Prelude to the Apocalypse

[Ed Oscuro]

So, let's hear it. Why does capitalism lean realist and Marxism nominalist?

This should be obvious, though. Capitalism is derived from a real-world principle (exchange of goods of differing/equal values), whereas Marxism is based off of an idealistic supposition of how things ought to be (government-mandated distribution and economic management).

...you have everything confused, and I think you should hesitate before declaring an entire school of thought wrong, especially if you do not know how to properly describe things. But, points to you for coming out here and laying out what you think the difference is - I think that your comment fairly accurately describes the misinformation in the West about Marxism. (I'm not a fan of Marxism, the full enchilada and self-service car wash, but I am a fan of Marx the man.)

Marx was one of the crucial players in the development of capitalist economic theory - yes, that very same one you are talking about. He follows directly after Adam Smith, the philosopher who founded the modern discipline of economics, in making certain philosophical distinctions about value - Adam Smith was not just interested in "how the world works" but "how the world should work." There is nothing wrong with explaining "how the world works" but unless you deny the naturalistic fallacy ("how the world works is how it should work, of course!") you will want to do more than this. Marx might only have a subsection in the Wikipedia article on Capitalism but if you follow the links around you will discover a number of crucial modern economic concepts got their start with Marx.

Even taken on his own terms, Marx is almost wholly concerned with first explaining what really happens in societies - having done that, I think he is less concerned about micro-managing the response, given the knowledge that bad conditions cannot simply be swept under the rug as they had been before. This is why he worked closely with Engels, who studied and recorded real conditions in Steel City - Sheffield, England - at a time when nobody else cared to. This is why Marx criticizes the unrealistic assumptions behind interest, using colorful thought experiments to demonstrate their impossibility. What makes Marx different from other economists is that he has somewhat different prescriptions, but this does not make him any more a "dreamer" than other economists. Some economists hew more closely to "what can actually be done" at the cost of losing some justice, while others care more about doing what is right. What is "right" can look quite different from Marx if you are a Laissez-faire capitalist, even though the effects on a society guided only by Laissez-faire principles would be no less intrusive than under a Marxist system.

When you say "capitalism is derived from..." and "Marxism is based off..." you are comparing two completely different things. All economic theories can be justified, and all economic theories need solid evidence. "Laissez-faire capitalism" is just as concerned with spinning out fairy tales about how "the world really works" as Marxian philosophers are. Marxian economics is fundamentally materialistic, but one of its key differences is simply that it views freedom in a slightly but importantly different way than a laissez-faire capitalist.

But does that mean we're worse off in a system which has, as ChurchOfSolipsism said, a pluralistic media, just because the news might not be completely accurate? Well, it so happens that in other nations with state-controlled media, there isn't any likelihood that the news there will be more complete or more accurate, either, because those societies have their own experts and their own storylines - and even fewer opportunities for challenging them.

Political freedom (and according to everything I have read, we find more of it say in Western Europe than in China) is not just a good in itself - it will lead to many processes, including journalism, evolving and developing a higher quality, since plurality itself will lead to competition.

Yes, this is a better way of putting it than I did, and I agree with it.

[trap15]

??? Wrong topic, or just bringing up some old shit that doesn't matter because you want to try to harass mr. rabbit?

[Ed Oscuro]

??? Wrong topic, or just bringing up some old shit that doesn't matter because you want to try to harass mr. rabbit?

There's definitely at least three discussions going on at the same time here

[trap15]

Woops, that was @Minty, not you, sorry!

[cave hermit]

Spoiler

[BryanM]

I think we can all pretty much agree that there is no such thing as ethics in journalism and we should all dehumanize ourselves and submit to Trump.

we should all dehumanize ourselves and submit to Trump.

We could do all that, but would it end racism?

[Giest118]

Racism is caused by liberal PC feminazi jew culture, obviously.

[MintyTheCat]

??? Wrong topic, or just bringing up some old shit that doesn't matter because you want to try to harass mr. rabbit?

Well, more an issue that Jeff wishes to harass me given that he raised it, Trap.

[Mischief Maker]

So, let's hear it. Why does capitalism lean realist and Marxism nominalist?

This should be obvious, though. Capitalism is derived from a real-world principle (exchange of goods of differing/equal values), whereas Marxism is based off of an idealistic supposition of how things ought to be (government-mandated distribution and economic management).

