Great Depression Ii

[Roxanne Appleby]

I'm still waiting for someone to explain in explicit terms exactly what is racist about it.

I'm not necessarily disagreeing that it is -call me agnostic, leaning toward.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

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[JAMESBJOHNSON]

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[Roxanne Appleby]

ROXANNE

I read a variety of opinions today, and combining this with what the Democrats did from 1931-1933 when Hoover was President, I expect Congress to sit on its hands with respect to the credit problem. The election is too soon, and they wont save Dubya if harming the nation helps Obama.

Boy, that would be very high risk. Politicians are primarilly motivated by fear of being blamed for anything that goes wrong, and the markets gave about as solid endorsement as possible to this RTC plan. If the Dems stiff Bush on it then they will take "ownership" of the crisis, and the blame for anything bad that happens from here on out will be placed on them - starting with a 1,000-2,000 point Dow fall if this deal doesn't go. I see their path of least resistance to go along, throw a few wealth restrib pork-pies into the mix for cover, and be done with it for this season.

 

[Guest]

Wow.

Perhaps it's the rum and the fact that I just checked in this evening.

This thread is fucked.

Really a lot.

 

[Le Jacquelope]

I don't necessarily disagree, but I wonder if you are willing to explain in precise, explicit terms just what makes that av racist, if it is?

Obama, looking over waffles like a coon?

That's a classic caricature of black people.

Even the Conservative forum where these things were sold, took these things off display.

If THEY realize it's racist, and YOU don't?

Well, you know what. I have the real world behind me. Even conservatives who took that crap off public display. Who do you have defending JBJ's racist crap?

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=75506

Event organizers ended waffle sales Saturday, the Associated Press reported. They said they didn't realize the caricatures were "offensive material." Meanwhile, news outlets and blogs have picked up the story, claiming the writers were pushing racial stereotypes.

As you can tell, I am backed up by a very large number of real world people here.

 

[Le Jacquelope]

JOMAR

SAMBO is still in print.

Actually he isnt black, he's Indian. There are no tigers in Africa.

Your sorry ass is on ignore for good, you pathetic keyboard coward.

Why don't you walk around with that on your shirt and see how people react? Oh no wait, you wouldn't dare. You're a cowardly chickenshit.

Fortunately I and society at large have no tolerance for this garbage. It's sad, though, that the Author's Hangout isn't verbally stringing you up en masse.

I'd like to see how they'd react if I came here and had an AV with stereotypes about whites...

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

Obama, looking over waffles like a coon?

That's a classic caricature of black people.

Like I said I think I agree. I was mostly interested in whether anyone here could or was willing to articulate precisely what makes it racist. No one has. All you've done is explain it with a circular defininition, and a racist one at that.

Yes, it is racist, but it also raises a concern. If no one is willing to state the elements that define racism in a cartoon of Obama, does that mean political cartoon caricatures of him are forbidden, or at the very least, that any cartoonist who creates one is vulnerable to the 21st century's version of the scoundrel's last resort?

 

[colddiesel]

Wow.

Perhaps it's the rum and the fact that I just checked in this evening.

This thread is fucked.

Really a lot.

You're right and it ain't the rum.

 

[xssve]

ROXANNE

I read a variety of opinions today, and combining this with what the Democrats did from 1931-1933 when Hoover was President, I expect Congress to sit on its hands with respect to the credit problem. The election is too soon, and they wont save Dubya if harming the nation helps Obama.

They will act on behalf of special interests, that's where their campaign financing comes from, that's where their bread is buttered, and that goes for both parties.


As for your avatar, it isn't overtly racist on the face of it, it mainly plays to the "happy negro" stereotype, i.e., the childish, hedonistic "darkie" who prefers to sing and dance and eat watermelon rather than work, and is helpless without the firm guidance of the White mans hand.

In short, it's comparing him to George W. Bush which is highly offensive.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

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[JAMESBJOHNSON]

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[Roxanne Appleby]

They will act on behalf of special interests, that's where their campaign financing comes from, that's where their bread is buttered, and that goes for both parties.

Theres a difference here though, LJ. Sure, they always play to special interests - unions, agribiz, etc. But the world financial system doesn't hang on whether they pass another ethanol subsidy or card-check bill. If the world financial system locks up then JBJ's Depression II fever dreams come true - and which "special interest" is helped most by avoiding that?

 

[Guest]

What's racist, exactly?

Here is the original Aunt Jemima ad photo.

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b318/sweetsubsarahh/AuntJemima.jpg

And here's a cookie jar.

