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TechnoratiWill Obama Reboot Capitalism Anew?
A hundred years ago, Republican President Theodore Roosevelt tried to reign in some of the most toxic behaviors of capitalists that he found incompatible with modern democracy by pushing through congress a law that banned the practice of corporations giving money to politicians. He slowed down the robber barons a bit, but three consecutive Republican presidents in the 1920s led us straight into the Republican Great Depression.
Franklin Roosevelt, his distant cousin, rebooted capitalism in the 1930s, ushering in an era of regulated capitalism - embraced by Republicans like Eisenhower and Democrats like JFK - that brought us the largest, strongest, and most stable middle class ever seen. We also became the world's economic superpower, as the world's largest importer of raw materials, exporter of finished goods, and banker to the world. We imported iron ore and exported televisions and cars and washing machines. The rest of the world was in debt to us. A worker with a high school diploma could find a job that paid enough to raise a family and have a safe and comfortable retirement.
The Reagan Revolution of the 1980s was the third "rebooting" of capitalism in the 20th Century, and continues to this day. Scorning the "regulated" part of "regulated capitalism," economic Reaganites from the Gipper himself to GHW Bush to Bill Clinton to GW Bush flipped our economy upside down. Today, after just thirty years of "free trade" and "right to work" and other oxymoronic nostrums applied as policy, we've become the world's largest importer of finished goods and the world's largest debtor. We now export minerals to Asia, and import back from them televisions, cars, and washing machines.
So now the big question: Will Obama reboot capitalism anew? Will he move us into a new realm of capitalism, back toward regulated capitalism, or continue the slide toward a poverty-ridden Dickensian economy that Reagan started?
At the moment, nobody knows.
Reagan began the war on working people when he busted PATCO in the first year of his administration, and then began the process - largely uninterrupted right up to a few months ago - of dismantling the protections organized labor had enjoyed since the New Deal. When Bill Clinton totally abandoned the national industrial policy that Alexander Hamilton had put into place in 1791 with NAFTA, GATT, and the WTO, we made the shift from a "Made in the USA" to a "Do you want fries with that?" economy. And the near-total deregulation of the commodities (including energy) and financial sectors begun in the last years of the Clinton administration and put on steroids by Republicans during the GW Bush administration led to a shift from a "Do you want fries with that?" economy to a "How much would you like to borrow from us?" economy.
Now the manufacturing jobs are shipped overseas, and we're left with lousy jobs and maxed out of credit cards. Many of the few manufacturing jobs that will be created by the Obama stimulus plan will be done in American factories, but the profits will go back to Denmark, Japan, Norway, and other countries whose "green" companies are buying or building our manufacturing facilities.
All of this seems just fine with the Summers and Geithners of the world, and many of the Democrats who rolled over in the face of Republican opposition to the "Buy American" provision that was thus and then removed from the Stimulus bill. "Cheap credit" seems like a goal rather than a warning. And, tragically, several democratic senators have already signaled their fealty to the Robber Barons by refusing to endorse the Employee Free Choice Act.
One can only hope that - like the Obama reversal on the possibility of prosecution of Bush war criminals - our new president will change course and take us back to a "Made in the USA" economy. Like Franklin Roosevelt famously (and perhaps apocryphally) said, perhaps Obama is waiting for us to pressure him to "Make me do it."
64 Comments so far
Show AllThe Glue That Holds Chaos Together
In the movie, "Sneakers", there is a line that Ben Kingsley delivers that is something like this: "If you control the perception of reality, then you control reality."
..I may have paraphrased that. My point being that if enough people believe that Obama is positively influencing the economy, then the economy will improve and there will be more jobs...probably selling fries. ;)
To fix the economy at this point would be like trying to make a Swiss watch out of Jello, so any attempt at such a thing is highly experimental and has no predating definitive protocol.
Rock on, Thom!
Thom,
This is a well-meaning article, but rebooting the system will require much more that mere regulation and redistribution; the system is fatally flawed, and requires comprehensive, fundamental, structural reform. Anything but this will not do the job, and we will be revisiting these repeated crises all over again.
