Do people actually think Michael Moore is honest and has the answers for this country? Or is he just an entertainer? Something I've never understood. Forgive my ignorance.
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on October 30, 2009.
I think we need to start playing the symantex(sp?) game as well...let's begin calling Capitalism SOLEY FREE MARKET SYSTEM...because people, uneducated ones, have the wrong idea about capitalism. If we start saying FREE MARKET in place of it every time perhaps we can gain some listeners.
I hate that Michael Moore's movie is about CORPORATISM and no one can grasp it (no one in the media). Let's try to change the game up, not like we all don't say "free market" on a daily basis.
What Ron Paul is saying here is complete bogus. How come every country has practiced protectionism/government intervention in order to develop. In fact, this policy was first formulated by Alexander Hamilton, who argued for infant industry protection. If the United States would have listened to the free-market theologians of the British empire back in the days, they would still be pursuing their comparative advantage in fur and tobacco.
The policies Paul advocates for the United States do exist in some parts of the world, they exist in a good part of the third world. Which is exactly why the third world looks the way it does. Privatize almost everything, open your markets and you'll quickly see that your country will lose all it's industry(which is unable to compete with their more efficient western counterparts), which will result in a decline of real wages. Now free-market doctrine prescribes that it doesn't matter whether someone spends his time as a farmer in Mongolia or as a computer technician in Silicon Valley, both activities have the same potential value. The story goes that once everybody abolishes government intervention, something called, factor-price equalization will happen. Such a notion might seem contrary to common sense, but more importantly it's even contrary to what we see happening in the world.
Manufacturing contrary to say agriculture has the advantage of increasing returns to scale. What this actually means is that in most manufacturing activities, you can add units of capital and labour and the productivity will only increase. In agriculture in contrast you can get at a certain point where productivity per unit labour or capital will drop(over fertilization, the need to use 'bad' pieces of land etc.). This means that there's a higher wage potential for activities subject to increasing returns to scale, where in agriculture you can not keep paying higher wages since productivity will decrease. The point being, that government intervention to protect manufacturing(atleast untill it can deal with the competition) is not bad policy. It's what the US did, it's what my country(Holland) did in it's golden age, it's what the English did and more recently it's what South Korea has done.
Also there are obvious falsehoods in this interview, he claims there's nobody dying from lack of health-care. Well take a look at a recent Harvard study which shows that people who don't have health-care insurance have 40% higher death rates then those who do have health-care insurance. This means that there's about 45000 people dying every year because they lack health-care insurance. Well you can go and talk about how it's theft when you give health-care to these people, or you could show a more humane pose and acknowledge the facts. Nobody is dying in Australia because of lack of health-care, it's an American phenomena typical, because it represents the corporate mentality. Back in the 19th century, workers in the mills in Lowell, Massaschussets denounced what they called, "the new spirit of the age[..] gain wealth forget all but self". That's what Paul is advocating, an ideology that has been extremely harmful for the miserable and suffering people around the world. I can not help but be skeptical of this whole libertarian movement in the US that presumably advocates freedom, but can only look at the tyranny of goverment, but can't see that as John Dewey once said that "Unless industrial feudalism is replaced by industrial democracy. Politics will remain the shadow cast by business over society". The problem is private tyranny not the other way around.
Submitted by Jesse Frederik (not verified) on October 31, 2009.
Jesse, your "American system" of economics simply amounts of mercantalism, imperialism, and corporatism. The third world has not adopted open markets, far from it. What the third world has adopted is authoraitainsim and ceding control of their markets to economic systems such as the US and EU who do practice psuedo-mercantalism through leveraging their industries with subsidies and fixed trade agreements, which has been disastrous for the third world.
How come every country has practiced protectionism/government intervention in order to develop.
Post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy, fallacy. You are misconstruing correality with causality. Just because every developed country has had some mercantalist/protectionist traits in it's history does not mean that it is those traits that made it successful. In fact, that contrapositive is true. The countries that have had the least government intervention in teir history have had the most rapif growth rates.
Now free-market doctrine prescribes that it doesn't matter whether someone spends his time as a farmer in Mongolia or as a computer technician in Silicon Valley, both activities have the same potential value.
Uhh, no, it doesn't. I highly recommend you read some free market doctrine before you start criticizing it fallaciously, you are making the same mistakes as Marx.
