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Here's a statement of the obvious: The opinions expressed here are those of the participants, not those of the Mutual Fund Observer. We cannot vouch for the accuracy or appropriateness of any of it, though we do encourage civility and good humor.

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  • What evil lurks in the hearts of men? Lamont Cranston knows but Paul Krugman probably does not.My remark should NOT be interpreted as approval of the Republican Policy but I would be interested in a capable defense of it. Of course that might not be possible.
  • Howdy,

    Some of their actions are cruel, but I doubt if it's a motive for the vast majority. Geez, they're looking at the coming Blue Wave and arranging their golden parachutes. They are so hell bent on sucking up to the donor class they don't have time to consider John and Jane Doe. The problem with this is the further skewing of the inequality of wealth and I fear that if that doesn't stop and reverse course, it will end badly.

    and so it goes,

    peace,

    rono
  • Yes cruelty, and sticking it to President Obama and anything he stood for. This most certainly is not the America I spent 4 years of my life getting shot at for.
  • edited January 2018
    Philosopher Max Weber's book on the Protestant work ethic explains much of this behavior I think. There is a Puritanical punitive strain regarding work that runs through America's ethos from its founding that functions well economically--only economically--in capitalism's early stages in a country as there's plenty of work to go around. Therefore anyone not working is considered sinful and lazy and deserves what they get in this Puritanical view. So the U.S. became very productive.

    But when you have a well developed nation that is suffering from significant overcapacity thanks to technology and cheap labor overseas, that ideology doesn't really work any more as many people are displaced from the labor force through no fault of their own. It also doesn't function obviously with children in the CHIP healthcare program who shouldn't be working in the labor force but in school, although I suspect there are some in the Republican party who wish to go back to the old days of child labor. In any case this Puritan strain leads many politicians who are either Evangelical Christians or market efficiency ideologues--same thing in some cases--to believe that those struggling economically without work are "sinful" and "deserve what they get."

    One of the worst things you can say to someone in our culture because of this Puritanism is to call them lazy. This slur is often applied to those on welfare, disability, food stamps, etc. But what if our addiction to productivity and growth leads to manufacturing a lot of junky goods the world doesn't really need--search for plastic poop on Amazon--and leads to poisoning of our environment with toxic emissions from manufacturing and climate change? In some respects, it's true. This antiquated Puritan ideology is a death cult.
  • @LewisBraham- Yes, I think that you've got it pretty well nailed.
  • edited January 2018
    With respect to Krugman, I'm pretty much in agreement with his general line of thinking. But I do question some of his premises, such as his suggestion that states should not care about saving "federal" dollars. That's just baloney... those are United States taxpayer dollars, not "state" or "federal". There is a limited supply of them, and attempts to use them responsibly should be appreciated.
  • This pretty much captures the prevailing philosophy since the beginning:
    blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2013/12/24/punitive-politics-blame-the-puritans/
  • edited January 2018
    @LewisBraham- Oh, yes, that rang a bell. I remember reading that article years ago. Certainly brings back memories... I always thought that John Boehner was at heart a decent man (unlike most of today's crop of brutish right-wing political hacks), even when I disagreed with him.
  • the big split now is that the supposedly undeserving poor are never ever to be on the same respected level as the undeserving rich
  • edited January 2018
    Welcome to the third world. The ultimate irony is that Trump and his cohort will make a "shithole country" out of us too, before he's done.
  • Hi @Old_Joe
    You noted:"Welcome to the third world. The ultimate irony is that Trump and his cohort will make a "shithole country" out of us too, before he's done."
    What are the odds that a management team is working on an relative etf, soon coming to a city near you; as the saying goes.
    There are many great thinkers here. What would be an appropriate ticker for a domestic shithole country etf?
  • You guys are a hoot!
    It’s amusing to see you glom together in your group-think sessions
    and get all hot and sticky in your fright, anger and despair.
    What will you, Krugman and Mark Cuban say when the apocalypse fails to appear?
    Or maybe you’re playing it cool by not stating a due date. So you’re safe for now.
  • The safest way to play is for a troll to attack people anonymously without using his real name. That way it's impossible to tell whether he's a real person or a bot or sock puppet for Mr. Putin or some other already existing member of this board assuming a different identity.

    Note that Krugman made no apocalyptic predictions in his article. He's talking about already existing cruelties in the nation. Nor did I make any predictions. I'm talking about a cruel punitive Puritanical strain that has existed in the U.S. from the beginning.

    Also, crucially, for many Americans the apocalypse may already be here:
    https://theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/05/my-secret-shame/476415/

    This article is by the same author, Neal Gabler, who wrote the one about the Protestant work ethic. He notes in the first paragraph:
    Since 2013, the Federal Reserve Board has conducted a survey to “monitor the financial and economic status of American consumers.” Most of the data in the latest survey, frankly, are less than earth-shattering: 49 percent of part-time workers would prefer to work more hours at their current wage; 29 percent of Americans expect to earn a higher income in the coming year; 43 percent of homeowners who have owned their home for at least a year believe its value has increased. But the answer to one question was astonishing. The Fed asked respondents how they would pay for a $400 emergency. The answer: 47 percent of respondents said that either they would cover the expense by borrowing or selling something, or they would not be able to come up with the $400 at all. Four hundred dollars! Who knew? Well, I knew. I knew because I am in that 47 percent.
  • Welcome, Flack!
  • Hi, davidmoran.
    Hope you're enjoying this market run.
  • I am so wealthy I want to call for more Benghazi hearings
  • Dear LewisBraham,

    You said: “The safest way to play is for a troll to attack people anonymously without using his real name. That way it's impossible to tell whether he's a real person or a bot or sock puppet for Mr. Putin or some other already existing member of this board assuming a different identity.

