Edited October 16, 2011 by ralis

[Encephalon]

A few examples of political propaganda that can lead to hate and division. I believe it was Rush Limbaugh that instituted hate speech against liberals.

 

 

 

 

Herman Cain believes liberals are out to destroy this country.

 

Yep, Rush was probably the first hate-monger to go national, although there were plenty of psychopathic radio preachers on rural christian radio stations throughout the country that were saying things like this before he hit the scene. After Rush, and Clinton's election, they multiplied like mosquitoes and became the Rush wannabes.

 

An enduring question has been whether Rush really believes what he says. His intellectual and educational background, which does not exist beyond high school, seems to be consistent with what psychologist Bob Altemeyer described as RWA personality type, or right-wing authoritarian. Since Rush is plenty happy making big bucks as a corporate propagandist he's never personally exercised his authoritarian impulses the way an elected official can from office, but he seems happy enough to champion their goals while normalizing their corporate and state malfeasance. It's unlikely for people to play the role of corporate mouthpiece without internalizing the data they swim in daily.

 

I just finished John Dean's "Conservatives without Conscience" and he utilized Altemeyer's work a great deal. Clearly, from a Taoist perspective, balance of ideas, and what we refer to as "a respect for the opinions of mankind" have no place in right-wing authoritatian thought, or of any stripe.

Edited October 16, 2011 by Encephalon

[JustARandomPanda]

Excerpts to encourage you to consider buying/reading this book, Crisis Economics.

 

 

Take the most obvious, tired explanation of the crisis: greed. When the financial levees first broke [my note: he's talking about 2008], countless commentators claimed that Wall Street's unbridled lust for money had wrecked the financial system. That implausibly assumed that the financiers of 2007 were greedier than the Gordon Gekkos of a generation ago. In fact, what made a difference was not the magnitude of greed but new structures of incentives and compensation that channeled greed in new and dangerous directions. Over the previous two decades, bankers and traders had increasingly been rewarded with bonuses tied to short-term profits, giving them an incentive to take excessive risks, leverage up their investments, and bet the entire bank on astonishingly reckless investment strategies.

 

That's precisely what happened in the recent crisis: financial wizards set up "insurance" in the form of credit default swaps (see Chapter 5). These swaps yielded staggering profits and bonuses in good times but set firms like AIG up for catastrophic collapse when the sailing got rough. Yes, traders were greedy - and arrogant and foolish too - but that alone would not have triggered the financial equivalent of a nuclear meltdown had the bonus system not become the dominant kind of compensation in the financial sector.

 

 

It was my impression one reason this kind of compensation was championed by its proponents is that it is very merit-based. That is, those who deliver superior profits deserve the rewards of their superior performance. Greed need not even be invoked for what the author is about to highlight in the passages to come.

 

 

 

In theory, the firms' shareholders should have put an end to these practices. In reality, corporate governance failed long before the entire financial system did: conflicts of interest were rife among the boards of directors charged with minding the store. This was nothing new, but the financial system that emerged in the late twentieth-century was particularly opaque and impenetrable. In the process, the interest of shareholders and the interests of bankers, traders, and managers who were the agents of those shareholders diverged.

 

Regulators could have stepped into the breach. But like so many eras of booms gone bust, the late twentieth century was an era of free-market fundamentalism. Regulators and supervisors in the United States-not only the Federal Reserve but dozens of other federal and state authorities - were asleep at the wheel, unaware or willfully ignorant of how financial institutions were circumventing everything from capital adequacy requirements to accounting regulations. In fact, many of these regulators actively encouraged the financial innovations that would become the catalysts for the crisis: interest-only mortgages, negative amortization loans, teaser rates, andoption adjustable-rate mortgages, along with the increasingly esoteric securities that derived value from those toxic assets. Many of the same conditions prevailed in the United Kingdom.

 

Markets know best and never fail: this was the conventional wisdom in Washington, London, and elsewhere in the English-speaking world. Alan Greenspan, perhaps the most visible advocate for letting the financial system regulate itself, claimed that markets would sort things out, warning in 1997 that when it came to financial innovation, "we should be quite cautious in enacting legislation or creating regulations that unneccessarily fetter market development." Greenspan even defended the rise of subprime lending, claiming in 2005 that "lenders are now able to efficiently judge the risk posed by individual applicants and to price that risk appropriately."

 

In retrospect, these remarks seem laughable. In fact, financial innovations rendered irrelevant the question of whether lenders bothered to assess risk: rather than make loans and hold them on their books, banks and other financial institutions made loans regardless of the applicants creditworthiness, then proceeded to funnel the loans - mortgages, auto loans, student loans, and even credit card debt - to Wall Street, where they turned into increasingly complex and esoteric securities and sold around the world to credulous investors incapable of assessing the risk inherent in the original loans. Securitization was the name of the game,and banks and other Wall Street firms made hefty fees while passing along the risk to unwitting investors.

 

The various ratings agencies - Fitch, Moody's, Standard & Poor's - could have and should have prevented this from happening. But they too made hefty fees from securitization and were more than happy to help turn toxic loans into gold-plated securities that generated risk-free returns. Far from criticizing this cozy relationship, Greenspan and other cheerleaders of financial innovation blessed it.

 

Greenspan also performed a key action in adopting easy-money policies, slashing the rate at which the Federal Reserve lent money to the larger financial system. From early 2001 through the middle of 2003, Greenspan cut the Fed funds rate by some 5.5 percent (or in banking parlance, by 550 basis points). He then kept rates low for too long a time, an easy-money policy that would help foster the unsustainable credit and housing boom. But the story is even more complicated. After all, the Fed raised rates in 2004-6, yet long-term interest rates and fixed mortgage rates barely moved, monetary tightening had no traction. As it turned out, there were plenty of sources of easy money overseas. Over the course of the past decade, China, Japan and Germany had accumulated massive stockpiles of savings they lent back to the United States, financing budget deficits and excessive borrowing by everyone from households to corporations. In effect, China lent Americans the rope they used to hang themselves. Again, nothing changes, and yet everything is different.

 

The onset of the crisis was likewise a mixture of old and new. Housing prices eventually leveled off, and in late 2006 and early 2007 the first nonbank mortgage lenders specializing in subprime loans failed after growing defaults among borrowers. Then in June 2007 two highly leveraged hedge funds managed by Bear Stearns, which had invested in securities backed by subprime mortgages, collapsed, triggering a flight from all securities associated with the subprime market. As awareness mounted that exposure to subprime mortgages was ubiquitous throughout the global financial system, panic spread.

 

As with so many panics, uncertainty drove decisions. Thanks to securitization, credit risk was transferred from banks to investment banks and then to other financial institutions and investors around the world. But by the time the crisis hit, this process was incomplete: banks kept some of the toxic assets on their own balance sheets or else stowed them in "structured investment vehicles" and "conduits" that did not show up on official balance sheets until the crisis forced banks to acknowledge their losses.

