I'm falling...
Falling...
Into the Nietzschean Abyss...
Quick...
Anybody have a trampoline...
A really, really long ladder...
A fire department...
A parachute...
Even a set of mountain gear...
Some shoes and gloves with spikes...
To grab onto the walls...
Perhaps a ledge...not that I've seen a ledge...
I can't see anything..
It just keeps getting darker, and darker, and darker...
I can barely see the light above me...
Does this abyss...
End in water?
Or hard rock ground...that is going to break all my bones...
And kill me...
Anybody got a super big, thick mattress...
That they can throw beneath me...
Perhaps this abyss...
Goes right through the earth...
To China...or Australia...or New Zealand...
Or more likely it ends in fire and rock...
Perhaps I will meet the Devil himself...
Did I do something wrong...
Go down a bad path...
Or make a wrong choice...
Make a whole bunch of bad choices...
To get me here....
Is this my 'Un-Divine Punishment'...
Or might I learn something down here...
Can I learn something about myself...
And turn myself into a better person...
My own personal Phoenix re-born...
Whatever doesn't kill you,
Makes you stronger....
How much deeper must I plunge?
And who or what am I going to meet down here?
Or is this going to end on a deathbed of cold rock...
Or burning lava...
Deep water maybe I can survive...
Although with my momentum,
I'll probably run out of air long before I resurface...
Assuming I resurface at all...
Is this a dream?
A myth?
A nightmare?
Please, be a nightmare!
And let me wake up!!
Now!! Before I have a heart attack!!
If I must be down here,
Let me at least walk around...
Not keep falling...
Man, did I ever miss The Nietzschean Bridge...
Even the Nietzschean Rope...
Anybody...give me a Nietschean Rope...
That I can once again feel some Nietzschean Hope...
Climbing is far better than falling...
Give me some mountain gear...
And I'll take on Mt. Everest...
Or let me land safely below...
And I will take on...
Narcissus...Dionysus...Even Satan himself...
The 'Unholy Trinity'...
No deals with The Devil...
Well, maybe some detoxified compromises...
(My bargaining power isn't very good right now...)
But I'm not going to sell my Soul...
Maybe I did already sell my Soul...
Maybe that is why I am down here...
I sold out on My Self...
I sold myself to The Devil...
Where did I go wrong?
What bad choice did I make?
Or was it a whole slew of them?
How did I sell myself to The Devil?
By failing my parents when they need me most?
By looking powerless and weak in front of my kids...
And in front of my long-time girlfriend?
Maybe I have become powerless and weak?
How did that happen?
By turning my back on corporate owners...
Who had already sold themselves to The Devil?
Who every day were choosing Profit over People?
But in walking a way...
I was making things worse for myself...
Throwing myself into this economic abyss?
Is a 'Personal Economic Abyss'
The same as a 'Nietzschean Abyss'?
Or are the two abysses just connected together?
Different holes down to the same landing pit?
Not enough money and you can't pay your bills properly...
Take your kids and/or your girlfriend out for dinner...
Help your parents out of their own Economic Abyss...
You/I feel weak inside...
You can't chase your own dream...
Because you are too busy just trying to get out of...
Your Own Economic Abyss...
'Recession' is too weak a word to describe...
The Personal Economic Hell that you feel going on inside you...
And all around you...
As you battle your personal demons...
And meet some of the people you need to meet...
To work your way out of your Economic Abyss...
And not the ones who want to keep you down there...
The psychology, economics, and politics
Of Insufficieny...and Deficiency...
Keep you deficient...
And they can keep the 'puppet controls' on your destiny...
A bloated, unemployed work force...
Willing to work for less and less..
Makes unethical Corporate Owners....smile in smug self-satisfaction...
'Keep the immigration coming...'
Chirp the corporate owners to the politicians....
'More tax dollars and votes for you....
And a cheaper and cheaper labour force for us...
Pretty soon, we won't have to build our plants...
And offices...
Overseas...
Cause we'll have what we need here!
The minimum wage is $10 an hour...
We can get around that...
Here in Toronto, just get Ford to dump the 'fair wage policy'...
I like much of Ford's mandate....but not that one...
You can't justify a two or three tiered workforce...
Where contracted, privatized workers become essentially discriminated against...
And treated like 'Third World Workers'...
Turn a blind eye while they get paid half -- or a third of -- the wages of the workers still left over in City Hall...
This is what I call 'Downloaded' and 'Downsized' Worker Contracts'...
Where hundred thousand dollar earning civil politicians...
Allow private contractors to treat their workers like 'Third World Slaves'...
The Importation of 'Third World Wages' into Canada to become competitive with..
China, India, Pakistan, Indonesia, The Philipines, Mexico, South America...
While politicians keep the borders open, the immigration tap on full blast...
Like the bathtub tap running full at full throttle while water spills over the top of the bath...
More immigration, cheaper labour, unethical corporate owners, and/or even corporate owners simply trying to remain competitive with outside countries' cheaper labour forces...
What we need in as international monetary system...and an international minimum wage system that puts all countries, and all corporations on the same equal footing...
Otherwise, the countries with the cheapest work forces win the battle of Globalization...
Canada, and particularly Ontario...seems to be trying hard to get there...
What used to be Canada's wealthiest province....
Is being trashed by Free Trade, Globalization, Uncapped Immigration, Paying more attention and giving more favoritism to new immigrants than to the senior citizens and the workers who have lived in Canada all their lives...
I am all for cultural diversity, cultural integration, AND EGALITARIANISM
BUT EGALITARIAN TAKES A VICIOUS NOSE DIVE WHEN CANADA IS TRYING TO RE-CREATE ITS OWN 'INTERNAL GHETTO WORK FORCE' TO COMPETE WITH FOREIGN COUNTRIES...
I ADVOCATE FAIR WAGES TO EVERYONE WHO LIVES AND WORKS IN CANADA, NOT JUST TO THOSE WHO WORK FOR THE GOVERNMENT, AND/OR THE HIGHEST ECHELONS OF PRIVATE CORPORATIONS...
For anyone who has done well in Canada, I tip my hat to you...as long as you have maintained your ethics and integrity getting to where you are...
But beneath you, and amongst the 'front line blue collar and white collar workers' there is a movement going on...and it is not a good one...
I call it creating a 'ghetto work force' -- even to the point of ignoring and/or finding ways around provincial 'minimum wage' laws....
One very efficient way around Ontario's minimum wage laws...
Is simply to create a 'worker's contract'...
No benefits, no minimum wage...
Maybe they are paid 'ghetto commissions'....
Or maybe they are given an hourly wage...and then told...
It includes your gas expenses....
That is a very popular trend these days...
Dowload rising gas prices onto the 'worker with a contract'...
Turn most of Ontario taxi drivers, or limo drivers, or courier drivers...
The ones who can't figure it out, or have nothing better to turn to...
Into a provincial 'Ghetto Work Force on Wheels'...
Let's see if we can get them down to $5 an hour....or less...
While our politicians turn a blind eye to what is happening...
'Oh Canada, We Stand On Guard For Thee!'
Keep those borders open, all you Republican and Democratic politicians...
And keep all those New Mexico farmers and corporations happy...
How can you know how much a worker is making?
If you don't even know that he or she is in the country?
If you want cheap 'home-grown' products and services, North America...
Then, you have to accept The New and Already Here, 'Third World Working Wages'...
Otherwise, stay at home, stay unemployed...
And we will simply produce our products, create our services...
Elsewhere, in other parts of the world...
It's called 'Free Trade'....
And 'Globalization'....
Don't you just love it?
It is bringing more and more workers...thousands...millions...
To a much clearer understanding of what at least one part of...
The Nietzschean Abyss is...
Fewer and fewer Big Unions...or for that matter, any type of unions...large or small...
As the whipped cream and the cherry on top...of the Banks and Mortgages 'Almost Financially Collapsing'....But somehow, with The Presidents' and The Senate's help....managing to escape with millions and millions of dollar of 'separation contracts'...and then 'Stimulus Packages' to coax them back....We need you...kind sirs...to steal more and more of our hard earned money...
We can't live with you, but we can't live without you either...
So we will give you millions of more money...'Stimulus Money'...to not go out the back door and leave an empty bank or mortgage company behind you...They must have learned from the Fitness Clubs...they used to do that...Go bankrupt under one name after stealing 'years of contract membership money'...and then open another Fitness Club...under a different name...
Only in America...
Well....correction...it seems to be a 'Global Financial Game' these day...
Here's to Globalization...
China is doing well...
I better not write too loudly...
China is in the process of owning North America...
If it hasn't essentially gotten there already...
Anyway, hats off to China and India in one respect at least....
They know how to balance budgets...and pay by cash, not credit...
I have no problems with these countries, or any other country, wanting to do better...
I just ask how North Americans are making their own lives better?
Canada used to be scared of being 'swallowed up' by America...
Now both Canada and America deserve to feel rightfully afraid...
Of being swallowed up by China...
America...home of the brave and free....
America...fighting on foreign shores to preserve its freedom and integrity...
While Foreign Corporate Forces Are Taking that same freedom and integrity away...
Coming in through a different door...
'Free trade' is not the same as 'fair trade'...
The generations of politicians and capitalists before us knew that...
That is why they had 'tariffs'....for purposes of 'national protectionism' and/or a 'more equal international trading foundation'....
If foreign corporations are paying a pittance of the labour costs that North American corporations are paying....
How is that 'fair' in a very competitive global market?
It is like one gigantic 'teeter totter game'...
China, India, Pakistan, The Phillipines, Taiwan, Mexico, South America...
Are all going up...
As America and Canada go down...
The Economic Abyss....bringing with it economic despair...
Soon funnels into the Niezschean Abyss....
Until our whole existence is essentially poisoned by economics...
We still have freedom...some freedom...less freedom...
I take my hat off to those who are doing well...when many are not...as long as you have kept your ethics and integrity reasonably intact...
Meanwhile, I still write about the politically...
And economically...
Incorrect...
My problems pales compared with those who are fighting...
In foreign wars...
Or are fighting devastating health problems...
Or are living on the street or in temporary shelters...
At least when I step away from this computer in a few minutes...
I still have a solid home base from which to leave and come back to, and enough time, money, and energy to fight another economic day...
In between my forays into writing about philosophy, psychology, economics, politics, mythology, religion...
Lose your body, lose your mind...and you lose everything you have to fight your economic, creative, professional, and/or personal battles with...
At least in between bad jobs, I can still write in Hegel's Hotel...
Write about Nietzsche and The 'Anti-Christ'...
Write about Jung and Mythology...
Write about Freud and Transference...
And still find a way to help my parents...
And take my kids and girlfriend out to dinner...
Together or separately,
As long as we are living, breathing, and still have hope, energy, and willpower...
We can still climb our way out of Nietzsche's Abyss...
No Faustian deals with The Devil...
Are needed...
Just faith in ourselves, and what we can do...
Both individually...
And collectively...
In dialectic...
And pluralistic...
Union...
-- dgb, Nov. 12th, 2010,
-- David Gordon Bain
Posted by david gordon bain at 6:27 AM Links to this post
Friday, November 12, 2010
Thursday, August 19, 2010
Top 6 most indebted countries (and why)
Top 6 most indebted countries (and why)
by Michael Sanibel, Investopedia.com
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Provided by:
The recent financial crisis and recession have been a worldwide occurrence. The events in the United States since 2008 have garnered most of the headlines because the U. S. has the world's largest economy and national debt, but the reality is that many countries in Europe are in worse financial shape and continue to deteriorate.
More from Investopedia:
• 7 Currency Blunders You Could Cash In On
• 6 Things You Didn't Know About The U.S. Budget Deficit
• 7 Smart Steps Every New Homeowner Should Take
There are various ways to rank indebtedness, such as debt per capita and deficit or debt as a function of gross domestic product (GDP). This ranking is based on cumulative debt as a percentage of GDP and is limited to an analysis of the 25 largest economies. It is further limited to "external" debt, which is the portion of the national debt that is owed only to foreign creditors. The source for the debt and GDP amounts is the Central Intelligence Agency World Factbook most recent numbers from mid to late 2009.
1. Ireland - Debt/GDP: 997%
The days of Ireland enjoying one of the fastest growing economies in Europe are over, at least for now. The story is all too familiar, as easy credit fueled a housing bubble that burst and damaged consumer confidence.
After recording budget surpluses in the prior two years, the economy reversed course in 2009 and contracted 7%. This eroded tax revenues and sent the annual deficit to a record 14.3% of GDP. The European Union set a target for Ireland to reduce that figure to 3% by 2014, but the International Monetary Fund has indicated that the deadline will be missed. Moody's has subsequently lowered its bond rating.
2. Netherlands - Debt/GDP: 467%
The national debt in the Netherlands has reached record levels as a result of the world financial crisis and recession. Much of the added burden was caused by significant government support for the country's banking sector. The increase in debt per capita is second only to that experienced in Ireland.
The Netherlands joined the eurozone with a hard guilder a decade ago, but its current debt would likely disqualify it for membership.
3. United Kingdom - Debt/GDP: 409%
Investment bank Morgan Stanley fears that Great Britain could face a severe debt crisis in the near future if it continues down its current path. According to the bank's report, this is a case of not putting aside sufficient reserves when the economy was sound. During the peak of the boom, it still ran a budget deficit of 3% of GDP when other European countries were running surpluses exceeding 2%.
Like many other countries, Britain bought time during the financial crisis by implementing massive fiscal stimulus and forcing the public to fund losses in the private sector. Without the restoration of fiscal credibility, there is a significant danger of a government bond sell-off, pound weakness and a flight of capital.
4. Switzerland - Debt/GDP: 273%
Generally regarded as having one of the world's most stable economies, Switzerland has taken its budget crisis seriously. When the national debt began to escalate in the last decade, the Swiss voted to approve a constitutional amendment forcing the government to balance expenses and revenue during each economic cycle. While annual deficits may still occur, this has instilled discipline in the process and lowered the country's borrowing costs as investors rushed to safety.
This so-called "debt brake" was implemented in response to increasing debt stemming from a slowdown in economic growth. Deficits climbed as spending rose for unemployment benefits and tax revenues declined. While government expenditures were cut across the board, rising revenues have not been sufficient to pay down the incurred debt.
5. Portugal - Debt/GDP: 228%
With last year's deficit coming in at 9.4% of GDP, the Portuguese government has instituted a growth and austerity program with the objective of reducing that number to 2.8% by 2013. These measures have sparked strikes in the public sector including postal and transportation services. Those events have been further propelled by unemployment above 10%, the worst in 40 years.
The root problem has been low productivity and virtually no economic growth in the past few years. Portugal ranks last in GDP growth among countries that adopted the euro as a common currency. Demand for goods and services has stalled, along with innovation and business momentum. In addition, Portugal's exports have been undercut by cheap labor in countries such as China. (For related reading, see The Economics Of Labor Mobility.)
6. Austria - Debt/GDP: 214%
The recession and government assistance to banks have contributed to the budget crisis in Austria. The finance minister has rejected the notion of higher taxes in favor of administrative reforms to cut spending. He has predicted that the annual deficit would grow from 3.5% to 4.7% of GDP between 2010 and 2012 before starting to decline. That peak would be the third-highest since 1976 when such data were first recorded.
Rising unemployment has resulted in increased expenditures for unemployment compensation and other government benefits. In addition to the reduced payrolls, tax reforms have driven down overall tax revenues.
The Bottom Line
While the U.S. and Canada have large economies, their respective debt-to-GDP ratios are 93% and 62%. The U.S. gets most of the attention because of the size of the numbers that comprise the ratio - $13.5 trillion debt (June 2009) and $14.4 trillion GDP (2009 estimate).
By comparison, China and India have ratios of 7% and 20% respectively. Their economic growth rates have also exceeded the western nations over the past few years, thereby keeping their debt ratios relatively low. If the western nations don't implement policies to reduce their debts, they run the risk of jeopardizing future economic growth and prosperity.
Email this Page IM this StoryBookmark this StoryAdd to your Del.icio.us accountTuesday, August 17, 2010
Provided by:
The recent financial crisis and recession have been a worldwide occurrence. The events in the United States since 2008 have garnered most of the headlines because the U. S. has the world's largest economy and national debt, but the reality is that many countries in Europe are in worse financial shape and continue to deteriorate.
More from Investopedia:
• 7 Currency Blunders You Could Cash In On
• 6 Things You Didn't Know About The U.S. Budget Deficit
• 7 Smart Steps Every New Homeowner Should Take
There are various ways to rank indebtedness, such as debt per capita and deficit or debt as a function of gross domestic product (GDP). This ranking is based on cumulative debt as a percentage of GDP and is limited to an analysis of the 25 largest economies. It is further limited to "external" debt, which is the portion of the national debt that is owed only to foreign creditors. The source for the debt and GDP amounts is the Central Intelligence Agency World Factbook most recent numbers from mid to late 2009.
1. Ireland - Debt/GDP: 997%
The days of Ireland enjoying one of the fastest growing economies in Europe are over, at least for now. The story is all too familiar, as easy credit fueled a housing bubble that burst and damaged consumer confidence.