What this actually means is that in most manufacturing activities, you can add units of capital and labour and the productivity will only increase. In agriculture in contrast you can get at a certain point where productivity per unit labour or capital will drop(over fertilization, the need to use 'bad' pieces of land etc.). This means that there's a higher wage potential for activities subject to increasing returns to scale, where in agriculture you can not keep paying higher wages since productivity will decrease.
This is mostly just nonsense in that it completely ignores the laws of supply and demand and the marginal utility theory of value.
he claims there's nobody dying from lack of health-care
Uhhh, no. Perhaps you should watch the interview again. he said befoe government intervention in the healthcare industry no one was ever denied care, which is true. This is because without government intervention there existed a lot more charity hospitals as well as greatly reduced costs. The amount of GDP we spent on healthcare in the 1940s is a fraction to that which is spent today. This is largely to do with our mercantalist/protectionist approach to the healthcare industry that you proscribe.
it's an American phenomena typical, because it represents the corporate mentality.
The corporate mentality exists solely because of perverse government incentives generated by the likes of protectionists interested solely in protecting American industries over what is good for the American consumers as well as the nation as a whole. It ws Hamilton and the protectionists who favored protecting big business at the expense of the consumer, he is the founder of the corporatist economic system which still rules the day.
Paul is advocating, an ideology that has been extremely harmful for the miserable and suffering people around the world. I can not help but be skeptical of this whole libertarian movement in the US that presumably advocates freedom, but can only look at the tyranny of goverment, but can't see that as John Dewey once said that "Unless industrial feudalism is replaced by industrial democracy. Politics will remain the shadow cast by business over society". The problem is private tyranny not the other way around.
Paul is advocating an ideology that has lifted literally billions of people from poverty around the world. It is the free market ideology that made America the economic powerhouse that it was only a few years ago, and it is government intervention for the sake of reducing "private tyranny" that has done the greatest damage to our economic well-being. I highly recommend you visit the Ludwig von Mises Institue webpage and read some of the free literature on that site. I'd start with Murray Rothbard's Power and Market: The Government and the Economy. As the great Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises once said, "government cannot make man richer, but it can make him poorer."
I don't understand why you would visit and post on a website so antithetical to your core values. I do, however, find it intriguing that you both rail against and support corporate tyranny in the same passage.
Submitted by John M (not verified) on October 31, 2009.
You guys don't look like you need the help. I'm not very tech-savvy and never have much I'd like to share, but I'll think about it and get back to you on that. :)
Submitted by John M (not verified) on November 1, 2009.
Ok, well just let me know. It doesn't really require any computer skills -- if you can use Microsoft Word, you can use our text editor. But bloggers usually only last so long, with some rare and very faithful exceptions, so I'm always on the lookout for fresh meat XD
Just message me through the site if you decide you are interested, and no hard feelings if you aren't.
Do people actually think Michael Moore is honest and has the answers for this country? Or is he just an entertainer? Something I've never understood. Forgive my ignorance.
"a touch of pregnancy" -- so great. Dr. Paul is excellent on the wars as well...but then he always is.
I think we need to start playing the symantex(sp?) game as well...let's begin calling Capitalism SOLEY FREE MARKET SYSTEM...because people, uneducated ones, have the wrong idea about capitalism. If we start saying FREE MARKET in place of it every time perhaps we can gain some listeners.
I hate that Michael Moore's movie is about CORPORATISM and no one can grasp it (no one in the media). Let's try to change the game up, not like we all don't say "free market" on a daily basis.
What Ron Paul is saying here is complete bogus. How come every country has practiced protectionism/government intervention in order to develop. In fact, this policy was first formulated by Alexander Hamilton, who argued for infant industry protection. If the United States would have listened to the free-market theologians of the British empire back in the days, they would still be pursuing their comparative advantage in fur and tobacco.
The policies Paul advocates for the United States do exist in some parts of the world, they exist in a good part of the third world. Which is exactly why the third world looks the way it does. Privatize almost everything, open your markets and you'll quickly see that your country will lose all it's industry(which is unable to compete with their more efficient western counterparts), which will result in a decline of real wages. Now free-market doctrine prescribes that it doesn't matter whether someone spends his time as a farmer in Mongolia or as a computer technician in Silicon Valley, both activities have the same potential value. The story goes that once everybody abolishes government intervention, something called, factor-price equalization will happen. Such a notion might seem contrary to common sense, but more importantly it's even contrary to what we see happening in the world.