 

 

to be continued...

[JustARandomPanda]

Continued...

 

 

News that venerable banks had transferred only part of the risk to outside investors - holding the rest on their own balance sheets - sowed more panic. The dawning realization that every major and minor player throughout the global financial system had some exposure to toxic assets sparked a full-blown crisis. No one knew who was holding toxic assets or how much. A financial system that thrived on opacity and complexity began to unravel.

 

It had the makings of a classic panic, complete with bank runs, except that the "banks" this time weren't only commercial banks like the ones besieged during the Great Depression. These "banks" were also nonbank mortgage lenders, conduits, structured investment vehicles, monoline insurers, money market funds, hedge funds, investment banks, and other entities. These institutions, which belonged to the new shadow banking system (discussed in greater detail in Chapter 3), had one thing in common: they borrowed from the "depositors" (for example, purchasers of commercial paper) who lent these entities money on a short-term basis. The shadow banks then sank this money into illiquid, risky, long-term securities, mortgage-backed securities, CDOs, and other assets with mysterious acronyms. When panic struck this system, the "depositors" who had made the short-term loans demanded their money back or refused to renew loans, forcing the shadow banking system to liquidate these complex, difficult-to-value securities at fire-sale prices.

 

That process gathered speed in 2008. After more than three hundred non-bank mortgage lenders collapsed, shadow banking beasts born of regulatory evasion - structured investment vehicles, conduits, and other off-balance-sheet entities, which were also holding highly toxic mortgage-backed securities and other, even more esoteric forms of structured finance - began to collapse as well. The next step was the swift demise of Wall Street's major investment banks, which perished as their lifeblood- very short-term loans known as "overnight repo financing" - dried up. Bear Stearns was first, followed later that year by Lehman Brothers. Merill Lynch would have collapsed too, had it not been sold to Bank of America. Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley dodged the bullet by turning themselves into bank holding companies, gaining access to lender-of-last-resort support from the Federal Reserve in exchange for submitting to greater regulatory oversight.

 

The run on the shadow banking system continued with a run on the $4 trillion money-market fund industry. Thanks to exposure to Lehman Brothers, one of these supposedly safe funds, the Reserve Primary Fund, "broke the buck," meaning that a dollar invested with it was no longer worth a dollar. This was a fateful step: investors panicked and began to stage a run on the trillions of dollars of assets in those funds. To avoid a financial meltdown, the government was forced to provide a blanket guarantee - the equivalent of deposit insurance - to all existing money-market funds.

 

The panic did not end there. The demise of the shadow banking system continued with the collapse of the market for still more exotic instruments (ARSs, TOBs, VRDOs, and a whole alphabet soup's worth of securities) used by state and local governments to finance their spending. These markets disintegrated when the imperiled investment banks pulled the plug on these instruments, sending interest rates for borrowers - even safe state and local governments - through the roof.

 

Then it was the hedge funds' turn. The financial distress of the primary brokers - who financed hedge funds with overnight funds - and the losses that many of these funds experienced in the market turmoil of 2008 led to the equivalent of a bank run on hedge funds, forcing hundreds to close shop and others to reduce their leverage and their assets, driving prices of a host of exotic assets still lower.

 

This process reached new and dangerous levels in late summer and fall of 2008, when the entire shadow banking system suffered a massive run on its assets. Lehman Brothers crumpled, AIG teetered on the brink, and the Federal Reserve did what had eventually been done in the Great Depression: it became the lender of last resort and gave deposit insurance to a new generation of banks. Nonetheless, the fallout from Lehman's collapse and the resulting financial meltdown in the fall of 2008 led global credit and money markets to seize up. The humdrum business of global imports and exports threatened to collapse, as companies could no longer secure the financing necessary to move goods from one country to another.

 

By the end of the year, the crisis had spread far beyond the United States, reverberating through China and Japan to Ireland and Iceland. The reasons went beyond the general collapse of credit; there were underlying troubles in economies around the world. Many of the same problems that bedeviled the United States - a real estate bubble, overleveraged banks, excessive current account deficits, and overvalued currencies - were present throughout the world. In Europe banks had made high-risk loans in Romania, Hungary, Ukraine, and the Baltic states. Indeed, many economies in "emerging Europe", the twenty-plus countries formerly under Soviet control, were very fragile, being heavily dependent on overvalued currencies and high current account deficits for their continued prosperity.

 

No one was immune to the crisis. As the recession in the United States worsened, China, Japan, and other countries heavily dependent on exporting manufactured goods saw their economies crumble; likewise, commodity exporters in the Middle East and elsewhere saw demand collapse. In time, economies as diverse as Latvia and Dubai fell victim to what was quickly becoming a financial pandemic. As credit dried up in the United States, it evaporated overseas too, and as economies contracted, manufacturing giants like China and commodity exporters like Russia caught the virus.

 

Toward the end of 2008 the pandemic worsened and the history of long-forgotten crises became increasingly relevant for explaining what was happening. So too did the writings of economists who had languished in obscurity for many years. John Maynard Keynes came back into vogue, as did Joseph Schumpeter, Hyman Minsky, Irving Fisher, and even Karl Marx. Their sudden reappearance was significant, if portentous: all had made their mark studying how capitalism could collapse in crisis. They may have drawn wildly different conclusions as to why and how, much less what to do about it, but the fact that their names were uttered with a quiet respect was a sign that a sea change was at hand.

[JustARandomPanda]

Because the above posts have (imo) bearing on both the Tea Party movement and the Occupy Wall Street movement I offer the following link to the full show. Sometimes it's helpful to revisit history.

 

 

Nova: Inside the Meltdown

[strawdog65]

Great thread...

 

Has anyone seen this?

 

 

All I can say is wow!

Edited October 16, 2011 by SereneBlue
embedded vid. Thanks, Strawdog!

[ralis]

[JustARandomPanda]

Second verse, same as the first.

 

 

How Greece's Financial Crisis Hurts the U.S.

 

a snippet....

 

NEARY: And who is it that Greece and these other countries have borrowed from?

 

WESSEL: That's the key problem. The governments have borrowed heavily from European banks and the banks aren't strong enough to swallow the losses that would occur if they were honest about how much – how little the bonds on their books are worth. So right now there's this big controversy about a French Belgian bank called Dexia which is having trouble to keep itself afloat because markets are so suspicious about the amount of Greek and Italian debts on its books.

 

And this is a bank which happens to do a lot of business with U.S. cities and towns, and so it's starting to have ripple effects there. I think the fear is that other big banks in Europe could be swept up in this and already economists expect a recession in Europe. If banks get deeper into trouble, the ripple waves could turn into something like an economic tidal wave.

 

NEARY: Do American banks hold a lot of Greek, or Italian or Spanish debt?