After recording budget surpluses in the prior two years, the economy reversed course in 2009 and contracted 7%. This eroded tax revenues and sent the annual deficit to a record 14.3% of GDP. The European Union set a target for Ireland to reduce that figure to 3% by 2014, but the International Monetary Fund has indicated that the deadline will be missed. Moody's has subsequently lowered its bond rating.
2. Netherlands - Debt/GDP: 467%
The national debt in the Netherlands has reached record levels as a result of the world financial crisis and recession. Much of the added burden was caused by significant government support for the country's banking sector. The increase in debt per capita is second only to that experienced in Ireland.
The Netherlands joined the eurozone with a hard guilder a decade ago, but its current debt would likely disqualify it for membership.
3. United Kingdom - Debt/GDP: 409%
Investment bank Morgan Stanley fears that Great Britain could face a severe debt crisis in the near future if it continues down its current path. According to the bank's report, this is a case of not putting aside sufficient reserves when the economy was sound. During the peak of the boom, it still ran a budget deficit of 3% of GDP when other European countries were running surpluses exceeding 2%.
Like many other countries, Britain bought time during the financial crisis by implementing massive fiscal stimulus and forcing the public to fund losses in the private sector. Without the restoration of fiscal credibility, there is a significant danger of a government bond sell-off, pound weakness and a flight of capital.
4. Switzerland - Debt/GDP: 273%
Generally regarded as having one of the world's most stable economies, Switzerland has taken its budget crisis seriously. When the national debt began to escalate in the last decade, the Swiss voted to approve a constitutional amendment forcing the government to balance expenses and revenue during each economic cycle. While annual deficits may still occur, this has instilled discipline in the process and lowered the country's borrowing costs as investors rushed to safety.
This so-called "debt brake" was implemented in response to increasing debt stemming from a slowdown in economic growth. Deficits climbed as spending rose for unemployment benefits and tax revenues declined. While government expenditures were cut across the board, rising revenues have not been sufficient to pay down the incurred debt.
5. Portugal - Debt/GDP: 228%
With last year's deficit coming in at 9.4% of GDP, the Portuguese government has instituted a growth and austerity program with the objective of reducing that number to 2.8% by 2013. These measures have sparked strikes in the public sector including postal and transportation services. Those events have been further propelled by unemployment above 10%, the worst in 40 years.
The root problem has been low productivity and virtually no economic growth in the past few years. Portugal ranks last in GDP growth among countries that adopted the euro as a common currency. Demand for goods and services has stalled, along with innovation and business momentum. In addition, Portugal's exports have been undercut by cheap labor in countries such as China. (For related reading, see The Economics Of Labor Mobility.)
6. Austria - Debt/GDP: 214%
The recession and government assistance to banks have contributed to the budget crisis in Austria. The finance minister has rejected the notion of higher taxes in favor of administrative reforms to cut spending. He has predicted that the annual deficit would grow from 3.5% to 4.7% of GDP between 2010 and 2012 before starting to decline. That peak would be the third-highest since 1976 when such data were first recorded.
Rising unemployment has resulted in increased expenditures for unemployment compensation and other government benefits. In addition to the reduced payrolls, tax reforms have driven down overall tax revenues.
The Bottom Line
While the U.S. and Canada have large economies, their respective debt-to-GDP ratios are 93% and 62%. The U.S. gets most of the attention because of the size of the numbers that comprise the ratio - $13.5 trillion debt (June 2009) and $14.4 trillion GDP (2009 estimate).
By comparison, China and India have ratios of 7% and 20% respectively. Their economic growth rates have also exceeded the western nations over the past few years, thereby keeping their debt ratios relatively low. If the western nations don't implement policies to reduce their debts, they run the risk of jeopardizing future economic growth and prosperity.
Email this Page IM this StoryBookmark this StoryAdd to your Del.icio.us account
by Michael Sanibel, Investopedia.com
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Provided by:
The recent financial crisis and recession have been a worldwide occurrence. The events in the United States since 2008 have garnered most of the headlines because the U. S. has the world's largest economy and national debt, but the reality is that many countries in Europe are in worse financial shape and continue to deteriorate.
More from Investopedia:
• 7 Currency Blunders You Could Cash In On
• 6 Things You Didn't Know About The U.S. Budget Deficit
• 7 Smart Steps Every New Homeowner Should Take
There are various ways to rank indebtedness, such as debt per capita and deficit or debt as a function of gross domestic product (GDP). This ranking is based on cumulative debt as a percentage of GDP and is limited to an analysis of the 25 largest economies. It is further limited to "external" debt, which is the portion of the national debt that is owed only to foreign creditors. The source for the debt and GDP amounts is the Central Intelligence Agency World Factbook most recent numbers from mid to late 2009.
1. Ireland - Debt/GDP: 997%
The days of Ireland enjoying one of the fastest growing economies in Europe are over, at least for now. The story is all too familiar, as easy credit fueled a housing bubble that burst and damaged consumer confidence.
After recording budget surpluses in the prior two years, the economy reversed course in 2009 and contracted 7%. This eroded tax revenues and sent the annual deficit to a record 14.3% of GDP. The European Union set a target for Ireland to reduce that figure to 3% by 2014, but the International Monetary Fund has indicated that the deadline will be missed. Moody's has subsequently lowered its bond rating.
2. Netherlands - Debt/GDP: 467%
The national debt in the Netherlands has reached record levels as a result of the world financial crisis and recession. Much of the added burden was caused by significant government support for the country's banking sector. The increase in debt per capita is second only to that experienced in Ireland.
The Netherlands joined the eurozone with a hard guilder a decade ago, but its current debt would likely disqualify it for membership.
3. United Kingdom - Debt/GDP: 409%
Investment bank Morgan Stanley fears that Great Britain could face a severe debt crisis in the near future if it continues down its current path. According to the bank's report, this is a case of not putting aside sufficient reserves when the economy was sound. During the peak of the boom, it still ran a budget deficit of 3% of GDP when other European countries were running surpluses exceeding 2%.
Like many other countries, Britain bought time during the financial crisis by implementing massive fiscal stimulus and forcing the public to fund losses in the private sector. Without the restoration of fiscal credibility, there is a significant danger of a government bond sell-off, pound weakness and a flight of capital.
4. Switzerland - Debt/GDP: 273%
Generally regarded as having one of the world's most stable economies, Switzerland has taken its budget crisis seriously. When the national debt began to escalate in the last decade, the Swiss voted to approve a constitutional amendment forcing the government to balance expenses and revenue during each economic cycle. While annual deficits may still occur, this has instilled discipline in the process and lowered the country's borrowing costs as investors rushed to safety.
This so-called "debt brake" was implemented in response to increasing debt stemming from a slowdown in economic growth. Deficits climbed as spending rose for unemployment benefits and tax revenues declined. While government expenditures were cut across the board, rising revenues have not been sufficient to pay down the incurred debt.
5. Portugal - Debt/GDP: 228%
With last year's deficit coming in at 9.4% of GDP, the Portuguese government has instituted a growth and austerity program with the objective of reducing that number to 2.8% by 2013. These measures have sparked strikes in the public sector including postal and transportation services. Those events have been further propelled by unemployment above 10%, the worst in 40 years.
The root problem has been low productivity and virtually no economic growth in the past few years. Portugal ranks last in GDP growth among countries that adopted the euro as a common currency. Demand for goods and services has stalled, along with innovation and business momentum. In addition, Portugal's exports have been undercut by cheap labor in countries such as China. (For related reading, see The Economics Of Labor Mobility.)
6. Austria - Debt/GDP: 214%
The recession and government assistance to banks have contributed to the budget crisis in Austria. The finance minister has rejected the notion of higher taxes in favor of administrative reforms to cut spending. He has predicted that the annual deficit would grow from 3.5% to 4.7% of GDP between 2010 and 2012 before starting to decline. That peak would be the third-highest since 1976 when such data were first recorded.
Rising unemployment has resulted in increased expenditures for unemployment compensation and other government benefits. In addition to the reduced payrolls, tax reforms have driven down overall tax revenues.
The Bottom Line
While the U.S. and Canada have large economies, their respective debt-to-GDP ratios are 93% and 62%. The U.S. gets most of the attention because of the size of the numbers that comprise the ratio - $13.5 trillion debt (June 2009) and $14.4 trillion GDP (2009 estimate).
By comparison, China and India have ratios of 7% and 20% respectively. Their economic growth rates have also exceeded the western nations over the past few years, thereby keeping their debt ratios relatively low. If the western nations don't implement policies to reduce their debts, they run the risk of jeopardizing future economic growth and prosperity.
Email this Page IM this StoryBookmark this StoryAdd to your Del.icio.us accountTuesday, August 17, 2010
Provided by:
The recent financial crisis and recession have been a worldwide occurrence. The events in the United States since 2008 have garnered most of the headlines because the U. S. has the world's largest economy and national debt, but the reality is that many countries in Europe are in worse financial shape and continue to deteriorate.
More from Investopedia:
• 7 Currency Blunders You Could Cash In On
• 6 Things You Didn't Know About The U.S. Budget Deficit
• 7 Smart Steps Every New Homeowner Should Take
There are various ways to rank indebtedness, such as debt per capita and deficit or debt as a function of gross domestic product (GDP). This ranking is based on cumulative debt as a percentage of GDP and is limited to an analysis of the 25 largest economies. It is further limited to "external" debt, which is the portion of the national debt that is owed only to foreign creditors. The source for the debt and GDP amounts is the Central Intelligence Agency World Factbook most recent numbers from mid to late 2009.
1. Ireland - Debt/GDP: 997%
The days of Ireland enjoying one of the fastest growing economies in Europe are over, at least for now. The story is all too familiar, as easy credit fueled a housing bubble that burst and damaged consumer confidence.
After recording budget surpluses in the prior two years, the economy reversed course in 2009 and contracted 7%. This eroded tax revenues and sent the annual deficit to a record 14.3% of GDP. The European Union set a target for Ireland to reduce that figure to 3% by 2014, but the International Monetary Fund has indicated that the deadline will be missed. Moody's has subsequently lowered its bond rating.
2. Netherlands - Debt/GDP: 467%
The national debt in the Netherlands has reached record levels as a result of the world financial crisis and recession. Much of the added burden was caused by significant government support for the country's banking sector. The increase in debt per capita is second only to that experienced in Ireland.
The Netherlands joined the eurozone with a hard guilder a decade ago, but its current debt would likely disqualify it for membership.
3. United Kingdom - Debt/GDP: 409%
Investment bank Morgan Stanley fears that Great Britain could face a severe debt crisis in the near future if it continues down its current path. According to the bank's report, this is a case of not putting aside sufficient reserves when the economy was sound. During the peak of the boom, it still ran a budget deficit of 3% of GDP when other European countries were running surpluses exceeding 2%.
Like many other countries, Britain bought time during the financial crisis by implementing massive fiscal stimulus and forcing the public to fund losses in the private sector. Without the restoration of fiscal credibility, there is a significant danger of a government bond sell-off, pound weakness and a flight of capital.
4. Switzerland - Debt/GDP: 273%
Generally regarded as having one of the world's most stable economies, Switzerland has taken its budget crisis seriously. When the national debt began to escalate in the last decade, the Swiss voted to approve a constitutional amendment forcing the government to balance expenses and revenue during each economic cycle. While annual deficits may still occur, this has instilled discipline in the process and lowered the country's borrowing costs as investors rushed to safety.
This so-called "debt brake" was implemented in response to increasing debt stemming from a slowdown in economic growth. Deficits climbed as spending rose for unemployment benefits and tax revenues declined. While government expenditures were cut across the board, rising revenues have not been sufficient to pay down the incurred debt.
5. Portugal - Debt/GDP: 228%
With last year's deficit coming in at 9.4% of GDP, the Portuguese government has instituted a growth and austerity program with the objective of reducing that number to 2.8% by 2013. These measures have sparked strikes in the public sector including postal and transportation services. Those events have been further propelled by unemployment above 10%, the worst in 40 years.
The root problem has been low productivity and virtually no economic growth in the past few years. Portugal ranks last in GDP growth among countries that adopted the euro as a common currency. Demand for goods and services has stalled, along with innovation and business momentum. In addition, Portugal's exports have been undercut by cheap labor in countries such as China. (For related reading, see The Economics Of Labor Mobility.)
6. Austria - Debt/GDP: 214%
The recession and government assistance to banks have contributed to the budget crisis in Austria. The finance minister has rejected the notion of higher taxes in favor of administrative reforms to cut spending. He has predicted that the annual deficit would grow from 3.5% to 4.7% of GDP between 2010 and 2012 before starting to decline. That peak would be the third-highest since 1976 when such data were first recorded.
Rising unemployment has resulted in increased expenditures for unemployment compensation and other government benefits. In addition to the reduced payrolls, tax reforms have driven down overall tax revenues.
The Bottom Line
While the U.S. and Canada have large economies, their respective debt-to-GDP ratios are 93% and 62%. The U.S. gets most of the attention because of the size of the numbers that comprise the ratio - $13.5 trillion debt (June 2009) and $14.4 trillion GDP (2009 estimate).
By comparison, China and India have ratios of 7% and 20% respectively. Their economic growth rates have also exceeded the western nations over the past few years, thereby keeping their debt ratios relatively low. If the western nations don't implement policies to reduce their debts, they run the risk of jeopardizing future economic growth and prosperity.
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Saturday, May 08, 2010
Good and Bad Bargains: Modern Day Narcissistic Capitalism, The Free Trade Agreement, Globalization, and Schisms Both in The Individual Personality and In The Socio-Economic-Political National and International Order
Freshly modified...and just finished...May 9th, 2010...
'The difference between a 'good Capitalist' and a 'bad Capitalist' is the difference between a person who cares about people and one who doesn't. The same goes for the difference between a 'good' and 'bad' Socialist. In this regard, the good Capitalist and the good Socialist have more in common than the good and bad Capitalist or the good and bad Socialist. I will trumpet the work, efforts, and ideals of good Capitalists AND good Socialists, while I will rhetorically seek to destroy the work and efforts of both 'narcissistic Capitalists' and 'narcissistic Socialists' alike. The worst narcissistic Capitalists in the world have more in common with Lenin, Stalin, and Mao Tse Tung -- and visa versa, than they do with anything Adam Smith or Ayn Rand wrote...' -- dgb, May 8th, 2010.
Introduction
This essay is probably my most definitive work so far on what I mean by 'good' and 'bad' Capitalism or between 'ethical' ('good will') Capitalism and 'narcissistic' ('bad will') Capitalism.
I look at this essay as hopefully being the tip of the iceberg in terms of what is coming down the chute in this realm of politics, business and economics. My passion -- largely from recent personal business traumacies -- reigns supreme here.
I both live and die for both the 'good owner' and the 'good employee'....I hate 'bad deals' between sellers and buyers and/or between employers and employees, producers and consumers...
I am always looking for that magic, highly elusive point of 'win-win, humanistic-existential, homeostatic balance'...
To the extent that I can promote 'good harmonious relations' between governments at all levels and corporations, employers and employees, sellers and buyers -- without anyone getting 'ripped off', exploiting and/or being exploited, and/or 'colluding' in the process -- that is the extent to which I may one day be able to rest in greater peace that my mission here in Hegel's Hotel is largely coming to an end...
Until then, and at this point in time, I am both crying and raging about what I see inside the mainly 'pathological' corporations I come into contact with in my working day...It is a pleasure when I hear about owners who run good, fair corporations and who treat their employees like humans, even like family, as opposed to 'things' that are there to be 'exploited'....
In Hegel's Hotel, Adam Smith and Karl Marx shake hands...as do Erich Fromm and Ayn Rand...
With yours truly continuing to play the Central Mediator...
Marx was the first protector of human rights in the work place, especially in his early work -- Marx was the first 'union steward'; whereas Adam Smith always had concerns about keeping the 'ethics' in businessmen and business transactions...
Have a seat...mediation is now in process...
Until we can find that ideal -- and always changing -- point of 'dialectic-democratic, humanistic-existential, narcissistic-altruistic, homeostatic balance...'
We haven't gotten there yet...indeed we have a very long road still to travel...a lot of floors still to build...
But the economy is starting to get better...
And the workers are back and building Hegel's Hotel again...
Pounding their hammers and nails again...
Ah, the sweetest of sounds...
Coming out of a bad economy, there is no sweeter sound and sight,
Than the sound and sight of workers building...
Hegel's Hotel carries the spirit of Ayn Rand's 'The Fountainhead'...
Just as much as it carries Hegel's 'Phenomenology of Spirit'...
And Fromm's spirit of 'Man For Himself' and 'The Sane Society'...
They all come together in the lobby and the negotiating rooms and the cocktail lounges of Hegel's Hotel...
-- dgb, May 8th, 2010.
..............................................................................................
As I have discussed in previous essays, the personality can be viewed from a host of different perspectives -- both wholistically and/or reductionistically using a variety of different theories and/or models of the personality.
Personally, I like to view the personality as being run like a partly authoritarian, partly democratic, government or corporation, with a distinction that can be made between the main Central Ego in the personality, which can be viewed as being like the CEO or President of a company or a country, surrounded by a host of partly competing, partly co-operating, auxiliary, 'lobbyist' and/or 'partisan' ego-states, that are like the partisan political parties and/or members of a government working in parliament, and/or like the 'special interest lobbyist groups' that solicit the government out in the hallways, in the front rooms, the back rooms, over the phone, in back alleys, with brief cases, in whatever style or manner seems to work most effectively in terms of getting what they want...legitimately or illegitimately...
