Signs that a collapse is under way.

[DiscoBiscuit]

Thanks for the perspective, SilverSurfer_OG.

 

[HempKat]

Mind if I draw a distinction? There may have been a point of contention over central monetary authority but there was consensus on free markets regulating themselves.

If Greenspan fell away from Rand decades ago, why did he wait until he was walking out the door to acknowledge? IMO, that's more fuel to suggest that Greenspan believed free markets could regulate themselves.

"AND Fraud has ALWAYS been regulated"

Maybe in theory. Investment markets weren't regulated until Glass Stegall. The distribution of food and drugs weren't cumulatively regulated until the inception of FDA. Worker safety wasn't regulated until OSHA. Environmental standards weren't regulated until EPA. Not enough space here to arguably demonstrate that markets never regulated themselves.

Without enforcement, regulation equals a former mine executive overseeing mine safety. (Big money in those pillars, lets see how many we can profit from while defending miner deaths as unavoidable.) Big oil over big oil. Enron, MCI, Arthur Anderson etc over Enron, MCI, Arthur Anderson etc.

The "market" is a cloud. It's innate nature neither produces nor negates regulation. That's up to the people that comprise the market.

Reading that a free marketeer endorses fraud regulation is refreshing. Suggesting we've always regulated is rather perplexing.

It's not that I resist proven principles. You can verify that by exampling successful "market regulation."

The problem with Free Markets and regulation or regulation in general is there is no affective way to regulate greed. Imagine what the world might possibly be like if it were possible to say "Oh, wait, you've already made plenty of money, you're not aloud to make any more until you spend at least 1/2 of everything you have." Yeah I know it will never happen but just imagine.

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

Good points, Hempkat.

If we could re-separate investment and commercial banking, I wouldn't necessarily moan from fat cats sailing the ionosphere. IMO, I-want-it-all-and-I want-it-now could, quite possibly should be there for the folks that want to play.

I'd just like to play the low risk, long term diversified game, free and clear of being sucked into the abyss of shisters. Not trying to be silly and suggest there's no risk but prior to 1999, long-term diversification virtually guaranteed a decent nest egg. Might still get there but I'm now crossing me fingers.

 

[HempKat]

Good points, Hempkat.

If we could re-separate investment and commercial banking, I wouldn't necessarily moan from fat cats sailing the ionosphere. IMO, I-want-it-all-and-I want-it-now could, quite possibly should be there for the folks that want to play.

I'd just like to play the low risk, long term diversified game, free and clear of being sucked into the abyss of shisters. Not trying to be silly and suggest there's no risk but prior to 1999, long-term diversification virtually guaranteed a decent nest egg. Might still get there but I'm now crossing me fingers.

I guess I could go along with that just so long as there was something in place to prevent the fat cat's from getting fatter at the expense of everyone else but then that would be regulation and eventually greed would allow the fat cats to find a way around it just like we've seen in our lifetime, many times over.

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

Yep, lol. As soon as we get something that's supposed to help, lawyers and loopholes rise to the surface. I'm the last to know where to draw the line but we need a big, fat, permanent Sharpie for the job.

 

[HempKat]

Yep, lol. As soon as we get something that's supposed to help, lawyers and loopholes rise to the surface. I'm the last to know where to draw the line but we need a big, fat, permanent Sharpie for the job.

Well I wish I had the solution to fix it all because then I'd sell it for a few Billion and live the rest of my life never wanting for anything.

That's what gets me, the people we're talking about that are doing all this stuff that's fucking things up for everyone else, most of them already have more money then they'll reasonably spend in a lifetime and the bulk of their money will go to relatives they probably didn't know very well if at all and to lawyers and what not to make sure that all happens properly.

 

[Hydrosun]

lol that you think Cannabis isnt regulated. illegality is regulation to the maximum. the price is consistently inflated and quality is consistently depressed.

you make the assumption that regulatory laws are typically passed to suppress crime and corruption, when in fact they are enacted to streamline it and consolidate power into the hands of the few.

rules were meant to be broken. people still commit murder despite the possibility of the death penalty in a number of states/countries. do you think that murder should instead go unpunished due to the failure of the death penalty?