Manufacturing contrary to say agriculture has the advantage of increasing returns to scale. What this actually means is that in most manufacturing activities, you can add units of capital and labour and the productivity will only increase. In agriculture in contrast you can get at a certain point where productivity per unit labour or capital will drop(over fertilization, the need to use 'bad' pieces of land etc.). This means that there's a higher wage potential for activities subject to increasing returns to scale, where in agriculture you can not keep paying higher wages since productivity will decrease. The point being, that government intervention to protect manufacturing(atleast untill it can deal with the competition) is not bad policy. It's what the US did, it's what my country(Holland) did in it's golden age, it's what the English did and more recently it's what South Korea has done.
Also there are obvious falsehoods in this interview, he claims there's nobody dying from lack of health-care. Well take a look at a recent Harvard study which shows that people who don't have health-care insurance have 40% higher death rates then those who do have health-care insurance. This means that there's about 45000 people dying every year because they lack health-care insurance. Well you can go and talk about how it's theft when you give health-care to these people, or you could show a more humane pose and acknowledge the facts. Nobody is dying in Australia because of lack of health-care, it's an American phenomena typical, because it represents the corporate mentality. Back in the 19th century, workers in the mills in Lowell, Massaschussets denounced what they called, "the new spirit of the age[..] gain wealth forget all but self". That's what Paul is advocating, an ideology that has been extremely harmful for the miserable and suffering people around the world. I can not help but be skeptical of this whole libertarian movement in the US that presumably advocates freedom, but can only look at the tyranny of goverment, but can't see that as John Dewey once said that "Unless industrial feudalism is replaced by industrial democracy. Politics will remain the shadow cast by business over society". The problem is private tyranny not the other way around.
Jesse, your "American system" of economics simply amounts of mercantalism, imperialism, and corporatism. The third world has not adopted open markets, far from it. What the third world has adopted is authoraitainsim and ceding control of their markets to economic systems such as the US and EU who do practice psuedo-mercantalism through leveraging their industries with subsidies and fixed trade agreements, which has been disastrous for the third world.
Post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy, fallacy. You are misconstruing correality with causality. Just because every developed country has had some mercantalist/protectionist traits in it's history does not mean that it is those traits that made it successful. In fact, that contrapositive is true. The countries that have had the least government intervention in teir history have had the most rapif growth rates.
Uhh, no, it doesn't. I highly recommend you read some free market doctrine before you start criticizing it fallaciously, you are making the same mistakes as Marx.
This is mostly just nonsense in that it completely ignores the laws of supply and demand and the marginal utility theory of value.
Uhhh, no. Perhaps you should watch the interview again. he said befoe government intervention in the healthcare industry no one was ever denied care, which is true. This is because without government intervention there existed a lot more charity hospitals as well as greatly reduced costs. The amount of GDP we spent on healthcare in the 1940s is a fraction to that which is spent today. This is largely to do with our mercantalist/protectionist approach to the healthcare industry that you proscribe.
The corporate mentality exists solely because of perverse government incentives generated by the likes of protectionists interested solely in protecting American industries over what is good for the American consumers as well as the nation as a whole. It ws Hamilton and the protectionists who favored protecting big business at the expense of the consumer, he is the founder of the corporatist economic system which still rules the day.
Paul is advocating an ideology that has lifted literally billions of people from poverty around the world. It is the free market ideology that made America the economic powerhouse that it was only a few years ago, and it is government intervention for the sake of reducing "private tyranny" that has done the greatest damage to our economic well-being. I highly recommend you visit the Ludwig von Mises Institue webpage and read some of the free literature on that site. I'd start with Murray Rothbard's Power and Market: The Government and the Economy. As the great Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises once said, "government cannot make man richer, but it can make him poorer."
I don't understand why you would visit and post on a website so antithetical to your core values. I do, however, find it intriguing that you both rail against and support corporate tyranny in the same passage.
Have you ever thought of blogging for us, John M?
You guys don't look like you need the help. I'm not very tech-savvy and never have much I'd like to share, but I'll think about it and get back to you on that. :)
Ok, well just let me know. It doesn't really require any computer skills -- if you can use Microsoft Word, you can use our text editor. But bloggers usually only last so long, with some rare and very faithful exceptions, so I'm always on the lookout for fresh meat XD
Just message me through the site if you decide you are interested, and no hard feelings if you aren't.
I say let's draft him!!!! Oh wait... we're philosophically opposed to that sort of thing... MY BAD!!
(just kidding obviously)
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