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Forums - Politics - Wall Street Protests

Kasz216 on 19 October 2011

Also worth noting....

our current unemployment rate is like... normal for most of Europe.

France Unemployment rate is 9.5% and really that's not exceptionally high for France.

You've really gotta ask yourself something...

Why did the US have so much lower unemployment then Europe.

It's either

A) The US system is superior. In which case, changing it to be more Europeon like the occupy Wallstreet people want WON'T help. (Though actually, it's not even Europeon like, a lot of people are against the Vockler rule being put into place soley because Europe didn't follow suit like they promised giving their banks a HUGE advantage.)

B) The US system isn't superior and is just like eveyrone else. In which case, you shouldn't be mad at this unemployment because it's NORMAL and the US was still benefiting from being an economic juggernaut largely due to the effects of World War 2 increase in foreign demand and giant decrease in the production capabilities of Europe.



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Marks on 19 October 2011
Raze said:
Marks said:
People are just complaining to complain. They don't even know why they're there.

People should be pissed about overspending (deficit budgets), unemployment (caused by gov't) and overtaxation. Its funny how people are mad at big business (aka the people who create jobs and keep the economy going) but not the government (who interferes with business and creates policies that cause unemployment e.g. Minimum wage, supporting unions, etc.).

The protest should be at the Whitehouse not Wall Street.

Absolutely agreed, well minus for the whitehouse part - it should be at the US Capitol building. After all, its the congress who are mostly responsible for the gov't actions.


Good point! Couldn't agree more. 



badgenome on 19 October 2011
Raze said:

Come on, use Ctrl-F and type "deregulation" if you don't want to read the whole article. Not just financial, but for the other industries too. Look what it did for them then, and the megapowers they've become since they were let off the leash.

As for a flimsy link, here http://washingtonindependent.com/82632/clinton-faults-himself-for-financial-industry-deregulation

I don't disagree that people screwed themselves over and lived irrationally, that's not the debate. You said, and I paraphrase, that we need more deregulation to make the economy better. History has shown, as provided through the before-mentioned links, that while some deregulation makes for immediate fixes, it has horrible results down the road. In the above link, is a brief blurb, an admission by Clinton, that his financial deregulation led to the creation of megabanks like BoA, who have recently just pulled a fast one on the Fed itself that threatens the entire financial structure of the United States.

My point is simple, deregulation was the weapon that killed America, and the United States government was the one to pull the trigger.

I never said we need deregulation to make the economy better. What I said is that specific government regulations contributed to the problem in a big way. For instance, when the Community Reinvestment Act said that, if a bank wants to participate in normal activities such as engaging in a merger or opening a new branch, it had better be loaning money to low income people (read: minorities), that paved the way for a lot of bad shit to happen. Ditto with Bush's "ownership society" initatives. So, if the government has regulations that are actively destructive, or it is just bad at enforcing existing regulations, then the answer cannot be simply MOAR REGULASHINZ.

Furthermore, a poll shows that fully half of the OWS protesters believe that TARP was necessary. So, to the extent that they have a coherent agenda at all, many of them are protesting something with which they agreed. Instead of yelling at Wall Street, they ought to take it up with Obama and Congress and demand to know why, if these banks which were "too big to fail" were prevented from failing, they weren't made not too big to fail in the future as a part of the bargain.



Raze on 19 October 2011
Kasz216 said:
Raze said:
badgenome said:
Raze said:

That's where we differentiate, I suppose.  You seem to think that violence begins with the protesters, I see it as beginning with the police. Of course, to be entirely honest, I see protesting as a giant waste of time, and believe that if they want the CEOs attention, they'll follow them to their house and get their address and post it online for the world to know. Because you never know what maniac will go vigilante and hunt the greedy bastard down. Either way, it'll seriously diminish the CEOs quality of life, making them quicker to react and more willing to listen.  >=)

I support the movement and anger of the OWS protest, but this hippie/peace-loving crap will accomplish nothing.

 

Well then, take heart, little fella. Doug Schoen polled some OWS protesters and found that one-third of them are as in favor of using violence as you are.

=D Little fella? I was born in the 70s and I'm over 6'2

Let me clarify, I'm saying that peaceful protests accomplish nothing, especially when you're yelling at a bunch of mostly-soundproofed buildings.

@Kas - Interesting article, my solution is a complete revamp of the US gov't. That's the REAL source. Without the regulations from long ago in place, the big businessmen have nothing keeping them in line. Between the worthless oil wars, massive bailouts, freely giving billions in international aid, protecting bigwigs from prosecution, I feel justified in saying that the US government has failed the people, and that it's time to start anew.

