Truckers line up to protest fuel costs

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

The false dichotomy is disturbing, the rest of the industrialized world has a sensible understanding of intermediate alternatives.

Doesn't that assume people are even remotely rational? After all, there will always be some populist politician who would exploit the grievances of the populace and then go with some bandwagon political system to suit his needs first, then the populace second.

[Illuminatus Primus]

It assumes that not all nations are created equal; that some are more acclimatized toward authoritarianism than others. I realize +1, people are sheep/stupid/vegetables/easily led/read: I am superior and enlightened, political cynicism is in vogue here. I understand that. However, how does that make wrong the casual observation by The Duchess or myself that the U.S. is uniquely situated due to it's political culture vis-a-vis communism that it may be more likely than say - Sweden - to slide into violence over economic upheaval? Is your trite 'people are sheep' observation mean it is meaningless to distinguish between the relative ease with which modern Russia or Wiemar Germany could and did slip toward authoritarianism versus the relative stability and liberalism of Canada or Ireland? How does this remark dissipate any differentiation between the political cultures of the rest of the industrialized world and the United States with regard to its relationship with authoritarianism, collectivism, and violence? Are we incapable of making distinctions because all people are sheep or stupid? Or are you trying to curry favor with the crowd here?

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Well, maybe not executing. Most recent revolutions have been peaceful and more or less democratic.

Seriously people, I think you're dramatizing much.

Before America will see riots and revolutions, the whole Third and Second world would be engulfed by struggle and violence.

Oh, I'm speaking about twenty years from now when things are as bad in America as they were in the days before the Russian Revolution, in Russia. I fully expect a civil war of some sort, though it may be abortive; but certain the Second and Third worlds will indeed be engulfed by struggle and violence soon enough.

Americans are, after all, neither peaceful nor democratic, so I don't know why you should expect us to behave like, well, anyone else. We're still a 19th century armed camp of a state.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

It assumes that not all nations are created equal; that some are more acclimatized toward authoritarianism than others. I realize +1, people are sheep/stupid/vegetables/easily led/read: I am superior and enlightened, political cynicism is in vogue here. I understand that. However, how does that make wrong the casual observation by The Duchess or myself that the U.S. is uniquely situated due to it's political culture vis-a-vis communism that it may be more likely than say - Sweden - to slide into violence over economic upheaval? Is your trite 'people are sheep' observation mean it is meaningless to distinguish between the relative ease with which modern Russia or Wiemar Germany could and did slip toward authoritarianism versus the relative stability and liberalism of Canada or Ireland? How does this remark dissipate any differentiation between the political cultures of the rest of the industrialized world and the United States with regard to its relationship with authoritarianism, collectivism, and violence? Are we incapable of making distinctions because all people are sheep or stupid? Or are you trying to curry favor with the crowd here?

It took the 9/11 incident to allow Bush and his bunch of incompetents to push for some of the most authoritarian policies in US history for a long while, and finally gave him the political capital to pursue the Iraqi war. Quite frankly, when people are in a state of fear, they can be exploited senseless. Even this board had quite a few who supported the war until it became clear that the arguments supporting the war were a whole pack of lies and yet Bush wasn't punished because the Democrats had no balls to do it. Even in Europe where people are generally liberal, when the economy goes down the shithole, the people start turning xenophobic with plenty of political vultures ready to exploit that.

[Illuminatus Primus]

It took the 9/11 incident to allow Bush and his bunch of incompetents to push for some of the most authoritarian policies in US history for a long while, and finally gave him the political capital to pursue the Iraqi war. Quite frankly, when people are in a state of fear, they can be exploited senseless. Even this board had quite a few who supported the war until it became clear that the arguments supporting the war were a whole pack of lies and yet Bush wasn't punished because the Democrats had no balls to do it. Even in Europe where people are generally liberal, when the economy goes down the shithole, the people start turning xenophobic with plenty of political vultures ready to exploit that.

Uh, okay, and that changes what I said, how? Again, how is this not trite?

Well, maybe not executing. Most recent revolutions have been peaceful and more or less democratic.

Seriously people, I think you're dramatizing much.

