Elitism and democracy (in democracy, etc)

[OftenWrong]

1 hour ago, Michael Hardner said:

Well, come on...

Okay then. 

 

[OftenWrong]

1 hour ago, Michael Hardner said:

I'm not here to teach people English, nor are you here to defend bad arguments.

Or perhaps I heard it differently than you, my friend. Makes me think that certain things that are important, mind you that are hard to get done can easily get undone by the next flip of ideological government. Because in democracy we sway to fro. However if things swing too much, the whole kit and kaboodle could flip right over.

[myata]

4 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

1. Are you a native English speaker?  Objective means goal or target.  Creating a registry is an objective.  Whether it's still in use or not doesn't change whether it was ever done.

Apart from lessons in English grammar (thanks but no thanks), can we conclude that the objective here (as in all other cited cases) was to get a checkmark on paper - rather than achieve a meaningful and measurable improvement in the reality?

Got it. In that case no one could argue that you can have every success imaginable - as long as it is in the head or on paper. Canada's per capita Covid mortality is about a half of the USA (looking pretty good!) and about 20 (twenty) times higher than in comparable by population Australia and South Korea. But that's still looking pretty good! because doing like them was never on the paper - and so, not an objective! Very smart, yes? And we can do another Phoenix too! And who said that we wouldn't?

[Michael Hardner]

16 minutes ago, myata said:

1. thanks but no thanks,
2. can we conclude that the objective here (as in all other cited cases) was to get a checkmark on paper - rather than achieve a meaningful and measurable improvement in the reality?
3. Got it. In that case no one could argue that you can have every success imaginable - as long as it is in the head or on paper. Canada's per capita Covid mortality is about a half of the USA (looking pretty good!) and about 20 (twenty) times higher than in comparable by population Australia and South Korea. But that's still looking pretty good! because doing like them was never on the paper - and so, not an objective! Very smart, yes?
 

1. you are too proud
2. are you saying the goal in politics is simply to look GOOD AND GET ELECTED... I just gasped !

3. don't understand

[cougar]

On 2/4/2021 at 6:17 AM, cannuck said:

I very much have to disagree with this.   Socialism IN THEORY treats greed as a sin, but it is nothing but pure greed that inspires EVERY socialist leader to reward themselves and their friends far in excess of what every other citizen will ever see.

 

If this happens, it is not because socialism meant for this to happen.   In theory you have a leader and people are more or less equal.  There might be differences in pay but they rarely, if  ever exceeded the 1:3 ratio.  In other words a low paid worker would make 1/2 or 1/3 of the wages of his top manager.   What are the ratios here?????  If socialist leaders could be democratically removed and new ones appointed, we might have had a good system in place.   Keep in mid we had no problems with homelessness, suicides, drug abuse,  job insecurity, inequality, racism, armed violence and many other capitalist traits under socialism.  We did not work on Saturdays and Sundays.  There was no overtime bullshit.  People were left to enjoy life with friends - having parties, different hobbies , different social gatherings and clubs.

Capitalism??  What a joke of a system.  It does not protect nothing.  If someone makes money from making plastic bottles they will be making them till the oceans are filled up with them.  The government will issue all appropriate permits.  If one makes money from guns, again, the government will issue permits and the kids can continue to shoot one another at school.  If the government makes money out of immigration, they will bring all kinds of people with no regard fro religion or culture, as culture realistically does not exist anyways.  No regard for nationality or protecting borders, lets call it multiculturalism.   No regard for destroying the environment and selling huge amounts of public lands and wildlife habitat to individuals or private entities.  No regard for letting the rich make the rest poorer and poorer by exploiting them and gradually taking their rights and wealth away.  All endorsed by the same democratic government.

Are you nuts my friend to tell me this is the system we should live under as it is the best of the best???

Those who chime for you , I am sure cannot think for themselves and are scared that what they were taught was the ultimate evil is in fact a more humane system that their own.

 

 

 

 

Edited February 8, 2021 by cougar

[cannuck]

On 1/12/2021 at 4:59 PM, cougar said:

We just live in a system interested in preserving itself at all costs.