Personally, in government, I think we should pull all the different lobbyists into Parliament -- call it a 'lobbyist session' -- and let each and everyone of them have their say with mikes and cameras on, give each of them 20 or 30 minutes in front of a mike to make their presentation and argue their case -- and wow, what do we have -- 'democratic transparency' -- the quality that every campaigning politician talks about on the campaign trail -- along with ethics, integrity, and accountability -- that is, until they get into office and grow increasingly quiet on these matters...when push comes to shove, deciding that they would prefer to have their 'expense accounts' and 'agenda books' remain 'private' -- and holding hands in one big circle with their fellow politicians in establishing a 'secret, unwritten collusion' on this matter. Very much like Freud's inner circle in this type of matter.
The unwritten code seems to run something like this:
'We shalt not give away our secret, narcissistic expense benefits that come with minding the country's cash register and bank account. The public doesn't need to know where I had lunch the other day and how much I spent. As long as it makes its way through the government expense account department -- which of course is made up of people who are enjoying the same expense benefits that I enjoy. We, in the government, call this a 'win-win situation' The public doesn't need to know everything'.
I am partly getting side-tracked here but partly not because the similarities between how we run our internal personality and how we run our external government are similar, and indeed, connected -- our external relationships projecting and reflecting our internal relationships between our different ego-states and our general personality dynamics.
In this regard, The Central Ego can also be viewed as being like a Supreme Court Judge and/or Mediator in the personality, ideally in charge of the rest of the courtroom/personality, but in less than ideal circumstances, being over run by politicians from above and/or by 'special interest lobbyist groups' running amok in the courtroom/personality and 'having their way' with a 'weak' Central Ego. When the Central Ego is not fully in control of the personality, and running a 'balanced courtroom', then either 'over-restraint' and/or 'over-impulse' (bi-polar disorder, manic-depression...) is likely to create pathology and disorder in the personality.
In an ideal political-socio-economic and legal world as well as in an ideal intra-psychic personality, each lobbyist and politician, like each auxillary ego-state would simply assert democratically and rhetorically what it wants... and leave the final decision in the workings and executive action of the Central Ego, The President, and/or The CEO..(as well as there being full public disclosure, transparency, integrity, and accountability in the case of politicians holding a public office.
But alas, as most of us are well aware, we live in a far from 'ideal' world.
In our 'real world', one-sided righteousness, narcissism and greed as well as conflict of interest situations evolving between public office holders' public responsibilities and private, personal interests become almost inevitable over time...and the temptation of the devil...indeed, with all of us, not just politicians...The corporate world is overflowing with 'conflict of interest' situations that impair socio-economic as well as ethical, legal, and political judgment...
Let's face it...Everyone wants what they want...and in all aspects of our world righteousness and narcissism intermingle...Oftentimes, righteousness is the cloak that hides inner narcissism and/or the pseudo-justification for inner narcissism....
Power and narcissism has the potential to corrupt all levels of inner and outer government...
We see this -- or at least I do -- over and over and over again in our entire interconnected socio-economic-political-legal-corporate-personal world...
Schopenhauer stirs in his grave...with an arrogant 'I told you so'...
The type of Capitalism I see all around me is not the same type of Capitalism that I remember reading about in Ayn Rand's 'The Fountainhead'.
Without being a 'Marxist', a 'Socialist' and/or a 'Communist', I can still tell you that Hegel's classic analysis of 'labour' in connection with his discussion of the 'the master/slave relationship', jumped on by Marx in his searing indictment of narcissistic Capitalism, comes much closer in awareness and insight as far as getting to the heart of what is the matter with modern day Capitalism.
Modern day Capitalism lacks integrity, ethics, character, transparency, accountability, and a sense of good will towards the person one is bargaining with...all of the things politicians keep saying they are going to fix...and rarely ever do...
Adam Smith would most certainly frown on modern day Capitalism if he could see the full extent of the type of corporate-political greed and narcissism that I see around me each and every day. He would say something like 'This is not the type of Capitalism I envisioned when I wrote 'The Wealth of Nations'...
................................................................................................................
From the internet...'Brainy Quote'...University of Liverpool...
No society can surely be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable.
Adam Smith
No complaint... is more common than that of a scarcity of money.
Adam Smith
Little else is requisite to carry a state to the highest degree of opulence from the lowest barbarism but peace, easy taxes, and a tolerable administration of justice: all the rest being brought about by the natural course of things.
Adam Smith
Man is an animal that makes bargains: no other animal does this - no dog exchanges bones with another.
Adam Smith
..................................................................................................................
I find Adam's most intriguing quote to be the last one cited above...
It is at this point -- the point of 'bargaining' -- that Adam Smith's philosophy starts to dialectically collide with the philosophy of Hegel and Marx...
Hegel was no Marxist but it was from Hegel's work on 'labour' and the 'master/slave relationship' that Marx was inspired to write his thousands of pages critiquing the pathological evolution of Capitalism...
You see, it makes all the difference in the world as to what type of Capitalist Leaders we have in order to determine whether we have a 'good or bad Capitalist System' or not.
Just as the character of a hockey or basketball or baseball team tends to take on much of the character of its coach, so it is with 'Capitalism' as Capitalism is played out in each and every corporation and in each and every corporate transaction, both internally and externally.
It makes all the difference in the world as to the ultimate evolution of Capitalism as to whether a person -- particularly the owner of a business -- is negotiating 'narcissistically' and only narcissistically, or whether he or she is negotiating narcissistically and altruistically at the same time.
Put another way, is the bargainer looking for an 'I win; you lose' bargain, or is he or she looking for an 'I win; you win' bargain.
The last type of 'win-win bargaining encounter' tends to be much more endearing and enduring to a long term negotiating relationship whereas the first type of 'win-lose encounter' tends to tarnish if not outright annihilate all future negotiating transactions...
However, here is where Marx steps in and starts to launch his anti-Capitalist tirade...
If the power of the owner (in Marx's language, the 'bourgeoisie') is far greater than the power of the individual employee (the 'proletariat' in Marx's language), and you have a narcissistic, unscrupulous, greedy owner, then 'bad employee bargains' can become the name of the game, the rule of thumb, unless and/or until the individual employees either leave or take a 'collective confrontational stance' against the 'bargains' of the unscrupulous owner. At this point in the evolution of Capitalism, we have the beginning of 'strikes' and 'unions'...and changes in the 'corporate power balance' -- both good and bad.
Short of this, the only other power that an individual employee has is to 'leave' if he is being essentially 'forced to either take or leave a bad bargain'. In a good economy, and even in a bad one, one of the 'surest signs of a bad corporation with bad, unscrupulous leaders' is 'constant employee turnover'.
Now if you have a bad economy with high unemployment levels and/or high immigration levels intermixing with a bad economy, then what is going to happen? Advantage: unscrupulous owner...who is going to take advantage of a 'desperate work force' in order to lower wages and/or instigate other 'bad employee bargains'... If one prospective and/or current employee doesn't take the 'bad bargain' that an 'unscrupulous owner' has laid on the table, the next one coming in for the next interview -- will. Unless as an employee, you have a 'special skill', you have essentially no negotiating power in such a circumstance.
One would hazard a pretty safe guess that most unscrupulous business owners would 'welcome with open arms' a larger unemployed workforce, higher immigration levels, importing 'cheaper labor', and 'exporting jobs to countries with cheaper labor' -- all in the name of the almighty Unscrupulous, Narcissistic Capitalist Ideal -- specifically 'Profit Margin'. There is an imperative distinction that needs to be made relative to the practice of 'Good' or 'Bad' Capitalism relative to a 'fair but healthy profit margin' vs. an 'unscrupulous, gouging profit margin'....
Which is why the Government -- any Democratic Government with Integrity, Character, Ethics, and Accountability in mind -- needs to step in and regulate 'profit margins'. To prevent or at least discourage 'consumer price gouging' as well as 'employee intimidation, coercing, manipulating, extorting...etc.'
Back in the late 1980s (1988 to be exact), not too many people -- at least private citizens, including me -- knew whether 'free trade' was going to be a 'good thing' or a 'bad thing'. All many of us knew is that it 'sounded good' -- probably because it had the word 'free' in it...
Now looking back at things, 22 years later, perhaps we can come to some more definitive, experientially based conclusions: specifically, 'free trade' is not going to be a 'good thing' for countries with 'higher labor wages' -- at least in terms of the workers who are used to getting these higher labor wages.
Again, from an 'unscrupulous employer's point of view -- and even from the point of view of business owners with 'good integrity and intentions towards their workers' but who may be getting slammed by 'merciless unions' -- say goodbye to 'manufacturing plants' and 'service industries' in Canada and America as corporations move their operations to 'third world countries' in order to take advantage of 'lower (to practically non-existent) employee wages'.
In short, the 'free trade agreement' put together by Brian Mulroney in 1988 (in conjunction with Bush from the American side), would increase the economic and corporate speed of 'globalization', and the overall improvement of 'third world economic countries' at the expense of North American jobs in the manufacturing and 'goods and service' industry. Mulroney and Bush obviously did not either foresee and/or want to advertise the 'negative side effects' of the free trade agreement...
..............................................................................................................................................
From the internet...see free trade, George Bush...
George W. Bush on Free Trade
President of the United States, Former Republican Governor (TX)
Sub-sections under Free Trade:
NAFTA + WTO
Other issues under Free Trade
Linked trade agreements to participation in Iraq War
Examples of using economic diplomacy for the common good have been overshadowed in recent years by the priorities set under the influence of the Bush pre-emptive war doctrine. Entering the war in Iraq based on erroneous information, has forced us to go shopping around the world for friends, armed with carrots and with sticks. In order to pull together what was called a willing coalition, they went to the poorest developing countries and said, 'If you can't send a soldier, send a policeman." And, "If yo don't have the money, can we give you some?"
Deals were made. Once in a small country I joined the US ambassador for a meeting. The US ambassador made it clear to this president that if he withdrew the handful of soldiers he had sent to Iraq, it would be very difficult for him to get a trade agreement with the US. I was shocked and clarified that I was opposed to the war and as far as I was concerned the deal for the trade agreement had nothing to do with his willingness to send troops.
Source: A Bad Day Since, by Charles Rangel, p. 168 Aug 5, 2008
Open more markets to keep America competitive
Keeping America competitive requires us to open more markets for all that Americans make and grow. One out of every five factory jobs in America is related to global trade, and we want people everywhere to buy American. With open markets and a level playing field, no one can outproduce or outcompete the American worker.
Source: 2006 State of the Union Address Jan 31, 2006
Fact Check: Free trade tempered by steel protectionism
FACTCHECK on Trade: In speaking of benefits of international trade, the President failed to mention his own steps to protect the politically important US steel industry.
BUSH: My Administration is promoting free and fair trade, to open up new markets for America ‘s entrepreneurs, and manufacturers, and farmers, and to create jobs for America ‘s workers.
FACTCHECK: Not mentioned: Bush’s imposition of tariffs on imported steel, which pleased US labor unions and steel executives but which were found to violate World Trade Organization rules. Bush lifted the steel tariffs Dec. 4 after trading partners threatened retaliation against US exports.
Source: FactCheck.org on the 2004 State of the Union address Jan 20, 2004
Tariffs over free trade, for steel industry
On March 5, 2002, the President announced he would impose tariffs of up to 30% on imported steel in an effort to shore up the long-declining industry. Steel executives praised the President and said that the tariffs might save jobs. Free trade advocates wondered how other countries would respond and what the effect would be on the cost of a wide array of goods.
Source: The Price of Loyalty, by Ron Suskind, p.238 Jan 13, 2004
Repeals steel tariffs he imposed in 2002
The Bush administration has decided to repeal most of its 20-month-old tariffs on imported steel to head off a trade war. European countries and Japan had vowed to respond to the tariffs, which were ruled illegal by the WTO, by imposing sanctions on up to $2.2 billion in exports from the US, beginning as soon as Dec. 15.
Bush advisers said they were aware the reversal could produce a backlash against him in several steel-producing states of the Rust Belt-including PA, WV, & OH. That arc of states has been hit severely by losses in manufacturing jobs and will be among the most closely contested in his reelection race.
Bush decided in March 2002 to impose tariffs of 8% to 30% on most steel imports from abroad for three years. The decision was heavily influenced by the desire to help the Rust Belt states, but the departure from Bush’s free-trade principles drew fierce criticism from his conservative supporters. After a blast of international opposition, the administration began approving exemptions.
Source: Mike Allen, Washington Post, p. A1 Dec 1, 2003
Don’t link trade to environment and labor
Free trade is a subject on which both candidates appear to start from the same position, commitment to free trade. From that point, their positions swiftly diverge. Bush would:
supports restoration of “fast-track” negotiating authority for the president
opposes linking trade agreements to labor and environmental issues
supports the expansion of NAFTA throughout the Americas
supports the admission of China and Taiwan to the WTO
wants strict enforcement of anti-dumping and other laws against “unfair” trade
intends to revise export controls to tighten control over military technology and ease restrictions on commercial technology
wants to make international financial institutions more accountable and transparent
strongly supports free trade, saying that the case for it is “not just monetary but moral” and pledging to make the expansion of trade a consistent priority“
Source: The Economist, “Issues 2000” Sep 30, 2000
Sow free trade and farmers will reap
Q: What will you do as president to help farmers get sufficient pay for their work?
A: I would be a free trading president, a president that will work tirelessly to open up markets for agricultural products all over the world. I believe our American farmers. can compete so long as the playing field is level. That’s why I am such a strong advocate of free trade and that’s why I reject protectionism and isolation because I think it hurts our American farmers.
Source: Republican debate in West Columbia, South Carolina Jan 7, 2000
A free market promotes dreams and individuality
[After visiting China], I’ll never forget the contrast between what I learned about the free market at Harvard and what I saw in the closed isolation of China. Every bicycle looked the same. People’s clothes were all the same. a free market frees individuals to make distinct choices and independent decisions. The market gives individuals the opportunity to demand and decide, and entrepreneurs the opportunity to provide.
Source: “A Charge to Keep”, p. 61. Dec 9, 1999
Import fees are not the answer to foreign competition
In 1999, when a glut of foreign oil drove prices below $12 a barrel, many of my friends in the oil business wanted the government to rescue them through price supports. . . I understand the frustration of people. but I do not support import fees. . . I believe it makes sense to use the tax code to encourage activities that benefit America. But I do not want to put up fees or tariffs or roadblocks to trade.
Source: “A Charge to Keep”, p. 65-66. Dec 9, 1999
The fearful build walls; the confident demolish them.
I’ll work to end tariffs and break down barriers everywhere, entirely, so the whole world trades in freedom. The fearful build walls. The confident demolish them. I am confident in American workers and farmers and producers. And I am confident that America’s best is the best in the world.
Source: Candidacy Announcement speech, Cedar Rapids, Iowa Jun 12, 1999
Click here for 13 older quotations from George W. Bush on Free Trade.
Click here for definitions & background information on Free Trade.
Click here for policy papers on Free Trade.
Click here for a profile of George W. Bush.
Click here for VoteMatch responses by George W. Bush.
Agree? Disagree? Voice your opinions on Free Trade or about George W. Bush in The Forum.
....................................................................
dgb...continued...
In contrast to 'unscrupulous, narcissistic business owners' who tend to follow the 'God of The Highest Profit Margin' and will exploit workers and customers to get there, 'ethical, win-win business owners' tend to look for that magic point of 'dialectic-homeostatic balance, fairness, unity, and harmony'...that stabilizes their business...
'Good Social Will' business owners may not get the highest profit margins in the short run but, over the long haul, Good Social Will' business owners tend to create the best businesses -- as long as they protect a 'healthy profit margin' -- because they are not constantly self-destructing on the basis of employee resentment, rebellion, anarchy, and the 'bad reputation' that the 'self-indulgent business owner's corporation will quickly or slowly establish in the work community both amongst prospective workers and prospective customers. The last thing an employer -- good or bad -- wants to hear is, 'Well, who's working for your company this week?' That is generally not a 'healthy sign' for the corporation.
Health in the personality, in the body, and in the corporation are all built upon the same principle: the principle of 'good self and social will' which in turn is based on the principle of 'dialectic-homeostatic balance'.
In the body, in the personality, and in our socio-economic world, we should all be looking for 'win-win solutions' with no serious 'negative side effects'.
Narcissistic people tend to foster 'a negative social willpower against them' -- they continue to chase 'short term profit gain' without caring one iota about the extent of the 'social pain they leave behind them' in their dust...
If their employees or their customers will eat 'dog food' disguised as 'health food'....the narcissistic owner doesn't think twice....because he or she serves 'The God of Profit Margins'....
Personally, I love to see such corporations run by unscrupulous business owners eventually crumble in the dust...or fold like a house of cards...
When such a business folds like a house of cards...
It reflects the personality, character, and integrity of the person who ran the company into the ground...
Adam Smith would say that this is the 'Free Market' work of 'The Invisible Hand'...