Before America will see riots and revolutions, the whole Third and Second world would be engulfed by struggle and violence.

Oh, I'm speaking about twenty years from now when things are as bad in America as they were in the days before the Russian Revolution, in Russia. I fully expect a civil war of some sort, though it may be abortive; but certain the Second and Third worlds will indeed be engulfed by struggle and violence soon enough.

Americans are, after all, neither peaceful nor democratic, so I don't know why you should expect us to behave like, well, anyone else. We're still a 19th century armed camp of a state.

I thought you didn't think your Global Peak scenario was necessarily the most likely; that civil war wasn't inevitable?

[Admiral Valdemar]

Why all this talk against American socialism? Don't you already have it? If a major banking corporation fails, it is bailed out by the government using the funds of the people. Unlike true capitalism with a free market where you place big bets and you lose money from that risk, you go broke and that's the end of you.

Clearly Americans openly embrace socialist ideology. It's just applicable only to card carrying corporate elitists. I believe those "cheese eating surrender monkeys" so often attacked over lack of backbone went and decapitated people who abused the system this way. Perhaps someone has some learning rather than preaching to do for once. It is, after all, capitalism taken to the extreme from America's unscathed status post-war that is fucking us all over now.

And I don't see 20 years as being an acceptable time-frame for any real social movement forming and taking action. If the trends continue that have been working the last couple of years at present rates, pretty soon most people in the developed world will be unable to afford any real living standard beyond subsistence. We'll have mass rallies and riots before we reach the point where we're all living comfortable compared to those in the developing world, just without our inflated standard of life we claim as a birth right today.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Why all this talk against American socialism? Don't you already have it? If a major banking corporation fails, it is bailed out by the government using the funds of the people. Unlike true capitalism with a free market where you place big bets and you lose money from that risk, you go broke and that's the end of you.

Clearly Americans openly embrace socialist ideology. It's just applicable only to card carrying corporate elitists. I believe those "cheese eating surrender monkeys" so often attacked over lack of backbone went and decapitated people who abused the system this way. Perhaps someone has some learning rather than preaching to do for once. It is, after all, capitalism taken to the extreme from America's unscathed status post-war that is fucking us all over now.

And I don't see 20 years as being an acceptable time-frame for any real social movement forming and taking action. If the trends continue that have been working the last couple of years at present rates, pretty soon most people in the developed world will be unable to afford any real living standard beyond subsistence. We'll have mass rallies and riots before we reach the point where we're all living comfortable compared to those in the developing world, just without our inflated standard of life we claim as a birth right today.

Real social movement? Since what was people with guns shooting the rich and taking their stuff a real social movement? Mass uprisings against the government will take a bit longer to happen than that.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

I thought you didn't think your Global Peak scenario was necessarily the most likely; that civil war wasn't inevitable?

I expect it anyway, so I can be pleasantly surprised by something in the future.

[HemlockGrey]

Socialist solutions cost shitloads of money. How can the government possibly be expected to apply these solutions when they're already staggering under the debt load? It's easy to say "raise taxes on the wealthy" but the wealthy have and will move their assets right out of the country when they start to feel a heavy tax burden.

[Edi]

Socialist solutions cost shitloads of money. How can the government possibly be expected to apply these solutions when they're already staggering under the debt load? It's easy to say "raise taxes on the wealthy" but the wealthy have and will move their assets right out of the country when they start to feel a heavy tax burden.

Your current solutions already cost more than the socialist solutions, as has been discussed several times on this board already, Hemlock.

[Broomstick]

I understand and sympathize with your anger, Broomie. But you don't seem to be suggesting anything. It's easy to tell me that my preferred solution (to simply allow prices to rise and inefficient trucking companies to die) is not perfect. But unless you suggest a better one, I don't see what you're trying to say. At some point, Americans have to let go of their idiotic obsession with being right about Reagan's war against socialism, and start doing what people in other countries do in similar situations: riot for socialist solutions until the government is forced to listen. That won't happen unless they are forced to stare reality in the face.

You are correct in that I did not propose a solution - really, today I'm having trouble with coming up with something. My focus is a lot more local than it used to be. After all, if I don't take care of me I can't take care of anyone else, be that family, friend, or countryman.