I think you win the internets this month with that statement.

But, what you said about the wonderful world of socialism is simply not in any way true.  What you would like to BELIEVE, maybe, but reality is that leaders in socialist countries are no different from leaders in Casino Capitalist societies where those who are in power give themselves through privilege things that NO ordinary citizen can get...and it is in the thousands or millions of times more, not 3:1.  To give you one example: your personal hero of the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela once tried to sell PDVSA's Citgo in USA by having the payment sent to him PERSONALLY offshore.  Meanwhile his citizens were as they are now destitute and starving.  Stand up to him and you get a bullet in the brain.  Even Bill Gates isn't that big an asshole.

Capitalism is NOT a political "system", it merely means that the means of production are funded privately OR PUBLICLY in an open and accountable way.  In a truly socialist system, government simply orders things to be done and there is no accounting system (as these are not financial transactions) to manage the costs or benefits.   EVERY government that has tried to do so has failed.   

Is North Korea your idea of heaven??????

Edited February 8, 2021 by cannuck

[cougar]

32 minutes ago, cannuck said:

I think you win the internets this month with that statement.

 

I take it you are done with your arguments.

In the socialist country I lived in, the leader / president  did not have any extravagant personal properties.  His privileges were more along the line of enhanced rights - traveling, hunting and so on.   But you get the same here with money.

The difference is, in a socialist country you will have one leach, in a capitalist country you will have countless leaches.

In a socialist country there is no real need for growth; in a capitalist - all about growth and money.  Madness!

Edited February 8, 2021 by cougar

[Nefarious Banana]

18 minutes ago, cougar said:

In the socialist country I lived in . . . . 

The difference is, in a socialist country you will have one leach, in a capitalist country you will have countless leaches.

In a socialist country there is no real need for growth; in a capitalist - all about growth and money.  Madness!

Your programming is total and complete . . . . . and yet, you're still unhappy.  The capitalists will work, you'll hide behind the couch someone donated to you. Stick your hand out for that govt. cheque every now and then.

[myata]

17 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

2. are you saying the goal in politics is simply to look GOOD AND GET ELECTED... I just gasped !

3. don't understand

2. Worse. You can get elected, but where? If nothing can be changed anymore and no new results can be produced, other than on paper? All what's left is to reproduce itself i.e. what already happened before: Dr. Charlie Smith disaster, gun registry, Phoenix system, Nova Scotia massacre, "travel from Wuhan"... "Changing this one paragraph will be such a can of worms!", the epitaph.

3. Indeed. If the steering wheel and levers aren't connected, what's the point of pretending to be driving?

[myata]

8 hours ago, Nefarious Banana said:

Your programming is total and complete . . . . . and yet, you're still unhappy.  The capitalists will work, you'll hide behind the couch someone donated to you. Stick your hand out for that govt. cheque every now and then.

Socialism does not work, there are too many examples. And pure, unrestrained capitalism does not work for large part of population, sometimes the majority of population, many examples. There may not be an easy answer, because it can be in the details: who writes the rules of capitalism, and how, how are they implemented and by who, etc.

[Michael Hardner]

14 minutes ago, myata said:

1.  If nothing can be changed anymore and no new results can be produced, other than on paper? All what's left is to reproduce itself i.e. what already happened before: Dr. Charlie Smith disaster, gun registry, Phoenix system, Nova Scotia massacre, "travel from Wuhan"... "Changing this one paragraph will be such a can of worms!", the epitaph.

2. Indeed. If the steering wheel and levers aren't connected, what's the point of pretending to be driving?

1. I don't accept that they have no effect.  
2. Did it ever work ?

[myata]

4 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

2. Did it ever work ?

The saying goes that somewhere around late 19th century or early 20th a transcontinental railway was constructed from scratch. And, around mid last century a public healthcare system was adopted and implemented. But it hasn't evolved since. And it was so long ago...

