Left vs Right Options

[Milton Roe]

No need to apologize to a Googlelectual. After all it is information he did not possess five minutes ago and won't know five minutes from now. If anything mis-quoting/attributing demonstrates a slightly more authentic relationship with the information.

This is very ironic, considering that I spend a certain amount of time these days lamenting that my general store of knowledge available without net-assist, is becoming more and irrelevant. Unless I become a Jeopardy contender.

I still find a few holes. I've seen a 1919 photo of the decomposed body in the canal that was ostensibly Luxemburg. It was taken while the body was still IN the canal. I would have expected to see it everyplace after the recent finding of what somebody suggested might have been her (headless) remains in the basement of a German history museum (never proven, no DNA, no head...). But I never saw the 1919 photo in the recent flurry. It's not in Wikipedia. So far as I can tell, it's not even on the net. It's almost as though most of the people writing do not know it exists.

But if I want to know the NAME of the canal, I can look it up in 90 seconds. Welcome to the future.

[GlassBeadGame]

No need to apologize to a Googlelectual. After all it is information he did not possess five minutes ago and won't know five minutes from now. If anything mis-quoting/attributing demonstrates a slightly more authentic relationship with the information.

This is very ironic, considering that I spend a certain amount of time these days lamenting that my general store of knowledge available without net-assist, is becoming more and irrelevant. Unless I become a Jeopardy contender.

I still find a few holes. I've seen a 1919 photo of the decomposed body in the canal that was ostensibly Luxemburg. It was taken while the body was still IN the canal. I would have expected to see it everyplace after the recent finding of what somebody suggested might have been her (headless) remains in the basement of a German history museum (never proven, no DNA, no head...). But I never saw the 1919 photo in the recent flurry. It's not in Wikipedia. So far as I can tell, it's not even on the net. It's almost as though most of the people writing do not know it exists.

But if I want to know the NAME of the canal, I can look it up in 90 seconds. Welcome to the future.

I suppose it is possible that, because of some neurological anomaly, you have a huge fund of knowledge organized (or rather so lacking organization) in such a manner as to simulate a the crude augmentation of a Googlectual. It is however pretty clear that you sneak unto Wikipedia unwanted to edit and have a fondness of fetching back articles to "support" your posts. So it just seems safer to assume you are just another know-it-all nerd retrieving information from Wikipedia etc and vomiting it undigested onto this forum than consider your pathology.

The part about Jeopardy is interesting. Any good Jeopardy players knows that any answer (yes, put in the form of a question, Alex) needs to be filtered with "is this the kind of answer they would want on Jeopardy?" That is to say is does it operate like the roadside dinner trivia kitsch collection. Any answer involving Marylin Monroe or Joe DiMaggio is always to be preferred.

[communicat]

As for "typical prostester is enraged about things he understands poorly at best": you don't need to be a rocket scientist to know when you're being ripped off.

True -- but history teaches us that you do need to be the equivalent of a rocket scientist to know how to change the situation without making it worse. Compare the success of the American revolution with the miserable failure of the French one.

History also teaches us that there's no correlation whatsoever between the American and French revolutions; it's like comparing apples with pineapples.

Meanwhile, it's amusing to note the innuendo in this (completely off-topic) discourse about OWS that seems to imply the protestors are themselves to blame for the economic chaos because they don't have a "platform" or manifesto for economic recovery. It's like blaming the victims for their victimisation. The protest movement (which is now international and focused on all major financial districts, not only Wall St), is just that: a protest movement, not a reform movement. They're simply saying to all the official policy makers and government-sponsored think-tanks: "We've had enough of your bullshit. Come up with some meaningful reforms that do not further punish the victims."

Communicat, think before you post. There was a massive correlation between the American and French revolutions; the French revolution was directly inspired by the American. In its initial stage, an important role was played by friends of Benjamin Franklin, Jean-Sylvain Bailly and Gen. Marquis de Lafayette. However, the situation was skillfully manipulated by agents of the British (such as Jean-Paul Marat,) who feared that the establishment of an American-style republic in Europe might start a trend, and the revolution became a senseless bloodbath followed by the dictatorship of Napoleon.