Part of my frustration is that I NEVER like Reagan's policies or the road we've been on these past couple of decades. I chose to live within my means, not take on debt, and so forth and it served me well - even now it serves me well because, unlike MOST people in my current shoes I really am able to pay my bills and buy food even several months after losing a job. The recommendation is to have six month's worth of resources to live on - I have/had nearly 11 months. MOST Americans wouldn't even have two months.

That's what I find so disturbing - I am better off than most right now, and I"m not doing particularly well.

Solutions? I don't know. I agree with the Duchess that for 80 years the US has been indoctrinated into an either/or way of thinking that is, frankly, potentially quite dangerous.

I do know that during the Great Depression the government funded various work programs. I've heard a lot of criticism about them not being efficient/effecitve/whatever BUT they did serve some valuable purposes. For one thing, people had to work for the paycheck - even if it was make-work, maintaining the routine and habits of getting up, getting dressed, going to work, and working 8 hours for that check was, psychologically, much better than people sitting at home on their asses waiting for a monthly dole. Second - and this is also important - people who are busy at work, even make-work, do not have as much time or energy to foment rebellion, riots, or other unrest. Maintaining stability can be a very important thing in a crisis, and the "alphabet soup" of work programs did perform those two functions. And, oh yes, gave people enough money to subsist on. That was no small feat even if it wasn't "cost-efficient" by some standards.

Is that the answer this time? I don't know. But at the time it was radical stuff - we need out of the box thinking. Which is one reason I think Obama is giving Hillary a run for her money - he talks about hope and he's new/outsider, instead of Hillary who is, let's be frank, viewed as a long-time insider and is and will be lumped with the people who got us into this mess.

So maybe tomorrow or the next day I'll come up with the Grand Plan to save America. Right now MOST of my energy is focused on the Grand Plan to Save the Broomstick Household.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Real social movement? Since what was people with guns shooting the rich and taking their stuff a real social movement? Mass uprisings against the government will take a bit longer to happen than that.

I admit, I was thinking more of Europe when typing that. Which is ironic, given all the revolutions we've had. Though I did say social movement, just not pacifism inclined in nature. Wealth can be redistributed and government cabinets shuffled by tooth and claw as well.

Solutions? I don't know. I agree with the Duchess that for 80 years the US has been indoctrinated into an either/or way of thinking that is, frankly, potentially quite dangerous.

Solutions usually go under the assumption everyone comes out on top at the end of it. The only solution to this problem - and by that, I mean the financial and resource based predicaments rather than solely materialism led greed - is population control and paradigm shifts in how we assess our lives and their worth i.e. not based on how much shit you own or figures in a bank account computer.

On the topic of the Great Depression, I noticed thisin the company cafeteria news stand today. As some have said elsewhere, it's not a real depression until they run out of food stamps. And I was just watching some clips from economist talking heads, the kind who come in on CNBC and Bloomberg to spew drivel they likely get a big cheque for to truly believe in. One such guy was going at length about how screwy the system was, then totally turned around and said the Fed is doing well and there may be a recession. So in summary, the government is falling apart handing the reigns of power to corrupt private bankers, the taxpayer is going to be dragged out into the street, mugged then shot. Oh, and a recession may occur. Not that bad then, eh?

[Broomstick]

Solutions usually go under the assumption everyone comes out on top at the end of it. The only solution to this problem - and by that, I mean the financial and resource based predicaments rather than solely materialism led greed - is population control and paradigm shifts in how we assess our lives and their worth i.e. not based on how much shit you own or figures in a bank account computer.

When people start struggling to house, feed, and clothe themselves they will quickly re-align priorities. I've seen more than person who once swore they'd never buy anything second hand start shopping at flea markets and Goodwill when the shit hit the fan.

But, if they're shopping at Goodwill and eating rice and beans while patching a leaky roof with cardboard and the wealthy guy drives by and laughs at them...well, rocks have been thrown through windows for less.

