I agree with you, "There are enemies of Democracy" like China and Russia and the cult of the Republican "Party."
Don't you mean to say Allende was President of Chile? Not Peru?
I also believe you are correct about the importance of where raw materials are located worldwide. This is why I think the French Physiocrats were on the right path …
I agree with you, "There are enemies of Democracy" like China and Russia and the cult of the Republican "Party."
Don't you mean to say Allende was President of Chile? Not Peru?
I also believe you are correct about the importance of where raw materials are located worldwide. This is why I think the French Physiocrats were on the right path which leads to my Economic emphasis on:
1) Raw Materials
2)Labor
3) markets
I read Marx when I was young. I have since come to modify his theory in my own mind with the thinking of the Physiocrats and the modern Democratic Socialists. A violent revolution by Communists may still be in the cards. Look at the movements Mao and Ho Chi Min led. But I think that historical door is closed now, even in China and Vietnam (for better or worse, I don't know). Notice I leave Lenin and Stalin out of this because the violent movement they led as you seem to know better than I do, was essentially Bastardized State Capitalism; also known as Fascism. The Soviet system of "Councils" or "Committees" was neither Democratic nor Socialistic.
I believe it would be better to try for a peaceful, Political Revolution by Social Democrats as in Scandinavia. I think this is what might be going on in Brazil, Chile, and Nicaragua right now. They are not following the violent path of Castro. They are trying to follow an independent , peaceful, political path of their own. Nevertheless our elite establishment cannot stomach them.
Incidentally, I really liked your sarcasm in an earlier Hartman blog when you said: "Imagine the Venezuelans thinking that oil under their ground belonged to them." Or something like that.
Thanks Gerald, calling Chile Peru is a brain fart. I often do that when fast typing. I learned touch typing when I was 17 and got up to 132 wpm. My brain outpaces itself, and I often confuse their and there. And when I proof read before hitting the enter button or posting, I don't immediately see the error. Your comment has spurred me to be more cautious.
You are right that are political,social, economic elite can not allow real democracies to stand.
A real democracy is one that is based on our preamble to the constitution. The Common Good, anything else is a sham, devised, designed, run and manipulated by our own homegrown oligarchs, and real democracies mean little profit for the oligarchs, and a reduction in dollars, means a reduction in political power and a further degradation of their wealth. Money to gain power, power to keep the money. Simple equation.
Medieval serfs were bound to the land, modern serfs are bound to the job.
Spot on about Lenin he indeed said that the USSR was State capitalism, in other words a corporate state, the same as Mussolini's fascists Italy, where members of the Chamber of Deputies were appointed by corporations, and often the heads of corporations.
Now a days, they have improved their public relations, by buying politicians, rather than have their CEO's, COO's, and Chairmen sit as Senators. They simply buy them, and Reps.
As I posted previously, in researching a paper for my Masters, I dug through the attic of my university and came upon a 1922 issue of Fortnightly. It revealed that the USSR was actually a combine of seven trusts organized along resource lines, with the KGB in charge of human resources, which they sold to other trusts, like transportation, mining, forestry, agriculture.
Each trust had its own bank, accounts were settled between trusts, first with barter, then with gold, and all of it was managed by the GosBank, the central bank of the USSR, and there was the window to the west in Paris, called the NordBank. Where holders of rubles (not Russians) could redeem their rubles for gold.
To safeguard their supply of gold, they made the attempt to take (smuggle) rubles out of Russia a capitol crime, because as the stock of gold went down, the number of rubles in circulation decreased, thus causing even longer lines for bread, meat, and scarce goods.
Goods were scarce because the USSR was in a perpetual depression, because of the shortage of money. The populations concern was assuaged by the Kremlin blaming the west for the Cold War, which meant patriotic Russians had to buck up, eat it, and support the leadership.
The problem was caused by their adherence to Marx. Marx was, as I have said, a proto libertarian and the USSR and Stalin were the role models of Fred Koch.
Back to my rant. The USSR defined a ruble as . 9851 grams fine gold and only put in circulation the number of rubles that the gold represented. Russian citizens could not redeem their rubles, but foreigner and nations could, via the NordBank, Russia always tried to resolve debts by barter, first, then at last moment by gold.
