Want to help VirZOOM?

[patrikkorda]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

Somehow I have this feeling that the entire American Kleptocracy is working hard to make Clinton the President, and the Fed is delaying rates hikes to support the stock market.

I really hope so. The alternative is an authoritarian birther in power.

[Woodsman]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

I really hope so. The alternative is an authoritarian birther in power.

Ends justify means, even if it means the end of any pretense of fair and objective journalism or elections free of taint or influence. If we think we can deploy this once in an "emergency" and then return to regularly scheduled programming, folks have another thing coming.

The media is essentially 100 percent united, vehemently, against Trump and engaged in a project to prevent him from being elected president. The Democratic Party has been shown to rig the outcome of its primaries and coordinated with the media in defeating Sanders. The husband of the Democratic nominee engaged in ex-parte communications with the highest law enforcement officer in the nation while that presumptive nominee was being investigated by the highest law enforcement agency in the nation. And the director of that highest agency refused to indict the candidate despite detailing extensive and serious violations of law while at the same warning others not to imagine they could rely on similar immunity.

Now one may not have an actual problem with that and share the premises on which the project is based about why one candidate or other poses such extreme dangers. But that doesn’t mean that as a citizen that I am willing to go along with any any action or omission or any claim, no matter how fact-free, no matter how irrational, no matter how dangerous it could be, in order to bring Trump down. We can survive any presidency, as the disaster of Bush and Obama confirms yet again. But what is left of an America where the press becomes an adjunct of a political party, when the Democratic Party abandons all pretense to democracy, and when we cease to have free elections?

Culture is stronger than politics and the fear of social isolation stronger than common sense and this has been deployed in the service of a party and candidate. So people are all talking to each other and agreeing with each other, reinforcing each others prejudices and blind spots, and uniformly and aggressively policing any dissent, no matter how small, no matter how reasoned or principled, instantly castigating anyone who dares question orthodoxy, accusing them of everything from crypto-fascist tendencies to out and out racism or even mental illness.

This is precisely why morning after Brexit came as such a surprise and why I am convinced barring vote tampering the likes we have not seen in this nation, the morning after Election Day will prove equally as surprising. The reason for Trump isn’t that people are too stupid to understand the arguments or because they've been beguiled by the Svengali powers of a master communicator. It's because people have been so ufcked by the prevailing order in such deep and fundamental and enduring ways that they can’t imagine that anything is worse than preservation of the status quo.

You have 160 million Americans who are so angry and so helpless that they view exploding things without any idea of what the resulting debris is going to be to be preferable to having things continue as they are. They have identified the people they view as having done this violence to them and they are determined to remove them from power. And that is a completely valid perception that is reinforced by their daily lived experience. It is a completely understandable response to their present circumstances.

The worry is not that these 160 million will lead to insurrection or a precursor to fascism or a race war, but rather that conditions have deteriorated to such dangerous levels that such perceptions and realities are so wide as to make Trumps possible. The fear is the willingness of the other 160 million deployed in opposition to deny their lived experience while at the same time dehumanizing and degrading them further still by calling them primitive, racist, and stupid. The terror is that all of this is coordinated and facilitated by the highest strata of American life and that people with the intelligence, education and discernment to know better don't seem the least perturbed by what they say and in whose name they say it.

I have every expectation that they will create the outcome they fear most. And as I've said before, it couldn't happen to a more deserving bunch than the gang running the GOP and the Democrats. This is the year of political nihilism and I feel fine.

David Stockman: "Donald Trump’s Candidacy—–The Good And The Bad Of It"

[patrikkorda]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

The media is essentially 100 percent united, vehemently, against Trump and engaged in a project to prevent him from being elected president.

100%? Not even close. Trump is the Republican candidate and Fox News, amongst others, is a Republican outfit. This is not to mention all the doom&gloom-porn outlets that exist all over the internet that portray Trump as some sort of underdog.

