From: Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@datamann.com)
Date: Mon Jul 23 2001 - 10:40:47 MDT
Tiberius Gracchus wrote:
>
> On Sun, 22 Jul 2001 20:59:54 -0400, you wrote:
>
> >Tiberius Gracchus wrote:
> >>
> >> On Sun, 22 Jul 2001 08:40:38 -0700, you wrote:
> >>
> >> >> Carlos Gonzalia wrote: Our local protesters sometimes make
> >> >> explicit mention to those organizations in their protests, but are usually
> >> >> more concerned in getting their displeasure be known to the local
> >> >> establishment and oligopolies. That is, to the guys that have reaped the
> >> >> spoils of IMF/WB/etc policies. ...-Carlos
> >> >
> >> >Carlos, why do the locals have a problem with the guys who reap
> >> >the spoils of the IMF/WB policies? Seems like they would be in
> >> >favor of these guy because they bring jobs and money into the
> >> >neighborhood. What am I missing? spike
> >>
> >> Maybe they don't want to turn Italy into another America: just a
> >> bunch of hamsters spinning madly on a wheel in some rich man's cage...
> >> (I'm exaggerating, of course, but there is some truth to that...)
> >
> >Hardly, considering that the US has the highest percentage of its
> >population with business ownership / self employed of any industrialized
> >nation.
>
> That may be. Still.....my point is that if you have wealth then that
> is dependent mainly (in most cases) upon the demand for that wealth by
> other people. I think I have shown that this system (call it
> capitalism or whatever else you want) NECESSITATES that some sizeable
> fraction of the population MUST GO WITHOUT the basics of a comfortable
> life; furthermore, there must also exist some still fraction that
> struggles to keep falling into that bottom category.
Excuse me? How is it that one person's wealth requires that other people
be poor? If you are going to make an asinine argument about relative
levels of wealth, then I can categorically say that relational
comparisons are useless.
In a country where the average welfare recipient has a cell phone, a
VCR, a TV, and a diet of over 2500 calories a day, I fail to see where
'must go without' even fits into the equation.
>
> There is a myriad of laws/regulations/cultural norms designed to make
> it harder to obtain the basics of a comfortable life. These laws/regs
> etc prop up wealth. This is oppression and exploitation, nothing less
> (of course, everytime I mention exploitation, the kneejerk response is
> " oh well how is offering a low paying job exploitation?" That has
> nothing to do with it, of course..)
While the old welfare system did prohibit recipients from obtaining
assets that could be used to make them independent of the welfare
system, this is no longer the case. I also fail to see how a system that
forcibly confiscates 39% of the income of the wealthiest people 'props
up wealth'.
>
> Just because it is 10 or 20 or whatever percent of the population that
> is oppressed, means nothing. They have no more, so they riot.
THis is so bogus. Over 70% of the population owns stock in corporations,
and over 60% of the black population does.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Nov 02 2002 - 08:09:03 MST