[Michael Hardner]

3 hours ago, myata said:

The saying goes that somewhere around late 19th century or early 20th a transcontinental railway was constructed from scratch. And, around mid last century a public healthcare system was adopted and implemented. But it hasn't evolved since. And it was so long ago...

So government reaches its objectives sometimes.  Right ?  What makes it fail today then ?

[myata]

1 hour ago, Michael Hardner said:

So government reaches its objectives sometimes.  Right ?  What makes it fail today then ?

Not "reacheS", but "reachED", some and some decades back. That English can be tricky I know.

What makes it fail? Primarily, and in the essence, our complacency. It allows the governments and the bureaucracy to become things in themselves, elites, clans, corporations. And then who can blame them that they only care about things that matter to them, procedures, hierarchies, meetings and action plans? And not even because they became bad, no. It's just their shape, the construction of its body allows it only these moves, these responses and that perspective on the reality. If we cannot keep them in shape that is right for us, not for "it" than nothing will and the outcome is predetermined by the laws of evolution: "ever less out for ever more in".

Edited February 8, 2021 by myata

[Michael Hardner]

2 minutes ago, myata said:

Not "reacheS", but "reachED", some and some decades back. That English can be tricky I know.

Yeah... Governments sometimes REACH their objectives.  Stop showing off your verb tenses and answer...

[cannuck]

22 hours ago, cougar said:

The difference is, in a socialist country you will have one leach, in a capitalist country you will have countless leaches.

In a socialist country there is no real need for growth; in a capitalist - all about growth and money.  Madness!

I know this might be hard for you to follow, but please try.

Capitalism does NOT rely on endless growth.  What we have now is NOT capitalism per se, so I use the term "Casino Capitalism" that is a very different thing.   Capitalism just means using capital to fund business for the purpose of placing accountable quantities of resources in the hands of a business, hopefully then creating wealth.  It doesn't even have to be private money to be capitalistic, it just has to be a quantifiable amount in an environment where profit and loss is once again accountable to relate to the shareholders what has happened with their money.   What has happened in most of the world today is that we no longer use the mechanisms of invested capital to create wealth (that is incremental related exactly and ONLY to wealth that has been created by adding value to a resource or delivering service in support of same), but instead we have granted the very special privilege for the value established by the investment of capital to be traded by betting on the perceived value of such equities, or even worse than that, gambling on purely imagined financial instruments ("synthetic" instruments derived from some other market activity - thus called "derivatives") that do nothing but re-distribute wealth by simply inflating values artificially.  THAT is what requires constant growth and worships not the work and product of capitalism, but just the capital itself.

You are very right in calling it madness, but not capitalism.

[cougar]

3 hours ago, cannuck said:

Capitalism does NOT rely on endless growth

I would have to again disagree. 

Growth is in the mouths of our politicians.   Growth is all around us.  Growth is the increased number of people and the increased amount of natural habitat converted by us into urban ghettos and junk yards.

Capitalism. particularly the wild west type of North America relies heavily on growth - the pyramid scheme as we know it - baby boomers replaced by more baby boomers and then by even more baby boomers.

........yeah, I know I do not get the point of  what you are trying to tell me.  Hopefully you get what I am telling you ;-)

[Michael Hardner]

3 hours ago, cougar said:

I would have to again disagree. 

Growth is in the mouths of our politicians.   Growth is all around us.  Growth is the increased number of people and the increased amount of natural habitat converted by us into urban ghettos and junk yards.

 ;-)

I have to say something here.  Growth can also mean LESS.  If it takes LESS effort to do something then productivity improves.  And this can come from innovation.

 

Capitalism is a general descriptor for a system that includes activities which are generally advantageous.

[Nefarious Banana]

7 hours ago, cougar said:

Growth is in the mouths of our politicians.   Growth is all around us.  Growth is the increased number of people and the increased amount of natural habitat converted by us into urban ghettos and junk yards.

Capitalism. particularly the wild west type of North America relies heavily on growth - the pyramid scheme as we know it - baby boomers replaced by more baby boomers and then by even more baby boomers.

 

cougar . . . in a perfect Canada/USA, what would make you happy?  What's the perfect system?  Please inform us . . 