Think about this basic inconsistency of the present system: financially the world is living on drafts upon the future (the credit/debt-money system); economically it is living on the products of the past. Without having to go into mathematical proofs, the empirical evidence shows that the resulting effects of this are:
1. total prices increase at a faster rate than incomes are distributed to pay them;
2. the increasing shortfall is filled with increasing accumulations of debt.
This is the reason why levels of debt are about (at least) 1.5 times more than the amount of money, and the divergence is growing.
This is obviously an impossible situation; over time it can only get more impossible, until at some point it becomes terminal.
It is a tragic game of cat-and-mouse, except the mouse (income; money) is trying to chase the cat (prices; debt)! The cat keeps getting bigger relative to the mouse, and at some point the cat will turn and swallow the mouse whole.
The root cause of this unsustainable and terminal situation is the credit/debt-money-creation mechanism, what was traditionally called 'fractional reserve banking'; this is the snake in the house, which must be gotten rid of, otherwise it will keep biting, and eventually kill all the inhabitants.
The debt-money machine is a Terminator; it is automatic and set to destroy humanity. We made it, we have to change it.
Regulating a Terminator without changing the way it works is obviously not a solution.
There are many so-called monetary reform proposals which suggest doing everything and anything but get the snake out of the house.
The only serious monetary reform solution I am aware of for the USA is the American Monetary Act, developed by the American Monetary Institute, and based on the research of over 3,000 years of history, i.e. based on the facts of human experience. This draft legislation contains the 3 essential elements of meaningful reform that will deliver a lasting solution:
1. It restores the monetary system to society, but does NOT nationalize the banking system (this would be very dangerous; combining the banking system with the law-making system would risk a totalitarian tyranny).
2. It keeps banks doing banking, but stops banks from being able to create money using 'fractional reserve' methods (this is what always brings us to repeated crises).
3. It introduces additional money into the economy in beneficial and accountable ways (this means what is physically possible and socially desirable can always be made financial possible, without fuss or favor).
I trust you will be able to see the vital importance of making this solution known to as many people as possible.
Thank you.
Just call US now :
_________ The United States of Goldman Sachs.
The depth and breadth of this is amazing
Read
http://tinyurl.com/Goldman-Conspiracy
or
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/182789-Jack-Bauer-can-t-stop-The-Goldman-Conspiracy-
Namaste
I wish we could realize that a lot of our prosperity in those "golden years" was due to the fact that every other nation was bombed to bits in WWII and we had a monopoly on slick industrial production.
Now we make nothing and thus we can't get back to that garden. We need more and better paying jobs for average people, not more schooling so we can all become traders or rocket scientists.
Wake up -- "It's the Wages, Stupid"
Times change, economies do as well. I would offer that there has been a trending away from manufacturing as the base of American economic health for some time now. We have become a service and technological nation and that is where our future lies.
There is simply no way to compete with ten cent an hour wages, no environmental consideration, no health and safety requirements and our factories aint coming back, get used to it.
When one reboots a computer, one dumps what's in memory. If one reboots capitalism, the institutions derive from conflicts in prior institutions. We never get to wipe the slate.
As Faulkner put it, "The past is not dead. In fact, it's not even past." If one considers "reboot" as jettisoning the past, one not only ignores part of the past, but enduring aspects of the present --
like Clinton-era officials.
Hartmann sees himself as a progressive populist, but my guess is he is too wrapped up in his own ideology and corporate enterprises like his web site, or radio show, to actually read the REAL populist voices like Hedges, Greenwald, Robert Kennedy, Amy Goodman, Ralph Nader,and numerous others who fall under the rubrick of a change agent. Of course, his income is generated by mainting the status quo at all costs by keeping the entrenched elites like Obama and Pelosi in power. Too bad, years ago that Cat actually stood for something more than his current Democratic apologetic. His current article is nothing more than a watered down attempt apologetically asking if Obama will do something outside the box. As a reference he points to Obama's recent statement about torture and those responsible, but this is before any acutal investigation. More likely it represents nothing more than a dog and pony show, and like everything else, once out of the latest News cycle will be tossed over the cliff while interest wanes.