That is, until our North American Governments -- both in America and in Canada -- let these corporate parasites...
Escape their corporate ruins...
With Golden Bailouts and Parachutes...
Then even Adam Smith is crying...
-- dgb, May 8th, 2010.
-- David Gordon Bain,
-- Dialectic-Democratic, Ethical-Good Will-Capitalism, Negotiations...
-- Are Still in Process...
-- Democracy Goes Beyond Narcissism...
'The difference between a 'good Capitalist' and a 'bad Capitalist' is the difference between a person who cares about people and one who doesn't. The same goes for the difference between a 'good' and 'bad' Socialist. In this regard, the good Capitalist and the good Socialist have more in common than the good and bad Capitalist or the good and bad Socialist. I will trumpet the work, efforts, and ideals of good Capitalists AND good Socialists, while I will rhetorically seek to destroy the work and efforts of both 'narcissistic Capitalists' and 'narcissistic Socialists' alike. The worst narcissistic Capitalists in the world have more in common with Lenin, Stalin, and Mao Tse Tung -- and visa versa, than they do with anything Adam Smith or Ayn Rand wrote...' -- dgb, May 8th, 2010.
Introduction
This essay is probably my most definitive work so far on what I mean by 'good' and 'bad' Capitalism or between 'ethical' ('good will') Capitalism and 'narcissistic' ('bad will') Capitalism.
I look at this essay as hopefully being the tip of the iceberg in terms of what is coming down the chute in this realm of politics, business and economics. My passion -- largely from recent personal business traumacies -- reigns supreme here.
I both live and die for both the 'good owner' and the 'good employee'....I hate 'bad deals' between sellers and buyers and/or between employers and employees, producers and consumers...
I am always looking for that magic, highly elusive point of 'win-win, humanistic-existential, homeostatic balance'...
To the extent that I can promote 'good harmonious relations' between governments at all levels and corporations, employers and employees, sellers and buyers -- without anyone getting 'ripped off', exploiting and/or being exploited, and/or 'colluding' in the process -- that is the extent to which I may one day be able to rest in greater peace that my mission here in Hegel's Hotel is largely coming to an end...
Until then, and at this point in time, I am both crying and raging about what I see inside the mainly 'pathological' corporations I come into contact with in my working day...It is a pleasure when I hear about owners who run good, fair corporations and who treat their employees like humans, even like family, as opposed to 'things' that are there to be 'exploited'....
In Hegel's Hotel, Adam Smith and Karl Marx shake hands...as do Erich Fromm and Ayn Rand...
With yours truly continuing to play the Central Mediator...
Marx was the first protector of human rights in the work place, especially in his early work -- Marx was the first 'union steward'; whereas Adam Smith always had concerns about keeping the 'ethics' in businessmen and business transactions...
Have a seat...mediation is now in process...
Until we can find that ideal -- and always changing -- point of 'dialectic-democratic, humanistic-existential, narcissistic-altruistic, homeostatic balance...'
We haven't gotten there yet...indeed we have a very long road still to travel...a lot of floors still to build...
But the economy is starting to get better...
And the workers are back and building Hegel's Hotel again...
Pounding their hammers and nails again...
Ah, the sweetest of sounds...
Coming out of a bad economy, there is no sweeter sound and sight,
Than the sound and sight of workers building...
Hegel's Hotel carries the spirit of Ayn Rand's 'The Fountainhead'...
Just as much as it carries Hegel's 'Phenomenology of Spirit'...
And Fromm's spirit of 'Man For Himself' and 'The Sane Society'...
They all come together in the lobby and the negotiating rooms and the cocktail lounges of Hegel's Hotel...
-- dgb, May 8th, 2010.
..............................................................................................
As I have discussed in previous essays, the personality can be viewed from a host of different perspectives -- both wholistically and/or reductionistically using a variety of different theories and/or models of the personality.
Personally, I like to view the personality as being run like a partly authoritarian, partly democratic, government or corporation, with a distinction that can be made between the main Central Ego in the personality, which can be viewed as being like the CEO or President of a company or a country, surrounded by a host of partly competing, partly co-operating, auxiliary, 'lobbyist' and/or 'partisan' ego-states, that are like the partisan political parties and/or members of a government working in parliament, and/or like the 'special interest lobbyist groups' that solicit the government out in the hallways, in the front rooms, the back rooms, over the phone, in back alleys, with brief cases, in whatever style or manner seems to work most effectively in terms of getting what they want...legitimately or illegitimately...
Personally, in government, I think we should pull all the different lobbyists into Parliament -- call it a 'lobbyist session' -- and let each and everyone of them have their say with mikes and cameras on, give each of them 20 or 30 minutes in front of a mike to make their presentation and argue their case -- and wow, what do we have -- 'democratic transparency' -- the quality that every campaigning politician talks about on the campaign trail -- along with ethics, integrity, and accountability -- that is, until they get into office and grow increasingly quiet on these matters...when push comes to shove, deciding that they would prefer to have their 'expense accounts' and 'agenda books' remain 'private' -- and holding hands in one big circle with their fellow politicians in establishing a 'secret, unwritten collusion' on this matter. Very much like Freud's inner circle in this type of matter.
The unwritten code seems to run something like this:
'We shalt not give away our secret, narcissistic expense benefits that come with minding the country's cash register and bank account. The public doesn't need to know where I had lunch the other day and how much I spent. As long as it makes its way through the government expense account department -- which of course is made up of people who are enjoying the same expense benefits that I enjoy. We, in the government, call this a 'win-win situation' The public doesn't need to know everything'.
I am partly getting side-tracked here but partly not because the similarities between how we run our internal personality and how we run our external government are similar, and indeed, connected -- our external relationships projecting and reflecting our internal relationships between our different ego-states and our general personality dynamics.
In this regard, The Central Ego can also be viewed as being like a Supreme Court Judge and/or Mediator in the personality, ideally in charge of the rest of the courtroom/personality, but in less than ideal circumstances, being over run by politicians from above and/or by 'special interest lobbyist groups' running amok in the courtroom/personality and 'having their way' with a 'weak' Central Ego. When the Central Ego is not fully in control of the personality, and running a 'balanced courtroom', then either 'over-restraint' and/or 'over-impulse' (bi-polar disorder, manic-depression...) is likely to create pathology and disorder in the personality.
In an ideal political-socio-economic and legal world as well as in an ideal intra-psychic personality, each lobbyist and politician, like each auxillary ego-state would simply assert democratically and rhetorically what it wants... and leave the final decision in the workings and executive action of the Central Ego, The President, and/or The CEO..(as well as there being full public disclosure, transparency, integrity, and accountability in the case of politicians holding a public office.
But alas, as most of us are well aware, we live in a far from 'ideal' world.
In our 'real world', one-sided righteousness, narcissism and greed as well as conflict of interest situations evolving between public office holders' public responsibilities and private, personal interests become almost inevitable over time...and the temptation of the devil...indeed, with all of us, not just politicians...The corporate world is overflowing with 'conflict of interest' situations that impair socio-economic as well as ethical, legal, and political judgment...
Let's face it...Everyone wants what they want...and in all aspects of our world righteousness and narcissism intermingle...Oftentimes, righteousness is the cloak that hides inner narcissism and/or the pseudo-justification for inner narcissism....
Power and narcissism has the potential to corrupt all levels of inner and outer government...
We see this -- or at least I do -- over and over and over again in our entire interconnected socio-economic-political-legal-corporate-personal world...
Schopenhauer stirs in his grave...with an arrogant 'I told you so'...
The type of Capitalism I see all around me is not the same type of Capitalism that I remember reading about in Ayn Rand's 'The Fountainhead'.
Without being a 'Marxist', a 'Socialist' and/or a 'Communist', I can still tell you that Hegel's classic analysis of 'labour' in connection with his discussion of the 'the master/slave relationship', jumped on by Marx in his searing indictment of narcissistic Capitalism, comes much closer in awareness and insight as far as getting to the heart of what is the matter with modern day Capitalism.
Modern day Capitalism lacks integrity, ethics, character, transparency, accountability, and a sense of good will towards the person one is bargaining with...all of the things politicians keep saying they are going to fix...and rarely ever do...
Adam Smith would most certainly frown on modern day Capitalism if he could see the full extent of the type of corporate-political greed and narcissism that I see around me each and every day. He would say something like 'This is not the type of Capitalism I envisioned when I wrote 'The Wealth of Nations'...
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From the internet...'Brainy Quote'...University of Liverpool...
No society can surely be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable.
Adam Smith
No complaint... is more common than that of a scarcity of money.
Adam Smith
Little else is requisite to carry a state to the highest degree of opulence from the lowest barbarism but peace, easy taxes, and a tolerable administration of justice: all the rest being brought about by the natural course of things.
Adam Smith
Man is an animal that makes bargains: no other animal does this - no dog exchanges bones with another.
Adam Smith
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I find Adam's most intriguing quote to be the last one cited above...
It is at this point -- the point of 'bargaining' -- that Adam Smith's philosophy starts to dialectically collide with the philosophy of Hegel and Marx...
Hegel was no Marxist but it was from Hegel's work on 'labour' and the 'master/slave relationship' that Marx was inspired to write his thousands of pages critiquing the pathological evolution of Capitalism...
You see, it makes all the difference in the world as to what type of Capitalist Leaders we have in order to determine whether we have a 'good or bad Capitalist System' or not.
Just as the character of a hockey or basketball or baseball team tends to take on much of the character of its coach, so it is with 'Capitalism' as Capitalism is played out in each and every corporation and in each and every corporate transaction, both internally and externally.
It makes all the difference in the world as to the ultimate evolution of Capitalism as to whether a person -- particularly the owner of a business -- is negotiating 'narcissistically' and only narcissistically, or whether he or she is negotiating narcissistically and altruistically at the same time.
Put another way, is the bargainer looking for an 'I win; you lose' bargain, or is he or she looking for an 'I win; you win' bargain.
The last type of 'win-win bargaining encounter' tends to be much more endearing and enduring to a long term negotiating relationship whereas the first type of 'win-lose encounter' tends to tarnish if not outright annihilate all future negotiating transactions...
However, here is where Marx steps in and starts to launch his anti-Capitalist tirade...
If the power of the owner (in Marx's language, the 'bourgeoisie') is far greater than the power of the individual employee (the 'proletariat' in Marx's language), and you have a narcissistic, unscrupulous, greedy owner, then 'bad employee bargains' can become the name of the game, the rule of thumb, unless and/or until the individual employees either leave or take a 'collective confrontational stance' against the 'bargains' of the unscrupulous owner. At this point in the evolution of Capitalism, we have the beginning of 'strikes' and 'unions'...and changes in the 'corporate power balance' -- both good and bad.
Short of this, the only other power that an individual employee has is to 'leave' if he is being essentially 'forced to either take or leave a bad bargain'. In a good economy, and even in a bad one, one of the 'surest signs of a bad corporation with bad, unscrupulous leaders' is 'constant employee turnover'.
Now if you have a bad economy with high unemployment levels and/or high immigration levels intermixing with a bad economy, then what is going to happen? Advantage: unscrupulous owner...who is going to take advantage of a 'desperate work force' in order to lower wages and/or instigate other 'bad employee bargains'... If one prospective and/or current employee doesn't take the 'bad bargain' that an 'unscrupulous owner' has laid on the table, the next one coming in for the next interview -- will. Unless as an employee, you have a 'special skill', you have essentially no negotiating power in such a circumstance.
One would hazard a pretty safe guess that most unscrupulous business owners would 'welcome with open arms' a larger unemployed workforce, higher immigration levels, importing 'cheaper labor', and 'exporting jobs to countries with cheaper labor' -- all in the name of the almighty Unscrupulous, Narcissistic Capitalist Ideal -- specifically 'Profit Margin'. There is an imperative distinction that needs to be made relative to the practice of 'Good' or 'Bad' Capitalism relative to a 'fair but healthy profit margin' vs. an 'unscrupulous, gouging profit margin'....
Which is why the Government -- any Democratic Government with Integrity, Character, Ethics, and Accountability in mind -- needs to step in and regulate 'profit margins'. To prevent or at least discourage 'consumer price gouging' as well as 'employee intimidation, coercing, manipulating, extorting...etc.'
Back in the late 1980s (1988 to be exact), not too many people -- at least private citizens, including me -- knew whether 'free trade' was going to be a 'good thing' or a 'bad thing'. All many of us knew is that it 'sounded good' -- probably because it had the word 'free' in it...
Now looking back at things, 22 years later, perhaps we can come to some more definitive, experientially based conclusions: specifically, 'free trade' is not going to be a 'good thing' for countries with 'higher labor wages' -- at least in terms of the workers who are used to getting these higher labor wages.
Again, from an 'unscrupulous employer's point of view -- and even from the point of view of business owners with 'good integrity and intentions towards their workers' but who may be getting slammed by 'merciless unions' -- say goodbye to 'manufacturing plants' and 'service industries' in Canada and America as corporations move their operations to 'third world countries' in order to take advantage of 'lower (to practically non-existent) employee wages'.
In short, the 'free trade agreement' put together by Brian Mulroney in 1988 (in conjunction with Bush from the American side), would increase the economic and corporate speed of 'globalization', and the overall improvement of 'third world economic countries' at the expense of North American jobs in the manufacturing and 'goods and service' industry. Mulroney and Bush obviously did not either foresee and/or want to advertise the 'negative side effects' of the free trade agreement...
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From the internet...see free trade, George Bush...
George W. Bush on Free Trade
President of the United States, Former Republican Governor (TX)
Sub-sections under Free Trade:
NAFTA + WTO
Other issues under Free Trade
Linked trade agreements to participation in Iraq War
Examples of using economic diplomacy for the common good have been overshadowed in recent years by the priorities set under the influence of the Bush pre-emptive war doctrine. Entering the war in Iraq based on erroneous information, has forced us to go shopping around the world for friends, armed with carrots and with sticks. In order to pull together what was called a willing coalition, they went to the poorest developing countries and said, 'If you can't send a soldier, send a policeman." And, "If yo don't have the money, can we give you some?"
Deals were made. Once in a small country I joined the US ambassador for a meeting. The US ambassador made it clear to this president that if he withdrew the handful of soldiers he had sent to Iraq, it would be very difficult for him to get a trade agreement with the US. I was shocked and clarified that I was opposed to the war and as far as I was concerned the deal for the trade agreement had nothing to do with his willingness to send troops.
Source: A Bad Day Since, by Charles Rangel, p. 168 Aug 5, 2008
Open more markets to keep America competitive
Keeping America competitive requires us to open more markets for all that Americans make and grow. One out of every five factory jobs in America is related to global trade, and we want people everywhere to buy American. With open markets and a level playing field, no one can outproduce or outcompete the American worker.
Source: 2006 State of the Union Address Jan 31, 2006
Fact Check: Free trade tempered by steel protectionism
FACTCHECK on Trade: In speaking of benefits of international trade, the President failed to mention his own steps to protect the politically important US steel industry.
BUSH: My Administration is promoting free and fair trade, to open up new markets for America ‘s entrepreneurs, and manufacturers, and farmers, and to create jobs for America ‘s workers.
FACTCHECK: Not mentioned: Bush’s imposition of tariffs on imported steel, which pleased US labor unions and steel executives but which were found to violate World Trade Organization rules. Bush lifted the steel tariffs Dec. 4 after trading partners threatened retaliation against US exports.
Source: FactCheck.org on the 2004 State of the Union address Jan 20, 2004
Tariffs over free trade, for steel industry
On March 5, 2002, the President announced he would impose tariffs of up to 30% on imported steel in an effort to shore up the long-declining industry. Steel executives praised the President and said that the tariffs might save jobs. Free trade advocates wondered how other countries would respond and what the effect would be on the cost of a wide array of goods.
Source: The Price of Loyalty, by Ron Suskind, p.238 Jan 13, 2004
Repeals steel tariffs he imposed in 2002
The Bush administration has decided to repeal most of its 20-month-old tariffs on imported steel to head off a trade war. European countries and Japan had vowed to respond to the tariffs, which were ruled illegal by the WTO, by imposing sanctions on up to $2.2 billion in exports from the US, beginning as soon as Dec. 15.
Bush advisers said they were aware the reversal could produce a backlash against him in several steel-producing states of the Rust Belt-including PA, WV, & OH. That arc of states has been hit severely by losses in manufacturing jobs and will be among the most closely contested in his reelection race.
Bush decided in March 2002 to impose tariffs of 8% to 30% on most steel imports from abroad for three years. The decision was heavily influenced by the desire to help the Rust Belt states, but the departure from Bush’s free-trade principles drew fierce criticism from his conservative supporters. After a blast of international opposition, the administration began approving exemptions.
Source: Mike Allen, Washington Post, p. A1 Dec 1, 2003
Don’t link trade to environment and labor
Free trade is a subject on which both candidates appear to start from the same position, commitment to free trade. From that point, their positions swiftly diverge. Bush would:
supports restoration of “fast-track” negotiating authority for the president
opposes linking trade agreements to labor and environmental issues
supports the expansion of NAFTA throughout the Americas
supports the admission of China and Taiwan to the WTO
wants strict enforcement of anti-dumping and other laws against “unfair” trade
intends to revise export controls to tighten control over military technology and ease restrictions on commercial technology
wants to make international financial institutions more accountable and transparent
strongly supports free trade, saying that the case for it is “not just monetary but moral” and pledging to make the expansion of trade a consistent priority“
Source: The Economist, “Issues 2000” Sep 30, 2000
Sow free trade and farmers will reap
Q: What will you do as president to help farmers get sufficient pay for their work?