[shiny!]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

This is the year of political nihilism and I feel fine.

Same here, Woody. Thanks for the link to the Stockman article. He's refreshingly honest.

David Stockman: "Donald Trump’s Candidacy—–The Good And The Bad Of It"

"What needs to happen when the next recession and stock market plunge unfolds is exactly nothing."

[vt]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2016 8:58 pm Post subject: Did Philly And Clevelnd Mark The End Of US Two-Party System? http://tinyurl.com/hwyasvs Did Philly And Cleveland Mark The End Of U.S. Two-Party System? 7/29/2016 Election 2016: Two weeks, two major political conventions, and both parties are showing the strain from the ideological fractures among their followers. Can the two-party system, a bedrock of American politics, survive as it is now? That's an open question. The media acted surprised that, after he heartily endorsed Hillary Clinton's candidacy, septuagenarian socialist Bernie Sanders bowed out of his marriage of convenience with the Democrats -- going back to being an independent. IBD was in Philadelphia for the Democratic Convention, and saw one thing clearly in dozens of conversations with delegates, activists and movement officials: The grassroots energy of today's Democratic Party lay with Sanders' followers, the far-left wing of his party. They represent by various estimates 40% of the party. Without them, Hillary may have a tough time getting elected. Now that Sanders is gone, will they leave too? Will they find the Democrats' "rigged" system -- the WikiLeaks release of DNC emails shows clearly how Democratic leaders colluded against the Sanders campaign -- intolerable and form an alternative? Will they join the Greens? Go with the Libertarians? It's not clear. The same can be asked of the Republicans. Standard-bearer Donald Trump is the most divisive mainstream political candidate in postwar history. Unlike Sanders, however, he won his race. He won because Tea Party followers and other grassroots GOP members in America's heartland had grown tired of being ignored or condescended to by the party's elites. Trump represents, as much as anything, a thumb in the eye of those elites. But it may be something else entirely. The two-party system was created for an era of large-bloc voting, wherein unions, small-business people, corporations, Wall Street and Main Street made up the largest blocs of voters. Today, it's not so easy, thanks to the internet. As was apparent in Philadelphia, social networks are a way of circumventing the top-down control by the party of its members. Daily demonstrations in FDR Park in Philadelphia, often with messages starkly at odds with those inside the Wells Fargo arena where the convention was held, showed that clearly. So did the frequent interruptions of speakers, including former Defense Secretary and CIA head Leon Panetta, whose speech Wednesday night was heckled and repeatedly interrupted with chants of "No more war." The fact is, the internet genie is not going back in the bottle. Activists on both left and right will continue their virtual organizing, circumventing the dictates of the major parties. Whether hard-core left, netroots, Green, Libertarian, or Tea Party conservative, it's unlikely that the two parties will ever again be able to rely on a herd of docile voters doing what they're told. Sure, the Republicans will stay in business, and so will the Democrats. But the old dictatorial way of doing business is going to die. Parties can't survive if they alienate their bases. Just ask the Whigs, once a powerful force in American politics that all but disappeared after Abraham Lincoln's Republicans emerged with their powerful anti-slavery message. We may soon witness a proliferation of political parties and splintered interest groups coalescing to relegate the two main parties to the sidelines. For good or ill, things will then get very interesting.