"The Reagan Revolution of the 1980s was the third "rebooting" of capitalism in the 20th Century, and continues to this day. Scorning the "regulated" part of "regulated capitalism," economic Reaganites from the Gipper himself to GHW Bush to Bill Clinton to GW Bush flipped our economy upside down."
This is simply not true. The "deregulation" of the Reagan era is a myth. Real deregulation would mean ending intellectual property laws, subsidies (especially to transportation and communication) and other government handouts, shutting down the monopolistic Fed and allowing competing currencies, cutting offense spending to free up more money for productive economic activity, and ending the draconian laws that shackle organized labor. All Reagan did was legalize white collar crime, make government regulatory agencies easier to buy off, give more corporate handouts, decrease spending on programs for the poor, murder millions of people in Latin America, and equate "special interests" with the interests of the general population. Some free marketeer.
If you're interested in real free market thought, check out anarchists like Benjamin Tucker, Murray Rothbard, Sam Konkin, Roderick T. Long, or Kevin Carson.
"Meanwhile, still-profitable American corporations manufacture goods for American consumption using Chinese labor and pay virtually no income tax by keeping their profits offshore."
Note: corporations pay no income tax anywhere. They just pass the taxes on to consumers and waste a whole lot of money (that could be spent on something productive) complying with the tax code and paying lawyers to find ways around it. Anyone who advocates for a so-called "corporate tax" is just advocating for another regressive tax and more government waste.
Tom,
Why blame the politicians? The fault is with the American public who are to stupid or lazy to evaluate the record of the politicians who they vote for.
They just listen to what those mountebanks say and believe every word.
Try http://www.votesmart.org/ next time.
MEET THE NEW BOSS... SAME AS THE OLD BOSS...
Sorry about the caps, I was singing.
What is Obama's vision? I don't see it. I don't know which is worse - the Republicans with their open thuggery, or the good-cop Democrats that blunt any real change.
Thom, you should know by now that a growth-based economy is not a real economy at all, but a major drain on resources and human life that eventually sends the majority into penury while temporarily lifting the boats of an ever-decreasing minority.
You should know that as long as Obama attempts to reboot this growth-based economy, nothing will happen that will make life better for the majority of people, and scarcity of resources will continue to mount.
Nicely stated. Hartmann is nothing more than a corporate "yes" man. The elites say "jump" and Hartmann asks "How high?"
I say good luck to obama if he really means to fix this financial mess, but his actions speak so much more than his words on this, and he may as well just be pissing in his boot since the financial and economic sectors are NOT about to give up what they are getting away with(possession is 9/10th of the law, for now). Even if he gets it turned around there is the unsustainable high % of growth that just cannot be sustained unless the population of humans is reduced to balance out the resources used and the renewal of those resources that are renewed. Then the question of another attack that can happen at any time the 'elite' really feel threatened.
But, as I said, if he really means to fix the mess, his actions so far for me pale in comparison with his rhetoric and that leaves me doubting just where his loyal really is. I still want to believe he will get something constructive done but I am running short as hell on belief.
Will Obama Reboot Capitalism Anew?
The only capitalist boot around is the one George Orwell talked about, smashing everyone's faces forever.
That boot isn't only 'capitalist', it's 'communist', 'socialist' and just about every other '-ist'. With a debt-money system operated by and for bankers, all the '-isms' become 'monopolist', i.e. total control, total power ... totalitarian, as George Orwell warned.
"...With a debt-money system operated by and for bankers, all the '-isms' become 'monopolist'..."
- At least in theory, under communism & socialism, there are no private bankers, so there's no such thing as a "debt-money system operated by and for bankers." The ideas of how socialism should work were developed specifically to prevent the tyranny of private finance capital.
It's oversimplistic & entirely too easy to issue blanket denunciations of all "isms." "Ism's" are not all the same, & don't all have the same shortcomings.
I believe you are wrong. Socialism, Communism and Fascism are all about Monopoly Capitalism and Central government control and planning. The difference lies only in the execution and details. In all forms, the worker and non-elite is exploited and manipulated to serve the elite leaders.