 

WESSEL: No, and we can be grateful for that, but financial viruses move very quickly around the world these days. I mean, it was just three years ago when Lehman Brothers, a relative small investment bank, collapsed and that set off the worst global financial crises in most of our lifetimes

 

On Capitol Hill yesterday, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told members of Congress that what he called a disorderly default by Greece could lead to runs or stresses on European banks, which he said would create a huge amount of financial turmoil that would have, what he said, was a substantial impact - not only on our financial system, but our economy. And that's one of the reasons why the stock market has been so weak lately.

 

 

Note: Dexia was nationalized last week

 

This marks the demise of a bank that just a few months ago, in European Union stress tests, was rated the 12th safest bank in the E.U.

[Seth Ananda]

Hi, Day two of occupy Melbourne yesterday, I spent most of the Day suspending a very large Tarp to serve as a sleeping shelter. It was a fulfilling day.

 

Again, most of the white 'middle class' people I saw there [and note there were plenty of 'lower class' people as well] were speaking out against War, {not asking for a share of the loot as Twinner keeps ignorantly postulating}

Asking for Aborigional Land rights, not more loot.

Asking for more constraints on Corporations, not more loot.

Demanding Total Accountability for Corrupt politicians in cahoots with corporate Interests, not larger pay.

Asking for proper Enviromental protection laws, not a fatter pay check...

 

Of course I still support unionists with demands for better working conditions which some times includes pay rises, and I do support people in not wanting to see the Government try to profit as much as possible by making people pay for their educations, and that does help a struggling students pocket which is already very slim...

 

But saying that just because {some of} the protesters are middle class means that the Entire movement is just Greedy people wanting more is one of the stupidest assertions that can be made.

 

In many Instances I think the people here want less, they call for reforms that will limit mass production and enviromental exploitation, thus the result being, having less.

[strawdog65]

Hi, Day two of occupy Melbourne yesterday, I spent most of the Day suspending a very large Tarp to serve as a sleeping shelter. It was a fulfilling day.

 

Again, most of the white 'middle class' people I saw there [and note there were plenty of 'lower class' people as well] were speaking out against War, {not asking for a share of the loot as Twinner keeps ignorantly postulating}

Asking for Aborigional Land rights, not more loot.

Asking for more constraints on Corporations, not more loot.

Demanding Total Accountability for Corrupt politicians in cahoots with corporate Interests, not larger pay.

Asking for proper Enviromental protection laws, not a fatter pay check...

 

Of course I still support unionists with demands for better working conditions which some times includes pay rises, and I do support people in not wanting to see the Government try to profit as much as possible by making people pay for their educations, and that does help a struggling students pocket which is already very slim...

 

But saying that just because {some of} the protesters are middle class means that the Entire movement is just Greedy people wanting more is one of the stupidest assertions that can be made.

 

In many Instances I think the people here want less, they call for reforms that will limit mass production and enviromental exploitation, thus the result being, having less.

 

 

Seth, Glad to hear you are making a contribution to this event.

 

Has there been any talk of The Zeitgeist Movement in regards to the

"occupy" event?

 

There is some talk of it online....was wondering about Australia though.

[JustARandomPanda]

But saying that just because {some of} the protesters are middle class means that the Entire movement is just Greedy people wanting more is one of the stupidest assertions that can be made.

 

 

Actually there IS an increasingly global finance alternative available. It can't address every ill listed by the OWS movement but does help with one part of it.

 

 

Islamic Finance.

 

It's my understanding it's a growing sector of finance worldwide and is not restricted to Muslims. It's gaining popularity with Non-Muslims and Non-Islamic countries as well (including in the U.S. and UK). Islam forbids interest and so Islamic financial institutions have had to come up with creative ways to meet the needs of businesses and consumers while still turning a profit so as to be compliant with Sharia Law.

 

 

Islamic Finance in a Nutshell: A Guide for Non-Specialists

 

 

 

 

[strawdog65]

Statement from The Venus Project

----------------------------------

 

 

 

The Venus Project Perspectives on the Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Together movements

by The Venus Project - Global on Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 11:49am

 

The Venus Project realizes the significance of the Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Together movements and offers a positive solution for their grievances.

 

 

 

We at The Venus Project fear that any acquiescence to the protestor’s demands will do very little if the processes that cause the problems are left in place. In this case whatever laws or regulations are made will be eventually bypassed or overturned and conditions will revert back. This has almost always been the situation historically.

 

 

 

We are concerned that meeting the demands of the protestors while keeping the current economic system in place will not have the desired outcome. It will merely serve to temporarily pacify those who are abused and rightly angry. This will not solve the problems but will prolong them. When force does not work and superficial fixes (laws) are put into place without addressing the underlying problems, then no effective remedy will occur. It is the monetary economic system itself that is the root cause of these problems. Greed, corruption, and war are inevitable byproducts of the monetary system.

 

 

 

We maintain an obsolete economic system that has been handed down to us from centuries ago. It has never been just or equitable, nor can it be. The main aim of the monetary system is wealth, property, and power. This results in everyone being out for themselves. Our current circumstances are merely the evolution of a monetary-based system. It generates scarcity, poverty, aberrant behavior and the accumulation of wealth at the expense of others and the environment. The main aim is not the well being of the environment or people. Is it any wonder that most of the money is usurped by 1% of the population?

 

 

 

The wealthy buy and control the politicians, courts, judges, media, police, entertainment, and even the universities. They set the agenda and the laws for their own advantage. It is the taxpayers who pay the salaries of the police while they work for the wealthy (who pay very little taxes) to violently put down peaceful protestors who threaten the status quo.

 

 

 

Those in positions of advantage will not yield their control willingly.

 

 

 

Calls for stopping wars seems to be a fruitless plea when there is so much money to be made from them. Peace is the brief interval between wars. We have many real problems as a human species, but wars should not be one of them. Wars are the supreme failure of inadequate social structures. Conflicts must be expected when people have unequal access to goods and services.

 

 

 

Some say we should elect more “ethical” people to government. It is not ethical people we need but the intelligent management of Earth’s resources for the benefit of all. Anything less will revert back to the same problems we face today.

 

 

 

If we wish to put an end to wars, greed, and corruption, we must come to understand that the real culprit is the monetary system itself and the values it generates in order to perpetuate itself. It values competition rather than cooperation. People are pacified with the notion of “freedom”. As Jacque Fresco says, “one is only as free as their purchasing power”. Concepts of “individuality” keep people divided. It puts the blame on individuals rather than the system that has failed them, whether it is going abroad for cheap labor or automating to maintain a competitive edge. However, you are brought up with the propaganda that you are to blame, not the environment. This is not the case.

 

 

 

There is an alternative.