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b318/sweetsubsarahh/AuntJemimaCookiejar.jpg

Here is the Obama box.

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b318/sweetsubsarahh/s-OBAMA-WAFFLES-large.jpg

I suppose they are capitalizing on that "Happy darkies, singing in the field, while Miss Scarlett primps for her beau" sort of look. It is insulting.

And Aunt Jemima, finally recognizing the insult, has updated and upgraded their look. Including the bottle.

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b318/sweetsubsarahh/auntjemimaupdated.jpg

They're doing anything they can. Attacking from every direction.

If they can snare a few more racists along the way, why not I suppose?

 

[xssve]

Theres a difference here though, LJ. Sure, they always play to special interests - unions, agribiz, etc. But the world financial system doesn't hang on whether they pass another ethanol subsidy or card-check bill. If the world financial system locks up then JBJ's Depression II fever dreams come true - and which "special interest" is helped most by avoiding that?

Depends on which special interest you belong to - the capital/investment worshippers are not the only special interest, the penal economics crowd is firmly entrenched: economic collapse will increase the crime rate and divert more tax dollars into military/penal investments, under the guise of maintaining social order.

That is essentially the economic philosophy that has gotten us to this point, and in the words of the great obfuscater: "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". More accurately, if it's fixed, break it - do you honestly think this situation developed overnight?

The Chinese word for "disaster" is comprised of two glyphs - "danger" and "opportunity". Go see where the administration has it's money.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

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[JAMESBJOHNSON]

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[JAMESBJOHNSON]

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[xssve]

During the great depression, Andrew Mellon's word was "liquidate, liquidate, liquidate..." - which is the only proper free market response in the strictest sense - the result was the introduction of the concept of Keynesian stimulus, which resulted in the longest period of sustained economic growth since the Bronze age.

We no longer believe in free markets however; Monetarist policy has supplanted Keynesian policy and, this is strictly corporatist socialism, whether you like the phrase or not - I think it's a natural progression that follows when you make the initial decision to distort the invisible hand with monetarist market manipulation - i.e., where do you stop?

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

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[xssve]

XSSVE

Keynes said a lot of things, like: A market full of irrationality will kick your pocketbooks ass every time.

The foundation of solid economic growth remains a solid underlying economic infrastructure - it was as true in Smiths time as it is now, and one of his big critiques of feudal economics were toll roads as barriers to entry.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

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[Roxanne Appleby]

ROXANNE

I swear, youre becoming as histrionic as THE USUAL SUSPECTS, to wit, my Depression Dream.

I just read a Robert Rubin biography. In 1996 he was apoplectic that Mexico might default on its bonds, bringing ruin and prostration to Western Civilization. The cost to fix the problem was 30-40 BILLION.

ONE TRILLION is a lot more than 40 BILLION, and the final bill might be a lot more. People who know about how banks leverage deposits estimate maybe TEN to FIFTEEN TRILLION. Some in government use words like impending financial collapse.

Bush is borrowing the money for all of this help. This means there is less money for business and consumers to borrow for their needs.

I think the Democrats will spin their resistance however they can, to milk all the panic and terror possible before the election.

Yeah, but Rubin's a dork.

Your "crowding out" of private capital for lenders if off base. The worst crowd-out is that the system locks up and no one can get any loan for any thing. Go back to the projection of a few hundred billion in losses when all the dust has cleared. It's not that big an amount compared to the world pool of capital And - those loses have already happened. \

What's bollixing things up today is that the bad loans that represent the losses are all bundled in with the good ones, and no one can tell which is which right now. That's the purpose of an RTC - a deep-pocketed entity assumes all the dubious paper, and has the luxury of time to untangle the good from the bad, sell the good loans back into the market, recognize and "book" the (already existing) losses on the bad ones, liquidate the underlying assets, and put the whole thing behind us. No fuss, no muss, the world economy steams ahead.

 

[xssve]

Markets are infrastructure and you can have markets without either cash or credit, these are higher level abstractions that expand the array of goods and services that can be be exchanged, goods and services of theoretical, as opposed to immediate and intrinsic value.

They have value only insofar as they represent intrinsic value, equity, etc.

A physical infrastructure is required to have markets and to deliver goods and services to those markets to exchange, this market is almost completely abstract, electronic numbers representing debt, and it is debt that's being bought and sold, packaged and exchanged, the real value of which is based on a theoretical ability to pay.

And yes, if you're trading debt, then a credit crunch is definitely going to be a problem.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

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