Today we are about 40% socialism, 40% fascism (better named corporatism), 20% other. Corporatism involves governments unhealthy relationship with monopoly capitalists. Regulation is the way the created and protect monopolies (cartels).
Socialism is used for areas where there is not enough profit, like insuring the old and poor, thus protecting the insurance cartels who insure the mostly healthy population and at risk for a move to 100% national health care (single payer). The health care providers are also kept in the private domain and secure to charge what the insurance companies, government and private, are willing to pay from increasing premiums (in governments case from increasing taxes or debt). The high cost works in the private insurance companies favour because it is the crippling cost of medical care which makes people need private insurance. The higher the cost, the more people are willing to pay higher premiums for the insurance.
Also, the military is socialist and used by government to open up markets for monopoly capitalists and provide protection for their operations overseas, all while pretending to keep us secure from the enemy. Banking is essentially fascist, with government protection and corporate welfare for the banksters, ensuring the tax payer is on the hook for the losses, and the profits get booked by the monopolists.
The enemy is anyone not going along with the Global Empire being built via Globalization on behalf of the Global Monopoly Capitalists. The Global Government will be one giant Global Corporation with many divisions, and the Global Corporations CEO will be the Global leader of it's Global Work force, maybe called the Global President. There will be no distinction between corporate control and government control, they will be integrated into one entity. That my friend is Global Communism according to Marx. If you don't work, you don't eat, as Stalin once said.
Communism and Socialism was marketed to those as an alternative to Capitalism and Democracy. Both of the latter were discredited by the banksters who financed the Communist movement and used their influence to create depressions, bankrupt companies and control politicians and moved the economy toward Monopoly Capitalism.
FDR did more for Socialism and Monopoly Capitalism than any other President. He was the founding father of our current state of affairs, although Woodrow Wilson might be the grandfather. Wilsons chief adviser was Colonel House. House was a Communist and he was Wilsons Dick Cheney. Under Wilson, we got the Fed, and income tax, and entry into a war we need not have entered at the cost of 150,000 lives and a mountain of debt.
Monopoly capitalism = socialism and fascism, and they are just stepping stones to Global Communism. That's where we are heading, but they will call it some other -ism
The fault (faults) in America's banking system are easily traceable..and correctable. We at the American Peasant are not hopeful that the slogans being offered by Federal Reserve lackeys will be helpful. If one looked at the problem through a prism which included the class warfare elephant in the room, then one might be able to see clearly through the delaying actions/propaganda being shoveled at us. If we American peasants live like Mexicans, as we very well, in the near future, it wouldn't change how Bernake lives his life one whit.
The gap between wages and production has become way too big to ignore. And, of course, corporations keep the spread and then waste it on bonuses and such rather than shore up their own books. We see this dynamic in a lot of sectors of the economy; most notable in the criminal financial markets. In a broader context, and by a default position, we should hope to see many trillions more go to bailing out the top. In this way it will bankrupt the government completely and - finally - allow the people the level of equality our Constitution intended. Not ideal but history seems determined to repeat itself.
"History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce."
Karl Marx
Do we really want to "reboot" capitalism? The post-war period that Hartmann always speaks of so glowingly, led to the frenzy of consumerism and mass production of junk that has nearly destroyed our environment AND the economy. It's time to think of more long-term and rational solutions.
blessthebeasts/kivals
"Do we really want to "reboot" capitalism?"
Yes we do. I believe the period you spoke of really didn't take flight till the 80's. Thats when the indulgance started as I remember it.
The post war period was a great time.....not too much spending, little debt except for a house...not the palace's built these days. Expanding economy but not at the expense of the American worker or citizen.
When you look at all the infoemation, our enviornment is not in near as much danger as advertised (my conclusion...everyone is welcome to their own)
The porblen arose when the Captains of Industry decided they were not average mortals and their needs and decisions should be paramount. Much the same hapopened with our educational elite. The numbers are there for anyone that cares to compare.
As Kivals rightly points out, in the post war period Mickey Mouse could have run a fortune 500 company and couldn't have messed it up.
There is nothing much wrong with the system, the problem begins with the folks both left and right that have perverted things to suit their own agendas rather than the needs and welfare of their own nation's citizens.
