It’s funny ya know. How even those on the far left politically are convinced that we can save our economy/government etc. if only we could find the right policies/representatives/etc. Rather like someone with a know fatal disease is convinced they can get cured and live forever if only they could find the right treatment. Denial and delusion are very powerful mindsets.
Because of this I find Dmitri Orlov to be curiously refreshing.
“I’ve found the job where I fit best!” – Artist: George Ropper
Anyone who was here state side during WWII can tell you of the rationing that went on. Everything was rationed. From bread to tires. They can also tell you that no matter what industry you were in, you were doing defense work. WWII took this country from nearly 30% unemployment to 0 unemployment over night. New businesses formed overnight to meet the demands. Struggling businesses like Willys Motors became major contractors.
There were factories and corporations making each other’s products to meet the demand of the military. RCA, Stromberg Carlson, and Bendix all making the same radios. Willys and Ford made the Jeeps. Whole towns grew up from nothing to support new ship and arms factories. One could say that nearly every corporation became a wholly owned subsidiary of USA Inc. The technology of the time expanded at a breakneck pace and the war paid for nearly all of it.
When WWII came to an end in 1945 the so called Cold War against what was called Communism began as well as a new war to fight it. Korea and the cold war kept many of these plants humming right along. And new defense systems needed new advances which meant lots of dollars for research and development and nearly all of it paid for by Uncle Sam. Working for a defense contractor – and at that time nearly all the major corporations were defense contractors – meant you could get whatever new and necessary equipment you needed to advance your project. And a lot of this made its way to the products that were sold to the general public as well.
Pretty sweet deal wouldn’t you say? Putting a good part of your research staff’s overhead on the government’s bill. And if the US military stopped being interested, you could also sell it to France or Egypt or Iran or Iraq or Israel or some South American country. And nearly every technical advance we saw had its origin or was advanced in some way through military material need – and I include NASA here . From television – improved for WWII, to computers – ENIAC for WWII became IBM. Continue reading “Cold War – Hot Profits”→
One of the comments to a post by David Seaton was this quote by Bertrand Russell.
“In America everybody is of the opinion that he has no social superiors, since all men are equal, but he does not admit that he has no social inferiors, for, from the time of Jefferson onward, the doctrine that all men are equal applies only upwards, not downwards”.
We do not see ourselves in a realistic light but in the way we wish we were or hope to become. This is true of racial relations, finances, politics…you name it. The so called American Exceptionalism. This is evident int the tax proposal of the president to except the first $250,000.00 of income from the tax hike. To same the Middle Class. But as Ted Rall points out in this column, this is hardly middle class. More like the top 2% of earners. Especially since the median income is $49,000.00. Bit of a difference, wouldn’t you say. Continue reading “The American Fantasy Land”→
It has been said that the two biggest motivations of humans are to obtain pleasure and to avoid pain. I believe with some variations, this is mostly true. Add into this our instinct for survival and you can probably explain most behaviors. But I am just guessing here, I suppose. Continue reading “The Pursuit of Happiness…..”→
We’ve all seem them. The iconic scenes of the train wreck or car wreck with the cars hanging off a cliff. Nobody dares move else they cause the whole thing to plummet into the abyss below. This is where the economy stands today according to Dr. Paul Craig Roberts in his current analysis. Continue reading “Economy on a precipice”→
The other day I though I would surf over to Dpreview and check out the latest Digital SLR cameras from Nikon. I will admit it, I’m a Nikon bigot. The site reviews digital cameras and sometimes lenses. It’s pretty good with good comparisons, sample images and quality tests.
Yes I am lusting after the the Nikon D800, their latest offering in the pro-sumer or semi professional line. Excellent imaging even at ISO6400 and above. I have a D200 which is not that old but compared to the latest, it’s a 1957 Chevy.
And the newest Hasselblad medium format digital is even better. But then it’s 13 grand. We have the ability to find planets circulating other stars. Nearly every cell phone has a built in camera and the ability to upload images to the internet. We can eavesdrop on radio waves from other galaxies.
And here is the point of this diary – you can bet your sweet bippy the government, ours and others, have capabilities a few orders of magnitude better than what us lowly peons get to play with.
I have been looking for new digs. My current one was to be temporary when I moved here, until I got my “feel” for the area a little bit better. I looked at some new apartments/duplexes here but want to be able to “see” what other layout possibilities one could have. Kind of a “what if” I could find something that really was what my ideal would be. So I decided to see what was being done outside this country. I began with various cities/areas in Europe since I could easily convert the currency and find equivalent ones in my price range. I was rather surprised at what I found, though I shouldn’t been since I was very much experienced with other European products – electronics, cars, furniture etc. Continue reading “It’s the Attitude….Dummy..”→
This is a fairly long presentation by Dr. David Harvey given at the Penn Humanities Forum in Nov. of last year. He gives a very good history of the situation in Europe as well as here. What lead up to it, why it was inevitable and the obvious outcome. And as the title suggests, why the end of capitalism is not only likely but also necessary. [h/t to SouthernDragon for turning me on to this as well]
If you watched the whole thing through you will see how Dr. Harvey says that a centrally managed zero growth economy is necessary. Before you ask how this could be done remember that during WWII that is exactly what we had. We also had some of the most technological innovation and advancement during those three years. And the remnants of this during the cold war years of the 1950s through the 1970s was nearly as great. Dr. Harvey’s website.
One of the biggest problems we have is that there are still a lot of people who either consciously or subconsciously still believe in the Fantasy of capitalism. Who still insist on playing the game the way TPTB have set it up. That things will “Get back to normal” if only _______________.
They fail to realize that THIS is the normal condition and that the previous decades or time up until the 1970s were the aberration and anomaly. And that they have a snowball’s chance in hell of ever “making it big”. Mostly the upper 20% and until they themselves are sleeping under some underpass, this is not likely to change except getting worse.
Everything that Bush and Obama has done and is doing, is simply to hide this economic reality from the top 20% so they go on with their little fantasy. The financial equivalent of soma.
Once Upon a Paradigm 
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