-iD

Prohibition is not regulation it is prohibition. The cannabis that is cultivated is grown despite prohibition and the gardener is free to grow their crop as they best see fit (avoiding detection and the prohibitionists is a chief priority ).

I think that DiscoBiscuit argues that regulation can reduce corruption and increase quality. I in fact agree with you that regulation as it is know in the USA is for consolidating power in the hands of the few at the expense of the many.

I don't think the death penalty is a failure. Executing the wrong person is a failure; however no person ever executed has killed again.

Murder is not a victimless made up crime, it is actually a violation of natural law and has been recognized as such by every nation on the globe through recorded history. The great "legalize murder" experiment hasn't occurred yet, but if it did that certainly would be a sign of a collapse.

 

[Hydrosun]

Yep, lol. As soon as we get something that's supposed to help, lawyers and loopholes rise to the surface. I'm the last to know where to draw the line but we need a big, fat, permanent Sharpie for the job.

That is the quick sand you are in. NO matter how black letter your laws and regulations are people will always violate them and lawyers and regulators will always fight over them.

Lawyers and regulators have managed to keep their employment levels up in these tough times. Unfortunately (and despite the GDP calculation) these types of jobs don't produce anything and actually the salaries of all lawyers and regulators are a tax on us all.

 

[SpasticGramps]

Some interesting musings from a blog.

The Final Form of Human Government

Man is not only the most individual being on earth; he is also the most social being.
– Mikhail Bakunin

As Donne reminds us, No man is an island, at least if he attains to the order, the harmony – that “pleasing combination of the elements” – for which he naturally yearns. Alone against the elements, man is as nothing, scratching out an existence unfit for his kind and indeed destructive of it, selfless because, in having no others with whom to associate, no true self exists. But in that convivium – that “living together” – a self emerges, or at least the reflection of a self, into which he gazes and through which he begins not only to act but to act human, the goal of which is always the satisfaction of the acting man’s desires. And that, as we have said, is the source and sustenance of the social enterprise:

Society is concerted action, cooperation … the outcome of conscious and purposeful behavior. … Individual man is born into a socially organized environment. In this sense alone we may accept the saying that society is – logically and historically – antecedent to the individual. In every other sense this dictum is either empty or nonsensical. The individual lives and acts within society. But society is nothing but the combination of individuals for cooperative effort.

In seeing that it was out of this cooperative effort that civil society’s Twin Pillars – money and law – evolved, it is clear that in order for “the final form of human government” to indeed be final (inasmuch as humanity remains subject to material scarcity and thus to the demands of homo economicus), gold and the golden rule must be put back on their foundations. They must be returned to their rightful owners, that is, leaving us with one last question so far as societal governance is concerned. For in debunking the state, including and especially the “democratic” state, it would appear that we have debunked democracy as well, and that the collapse of the democratic state therefore means the death of democracy. On the contrary, however, the collapse of the democratic state will mean the birth of genuine democracy. For as the mechanism whose modus operandi is compulsion and coercion is displaced by the organism whose modus vivendi is voluntary cooperation, democracy in the form of majority rule will give way to democracy in the form of individual rule. That is, the individual, as a sovereign unto himself, will rule over himself, the devolutionary process rendering the fraud of representative/ constitutional democracy null and void amid the flowering of a participatory, and thus truly social, democracy rooted in a negative – i.e., non-interventionist – rule of law.

It will be market democracy, in other words, and while everyone will not have the same number of “votes” – i.e., the same amount of purchasing power – the tendency will be in this direction, as the enormous, state-induced disparities between rich and poor narrow over time (even as vastly more wealth is created) and society moves toward a state of equilibrium that is steady not because it doesn’t change but because it changes steadily, spontaneously generating more and more order.

Will it be utopia? Yes, and emphatically so, for the simple reason that “Utopianism is compatible with everything but determinism,” which is to say, with everything but the state. And as the state atrophies, we can therefore expect utopia – “nowhere” – to appear first here, then there, in this form and that, at once experimental and experiential, until it is everywhere, evolving as one, under the direction of no one and everyone at the same time, and doing so, again, without limit:

Since man is always acting, he must always be engaged in trying to attain the greatest height on his value scale, whatever the type of choice under consideration. There must always be room for improvement in his value scale; otherwise all of man’s wants would be perfectly satisfied, and action would disappear. Since this cannot be the case, it means that there is always open to each actor the prospect of improving his lot, of attaining a value higher than he is giving up, i.e., of making a psychic profit.”