That is what needs to be fixed in my opinion.
And Kivals is again right, the competition is there now and trying to compete in the world by allowing your country and another country to be robbed under trade traties like NAFTA is not a good way to start. Or failing to put financial safeguards back where they belong.
Capitalism contains within it the seeds of its own destruction. Despite your willingness to don rose colored glasses and see the past as a desirable place, it was already sowing the seeds that grew to fruition these past few years.
Your glasses are also useful to see no looming environmental disaster, yet the majority of scientists disagree with your assessment. Im going with science. Not only does environmental protection become a way to save our species it also contains within it the path to a new and far more equitable economic model.
I'm sure from your white-bread perspective the post-war period was a great time. And the environment's not in much danger? Go ahead--keep kidding yourself.
The environment had a big problem in the 50's into the 70's, polluted water, sooty air, trash, chemical waste. We were like China is today. But the environment is much better now, maybe because we moved our manufacturing to China, which is one reason our economy is bad.
Of course there is the CO2 myth that CO2 is going to turn the planet into a green hell, maybe thats what you are referring to. If you believe this, my sympathies.
Re Green-is-Red April 24th, 2009 3:19 am, who claims
"But the environment is much better now, maybe because we moved our manufacturing to China, which is one reason our economy is bad."
Good thing for the USA that pollutants respect national borders, eh?
(post deleted because I violated my own self-imposed rule to try to be polite whenever possible)
Darn, I forgot you have a problem with White people. I was speaking of the economy...just the economy.
As to the enviornment, there simply isn't any proof that climate change is causedby Man and there is certainly no science that is credible that even if it was there would be anything anyone could do about it. No science at all. And I don't consider models scienceas they are so fallible. As I said above, that is my conclusion, you are welcome to your own.
I wasn't referring to White People--I am one. I was talking about the culture of consumerism, convenience food (white bread for instance), and rah-rah, the USA can do no wrong which arose after World War II. I should have known you wouldn't get it.
Come Thomas, no science at all?
You mean the mass consensus of scientific associations of the world on anthropogenic global warming contains - in your words - "no science?" I'll grant you that it is not as conclusive as the Pythagorean theorem, but I think by making such an absolutely delusional statement, you have confirmed in the mind of every rational thinking poster here on common dreams that you are a complete irrational loon. No science at all? No proof at all? Wow.
Right, and it was all downstream then, as virtually all the other major industrialized economies had suffered catastrophic damage from the war and US manufacturers had weak competition. Now it is upstream, against a strong current, with a decimated manufacturing base, and it does not look so easy.
Will Obama Reboot Capitalism Anew?
I t _ p a r t l y _ d e p e n d s _ o n :
Who he BOOTS, off the wall-eyed St's raptor roosts
Where he puts the BOOT ( a ' hem )
If de-CAPITATIONalism can re-grow a moral HEAD
If Cranial anal inversion, can be reversed
Will Obama Reboot the Capitalist Idealogy? He's trying. That's what the Democrats are all about.
Will Obama Reboot Capitalism Anew?
It depends on who has his ear, or balls.
Trade doesn't always have to be a bad thing but when it's misused for backdoor slave labor, then it is no longer capitalism but slavery. What TH also forgot to mention is what we are mistaught in life about buying and selling. We are taught that whole-sale volume-sale is "good for the economy" while being taught to write off or even demonize product quality because somehow it cannot generate enough profit. For example, let's say that I am selling a high quality product for $20 but it lasts for 5 years while a competitor is selling an inferior version for $10 and it doesn't last for more than a year. I sell 1 or 2 while he is selling 5. One customer buys my $20 product and it lasts for 5 years. Another customer buys the inferior version from my competitor. 1 year later, assuming its best, he comes back for another one. So in 5 years, that customer who bought from the competitor ends up spending $50 in the same 5 years. Because I'm not expected to make a high profit compared to the one selling the "cheap" version, I will be considered a nobody as far as the "economy" is concerned. The person spending $50 is considered as "contributing to the economy" while the frugal one who bought my product is left out or even blamed for the recession. I know that there are other factors to consider but even those factors do not change the indisputable fact that whole-sale-volume-sale madness is completely destructive. Now, let's apply that to "free" trade over fair trade, wars for oil instead of alternative renewables, quality labor vs "cheap" slave labor, etc ... While on the surface, whole-sale-volume-sale looks artificially "good", what the weasels don't want you to understand are the long term damages and costs that will follow. No economics or finance class that I have heard of will ever teach students that dirty rotten secret.