Excuse our earlier typos, but we're talking about the philosophical concept of realism, not which one is more "realistic."

See, Opus? It happens to everyone!

[MintyTheCat]

Human rights defenders continued to risk harassment, arbitrary detention, imprisonment, and torture and other ill-treatment for their legitimate human rights work. Cao Shunli died from organ failure in a hospital in March after being denied adequate medical care in detention for an existing condition.5 She had been detained at a Beijing airport in September 2013 when on her way to a human rights training in Switzerland.

^ Tragic. But this doesn't tell me anything. At all. How do I know any facts or details about this incident, bar the fact that all the emphasis in this paragraph is "Human Rights"... ?

I see how that works clearly, Skykid - bad things happen to other people and where's the proof, yeah, yeah. That tells me that provided nothing ever, ever affects you then all around you are fair game.
That works fine until it gets out of control and when it not just someone else's problem.

You would have to be mentally detached to give that as an answer.

You have no experience, you're just acting as a sock puppet for agenda riddled mass media.

And you, my duck, are acting like a cold, 'don't give a shit about what's around me' puppet yourself.

You have never given any reflection on pretty much any of the negative aspects and only concentrated on what appears to be 'good' for you and or China. I believe in meeting optimism with realism and not putting the blinkers on, Skykid.

It's not entirely wrong. You see, you take these statements (and those of Amnesty International, which is absurd) at complete face value, where there are actually a million shades of grey

They are not 'shades of grey' in any decent person's mind, Skykid, this is out and out abuse and you will know from your sources that the chinese state has agreed to curb the use of torture and such in interrogations:

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter ... made-enor/

For example, while China agreed to an anti-torture convention, it added that it would not recognize a clause that allows the United Nations to investigate suspected torture

You cannot agree to desist in doing something having agreed that the matter takes place, you may now remove the blinkers, Skykid, as the chinese state has been caught red handed.

A long way to go

Any acknowledgement that China has made gains on some issues comes with the caveat that the country is "starting off a much lower base than most," said Joshua Castellino, a law professor at Middlesex University in London and at the Irish Center for Human Rights

Policing tools used in China, better not get caught, Skykid as that prickly looking one is beyond 'kinky':



And in the flesh:

China is the only country known to make spiked batons, which are either made entirely from steel or of plastic with a spiked metal head.
The United States Bureau of Industry and Security considers spiked batons to be “specially designed implements of torture” and has banned their trade. The European Commission said spiked batons are no more effective for riot control or self-protection than normal batons.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... anned.html





http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/n ... ts-amnesty

...government and are occasionally responsible for infringing human rights based on their practices..

Pull the other one, me old china - nothing occasional about this; we are talking modus-operandi here which is why the pressure was put on the chinese state internationally to reform.

Is it true you're going to be 'disappeared' and tortured to make false confessions like you're in a Stalinist regime? No, that's highly unlikely unless you were considered to be seriously compromising national security or law. The exact same things happen in the US, for example, for even lesser reasons - especially under the Patriot Act which essentially makes all your civil rights null and void and means you can end up being raped, tortured, humiliated and waterboarded simply if you're under suspicion of conspiracy: no hard evidence required.

But how would you know, Skykid, given that you have to see it to believe it and there are so many shades of grey as you say?




And there you go again with this shall we say christian and rather limited way of seeing the world in terms of one or the other. Two crimes do not equal a non-crime and indeed two wrongs do not make any wrong righter. This dichotomy limits you and keeps you in the dirt. Rather than throwing mud at the Americans, and yes the american state has committed violations in human rights, but that is not the topic here, let's look at something positive: let's look at bringing about the end of human rights violations and work towards getting the safety standards to where they need to be at for everyone's benefit - call it the bigger game if you like.

Yu claimed he was held with death row inmates for 61 days, during which he was questioned about 200 times. At one point officers handcuffed him to an iron chair with his hands behind his back.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/n ... ts-amnesty

So what was it that that poor Lawyer (I cannot believe I wrote the word 'poor' and 'laywer' in the same sentence - but the man is human and he put himself on the line) did to have his rights removed? How easy and quickly is it to have your civil rights quashed over there or would you need a lot more experience to find out do you feel?