No one is "blaming the victims," but one way to guarantee that the OWS movement is a massive failure is to expect "all the official policy makers and government-sponsored think-tanks" to "come up with some meaningful reforms that do not further punish the victims." Not going to happen. The protesters are going to have to learn something about history and economics themselves, so that they know what to demand. They are going to have to become a "reform movement," or they will simply become the pretext for martial law and a coup d'etat.

A peripheral albeit colourful anecdote does not represent a "massive correlation". The only massive correlation around here is that which exists between WP and WR relative to your banality.

There is no correlation between a war of independence on the one hand and, on the other, a Reign of Terror motivated by a spirit of total, radical innovation: the overthrow of all prescriptive rights; confiscation of private property; destruction of the Church and veneration of a ruling elite. All of which latter remained firmly intact after the American "Revolution".

As regards the remainder of your posting: I suggest you stay with your Polish Judaica articles; they don't require any level of political consciousness.

[Milton Roe]

Communicat, think before you post. There was a massive correlation between the American and French revolutions; the French revolution was directly inspired by the American. In its initial stage, an important role was played by friends of Benjamin Franklin, Jean-Sylvain Bailly and Gen. Marquis de Lafayette. However, the situation was skillfully manipulated by agents of the British (such as Jean-Paul Marat,) who feared that the establishment of an American-style republic in Europe might start a trend, and the revolution became a senseless bloodbath followed by the dictatorship of Napoleon.

You missed one of the main connections: France had to increase their national debt by 50% to pay for their part in the American Revolution. That was a lot more than the US comparitively spent on (say) Iraq. Then, the French increased taxes to pay for the war (proving they were not yet Republicans, yuck, yuck). When the French economy fell on hard times not much later, due to bad weather and other things, all this was like a boat anchor chained around the France's neck while they were sinking.

And just to get things straight: no country ever got itself out of a recession/depression by SIMPLY spending money on a war, and increasing national debt. That includes the US in WW II. Spending tax money on a war will certainly cut joblessness and increase GDP/capita, but the salaries for the formerly jobless are paid for with borrowed money, and GDP spent uselessly to dig holes and fill them in (or make weapons and blow them up) does not count toward a better quality of life, and thus does not count at all. It is also a giant myth that most of WW II spending was on infrastructure. Only a tiny fraction was.

The US standard of living actually fell during WW II while GDP/capita rose. That sounds like a paradox but is not. You can raise your standard of living by using your plastic credit card, too-- for a while. You can borrow from yourself (war bonds) while doing useless work and raise your "work-product" and GDP without even raising your standard of living. But if you borrow from somebody else you need to get a good source of real income LATER to pay it off eventually, or you'll sink. For the US, after WW II, that source of real (not borrowed)l income was being manufacturer to the world, which was composed of economies whose own infrastructure had been destroyed, or who never had any to begin with. The US (for example) replaced Britain as the manufacturer for quite a lot of the (former) British empire. And replaced Germany and France as manufacturers for Europe. (Any factories left in Eastern Europe were being disassembled and shipped away to the USSR, where their products stayed).

In 2008 to the present, the US was forced to borrow international money to prevent a national economic collapse as a result of $7 trillion dollars borrowed by American home owners against their houses from 2001-8. But we have no post-WW II world to rely on to pay that off, and (as a result) our debt per capita is higher than it has ever been since WW II, and will reach WW II levels within 3 years at present rates. Setting up for the perfect storm. Après le machin de dette, le déluge.

[Milton Roe]

The part about Jeopardy is interesting. Any good Jeopardy players knows that any answer (yes, put in the form of a question, Alex) needs to be filtered with "is this the kind of answer they would want on Jeopardy?" That is to say is does it operate like the roadside dinner trivia kitsch collection. Any answer involving Marylin Monroe or Joe DiMaggio is always to be preferred.

Yes. Had they let Deep Thought play Jeopardy, the answer would not have been 42, but 56. However, it would happen 42% of the time.

I suppose it is possible that, because of some neurological anomaly, you have a huge fund of knowledge organized (or rather so lacking organization) in such a manner as to simulate a the crude augmentation of a Googlectual.

