Quote :

"Are the you arguing that the rich are the majority of americans or that the majority of americans want free shit at the expense of the rich? Either way, I'm not sure how you invalidate my statement."

I'm just ridiculing your notion that financing something == "footing the bill" and that other people get it at that person's "expense". Lol. Jesus fucking christ, I can't even bend my mind back into such a fucked set of values anymore. As if the rich drop a dollar bill and this magnanimous act causes food to spring from the ground

10/27/2011 7:23:10 PM

Seriously you're taking the "pretend the store-bought cake was slaved over in the kitchen" schtick to the whole new level of claiming you're personally responsible for the food when you take a friend to dinner.

[Edited on October 27, 2011 at 7:26 PM. Reason : takes balls]

10/27/2011 7:24:52 PM

so wait, McDouche, "the rich" are now "the majority of americans"? what?

10/27/2011 7:36:15 PM

All I want is a reasonable loan from the bank to start a business, without having to secruitize it with property I don't have.

10/27/2011 8:13:02 PM

^put yourself in their shoes. If I came to you and said I wanted to start a business and need 100k. Im pretty sure you would want to ask a couple questions first or want to know what happens if your business doesnt pan out.

[Edited on October 27, 2011 at 9:30 PM. Reason : .]

10/27/2011 9:29:30 PM

I was surprised by Morning Joe's reaction to the Oakland riots that occurred, with one commentator referring to it as a "Police Riot".

The footage of the flash grenade being thrown at the protesters assisting the wounded veteran is .

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/mark-finkelstein/2011/10/27/morning-joe-oakland-occupy-police-riot-brutality

Also, the column below provides an interesting view of how the occupations could potentially progress.

http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2011-10-25/occupy-self-manage

Quote :

"... Sleeping out is a young person’s passion - but not an option for everyone... So, while sleeping in an occupied space makes sense for some young or homeless folks, why not proactively take for granted that many other folks, particularly with families, will not and cannot sleep under the stars? Why not have a program of activities that returns people to their home locales for organizing purposes each night, or even for all but the explicit time of assembly meetings, perhaps? ... once an occupation has a lot of people, have subgroups initiate other occupations in more places, all federated together and providing one another mutual aid. In the most local, neighborhood occupations, visit every home. Talk with every resident. Involve as many neighbors as possible. Determine real felt needs. If what is most upsetting neighbors is housing concerns, daycare issues, traffic patterns, mutual aid, loneliness, whatever, try to act to address the problems. Have occupations self manage and create innovations artistically, socially, and politically. Have occupations occupy indoors, not just outside... some have tentatively begun occupying abandoned apartments and other buildings, preparatory... to inviting the homeless to dwell in them, as well as to using them for meetings and the like... But to occupy buildings, especially institutions like universities or media, isn’t just a matter of call it, or tweet it, and they will come. It is a matter of go get them, inform them, inspire them, enlist them, empower them, and they will come."

[Edited on October 27, 2011 at 9:50 PM. Reason : ]

10/27/2011 9:49:04 PM

I've never seen Schiff lose an argument yet. He makes fools of occupy wall street

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/10/27/peter_schiff_takes_on_occupy_wall_street_protesters_again.html

10/27/2011 10:01:56 PM

[old]

10/27/2011 10:02:48 PM

I'm loving the outrage over the "veteran being attacked by the police". Like the police walked out there with the rolls from the local VA and facial recognition technology searching for a former military guy to shoot. The focus being put on this by the liberal media outlets just shows even more how much in the tank they are. Even NPR is having a field day fawning all over this when they could barely be bothered to report on Tea Party protests. And they wonder why I didn't and don't pledge.

10/27/2011 10:15:21 PM

How many Tea Party protesters had their skulls cracked open by gas cans?

10/27/2011 10:29:03 PM

^^So what exactly are you arguing? Are you saying that the police can't be bothered to practice a little discretion? Are you arguing that the police would have not hurled flash grenades at people if they knew some of them were war vets?



War veteran or not, the police shouldn't be hurling flash grenades at unarmed US citizens. Period.

[Edited on October 27, 2011 at 10:32 PM. Reason : ]

10/27/2011 10:31:50 PM

Unless the guilty officer was just not aware that the protesters were attempting to assist an injured protester, it's fairly shocking.

10/27/2011 10:31:53 PM

^did u watch the video

10/27/2011 10:49:13 PM

Quote :

"How many Tea Party protesters had their skulls cracked open by gas cans?"

Good question. How many Tea Party protesters were behaving like barbaric humanoids?