The report also states that lawyers’ efforts to protect their clients from human rights violations are labelled “harmful” to the system and to social stability. But Patrick Poon, the author of the report, has countered, “f they continue to crack down on lawyers and to allow this kind of torture to happen, it won’t help maintain social stability but will only create even more social unrest.”

http://thediplomat.com/2015/11/torture- ... ous-cycle/

Finally we're at the heart of the issue. Took a while to get here, but we're here. This is why you're ignorant: because you accept and trust third-party information wholeheartedly, as you've just admitted. You have no ability to self-educate and are unwilling to look outside of the propaganda matrix - therefore you are a deluded parrot of the tabloids with no voice of his own.

Bollocks, Skykid. Propaganda matrix - are there any shape-shifting lizards in this matrix too do you think?
Amnesty International are not run by a second rate sociology student, it is an organisation whose role is to promote and defend Human Rights - that means you too, Skykid.
I think your quip on "self-educate" is laughable. Let's not start comparing education and degrees; trust me you will lose that one

You're entire argument is based on information without context. You have not witnessed anything for yourself, yet you're happy to sit in your chair and tell all the other people

If by context you mean to sit in the blast radius of that explosion at Tianjin or to be taken by the chinese police and whacked for not adhering to the party line, then yes, you are a man of more fitting purpose than me, but were you actually standing in the middle of the blast when it went off or did you come down with Mercury poisoning, you even said that when you went to Beiing that it was nice sunny weather with blue skies. So really, all these must be simply WRONG if you have to be physically be there to really know that they occurred. That's a very interesting abstraction that you have manufactured there - well done because according to your logic here we can safely say that no man landed on the moon as you and me did not see it and so on for as long as you like. You did take a degree in Sociology didn't you or was it bullshitology that you went for instead?

You remind me of one of those polytechnic sociology types that you find hanging around Universities and actually like Rick from The Young Ones

Ok.

I am glad that we agree on that.

For the record I am british and although Skykid may tell us all as to how we know nothing as we have not seen anything, I have travelled widely and lived in three countries thus far.

Evidently that doesn't make a person intelligent.

And neither does mercury poisoning, black rain, air pollution and rebutting what can be proven.
Again, let's not get into the education debate here and we have no need to compare IQs for heaven's sake but let's say that I have little to fear should we do so

But you haven't been to China, so you don't actually know anything. I and others have pointed out numerous times that you sound like a jackass.

I have not been to China, no. But very few people have been to the moon or Jupiter but there are plenty of folks out there with an understanding of both and plenty more.
You can sound and say as you wish and jackass or not I don't feel it bears much influence. I do not need a mob to represent me and I will shut your arguments down when they go against something important such as human rights, the chinese state not giving a shit, the state of pollution in some chinese cities, etc.

Also, if you wish to insult me, we are both British here, use a British English term please, otherwise I might think that you have been subsumed by the media and are only a pawn of the US or China or something else

I've addressed all of your points and you haven't read or responded to any of them, and I haven't actually denied that most of your criticisms exist, I've just argued that they don't necessarily exist in the way you perceive them to.

You know what, I have come to the same feeling over how you respond to my points. You use slight and blind ignorance over matters as important as human rights violations for starters and I have to conclude that not a lot gets through to you, but hey, you have your investments to ponder on so perhaps China is worth just too much for it to fail for you personally and to hell with everything else.

In reality your 'cold war' thought process is a figment of sensationalist news media, making you nothing but a loyal Murdoch pawn.

There you go again with that "propaganda", "never seen it", "never been there" and "only believes what he sees on TV and reads in the western tabloids" thing again.
Give us some credit; I have an education, job and such that I hope clearly demonstrates that I am better than that

Plus, Murdoch is a cock and he should have retired yonks ago.

The most impressive thing you've managed is to repeat the same points fifty times over and say absolutely nothing of value.

I had come to the same conclusion too as to how you will protect China at all costs and choose not to see the whole in a holistic sense but prefer to see China in mostly positive terms.
You simply have to take the rough with the smooth and light with the dark and you also need to understand balance, I am sure they will get you onto that in China and that will help you long term.

It's also debatable and indeed subjective, Skykid. I personally feel that your best and telling move has been to completely ignore the state of human rights and indeed the pattern for continued pollution.
I actually sat and watched you produce reams and reams about how great China was before I made a single comment which, although it might be a bit tedious didn't concern me too much. What concerns me is how you play down what is pretty important to not just you or me but the entire human race, be it pollution, human right violations, people going missing - that includes book publishers, and even how the massive expansion of urban areas has caused deforestation in China, etc.