And I was just watching some clips from economist talking heads, the kind who come in on CNBC and Bloomberg to spew drivel they likely get a big cheque for to truly believe in. One such guy was going at length about how screwy the system was, then totally turned around and said the Fed is doing well and there may be a recession. So in summary, the government is falling apart handing the reigns of power to corrupt private bankers, the taxpayer is going to be dragged out into the street, mugged then shot. Oh, and a recession may occur. Not that bad then, eh?

The average person is waking up (finally!) that the big boys in DC are either lying, clueless, or both. What will happen...? I don't know.

Uh... pardon for sort of vomiting my personal situation onto this thread, but it's been one of those days. I try not to whine too much - hell, even if I find part time work that could reset my doomsday clock another 6-12 months in the future and I'm still healthy enough to do at least light manual labor if I have to - but once in awhile it happens.

You may now resume speculation. Me, I'm going to take yet another look at USAJOBS before getting started on dinner. At least we're still eating well.

[Admiral Valdemar]

When people start struggling to house, feed, and clothe themselves they will quickly re-align priorities. I've seen more than person who once swore they'd never buy anything second hand start shopping at flea markets and Goodwill when the shit hit the fan.

But, if they're shopping at Goodwill and eating rice and beans while patching a leaky roof with cardboard and the wealthy guy drives by and laughs at them...well, rocks have been thrown through windows for less.

One can only hope, though I want it without much violence, I know many have taken the extreme route before (the last nation to hit this kind of hurdle was Germany in '31, and we all know how that turned out).

The average person is waking up (finally!) that the big boys in DC are either lying, clueless, or both. What will happen...? I don't know.

Uh... pardon for sort of vomiting my personal situation onto this thread, but it's been one of those days. I try not to whine too much - hell, even if I find part time work that could reset my doomsday clock another 6-12 months in the future and I'm still healthy enough to do at least light manual labor if I have to - but once in awhile it happens.

You may now resume speculation. Me, I'm going to take yet another look at USAJOBS before getting started on dinner. At least we're still eating well.

I think your contribution, especially, is most needed and I thank you for being able to talk about it without getting into emotional hysterics as some I know would (whom are also still employed and not all that worse off, frankly).

I can't say I've been in the exact situation you're in now, though I can sympathise. I was on the dole for 18 months prior to getting into my first proper job now. Coming out of uni with debt and the shattered belief that finding work will be a cinch is not fun, and it hurts your esteem more when you're in a government Jobcentre Plus and surrounded by high-school dropouts who simply can't be bothered to do anything but breed, collect benefits for living in a council house and complain about the Poles stealing jobs. I wasn't the only graduate there though. There were one or two people, lifetime lawyers or aerospace engineers, who had lost a job and needed help finding work who were stuck in the slow lane with me learning how to write a fucking CV and use Internet Explorer. Christ.

So with first hand experience of the "efforts" over here to find work for the down and out, I can only wish it is better in the States and you get out of this predicament, if only to relocate or bring about a plan of action for future hardship. We're all in the same boat, just some are going to feel this sinking sensation before others.

[Darth Wong]

Socialist solutions cost shitloads of money. How can the government possibly be expected to apply these solutions when they're already staggering under the debt load? It's easy to say "raise taxes on the wealthy" but the wealthy have and will move their assets right out of the country when they start to feel a heavy tax burden.

I'm so tired of this canard, because it's such utter bullshit. Yes, they can move their money, but the kind of money they can easily move off-shore isn't doing the rest of the country any goddamned good anyway, and the shift will make a difference moving forward.

If you raise capital-gains taxes on shares they hold in American corporations, they can't get that money out without paying the tax. If you raise income taxes on the higher income brackets, that doesn't affect the super-rich anyway, and the slightly lesser rich can't avoid paying them.