10/27/2011 10:59:35 PM

how many of the tea party members took shits in parks and threatened by force to trample the one building that trades literally more money a day than any place on earth?

dude you are lucky there aren't tanks running your dumb asses down.

comparing hipster rioters and professional pan-handlers to the tea party. lol

10/27/2011 11:35:52 PM

Quote :

"So what exactly are you arguing? Are you saying that the police can't be bothered to practice a little discretion?"

what, the discretion to magically know who is or isn't a veteran?

Quote :

"War veteran or not, the police shouldn't be hurling flash grenades at unarmed US citizens. Period."

maybe those citizens shouldn't also be rioting...

10/27/2011 11:48:12 PM

Quote :

"maybe those citizens shouldn't also be rioting..."

dude, can you at least pick one shitty argument instead of bouncing from retarded idea to retarded idea.

Fuck.

First the cops needed to inspect food.

Then you said that the cops shouldn't be held responsible because they "didn't know" the guy was a war vet.

Now you're declaring all of them as rioters.


Fuck, do you have any idea how much of a bootlicker you are?

10/27/2011 11:52:08 PM

Quote :

"I've never seen Schiff lose an argument yet. He makes fools of occupy wall street http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/10/27/peter_schiff_takes_on_occupy_wall_street_protesters_again.html "

I watched the whole video, and although he has some points, lots of his arguments are deeply flawed.

He argues that if government did not issue student loans, free market economy would drive the tuition cost the pointwhere it was out-of-pocket affordable for every college age person.

He argues that free market would self-regulate fair level of wages "Corporation can't just take advantage of their workers and pay them as little as it wants, because businesses compete with one another to buy labor." Tell that to the goddamn sweat shop laborers overseas. When corporations ALL drop their wages because there is no set minimum wage, most manual workers are SOL.

He argues for elimination of all regulatory organizations. I'm not going togo into that one. I'm just going to point out a simple fact that most corporations solely spend money on compliance because they have to, unless it saves them money.

I am a firm believer of the incentive that capitalism provides, and I support regulated capitalism. But let be clear that corporations, once they get past a certain size, pursue one thing only, and that is building wealth for the shareholders. All other actions are is either a part of indireclty achieving that goal, or are an afterthought pushed by concerned individuals with some type of decision making power.

10/27/2011 11:57:14 PM

^ all good points, especially the last paragraph.

Historically, systems with no regulation have always failed miserably for the people, i'm not sure why any intelligent person would think things would be better this time. It seems to be more of the short-sighted wishful thinking that made the bankers think they could have a stable ecosystem from bad debt.

10/28/2011 12:16:55 AM

^^ wow, one of the most thoughtful and balanced posts i've seen in soap box in years!

yup, sometimes we have too much regulation, and the secondary and tertiary effects of it harm the economy (or at least some markets within it. the biomass crop assistance program, or BCAP, is a good example of a gov't subsidy/regulation really screwing up market dynamics). but having an unregulated "free market economy" isn't the answer either, as what's best for individual corporations often isn't what's best for society. oh well. it would help if our politicians couldn't be bought, and could be trusted to make smart decisions in these matters, but they often don't. it's too bad really.

10/28/2011 2:45:59 AM

Info for last year in UK:

FTSE 100 Directors: 49% pay rise
FTSE 100 CEOs: 43% pay rise
Private sector: 2.6% pay rise
Public sector: 0% pay rise
Inflation: 5.2%

I guess the US is facing the same problem.

Now Europe wants to borrow money from China!

10/28/2011 8:23:55 AM

Quote :

"I've never seen Schiff lose an argument yet. He makes fools of occupy wall street http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/10/27/peter_schiff_takes_on_occupy_wall_street_protesters_again.html "

Also I forgot to mention in that most OWS protestors dont' need any help making fools out of themselves in the video. I am not sure it has been edited to skew the message, or if no one in that park with any debate experience cared to walk up and join the dialogue. This could have been a very thoughtful and interesting discussion, but it was ruined with WTF moments like "Are you going to make me a ramp for your ollie," with personal attacks on Schilff, and overwhelmingly emotional and underwhelmingly logical arguments on the OWS side. Props to Schiff for coming out and providing an alternative view. I'm all about freedom of speech and ability to make decisions for yourself after hearing both sides. I just wish OWS had an equally skilled speaker to get to present their point.

10/28/2011 9:21:07 AM

Peter Shiff is a fucking joke and the only way you wouldn't know this is if you just learned about him recently. In particular, he made a fool of himself making very specific predictions about Zimbabweian hyperinflation that never materialize. I'll give him credit though, very few goldbug libertarian fuckheads have the balls to actually make specific predictions about their financial end-times scenarios.