Gosh, that sounds suspiciously like politically-incorrect genetic determinism. However, I suppose it's okay since it still refuses to recognize that any part of what I know is due to my own work or individual initiative. All that is only for proles, eh?

[GlassBeadGame]

The part about Jeopardy is interesting. Any good Jeopardy players knows that any answer (yes, put in the form of a question, Alex) needs to be filtered with "is this the kind of answer they would want on Jeopardy?" That is to say is does it operate like the roadside dinner trivia kitsch collection. Any answer involving Marylin Monroe or Joe DiMaggio is always to be preferred.

Yes. Had they let Deep Thought play Jeopardy, the answer would not have been 42, but 56. However, it would happen 42% of the time.

I suppose it is possible that, because of some neurological anomaly, you have a huge fund of knowledge organized (or rather so lacking organization) in such a manner as to simulate a the crude augmentation of a Googlectual.

Gosh, that sounds suspiciously like politically-incorrect genetic determinism. However, I suppose it's okay since it still refuses to recognize that any part of what I know is due to my own work or individual initiative. All that is only for proles, eh?

Some people probably could have dealt with a passing reference to a ball player without serving up a web page. I didn't know us commies weren't suppose to believe in brain disease. I will allow you might have been dropped on the head as a child.

[Milton Roe]

I suppose it is possible that, because of some neurological anomaly, you have a huge fund of knowledge organized (or rather so lacking organization) in such a manner as to simulate a the crude augmentation of a Googlectual.

Gosh, that sounds suspiciously like politically-incorrect genetic determinism. However, I suppose it's okay since it still refuses to recognize that any part of what I know is due to my own work or individual initiative. All that is only for proles, eh?

Some people probably could have dealt with a passing reference to a ball player without feeding up a web page. I didn't know us commies weren't suppose to believe in brain disease.

How else to explain the last years of Lenin? But I had no idea you believed in brain diseases that resulted in huge funds of knowledge.

...organized (or rather so lacking organization) in such a manner as to simulate a the crude augmentation of a Googlectual. I will allow you might have been dropped on the head as a child.

One can say the same of Marx, whose book on Capital is about the most disorganized and opaque mass of random facts and fatuous arguments still in print. I wonder if even Moby Dick has as many people who've read the first chapter, then no farther.

But when a writer works on commission I suppose he is obligated to produce something every so often, even if it's crap.

[communicat]

Roe:
"... just to get things straight: no country ever got itself out of a recession/depression by SIMPLY spending money on a war ..."

America became richer, much richer because of WW2, which provided the US economy with a great boost to growth, taking the country from virtual recession to decisive world economic leadership in just a few years. During the period 1940 to 1944 domestic American industrial expansion rose by 15 percent — a faster pace than at any period before or since. (Paul Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, London: Unwin Hyman 1989, pp.357-8). By the time that war ended, Washington controlled gold reserves of $20 billion, almost two-thirds the word's total of $33 billion.(Gordon Wright, The Ordeal of Total War, New York: Harper and Row 1968, pp.264-5.) Major American corporations had continued trading with Germany for the duration of the war. Standard Oil had shipped enemy fuel through Switzerland for the German occupation forces in France; Ford trucks transported German troops; ITT helped supply Germany with rocket bombs and was also involved in building Focke-Wulf aircraft. The Chase, Rockefeller and Morgan banks had also been implicated in secret deals with the Nazis. (Charles Higham, Trading with the Enemy, London: Robert Hale, 1983).

As for the rest of your TL;DR postings, kindly wake me up when you've actually got something meaningful to say. Or, on second thoughts, don't bother. Nothing that said here by you, me, or anyone else, is ever going to make the slightest bit of difference in the real world or even in the fairy-tale world of WP/WR. So what's the point.

This post has been edited by communicat: Mon 17th October 2011, 5:14pm

[GlassBeadGame]

Moved some (24) off topic posts about Communist Manifesto, Das Kapital, Moby Dick and Lyndon LaRouche to Manifesto Destiny, rides again in OT politics forum.