http://tinyurl.com/hwyasvs Did Philly And Cleveland Mark The End Of U.S. Two-Party System? 7/29/2016 Election 2016: Two weeks, two major political conventions, and both parties are showing the strain from the ideological fractures among their followers. Can the two-party system, a bedrock of American politics, survive as it is now? That's an open question. The media acted surprised that, after he heartily endorsed Hillary Clinton's candidacy, septuagenarian socialist Bernie Sanders bowed out of his marriage of convenience with the Democrats -- going back to being an independent. IBD was in Philadelphia for the Democratic Convention, and saw one thing clearly in dozens of conversations with delegates, activists and movement officials: The grassroots energy of today's Democratic Party lay with Sanders' followers, the far-left wing of his party. They represent by various estimates 40% of the party. Without them, Hillary may have a tough time getting elected. Now that Sanders is gone, will they leave too? Will they find the Democrats' "rigged" system -- the WikiLeaks release of DNC emails shows clearly how Democratic leaders colluded against the Sanders campaign -- intolerable and form an alternative? Will they join the Greens? Go with the Libertarians? It's not clear. The same can be asked of the Republicans. Standard-bearer Donald Trump is the most divisive mainstream political candidate in postwar history. Unlike Sanders, however, he won his race. He won because Tea Party followers and other grassroots GOP members in America's heartland had grown tired of being ignored or condescended to by the party's elites. Trump represents, as much as anything, a thumb in the eye of those elites. But it may be something else entirely. The two-party system was created for an era of large-bloc voting, wherein unions, small-business people, corporations, Wall Street and Main Street made up the largest blocs of voters. Today, it's not so easy, thanks to the internet. As was apparent in Philadelphia, social networks are a way of circumventing the top-down control by the party of its members. Daily demonstrations in FDR Park in Philadelphia, often with messages starkly at odds with those inside the Wells Fargo arena where the convention was held, showed that clearly. So did the frequent interruptions of speakers, including former Defense Secretary and CIA head Leon Panetta, whose speech Wednesday night was heckled and repeatedly interrupted with chants of "No more war." The fact is, the internet genie is not going back in the bottle. Activists on both left and right will continue their virtual organizing, circumventing the dictates of the major parties. Whether hard-core left, netroots, Green, Libertarian, or Tea Party conservative, it's unlikely that the two parties will ever again be able to rely on a herd of docile voters doing what they're told. Sure, the Republicans will stay in business, and so will the Democrats. But the old dictatorial way of doing business is going to die. Parties can't survive if they alienate their bases. Just ask the Whigs, once a powerful force in American politics that all but disappeared after Abraham Lincoln's Republicans emerged with their powerful anti-slavery message. We may soon witness a proliferation of political parties and splintered interest groups coalescing to relegate the two main parties to the sidelines. For good or ill, things will then get very interesting.

[jk]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

We can survive any presidency, as the disaster of Bush and Obama confirms yet again.

i'd like to think this is correct, but don't share your certainty. i don't think bush or obama ever attempted to declare a national state of emergency, such as currently exists in france. and although the patriot act frightens me, i don't believe its powers have ever been deployed widely enough to threaten our constitutional system itself.

i have read that the military and secty of defense had discussions about refusing orders from nixon that might trigger a war to wag the dog. and we know that there was an attempt to organize a coup during franklin roosevelt's presidency.

i don't think germans predicted the future course of events when hitler first became chancellor. as a more recent example erdogan was elected democratically but between one thing and another turkey is turning into a dictatorship.

i am not predicting such a turn of events should trump become president. otoh, i cannot confidently rule out such a scenario. can you? and if so, on what basis?

[LazyBoy]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

I'm finishing up the Summer here in Silicon Valley.

Could you share what you have planned with your new education?

[GRG55]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

Could you share what you have planned with your new education?

1. Start with a tech idea;
2. Use VC capital to build it up into a Unicorn;
3. Hire Morgan and Goldman to take it public;
4. Use one-third of the profits to buy a fixer-upper "starter" home in Frisco;
5. Use another one-third to found a self-driving electric car company;
6. Use the final third to buy out your favourite NBA franchise;
7. Try to figure out what you are going to do with your life once 2018 rolls around


[and anybody following VirZOOM closely will immediately recognize it ain't quite THAT easy ]

[BK]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

SEO,
Well said and great analysis.

People forget that places like Trenton-NJ, Worcester-MA, Rochester-NY, Troy-NY, Lawrence-MA were once Palo Alto or San Fran of Tech.

Several massive local Bubble economies in the USA today. San Fran, Boston, New York, Washington DC, and Seattle.