 

 

 

The Venus Project calls for a total redesign of society where human rights are not merely paper proclamations but a way of life. A society can be designed where war and want are distant memories. All people need clean air, water, food, a relevant education, and the necessities of life. This is now possible if we update our social systems as we have updated our technologies. We are not separate from nature and must live within the carrying capacity of our planet’s resources. This can be accomplished by applying the methods of science to the way we live with the main aim being the wellbeing of all the world’s people and the protection of the environment.

 

 

 

Jacque Fresco, the originator of the Venus Project, arrived at this new holistic socioeconomic system through more than 7 decades of scientific inquiry, research and development, which he calls a resource-based economy. We invite you to learn more about it at www.thevenusproject.com

 

 

 

Once we join together and proclaim all earth’s resources as the common heritage of all people, we will begin to know what it means to be civilized. Until that time we will be continuously fighting for a piece of the pie.

Edited October 16, 2011 by strawdog65

[JustARandomPanda]

Why Prosecutors Don't Go After Wall Street

 

 

Fewer Financial Crisis Pursued in Courts

 

Snippet of the 2nd link:

 

SIEGEL: In a nutshell, why? Why so few cases this time?

 

BLACK: The most direct reason is the regulatory agencies became controlled by anti-regulators and they ceased making criminal referrals. In the savings and loan debacle, our agency made well over 10,000 criminal referrals. In this crisis, the office of thrift supervision that was supposed to regulate Washington Mutual, IndyMac, Countrywide, made zero criminal referrals.

 

 

[Seth Ananda]

Seth, Glad to hear you are making a contribution to this event.

 

Has there been any talk of The Zeitgeist Movement in regards to the

"occupy" event?

 

There is some talk of it online....was wondering about Australia though.

Yep, the Zeitgeist tent is there

[JustARandomPanda]

Lehman Brothers - E.U. Style

 

 

But first, let's take a look at the global economy. It's an important week in Europe as many parliaments there are set to vote on measures aimed at propping up the struggling economies of Ireland, Portugal, and Greece. Finance officials from all over the world met over this past weekend at the International Monetary Fund in Washington. Those meetings were intended to devise ways to stem growing anxieties that Europe's debt crisis may lead to a market meltdown.

 

Here's IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde speaking on Saturday.

 

(SOUNDBITE OF SPEECH)

 

CHRISTINE LAGARDE: I certainly myself was very strongly encouraged by the purpose, the determination, the sense of absolute urgency that was shared amongst the membership.

 

LYDEN: Here to talk about how economic woes across the pond may impact Wall Street and Main Street in the United States is Sudeep Reddy. He's a reporter who covers economics for the Wall Street Journal. And also with us is Roben Farzad who's a senior writer for Bloomberg Business Week. We're pleased to have you both here with us. Welcome.

 

ROBEN FARZAD: Thank you Jacki, great to be here.

 

SUDEEP REDDY: Thank you.

 

LYDEN: Sudeep, remind us what's the issue at the heart of this crisis which was obviously, you know, at the heart of everything this past weekend?

 

REDDY: The big issue is this broad concern about the stability of the financial system not only in Europe but in the United States and around the world. And if you look back to the financial crisis we experienced in 2008, that was a small piece, not a - Lehman Brothers was the big bank and of course there was AIG right after that.

 

Those were pieces of the financial system that if they were properly insulated wouldn't have led to this enormous breakdown in U.S. markets and in the global economy. We saw a contraction in 2009, the economies of the world going into recession for the first time since the Great Depression.

 

And so, there is the same fear now that a meltdown in Europe this time tied to sovereign debt, the debt of countries that are collectively known as PIIGS in an affectionate way - Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece, and Spain. That debt is sitting on bank balance sheets in Europe. And there's a fear that the problems tied to the debt will bring down the banks and bring down the financial system in a way that cascades around the world again.

 

LYDEN: Now, people were kind of at pains at this IMF meeting to say that that would not happen, as you say. German Chancellor Angela Merkel as well as U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said that, you know, Europe economic woes would not trigger a financial collapse the way Lehman Brothers did. Roben, is comparing a potential debt default of a nation - in this case Greece which everyone's talking about - and the collapse of the financial institution a valid comparison?

 

FARZAD: There is precedent actually for both going back into the 20th century. We had rolling contagions in the emerging markets in the late 1990s. Greece, I believe 24 centuries ago, saw a municipality default. You've had this happen in Russia. The problem is you have not ever seen this with the experiment of a 17-nation currency and maybe even twice as many countries loosely in that economic union.

 

It's one thing for a country to become unhinged, it's another thing for an entire subcontinent to go potentially the way of Lehman Brothers. And Sudeep talks about cordoning off Lehman Brothers and AIG. It's infinitely more difficult to cordon off the effects of maybe five nations defaulting.

 

LYDEN: And that, Roben, is why we are so invested in what's going on in Europe, right?

 

FARZAD: We're all connected. It's like the old New York telephone jingle. I mean, it's especially so in this case. You can't really be nostalgic for that whole 19th century isolationism, where what happens in Germany and what happens in France is their problem.

 

Our banking system is inextricably linked to theirs. If you have nominally tens of billions of dollars of Greek debt on one bank's books that could affect that bank, but it affects the entire banking system psychologically because you don't know where the bodies are buried. You don't know which counterparty is good for the money. And that's where the analogue to Lehman Brothers is quite instructive.

 

LYDEN: If you're just joining us you're listening to TELL ME MORE from NPR News.

 

We're speaking about how the financial crisis in Europe could impact the U.S. financial markets. And our guests are Roben Farzad of Bloomberg Business Week and Sudeep Reddy of the Wall Street Journal.

 

Sudeep, Treasury Secretary Geithner met, of course, with his European counterparts for three straight weekends. And the latest was this past weekend here in D.C., as you know. The International Monetary Fund meeting we've been talking about. So, how much does the U.S. depend on Europe for stability in our own markets?

 

REDDY: The U.S. looks to Europe for two things. One is it's obviously a very important export market. More than a quarter of U.S. exports actually go to Europe. And if you look at multinational corporations from the U.S., they get a very large chunk of their sales from Europe. Those are developed markets.

 

A lot of the things that the United States produces that are more advanced, whether they're high tech semi conductors, airplanes from Boeing, or some higher end cars. They go to Europe and European's want them. And that's why it's really important for an advanced market to be able to buy our products that we make, especially when we're importing so much from places like China that are making cheaper products.

 

The other really important link, though, is through financial markets. And the one concern that Secretary Geithner has is that markets drop in Europe and it just spreads around the world. We see that every morning when you're watching Asian and European markets to get a sense of where the U.S. is going to go.

 

LYDEN: And that's part of a global contagion.

 

REDDY: Exactly, exactly. There are also some very specific ways. Money market funds in the United States, places where people park their money to really get an instant return, they are heavily invested in European markets and European bank debt.