10/28/2011 9:34:01 AM

Quote :

"Historically, systems with no regulation have always failed miserably for the people, i'm not sure why any intelligent person would think things would be better this time. It seems to be more of the short-sighted wishful thinking that made the bankers think they could have a stable ecosystem from bad debt. "

Historically, systems with no regulation have failed miserably for most people. Some people got filthy rich. Wonder why they'd want to keep it that way?

10/28/2011 9:34:22 AM

Also lol at "man on the street" interviews. Literally pioneered by late night comedy talk show hosts. It's almost as though a heavily prepared individual, no matter how stupid in reality, will almost always talk circles around a random, unprepared individual chosen from a group (and edited out on the off-chance they did well).

10/28/2011 9:36:38 AM

Quote :

" Historically, systems with no regulation have failed miserably for most people. Some people got filthy rich. Wonder why they'd want to keep it that way? "

It is through regulation-less systems where mo money = mo power that the entire 6000 or so years of human history that was characterized by absolute brutality and oppression came to pass.

Hint: People didn't give all their gold to the Pharaohs because they said they were Gods. They got the gold through commerce and at times force, *then* made up the whole God-King thing to maintain psychological control once they'd secured control through wealth accumulation. The entire feudal era was one big pre-Industrial imitation of Capitalism. Seriously folks, we have thousands of years of history to look back on when asking "Should we just let wealth flow around unregulated and see what happens?"

10/28/2011 9:39:43 AM

Quote :

"They got the gold through commerce and at times force, *then* made up the whole God-King thing to maintain psychological control once they'd secured control through wealth accumulation."

Fucking hilarious. And impossible. People stop trading with people they fear, so there is no way to build an army through commerce. However, it is readily simple to build commerce through an army. Yet you are so desperate to squeeze everything into your world-view that you are going to rewrite Egyptian History?

Egypt was never a sword-less land. Before Pharaoh's army were the army's of the upper and lower kingdoms, which were built out of smaller kingdoms, which were built out of tribal dictators. As group size grows, someone picks up a weapon and starts bossing people around long before the group starts engaging in commerce.

10/28/2011 10:14:17 AM

Why would anybody join an army if they weren't getting paid?

Quote :

"People stop trading with people they fear, so there is no way to build an army through commerce."

So you're saying that people wont trade with somebody out of fear of their future army? What?

[Edited on October 28, 2011 at 10:21 AM. Reason : .]

10/28/2011 10:20:33 AM

Quote :

"Why would anybody join an army if they weren't getting paid? "

Ask them. We have street gangs in this country.

But, historically speaking, just like 3rd world "countries" today where the army is underpaid (or sometimes unpaid) the compensation comes in the form of being able to take what you want from any civilian, which cannot fight back because you have an army backing you up.

It is this configuration that is keeping much of Africa poor today. Their army is "self financing" so everything of value is stolen by the army, leaving very little commerce.

10/28/2011 10:31:55 AM

Quote :

" Ask them. We have street gangs in this country. "

Yes, they join because the get paid either in cash, benefits such as security, or getting your own street corner to *gasp* CONDUCT COMMERCE. Very few gangs fight each other just to steal. You can't really benefit from stealing from people as poor as you. They fight over turf AKA street corners AKA fucking commerce.

Quote :

" But, historically speaking, just like 3rd world "countries" today where the army is underpaid (or sometimes unpaid) the compensation comes in the form of being able to take what you want from any civilian, which cannot fight back because you have an army backing you up."

You're putting the cart before the horse again. How did the first armies form? You say that people join an army so they can join the army in plundering. That doesn't explain how the army originally formed [Hint: accumulated capital paid the plunder forward]

Quote :

" It is this configuration that is keeping much of Africa poor today. Their army is "self financing" so everything of value is stolen by the army, leaving very little commerce."

Much of Africa is poor today because their scant few natural resources are controlled by foreigners, their agricultural techniques are lacking, climate change is turning their continent into one giant desert, and their infrastructure is practically non-existant. The resulting scarcity of course leads to people fighting to the death over the scraps. Extreme scarcity invariably leads to violence, wherever you go on planet Earth.


[Edited on October 28, 2011 at 10:41 AM. Reason : .]

