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Topic: 2010: The year of the global insurrection? (Read 711 times) |
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Blunderov
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"We think in generalities, we live in details"
  
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2010: The year of the global insurrection?
« on: 2010-03-13 02:45:18 » |
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[Blunderov] Add to the following article the recent collapse of the Dutch government under voter dissaprobrium of the foundering imperialist misadventure in Afghanistan - now in it's 8th year. In South Africa, the poor have returned to the politics of street violence last seen during the dying days of Apartheid. Violence, the rioters claim, is the only way to make their voices heard. They are correct IMV. Such is the din of the guzzling at the public trough that it requires a very loud sound indeed to rise above it.
Come back Baader Meinhof. All is forgiven
[The Daily Reckoning]
By Bill Bonner Guest blogger / March 12, 2010
“Masked youths…attacked the head of Greece’s largest trade union, who was addressing the crowd, and hurled stones at the police. GSEE union boss Yiannis Panagopoulos traded blows with the rioters before being whisked away, bloodied and with torn clothes.”
2010: The year of the global insurrection? .
The Daily Mail account put the blame for these disturbances on Germany’s finance minister, who warned the Greeks that “the German government does not intend to give a cent.” At least Bild, a popular German newspaper, was trying to be helpful. It suggested that Greece sell Corfu…and that Greeks get up earlier and work harder.
Meanwhile, from Iceland comes news that every voter with an IQ above air temperature has cast his ballot against a bailout plan. The Icelanders were slated to make good $5.3 billion in bank losses. But why shackle common voters to the banks’ losses? The plan was so outrageous and so unpopular that Iceland’s normally compliant Prime Minister called for a referendum. Given a chance to vote on it, 93% said no. The other 7% probably read it wrong.
Insurrection is in the air. In England, government employees are preparing the biggest strike since the ’80s. In America, dissatisfaction with Congress is at record highs; four out of five of those polled say, “Nothing can be accomplished in Washington.”
Herewith, an attempt to deconstruct the rebel yell. By way of preview, it’s not the principle of the thing, we conclude; it’s the money.
There are more clowns in economics than in the circus. They invented an economic model that has been very popular for more than 50 years – particularly in the US and Britain. It began with a bogus insight; John Maynard Keynes thought consumer spending was the key to prosperity; he saw savings as a threat. He had it backwards. Consumer spending is made possible by savings, investment and hard work – not the other way around. Then, William Phillips thought he saw a cause and effect relationship between inflation and employment; increase prices and you increase employment too, he said.
Jacques Rueff had already explained that the Phillips Curve was just a flimflam. Inflation surreptitiously reduced wages. It was lower wages that made it easier to hire people, not enlightened central bank management. But the scam proved attractive. The economy has been biased towards inflation ever since.
Economists enjoyed the illusion of competence; they could hold their heads up at cocktail parties and pretend to know what they were talking about. Now they were movers and shakers, not just observers. The new theories seemed to give everyone what they most wanted. Politicians could spend even more money that didn’t belong to them. Consumers could enjoy a standard of living they couldn’t afford. And the financial industry could earn huge fees by selling debt to people who couldn’t pay it back.
Never before had so many people been so happily engaged in acts of reckless larceny and legerdemain. But as the system aged, its promises increased. Beginning in the ’30s, the government took it upon itself to guarantee the essentials in life – retirement, employment, and to some extent, health care. These were expanded over the years to include minimum salary levels, unemployment compensation, disability payments, free drugs, food stamps and so forth. Households no longer needed to save.
As time wore on, more and more people lived at someone else’s expense. Lobbying and lawyering became lucrative professions. Bucket shops and banks neared respectability. Every imperfection was a call for legislation. Every traffic accident was an opportunity for wealth redistribution. And every trend was fully leveraged.
If there was anyone still solvent in America or Britain in the 21st century, it was not the fault of the banks. They invented subprime loans and securitizations to profit from segments of the market that had theretofore been spared. By 2005 even jobless people could get themselves into debt. Then, the bankers found ways to hide debt…and ways to allow the public sector to borrow more heavily. Goldman Sachs did for Greece essentially what it had done for the subprime borrowers in the private sector – it helped them to go broke.
As long as people thought they were getting something for nothing, this economic model enjoyed wide support. But now that they are getting nothing for something, the masses are unhappy. Half the US states are insolvent. Nearly all of them are preparing to increase taxes. In Europe too, taxes are going up. Services are going down. And taxpayers are being asked to pay for the banks’ losses…and pay interest on money spent years ago. Until now, they were borrowing money that would have to be repaid sometime in the future. But today is the tomorrow they didn’t worry about yesterday. So, the patsies are in revolt.
Several countries are already past the point of no return. Even if America taxed 100% of all household wealth, it would not be enough to put its balance sheet in the black. And Professors Rogoff and Reinhart show that when external debt passes 73% of GDP or 239% of exports, the result is default, hyperinflation, or both. IMF data show the US already too far gone on both scores, with external debt at 96% of GDP and 748% of exports.
The rioters can go home, in other words. The system will collapse on its own.
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the.bricoleur
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making sense of change
 
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Re:2010: The year of the global insurrection?