 

And so, by being funders to those banks, they are now starting to pull back and worry about the contagion and that's how bank runs begin. When people stop trusting their trading partners and pull back and that's - we're starting to see the early stages of that. And if it were to accelerate in a true panic, true crisis, then it's not only going to affect the money market funds, it's going to affect everybody tied to the money market funds. And that's where you have that enlargening circle of fear spreading around the world.

 

LYDEN: Roben, how confident do you think the U.S. feels about its trading partners?

 

FARZAD: It's not very confident. In fact, the default market is pricing in pretty, I mean, inevitable likelihood of Greece defaulting. Now, the problem is, is can that be done in an orderly manner? Can you have the likes of Lagarde and Merkel and some of the more responsible higher-up parties saying that we are going to, hell or high water, protect the tier one economies of Germany, France and, to a lesser extent, Italy and Spain in order for this to not become a global contagion. That the real-time experiment.

 

If you recall, going back to the Lehman Brothers example and those tense meetings downtown that the New York Fed in September of 2008, people were saying that, listen, we can't just bail every firm out. Bear Stearn's happened already. We know that there is going to be a chain reaction of every bank coming to us and asking for a bailout. It has to stop somewhere. So, let's see if we just let Lehman Brothers go.

 

Now, obviously in 20/20 hindsight that was a catastrophic decision and we have no neat precedent for a country in the Eurozone defaulting like this and how that could potentially take down the entire subcontinent. So, paradoxically, you Timothy Geithner who still had his battle scars from the crisis of September 2008 going across the pond and saying: You guys better get your act together. I mean, I'm telling you from a first-person perspective, you don't want to deal with the alternative.

 

REDDY: And Roben's really right here about the U.S. fears, because Geithner saw during 2008 and 2009 how difficult it was to bring one political system together, particularly during election and election (unintelligible) past under the prior administration's watch. And this time he's looking at the Eurozone 17 governments all fighting together.

 

When the euro was created as this joint currency 12 years ago, the entire idea was that it would herald in this new era of cooperation and unity among countries that have fought wars and had all sorts of social differences over the years. And to a large extent, it has. It's benefited them tremendously. You can hop a Ryanair flight to go between countries. There is this sense of cohesion in one way, but it's also highlighted the concerns and the differences between them as well.

 

And the fact that we're sitting here right now worried about whether Finland or Slovenia or Austria are going to pass the bailout plan for Europe and that is hanging over U.S. financial markets and U.S. investors. I doubt most investors who are looking at that can even spot Slovenia on a map and they're dealing with this concern.

 

That really underscores how much and how tense this situation is and why the U.S. is worried. Because imagine if you had to have Montana, Texas, California and New York all come together and agree on a bailout plan for something that might have started in Michigan or Florida. And it's just very difficult to get those kinds of differences resolved in a quick fashion to get ahead of markets.

 

LYDEN: Or waking up in Montana thinking about a Greek default. Roben, you're speaking to us in New York. So, all of this uncertainty in the European market, it certainly has had an effect on Wall Street.

 

FARZAD: Yes, it has, because this is certainly not your garden variety recovery. We're coming off - obviously, you know, it's cliche times 10 by now, the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. The economy is perilously weak, 9.1 percent unemployment. The long-term unemployment rate is at a record. You have food stamp usage at a record. We need Europe becoming unhinged like we need a bullet in the head.

 

So, this economy, especially with the dollar being weak, needs to be able to export whatever the heck it can. I mean, people still think that the United States doesn't export anything anymore. Well, in fact, we do with tractor equipment, grains. When the dollar is weak, this is something that's supposed to help us feel our oats again, when other countries that are doing somewhat better than us that have a stronger currency than we do, i.e., the euro, i.e. the yen, can buy from us. And this is something that we badly, badly need to get the unemployment rate to even stabilize in the United States.

 

LYDEN: Sudeep, a final word?

 

REDDY: Well, the reason people are so concerned is because the economy is in such a dangerous position. And it's also that there's less trust in policymakers to respond today. There is a lot less ammunition when it comes to both interest rates. Monetary policy has reacted enormously and interest rates are near zero in most advanced economies. And you can see in the U.S. right now how difficult it is to pass any kind of fiscal stimulus to try to boost the economy.

 

And that's all coming at a time when the world is obviously - and markets are obviously closely interconnected, almost in a frightening way. And so, at times when they're interconnected, you actually do see the benefits of the efficiency, of the ties, how much that helps markets, how much it helps trade. But at times like this when you see how closely they're connected and they could fall apart at the same time, that's something that leads everyone to worry about and worry a lot about.

 

LYDEN: I try not to think of the words perfect storm a little bit. Sudeep Reddy covers economics for the Wall Street Journal and he joins us here in our Washington, D.C. studios. And Roben Farzad, senior writer for Bloomberg Business Week, joined us from our bureau in New York. Thank you, fellows, for giving us the news and for speaking with us today.

 

REDDY: Thank you, Jacki.

 

FARZAD: My pleasure.

[JustARandomPanda]

Thousands Nationwide Join NY Born Protests

Report date: October 16, 2011

 

 

Occupy Protests Spread Around the World

Report date: Sat October 15, 2011

[Aaron]

Hi, Day two of occupy Melbourne yesterday, I spent most of the Day suspending a very large Tarp to serve as a sleeping shelter. It was a fulfilling day.

 

Again, most of the white 'middle class' people I saw there [and note there were plenty of 'lower class' people as well] were speaking out against War, {not asking for a share of the loot as Twinner keeps ignorantly postulating}

Asking for Aborigional Land rights, not more loot.

Asking for more constraints on Corporations, not more loot.

Demanding Total Accountability for Corrupt politicians in cahoots with corporate Interests, not larger pay.

Asking for proper Enviromental protection laws, not a fatter pay check...

 

Of course I still support unionists with demands for better working conditions which some times includes pay rises, and I do support people in not wanting to see the Government try to profit as much as possible by making people pay for their educations, and that does help a struggling students pocket which is already very slim...

 

But saying that just because {some of} the protesters are middle class means that the Entire movement is just Greedy people wanting more is one of the stupidest assertions that can be made.

 

In many Instances I think the people here want less, they call for reforms that will limit mass production and enviromental exploitation, thus the result being, having less.

 

Hello Seth,

 

I understand that you might not see things the same way that I do and that's fine, but let me ask you this, when you say lower class who are you talking about? Are you talking about the mother who works two jobs to support her children, so she doesn't have time to go to a movement? Are you talking about the homeless man who has no place to live and no money and depends on the handouts of strangers and charities to exist? Are you talking about the family that can't afford to take their child to the doctor when they are sick? I'm not sure what you are considering lower class. When I talk about the lower class I'm talking about the people that suffer the most from the economic yoke of capitalism as we know it today. In that light none of the reforms that you're talking about are really going to change life for them.