10/28/2011 10:39:23 AM

peter schiff rules.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/10/27/peter_schiff_takes_on_occupy_wall_street_protesters_again.html

10/28/2011 10:44:21 AM

http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2009/01/peter-schiff-was-wrong.html

http://www.portfolio.com/views/blogs/market-movers/2007/12/10/the-myth-that-lending-rates-rise-in-response-to-policies

http://seekingalpha.com/article/57919-peter-schiff-on-the-housing-market-and-the-rescue-plan

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S98_eMax9xo&feature=player_embedded

http://www.google.com/search?q=schiff+hyperinflation+2010&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ftUn3zU2LNI&feature=player_embedded

Reminder that anyone telling you Peter Shiff isn't a moron outside of a few good calls earlier in his career is either

A) Peter Shiff himself

B) Somebody who just read something written by A having never heard of A before

C) Somebody who just read something written by B having never heard of A before


[Edited on October 28, 2011 at 10:54 AM. Reason : .]

10/28/2011 10:51:22 AM

Quote :

"You can't really benefit from stealing from people as poor as you. They fight over turf AKA street corners AKA fucking commerce."

And yet crime statistics show the victims of theft are almost always robbed by their neighbors. BTW, street gangs pre-date the drug war. Sure, the mob engaged in commerce during prohibition, but before that their main source of revenue was protection.

Quote :

"How did the first armies form? You say that people join an army so they can join the army in plundering. That doesn't explain how the army originally formed [Hint: accumulated capital paid the plunder forward]"

Ridiculous. "accumulated capital" is an advanced form of technology requiring not just trade but money. Governments predate this technology by a huge margin. If you go find a truly isolated jungle tribe of south America, lacking the technology for money, they engaged in no commerce. But managed to wage wars, because all a war requires is pointy sticks, which they had. So, clearly, on the technology tree "army" predates "accumulated capital."

10/28/2011 11:07:40 AM

Quote :

" And yet crime statistics show the victims of theft are almost always robbed by their neighbors. "

"robbed by neighbors" does not equal "robbed by fellow gang members, or gang members at all", but nice try anyway with that "take an extremely broad statistic and make particular implications from it" strat

I would think a libertarian would realize that criminals generally avoid well-armed households when seeking out victims...

Quote :

"BTW, street gangs pre-date the drug war. Sure, the mob engaged in commerce during prohibition, but before that their main source of revenue was protection. "

Protection is useless if a competing gang out-'protects' you, so who's going to join a startup protection racket without getting paid forward to some degree?


You also completely ignored the key point in my last message: these gangs/armies are first formed by paying forward the plunder with accumulated capital had through commerce. It's fucking laughable that you're so dubious of this proposition that money derived from legitimate commerce might be used for evil, lol.

edit: Nevermind, you just did:

Quote :

" Ridiculous. "accumulated capital" is an advanced form of technology requiring not just trade but money."

Jesus Christ you are retarded. It's called a food store, or status trinkets, or weaponry. You can still accumulate wealth in a barter economy you dumb shmuck. "HOW COULD ONE POSSIBLY COMPENSATE AN ARMY IF MONEY DID NOT EXIST"

Quote :

"If you go find a truly isolated jungle tribe of south America, lacking the technology for money, they engaged in no commerce. "

[Edited on October 28, 2011 at 11:16 AM. Reason : .]

10/28/2011 11:14:16 AM

guh, i have this surplus of coconuts

and you have all these bananas

i want those bananas

and you want these coconuts

but how can we possibly have our needs met without abstracting these items into a form completely alienated from the underlying social relation???

10/28/2011 11:25:36 AM

So best case scenario for the OWSers "Valley Forge" is massive contraction of typhoid and dysentery?

10/28/2011 11:30:15 AM

Quote :

"so who's going to join a startup protection racket without getting paid forward to some degree?"

Lots of people. How many years did you pay to go to school that you might one day get a productive job?

People engage in crime today. They might not be able to steal anything. The might get killed or arrested. They might not be able to sell what they steal. But they don't insist on being paid up-front. Hell, only football players get paid up front signing bonuses. 99.999% of humanity has always done their work under the expectation of getting paid in the future. Sometimes in a far distant uncertain future, such as farmers, who work half a year with no payment for their efforts. Ancient and Medieval armies were staffed by unpaid foot-soldiers, often not even fed, expecting a share of the plunder. This is still the pay scheme for more modern Pirates who only got paid a share of the plunder or ransom.

Do you really find it so hard to believe someone once accepted the argument "hey Isaiah, that's enough hunting for today, grab your club and join your friends, you can have a share of whatever plunder we get!"