There are no shades of grey over certain subjects, Skykid and you insult people to say that human right infractions are 'acceptable'.

[Jonathan Ingram]

To think otherwise you would have to ignore the simple fact that "free-market" competition has made nations wealthier, and that "government-mandate markets" (for lack of a better term atm) have made nations poorer. Why do you think China keeps on getting richer as it moves further away from Marxist principles?

Capitalism is by definition a system of "government-mandate markets". What else do you call a mode of production organization which requires state enforcement of contracts, interest rates and currency? The free-market competition you're speaking off is an idealist abstraction confined to the writings of right-wing libertarians and has never existed at any point in human history.

Whereas Marxist thought operates on a very abstract level of possibilities that have yet to be born out in any significantly positive way.

As Ed Oscuro has already pointed out, the writings of Marx are materialistic. Socialism per Marx is not a realization of a few abstract principles carried out into reality through decrees by a group of enlightened individuals nor a checklist of things of how you want the society to operate, but the end result of all capitalist development derived from the latter's tendency towards centralization and concentration of production - a system that both supersedes capitalism and addresses its internal contradictions. Marxist Socialism is radically empirical and anti-idealist relative to the social theories that preceded it.

[BryanM]

The Jungian-inspired School of Philosophy of China's Marxist Smog.

[rancor]

Well, more an issue that Jeff wishes to harass me given that he raised it, Trap.

It used to bother me that you took an out of context quote and attributed it to me as your sig.. But the more you post, the more people see just exactly how fucking nuts you are, kris - and it means less and less. Keep it up! Just keep talking.. lol.. Please, for the love of god, keep it up with your 800-word-diatriabes against people with experience vs you and your computer screen. If that doesn't work out, you can always PM a mod that the meanies here are disagreeing with you, and you cant handle it! Let everyone know exactly how educated you are, and how you boldly moved from your hometown to another city some ~250km away - possibly all on your own! This is great stuff - honestly.

[MintyTheCat]

Well, more an issue that Jeff wishes to harass me given that he raised it, Trap.

It used to bother me that you took an out of context quote and attributed it to me as your sig.. But the more you post, the more people see just exactly how fucking nuts you are, kris - and it means less and less. Keep it up! Just keep talking.. lol.. Please, for the love of god, keep it up with your 800-word-diatriabes against people with experience vs you and your computer screen. If that doesn't work out, you can always PM a mod that the meanies here are disagreeing with you, and you cant handle it! Let everyone know exactly how educated you are, and how you boldly moved from your hometown to another city some ~250km away - possibly all on your own! This is great stuff - honestly.

You're cheap, Jeff.

Edit:

I thought so, as I recall, the image spam issue was you having a cheap little swipe at Europeans and German speakers in particular; you are aware this the image you posted was of people in a German speaking country, but I doubt they teach you that in gun school eh, Rancor?

This is what I notified Icarus the moderator of to prevent yet more cheap little attempts at slights and you sulked back into the background after that, oh no, there was that point where you tried to weed your way out of your braindead gun law argument to which it was taken apart :

@rancor: that's far-right-wing propagandist video though,

Clearly. All of those isis flags, long-bearded mullahs, and burqa-clad females are part of a vast right wing conspiracy.

don't know a thing about the complex cultural and political aspects of our lives.

Oh, please. You've got trash and we've (USA) got trash. Get off your high horse.

[trap15]

And that's why I buy things from him

[cave hermit]

Spoiler

Disclaimer: I have no investment in this argument outside of morbid entertainment.

[MintyTheCat]

And that's why I buy things from him

Me too most of the time but sometimes Amazon is a bit cheaper

[BIL]

harass mr. rabbit

Best euphemism since rescue the professor!

[Skykid]

Morning *sips coffee*

Minty, before we go on, there are a couple of non-topic things I'd like to point out.

Firstly, you talk like someone's beery uncle. You're most certainly British, and perhaps not in the best sense. But that can be largely ignored if you'll just stop putting everyone's forum handle into every fucking sentence!

Christ, that's annoying. We already know who's being addressed, the quote tags are doing a good job. You don't need to open a sentence with "Skykid" and finish it with "Skykid" all the time, like you're a 1940s headmaster. Believe me, it doesn't make the content within any more wise.

Secondly, I actually attempted to engage you in this debate on real terms. I live in China, you don't - you might offer a tiny bit of acknowledgment of that fact instead of picture spamming like an infant. Do you realise on the last page there are two images with the word "PRICK" scrawled on them? Not only is that the bottom rung of any reasonable debating form, but it's also an infringement on forum rules.

