Capitalism: A Love Story

• I Wear Pants

  rookie_j70 wrote: capitalism is what makes this country great. it is based on the idea that hard work pays off and one should be payed what they truly worth. for example should a doctor who worked hard in school and studied in school be paid the same as a fry cook in mcdonalds who screwed off in school? absolutley not.

  People doing what they love as best as they damned can makes this country or any country great. Not an economic model.
• bigkahuna

  I 100% agree with you on that Pants.
• sonofsam

  

  As well as I.
• dwccrew

  

  Cleveland Buck wrote: It has nothing to do with 'rich bankers'. What we don't need are banks that are so big that their failure would decimate the economy, and we also don't need scumbag Congressmen who are for sale to the highest bidding monopoly. I don't give a shit if a banker gets rich as long as his bank is allowed to fail if he fucks up.

  Exactly. You can not let an entity get so large that it could cripple the system. That is not capitalism.
  

  majorspark wrote: Any entity deemed to big to fail is inherently not a capitalistic entity. Capitalism requires the raising of non-government generated capital to be placed at risk by its contributors, in the hope that the risk generates capital to the contributors, while benefiting its customers with a product worthy of private individuals or groups exchanging the benefit of receiving the product with their dollars.
  
  An entity that is allowed to gain so great a share of the free market that the risk of its failure is so great that it threatens to bring down the entire market it operates in is not capitalistic. It becomes socialistic in nature because its risk is placed on the public in that its success becomes so vital in sustaining the free public market it operates in. Bailouts are failures of the government to insure the public's trust in the free market. Many times these failures are generated by the government's own interference by subsidizing or unjustly regulating free market activities. The government's job is simply to keep the market free by not allowing a free market entity to gain so much power over its market that it risks the public trust, thus becoming a socialistic entity.
  
  Government's role should be that of the referee of the free market. Instead they have become one of the players in the game as well. They compete for power and influence just as the major corporate players do. The only difference is the trump card is in their deck.

  Sums it all up.
  

  HitsRus wrote: Michael Moore is a propagandist. He claims to make documentaries, but academically and journalistically, he is dishonest and a fraud. Moore's MO is to take facts, intersperse them with emotion images, and string them together so as to lead the viewer to a conclusion that is not necessarily warranted or the truth. His facts might be correct...the images heart-renderingly real, but they do not necessarily follow from each other. Moore knows that, but his goal is not the truth ... it is to convince people of his leftist, hateful take on America.
  To be fair to him(something he is not to his 'subjects') I haven't seen this particular film.... Nor do I intend to. But I have seen enough of this creature to realize that I'll not patronize any more of his films and hence give the slimeball any of my money. I find him disgusting, he nauseates me, and I'm just NOT going to watch anything else he puts together.
  
  
  So Moore is blaming capitalism for the bailout? That's rich (pun intended). Let's not forget the wonderful government's role in all of this..... lessening of lending standards so people could get loans that they weren't qualified for....the politicians could have said 'no' to a bailout and let 'capitalism' work and weed out the 'bad' bankers who made the risky loans....etc etc.
  So wait.....we want to trust healthcare to them?....hahaha. Sicko man.

  Great post. This and Major's post are the 2 best and most knowledgable on this thread.
  

  Writerbuckeye wrote: MM has to be laughing his considerable butt off at how he's fooled some of you folks.
  
  If ever someone used the capitalistic system to make as much as he could, it's Moore -- and then he turns around and convinces the same fools who shelled out their dollars to believe his anti-capitalism, leftist rant in the process.
  
  Too rich.

  I've always said this as well. Moore is blasting the very system that he has used to become wealthy.
  

  bigkahuna wrote:
  
  
  
  I liked what he said about having businesses being run like a democracy, at least in principle. I found it interesting how the company in Wisconsin was run. It's funny though because people will call this Socialism. But for some reason in government it's call Democracy.
  

  
  I disagree. The government should run like a business. The government works for we, the taxpayers. We should be treated like shareholders. If the government operated in that fashion we would not be so far in debt and spending outrageously.
  
  But now, businesses do operate like the government and look where that has gotten them....into such financial ruin that they needed a bailout.
  
  Run the government like a business, do not run a business like the government (presently) is ran.
• Footwedge

  sonofsam wrote: [I refuse to lick someones rear end to make money.

  Better open up your own shop then.
• Footwedge

  Whereby it's true that piggy has made a ton of money in our capitalist society, at least he plays by capitalism's rules in doing so. He competes against other directors of movies for market share.
  