I'm not calling for people to go start killing cops or CEOs, I'm calling for people to do something significant, instead of meditating in a park.

Between active , reserved and retired military, government milita forces and local police throughout the US, the combined amount equals to less than 1% of the US population. The US unemployment rate is 9% of the population. If HALF of the unemployed revolted, all of the defensive forces would be outnumbered by over 4 to 1. Combine that with the concept that a good portion of the  military - active, reserved and retired, would not side with the governing powers in case of a revolution or civil war.

What I'm saying is - be prepared. I can see the fuse is lit, doesn't take a clairvoyant to see that.

 

 

 


1)  You said you're not caling for people to start killing cops or CEO's.... then your very next sentence is about Killing cops and CEOS.

2)  Most of the Occupy Wallstreet movement is for international Aid.  Additionally, they're against things like the new natural gas drilling that will bring tons of jobs becuase it's not alternative energy... so half your reasons don't mesh with the movement.

3)  Thirdly, there were no Oil Wars.  Or if they were oil wars they sure were shitty ones, since before the invasion of Iraq most of the oil produced their went to Europe in the corrupt oil (and kickbacks to Un officials) for food (and banned items) program.

Now the majority of Iraq Oil and newly discovered natural resoruces goes to China.  Afghanistan oil production isn't really getting anywhere.

4)  Protecting Bigwigs from prosecution... if you mean Wallstreet, then no, they aren't.  Those who actually were guilty of crimes were punished, "Wallstreet criminals" is really nothing but a false labeling.

If you mean certain officials that have been accused of warcrimes.  I don't see how this hurts the average person.

5) There is no system of government free from lobbyist involvement, actually as far as political corruption goes we're very low on the scale because we have relativly small government compaired to most of the world.

Most of the shit that's "corruption" over here isn't even considered so in other countries. 


1 - Thats a bit of a massive leap, I said do something significant - something more than flop around a park all day.  Damn Kas, I'd hate to see how you go from being bored to not bored.  =D

2- I support the movement in its disgust with the system, not in its proposals. I am not a socialist. I don't quite recall discussing natural gas drilling, so I'm not sure how that's relevant here. I fully support independently generated energy, such as enhanced solar or turbine power. I believe everyone should create their own energy for consumption, at home and in transport alike. (which is a lengthly technology discussion for another time)

3 - The US gov't seemed to feel that success in Iraq would help with oil control. How exactly still remains a mystery. Having contact with many people in the military who served in Iraq, even they state that our involvement in Iraq had nothing to do with Hussein. Maybe you can shed some light on how Al'Qaeda = Iraq, you might be better read on the topic than anyone I've spoken with yet.

4 - A bit of a tangent, if you read my OP, I actually stated that I don't believe that the anger should be focused on Wall St (with exception of oil speculators who are quite shady, but again, different discussion). My point is moreso with the whole Cheney scandal,  how GWB Jr protected him from testifying, his direct involvement with Enron, etc. It's more the politicans being protected from justice than CEOs. CEOs get busted for bribery or have the SEC on their backs at least.

5 - Agreed there, but would you not agree that lobbying has constricted a lot of progress in this nation, such as agendas to keep oil based energy relevant? What if the US citizens themselves were the system of checks and balances? It'd be pretty hard for the lobbyists to buy the vote of every eligible American voter, no?  I believe in a direct democracy, a leader with a skeleton crew gov't, and the people of America vote on what is passed and what is not. Yes, it sounds idealistic and very hard to manage, but I think it can be done.



The Carnival of Shadows - Folk Punk from Asbury Park, New Jersey

http://www.thecarnivalofshadows.com 


Raze on 19 October 2011
badgenome said:

I never said we need deregulation to make the economy better. What I said is that specific government regulations contributed to the problem in a big way. For instance, when the Community Reinvestment Act said that, if a bank wants to participate in normal activities such as engaging in a merger or opening a new branch, it had better be loaning money to low income people (read: minorities), that paved the way for a lot of bad shit to happen. Ditto with Bush's "ownership society" initatives. So, if the government has regulations that are actively destructive, or it is just bad at enforcing existing regulations, then the answer cannot be simply MOAR REGULASHINZ.

Furthermore, a poll shows that fully half of the OWS protesters believe that TARP was necessary. So, to the extent that they have a coherent agenda at all, many of them are protesting something with which they agreed. Instead of yelling at Wall Street, they ought to take it up with Obama and Congress and demand to know why, if these banks which were "too big to fail" were prevented from failing, they weren't made not too big to fail in the future as a part of the bargain.


Ah finally, we've come to an agreement.