 

When I say that no lasting change will come from these demonstrations it's because I understand the root of desire and the root of capitalism and that you cannot have real economic change so long as you have a capitalist economy that allows others to take advantage of the lower (and middle) class. The only real change that will occur that will end poverty and suffering for the majority of the people of this world is when we cease to use the same economic and socioeconomic values as a means for determining our future wellbeing. The Zeitgest Movement is on the right page, but even they have some room for improvement.

 

We are all talking about "the world as it is" and how we need to "look at realistic changes in our modern economy" without seeing that the modern economy is the cause of all the problems in the first place. So when I say stop valuing what the rich value and stop valuing what you have been taught to value what I am also saying is that we need to change our value system, both internally and externally.

 

We look at technology as the salvation of mankind, thinking that these modern conveniences have eased our suffering, but in reality we are living in a world that is suffering from overpopulation, ecological devastation, and moral bankruptcy, in large part because of the technological advancements that were meant to make life easier. In fact technology is the noose around our children's necks. They've been ingrained and taught to depend on facebook, Ipads, and laptops to survive, when many don't even know how to use a mechanical can opener.

 

So long as we continue to allow corporations to shape the social values of our youth through media and goods, then we will never have a lasting change. Lasting change will only come when we realize the differences between needs and wants and adjust our lifestyles accordingly. You see those evils you talked about earlier in this thread, obesity being among them, are all a result of our slow decline into corporate capitalism. It's been going on for over 50 years now, perhaps longer. The corporations don't care about our children or their wellbeing, they care about the money they can earn off of them.

 

Lasting change will not come from demonstrations but from ceasing to be a part of a morally bankrupt system that exploits the world and it's people. It starts by simply not buying things you don't need. It starts by sharing the wealth you do have. It starts by not shouting at the corporations to stop, but talking to your friends and neighbors about the need for change and telling them what you're doing to help with that change.

 

This Christmas, don't buy your kids an x-box, laptop, i-pod, or any of the other fancy gizmos they've been taught they need, but rather take them out and show them the poor and destitute, ensure that they understand the differences between needs and wants and encourage them to be compassionate to those who suffer. And while you're at it, turn off the television, take away their cellphones, and teach them that they don't need to be in constant contact with everyone instantly, that silence is golden, that absence does make the heart grow fonder. Teach them the difference between a facebook friend and a real friend, that a status online has no bearing on the reality of their situation.

 

Anyways I can rant about this all day, but it doesn't change a thing. I have taken much of this to heart. I stopped playing video games, stopped buying vanity products and I've begun to appreciate the value of human companionship and simply eating a meal and appreciating the world around me.

 

With that said, I wish you and the OWS people success, but I also hope that somewhere along the line people wake up and realize that what they're asking for isn't just not enough, but in the end meaningless. You can't fix a system that's already fixed.

 

Aaron

Edited October 17, 2011 by Twinner

[Aaron]

I posted Chapter 81 in the Tao Teh Ching Subforum and I couldn't help but think that maybe it applied to some of the things that are being discussed here, so if you get a chance take a look at it and tell me what you think. You can also view a few translations over here.

 

Aaron

[Seth Ananda]

Hello Seth,

 

I understand that you might not see things the same way that I do and that's fine, but let me ask you this, when you say lower class who are you talking about? Are you talking about the mother who works two jobs to support her children, so she doesn't have time to go to a movement? Are you talking about the homeless man who has no place to live and no money and depends on the handouts of strangers and charities to exist? Are you talking about the family that can't afford to take their child to the doctor when they are sick? I'm not sure what you are considering lower class. When I talk about the lower class I'm talking about the people that suffer the most from the economic yoke of capitalism as we know it today. In that light none of the reforms that you're talking about are really going to change life for them.

 

When I say that no lasting change will come from these demonstrations it's because I understand the root of desire and the root of capitalism and that you cannot have real economic change so long as you have a capitalist economy that allows others to take advantage of the lower (and middle) class. The only real change that will occur that will end poverty and suffering for the majority of the people of this world is when we cease to use the same economic and socioeconomic values as a means for determining our future wellbeing. The Zeitgest Movement is on the right page, but even they have some room for improvement.

 

We are all talking about "the world as it is" and how we need to "look at realistic changes in our modern economy" without seeing that the modern economy is the cause of all the problems in the first place. So when I say stop valuing what the rich value and stop valuing what you have been taught to value what I am also saying is that we need to change our value system, both internally and externally.

 

We look at technology as the salvation of mankind, thinking that these modern conveniences have eased our suffering, but in reality we are living in a world that is suffering from overpopulation, ecological devastation, and moral bankruptcy, in large part because of the technological advancements that were meant to make life easier. In fact technology is the noose around our children's necks. They've been ingrained and taught to depend on facebook, Ipads, and laptops to survive, when many don't even know how to use a mechanical can opener.

 

So long as we continue to allow corporations to shape the social values of our youth through media and goods, then we will never have a lasting change. Lasting change will only come when we realize the differences between needs and wants and adjust our lifestyles accordingly. You see those evils you talked about earlier in this thread, obesity being among them, are all a result of our slow decline into corporate capitalism. It's been going on for over 50 years now, perhaps longer. The corporations don't care about our children or their wellbeing, they care about the money they can earn off of them.

 

Lasting change will not come from demonstrations but from ceasing to be a part of a morally bankrupt system that exploits the world and it's people. It starts by simply not buying things you don't need. It starts by sharing the wealth you do have. It starts by not shouting at the corporations to stop, but talking to your friends and neighbors about the need for change and telling them what you're doing to help with that change.

 

This Christmas, don't buy your kids an x-box, laptop, i-pod, or any of the other fancy gizmos they've been taught they need, but rather take them out and show them the poor and destitute, ensure that they understand the differences between needs and wants and encourage them to be compassionate to those who suffer. And while you're at it, turn off the television, take away their cellphones, and teach them that they don't need to be in constant contact with everyone instantly, that silence is golden, that absence does make the heart grow fonder. Teach them the difference between a facebook friend and a real friend, that a status online has no bearing on the reality of their situation.

 

Anyways I can rant about this all day, but it doesn't change a thing. I have taken much of this to heart. I stopped playing video games, stopped buying vanity products and I've begun to appreciate the value of human companionship and simply eating a meal and appreciating the world around me.

 

With that said, I wish you and the OWS people success, but I also hope that somewhere along the line people wake up and realize that what they're asking for isn't just not enough, but in the end meaningless. You can't fix a system that's already fixed.

 

Aaron

Well first we have Aboriginal's down here, many who live in third world conditions in their 1st world country, we have a number of homeless people, and many poor people...

 

And second, while I agree totally that change comes from within, and is very Important, You are totally wrong about it not being able to come about from outside. One can demand change, and every revolution in history is an example of this.