How much “psychic profit” is humanity capable of generating? If there “must always be room for improvement in his value scale,” how much room can man, in that convivium, make? Given that he does not live by bread alone, how far beyond bread can man live? How far beyond the margin of subsistence, in other words, can he in fact go?

We conclude this series with an answer that could well be as probable as it is seemingly impossible, the title of which we withhold with a wink, a nod, and profound thanks for the service that this extraordinary site provides to the cause of human freedom and thus to humanity itself.

citation- Robert Nisbet, The Quest for Community: A Study in the Ethics of Order and Freedom, ICS Press, 1990 (Oxford University, 1953), pp. 90 and 91.

Revolution 2.0 baby. And so we stand on the precipice.

 

[HempKat]

I'd say those are nice thoughts but have doubts mankind will survive a collapse of democracy that nicely. The bleak, desolate, wasteland depicted in the Mad Max series seems far more likely to me. Given the way mankind has allowed it's moral decay to fester. We like to see ourselves as so supierior as to be the best of the best earth has to offer. We forget in our arrogance that in a bat of an eyelash mother nature can wipe out large segments of our population and so go the best laid plans of mice and men.

 

[Grimr3efer]

when the nfl is over.

 

[pine boy]

Solar floaties maybe???
http://stereo-ssc.nascom.nasa.gov/b...d/euvi/195/2048/20110605_031530_n7euA_195.jpg

 

[Bush Dr]

^^^^^Talk about rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic as it sinks ..... the only reason that oil is still traded in dollars is because the USA owes China so much money

The Arab oil producing states have been in discussion with China about direct sales since 2006

Don't think oil shale will save you, it's already poisoning the aquifers ..... as for using maize as 'biodiesel', the last civilisation to use food as fuel were the Incas

Hungry times ahead and a lot of people suffering ..... just like the rest of the World

 

[HippyJohnny]

Once the assumption that others are taking care of things, and others will do the things that need to be done is gone, progress will begin.

I agree for the most part with what SpasticGramps posted.

Will it be slick, no suffering into utopia... nah. But I do believe in the goodness of the group of humanity as a whole.

Good will prevail.

Oil just allows long distance dependencies for life. Life will snap back to local mode when oil is not ez.
Self cleaning oven comes to mind.

I am thinking the most effective movement needs to be the "local" movements.

The collapse is already underway.

The middle eastern spring was my sign it had officially begun.
Wikileaks started the drip..... look what happens when people start to really understand what is done in their names.

 

[grozzef]

Solar floaties maybe???
http://stereo-ssc.nascom.nasa.gov/b...d/euvi/195/2048/20110605_031530_n7euA_195.jpg

so cool just looked through so many of these. thanks for the link

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

Prohibition is not regulation it is prohibition. The cannabis that is cultivated is grown despite prohibition and the gardener is free to grow their crop as they best see fit (avoiding detection and the prohibitionists is a chief priority ).

I think that DiscoBiscuit argues that regulation can reduce corruption and increase quality. I in fact agree with you that regulation as it is know in the USA is for consolidating power in the hands of the few at the expense of the many.

I'll borrow a Ronald and say I don't recall suggesting that regulation have anything to do with growing cannabis.

I will offer that where needed, regulation improves quality of life. However, I've applied that to the market in general, where regulation (IMO) proves necessary. IMO, regulation isn't mandated because somebody thinks it'll prove worthy futuristically. IMO, regulation is mandated because of the propensity to make a buck at others' expense.

I'll make an example in the weed category for sh!ts and giggles.

Have you heard the complaints that potential, large grow-ops in Oakland (and anywhere else for that matter) pose significant environmental risks? I'd like to see the same regulations that already apply to ag-pollution because it's the same risk.