I'm so sick and tired of listening to American fellate the rich. We must kiss up to them or they will stop showering us with their love, right? Well guess what: they ain't showering us with anything but their contempt. And I don't know what the fuck economic theory you're using, but there's already plenty of incentive for people to leave America for tax havens. That's why Sir John Templeton doesn't live in the USA any more. Unless you plan to reduce the tax burden on wealthy people to zero, you can't keep assholes like him from moving their highly liquid assets out. Better to prevent that kind of totally non-productive concentration of wealth in the first place.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Once I get my degree, I may very well decamp for France--their nuclear industry is very progressive and healthy, after all. The whole thing with more than 80% of their power being produced by nuclear and their farms the most productive in all of Europe (despite being the least efficient--they just have so many of them!--which coincidentally means the small French farmers are highest placed to still be able to produce following the common shocks) makes it quite attractive. Or, if New Zealand goes nuclear, I know I'd move there in a heartbeat. I'll probably end up staying, though, because I'm a stubborn lunatic and I have to many friends here I want to take care of; a big sailing yacht to live on will be a wiser investment than a home, though. If needsbe, it makes becoming boat people very easy for me and those I care about.

[Darth Wong]

Well, maybe not executing. Most recent revolutions have been peaceful and more or less democratic.

Seriously people, I think you're dramatizing much.

Before America will see riots and revolutions, the whole Third and Second world would be engulfed by struggle and violence.

It's not as unrealistic as you might think. American cities were engulfed in riots during the civil rights era in the 1960s. John M. Collins actually talked about those riots with respect to counterinsurgency warfare strategies in his book titled Military Strategy: Principles, Practices, and Historical Perspectives. The government dealt with them not by bombing rioters, as many Americans might suggest if they were in a far-off country, but by basically trying to remove the source of their discontent: passing civil-rights legislation to address the massive inequities which fueled the riots.

Interesting side-note: near the end of his life, Martin Luther King wanted to shift his emphasis from race relations to poverty. He intended to march on Washington DC with an army of supporters to protest the immorality of unfettered capitalism. Many in his inner circle feared this change of emphasis and thought it meant he was becoming emotionally unstable. It was at this point that he was assassinated.

[Admiral Valdemar]

I'm so tired of this canard, because it's such utter bullshit. Yes, they can move their money, but the kind of money they can easily move off-shore isn't doing the rest of the country any goddamned good anyway, and the shift will make a difference moving forward.

If you raise capital-gains taxes on shares they hold in American corporations, they can't get that money out without paying the tax. If you raise income taxes on the higher income brackets, that doesn't affect the super-rich anyway, and the slightly lesser rich can't avoid paying them.

I'm so sick and tired of listening to American fellate the rich. We must kiss up to them or they will stop showering us with their love, right? Well guess what: they ain't showering us with anything but their contempt. And I don't know what the fuck economic theory you're using, but there's already plenty of incentive for people to leave America for tax havens. That's why Sir John Templeton doesn't live in the USA any more. Unless you plan to reduce the tax burden on wealthy people to zero, you can't keep assholes like him from moving their highly liquid assets out. Better to prevent that kind of totally non-productive concentration of wealth in the first place.

This has been debated recently in the UK too. Listening to the Jeremy Vine Show on Radio 2, I heard more than a couple of people speak out in favour for taxing more on those who have major assets in the UK. These non-residency foreign nationals don't pay tax on their bank balances, or at least, not as high as they should be paying. There was a stupid cow trying to defend them because she was employed as a maid by a wealthy Russian family in London and looked after her health and pension schemes and even, gasp, paid council tax on their property. She sure sounded totally impartial.

As I've often heard, the top 1% could, if taxes were increased to something useful on the super rich, help off-set the deficit in a great many social programmes from the NHS to council facilities. Given I also saw one big entrepreneur on another programme argue that while he could pay more, he'd rather not because it was painful enough already. The interviewer then brought up the question of why he should only pay 40% when someone earning a fraction of his salary can also pay the same amount once earning over £30k or so a year. I don't think I left the TV on long enough to hear his response.

[Darth Wong]

As I've often heard, the top 1% could, if taxes were increased to something useful on the super rich, help off-set the deficit in a great many social programmes from the NHS to council facilities. Given I also saw one big entrepreneur on another programme argue that while he could pay more, he'd rather not because it was painful enough already. The interviewer then brought up the question of why he should only pay 40% when someone earning a fraction of his salary can also pay the same amount once earning over £30k or so a year. I don't think I left the TV on long enough to hear his response.