I also have no idea why, in the most childish possible way, you would start outlining people who have disagreed with you in your forum signature. It started off with quotes from me you liked. You removed those and put myself and Xyga in there for disagreeing with you. Now he's not bothered anymore, it's just me, and then Rancor because he made one comment you took offence to.

It's embarrassing.


Anyway, now I've got that out the way, I'll see what's worth discussing today.

(SKykid:) Thanks for taking the time to type a thorough, thoughtful reply. While I agree there are typical perspectives or political leanings that certain publications have, I don't think that this is the same as having an agenda. There can be left leaning and conservative perspectives, and while different sorts of publications would write different articles, I would say that, as long as they were good (= high journalistic standard) articles, they would both contain the same amount of truth. I am still convinced that by accessing a broad range of Western media, you get a good/ truthful idea of what is going on in the world, so to me, your perspective seems needlessly nihilistic - and I am convinced that there is something like a high journalistic standard that the majority of journalists of serious media at least try to adhere to. Seems like we agree on quite a few of the details (ad customers influencing coverage on certain topics etc.) but our interpretations differ significantly.

Yo!

Well there's definitely some disagreement here. I do believe that journalists aspire to do the best job possible, and some are obviously better than others outright, but I believe most are also held back from achieving those aspirations by a very muddy system. I think they probably do hold themselves to ethics and standards, but news media itself isn't a reflection of those ethics and standards because it's more of a machine and not the work of a single individual. For example, a newspaper's boss has to make money, he knows the general demographic his paper appeals to, and in a month he will take on certain stories from freelancers and employees and disallow certain others. The pursuit of profit is already an agenda, and this will define whether or not sensationalism is paramount, whether the paper tries to stay close to hot public topics, and where they send their journalists to do their reporting.

I certainly don't believe in ethics in journalism quite the same way you might. These guys are willing to hack the phones of kidnap victims and their families to gain a little more sensationalist ground.

One thing that we glossed over that's important is what's not printed rather than what is. That old Fox news angle "Fair and Balanced", is a nice dream, but the fairness is only there to the individuals they have a personal interest in promoting, and the balance doesn't exist because the alternative side to war, muslims, and China for example, don't get published because they're not as saleable and don't fit into whatever pre-fashioned public opinion talking points there are at a given time.

And I believe this applies to all mainstream publications and not just Fox, it's just that some are more surreptitious than others.

Deep breath now!:

I actually sat and watched you produce reams and reams about how great China was before I made a single comment

Didn't happen. I was discussing the Federal Reserve system and an alternate global currency replacing the dollar with Ed, who enlightened me regarding several areas of the economy I was unaware of and we came to some agreement and some agrees to disagree on the subject. There was no talking about China except in regard to economic development.

Basically you didn't have any reason to butt in with all this sensationalist rubbish, but you did, and now here we are.

torture/human rights/stupid pictures/

Do you know who you are? You're that guy in the pub who's someone's mate who nobody really knows, who joins a conversation and acts as though because they've read the daily Telegraph, they know absolutely everything about whatever the given subject is, and then proceeds at length to school the rest of the party about this that and the other while everyone sips their drinks quietly and waits for you to finish so they can go on with their conversation.

There's no point breaking down your posts anymore, it's a waste of time because it's all the same thing anyway. However, I'll try to tie this in a bow for you:

China is a developing country. It's not your country. They have their own priorities and methods, and you or I may or may not agree with them, and may not even understand them; but it's the way they do things for now. They continue to advance and develop their policies year on year, to make improvements of their own and sometimes at the behest of external pressure. What you consider democracy is different to what they consider democracy, and they don't consider the UK or US's electoral systems to represent democracy, and I'm in agreement with that. Every country is guilty of human rights infractions, it's just in the eyes of the capitalist horde some are more guilty than others. The important point is: don't break the fucking law. I know in China drug dealing is punishable by death, so I don't deal drugs. I also don't drink and drive, rape women, rob banks and murder indiscriminately, or arrange protest groups to try and overthrow the government.