« Reply #1 on: 2010-03-13 08:08:07 » |
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Excellent read. Thank for sharing Bl.
the.bricoleur
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Fritz
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Re:2010: The year of the global insurrection?
« Reply #2 on: 2010-03-13 12:37:54 » |
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Quote:| [Blunderov]<snip> collapse of the Dutch government under voter dissaprobrium of the foundering imperialist misadventure<snip> |
Firstly great articles thx BL ..... however the kitchen table crew this morning is rank with discontent and indignation over your use if the alleged word dissapprobrium; totally ignoring the article and focusing on the Word. Yet another sign for me that we are not going to make it 
I found numerous referenced to it's use on the Net, but the coffee swilling granola munching crew insisted it is not a word and this word should have been used:
opprobrium
/probrim/
• noun 1 harsh criticism or scorn. 2 public disgrace arising from shameful conduct.
— ORIGIN Latin, ‘infamy’.
Closing with that this is yet another new age "dis"-use of the Kings ENGLISH and goaded me into this post.
Cheers
Fritz
PS:
Quote:| [BL]<snip>The Daily Mail account put the blame for these disturbances on Germany’s finance minister, who warned the Greeks that “the German government does not intend to give a cent.” At least Bild, a popular German newspaper, was trying to be helpful. It suggested that Greece sell Corfu…and that Greeks get up earlier and work harder.<snip> |
[Wally] Nice to see the Fatherland endearing themselves, yet again; must be the Turkish contingent in Germany
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Where there is the necessary technical skill to move mountains, there is no need for the faith that moves mountains -anon-
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MoEnzyme
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Re:2010: The year of the global insurrection?
« Reply #3 on: 2010-03-13 13:38:02 » |
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It does seem a bit of a long line to put this all at the feet of Keynes, some objections about context seem appropriate. A simple idea of limited economic stimulus was certainly never intended as a plan to run the whole economy. However, its a powerful piece of writing and some strong criticism that most relevant/responsible people in the US seem to eager to avoid. In terms of how economies actually work, I'm not feeling eager to embrace this author, but he's certainly put his finger on some very relevant ways they don't work. Good powerful writing that way and points well made.
-Mo
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I will fight your gods for food,
Mo Enzyme
(consolidation of handles: Jake Sapiens; memelab; logicnazi; Loki; Every1Hz; and Shadow)
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Fritz
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Re:2010: The year of the global insurrection?
« Reply #4 on: 2010-03-14 22:53:13 » |
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Another take from the main stream on this topic ... yet all this alleged recover seems suspect to me. The point is still well taken on who is really hurting.
Cheers
Fritz
Europe's hypochondriacs
Most Europeans are doing better than they think, and can take more fiscal austerity
Source: The Economist print edition
Author: Charlemagne
Date: Mar 4th 2010
IMAGINE two cousins. One comes from continental Europe, France, perhaps. A hypochondriac, his life is filled with vague complaints—stress, fatigue and mysterious aches—for which he takes fistfuls of pills. He is sure that strenuous exercise is a menace to his fragile health. The other cousin is American (or British, take your pick), a risk-taker devoted to extreme sports. Shunning doctors, he feels as strong as an ox, although he has been drinking and overeating for years. Eventually, in 2008, he succumbs to a massive heart attack while out jogging. As far as his French cousin is concerned, a deep truth has thus been confirmed: that exercise is bad for you.
Substitute free-market competition for exercise, and you have the European debate over the financial crisis. Sober discussion about how to manage the instability of markets is giving way to a simpler fable. Too many voters now believe that the credit crunch has proved that globalisation is bad for you. And too many politicians are happy to endorse such views. In a televised meeting with voters in January the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, denounced Renault for planning to build a new car in Turkey, saying “I do not accept that cars sold in France should be manufactured abroad.”
More recently, politicians have condemned speculators for picking on weak links in the euro-area. Jean-Claude Juncker, the prime minister of Luxembourg and president of the Eurogroup of finance ministers, has declared that governments must show “the primacy of politics” over markets. In an unexpected Bela Lugosi moment, Mr Juncker said governments had “instruments of torture in the basement”, and would readily “display” them.
In a more thoughtful speech, the new president of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy, noted that Europeans were “anxious”, as they watched the economic strength of emerging countries like China, India or Brazil turning into political power. As long as globalisation was seen mainly as economic, Europeans felt as if everyone could win from it, argued Mr Van Rompuy. But now that other world powers are rising, Europeans fear that unstoppable competition may take away their jobs and undermine their welfare states.
In a new paper a French academic from SciencesPo, Zaki Laïdi, pulls together data to demonstrate that Europe is risk-averse (“Europe as a Risk Averse Power”, Garnet). Most Europeans dispute the idea of just war, he notes. Many fear genetically modified crops. They are less likely to own stocks and shares than Americans, even though some are assiduous savers against a rainy day (three-quarters of all French household financial assets are free from capital risk). Mr Laïdi cites a “job protection index” drawn up by the OECD club of rich countries. On average, this shows, it is 12 times harder to lay off permanent workers in Europe than it is in America.