As for regulations, yes, there are a LOT of bad moves more recently that caused the credit/housing mess, as you said above. My point on deregulation was more about what was done in the long-ago deregulation. How about this thought - price regulation for fixed market oil? For example, a price lock of $2.00/gallon for gasoline. When gas prices hit $3.00/gallon, oil companies post 300-400% profits. If they took a 50% hit in price, they'd still make 150%-200% profit, and the suggested regulation isn't asking for that much of a reduction.



The Carnival of Shadows - Folk Punk from Asbury Park, New Jersey

http://www.thecarnivalofshadows.com 


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Kasz216 on 19 October 2011
Raze said:
Kasz216 said:
Raze said:
badgenome said:
Raze said:

That's where we differentiate, I suppose.  You seem to think that violence begins with the protesters, I see it as beginning with the police. Of course, to be entirely honest, I see protesting as a giant waste of time, and believe that if they want the CEOs attention, they'll follow them to their house and get their address and post it online for the world to know. Because you never know what maniac will go vigilante and hunt the greedy bastard down. Either way, it'll seriously diminish the CEOs quality of life, making them quicker to react and more willing to listen.  >=)

I support the movement and anger of the OWS protest, but this hippie/peace-loving crap will accomplish nothing.

 

Well then, take heart, little fella. Doug Schoen polled some OWS protesters and found that one-third of them are as in favor of using violence as you are.

=D Little fella? I was born in the 70s and I'm over 6'2

Let me clarify, I'm saying that peaceful protests accomplish nothing, especially when you're yelling at a bunch of mostly-soundproofed buildings.

@Kas - Interesting article, my solution is a complete revamp of the US gov't. That's the REAL source. Without the regulations from long ago in place, the big businessmen have nothing keeping them in line. Between the worthless oil wars, massive bailouts, freely giving billions in international aid, protecting bigwigs from prosecution, I feel justified in saying that the US government has failed the people, and that it's time to start anew.

I'm not calling for people to go start killing cops or CEOs, I'm calling for people to do something significant, instead of meditating in a park.

Between active , reserved and retired military, government milita forces and local police throughout the US, the combined amount equals to less than 1% of the US population. The US unemployment rate is 9% of the population. If HALF of the unemployed revolted, all of the defensive forces would be outnumbered by over 4 to 1. Combine that with the concept that a good portion of the  military - active, reserved and retired, would not side with the governing powers in case of a revolution or civil war.

What I'm saying is - be prepared. I can see the fuse is lit, doesn't take a clairvoyant to see that.

 

 

 


1)  You said you're not caling for people to start killing cops or CEO's.... then your very next sentence is about Killing cops and CEOS.

2)  Most of the Occupy Wallstreet movement is for international Aid.  Additionally, they're against things like the new natural gas drilling that will bring tons of jobs becuase it's not alternative energy... so half your reasons don't mesh with the movement.

3)  Thirdly, there were no Oil Wars.  Or if they were oil wars they sure were shitty ones, since before the invasion of Iraq most of the oil produced their went to Europe in the corrupt oil (and kickbacks to Un officials) for food (and banned items) program.

Now the majority of Iraq Oil and newly discovered natural resoruces goes to China.  Afghanistan oil production isn't really getting anywhere.

4)  Protecting Bigwigs from prosecution... if you mean Wallstreet, then no, they aren't.  Those who actually were guilty of crimes were punished, "Wallstreet criminals" is really nothing but a false labeling.

If you mean certain officials that have been accused of warcrimes.  I don't see how this hurts the average person.

5) There is no system of government free from lobbyist involvement, actually as far as political corruption goes we're very low on the scale because we have relativly small government compaired to most of the world.

Most of the shit that's "corruption" over here isn't even considered so in other countries. 


1 - Thats a bit of a massive leap, I said do something significant - something more than flop around a park all day.  Damn Kas, I'd hate to see how you go from being bored to not bored.  =D

2- I support the movement in its disgust with the system, not in its proposals. I am not a socialist. I don't quite recall discussing natural gas drilling, so I'm not sure how that's relevant here. I fully support independently generated energy, such as enhanced solar or turbine power. I believe everyone should create their own energy for consumption, at home and in transport alike. (which is a lengthly technology discussion for another time)

3 - The US gov't seemed to feel that success in Iraq would help with oil control. How exactly still remains a mystery. Having contact with many people in the military who served in Iraq, even they state that our involvement in Iraq had nothing to do with Hussein. Maybe you can shed some light on how Al'Qaeda = Iraq, you might be better read on the topic than anyone I've spoken with yet.