A: I would be a free trading president, a president that will work tirelessly to open up markets for agricultural products all over the world. I believe our American farmers. can compete so long as the playing field is level. That’s why I am such a strong advocate of free trade and that’s why I reject protectionism and isolation because I think it hurts our American farmers.
Source: Republican debate in West Columbia, South Carolina Jan 7, 2000
A free market promotes dreams and individuality
[After visiting China], I’ll never forget the contrast between what I learned about the free market at Harvard and what I saw in the closed isolation of China. Every bicycle looked the same. People’s clothes were all the same. a free market frees individuals to make distinct choices and independent decisions. The market gives individuals the opportunity to demand and decide, and entrepreneurs the opportunity to provide.
Source: “A Charge to Keep”, p. 61. Dec 9, 1999
Import fees are not the answer to foreign competition
In 1999, when a glut of foreign oil drove prices below $12 a barrel, many of my friends in the oil business wanted the government to rescue them through price supports. . . I understand the frustration of people. but I do not support import fees. . . I believe it makes sense to use the tax code to encourage activities that benefit America. But I do not want to put up fees or tariffs or roadblocks to trade.
Source: “A Charge to Keep”, p. 65-66. Dec 9, 1999
The fearful build walls; the confident demolish them.
I’ll work to end tariffs and break down barriers everywhere, entirely, so the whole world trades in freedom. The fearful build walls. The confident demolish them. I am confident in American workers and farmers and producers. And I am confident that America’s best is the best in the world.
Source: Candidacy Announcement speech, Cedar Rapids, Iowa Jun 12, 1999
Click here for 13 older quotations from George W. Bush on Free Trade.
Click here for definitions & background information on Free Trade.
Click here for policy papers on Free Trade.
Click here for a profile of George W. Bush.
Click here for VoteMatch responses by George W. Bush.
Agree? Disagree? Voice your opinions on Free Trade or about George W. Bush in The Forum.
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dgb...continued...
In contrast to 'unscrupulous, narcissistic business owners' who tend to follow the 'God of The Highest Profit Margin' and will exploit workers and customers to get there, 'ethical, win-win business owners' tend to look for that magic point of 'dialectic-homeostatic balance, fairness, unity, and harmony'...that stabilizes their business...
'Good Social Will' business owners may not get the highest profit margins in the short run but, over the long haul, Good Social Will' business owners tend to create the best businesses -- as long as they protect a 'healthy profit margin' -- because they are not constantly self-destructing on the basis of employee resentment, rebellion, anarchy, and the 'bad reputation' that the 'self-indulgent business owner's corporation will quickly or slowly establish in the work community both amongst prospective workers and prospective customers. The last thing an employer -- good or bad -- wants to hear is, 'Well, who's working for your company this week?' That is generally not a 'healthy sign' for the corporation.
Health in the personality, in the body, and in the corporation are all built upon the same principle: the principle of 'good self and social will' which in turn is based on the principle of 'dialectic-homeostatic balance'.
In the body, in the personality, and in our socio-economic world, we should all be looking for 'win-win solutions' with no serious 'negative side effects'.
Narcissistic people tend to foster 'a negative social willpower against them' -- they continue to chase 'short term profit gain' without caring one iota about the extent of the 'social pain they leave behind them' in their dust...
If their employees or their customers will eat 'dog food' disguised as 'health food'....the narcissistic owner doesn't think twice....because he or she serves 'The God of Profit Margins'....
Personally, I love to see such corporations run by unscrupulous business owners eventually crumble in the dust...or fold like a house of cards...
When such a business folds like a house of cards...
It reflects the personality, character, and integrity of the person who ran the company into the ground...
Adam Smith would say that this is the 'Free Market' work of 'The Invisible Hand'...
That is, until our North American Governments -- both in America and in Canada -- let these corporate parasites...
Escape their corporate ruins...
With Golden Bailouts and Parachutes...
Then even Adam Smith is crying...
-- dgb, May 8th, 2010.
-- David Gordon Bain,
-- Dialectic-Democratic, Ethical-Good Will-Capitalism, Negotiations...
-- Are Still in Process...
-- Democracy Goes Beyond Narcissism...
Sunday, April 18, 2010
GG draws attention for declaring slavery an ongoing practice in Africa
GG draws attention for declaring slavery an ongoing practice in Africa
Fri Apr 16, 5:59 PM
By Alexander Panetta, The Canadian Press
GOREE ISLAND, Senegal - First she drew attention in Africa for bluntly declaring that slavery remained widespread, and then Gov. Gen. Michaelle Jean visited a dungeon with a dark past to illustrate her point Friday.
Jean's statement about the plight of children in Senegal was widely reported by media in that country, where an in-depth survey has concluded that at least 50,000 boys are being exploited and frequently beaten at their religious schools.
Her sentiments are supported by a new report from Human Rights Watch, an organization that also describes as "slavery" a common Senegalese custom: Islamic schools that send children out to beg for money all day, then often beat them when they don't return with enough cash.
The country's so-called talibes, boys as young as four, can be seen wandering through traffic in tattered clothes and pleading for money. Because charity is considered a religious duty, people hand over enough donations to make the schoolmasters wealthy by local standards.
Jean's visit made the front page of several newspapers Friday.
"Exploitation of Children In Senegal: Michaelle Jean Calls It Slavery," was one headline in Le Quotidien newspaper, the day after Jean surprised some journalists at the presidential palace by making that assessment at a joint press conference with the country's president.
Human-rights groups estimate that as many as 27 million people live in modern-day slavery - and that there are more slaves in the world now than at any point in human history.
They include unpaid labourers who work for room and board, women forced into the sex trade, underage soldiers, and child workers who are paid a pittance.
The UN's High Commission on Human Rights has suggested a variety of means to fight the problem, including product boycotts and mandatory labelling of goods in industries - like carpet-weaving - where child exploitation has been a problem.
This week's report on Senegal by Human Rights Watch urged the Senegalese government to better regulate religious schools, which are popular because they offer the promise of a free education.
As she visited a former slave-trading centre Friday, Jean used the occasion to illustrate her point for the second day in a row.
She was received jubilantly by dancing and singing locals on Goree Island. Now a pastel-coloured tourist destination and UN World Heritage Site, the French used this island to imprison slaves traded for guns and alcohol.
Jean toured the former prison where slaves were once chained to walls by their necks; where children were crammed, in the words of her tour guide, "like fish in a sardine can," with 150 kids crowded into a separate dungeon half the size of a bowling alley; where men were sold for the price of a barrel of rum, while women fetched the same price if they had attractive physical attributes.
"These captives were not considered human beings," said Jean's guide, Eloi Coly.
"They were considered merchandise."
People had their names taken away, and were assigned a number. They were marched down a stone hallway through the infamous "Door of No Return," then loaded onto ships that carried them on a three-month - often fatal - journey to the new world.
A teary-eyed Jean, after the tour, said descendents of former slaves and former slave-owners can work together today on a common cause: ending modern-day slavery.
"This place is not about the history of black peoples. It's about us all," Jean told Canadian and Senegalese journalists.
"Whether we are of European descent, and probably related to those who committed that crime of slavery and slave trade, or whether we are of African descent, we all belong to that history."
She delivered a similarly contemporary message four years ago during a visit to Ghana. During a visit to a similar prison there, she knelt on the ground and broke into sobs, then waved off a question about what special meaning the place carried for someone like her, the descendant of African slaves.
Jean repeated Friday that it would be a mistake to view slavery uniquely through the prism of African history.
"It's about us all. And it's about how life can triumph over barbarism. And we must stand together today, to really fight every situation that denies rights, dignity and humanity to people in the world today. Slavery is still a fact today, in so many different ways," she said.
"Human-trafficking, injustices, are still a reality today. But we are together - and we can say no to it. It's a responsibility."
On Friday, Jean also addressed a school where Canadian aid money has helped train young Senegalese journalists over the years and, on the second full day of her 10-day trip to Africa, she met with a women's group after touring Goree's House of Slaves.
Just outside that old prison, young Amadou Guisse spends the whole day working. He started three years ago, when he was only 10. Guisse follows tourists onto a ferry and, to earn a few dollars on the ride back and forth from the capital, Dakar, he goes around the boat urging tourists to let him shine their shoes.
Guisse shook his head when asked whether he keeps any of the money he earns.
"It's for my family," he said. "Everything."
Fri Apr 16, 5:59 PM
By Alexander Panetta, The Canadian Press
GOREE ISLAND, Senegal - First she drew attention in Africa for bluntly declaring that slavery remained widespread, and then Gov. Gen. Michaelle Jean visited a dungeon with a dark past to illustrate her point Friday.
Jean's statement about the plight of children in Senegal was widely reported by media in that country, where an in-depth survey has concluded that at least 50,000 boys are being exploited and frequently beaten at their religious schools.
Her sentiments are supported by a new report from Human Rights Watch, an organization that also describes as "slavery" a common Senegalese custom: Islamic schools that send children out to beg for money all day, then often beat them when they don't return with enough cash.
The country's so-called talibes, boys as young as four, can be seen wandering through traffic in tattered clothes and pleading for money. Because charity is considered a religious duty, people hand over enough donations to make the schoolmasters wealthy by local standards.
Jean's visit made the front page of several newspapers Friday.
"Exploitation of Children In Senegal: Michaelle Jean Calls It Slavery," was one headline in Le Quotidien newspaper, the day after Jean surprised some journalists at the presidential palace by making that assessment at a joint press conference with the country's president.
Human-rights groups estimate that as many as 27 million people live in modern-day slavery - and that there are more slaves in the world now than at any point in human history.
They include unpaid labourers who work for room and board, women forced into the sex trade, underage soldiers, and child workers who are paid a pittance.
The UN's High Commission on Human Rights has suggested a variety of means to fight the problem, including product boycotts and mandatory labelling of goods in industries - like carpet-weaving - where child exploitation has been a problem.
This week's report on Senegal by Human Rights Watch urged the Senegalese government to better regulate religious schools, which are popular because they offer the promise of a free education.
As she visited a former slave-trading centre Friday, Jean used the occasion to illustrate her point for the second day in a row.
She was received jubilantly by dancing and singing locals on Goree Island. Now a pastel-coloured tourist destination and UN World Heritage Site, the French used this island to imprison slaves traded for guns and alcohol.
Jean toured the former prison where slaves were once chained to walls by their necks; where children were crammed, in the words of her tour guide, "like fish in a sardine can," with 150 kids crowded into a separate dungeon half the size of a bowling alley; where men were sold for the price of a barrel of rum, while women fetched the same price if they had attractive physical attributes.
"These captives were not considered human beings," said Jean's guide, Eloi Coly.
"They were considered merchandise."
People had their names taken away, and were assigned a number. They were marched down a stone hallway through the infamous "Door of No Return," then loaded onto ships that carried them on a three-month - often fatal - journey to the new world.
A teary-eyed Jean, after the tour, said descendents of former slaves and former slave-owners can work together today on a common cause: ending modern-day slavery.
"This place is not about the history of black peoples. It's about us all," Jean told Canadian and Senegalese journalists.
"Whether we are of European descent, and probably related to those who committed that crime of slavery and slave trade, or whether we are of African descent, we all belong to that history."
She delivered a similarly contemporary message four years ago during a visit to Ghana. During a visit to a similar prison there, she knelt on the ground and broke into sobs, then waved off a question about what special meaning the place carried for someone like her, the descendant of African slaves.
Jean repeated Friday that it would be a mistake to view slavery uniquely through the prism of African history.
"It's about us all. And it's about how life can triumph over barbarism. And we must stand together today, to really fight every situation that denies rights, dignity and humanity to people in the world today. Slavery is still a fact today, in so many different ways," she said.
"Human-trafficking, injustices, are still a reality today. But we are together - and we can say no to it. It's a responsibility."
On Friday, Jean also addressed a school where Canadian aid money has helped train young Senegalese journalists over the years and, on the second full day of her 10-day trip to Africa, she met with a women's group after touring Goree's House of Slaves.
Just outside that old prison, young Amadou Guisse spends the whole day working. He started three years ago, when he was only 10. Guisse follows tourists onto a ferry and, to earn a few dollars on the ride back and forth from the capital, Dakar, he goes around the boat urging tourists to let him shine their shoes.
Guisse shook his head when asked whether he keeps any of the money he earns.
"It's for my family," he said. "Everything."
Wednesday, April 07, 2010
The Dynamics of 'The Will to Power' in 'The Master/Slave Relationship' -- And The Conflict Between The Will To Power and The Will To Democratically Negotiate to a 'Win-Win' Conflict Resolution...
Life is full of opposites...and much positive energy and results can be derived from engaging opposites -- opposite perspectives, opposite concepts, opposite theories, opposite personalities, opposite characteristics...-- into contact with each other, playing both sides towards the middle in a way that brings creative new integrative possibilities into existence where none existed before...
As Carl Jung has stated, the energy comes from the tension of the opposites interacting with each other...sometimes in the heat of attraction, passion, and sexuality, other times, in the heat of argumentation, disagreement, and conflict...Either way, I call this the 'dialectic force of Nature/God/Evolution'...
The first 'dialectic philosopher' in the East goes back to whoever created the concepts of 'yin' and 'yang'...the 'feminine' and 'masculine' forces in Nature and Evolution...I have this philosopher pinned as Lao Tse. However, the roots of Chinese philosophy go very, very deep, and it could have been someone unknown before Lao Tse who created the yin/yang dialectic concepts...
Over in the West, back in Ancient Greece, before Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, I have Anaximander pinned as the first Western dialectic philosopher. Anaxamander's philosophy was both very mystic and primitive on the one hand, but interpreted in a particular way, it becomes very profound and wise, and just as relevant today as when he created it somewhere back about 650-700BC...
Anaxamander's idea -- and I am paraphrasing and interpreting -- was that opposites are born from Chaos (The Apeiron, The Universe, The Boundless, The Infinite, The Shadows...Jung/Gestalt Psychology)...From Chaos and The Shadows are born opposites (night vs. day, hot vs. cold, men vs. women...) which are differentiated from each other and enter the World as we know it, and experience their differences in contact with each other. From this contact of differences, boundaries become apparent, and a Battle For Power ensues...(Nietzsche's 'Will to Power'...)...
Out of this 'battle for power', 'winners' and 'losers' become apparent based on the difference of 'superiority' and 'inferiority' (Adler)...and based on this principle of superiority and inferiority becomes the beginning of what Hegel would come to call over 2000 years later, 'The Master/Slave Relationship'... Translated into Marxian Philosophy, this becomes 'The Bourgeoisie' vs. 'The Proletariat'...translated into Capitalist Philosophy, this becomes 'The Employer' vs. 'The Employee, The Union, The Workers'...translated into Feminist Philosophy, this becomes the old 'Dominant Husband vs. Submissive Wife role positions'...translated into Religious Philosophy this becomes the tension between the Catholics and the Protestants, the Christians and the Muslims, the Palestinians and the Jews...translated into Political and Economic Philosophy this becomes the tension between the Capitalists and The Socialists, The Liberals and The Conservatives, the Republicans and The Democrats...the Politicians and the Citizens...
Everywhere we look the 'fight for power between opposites' is evident....
In some cases, we at least partly strive to 'balance this power' in the idea of a 'democracy' or 'egalitarianism'... The idea of 'balancing opposite powers' goes back to Heraclitus in the West (following in Anaxamander's footsteps but taking Anaxamander's philosophy to a different level in the idea of 'balancing opposing forces'); and again to the East and the idea of 'balancing yin and yang forces for the purpose of obtaining and maintaining health'...In contrast, the idea of 'an imbalanced power force' between yin and yang forces -- either yin dominating yang, or yang dominating yin, becomes associated with the idea of 'medical pathology'...This idea can easily be transferred to psychology and to much, if not all, of life....
Thus, even in the realm of 'yin and yang (masculine/feminine; testosterone/estrogen) relationships', we can talk about Hegel's idea of the 'master/slave relationship'...which has roots in the ancient 'Power Philosophy of Anaxamander'...
Now this 'master/slave relationship' is a little more complicated than we usually assume it to be, and Hegel was the first to point this out...Indeed, the relationship of the 'master' and 'slave' is often a relationship of 'co-dependence'...and 'attraction' as well as 'repulsion'...People want freedom and yet they are afraid of freedom and in the words of Kierkegaard, Sartre and Eric Fromm often get 'terrified by freedom' and 'back up' to 'Escape From Freedom' (Fromm)...
They often 'retreat to the Master/Slave Relationship' in order to 'escape the terror of their own individual freedom'....
Regarding the issue of 'co-dependence', the Master and The Slave are often tied to each other in a co-dependent relationship in which both perceive that they need each other -- just as often, they resent and hate each other for the same reason. They both have a different type of 'power' and a different type of 'weakness'. The Master knows how to 'lead' and how to 'tell other people what to do' but at the same time, often he or she is either incapable of, and/or unwilling to, do the work the Slave knows how to, and is capable of, doing...