The French are outliers in western Europe, marked by unusual pessimism and hostility to free markets. Jean-Paul Delevoye, France’s médiateur de la République, a sort of national ombudsman, made front-page news in February by declaring that French society was “psychologically exhausted”. In a poll by the CSA institute 56% of French respondents said it was somewhat or very possible that they could end up homeless (despite living in one of the world’s most generous welfare states).
French politicians play up to this national hypochondria. Like a cynical quack, Mr Sarkozy prescribes homeopathic cures in which policies like protectionism are so much diluted that they cease to function. Elsewhere EU governments have surrendered to the first sign of protests by reversing austerity measures almost as soon as they announce them. The Spanish have proved especially feeble, with ministers twice proposing and then swiftly backtracking on reforms, once over a rise in the legal pension age, and once over public-sector pay cuts.
Perks and privileges
Even in the worst-hit countries, protests rarely come from the main victims of the crisis: the young, immigrants and temporary workers. Unemployment in Spain is close to 20%, but the loudest squeals have come from full-time workers arguing against raising the pension age to 67. Greek civil servants are mobilising to defend generous pensions that most of their countrymen will never enjoy. Other strikers include Greek tax collectors (whose bribe-taking is one reason why the country is broke) and taxi drivers furious over plans to make them issue receipts, keep accounts and pay taxes on their full incomes. Elsewhere, strikers have included French air-traffic controllers, said in a recent study by French state auditors to work fewer than 100 days a year—though nobody knows for sure, as their perks include shift patterns kept secret from senior management.
It is perhaps no surprise to find that organised workers in positions of privilege, including many in the public sector, fight the hardest and squeal the most in defence of their benefits. But European governments know that they have been living beyond their means—and so, deep down, do most voters. Besides, hypochondriac Europe is stronger than it thinks. German manufacturing has weathered the crisis quite well, partly because Germany’s economy has become more Anglo-Saxon in recent years than its political leaders care to admit. Poland avoided recession altogether. Italy has escaped any upsurge in its deficit. France’s companies are in better shape than its public opinion. Just look at Renault: despite being hauled over the coals, it continues to make more cars abroad than at home. Politicians need to hold their nerve and make cuts. They should also remember what doctors have always known: those who shout loudest are not always the ones in the most pain.
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Where there is the necessary technical skill to move mountains, there is no need for the faith that moves mountains -anon-
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Fritz
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Re:2010: The year of the global insurrection?
« Reply #5 on: 2010-03-15 10:32:57 » |
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The symbolic spilling of real blood is an interesting twist. I wonder if there are any precedence for this approach ?
Cheers
Fritz
Source: BBC News
Author: n/a
Date: Monday, 15 March 2010
Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva has rejected a demand from protesters to resign and call elections.
He spoke on national TV as tens of thousands of demonstrators gathered outside the barracks where he is based.
The rally, led by red-shirted supporters of ousted PM Thaksin Shinawatra, was one of the largest in recent years.
It passed off peacefully, but two soldiers were hurt when grenades exploded inside another army base.
An army spokesman said the grenades appeared to have been fired into the compound, but said it was not clear who was responsible.
Early in the day, crowds of demonstrators gathered outside the headquarters of the 11th Infantry Battalion barracks in the north of the Thai capital.
Several thousand extra soldiers were sent to reinforce security at the barracks - to which the prime minister had moved after the demonstrators set up camp around Government House.
As the protesters' deadline for him to step down passed, Mr Abhisit appeared on national television flanked by ministers and coalition allies.
"The protesters have demanded that I dissolve the house before midday (0500 GMT) today, but the coalition parties agree the demand cannot be met," he said.
"Elections must be held under common rules and genuine calm. We have to listen to other people's voices, not just the protesters."
Mr Abhisit then left the army base by helicopter, saying he wanted to inspect the traffic.
The BBC's Rachel Harvey, who was outside the barracks, says it is not clear where he is now.
The protest passed off in a peaceful and good-humoured manner, our reporter adds, but there was no sign of compromise from either side.
The protesters have now returned from the barracks to their base camp at Government House. Red-shirt leaders said they would meet to discuss their next move.
One protest leader said the demonstrators would each contribute a small amount of blood to be thrown on the gates of Government House on Tuesday, as a symbol of their determination.
Thaksin legacy
About 100,000 demonstrators held rallies in Bangkok on Sunday.
Political speeches culminated in a video address by Mr Thaksin, who told the crowd they were bringing democracy to Thailand.
Mr Thaksin is living in self-imposed overseas exile after receiving a two-year sentence in absentia for abuse of power; his supporters say that case was politically motivated.
The protesters say the present government was installed illegally after Mr Thaksin was ousted in a military coup in 2006, and two subsequent allied governments were deposed by court action.
The red-shirt protest leaders insist their movement is non-violent.
They say they are prepared to stay in the capital for five days, to pressure the government into calling new elections.
The military has been given extra powers to impose curfews and restrict numbers at gatherings if necessary.
The last major protests, in April 2009, turned violent, with two deaths and dozens of people injured.
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Where there is the necessary technical skill to move mountains, there is no need for the faith that moves mountains -anon-
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