Thus the Bolsheviks/Stalinists did what William Jennings Bryant said in his "Cross of gold speech" created a permanent depression, a perpetual shortage of rubles.
I agree with you, "There are enemies of Democracy" like China and Russia and the cult of the Republican "Party."
Don't you mean to say Allende was President of Chile? Not Peru?
I also believe you are correct about the importance of where raw materials are located worldwide. This is why I think the French Physiocrats were on the right path which leads to my Economic emphasis on:
1) Raw Materials
2)Labor
3) markets
I read Marx when I was young. I have since come to modify his theory in my own mind with the thinking of the Physiocrats and the modern Democratic Socialists. A violent revolution by Communists may still be in the cards. Look at the movements Mao and Ho Chi Min led. But I think that historical door is closed now, even in China and Vietnam (for better or worse, I don't know). Notice I leave Lenin and Stalin out of this because the violent movement they led as you seem to know better than I do, was essentially Bastardized State Capitalism; also known as Fascism. The Soviet system of "Councils" or "Committees" was neither Democratic nor Socialistic.
I believe it would be better to try for a peaceful, Political Revolution by Social Democrats as in Scandinavia. I think this is what might be going on in Brazil, Chile, and Nicaragua right now. They are not following the violent path of Castro. They are trying to follow an independent , peaceful, political path of their own. Nevertheless our elite establishment cannot stomach them.
Incidentally, I really liked your sarcasm in an earlier Hartman blog when you said: "Imagine the Venezuelans thinking that oil under their ground belonged to them." Or something like that.
Thanks Gerald, calling Chile Peru is a brain fart. I often do that when fast typing. I learned touch typing when I was 17 and got up to 132 wpm. My brain outpaces itself, and I often confuse their and there. And when I proof read before hitting the enter button or posting, I don't immediately see the error. Your comment has spurred me to be more cautious.
You are right that are political,social, economic elite can not allow real democracies to stand.
A real democracy is one that is based on our preamble to the constitution. The Common Good, anything else is a sham, devised, designed, run and manipulated by our own homegrown oligarchs, and real democracies mean little profit for the oligarchs, and a reduction in dollars, means a reduction in political power and a further degradation of their wealth. Money to gain power, power to keep the money. Simple equation.
Medieval serfs were bound to the land, modern serfs are bound to the job.
Spot on about Lenin he indeed said that the USSR was State capitalism, in other words a corporate state, the same as Mussolini's fascists Italy, where members of the Chamber of Deputies were appointed by corporations, and often the heads of corporations.
Now a days, they have improved their public relations, by buying politicians, rather than have their CEO's, COO's, and Chairmen sit as Senators. They simply buy them, and Reps.
As I posted previously, in researching a paper for my Masters, I dug through the attic of my university and came upon a 1922 issue of Fortnightly. It revealed that the USSR was actually a combine of seven trusts organized along resource lines, with the KGB in charge of human resources, which they sold to other trusts, like transportation, mining, forestry, agriculture.
Each trust had its own bank, accounts were settled between trusts, first with barter, then with gold, and all of it was managed by the GosBank, the central bank of the USSR, and there was the window to the west in Paris, called the NordBank. Where holders of rubles (not Russians) could redeem their rubles for gold.
To safeguard their supply of gold, they made the attempt to take (smuggle) rubles out of Russia a capitol crime, because as the stock of gold went down, the number of rubles in circulation decreased, thus causing even longer lines for bread, meat, and scarce goods.
Goods were scarce because the USSR was in a perpetual depression, because of the shortage of money. The populations concern was assuaged by the Kremlin blaming the west for the Cold War, which meant patriotic Russians had to buck up, eat it, and support the leadership.
The problem was caused by their adherence to Marx. Marx was, as I have said, a proto libertarian and the USSR and Stalin were the role models of Fred Koch.
Back to my rant. The USSR defined a ruble as . 9851 grams fine gold and only put in circulation the number of rubles that the gold represented. Russian citizens could not redeem their rubles, but foreigner and nations could, via the NordBank, Russia always tried to resolve debts by barter, first, then at last moment by gold.
Thus the Bolsheviks/Stalinists did what William Jennings Bryant said in his "Cross of gold speech" created a permanent depression, a perpetual shortage of rubles.