Thus, take away the Slave, and the Master becomes terrified -- he or she loses his or her power and doesn't know what to do because he or she doesn't know how to do the work that The Slave was doing...The Master feels a deep emotional and behavioral void and vacuum in the absence of the Slave...unless the Master knows how to, and is capable of doing, the work just vacated by The Slave...
Now the Slave may feel terrified of running away from The Master for any or all of a variety of different reasons: provocation, intimidation, prosecution, persecution, victimization, loss of food, shelter, and/or money...
Which heightens the Master's power....
Until the 'cycle of power' changes...
This was the essence of the wisdom of Anaxamander's 2700 year old philosophy...
The cycle of power always changes...
People do injustices upon each other...
The Master exploits injustices onto the Slave...
But The Slave, over time, learns how to exploit injustices back onto the Master...
And over time, the powerful (the Master) becomes weaker, while the less powerful (the Slave) becomes more powerful...
To the point, where one day the Slave becomes Master of either his or her own freedom, and/or the Slave becomes Master over The Master...(Adler, 'superiority striving', 'the mastery compulsion')...
But there are a lot of steps -- and steps backward -- to getting here....
For both the Master and the Slave...
The Master needs to learn how to 'give up control'...to 'listen' to the Slave...and to 'learn' from the Slave...to learn from the Slave how to do those things that the Master may not know how to do properly...
And the Slave needs to learn from the master how to take more 'initiative' and 'risk'...to have more 'courage to leap into the unknown'....'to take chances'....to 'jump across the Nietzschean Abyss from Being or non-Being to Becoming'...
In short, the Master needs to learn more 'social sensitivity skills', more how to 'give up self- control',
While the Slave needs to learn more 'self-assertiveness skills', more how to 'take self-control'...
The Master too often has no ears to listen...
While the Slave too often has no mouth to speak...
The Master usually has too much 'yang'...
And the Slave too much 'yin'...
They both have 'gaps', 'holes', 'voids' in their personality....
They both long for freedom and strive to achieve and/or maintain power, while avoiding self-accountability for their own respective 'weaknesses',
They both can learn from each other...
Such is the nature, essence, the ongoing dialectic, between The Will to Power and The Will to Democracy and Egalitarianism...
In the combined words of a number of historical, philosophical friends of mine...
'Thus, Anaxamander, Lao Tse, Hegel, Nietzsche, Zarathrusta
And dgb...
Spoke...'
-- dgb, March 5th, 2010,
-- David Gordon Bain,
-- Dialectic Gap Bridging Negotiations...
-- Are Still in Process...
As Carl Jung has stated, the energy comes from the tension of the opposites interacting with each other...sometimes in the heat of attraction, passion, and sexuality, other times, in the heat of argumentation, disagreement, and conflict...Either way, I call this the 'dialectic force of Nature/God/Evolution'...
The first 'dialectic philosopher' in the East goes back to whoever created the concepts of 'yin' and 'yang'...the 'feminine' and 'masculine' forces in Nature and Evolution...I have this philosopher pinned as Lao Tse. However, the roots of Chinese philosophy go very, very deep, and it could have been someone unknown before Lao Tse who created the yin/yang dialectic concepts...
Over in the West, back in Ancient Greece, before Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, I have Anaximander pinned as the first Western dialectic philosopher. Anaxamander's philosophy was both very mystic and primitive on the one hand, but interpreted in a particular way, it becomes very profound and wise, and just as relevant today as when he created it somewhere back about 650-700BC...
Anaxamander's idea -- and I am paraphrasing and interpreting -- was that opposites are born from Chaos (The Apeiron, The Universe, The Boundless, The Infinite, The Shadows...Jung/Gestalt Psychology)...From Chaos and The Shadows are born opposites (night vs. day, hot vs. cold, men vs. women...) which are differentiated from each other and enter the World as we know it, and experience their differences in contact with each other. From this contact of differences, boundaries become apparent, and a Battle For Power ensues...(Nietzsche's 'Will to Power'...)...
Out of this 'battle for power', 'winners' and 'losers' become apparent based on the difference of 'superiority' and 'inferiority' (Adler)...and based on this principle of superiority and inferiority becomes the beginning of what Hegel would come to call over 2000 years later, 'The Master/Slave Relationship'... Translated into Marxian Philosophy, this becomes 'The Bourgeoisie' vs. 'The Proletariat'...translated into Capitalist Philosophy, this becomes 'The Employer' vs. 'The Employee, The Union, The Workers'...translated into Feminist Philosophy, this becomes the old 'Dominant Husband vs. Submissive Wife role positions'...translated into Religious Philosophy this becomes the tension between the Catholics and the Protestants, the Christians and the Muslims, the Palestinians and the Jews...translated into Political and Economic Philosophy this becomes the tension between the Capitalists and The Socialists, The Liberals and The Conservatives, the Republicans and The Democrats...the Politicians and the Citizens...
Everywhere we look the 'fight for power between opposites' is evident....
In some cases, we at least partly strive to 'balance this power' in the idea of a 'democracy' or 'egalitarianism'... The idea of 'balancing opposite powers' goes back to Heraclitus in the West (following in Anaxamander's footsteps but taking Anaxamander's philosophy to a different level in the idea of 'balancing opposing forces'); and again to the East and the idea of 'balancing yin and yang forces for the purpose of obtaining and maintaining health'...In contrast, the idea of 'an imbalanced power force' between yin and yang forces -- either yin dominating yang, or yang dominating yin, becomes associated with the idea of 'medical pathology'...This idea can easily be transferred to psychology and to much, if not all, of life....
Thus, even in the realm of 'yin and yang (masculine/feminine; testosterone/estrogen) relationships', we can talk about Hegel's idea of the 'master/slave relationship'...which has roots in the ancient 'Power Philosophy of Anaxamander'...
Now this 'master/slave relationship' is a little more complicated than we usually assume it to be, and Hegel was the first to point this out...Indeed, the relationship of the 'master' and 'slave' is often a relationship of 'co-dependence'...and 'attraction' as well as 'repulsion'...People want freedom and yet they are afraid of freedom and in the words of Kierkegaard, Sartre and Eric Fromm often get 'terrified by freedom' and 'back up' to 'Escape From Freedom' (Fromm)...
They often 'retreat to the Master/Slave Relationship' in order to 'escape the terror of their own individual freedom'....
Regarding the issue of 'co-dependence', the Master and The Slave are often tied to each other in a co-dependent relationship in which both perceive that they need each other -- just as often, they resent and hate each other for the same reason. They both have a different type of 'power' and a different type of 'weakness'. The Master knows how to 'lead' and how to 'tell other people what to do' but at the same time, often he or she is either incapable of, and/or unwilling to, do the work the Slave knows how to, and is capable of, doing...
Thus, take away the Slave, and the Master becomes terrified -- he or she loses his or her power and doesn't know what to do because he or she doesn't know how to do the work that The Slave was doing...The Master feels a deep emotional and behavioral void and vacuum in the absence of the Slave...unless the Master knows how to, and is capable of doing, the work just vacated by The Slave...
Now the Slave may feel terrified of running away from The Master for any or all of a variety of different reasons: provocation, intimidation, prosecution, persecution, victimization, loss of food, shelter, and/or money...
Which heightens the Master's power....
Until the 'cycle of power' changes...
This was the essence of the wisdom of Anaxamander's 2700 year old philosophy...
The cycle of power always changes...
People do injustices upon each other...
The Master exploits injustices onto the Slave...
But The Slave, over time, learns how to exploit injustices back onto the Master...
And over time, the powerful (the Master) becomes weaker, while the less powerful (the Slave) becomes more powerful...
To the point, where one day the Slave becomes Master of either his or her own freedom, and/or the Slave becomes Master over The Master...(Adler, 'superiority striving', 'the mastery compulsion')...
But there are a lot of steps -- and steps backward -- to getting here....
For both the Master and the Slave...
The Master needs to learn how to 'give up control'...to 'listen' to the Slave...and to 'learn' from the Slave...to learn from the Slave how to do those things that the Master may not know how to do properly...
And the Slave needs to learn from the master how to take more 'initiative' and 'risk'...to have more 'courage to leap into the unknown'....'to take chances'....to 'jump across the Nietzschean Abyss from Being or non-Being to Becoming'...
In short, the Master needs to learn more 'social sensitivity skills', more how to 'give up self- control',
While the Slave needs to learn more 'self-assertiveness skills', more how to 'take self-control'...
The Master too often has no ears to listen...
While the Slave too often has no mouth to speak...
The Master usually has too much 'yang'...
And the Slave too much 'yin'...
They both have 'gaps', 'holes', 'voids' in their personality....
They both long for freedom and strive to achieve and/or maintain power, while avoiding self-accountability for their own respective 'weaknesses',
They both can learn from each other...
Such is the nature, essence, the ongoing dialectic, between The Will to Power and The Will to Democracy and Egalitarianism...
In the combined words of a number of historical, philosophical friends of mine...
'Thus, Anaxamander, Lao Tse, Hegel, Nietzsche, Zarathrusta
And dgb...
Spoke...'
-- dgb, March 5th, 2010,
-- David Gordon Bain,
-- Dialectic Gap Bridging Negotiations...
-- Are Still in Process...
'The Devil Made Me Do It!!' On Self-Accountability -- And Integrating 'The Disowned' With The 'Owned'...The 'Marginalized' With The 'Dominant'...
Freud was an atheist. I'm not saying this is necessarily good or bad. But basically, he believed that 'God' is an 'external projection' of our own 'internal psychological forces' -- and particularly, one force, one wish, one choice, to believe in a Creator and an 'Ultimate Force' that is either behind our own individual choices, and/or is so great, so important, that we become willing to 'submit' to what we believe 'God wants us to do'? But how do we know what God wants us to do except through our own choices of what we want to believe God wants us to do? One person might choose to believe that God wants us to go out and be 'kind to all people'...While another person may choose to believe that 'God wants us to go out and kill anybody and everybody who does not believe in the same God that we do'...
Who's right? Who's making the choice? God or us?
I say we are all 'accountable' for our own choices, our own beliefs, our own values, our own actions...
And anyone who chooses to believe anything else other than 'self-accountability for one's own actions' is 'choosing to run away from, avoid, escape from, bury his or her own head in the sand from, his or her own individual freedom to make choices...
That goes for 'choosing to give God responsibility for making us choose what we ourselves choose', and it also goes for any Freudian theory of determinism which is cloaked in self-deception as well.
Most of us are fully aware of the type of thinking that comes out of our 'id'. First, understand that 'the id' is only a concept and a label that Freud invented in order to help us understand how the personality works. Look at 'the id' as a 'teaching device'. It is a 'classification device'. Anything to do with 'sexuality, sensuality, pleasure, hedonism, aggression, violence, evil, immoralism...' we lump into our teaching device, our classification device, that we then say is 'responsible' for these types of thoughts, feelings, and/or impulses. They may start in our 'unconscious' but here again we have a 'troublesome word' that seeks to avoid self-responsibility, self-accountability...'The devil made me do it'. The 'id' made me think of it'...Same idea...different starting point, different name...people have lots of different names and different 'starting-points' for basically the same ideas...The 'id' at least recognizes that the thought, the feeling, the impulse -- of a possibly 'diabolical' nature -- is coming from us. When we use words like 'the devil' or 'Satan' or 'Hell'...we are usually taking one further step away from self-responsibility, self-accountability. Because now we no longer even acknowledge that the thought, the feeling, the impulse...is coming from 'inside us'...Rather we have to 'project' and 'eject' our thought/feeling/impulse/action out into the world and onto someone else's shoulders -- the 'Devil's shoulders' -- let us all make 'the Devil' responsible for our 'immorality', our 'sexual desires', our 'evilness'. If we say that the 'Devil made me do it'...then I don't have to take responsibility for looking at my own potential for 'sexual thoughts', or 'violent thoughts' or plain downright 'evilness'....Because the Devil -- Satan, Dionysus -- is not inside me, or if he or she is, The Devil is certainly not a part of me -- not a part of my own personality and character that I have 'ostracized', 'marginalized', 'alienated' from the rest of my personality. No sir...because once again to recognize the 'id' and/or the 'devil' (same thing, different name) as a part of 'Me' would mean that I would have to be accountable for, and responsible for, a part of me that I might not view as being very 'ethical', 'moral', 'nice', or 'good'. I might not like this part of my personality...
So, in classical Freudian and/or post-Freudian theory, I 'split this disowned part of my personality' off from the rest of myself, from the rest of my personality...and say it 'doesn't belong to me', 'I don't take responsibility' for this part of my personality...'I throw this part of my personality into the 'garbage of my psyche' -- my 'unconscious' or my 'subconscious' or my 'out of awareness'...Do we know that it is there? Yeah, usually we know that it is there...Will it always stay there -- in the 'garbage' or the 'files' of the conscious psyche -- i.e., the 'unconscious or subconscious psyche'? No, this is one of the first things that Freud and Breuer learned about the unconscious -- or in Freud's later language -- the 'repressed'...
'The repressed will always return to haunt you' until the day that you can finally look at your own repressed material square in the eye -- look at your 'id' square in the eye -- and say, 'Id, you are me, and I am you...and we have to learn to live together as harmoniously as we possibly can because we live in the same house, the same psyche, and isolated from each other, alienated from each other -- without proper mutual self-acceptance and self-integration -- we will tear each other apart, bring each other down to our knees, and destroy each other, as we both seek 'to win power over the same personality domain' when, by ourselves, separate from each other -- our 'id' alienated from our 'ego' if you wish, or alternatively our 'impulsive, sensual Dionysian Ego' alienated from our 'righteous, ethical, restrained Apollonian Ego' -- neither of us can win. We both only can lose in self destruction.
Together we win. Separate and alienated from each other, we both lose and/or we all lose.
This was Freud's most essential message to the world.
And even though Freud might have been an atheist, it is probably also the most essential message from the Bible, or the Quran, etc.
Together, we flourish. Divided, we fall.
Both inside and/or outside our own Integrated and/or Divided Selves...
This is the most important message of Freud, The Bible, the Quran...
And Hegel's Hotel...
Integration works...alienation doesn't...
-- dgb, April 7th, 2010.
-- David Gordon Bain
-- Dialectic Gap-Bridging Negotiations...
-- Are Still in Process...
-- Democracy Goes Beyond (Personal and Group) Narcissism...
Who's right? Who's making the choice? God or us?
I say we are all 'accountable' for our own choices, our own beliefs, our own values, our own actions...
And anyone who chooses to believe anything else other than 'self-accountability for one's own actions' is 'choosing to run away from, avoid, escape from, bury his or her own head in the sand from, his or her own individual freedom to make choices...
That goes for 'choosing to give God responsibility for making us choose what we ourselves choose', and it also goes for any Freudian theory of determinism which is cloaked in self-deception as well.
Most of us are fully aware of the type of thinking that comes out of our 'id'. First, understand that 'the id' is only a concept and a label that Freud invented in order to help us understand how the personality works. Look at 'the id' as a 'teaching device'. It is a 'classification device'. Anything to do with 'sexuality, sensuality, pleasure, hedonism, aggression, violence, evil, immoralism...' we lump into our teaching device, our classification device, that we then say is 'responsible' for these types of thoughts, feelings, and/or impulses. They may start in our 'unconscious' but here again we have a 'troublesome word' that seeks to avoid self-responsibility, self-accountability...'The devil made me do it'. The 'id' made me think of it'...Same idea...different starting point, different name...people have lots of different names and different 'starting-points' for basically the same ideas...The 'id' at least recognizes that the thought, the feeling, the impulse -- of a possibly 'diabolical' nature -- is coming from us. When we use words like 'the devil' or 'Satan' or 'Hell'...we are usually taking one further step away from self-responsibility, self-accountability. Because now we no longer even acknowledge that the thought, the feeling, the impulse...is coming from 'inside us'...Rather we have to 'project' and 'eject' our thought/feeling/impulse/action out into the world and onto someone else's shoulders -- the 'Devil's shoulders' -- let us all make 'the Devil' responsible for our 'immorality', our 'sexual desires', our 'evilness'. If we say that the 'Devil made me do it'...then I don't have to take responsibility for looking at my own potential for 'sexual thoughts', or 'violent thoughts' or plain downright 'evilness'....Because the Devil -- Satan, Dionysus -- is not inside me, or if he or she is, The Devil is certainly not a part of me -- not a part of my own personality and character that I have 'ostracized', 'marginalized', 'alienated' from the rest of my personality. No sir...because once again to recognize the 'id' and/or the 'devil' (same thing, different name) as a part of 'Me' would mean that I would have to be accountable for, and responsible for, a part of me that I might not view as being very 'ethical', 'moral', 'nice', or 'good'. I might not like this part of my personality...