4 - A bit of a tangent, if you read my OP, I actually stated that I don't believe that the anger should be focused on Wall St (with exception of oil speculators who are quite shady, but again, different discussion). My point is moreso with the whole Cheney scandal,  how GWB Jr protected him from testifying, his direct involvement with Enron, etc. It's more the politicans being protected from justice than CEOs. CEOs get busted for bribery or have the SEC on their backs at least.

5 - Agreed there, but would you not agree that lobbying has constricted a lot of progress in this nation, such as agendas to keep oil based energy relevant? What if the US citizens themselves were the system of checks and balances? It'd be pretty hard for the lobbyists to buy the vote of every eligible American voter, no?  I believe in a direct democracy, a leader with a skeleton crew gov't, and the people of America vote on what is passed and what is not. Yes, it sounds idealistic and very hard to manage, but I think it can be done.


1)  That didn't actually adress anything.  Also if people are going to revolt because of europeon level unemployment... we're in real trouble as a people as far as realism goes.

2) Supporting someone who will make things worse is just, stupid.  Even if you do agree with their overall reason of being upset.

3)  Those people in the military, were any of them actually policy making people?  Why would your average footsoldier be told anything about why people invaded.  Where are you getting the US thought it would help "oil" control.   Hell where are you even getting "Al Queda"?   The offical line was "Weapons of Mass Destruction". 

The unoffical line is Bush beleived in Democratic exceptionilism and that he could just knock over foreign countries with unpopular leaders, set up a democracy and all would be well... and what better country to start with then the one that

A) His father couldn't conquer

B) Tried to kill his father.

C) Was giving the US a great excuse by not letting weapons inspectors in, and by lieign to Saddam Hussein who actually thought he did have WMDs.   Well more WMDs then he had, because they did find WMDs, just not the big name WMDS like nukes.

D) Is right next to to Iran who is causing all kinds of trouble and can't be as eaisly directly acted against.   Sure Afghanistan is right next to Iran too, but the worthless 3/4ths of Iran.  If you ever look at a map of Iran you'll notice everything is situated on the third to the west.

 

4)  That's one politician,  I wouldn't mind seeing an investigation into Cheney but considering the fact that i believe he donated all his Enron money to charity as soon as he got it, I'm not sure what the motivation for corruption would be.  However most politicians generally do get charged or investgated for bribery, sure some get away like Frank Dodd.  (How he's the head of the "anti-banking bill" and people take that bill seriously when he was caught taking bribes from banks i'll never know.)

5)  I actually think direct democracy could work pretty well with modern technology.   The issue is we'd have Tyranny of the Majority and people would either put their short term benefits ahead of the long term or even worse put neither ahead of each other and vote for something that "sounds good".   The demands of the Occupy Wallstreet movement which are mostly gibberish pretty accurately reflects this.

A $20 minium wage sounds great to the laymen.... in practice....



badgenome on 19 October 2011
Raze said:


Ah finally, we've come to an agreement.

As for regulations, yes, there are a LOT of bad moves more recently that caused the credit/housing mess, as you said above. My point on deregulation was more about what was done in the long-ago deregulation. How about this thought - price regulation for fixed market oil? For example, a price lock of $2.00/gallon for gasoline. When gas prices hit $3.00/gallon, oil companies post 300-400% profits. If they took a 50% hit in price, they'd still make 150%-200% profit, and the suggested regulation isn't asking for that much of a reduction.

Not a fan of price controls, for fairly obvious reasons. Neither am I especially offended by an oil company making massive profits given the fact that their product is critical to life as we know it. The fact that they receive about $20 billion in subsidies per year is what gets my goat.

The problem with current regulations is that they're written by people who have their own constituencies and donors in mind, usually with direct input from lobbyists. The stiffest penalty there is, is bankruptcy without any possibility of a government bailout. Instead, we have what amounts to a long series of wristslaps, and hey, the more you fuck up, the more taxpayer money you'll be lavished with.



snakenobi on 19 October 2011
Kasz216 said:
snakenobi said:
kingofwale said:

one of the most senseless protests of all time, no fixed agenda or goal, no organizations, no plan going forward.

people cry about police brutality, why not go to a third world countries and actually learn what the word means. the same goes for 'poverty in US', most second or third world people simply laugh at us for claiming so, this is even factoring in PPP (if you don't know what PPP is, you shouldn't be making such claims)


they call poverty in US as they are US citizen and US is a wealthy state

why should they be comparing themselves to third world countries?

Because generally that's how the economy works... you can either grow it quickly unevenly, or grow it slowley evenly (or even have it stop!).