    A troll? Is this directed at me? Me, who’s been a here for many years?

    “Note that Krugman made no apocalyptic predictions in his article.”

    You’re correct. He made his market crash prediction prior to the election outcome.
    And Mark Cuban stated that he would sell short the market if Trump was elected.

    “Nor did I make any predictions.”

    So noted – and I never said that you did.

    “I'm talking about a cruel punitive Puritanical strain that has existed in the U.S. from the beginning.”

    Yes you are. It’s all so … unfair! And what, prey tell, is your solution?

    I read The Atlantic article with your foreword “Also, crucially, for many Americans the apocalypse may already be here:
    https://theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/05/my-secret-shame/476415

    Interesting, but hardly “apocalypse”. I’m reminded that someone once said that each day we are just one choice away from changing our life.
    This guy spent years writing books but didn’t choose to spend a couple of days
    expanding his financial knowledge. Well, his choice.
  • Anyone who knows anything knows the modern repuglican party exists for only one reason. That reason is to put ALL the money in the hands of the fewest people. Sadism is only a by product of the greed. All all the social issues are just noise to distract the 98% of the citizens to vote against their own economic interests.
  • edited January 2018
    What you say it all true, but it's way more than a 'byproduct' --- there is a huge amount of payback, for Woodstock, for L B J's groundshaking civil rights programs, for affirmative action, for fair housing initiatives, for welfare programs in their broadest senses, for the ERA and anti-NRA efforts, for Roe v Wade, for the Vietnam catastrophe that we still cannot reckon truthfully with, for all such accompanying perceived snootiness and condescensions, and on and on. The surprising DT victory was not this WWC thing; all the voter income data make that quite clear. Obama resentment and Clinton repudiation were, and remain, paramount. Death w progressivism, etc etc etc.
  • The anti Woodstock vote? Against fair housing? against civil rights? Against EQUAL RIGHTS? Yuup, that explains today's whack repugs all right. But at the end of the day and at the top of the pyramid,,,,, it's all about the money. The shit you talk about is just repug distractions while the top dogs take everything and pay nothing. And don't fool yourself,,,, you know that is ALL that matters to them.
  • larryB said:

    ,,,,, it's all about the money. ,,, you know that is ALL that matters to them.

    +1
  • maybe at the top, okay, but for the base below, it is all resentments and payback

    a winning combination!
  • but also destruction (expertise, academe, more) and 'restoration':

    (PK NYT yesterday):

    ... an important 2012 book, Enrico Moretti’s “The New Geography of Jobs,” [is] about the growing divergence of regional fortunes within the United States. Until around 1980, America seemed on the path toward broadly spread prosperity, with poor regions like the Deep South rapidly catching up with the rest. Since then, however, the gaps have widened again, with incomes in some parts of the nation surging while other parts fall behind.
    Moretti argues, rightly in the view of many economists, that this new divergence reflects the growing importance of clusters of highly skilled workers — many of them immigrants — often centered on great universities, that create virtuous circles of growth and innovation. And as it happens, the 2016 election largely pitted these rising regions against those left behind, which is why counties carried by Hillary Clinton, who won only a narrow majority of the popular vote, account for a remarkable 64 percent of U.S. GDP, almost twice as much as Trump counties.
    Clearly, we need policies to spread the benefits of growth and innovation more widely. But one way to think of Trumpism is as an attempt to narrow regional disparities not by bringing the lagging regions up but by cutting the growing regions down. For that’s what attacks on education and immigration, key drivers of the new economy’s success stories, would do. ...
  • David,,,, is your last posted to the wrong thread? I thought this was about the cruelty and sadism of one political party.
  • Well, were discussing motives, and I was fleshing out w/ the other, more destructive forms of resentment and newly analyzed consequences thereof, that's all.
  • FWIW, and perhaps it's worth nothing at all, we have a federal government controlled by the right and left extremes. Both groups seems to care about one thing only, and that is power. There is no place for vocal moderates in either party who advocate real compromise, since that does not meet the filter for the left or right extremes. There were times (many years ago!) when moderate/liberal Republicans sought common ground with Democrats, and the same was true for the other side. Both parties have 3 or 4 issues that are essentially litmus tests for membership, so the days of compromise are over. The two women senators from Maine (now just one), might have been the last moderates. The fact that both were registered Republicans is a source of anguish for the hard-core right. There are none in the Democratic party now...it's just not allowed to question that party's leadership on issues. Until a viable third party gains some steam and legislative clout, I don't see things changing at all. Special interest groups control campaign dollars for both parties, so the chances of any person not adhering to their party's dogma winning election are darned slim at best. Spoke with a former US representative, who said essentially that on day one of their terms, they are taken to a bank of phones and told to start raising money for their next election. Both parties do this, and I find it totally disgusting.

    I don't see either party as inherently cruel, but I think the way both are run by big money and unbending dogma is itself cruel to all Americans. I'll shut up and move on to another thread.
  • Please, please, you of all smart people, knock it off w/ this false equivalence / 'both sides do it' crap! Name one extreme left elected official and his or her extreme-left position(s). Good Lord.
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