As far as quality, I'd like to see potential, for-profit ops be required to follow the same insecticide regulations that their ag cousins adhere to.

Hydrosun, I get the feeling that you wouldn't require mandates to produce quality and safe product.

Sometimes it takes decades for regulation to materialize. IMO, it's not for naught and it doesn't enrich a select few. IMO, real problems arise from industry and the collective, national scale problems they cause. If we kept doing business as usual, the gulf would have more marine killing minerals, more topsoil would blow away and people would ingest more of the chemicals that insure produce gets to market.

Do I believe regulation would make for better cannabis-growing-skills type quality? The short answer is no. But big ag has already proved the need to farm responsibly. IMO, they've already proved they don't collectively regulate themselves enough to look the other way.

Why couldn't we enforce after the fact? After the damage has already been done by the relative few (I'm being immeasurably generous) instigators? Because our enforcement to go after them would be the size of Kansas. Once-scrupulous farmers would say, "Hey, Sam's saving a quarter million annually because he doesn't dispose-of properly. I need that quarter million to keep the bank from foreclosing."

IMO, much easier to mandate, that way potential farmers know what they have to contribute in order to be safe and profitable, before their back's against the wall.

 

[Hydrosun]

Disco, I like your idea of not regulating cannabis. As for regulating other industries I don't see the value ad that regulators infer that they help create.

All the frauds and recalls happen despite regulation and rules.

You are correct that I would not mandate anyone do anything. I am a strong believer in caveat emptor (let the buyer beware). As a great example the "ratings agencies" (s&p, moodies, and finch) all rated sub prime crap as AAA. These rating agencies ARE regulated AND congress mandated that you PAY one of these three CON BUSINESSES to rate your products if you wished to sell them in the REGULATED financial markets.

As for food, "Food Inc." has some great scenes with a responsible natural farmer in VA. He has to break regulations and challange the FDA in order to make his product as fresh and healthy as possible. The FDA wanted all his chickens to be slaughtered INSIDE a closed environment despite the farmers PROVEN results that out door fresh air slaughtered chickens have FEWER bacteria and problems than the FDA approved indoor method.

I wouldn't mandate anything because those that want to scam and defraud will do so IRRESPECTIVE of rules and laws. Regulations only hamper good business people who AREN'T trying to scam, because the scammers WRITE and IGNORE the rules as they see fit.

I don't trust the government one bit. The treatment of cannabis and food are just some examples. Any rules set out by an immoral government does nothing to help me feel that farmers will know what they have to do in order to be safe. Profitable is fucking laughable as a result of listening to the government. The government has NEVER done anything profitably and in no way can enlighten an honest business person in what must be done in order to be profitable.

I actually see increased bureaucracy as a HUGE sign of the collapse. Red tape has killed as many economies as war.

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

Disco, I like your idea of not regulating cannabis. As for regulating other industries I don't see the value ad that regulators infer that they help create.

All the frauds and recalls happen despite regulation and rules.

You are correct that I would not mandate anyone do anything. I am a strong believer in caveat emptor (let the buyer beware). As a great example the "ratings agencies" (s&p, moodies, and finch) all rated sub prime crap as AAA. These rating agencies ARE regulated AND congress mandated that you PAY one of these three CON BUSINESSES to rate your products if you wished to sell them in the REGULATED financial markets.

As for food, "Food Inc." has some great scenes with a responsible natural farmer in VA. He has to break regulations and challange the FDA in order to make his product as fresh and healthy as possible. The FDA wanted all his chickens to be slaughtered INSIDE a closed environment despite the farmers PROVEN results that out door fresh air slaughtered chickens have FEWER bacteria and problems than the FDA approved indoor method.

I wouldn't mandate anything because those that want to scam and defraud will do so IRRESPECTIVE of rules and laws. Regulations only hamper good business people who AREN'T trying to scam, because the scammers WRITE and IGNORE the rules as they see fit.

I don't trust the government one bit. The treatment of cannabis and food are just some examples. Any rules set out by an immoral government does nothing to help me feel that farmers will know what they have to do in order to be safe. Profitable is fucking laughable as a result of listening to the government. The government has NEVER done anything profitably and in no way can enlighten an honest business person in what must be done in order to be profitable.