[myata]

8 hours ago, cougar said:

Capitalism. particularly the wild west type of North America relies heavily on growth - the pyramid scheme as we know it - baby boomers replaced by more baby boomers and then by even more baby boomers.

It's in the frame. A discussion in the frame of static, fixed "isms" will not give us a meaningful answer. There were extremes in unconstrained, oligarchic versions of capitalism, and socialism as an ism, an ideology promoting restriction and persecution of private initiative is dead, most likely on arrival because it contradicts the very nature not even human, but of the evolution.

So, what other, different frames of questioning are possible and are there any? We know, observed many times in natural and social history that an individual or group that stopped evolving, began to stagnate inevitably decline, deteriorate and give in to the entropy. What if the only way to achieve something better is to change, and evolve? And how can we change and evolve?

What new horizons and objectives (not in the sense of paper registries, but real change in the society) can we think of, and construct in the reality in this century? Fully sustainable, zero-emission and 100% recyclable communities? Free and continuous education? Open, effective and flexible public service working for the community and as a community, not an entrenched corporation? Meaningful participation of citizens in prosperity and active, engaged, daily process of democracy? It's not the left or the right, it is "in", what's in us: if we stop to change and evolve the answer becomes inevitable, through ice or fire if it matters.

[myata]

Here's a great example exactly when one is needed: Maori MP ejected from NZ parliament for refusing to wear a tie.

See there's this thing that came to believe that wearing a tie must be extremely important. In its perception of the world, it is definitely more important than the right of the citizens to ask questions to the government and have representatives in the parliament at all times. Now, is there any point in asking it why exactly it came to think this way; or it's better i.e. more effective to shake it a bit, if necessary, and bring it back to the reality of the century around it?

What happens next? And here's what: left to itself, it's own priorities and instruments, it will invent itself dozens more "important" rules, traditions and routines; it will appoint itself five-to-six digit salaries (what? already?) for performing extremely important democratic businesses; and then go back to its daily operations.

It lives perfectly fine without any reality outside the revered walls and doors. It has all it needs for an infinite and productive activity and it has no need for the reality. And this is the problem. A democracy in this century must be open, direct and continuous. It can be the only effective solution.

Edited February 9, 2021 by myata

[DogOnPorch]

No tie? Well, there goes my shot at the NZ Parliament.

[cougar]

11 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

I have to say something here.  Growth can also mean LESS.  If it takes LESS effort to do something then productivity improves.  And this can come from innovation. 

I can give your argument a fleeting consideration.  Unfortunately believing in it is pure utopia.   You can increase productivity but who do you sell your products to if you do not increase the customer base?  Then what do you do with your redundant employees if you do not create another business to make them produce something else?

Show me an example of a successful country that increases productivity while reducing employees and a country that does not sell those products outside to another country with an expanding population????    (I got you, didn't I )

 

Edited February 9, 2021 by cougar

[Michael Hardner]

12 minutes ago, cougar said:

1. who do you sell your products to if you do not increase the customer base?  Then what do you do with your redundant employees if you do not create another business to make them produce something else?

2. Show me an example of a successful country that increases productivity while reducing employees and a country that does not sell those products outside to another country with an expanding population????    (I got you, didn't I )

 

1.  Businesses don't exist to increase the customer base.  They exist to maximize profits.  So you can make more money by cutting the number in customers in half and selling the 201% of what they were buying before.  You see ?
2. No you didn't get me.  You very much can increase productivity while reducing employees in many ways, such as automation.  Exporting is a different question, but yes you can increase profits if you only sell domestically and reduce the number of employees.  Easy example: A Tim Hortons buys a dishwasher instead of getting a high school student to do it.

Did I understand what you were framing ?  I don't want to frame this as me one-upping you, nor do I want to present myself as someone knows more than the basics about economics.  We're working on these questions together, and I could be wrong at any step - if I am just correct me.
 

[cougar]

59 minutes ago, Michael Hardner said:

 if I am just correct me.
 

I will.   I may have to elaborate a little more.  Can't do it right now.