Having lived in both the UK and China for prolonged periods, I can definitely say that comparatively the UK feels third world. I'm in no rush to go back to the UK's survival battle under crippling wage tax, extraordinary living costs, kneecapping transport fees and heart-attack end of the month budget foods. In my eyes, it's a fucking mess. And, having lived in both countries for prolonged periods - whereas you have only lived in one and experienced the other vicariously through sensationalist news media (who have no interest in reporting good news and promising developments) - I would appreciate if you would acknowledge the fact.

[Xyga]

...and put myself and Xyga in there for disagreeing with you. Now he's not bothered anymore

Well yah, reading him I knew it was useless to argue. I think if this goes on he will report us as undercover guoanbu agents.

[charlie chong]

this is like watching multiple scrappy doos locked in a keyboard battle for all eternity.
i can't be arsed to read one paragraph of this so how can you be bothered to type this crap ahaha
if you all didn't have such big intranet ego you would realise that none of you will change your opinions and then you can stop wasting time,give your wrists a rest and go outside or play games or something

[MintyTheCat]

Skykid

Good morning, Skykid.

I also have no idea why, in the most childish possible way, you would start outlining people who have disagreed with you in your forum signature. It started off with quotes from me you liked. You removed those and put myself and Xyga in there for disagreeing with you. Now he's not bothered anymore, it's just me, and then Rancor because he made one comment you took offence to.

Childish way, if you look back it was you who started throwing the insults around and using that blanket 'you are responding to propaganda' catch all, me laddo.

I believe in highlighting interesting, useful and ignorant statements; you have met the entry requirements for that, Skykid.

Do you know who you are? You're that guy in the pub who's someone's mate who nobody really knows, who joins a conversation and acts as though because they've read the daily Telegraph, they know absolutely everything about whatever the given subject is, and then proceeds at length to school the rest of the party about this that and the other while everyone sips their drinks quietly and waits for you to finish so they can go on with their conversation.

That sounds rather like psychological splitting to me, Skykid. I do wish that you and your mates Xyga and Rancor would learn some other approaches. Try studying Rhetoric or perhaps Game Theory.

On splitting:

Splitting diffuses the anxiety that arises from our inability to grasp the nuances and complexities of a given situation or state of affairs by simplifying and schematizing the situation and thereby making it easier to think about; it also reinforces our sense of self as good and virtuous by effectively demonizing all those who do not share in our opinions and values.

Having lived in both the UK and China for prolonged periods, I can definitely say that comparatively the UK feels third world. I'm in no rush to go back to the UK's survival battle under crippling wage tax, extraordinary living costs, kneecapping transport fees and heart-attack end of the month budget foods. In my eyes, it's a fucking mess. And, having lived in both countries for prolonged periods - whereas you have only lived in one and experienced the other vicariously through sensationalist news media (who have no interest in reporting good news and promising developments) - I would appreciate if you would acknowledge the fact.

I think you have been over there since 2012.

I can relate to your feelings on the UK: the south-east in particular is hard going. I saw a lot of people turning on each other and generally finding life hard going. And indeed, the cost of living is pretty high by most people's standards. It was a contributing factor for me to exit. I have spent a great deal of time living outside the UK and quite a bit longer than you. I estimate our ages to be fairly similar so I suppose I was the horse that merely bolted earlier from the stable but I get where you are coming from on that basis.

No, I have lived now in three countries, and not to count them, but that appears to be one more than you and having lived outside the UK longer than you. We both appear to speak a number of languages though and as such this is more of an option for us both to live like this, usually people from England ask me frantically "how do you survive??!!?!?" or "how do you speak the language??!?!" or "did you speak that language before you moved there?!?!?" - seems to be more over that UK citizens ask me this and less so Europeans.

I have a very, very critical stance on the BBC for example these days. I read widely and just as an idea I read the Financial Times whilst in University and at a push The Times or Telegraph. I feel that it is really out duty to apply a critical manner to what we read as news. I can wholely assure you that I am not in any way one of those bigoted Daily Mail readers and no, there are no egg stains on my shirt either and I do not smell of bacon and drink Special Brew with my Frosties

You may find that quite a number of people our age are pretty pissed off with the UK situation, many have little choice to move, that has not applied to us, but still, that does not exempt China as being only a place of things good, that would be to become a victim of delusion - you have to keep a clear head on these things, I find at least.

To make it clear: I only have an issue with people playing down Human Rights abuses. I also take a pretty serious line of defence over people's health, again, I have worked in medical technology along the way, whereas many of my mates and people from University ended up making military weapons I chose not to do that as it is seriously a waste of talent, time and lives and instead went the other route and worke don projects that gave some benefit to people and the environment in general.