JenniferBedingfield
"Trade doesn't always have to be a bad thing but when it's misused for backdoor slave labor, then it is no longer capitalism but slavery"
Fair trade is good foe everyone involved, but you put your finger on the current trade problem. Exactly in the middle of it. "when it's misused for backdoor slave labor, then it is no longer capitalism but slavery"
And the real damage as you pointed out recently as others do is the loss of jobs. No jobs, no nothing. You end up on the dole.
Speaking of jobs, isn't it amazing that back in the days when product quality mattered more than quantity for profit that unemployment wasn't as bad compared to the last decade? I know the 80s and 90s had their share of putting quantity over quality but this decade pretty much exposes the fatal flaws of the misnamed "free" trade scams. Every time something breaks and I find that it was made in China, I keep getting that haunted feeling about the events about slave labor in that country. And despite all that supposed trade surplus China got from our "cheap" electorate, I hear that the country's economy keeps collapsing from time to time. It will be interesting, well scary, to see what happens when China's done lending us money like mad.
One should note that the only politicos capable of taking on the robber barons are their neighbors – Roosevelts and Kennedys – because they do not require the largesse of Wall Street to run campaigns. In order to become serious candidates, all others must pass through the hidden primary, available by invitation only, where they swear their allegiance to the elite and their businesses. Overthrowing capitalism cannot occur by electing a new president and I do not know of any members of patrician families who would even want to defy their neighbors in political office. We are forced to await someone of a mischevious and stubborn character who considers politics a hobby.
Excellent Essay Thom. I like the way you frame the pressing questions of the day in history. I believe that President Obama CAN reboot capitalism... if we all help.
Apparently, "Instant gratification takes too long", for many of the readers here.
While Obama is piling sandbags on top of the levee to keep the river from engulfing the town, they're demanding that he tear the levee down and rebuild it from scratch. Lord knows, we need structural reform in the economy. But first we have to deal with the present emergency.
If gasoline supplies dried up the way credit has, would we want the government to build a brand new chain of gas stations - or put oil into the existing infrastructure of refineries, pipelines, tanker trucks, and retailers?
My job is hanging by a thread because my boss can't get a business line of credit to help with payroll. His business is hanging by a thread because our clients can't get construction loans.
The Revolution is going to have to wait until Obama's second term.
"My job is hanging by a thread because my boss can't get a business line of credit to help with payroll. His business is hanging by a thread because our clients can't get construction loans."
The above quote pretty much sums up why the majority are so afraid of revolutionary change. There is still too much for them to lose...
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"In the midst of discontent, talk, theoretical discussions, an individual or collective act of revolt supervenes, symbolizing the dominant aspirations. It is possible that at the beginning the masses will remain indifferent. It is possible that while admiring the courage of the individual or the group which takes the initiative, the masses will at first follow those who are prudent and cautious, who will immediately describe this act as "insanity" and say that "those madmen, those fanatics will endanger everything". They have calculated so well, those prudent and cautious men, that their party, slowly pursuing its work would, in a hundred years, two hundred years, three hundred years perhaps, succeed in conquering the whole world..." --Kropotkin
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While we wait for the 'prudent and cautious' blue party to slowly pursue its work, we allow ourselves to become debt slaves in the hopes of preserving the status quo. Even worse, some people are able to overlook the fact that the blue party already sold themselves out a few decades ago. But, God dammit, they say... we must stop being cynics and pessimists and fall in line with the rest and HOPE for the best.
"...Lord knows, we need structural reform in the economy. But first we have to deal with the present emergency..."
- Actually, the present emergency is itself the inevitable result of capitalism -- the very thing you're hoping Obama will reboot.