It doesn't need to be such a dichotomy that your either the USA or a thrid would country.... HOWEVER, more often then not the choice for the poor is between having a higher amount of money or a higher share of money.

You have to decide if you'd rather live in a society where you can afford 12 videogames a year and some rich CEO has a flying Yacht he can fly to the moon... or if you can afford 10 videogames a year and some CEO can afford 12 videogames a year.

I can understand the viewpoint of a lot of people, but i can't understand the viewpoint of someone who intentionally hurts their own standard of living soley to hurt the standard of living of someone they don't know.

yeah but that isn't the problem of a person who is saying is in poverty but the planning commision of the country



Kasz216 on 19 October 2011
snakenobi said:
Kasz216 said:
snakenobi said:
kingofwale said:

one of the most senseless protests of all time, no fixed agenda or goal, no organizations, no plan going forward.

people cry about police brutality, why not go to a third world countries and actually learn what the word means. the same goes for 'poverty in US', most second or third world people simply laugh at us for claiming so, this is even factoring in PPP (if you don't know what PPP is, you shouldn't be making such claims)


they call poverty in US as they are US citizen and US is a wealthy state

why should they be comparing themselves to third world countries?

Because generally that's how the economy works... you can either grow it quickly unevenly, or grow it slowley evenly (or even have it stop!).


It doesn't need to be such a dichotomy that your either the USA or a thrid would country.... HOWEVER, more often then not the choice for the poor is between having a higher amount of money or a higher share of money.

You have to decide if you'd rather live in a society where you can afford 12 videogames a year and some rich CEO has a flying Yacht he can fly to the moon... or if you can afford 10 videogames a year and some CEO can afford 12 videogames a year.

I can understand the viewpoint of a lot of people, but i can't understand the viewpoint of someone who intentionally hurts their own standard of living soley to hurt the standard of living of someone they don't know.

yeah but that isn't the problem of a person who is saying is in poverty but the planning commision of the country

I'm not talkiing about people who are currently in a system like that.

I'm talking about people who are in the US right now, who either want a system like that or want to move in that direction.

IE the Occupy Wallstreet protesters who's demands would make us all MUCH poorer, but at least that poorness would be more evenly divided.



Kantor on 19 October 2011
silicon said:
Kantor said:

The people protesting honestly can't even agree with each other about what they want. A couple of proposals (if you can call them that, because they're really just anti-capitalist rhetoric like "ending corporate personhood" whatever the hell that is supposed to mean - besides which Congress can't actually overturn a Supreme Court decision, that being the basis of the separation of powers) have support, but others have even this group of staunch (designer-wearing, apple-using) anti-corporatists divided.

Occupy Wall Street comprises about 20,000 people. It claims to represent 99% of the population. How on earth can it do that when less than 0.01% of the population has bothered to show up, and when even these people can't agree about what they want? It honestly reminds me of Soviet communism, not in its proposals, but in its methodology. It's essentially "I am doing what's best for you, so shut up, because I don't care what you think". Hardly a fine symbol of a democratic movement.

But that's not true. They are willing to listen to any opinion that agrees with their own. Any opinion foolish and misguided enough to disagree with the opinions of a bunch of twenty-somethings with no education in economics is that of a brainwashed slave/moron/worst of all, a member of the 1%, one of those foul creatures who eat your babies and kick puppies for fun.

Some of their proposals aren't half bad. Some are completely idiotic (prosecuting CEOs for causing the recession, when they really didn't doa ny such thing). I certainly agree that there should be a cap on campaign donations. The thing is, there's already a cap on campaign donations of $2500. Abolishing donations entirely just means that the richest candidate would be elected. Fun fact: Mr Hero of the People Barack Obama received $540 million in donations to wicked demon John McCain's $380 million. I have trouble understanding how the 1% have a stranglehold on the electoral process when somebody as clearly left-wing as Barack Obama gets enormous amounts of funding and wins.

And that's not even to say that I dislike Obama, just that claiming that any President who fights for the 99% is doomed to eternal failure (even though the 99% hold the vast majority of the country's wealth) is ludicrous.

I think the 99% refers to 1% of the population in America holds 99% of the wealth.

Although if you compare it to the global population, if someone makes more then 50k a year they're in the top 1% relative to the world. Basically people in NA have it really well, and they're complaining about the system that got them to be so well off. Makes no sense. 

No, it's definitely "we are the 99%"

Also, the notion that 1% of Americans have 99% of the wealth is ludicrous. They own 38% of the wealth, a figure similar to that of most countries in the world. It's also been at that position for several decades now, with only small fluctuations.

The rich being rich is nothing new.



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