Quote :

"It's fucking laughable that you're so dubious of this proposition that money derived from legitimate commerce might be used for evil, lol. "

In later era's, such as the iron age, an army without expensive weaponry is not much of an army. So, yes, I'm sure at some point a rich guy helped form an army which then sustained itself on plunder. But it is certainly not a requirement, as you are pretending.

10/28/2011 11:46:41 AM

^^ Occupy Oregon Trail??

10/28/2011 1:03:29 PM

Quote :

"There is no way to build an army through commerce."

Is this, like, a real argument? Seriously? Mercenary forces existed and were employed extensively before the idea of a professional military ever came about. And even if we were to extend the analogy, as you so did with the idea of gang wars - I own company X. I need security to protect my assets. Therefore I hire security company Y to provide guards for my property. I am able to do so because I have capital, which I have acquired via commerce.

10/28/2011 5:36:26 PM

Quote :

"God-King thing to maintain psychological control once they'd secured control through wealth accumulation. The entire feudal era was one big pre-Industrial imitation of Capitalism. Seriously folks, we have thousands of years of history to look back on when asking "Should we just let wealth flow around unregulated and see what happens?""

Bu...but..but.bu...bu, we shouldn't punish those Kings just for being successful. They worked hard, and their parents before them worked hard to accumulate that wealth, and if they weren't wealthy, then they wouldn't be able to give the rest of us bread. Why, no peasant ever gave me bread. If we cede all our wealth to those Kings who sooo deserved it, the rest of that wealth should trickle down back to us.

10/28/2011 5:51:29 PM

^go sign up for foodstamps. you know you want to.


stop being jealous of people who make >250k a year and figure out a way to join them.

[Edited on October 28, 2011 at 6:07 PM. Reason : x]

10/28/2011 6:05:27 PM

Let me quote myself: "So, yes, I'm sure at some point a rich guy helped form an army which then sustained itself on plunder. But it is certainly not a requirement, as you are pretending."

I am not arguing that some rich guy has never in history helped start an army. I am arguing such is not the only way. More than that, not even the most common way. I then had to confront the idea that no one would ever join an army without getting paid up front, historical evidence to the contrary.

10/28/2011 6:08:37 PM

Waiting on Obama to send in the national guard to protect innocent protesters from police who are shooting at crowds and confiscating generators ahead of a very cold weekend. Anything to end the protests. How can we spend billions on this type of thing in other countries and not even grant the basic right of protest to our own citizens?

10/28/2011 6:56:42 PM

^ Flint Sit Down Strike. The Governor of Michigan (with the approval of FDR) actually sent in the National Guard to protect the protesters from the police and strike-breakers.

Unfortunately, I don't think any of our current governors give enough of a damn to protect his/her citizens today.

[Edited on October 28, 2011 at 7:23 PM. Reason : ]

10/28/2011 7:13:46 PM

Quote :

"Waiting on Obama to send in the national guard to protect innocent protesters from police who are shooting at crowds and confiscating generators ahead of a very cold weekend. Anything to end the protests. How can we spend billions on this type of thing in other countries and not even grant the basic right of protest to our own citizens?"

yeh fuel drums in parks should be legalized, and anybody should have the right to storm a business if they feel it is 'greedy' in their eyes.

10/28/2011 8:02:39 PM

^^^^ That's a pretty stilted definition. It only counts as fighting for cash if you get paid upfront? So if I sign a contract with the Army, it doesn't count as fighting for monetary compensation because I won't get paid until my first paycheck?

10/28/2011 8:38:05 PM

^ According to Str8Foolish, getting paid up-front is the only way you would ever join the army. As such, according to him, if the army only offered you a future paycheck then you didn't join the army, regardless of what we might call it.

It is I who is pointing out that people join armies for a whole host of reasons. Sometimes a steady future paycheck, sometimes a signing bonus, and sometimes a share of future spoils.

10/29/2011 11:13:37 AM

Quote :

"stop being jealous of people who make >250k a year and figure out a way to join them."

step one is not letting entrenched and growing wealth to choke off everyone else.

10/29/2011 1:38:40 PM

Quote :

"step one is not letting entrenched and growing wealth to choke off everyone else. "

How does one person having wealth choke off someone else? How is Bill Gates having billions of dollars keeping you from becoming successful? I can see how patents, taxes, lobbying and other similar items could choke you off, but the simple possession and gain of wealth?

10/29/2011 2:35:35 PM

Quote :

"step one is not letting entrenched and growing wealth to choke off everyone else."

And step one of that is getting the government out of the economy.

10/29/2011 2:59:48 PM