You're worried about your job, & the survival of your company. That's perfectly understandable, in terms of your own individual concerns. You'd probably be very relieved if Obama forked over $10 billion to your company, no strings attached, just like he's doing for the banks.
But in the larger picture, the "credit crunch" that menaces your company derives directly from the Wall St swindlers, whose corrupt activities were enabled for decades by both parties -- itself, a nice demonstration of properties at the heart of the capitalist system. Under capitalism, the government ultimately serves the capitalist class. It might wish that we lived in a world where it could serve the interests of all its citizens simultaneously. But in the real world, the interests of the capitalist class often conflict with those of the rest of the population. And in these situations, a capitalist government will invariably serve the former. That's why we are where we are today.
The "financial crisis" was the product of capitalism, & how it shapes government policy. And the bailout is the product of the same thing. The bailout is going to make financial serfs out of the whole population, & might well lead to a catastrophic inflation, and/or collapse of the dollar. That's the system you're rooting for Obama to reboot.
"The bailout is going to make financial serfs out of the whole population, & might well lead to a catastrophic inflation, and/or collapse of the dollar."
That looks more and more likely. And since the finance fiends have completely captured the government, they will just add extra zeroes to their accounts, one way or another, while the rest of us become paupers. I suspect there will be a few openings for capable and talented sophists to explain it all to an angry public, given the historical precedents involving guillotines and such.
Ruinous inflation is the best bet . . . followed by armed insurrection in certain locales. It is not just the violent and paranoid right that will decide it has had enough. Many ordinary people will snap completely once their life savings have been totally wiped out and they lose their homes, etc. You can count on it. Barack Obysmal, aka Sigmund Fraud. The joke is monstrous and it's on us!
I recently saw an item about some right-wing loons hoping to organize a million militia man march on Washington, where the marchers plan to be armed! I think what we need to do is to convince the right-wing loons that their greatest enemies are on Wall Street (difficult, but not completely impossible given that it is true) and that is where they need to march. Then maybe the banksters would stop laughing at the joke, that joke that is on us. I can dream, can't I?
Franklin Roosevelt, his distant cousin, rebooted capitalism in the 1930s, ushering in an era of regulated capitalism - embraced by Republicans like Eisenhower and Democrats like JFK
I remember my father constantly complaining about Eisenhower when I was a kid, yelling "forrrrrrrrrre" whenever he saw him on television. Ike looks pretty good now . . . for a Republican.
Nope.
His model is Clinton--so expect more of the same until we enter the dark ages of empire.
And that you can take to the casino and win.
...already entered the dark age of this empire.
"So expect more of the same until we"...stop blogging and take to the streets as the CITIZENS of Europe do. The oligarchy knows Americans will be complacent.
Dear Mr. Hartmann:
"Reboot[ing] Capitalism", is in fact, the problem, not the solution. It is often said that F.D.R. saved Capitalism from itself, and protected the ruling class from a revolution from below. FDR's "reboot", only ensured that a crisis like the Depression would resurface again when the ruling class were able to finally cast off the regulations cramping their style. We should not reboot, rather we need to change the Operating System. It's time to say no to T.I.N.A. ("There Is No Alternative" (to capitalism)).
If Europe and Asia developed the green technology that we need to launch the green revolution, I have no problem paying for it. Playing catch-up is not the way to develop technology which is so vital to the future of the US and the world.
Many times, in the past, the government has worked with private industry to solve "urgent" problems. Virtually all manufacturing was converted to wartime production (WWII) in a relatively short period of time.
The atomic bomb, the rocket delivery systems, the space race, the internet and countless other technologies (good or bad) came from "crisis"
There is a lot of technology that is being developed or encouraged by the military and the government.
GPS technology, photonics(lasers), nanotechnology and the use of catalysts for clean energy are just emerging. They must be stimulated - quickly
If "Detroit" is closing down, buy the foreign talent needed to retool for the future. We have trillions of dollars to spend on usary; why not channel it into the purchase of technology (patents, expertise)
And why not have partnerships with other governments? If China wants to put in 50% of the money, to buy expertise and develop new industries, they can get 50% of the profits. Or Iceland...or South Africa.