 

We just do not have time to wait for everyone to start changing from the inside. We need environmental policy, political, corporate, and foreign policy changes now and we are going to get them.

 

Gandhi did not get people to stay at home and change from the inside. He organised mass rally's and marched on factory's, production mills, and Political embassy's. That is what happened. People got together, made noise, and made change. That is how it happens.

 

You might argue that that is not lasting change, but even if it is just change for a little while, that is good, and when human greed inevitably takes over again, well then we rally again.

[Aaron]

Well first we have Aboriginal's down here, many who live in third world conditions in their 1st world country, we have a number of homeless people, and many poor people...

 

And second, while I agree totally that change comes from within, and is very Important, You are totally wrong about it not being able to come about from outside. One can demand change, and every revolution in history is an example of this.

 

We just do not have time to wait for everyone to start changing from the inside. We need environmental policy, political, corporate, and foreign policy changes now and we are going to get them.

 

Gandhi did not get people to stay at home and change from the inside. He organised mass rally's and marched on factory's, production mills, and Political embassy's. That is what happened. People got together, made noise, and made change. That is how it happens.

 

You might argue that that is not lasting change, but even if it is just change for a little while, that is good, and when human greed inevitably takes over again, well then we rally again.

 

 

I'll agree that change for a little while is good, but my point has been what we can do to help invoke lasting change. I'm not saying that the protesters are wrong, simply that many are misguided and unaware of what the real problems are. Good luck, I really am rooting for you, despite what you might think.

 

Aaron

 

edit- Actually my main worry these days is that the protesters may be harmed eventually, so keep yourself safe out there and keep your kids home.

Edited October 17, 2011 by Twinner

[JustARandomPanda]

I'll go ahead and post Taomeow's quote from another thread (hope she doesn't mind) with regards to desire and attachment. It's another perspective from a Taoist for people to think about.

 

 

You have to keep in mind that taoism is an indigenous cognitive paradigm of China while attachment/desire eradication is not. If you come across these ideas inside taoism, they are invariably borrowings. Early taoism is not concerned with them, having different cares altogether -- to wit, bringing human life back into harmony with the life of nature. Nature, incidentally, runs on "attachments" and "desires," as anyone who has ever left the "comforts" of civilization to communicate with her for any significant stretch of time and awareness is likely to notice. Rulers, however, prefer a population free of "attachments and desires," and consequently robotically obedient, with no strong personal likes and dislikes... and consequently no active resistance to anything done to them... so all religions and ideologies supporting these stances have been historically well promoted and financed while the opposite, the natural, brutally suppressed.

 

Caveat emptor.

 

 

and the second

 

 

Steve,

 

the three treasures of taoism are different between different schools of taoism -- and there's quite a few versions, the Chinese love the number three, because it does beget all things. In alchemical taoism which I study and practice, the three treasures are Perfection, Nondecay, Immortality.

 

It is difficult to separate taoism from the rest of it but not impossible. E.g., if one reads TTC correctly, i.e. as a manual for the ruler rather than for the serf, it becomes clear that most virtues it promulgates simply do not apply to the disenfranchised. They are instructions for the greedy, not for the needy. When the needy get confused into striving to abide by those, the greedy rejoice...

 

And my biggest problem with the whole hoopla:

how do systems that promulgate extinguishing desires reconcile this position with a view of a no-desire state as desirable? and

how do they reconcile the ideal of no attachment with their most tenacious attachment to this ideal?

 

???...

 

They don't. They get by on fragmentation of consciousness and its resulting mandate on holding two mutually exclusive beliefs simultaneously. They get by on having their cake, eating it too, and declaring they don't really want it.

 

Taoism proper is about unification of consciousness, which results in a firm belief that some cake for everyone is good, too much cake for some and too little or none for others is bad, too much cake for you personally will give you indigestion, no cake at all for you personally will give you hunger pangs... A unified, whole, unmolested consciousness (referred to as the state of a "real human," "man/woman of tao," "holy sage," "realized human" and, occasionally, jun zi ) has no problem coping with these situations as they arise. None of them is elevated to the status of an absolute, an ideal. If you are told that no one should want any cake ever for any purposes under any circumstances in order to accomplish whatever, that's not taoism. Taoism is situationally flexible. If I want cake, it will look into why, and how much, and where and how I intend to get it, and when I plan to stop, and what it's made of, and how much I need it and how much I deserve it and so on... rather than invalidate my desire automatically. Cake, of course, stands for "any and all situations of the process of living" here.

[JustARandomPanda]

Ah...I think I'm going to have to check this book out from the library. I found out 9 other people are in line ahead of me to get their hands on it.

 

 

Boomerang: Travels in the New Third World

 

 

Product Description

As Pogo once said, "We have met the enemy and he is us."

 

The tsunami of cheap credit that rolled across the planet between 2002 and 2008 was more than a simple financial phenomenon: it was temptation, offering entire societies the chance to reveal aspects of their characters they could not normally afford to indulge.

 

Icelanders wanted to stop fishing and become investment bankers. The Greeks wanted to turn their country into a piñata stuffed with cash and allow as many citizens as possible to take a whack at it. The Germans wanted to be even more German; the Irish wanted to stop being Irish.

 

Michael Lewis's investigation of bubbles beyond our shores is so brilliantly, sadly hilarious that it leads the American reader to a comfortable complacency: oh, those foolish foreigners. But when he turns a merciless eye on California and Washington, DC, we see that the narrative is a trap baited with humor, and we understand the reckoning that awaits the greatest and greediest of debtor nations.

 

 

Here's an interview with the author:

 

 

 

In "Boomerang" Cheap Credit Exposes Nations' Flaws

 

No two countries are experiencing the global financial crisis in the same way. And according to author Michael Lewis, you can tell a lot about each country by looking at its problems — and how they're being dealt with.

 

To research for his new book, Boomerang, Lewis went on what he has called a "financial disaster tour." He surveyed some of the most financially challenged countries in the world, from Iceland and Ireland to Greece and the United States.

 

As he tells NPR's Lynn Neary, Lewis found a fatal flaw deeply ingrained in each country's culture — which he says helps to explain how they lost their economic way when they were offered cheap credit.

 

"You can think about the credit bubble as one giant temptation that was laid before the developed world," Lewis says. "Anybody who wanted to borrow basically could, in virtually unlimited sums. And given that temptation, different countries wanted to do different things with the money."

 

Interview Highlights

 

On Iceland

 

"Fishing has been a source of wealth there. And they've used the wealth to buy lots of education — it's a highly educated population. And then you've got a problem. You've got a bunch of highly educated people who are left to fish."

 

"When all of a sudden their banks were offered unlimited credit by the rest of the world, every young Icelander was offered the opportunity to essentially become an investment banker."