So, in classical Freudian and/or post-Freudian theory, I 'split this disowned part of my personality' off from the rest of myself, from the rest of my personality...and say it 'doesn't belong to me', 'I don't take responsibility' for this part of my personality...'I throw this part of my personality into the 'garbage of my psyche' -- my 'unconscious' or my 'subconscious' or my 'out of awareness'...Do we know that it is there? Yeah, usually we know that it is there...Will it always stay there -- in the 'garbage' or the 'files' of the conscious psyche -- i.e., the 'unconscious or subconscious psyche'? No, this is one of the first things that Freud and Breuer learned about the unconscious -- or in Freud's later language -- the 'repressed'...
'The repressed will always return to haunt you' until the day that you can finally look at your own repressed material square in the eye -- look at your 'id' square in the eye -- and say, 'Id, you are me, and I am you...and we have to learn to live together as harmoniously as we possibly can because we live in the same house, the same psyche, and isolated from each other, alienated from each other -- without proper mutual self-acceptance and self-integration -- we will tear each other apart, bring each other down to our knees, and destroy each other, as we both seek 'to win power over the same personality domain' when, by ourselves, separate from each other -- our 'id' alienated from our 'ego' if you wish, or alternatively our 'impulsive, sensual Dionysian Ego' alienated from our 'righteous, ethical, restrained Apollonian Ego' -- neither of us can win. We both only can lose in self destruction.
Together we win. Separate and alienated from each other, we both lose and/or we all lose.
This was Freud's most essential message to the world.
And even though Freud might have been an atheist, it is probably also the most essential message from the Bible, or the Quran, etc.
Together, we flourish. Divided, we fall.
Both inside and/or outside our own Integrated and/or Divided Selves...
This is the most important message of Freud, The Bible, the Quran...
And Hegel's Hotel...
Integration works...alienation doesn't...
-- dgb, April 7th, 2010.
-- David Gordon Bain
-- Dialectic Gap-Bridging Negotiations...
-- Are Still in Process...
-- Democracy Goes Beyond (Personal and Group) Narcissism...
Tuesday, April 06, 2010
A Tribute To Martin Luther King....http://mlkmemorialnews.org
To My Readers,
I had this request emailed to me and I am passing it on to any and/or all of you who would like to help the project of building a memorial of Martin Luther King in Washington, D.C. to its completion. Please check out the website listed above and below. It certainly seems to be for a good cause.
-- dave bain.
Memorial to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Tue, April 6, 2010 2:03:14 PM
From:
Lowell Dempsey
Add to Contacts
To: dgbainsky@yahoo.com
Hi David
The month of April marks the 42nd anniversary of the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. We are commemorating the life and work of Dr. King by creating a memorial in our nation's capital. The Washington, DC, Martin Luther King, Jr., National Memorial will honor his life and contributions to the world through non violent social change. I'm reaching out to ask if you and your readers would help spread the word by posting about this wonderful project on Hegel's Hotel: American Politics...DGB Philosophy-Psychology-Politics....
I've put together this blogger-friendly micro-site to help get the message out - there are videos, photos, banners, and even a web toolbar that, when used, donates money to the creation of the memorial:
http://mlkmemorialnews.org
After years of fund raising, the memorial is now $14 million away from its $120 million goal. This will be more than a monument to a great humanitarian, the National Memorial will be a place for visitors from around the world to share the spirit of love, freedom, and peace. If you are able to post or tweet about this please let me know so I can share it with the team. If you have any questions please pop me an email. And if you are able to help, thank you so much.
Lowell
--
Lowell Dempsey,
BuildTheDream.org
Twitter @mlkmemorial
Facebook.com/MLKNationalMemorial
"An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity"
--Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Thanks for the email, Lowell.
Your request is being passed along to my readers.
-- dave bain
I had this request emailed to me and I am passing it on to any and/or all of you who would like to help the project of building a memorial of Martin Luther King in Washington, D.C. to its completion. Please check out the website listed above and below. It certainly seems to be for a good cause.
-- dave bain.
Memorial to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Tue, April 6, 2010 2:03:14 PM
From:
Lowell Dempsey
Add to Contacts
To: dgbainsky@yahoo.com
Hi David
The month of April marks the 42nd anniversary of the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. We are commemorating the life and work of Dr. King by creating a memorial in our nation's capital. The Washington, DC, Martin Luther King, Jr., National Memorial will honor his life and contributions to the world through non violent social change. I'm reaching out to ask if you and your readers would help spread the word by posting about this wonderful project on Hegel's Hotel: American Politics...DGB Philosophy-Psychology-Politics....
I've put together this blogger-friendly micro-site to help get the message out - there are videos, photos, banners, and even a web toolbar that, when used, donates money to the creation of the memorial:
http://mlkmemorialnews.org
After years of fund raising, the memorial is now $14 million away from its $120 million goal. This will be more than a monument to a great humanitarian, the National Memorial will be a place for visitors from around the world to share the spirit of love, freedom, and peace. If you are able to post or tweet about this please let me know so I can share it with the team. If you have any questions please pop me an email. And if you are able to help, thank you so much.
Lowell
--
Lowell Dempsey,
BuildTheDream.org
Twitter @mlkmemorial
Facebook.com/MLKNationalMemorial
"An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity"
--Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Thanks for the email, Lowell.
Your request is being passed along to my readers.
-- dave bain
Monday, March 29, 2010
The Proposal of a New 'Ethical Harmony Tax'....Regarding The Subject of Political and Corporate Narcissism, and Unethical Lobbyist Practices...
Regarding, the subject of political and corporate 'lobbyist narcissism' and unethical lobbyist malpractices...
If there are 'corporate lobbyists' hanging around heads of pertinent government departments -- or 'power politicians' even above heads of government departments -- and 'contracts' or 'drug approvals' are at stake worth millions or even billions of dollars...and 'money' is either directly or indirectly (through 'political contributions') passing hands from 'private corporations' to 'government officials'...
then we all know that this is 'blatant conflict of interest', violating 'private competition laws'....and a form of direct or indirect bribery which obviously is illegal -- or should be.
However, like the 'back of the food package', often if not usually, we would just as soon not 'read or hear what we do not want to read or hear'....and when we read or hear these political-corporate scandals coming out in the daily news, we deem ourselves to be more or less 'helpless' on these matters, and eventually just let the whole scandal slide....which is what the accused and/or guilty politicians want us to do...
Meanwhile, the lost government money goes out the back door, or into the hands of some fired government official who walks away with a multi-hundred thousand dollar 'separation agreement', and to compensate for all the lost money, government just raises our taxes in the next budget meeting -- for example turning our 'Goods and Services Tax (GST)' into a more lucrative, all-encompassing, and hard-hitting 'Harmonized Sales Tax (HST)'....See, even the name of this new tax sounds nice and 'harmonious'...like the front of the package that says: 'No Trans Fats!'...
Every prime minister-to-be, or president-to-be has the greatest ideals for 'cleaning up government conflict of issue problems'...until they actually get into power...and then their 'ethical clean up program' seems to get swallowed up by the gigantic 'Government Establishment Whale'... Personally, I would create a whole system of new taxes geared towards reducing government and corporate corruption...
A brand new network of 'EHTs -- Ethical Harmony Taxes' such as: 1. The 'GOT' (as in 'GOT CAUGHT!') -- i.e., The 'Government Overspending Tax' -- this would be a 13 per cent 'Ethical Harmony Tax' applied to the personal income tax of any government official convicted of having a 'lavish and grossly inappropriate personal/government expense account' in any particular budget year. 2. The 'UGLYT' -- i.e., The 'Unethical Government Lobbyism Yearning Tax' -- this tax could be applied to either government officials and/or private corporate lobbyists who are convicted of any type of unethical government lobbyism malpractice -- such as:
Brian Mulroney and the 'suitcase full of money' episode with the German arms dealer.
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/francis/archive/2007/11/19/brian-mulroney-stevie-cameron-and-sleaze.aspx
At the very least, the Government of Canada could have hit Mulroney with the UGLY Tax -- a 13 per cent surcharge on his personal income tax plus another 13 per cent corporate tax on any company owned by Mulroney or anyone else associated with this debacle (we would hope that, in this case, the German arms dealer would have been banned from any further business dealings with The Government of Canada... however, I doubt it......this might be partly laughable but at the very least, any 'contract chaser' inside or outside Canada convicted of UGLY (Unethical Government Lobbyism Yearning) would be hit with a 13 per cent 'EHCT'' (Ethical Harmony Contract Tax) on any further government contract dealings, as well as an additional 13 per cent corporate surcharge tax, and a personal income tax surcharge for the particular convicted lobbyist and the owners and/or shareholders of the company the lobbyist is working for. It could be applied to anyone 'reasonably assumed to knowing what shenanigans were going on'.
In Ontario here, there was the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Scandal in which the terminated CEO, Kelly McDougald walked away with a$750,000 termination settlement...
http://blog.toronto-employmentlawyer.com/toronto_employment_lawyer/2009/12/ex-olg-exec-gets-750000-wrongful-dismissal-settlement.html
And there was the EHealth Scandal which the auditor said was a '1 billion dollar waste'...
His report says the board of directors at eHealth Ontario felt it had little power over CEO Sarah Kramer because she had been hired by chair Alan Hudson "with the support of the premier." That, McCarter said, gave Kramer the impression she had approval to ignore normal procurement procedures.
It was revealed late Tuesday that Health Minister David Caplan resigned because of the report.
Just minutes after the release of the report, Premier Dalton McGuinty announced that Children and Youth Services Minister Deb Matthews would take over the health portfolio.
Too much power in too few hands
McCarter's probe, which went back to 2000, criticized unnamed consulting companies for driving up each other's fees to artificially create a higher rate for their services and putting too much power in too few hands in awarding of contracts.
In his report, the auditor general also slammed unnamed officials at the Ministry of Health for thwarting his efforts to get investigators into the ministry for a routine audit in the summer of 2008. In the end, the audit didn't happen until February 2009.
McGuinty has since announced new rules to keep a closer eye on the expenses of about 300 top executives at 22 of Ontario's 615 arm's-length agencies, boards and commissions by having them approved by the province's integrity commissioner.
EHealth was set up in 2008 to create electronic health records after Smart Systems for Health spent $650 million but failed to produce anything of lasting value.
Smart Systems for Health was quietly shut down last September.
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2009/10/07/ehealth-auditor.html#ixzz0jZX5E7cj
Sarah Kramer walked away with, I believe, around a $300,000 termination settlement...Meanwhile here was what was said about her 'government performance as former CEO for The EHealth Department...
Kramer's $114,000 bonus was double eHealth's allowable rate
Cancer Care Ontario CEO says no one there was getting such bonuses
Last Updated: Friday, June 5, 2009 | 2:26 PM ET
CBC News
EHealth Ontario CEO Sarah Kramer's six-figure bonus was double the maximum rate allowed at the Crown-owned agency, a spokeswoman for the organization has confirmed.
EHealth Ontario first came under scrutiny last week for nearly $5 million doled out in untendered contracts, with more than half questioned over personal ties to company executives. (CBC)
In early March, four months after Kramer started her post at the newly created agency, its board of directors approved a $114,000 bonus, on top of her $380,000 salary.
Under eHealth's regulations, however, executives are permitted to receive a bonus ranging from zero to 15 per cent of their salary, spokeswoman Deanna Allen told CBC News.
Fifteen per cent would amount to $57,000 under Kramer's current salary. However, she received a bonus worth 30 per cent.
Asked by CBC News whether she had an explanation for why Kramer's bonus was double the highest allowable rate, Allen responded, "No, I don't."
The letter notifying Kramer of her approved bonus was signed by Dr. Alan Hudson, chairman of the board of directors and the former head of Cancer Care.
Hudson and Kramer have been under fire since late last week for awarding more than $5.5 million in untendered contracts, more than half of which have raised questions about personal connections to the vendors.
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2009/06/04/ehealth-ontario-cancer-care-bonus-kramer.html#ixzz0jZXobnoq
So who is paying for all of this overspent Ontario government money? The new 'Harmony Sales Tax' start on July 1st, 2010.
I think my 'EHT' and/or 'EHCT' ideas would have been, and still would be, much more appropriately suited here...There are a lot of potential 'ethical culprits' who could have, and should have, been taxed a new 'Ethical Harmony' tax....Without the McGuinty Liberal Government having to turn in the direction he has always turned in since he took power -- by taxing the citizens of Ontario more for his government's ethical transgressions and indiscretions...
Everyone maligned in 'The Gomery Report' regarding 'The Liberal Adscam Scandal' could have been hit with the EHT (Ethical Harmony Tax) and/or the EHCT (Ethical Harmony Contract Tax). You see, in Canada, Liberals and Conservatives alike have both been found guilty of such 'Unethical Lobbyism Scandals' (ULS). One might almost be tempted to say that it is in 'the blood of many, if not most, seasoned politicians'...not to mention the corporate lobbyists that they deal with behind closed doors, in bars, in alleys, and in untaped phone conversations...As far away as they can reasonably get from the probing public eye and ear...This is called the 'narcissistic capitalist subversion of democracy'... AIG....banks, mortgage companies, insurance companies, stock trading companies...which brings me to another two proposed taxes associated with the newly proposed EHT network of taxes...
3. The 'UGCBT' -- The 'Unreasonable/Unethical Government/Corporate Bonus Tax' -- charged against any and/or all government and/or private, corporate executives charged with, and convicted of receiving 'unreasonable and/or unethical bonuses' for performances not rendered...and/or not appropriate to their job...Sarah Kramer, are you listening? AIG, are you listening?
4. The 'UCSCT' -- The 'Unreasonable/Unethical Corporate Service Charge Tax' -- applied to any corporations and/or associated executives and/or shareholders who are found guilty of charging private citizens and/or employees for 'service charges and/or administration charges where there is no service delivered or delivered sufficiently to warrant the service charge'... Banks would probably be the number one offender here...
5. The 'CGT' -- The 'Corporate-Customer Gouging Tax' -- applied to any corporations and/or associated executives and/or shareholders who are found guilty of overcharging private citizens and/or employees for goods and/or services rendered (or not rendered)...
6. The 'RCBWT' -- The 'Rollover Contract and/or Bank Withdrawal Tax' -- applied to any corporation and/or executives and/or shareholders who are found guilty of coercing/seducing/manipulating customers into signing 'rollover contract agreements' that allow the particular corporation to keep withdrawing money from the customer's bank account even after year end and/or without any overt and/or direct consent on the part of the customer to continue with the contract basically until the customer is dead...or rather, the bank account is dead...All 'rollover contracts', or 'multi-year' contracts in cases such as 'gym memberships' and 'cell phone contracts' should be illegal and/or failing that, also hit corporations and their executives and/or shareholders who indulge in such 'unethical profit gouging' practices with a 13 per cent personal and/or corporate RCBWT...
7. The 'CMMMCT' -- The 'Corporate Monopoly and/or Collusion Tax' -- should be applied to any corporation and/or its executives and/or shareholders who are found guilty of artificially raising consumer prices because it is a monopoly goods and/or service company, and/or because it has found a way to 'manipulate the market' to artificially raise prices, and/or because two or more companies have banded together and colluded, in effect, to create a 'non-competition monopoly' in order to artificially raise consumer prices...
8. The 'GSOTT' -- The Government's (President's, Prime Minister's, Premier's, Mayor's...) Special Over-Taxing Tax' -- designed particular for any and/or all of those politicians held accountable for creating and passing into law the existence of a 'new citizen tax' -- such as the HST -- which is deemed inappropriate by a court of law based on the government's (President's, Prime Minister's, Premier's, Mayor's...) own accountability in the government's waste of taxpayers money relative to government overspending and/or lobbyist and/or bonus and/or expense account overspending scandals that should put the accountability for such overspending squarely back on the government's broad shoulders -- and any and/or all particular officials within the government who are dutifully (or non-dutifully) held accountable for such scandals -- through the administration of the GSOT on any and/or all of the accountable government officials on his or her: 1. personal income tax; 2. private expense accounts; 3. salary bonuses; and/or the elimination of all such future salary bonuses and/or expense accounts all together....
9. One more thing: A 'three strikes and you are out' policy where any and/or all politicians and/or corporations and/or corporation lobbyists who are convicted three times for 'overspending transgression's -- if they have not been let go already after the first or second transgression -- will be removed from all government jobs and/or government-corporate business transactions...forever...
That is about the limit of my political-corporate ethical imagination for today...
-- dgb, March 29th, 2010
-- David Gordon Bain
-- Dialectic Gap-Bridging Negotiations...
-- Are Still in Process...
-- Democracy Goes Beyond Narcissism....
If there are 'corporate lobbyists' hanging around heads of pertinent government departments -- or 'power politicians' even above heads of government departments -- and 'contracts' or 'drug approvals' are at stake worth millions or even billions of dollars...and 'money' is either directly or indirectly (through 'political contributions') passing hands from 'private corporations' to 'government officials'...
then we all know that this is 'blatant conflict of interest', violating 'private competition laws'....and a form of direct or indirect bribery which obviously is illegal -- or should be.
However, like the 'back of the food package', often if not usually, we would just as soon not 'read or hear what we do not want to read or hear'....and when we read or hear these political-corporate scandals coming out in the daily news, we deem ourselves to be more or less 'helpless' on these matters, and eventually just let the whole scandal slide....which is what the accused and/or guilty politicians want us to do...