He probably responded that it's different because entrepreneurs create jobs. There has long been a chauvinism about class and productivity where people act as though salaried workers' money is totally useless to the economy while business profits are useful. Using this logic, it makes sense to shift the tax burden from businessmen to workers. But there is no logical reason for it to be true; businesses use profits to invest in expansion and other things which fuel the economy, but workers use their income to purchase goods and services which fuel the economy as well. There is no justification for the idea that one of them is somehow irrelevant to the economy while the other is not.

[Admiral Valdemar]

In the US that sentiment should be even more talked about, because the vast majority (around 70%) of the industry in the US is based solely on consumption, the rest is services or logistics. Very little manufacturing happens in the West today since China et al took up the slack there (another reason why saying the US cut back carbon emissions or energy use, whatever, is misleading; it was just shifted over to Asia to pollute that part of the world instead).

Therefore, with the lowest consumer confidence in over 30 years, you can only wonder at what damage the economy will be taking soon. Remember, it makes the news when companies report on lower than expected growth in sales during Christmas. Heaven forbid they actually encounter NO growth, or a contraction in sales for net negative growth. No doubt given the markets today, that'd be cause for a big rally and more back patting. There's no connection with reality there any more anyway (UBS writes-off $12bn, the Dow does a moon shot of 200 points. Uh, what?).

[MKSheppard]

Stupid truckers. Scab away! Make it so that more business is delivered by rail to major areas and then distributed from railheads by trucks!

[J]

Heaven forbid they actually encounter NO growth, or a contraction in sales for net negative growth. No doubt given the markets today, that'd be cause for a big rally and more back patting. There's no connection with reality there any more anyway (UBS writes-off $12bn, the Dow does a moon shot of 200 points. Uh, what?).

GM and Dell announce factory shutdowns which will put tens of thousands out of work, Ford releases terrible quarterly results, banks write off record amounts of money, unemployment numbers are up, consumer confidence is down...and the Dow goes on a huge 400 point rally. And of course all the pundits on TV proclaim the bottom is in and the recovery is on the way. And people still lap it up even though these are the same bleeping idiots who swore that Bear Stearns was 100% healthy just two days before they went belly up.

I wish I could reach out to everyone and yell "wake up people! You're all getting ocularly penetrated unless you do something about it!"

[Admiral Valdemar]

GM and Dell announce factory shutdowns which will put tens of thousands out of work, Ford releases terrible quarterly results, banks write off record amounts of money, unemployment numbers are up, consumer confidence is down...and the Dow goes on a huge 400 point rally. And of course all the pundits on TV proclaim the bottom is in and the recovery is on the way. And people still lap it up even though these are the same bleeping idiots who swore that Bear Stearns was 100% healthy just two days before they went belly up.

The best candid article on the subject from the MSM I've read recently, and no doubt you too since I'm stalking you, is the Fortune op-ed. piece on The Automatic Earth. Although it goes all rosy near the end, it does at least give a novice to the situation a good sit. rep. on the world's markets.

I wish I could reach out to everyone and yell "wake up people! You're all getting ocularly penetrated unless you do something about it!"

LOL! And I concur.

[Darth Wong]

The problem is that people have to put their money somewhere, and in times of great uncertainty, nothing is reliable. Even stuffing money into your mattress is unreliable; you don't know if inflation will shoot up. So there's all this money floating around waiting for an entry point, and when people think they see one, they pile on. Hence these bizarre rallies.

The psychology is simple enough: UBS announces gigantic write-offs, but the stock price was already depressed on the assumption that they would do so. The market breathes a sigh of relief when they finally make the announcement because speculative investors fled a long time ago in anticipation of just such a thing happening. Once the announcement happens, they loosen their sphincters a bit and come back in.

It's sort of like getting in big trouble and expecting your father to beat you in anger. If he just yells at you and slaps you and then goes to the den to watch TV, you feel as if you just won the lottery.

[Admiral Valdemar]

That's exactly it. The current trend shows booms after announcements like this because the damage isn't as bad as they all expected. For the most part, we're talking along the lines of "Phew, the world didn't explode. But it is burning all over uncontrollably. Things will be fine now". The logic is there, it just doesn't make all that much sense given a deeper look at the problem.