Since we are printing the money, we can buy whatever we want...Let's buy some good stuff for the future, for a change.
"Will Obama Reboot Capitalism Anew?"
He will try and the attempt will fail. The American working class is too tired and over its head in debt and the American business class is financially and morally bankrupt, thoughy it $till has enough power to enforce its insane will on the rest of the country.
American capitalism is a flawed system that deserves to fail and be cast on th ash-heap of history. It won't happen tomorrow, next week, or even next month, but when it does happen it will be rapid, dramatic, and irreversable--and good riddance too.
Poet
and just think--like women are always taking the fall for the good old boys, a black man will be blamed for fall of empire.
Hey, you never know, history has a strange way of twisting back on itself--maybe some day he will be seen as the great (unintentional) liberator.
Sioux Rose
VERN: Interesting perspective.
v.purto
"The American working class is too tired and over its head in debt and the American business class is financially and morally bankrupt..."
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Cannot be said better. Besides, American working class, including relatively highly paid engineers and IT professionals, is so disunited and brainwashed by inceasant propaganda, and, gold-chained to their houses, has so much to loose, that when collapse does happen it will be a big splash.
I personally think that the size of cathastrophy is known to our fuhrers and they are scare to death much more than we think. This is the only explanation I see in paradox called Obama.
Nice post.
"Today, after just thirty years of "free trade" and "right to work" and other oxymoronic nostrums applied as policy, we've become the world's largest importer of finished goods and the world's largest debtor."
As such, it would seem that the Washington/Wall Street motto is:
Ask not what you can do for your country - ask what you can do for its corporatists!
That would include TARP, TALF, and all the other recently engineered forms of theft for "the good of our country?" and its grossly imbalanced globalized trade policies to support the financial portfolios of international corporatists.
The betrayal continues.....
13 to 1 Thom.
13 Trillion so far given/promised to criminal bankers.
1 Trillion (approx) given to we the people as economic stimulus.
In an economy where the GDP was 72% based on consumer spending does this ratio seem right to you?
If the President were serious about economic recovery (rebooting capitalism) wouldn't he have demanded these numbers flipped around?
Obama appears out of his league when it comes to economics.
He's getting rolled by big time by Summers, Geithener and Bernanke.
We'll just have to make him change it, or find someone else who will. To do that we will have to make it clear to people exactly how they're being ripped-off, and exactly what needs to be done to stop it.
Great point on the ratio between bailout and stimulus. I don't think I've seen it put that way before. As far as "getting rolled" by Summers and co., I think Obama is, pardon the pun, thick as thieves with these guys. I hope I'm wrong.
The last comments Obama made about the economy he appeared to be reciting lines that had been drilled into his head.
It didn't appear to me he particularly understood what he was saying.
Nor did it appear that he had sought other points of view.
On constitutional issues I will not cut him an inch of slack: HE'S COMPLICIT.
On economic issues we'll have to wait and see if Obama is naive, stupid, criminal or cowardly.
Obama needs to embrace his own rhetoric. Gather some strength and create change we can believe in, not this timid go with the corrupt flow he is espousing now.
Obama either 1) doesn't understand the problem, or 2) is too corrupt to fix it.
Two key industries that need drastic reform now if there is any hope of the economy picking up are the 1) financial industry, and 2) health care system, both of which are out of control. To date Obama's actions are enabling these industries to be more corrupt and out of control than they were when they created the economic meltdown.
or 3) Political conditions will not allow it (he'd become an impotent Carter); or 4) Obama is charting a moderate course of reform.
Have you heard the shrieks from the right? What do you think would happen if he banged a hard left like many on this board would like (and I would like too)? I think Obama, a Progressive himself, has the sort of respect and understanding for democracy that he will not completely shut out a large portion of the country. He is not Bush, who had no use or respect for the opposition. Obama is attempting a more measured, incremental approach. He does not want to cause serious unrest in this country.
Obama is getting heat from both ends. I dare say he is getting a lot more heat from the right. We need to turn it up.
the financial system and the health care system are one and the same under the existing hegemony of for-profit insurance corporations---which as you correctly observe are out of control.