Xyga, I realise that you have a lot of time on your hands and you seem to need the excitement and drama - I am not judging you. But understand that sometimes when people challenge your opinions you had better be able to back them up otherwise people tend to dismiss you are being a bit fickle. I have nothing against you personally and yes, we may not agree on all things and I am highly likely to target you when your thinking is not together ala the "pollution made me ill, black rain" and such and then to deny there is much of a problem - that would be inconsistent, illogical and asking for it.

Rancor

We have seen a few attempts now by you to push a situation in a certain direction through sleight that arose over the US guns thread a while back. Stick to the facts, stick to the subjects, don't make it personal and start to attack the side that you disagree with personally - try to elevate the situation and play the bigger game.

I do not mind debate and discussion when there is time for it. I also will only make it personal with people when they make it personal. I have a set of rules if you like but if you disregard those rules then I will send it back to you.

I think that we can find some common ground. I am not expecting Skykid to be accountable for what the chinese state does in any way, this is debate and discussion after all.

In this manner we all put ourselves in a position to improve ourselves.

Cheers,

Minty.

[Xyga]

Who's got too much free time lol ?

I use mine to discuss things with people when I feel it's worth. But with you Minty, on that particular topic ? No.
It's so obvious a hundred pages wouldn't change a fucking thing, why should I bother ?

Charlie's so right at this point.

[BulletMagnet]

In an attempt to pivot things a bit, I'll mention this article that I saw in the paper this morning; I'm definitely not as positive on Hillary as Krugman is, but the Sanders criticism he offers here seems to merit attention. Basically, Sanders (technically, a guy he goes to for a lot of his numbers) is promising to grow the economy even faster than Bush has said he would (though IIRC Trump's claims to that end were even more grandiose), despite the fact that making even Bush's numbers happen would be next to impossible no matter what the circumstances. Larger point: liberals claim to be the ones with their facts in order, and rightly ridicule the Trump-ish types who seem to believe that anything is possible if you just want it enough, but if we don't push back against overwrought rhetoric when it comes from our own side we won't even have that leg to stand on anymore, and when politics becomes pure theatrics the right will win, every single time.

Thoughts?

[Mischief Maker]

Thoughts?

The claims the economists are talking about come from [Gerald] Friedman’s analysis of the Sanders economic program. The good news is that this isn’t the campaign’s official assessment; the bad news is that the Friedman analysis has been highly praised by campaign officials.

This is the open letter against Gerald Friedman's stats. It doesn't specifically cite any errors, just says it's unrealistic.

Here is Gerald Friedman's response in the Washington Post. Choice quote:

Those economists didn’t reach out to Friedman before they released an open letter on Wednesday criticizing his analysis. If they had, he said, he would have happily adjusted his modeling to respond to their specific critiques.

I'm rather suspicious about the timing of this wordpress site whose sole purpose is to publicly spread this letter, written in language for non-economists, without any links to supporting papers or hard figures.

[Rob]

Thoughts?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqz3R1NpXzM

[EmperorIng]

I've read another article (from a report praising the assessment) which describes Friedman as a "democratic socialist who has partnered with Sanders in the past." In that regard I find it highly suspect that he publishes a report that says "everything will be better" and recommend taking what he says with a grain of salt, considering he is a lone voice describing the positives.

EDIT: I'll eventually respond to Ed and Jonathan; pls be patient

[BryanM]

when politics becomes pure theatrics the right will win, every single time.

Nah, Huey Long wins every single time. Since it's simple class warfare. If you're not in control of the country, you vote for Huey Long. If you are an oligarch, vote for a neoliberal.

It is neat to see that Krugman is a worthless "republicans suck" neolib though. Somewhere deep down I always knew, but in my heart I wanted to believe he wasn't a lizard person.

[quash]

Thoughts?

The more I read your posts, the more I see how dogmatic you really are, and the more clear it is that you do not understand the human element of politics in the slightest.

Clinton didn't get to be the politician he became by, in your words, "making sense". This was a guy so likable that he could've lied to us about anything and gotten away with it. A shame nobody else on that side of the aisle has even come close to his mastery of this.

[Mischief Maker]

Thoughts?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqz3R1NpXzM

Counterpoint:

Hamsters are made of meat and subject to physical laws.

The Economy is a mental concept that exists only in the abstract.