I actually see increased bureaucracy as a HUGE sign of the collapse. Red tape has killed as many economies as war.

I wish you didn't dislike formatting what comprises very comprehensive issues and the ideals they beget. I have to page back to stay relevant (and that's equally maddening.) Would be much easier to format each pertinent point you make... respectively. But I'll work with you in the spirit that your ideals are as valid as anyone else'. We just disagree what's best for all. You approach from the individual liberties perspective and I advocate the responsible and successful collective. Differences of opinion are good because neither of us are entitled to lone-gun our principles on the populous. We both have equal chance to persuade others yet we need mandates to advance in that direction.

For the record, I would mandate responsible regulation, regardless of industry. How 'bout mold, pesticides, and whatever could possibly harm the public and or environment in the name of profits. I love weed and the wonderful folks that comprise the community. But weed wouldn't change human nature any more than the cloud. Folks will abide and folks will exploit. We can't chase em as individuals until their ranks are diminished by enforcement across the board. You wouldn't want me to stay one step ahead of non-regulated fraud (and the chasers chasing individuals) because they couldn't catch me as fast. Might not catch me at all. Now, forget about "me", apply it to 310 million people.

Caveat Emptor is cool but some make their livelihood by making you unaware you're being ripped off. You and I would get hit repeatedly to the point we don't even trust each other (the good guys.) Sounds like a lonely existence.

Regulation didn't cause Moody's etc to rate (crap) AAA. The industry did that. The industry persuaded Moody's etc that a single AAA mortgage could back as many as 30 pieces of crap. Like a diamond in a giant turd. Then, the industry was afraid they'd be reigned in if they didn't insure the turd wouldn't stink.

Who allowed Moody's etc to rate turds anyway? The repeal of Glass Stegall aka deregulation.

Then industry bet the turd would stink. Doesn't it sound a bit stanky that regulation actually regulated fraud as legal?

When you capitalize misunderstanding..... you're yelling misunderstanding.

Lawmakers were persuaded to deregulate, based on promises of chaste. Then industry got what they wanted and ripped off the entire world.

I know it's hard to maintain all the details but it's imperative for us not to repeat mistakes we've already made and learned from. I'm sorry that human nature pokes a hole in one's principles. But rest assured I won't advocate something that's a historically proven bomb. In that case my principles are quenched with the cold, hard water of reality.

You're right that mandates come from lawmakers. But they're elected by the people you and I belong, if not agree. As much as you'll hate to consider, you and I collectively mandate commerce.

Besides, the most effective entity that goes against your and my interests and the ability to succeed as individuals is the corporate lobby. That ain't government, it's our collective yet respective hand in government's pocket. This stuff is really complicated.

I hope you see the significance with me borrowing the term mandate. It means it's backed and warranted by the majority, something our founding principles are based. "Free" could be misinterpreted to eliminate the constitutional constraints we all agree (if there is such a thing) in the interests of freedom. After all, one man's constitution differs significantly from another.

Enter democracy. Democracy is a form of regulation itself, the regulation aka mandate of majority rule.

IMO, you make my case better than I do. You state that fraud happens regardless of regulated circumstances. While this is true, Dr. Paul (and son) advocate that free markets won't do business with fraudsters (not to mention segregationists.) This is cloud ideology.

However, your posts demonstrate that fraud and other unseemly activity occurs when de-regulation is in effect. Irresponsible deregulation begets even more fraud.

Look what happened with almost 6 decades of commercial/investment banking separation. What happened? It stayed separated... (the entire time.) Don't let the actual event of repeal sway you as much as what happened afterward.

Goldman Sachs is but one example. For over 150 years, Goldman ripped off only shisters. Now they rip off the general public on a global scale. It's what happens when profits compromise ethics. Before de-regulation, Goldman wouldn't have been able to deal in long term, safe securities with fucked up schemes for the rich at our peril.

The fact that Goldman hedges their fraud, then sells it to the consumer is as good as admitting they're criminals. Glass Stegall kept Goldman out of the chicken house, period. Repeal made them the fox that now guards it. Goldman among others made caveat emptor as invisible as a used-car dealer's greedy hair up his bum.