  A little different animal than what goes on in Washington where special interest groups rig the game in their favor. I have never seen any of his movies, but from what I can tell, his markmanship on the housing bubble and the corporate bailouts was probably spot on.
• bigkahuna

  dwccrew wrote:

  Cleveland Buck wrote: It has nothing to do with 'rich bankers'. What we don't need are banks that are so big that their failure would decimate the economy, and we also don't need scumbag Congressmen who are for sale to the highest bidding monopoly. I don't give a shit if a banker gets rich as long as his bank is allowed to fail if he fucks up.

  Exactly. You can not let an entity get so large that it could cripple the system. That is not capitalism.
  

  majorspark wrote: Any entity deemed to big to fail is inherently not a capitalistic entity. Capitalism requires the raising of non-government generated capital to be placed at risk by its contributors, in the hope that the risk generates capital to the contributors, while benefiting its customers with a product worthy of private individuals or groups exchanging the benefit of receiving the product with their dollars.
  
  An entity that is allowed to gain so great a share of the free market that the risk of its failure is so great that it threatens to bring down the entire market it operates in is not capitalistic. It becomes socialistic in nature because its risk is placed on the public in that its success becomes so vital in sustaining the free public market it operates in. Bailouts are failures of the government to insure the public's trust in the free market. Many times these failures are generated by the government's own interference by subsidizing or unjustly regulating free market activities. The government's job is simply to keep the market free by not allowing a free market entity to gain so much power over its market that it risks the public trust, thus becoming a socialistic entity.
  
  Government's role should be that of the referee of the free market. Instead they have become one of the players in the game as well. They compete for power and influence just as the major corporate players do. The only difference is the trump card is in their deck.

  Sums it all up.
  

  HitsRus wrote: Michael Moore is a propagandist. He claims to make documentaries, but academically and journalistically, he is dishonest and a fraud. Moore's MO is to take facts, intersperse them with emotion images, and string them together so as to lead the viewer to a conclusion that is not necessarily warranted or the truth. His facts might be correct...the images heart-renderingly real, but they do not necessarily follow from each other. Moore knows that, but his goal is not the truth ... it is to convince people of his leftist, hateful take on America.
  To be fair to him(something he is not to his 'subjects') I haven't seen this particular film.... Nor do I intend to. But I have seen enough of this creature to realize that I'll not patronize any more of his films and hence give the slimeball any of my money. I find him disgusting, he nauseates me, and I'm just NOT going to watch anything else he puts together.
  
  
  So Moore is blaming capitalism for the bailout? That's rich (pun intended). Let's not forget the wonderful government's role in all of this..... lessening of lending standards so people could get loans that they weren't qualified for....the politicians could have said 'no' to a bailout and let 'capitalism' work and weed out the 'bad' bankers who made the risky loans....etc etc.
  So wait.....we want to trust healthcare to them?....hahaha. Sicko man.

  Great post. This and Major's post are the 2 best and most knowledgable on this thread.
  

  Writerbuckeye wrote: MM has to be laughing his considerable butt off at how he's fooled some of you folks.
  
  If ever someone used the capitalistic system to make as much as he could, it's Moore -- and then he turns around and convinces the same fools who shelled out their dollars to believe his anti-capitalism, leftist rant in the process.
  
  Too rich.

  I've always said this as well. Moore is blasting the very system that he has used to become wealthy.
  

  bigkahuna wrote:
  
  
  
  I liked what he said about having businesses being run like a democracy, at least in principle. I found it interesting how the company in Wisconsin was run. It's funny though because people will call this Socialism. But for some reason in government it's call Democracy.
  

  
  I disagree. The government should run like a business. The government works for we, the taxpayers. We should be treated like shareholders. If the government operated in that fashion we would not be so far in debt and spending outrageously.
  
  But now, businesses do operate like the government and look where that has gotten them....into such financial ruin that they needed a bailout.
  
  Run the government like a business, do not run a business like the government (presently) is ran.

  I disagree on the fact that we are looking at government vs. business differently. This is how I look it at.
  
  If the government were run like a business, we the shareholder/taxpayers wouldn't have a say in it and just get the benefits/lose money. If a business were run like a government, we as shareholder/employees could have a say in what went on.
  
  Like I said before, a CEO would have a more difficult time trying to give himself a raise if the rest of the company had a say in it.
  
  Also, if the President, VP, CEO... were making bad businesses according to the people and losing money/jobs, we could have a say in it. I mean we are the ones doing the hard work and making the company money, but see little reward besides a pay check.
  
  I think the government is being run like a business right now. The government is investing in these businesses basically with bailouts with our money. Now they say they want the banks/auto industries to pay it back, but will they? Some have given some back, but it's a trinkle.
  
  
  Now that I re read your post I will agree on the aspect of spending. The government can just print out more money if they run out, whereas a company is just done. I don't think that's the entire piece to the puzzle.