[santafe2]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

My only point is that if there is trouble in the economy, then the cause of the trouble can't be that wages are too high for corps to make profits.
In the aggregate, wages are taking less and less of GDP, while corp profits are taking more and more of GDP, and both have been true for more than twenty or thirty years....

I don't have time to check but I'd be surprised if the loss in the wage sector is not made up in an increase in capital gains. The fix for this is to tax capital gains at the same rate as wage and salary income.

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

I don't have time to check but I'd be surprised if the loss in the wage sector is not made up in an increase in capital gains. The fix for this is to tax capital gains at the same rate as wage and salary income.

I agree with you santafe2, taxing capital gains and wages at the same rate would be fair and helpful.
Your other point is pretty interesting. We were comparing the percent of GDP going to wages versus going to corp profits.
Corp profits may not end up as capital gains, at least not quickly.
There may have been a time when corp profits went back to shareholders as either dividends or capital gains, but our system might be more complicated than that now.
Plus the share owners don't realize capital gains as a taxable event until the day they sell the shares.

[vt]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

You're making incorrect assumptions about where the income is:

http://taxfoundation.org/article/wal...omestic-income

Also taxing capital gains as income at a higher rate is excessive double taxation and doesn't recognize risk and it's importance in the economy. One can't get capital gains unless they take a risk to invest money saved after paying taxes, instead of current consumption. You also have make a successful investment. If you lose you can only write off $3,000 a year. Plus you run the risk in the one year holding period of volatile markets.

[dcarrigg]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

You're making incorrect assumptions about where the income is:

http://taxfoundation.org/article/wal...omestic-income

Also taxing capital gains as income at a higher rate is excessive double taxation and doesn't recognize risk and it's importance in the economy. One can't get capital gains unless they take a risk to invest money saved after paying taxes, instead of current consumption. You also have make a successful investment. If you lose you can only write off $3,000 a year. Plus you run the risk in the one year holding period of volatile markets.

The Tax Foundation receives the majority of its funding from Koch Family Foundations. Without even looking at the link, I already know the conclusion:

Punish the poor. Punish the middle class. Punish workers. Reward billionaires.


Deny that wages are going down. Deny that inequality exists. Fudge numbers and deflators and screw with the ledger so that you can count the fact that a $500 cast for a broken leg costs $27,000 today as a 'benefit' for your average American.

"Foundations" like this are why nobody believes economists any more. They're all partisan and corrupt. The "research" conclusions are pre-determined. Support what Charles Koch believes or don't get your paycheck. Same goes for the GMU econ department, Reason Magazine, CATO Inistitute, Manhattan Institute and all the rest of the astroturf the brothers whipped up.

[santafe2]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

Also taxing capital gains as income at a higher rate is excessive double taxation and doesn't recognize risk and it's importance in the economy. One can't get capital gains unless they take a risk to invest money saved after paying taxes, instead of current consumption. You also have make a successful investment. If you lose you can only write off $3,000 a year. Plus you run the risk in the one year holding period of volatile markets.

Since I've had to make this decision more than once, I can assure you it's not double taxation, it's just what it appears to be, very little taxation. In fact, when one sells their business, the income from the sale is, for the most part, capital gain. The profits from the business now go to the new owner who uses that capital to, in part, pay the old owner and the income is now a capital gain. In 2011 that was about 60% less taxes. Is it fair? Nope. Is changing this situation part of the Democratic platform? Yes, but it's not specific enough, (pg. 13 if one is interested).

There's another dynamic in play as well. When one sells a closely held corporation to a much larger public entity, growth and cash flow are no longer competing for attention.

[vt]

Re: Want to help VirZOOM?

Ok DC.. First there was no denial wages had gone down or that inequality did not exist.

Here's a more "acceptable" source which basically says the same about wages and salary being about 50% of the total income:

http://www.bea.gov/iTable/iTable.cfm...isuri=1&903=58