Meanwhile, the lost government money goes out the back door, or into the hands of some fired government official who walks away with a multi-hundred thousand dollar 'separation agreement', and to compensate for all the lost money, government just raises our taxes in the next budget meeting -- for example turning our 'Goods and Services Tax (GST)' into a more lucrative, all-encompassing, and hard-hitting 'Harmonized Sales Tax (HST)'....See, even the name of this new tax sounds nice and 'harmonious'...like the front of the package that says: 'No Trans Fats!'...
Every prime minister-to-be, or president-to-be has the greatest ideals for 'cleaning up government conflict of issue problems'...until they actually get into power...and then their 'ethical clean up program' seems to get swallowed up by the gigantic 'Government Establishment Whale'... Personally, I would create a whole system of new taxes geared towards reducing government and corporate corruption...
A brand new network of 'EHTs -- Ethical Harmony Taxes' such as: 1. The 'GOT' (as in 'GOT CAUGHT!') -- i.e., The 'Government Overspending Tax' -- this would be a 13 per cent 'Ethical Harmony Tax' applied to the personal income tax of any government official convicted of having a 'lavish and grossly inappropriate personal/government expense account' in any particular budget year. 2. The 'UGLYT' -- i.e., The 'Unethical Government Lobbyism Yearning Tax' -- this tax could be applied to either government officials and/or private corporate lobbyists who are convicted of any type of unethical government lobbyism malpractice -- such as:
Brian Mulroney and the 'suitcase full of money' episode with the German arms dealer.
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/francis/archive/2007/11/19/brian-mulroney-stevie-cameron-and-sleaze.aspx
At the very least, the Government of Canada could have hit Mulroney with the UGLY Tax -- a 13 per cent surcharge on his personal income tax plus another 13 per cent corporate tax on any company owned by Mulroney or anyone else associated with this debacle (we would hope that, in this case, the German arms dealer would have been banned from any further business dealings with The Government of Canada... however, I doubt it......this might be partly laughable but at the very least, any 'contract chaser' inside or outside Canada convicted of UGLY (Unethical Government Lobbyism Yearning) would be hit with a 13 per cent 'EHCT'' (Ethical Harmony Contract Tax) on any further government contract dealings, as well as an additional 13 per cent corporate surcharge tax, and a personal income tax surcharge for the particular convicted lobbyist and the owners and/or shareholders of the company the lobbyist is working for. It could be applied to anyone 'reasonably assumed to knowing what shenanigans were going on'.
In Ontario here, there was the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Scandal in which the terminated CEO, Kelly McDougald walked away with a$750,000 termination settlement...
http://blog.toronto-employmentlawyer.com/toronto_employment_lawyer/2009/12/ex-olg-exec-gets-750000-wrongful-dismissal-settlement.html
And there was the EHealth Scandal which the auditor said was a '1 billion dollar waste'...
His report says the board of directors at eHealth Ontario felt it had little power over CEO Sarah Kramer because she had been hired by chair Alan Hudson "with the support of the premier." That, McCarter said, gave Kramer the impression she had approval to ignore normal procurement procedures.
It was revealed late Tuesday that Health Minister David Caplan resigned because of the report.
Just minutes after the release of the report, Premier Dalton McGuinty announced that Children and Youth Services Minister Deb Matthews would take over the health portfolio.
Too much power in too few hands
McCarter's probe, which went back to 2000, criticized unnamed consulting companies for driving up each other's fees to artificially create a higher rate for their services and putting too much power in too few hands in awarding of contracts.
In his report, the auditor general also slammed unnamed officials at the Ministry of Health for thwarting his efforts to get investigators into the ministry for a routine audit in the summer of 2008. In the end, the audit didn't happen until February 2009.
McGuinty has since announced new rules to keep a closer eye on the expenses of about 300 top executives at 22 of Ontario's 615 arm's-length agencies, boards and commissions by having them approved by the province's integrity commissioner.
EHealth was set up in 2008 to create electronic health records after Smart Systems for Health spent $650 million but failed to produce anything of lasting value.
Smart Systems for Health was quietly shut down last September.
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2009/10/07/ehealth-auditor.html#ixzz0jZX5E7cj
Sarah Kramer walked away with, I believe, around a $300,000 termination settlement...Meanwhile here was what was said about her 'government performance as former CEO for The EHealth Department...
Kramer's $114,000 bonus was double eHealth's allowable rate
Cancer Care Ontario CEO says no one there was getting such bonuses
Last Updated: Friday, June 5, 2009 | 2:26 PM ET
CBC News
EHealth Ontario CEO Sarah Kramer's six-figure bonus was double the maximum rate allowed at the Crown-owned agency, a spokeswoman for the organization has confirmed.
EHealth Ontario first came under scrutiny last week for nearly $5 million doled out in untendered contracts, with more than half questioned over personal ties to company executives. (CBC)
In early March, four months after Kramer started her post at the newly created agency, its board of directors approved a $114,000 bonus, on top of her $380,000 salary.
Under eHealth's regulations, however, executives are permitted to receive a bonus ranging from zero to 15 per cent of their salary, spokeswoman Deanna Allen told CBC News.
Fifteen per cent would amount to $57,000 under Kramer's current salary. However, she received a bonus worth 30 per cent.
Asked by CBC News whether she had an explanation for why Kramer's bonus was double the highest allowable rate, Allen responded, "No, I don't."
The letter notifying Kramer of her approved bonus was signed by Dr. Alan Hudson, chairman of the board of directors and the former head of Cancer Care.
Hudson and Kramer have been under fire since late last week for awarding more than $5.5 million in untendered contracts, more than half of which have raised questions about personal connections to the vendors.
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2009/06/04/ehealth-ontario-cancer-care-bonus-kramer.html#ixzz0jZXobnoq
So who is paying for all of this overspent Ontario government money? The new 'Harmony Sales Tax' start on July 1st, 2010.
I think my 'EHT' and/or 'EHCT' ideas would have been, and still would be, much more appropriately suited here...There are a lot of potential 'ethical culprits' who could have, and should have, been taxed a new 'Ethical Harmony' tax....Without the McGuinty Liberal Government having to turn in the direction he has always turned in since he took power -- by taxing the citizens of Ontario more for his government's ethical transgressions and indiscretions...
Everyone maligned in 'The Gomery Report' regarding 'The Liberal Adscam Scandal' could have been hit with the EHT (Ethical Harmony Tax) and/or the EHCT (Ethical Harmony Contract Tax). You see, in Canada, Liberals and Conservatives alike have both been found guilty of such 'Unethical Lobbyism Scandals' (ULS). One might almost be tempted to say that it is in 'the blood of many, if not most, seasoned politicians'...not to mention the corporate lobbyists that they deal with behind closed doors, in bars, in alleys, and in untaped phone conversations...As far away as they can reasonably get from the probing public eye and ear...This is called the 'narcissistic capitalist subversion of democracy'... AIG....banks, mortgage companies, insurance companies, stock trading companies...which brings me to another two proposed taxes associated with the newly proposed EHT network of taxes...
3. The 'UGCBT' -- The 'Unreasonable/Unethical Government/Corporate Bonus Tax' -- charged against any and/or all government and/or private, corporate executives charged with, and convicted of receiving 'unreasonable and/or unethical bonuses' for performances not rendered...and/or not appropriate to their job...Sarah Kramer, are you listening? AIG, are you listening?
4. The 'UCSCT' -- The 'Unreasonable/Unethical Corporate Service Charge Tax' -- applied to any corporations and/or associated executives and/or shareholders who are found guilty of charging private citizens and/or employees for 'service charges and/or administration charges where there is no service delivered or delivered sufficiently to warrant the service charge'... Banks would probably be the number one offender here...
5. The 'CGT' -- The 'Corporate-Customer Gouging Tax' -- applied to any corporations and/or associated executives and/or shareholders who are found guilty of overcharging private citizens and/or employees for goods and/or services rendered (or not rendered)...
6. The 'RCBWT' -- The 'Rollover Contract and/or Bank Withdrawal Tax' -- applied to any corporation and/or executives and/or shareholders who are found guilty of coercing/seducing/manipulating customers into signing 'rollover contract agreements' that allow the particular corporation to keep withdrawing money from the customer's bank account even after year end and/or without any overt and/or direct consent on the part of the customer to continue with the contract basically until the customer is dead...or rather, the bank account is dead...All 'rollover contracts', or 'multi-year' contracts in cases such as 'gym memberships' and 'cell phone contracts' should be illegal and/or failing that, also hit corporations and their executives and/or shareholders who indulge in such 'unethical profit gouging' practices with a 13 per cent personal and/or corporate RCBWT...
7. The 'CMMMCT' -- The 'Corporate Monopoly and/or Collusion Tax' -- should be applied to any corporation and/or its executives and/or shareholders who are found guilty of artificially raising consumer prices because it is a monopoly goods and/or service company, and/or because it has found a way to 'manipulate the market' to artificially raise prices, and/or because two or more companies have banded together and colluded, in effect, to create a 'non-competition monopoly' in order to artificially raise consumer prices...
8. The 'GSOTT' -- The Government's (President's, Prime Minister's, Premier's, Mayor's...) Special Over-Taxing Tax' -- designed particular for any and/or all of those politicians held accountable for creating and passing into law the existence of a 'new citizen tax' -- such as the HST -- which is deemed inappropriate by a court of law based on the government's (President's, Prime Minister's, Premier's, Mayor's...) own accountability in the government's waste of taxpayers money relative to government overspending and/or lobbyist and/or bonus and/or expense account overspending scandals that should put the accountability for such overspending squarely back on the government's broad shoulders -- and any and/or all particular officials within the government who are dutifully (or non-dutifully) held accountable for such scandals -- through the administration of the GSOT on any and/or all of the accountable government officials on his or her: 1. personal income tax; 2. private expense accounts; 3. salary bonuses; and/or the elimination of all such future salary bonuses and/or expense accounts all together....
9. One more thing: A 'three strikes and you are out' policy where any and/or all politicians and/or corporations and/or corporation lobbyists who are convicted three times for 'overspending transgression's -- if they have not been let go already after the first or second transgression -- will be removed from all government jobs and/or government-corporate business transactions...forever...
That is about the limit of my political-corporate ethical imagination for today...
-- dgb, March 29th, 2010
-- David Gordon Bain
-- Dialectic Gap-Bridging Negotiations...
-- Are Still in Process...
-- Democracy Goes Beyond Narcissism....
Saturday, March 20, 2010
Rules That Warren Buffet Lives By
Rules that Warren Buffett lives by
by Stephanie Loiacono, Investopedia.com
Thursday, February 25, 2010
provided by
http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/personal-finance/article/forbes/1440/rules-that-warren-buffett-lives-by
Warren Buffett is arguably the world's greatest stock investor. He's also a bit of a philosopher. He pares down his investment ideas into simple, memorable sound bites. Do you know what his homespun sayings really mean? Does his philosophy hold up in today's difficult environment? Find out below.
"Rule No. 1: Never Lose Money. Rule No. 2: Never Forget Rule No. 1."
Buffett personally lost about US$23 billion in the financial crisis of 2008, and his company, Berkshire Hathaway, lost its revered AAA ratings. So how can he tell us to never lose money?
He's referring to the mindset of a sensible investor. Don't be frivolous. Don't gamble. Don't go into an investment with a cavalier attitude that it's OK to lose. Be informed. Do your homework. Buffett invests only in companies he thoroughly researches and understands. He doesn't go into an investment prepared to lose, and neither should you.
Buffett believes the most important quality for an investor is temperament, not intellect. A successful investor doesn't focus on being with or against the crowd.
The stock market will swing up and down. But in good times and bad, Buffett stays focused on his goals. So should we.
"If The Business Does Well, The Stock Eventually Follows."
"The Intelligent Investor" by Benjamin Graham convinced Buffett that investing in a stock equates to owning a piece of the business. So when he searches for a stock to invest in, Buffett seeks out businesses that exhibit favorable long-term prospects. Does the company have a consistent operating history? Does it have a dominant business franchise? Is the business generating high and sustainable profit margins? If the company's share price is trading below expectations for its future growth, then it's a stock Buffett may want to own.
Buffett never buys anything unless he can write down his reasons why he'll pay a specific price per share for a particular company. Do you do the same?
"It's Far Better To Buy A Wonderful Company At A Fair Price Than A Fair Company At A Wonderful Price."
Buffett is a value investor who likes to buy quality stocks at rock-bottom prices. His real goal is to build more and more operating power for Berkshire Hathaway by owning stocks that will generate solid profits and capital appreciation for years to come. When the markets reeled during the recent financial crisis, Buffett was stockpiling great long-term investments by investing billions in names like General Electric and Goldman Sachs.
To pick stocks well, investors must set down criteria for uncovering good businesses, and stick to their discipline. You might, for example, seek companies that offer a durable product or service and also have solid operating earnings and the germ for future profits. You might establish a minimum market capitalization you're willing to accept, and a maximum P/E ratio or debt level. Finding the right company at the right price - with a margin for safety against unknown market risk - is the ultimate goal.
Remember, the price you pay for a stock isn't the same as the value you get. Successful investors know the difference.
"Our Favorite Holding Period Is Forever."
How long should you hold a stock? Buffett says if you don't feel comfortable owning a stock for 10 years, you shouldn't own it for 10 minutes. Even during the period he called the "Financial Pearl Harbor", Buffett loyally held on to the bulk of his portfolio.
Unless a company has suffered a sea change in prospects, such as impossible labor problems or product obsolescence, a long holding period will keep an investor from acting too human. That is, being too fearful or too greedy can cause investors to sell stocks at the bottom or buy at the peak - and destroy portfolio appreciation for the long run.
You may think the recent financial meltdown changed things, but don't be fooled: those unfussy sayings from the Oracle of Omaha still RULE!
The Buffett Philosophy
Baby Buffett Portfolio: His 6 Best Long-Term Picks
Think Like Warren Buffett
by Stephanie Loiacono, Investopedia.com
Thursday, February 25, 2010
provided by
http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/personal-finance/article/forbes/1440/rules-that-warren-buffett-lives-by
Warren Buffett is arguably the world's greatest stock investor. He's also a bit of a philosopher. He pares down his investment ideas into simple, memorable sound bites. Do you know what his homespun sayings really mean? Does his philosophy hold up in today's difficult environment? Find out below.
"Rule No. 1: Never Lose Money. Rule No. 2: Never Forget Rule No. 1."
Buffett personally lost about US$23 billion in the financial crisis of 2008, and his company, Berkshire Hathaway, lost its revered AAA ratings. So how can he tell us to never lose money?
He's referring to the mindset of a sensible investor. Don't be frivolous. Don't gamble. Don't go into an investment with a cavalier attitude that it's OK to lose. Be informed. Do your homework. Buffett invests only in companies he thoroughly researches and understands. He doesn't go into an investment prepared to lose, and neither should you.
Buffett believes the most important quality for an investor is temperament, not intellect. A successful investor doesn't focus on being with or against the crowd.
The stock market will swing up and down. But in good times and bad, Buffett stays focused on his goals. So should we.
"If The Business Does Well, The Stock Eventually Follows."
"The Intelligent Investor" by Benjamin Graham convinced Buffett that investing in a stock equates to owning a piece of the business. So when he searches for a stock to invest in, Buffett seeks out businesses that exhibit favorable long-term prospects. Does the company have a consistent operating history? Does it have a dominant business franchise? Is the business generating high and sustainable profit margins? If the company's share price is trading below expectations for its future growth, then it's a stock Buffett may want to own.
Buffett never buys anything unless he can write down his reasons why he'll pay a specific price per share for a particular company. Do you do the same?
"It's Far Better To Buy A Wonderful Company At A Fair Price Than A Fair Company At A Wonderful Price."
Buffett is a value investor who likes to buy quality stocks at rock-bottom prices. His real goal is to build more and more operating power for Berkshire Hathaway by owning stocks that will generate solid profits and capital appreciation for years to come. When the markets reeled during the recent financial crisis, Buffett was stockpiling great long-term investments by investing billions in names like General Electric and Goldman Sachs.
To pick stocks well, investors must set down criteria for uncovering good businesses, and stick to their discipline. You might, for example, seek companies that offer a durable product or service and also have solid operating earnings and the germ for future profits. You might establish a minimum market capitalization you're willing to accept, and a maximum P/E ratio or debt level. Finding the right company at the right price - with a margin for safety against unknown market risk - is the ultimate goal.
Remember, the price you pay for a stock isn't the same as the value you get. Successful investors know the difference.
"Our Favorite Holding Period Is Forever."
How long should you hold a stock? Buffett says if you don't feel comfortable owning a stock for 10 years, you shouldn't own it for 10 minutes. Even during the period he called the "Financial Pearl Harbor", Buffett loyally held on to the bulk of his portfolio.
Unless a company has suffered a sea change in prospects, such as impossible labor problems or product obsolescence, a long holding period will keep an investor from acting too human. That is, being too fearful or too greedy can cause investors to sell stocks at the bottom or buy at the peak - and destroy portfolio appreciation for the long run.
You may think the recent financial meltdown changed things, but don't be fooled: those unfussy sayings from the Oracle of Omaha still RULE!
The Buffett Philosophy
Baby Buffett Portfolio: His 6 Best Long-Term Picks
Think Like Warren Buffett
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