 

"The losses were just breathtaking — you know, hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars in banking losses, for every man, woman and child in Iceland."

 

"Essentially what had happened is, the men in the society — the fishermen — had told the women they knew what they were doing. And for a brief period, they looked like they were successful. When I walked in, the women were busy taking back the country from the men."

 

"They basically walked away from most of their debts. So, they've kind of gone on their way."

 

On Ireland

 

"The Irish, left alone in a dark room with a pile of money, wanted to buy Irish land. And they drove the prices up absurdly. But nobody said it. They all sort of kept mum."

 

"Ireland is the nation on Earth that seems most willing to suffer to repay its debts to others. I think anybody who's been in an Irish family can explain this. There's a kind of suspicion of happiness and a respect of suffering."

 

For his book exploring the global financial crisis, Michael Lewis visited countries to see where the money went.

 

"There was a moment, just after Lehman Brothers failed, when Ireland really could have walked away from its obligations — justifiably. It wasn't the Irish government that borrowed all this money; it was Irish banks."

 

"The Irish banks could have been allowed to fail; they could have at least said to the bondholders, 'We're not repaying you.' And the Irish government made a decision to basically nationalize this obligation. And the amazing thing is that the Irish people did not protest. The Irish people just said, 'Yep, we have to pay it back.' "

 

On Greece

 

"Greece is in some ways the mirror image of Ireland. Because in Ireland, the banks sunk the country; in Greece, the country sunk the banks."

 

"What happened in Greece — when the Greek people were left alone in a dark room with a pile of money — what they really wanted to do was bloat the state. Because they had this very perverted relationship to their own government — it was a kind of pinata filled with goodies that everybody got a crack at."

 

"And the Greek state borrowed huge sums of money to do things like run the world's most unprofitable state railroad, and pay people huge sums of money not to show up to their job, their government job — I mean, enormous graft and corruption. All the Greek people basically participated in this event."

 

"And yet, when they're called out on it, when they're told, you know, it's time to pay — they're furious. They took to the streets instantly. They're rioting; they're rioting, basically, against their own culture, in some ways. Their response is, 'We don't want to change; we don't want to pay back the money.' "

 

"The IMF and the European Union has been in Greece, trying to reform Greece. There are actually Germans in Greece, trying to collect taxes from Greeks — who don't pay their taxes, don't want to pay their taxes, don't have a culture of paying taxes."

 

"The problem with Greece: It's a very deep problem, it's a moral problem — a moral, cultural problem. There's no real sense of civil society. It's sort of every man for himself."

 

"And nobody actually trusts the state enough to give their money to the state. And their mistrust of the state is actually very justified. When you're robbing the state with one hand, it's hard to justify handing the state money with the other, because you see how corrupt it is."

 

On the United States

 

"A few months ago, Standard and [Poor's], the credit-rating agency, downgraded U.S. Treasury bonds. When that happened, the markets responded by buying Treasury bonds. The fear that created caused a stampede into Treasury bonds."

 

"It's like a monster walked into the room, and half the people in the room went to kind of hug the monster."

 

"What that tells you is that the financial crisis in this country is not going to strike first at the level of the federal government, because it's the last thing people are going to lose faith in — that we can get into even worse straits than we are now, and people are going to be willing to lend to us at very low rates."

 

"The federal government has the ability to push its problems down to the states. The states — like the state I live in, California — have enormous ability to push [their] financial problems down to the level of the city."

 

"Cities, at the local level, are in crisis. In California, there are cities that are bankrupt, there are cities that are on the verge of bankruptcy."

 

"And the way this crisis is going to express itself is much like Greece: It's going to be a gut check about what kind of civic life we want. Do we want to live in a city where there's just a skeletal staff, and the fire department and police department is inadequate and so on — or a city that actually walks away from its debt obligations.

 

"I think lots of cities are going to be facing that question — and some are right now."

 

"It's pretty clear that the sense of common purpose is fraying. There's less of a sense that we're all in this together, and more of a sense of every man for himself."

 

"What this creates is kind of a life-raft mentality, with shrinking provisions. People look at each other and evaluate each others' behavior more harshly."

 

"One day, Indiana may wake up and say, 'We're not paying for New Jersey anymore.' Or, people in California who are in solvent communities will wake up and say, 'We're not paying for Vallejo, or San Jose, or Oakland anymore, because they behaved badly.' I think what's happening is a kind of fragmentation."

[Aaron]

I'll go ahead and post Taomeow's quote from another thread (hope she doesn't mind) with regards to desire and attachment. It's another perspective from a Taoist for people to think about.

 

 

 

 

 

and the second

 

 

Hello Serene,

 

My two cents in regards to this... first Taoism teaches us to not value anything, to understand that everything we need is here with us, and that the way of man is to help mankind (see Chapter 81). As far as I can tell from my own experiences in meditating this is right on the money.

 

If I value my computer and it is taken from me then I have lost something, but if I don't value it and it is taken from me, I wont even notice. It's as simple as that. Now these days I'm not a Taoist (or anything else for that matter), but what I can tell you is that when one can put others before themselves, then they find true happiness in their life. This can be seen in groups such as AA and also in charities where people help the needy. There is something very primal that is touched when one acts selflessly. It brings one out of one's self and allows them insight into the nature of mankind.

 

Anyways, I just thought I'd throw that out there. Also, if I was a ruler the last religion in the world I'd want my followers to practice is Buddhism, that's one of the reasons it was so heavily repressed by communist regimes. Buddhism is much more dangerous to a ruler than Taoism is.

 

Aaron

[ralis]

Hello Serene,

 

My two cents in regards to this... first Taoism teaches us to not value anything, to understand that everything we need is here with us, and that the way of man is to help mankind (see Chapter 81). As far as I can tell from my own experiences in meditating this is right on the money.

 

If I value my computer and it is taken from me then I have lost something, but if I don't value it and it is taken from me, I wont even notice. It's as simple as that. Now these days I'm not a Taoist (or anything else for that matter), but what I can tell you is that when one can put others before themselves, then they find true happiness in their life. This can be seen in groups such as AA and also in charities where people help the needy. There is something very primal that is touched when one acts selflessly. It brings one out of one's self and allows them insight into the nature of mankind.

 

Anyways, I just thought I'd throw that out there. Also, if I was a ruler the last religion in the world I'd want my followers to practice is Buddhism, that's one of the reasons it was so heavily repressed by communist regimes. Buddhism is much more dangerous to a ruler than Taoism is.

 

Aaron

 

Wake up Aaron. No ideology has ever worked in curing the ills of humanity! None whatsoever!

Edited October 17, 2011 by ralis

[Aaron]

Wake up Aaron. No ideology has ever worked in curing the ills of humanity! None whatsoever!

 

Depends on what you classify as the ills of humanity. Once you tell me what those are, then I can honestly answer this question.

 

Aaron