They've got chicken feathers on their jowls to prove it. Profit compromising ethics, plain and simple. And from a company that honored itself as one who could be trusted to do the right thing for 15 decades.

This doesn't mean you will personally succumb to challenged ethics and outright fraud. We simply don't want to spend the effort and money going after criminals one-at-a-time, as they do their thing. We collectively set up the rules that everybody plays by.

Please don't forget that Democracy never promised the freedom to do whatever we want. It has [infinitesimally] more to do with the majority opinion. Democracy even allows majority opinion to drive us off the proverbial cliff, if they so choose.

I'm not advocating the cliff. I'm demonstrating that IMO, some folks think Democracy means one may do as they wish. That's somewhat limited and oversimplified.

The NFL would have more than a couple of helmet-spearing violations annually if they allowed each individual to apply as they see fit.

I don't automatically bow at mandates. Some go against my principles. But a bad hunk o' cheese doesn't make me a cheese-industry antagonist.

Mandates aren't any more static than the majority that supports. That means when regulation doesn't work or needs a tweak, it may be rectified in the form of more responsible and successful regulation.

When the majority leans against my better wishes, I realize that mistakes can and are rectified. Even the regulations I've supported in the past the beget additional problems bear the scrutiny they deserve.

What do you do with bad business, Hydro? Chase em individually? You'd get a kick out of the kids around here trying to catch chickens running around the farmyard. What you suggest says to apply your own standard, according to your specific beliefs.

Don't underestimate the significance of the key-word, specific.

I envision a collective of like-minds with your basic principles, striving for application when those basics fray into immeasurable differences.

We already experienced that with the Articles of Confederation. Those [states'] differences asked the federal government to intervene where states had no arbitrating authority.

Enter federal mandates.

I have my doubts of some individuals that comprise government, not the entity. I neither mistrust profit-seekers collectively. To do so would oversimplify my reasoning.

Immoral government suggests government w/o god. I sho am glad I live in America where morals are freely expressed in church and ethics (or lack of them) are expressed in state.

I dislike and mistrust immoral religiosos. Doesn't make religion immoral. There are exponentially more good believers than bad.

How would it sound to suggest there's enough religious pukes to wax religion itself? It might sound as if I'm oversimplifying to make my point. There's enough room for me to get out of earshot of religious insensitivity (and they don't ruin economies.) Except when they elect religious fundamentalists to operations of state.

Increased bureaucracy is a sign of increased industry run amok. Bureaucracy can and will run amok but has to be tempered with reality and the times that respective realities flourish.

I glad we agree on one thing. Government doesn't make a profit.

That's like saying a referee never won the Super Bowl MVP+

 

[Hydrosun]

Regulation didn't cause Moody's etc to rate (crap) AAA. The industry did that. The industry persuaded Moody's etc that a single AAA mortgage could back as many as 30 pieces of crap. Like a diamond in a giant turd. Then, the industry was afraid they'd be reigned in if they didn't insure the turd wouldn't stink.

Who allowed Moody's etc to rate turds anyway? The repeal of Glass Stegall aka deregulation.

Then industry bet the turd would stink. Doesn't it sound a bit stanky that regulation actually regulated fraud as legal?

This last point is my whole point. Regulation as know in the USA is just one economic actor imposing his will on ALL other actors. There are no better outcomes from regulation, only different outcomes where more than normal are screwed over.

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

This last point is my whole point. Regulation as know in the USA is just one economic actor imposing his will on ALL other actors. There are no better outcomes from regulation, only different outcomes where more than normal are screwed over.

One has to comprehend that de-regulation isn't more regulation. It's the absence of, after the fact.

Being on the same page is not an indication you have to agree with my opinion. But knowing the difference in what amounts to black and white opposites (regulation vs de-regulation) helps to keep the conversation from veering into two different paths. The same path affords both ideas and more, so long as we know that de-regulation is the arch opposite of regulation.

Remember when Reagan de-regulated air-traffic controllers? Doesn't mean they face different regulations. It means the regulations that governed air-traffic controllers dissolved. That's why we have them falling asleep on the job.