Posts Tagged
‘Michael Moore’
by ilene - October 22nd, 2009 4:44 pm
Courtesy of Mish
24 Senators and 63 House Representatives have completely lost their minds over pork bellies. Apparently the free market does not work, hog farmers are not making enough money, and the government owes farmers a profit no matter how much stuff they grow or raise.
Please consider USDA Must Buy Pork ‘Immediately,’ Hog Executive Says.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture must make funds available immediately to buy pork to keep hog farmers in business, the head of the second-biggest U.S. producer told a House of Representatives subcommittee.
Government pork purchases worth $100 million have won the backing of a bipartisan group of 87 lawmakers to support prices for farmers, who have lost money since 2007. Hog futures have dropped about 25 percent in Chicago since April 23, when swine flu began making headlines, depressing consumer demand and curbing exports to major markets including China and Russia.
Lawmakers need “to encourage and work with the Secretary of Agriculture to immediately make available” funds for government pork purchases, said Rod Brenneman, the chief executive officer of Seaboard Foods LLC, a unit of Merriam, Kansas-based Seaboard Corp. He testified before a House Agriculture Committee panel that oversees the livestock industry.
Lawmakers led by Senators Al Franken, Democrat of Minnesota, and Richard Burr, Republican of North Carolina, asked Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to increase U.S. spending on pork in letters earlier this month.
The group of 24 senators and 63 representatives asked Vilsack to buy more pork in the year that began Oct. 1 through government food programs. The U.S. Department of Agriculture bought $165 million of the meat a year earlier, including $30 million announced on Sept. 3, according to Justin DeJong, a USDA spokesman.
The USDA may have less to spend on pork this year because of fiscal restraints, Vilsack said in an interview last week. He said the department is reviewing its plans for this year with an eye toward maximizing available funds for pork producers.
“We have to be sure we husband our resources and use them wisely,” he said last week.
No One Owes Farmers A Profit
It is absurd to think the government or anyone else owes farmers a profit anymore than computer consulting corporations or real estate agencies are owed a profit.
Yes farmers have a rough life. But everyone unemployed…
Tags: capitalism, Hogs, Michael Moore, pork, USDA
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by ilene - October 15th, 2009 12:36 pm
Here’s an excellent, must-read article by William K. Black. Special thanks to New Deal 2.0. - Ilene
By Bill Black, Courtesy of New Deal 2.0
Roosevelt Institute Braintruster William K. Black explains how the finance economy preys on the real economy instead of serving it. He shows how both have become dysfunctional and warns that we must not neglect the real economy — the source of our jobs, our incomes, and the creator of goods and services — as we focus on financial reform.
What exactly is the function of the financial sector in our society? Simply this: Its sole function is supplying capital efficiently to aid the real economy. The financial sector is a tool to help those that make real tools, not an end in itself. But five fatal flaws in the financial sector’s current structure have created a monster that drains the real economy, promotes fraud and corruption, threatens democracy, and causes recurrent, intensifying crises.
1. The financial sector harms the real economy.
Even when not in crisis, the financial sector harms the real economy. First, it is vastly too large. The finance sector is an intermediary — essentially a “middleman”. Like all middlemen, it should be as small as possible, while still being capable of accomplishing its mission. Otherwise it is inherently parasitical. Unfortunately, it is now vastly larger than necessary, dwarfing the real economy it is supposed to serve. Forty years ago, our real economy grew better with a financial sector that received one-twentieth as large a percentage of total profits (2%) than does the current financial sector (40%). The minimum measure of how much damage the bloated, grossly over-compensated finance sector causes to the real economy is this massive increase in the share of total national income wasted through the finance sector’s parasitism.
Second, the finance sector is worse than parasitic. In the title of his recent book, The Predator State, James Galbraith aptly names the problem. The financial sector functions as the sharp canines that the predator state uses to rend the nation. In addition to siphoning off capital for its own benefit, the finance sector misallocates the remaining capital in ways that harm the real economy in order to reward already-rich financial elites harming the nation. The facts are alarming:
• Corporate stock repurchases…
Tags: Ayn Rand, Banking System, Banks, capitalism, Capitalism: A Love Story, corruption, economic reforms, Economy, financial sector, Fraud, Geithner, insolvency, James Galbraith, Michael Moore, mortgage fraud, Ponzi schemes, profits, real economy, William K. Black
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by ilene - October 14th, 2009 1:23 pm
US Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) is talking to Bill Moyers about the state of the economy. She claims it’s a "Financial Coup D’Etat"
It’s a lengthy interview, about 20 minutes, but well worth a listen in entirety. The site has a complete transcript for those with limited time. Here is a partial transcript.
MICHAEL MOORE: We’re here to get the money back for the American People. Do you think it’s too harsh to call what has happened here a coup d’état? A financial coup d’état?
MARCY KAPTUR: That’s, no. Because I think that’s what’s happened. Um, a financial coup d’état?
BILL MOYERS: That’s the progressive Representative from Ohio, Marcy Kaptur, she’s with me now. She has a Masters from the University of Michigan, did graduate study at M.I.T. and still lives in the same house in the Toledo working class neighborhood where she grew up.
She’s in her 14th term in Congress, the longest-serving Democratic woman in the history of the House, and she’s an outspoken financial watchdog on three important Committees: Appropriations, Budget and Oversight and Government Reform.
Also with me is a familiar face to viewers of this broadcast. Simon Johnson is the former Chief Economist at the International Monetary Fund. He now teaches Global Economics and Management at M.I.T.’s Sloan School of Management. He’s one of the founders of the website Baselinescenario.com. I check it out daily for Simon’s take on the economic and financial crisis.
It’s been a year since the great collapse and both my guests are well equipped to assess what’s happened since then. Welcome to you both.
MARCY KAPTUR: Thank you.
BILL MOYERS: Let’s look at this story that I just read from the Associated Press this week about how Treasury Secretary Geithner is on the phone several times a day with a select group of very powerful Wall Street bankers, especially Citigroup, J.P. Morgan, Goldman Sachs. He will talk to them when Members of Congress have to leave a message on the answering machine. And these are the bankers who helped bring on this calamity and who are now benefiting from it. What does that say to you? ….
A Huge Shift In Attitudes
Others have posted the link already but I wanted to get in a few comments.
At left:
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Tags: Bill Moyers, Financial Coup D'Etat, Michael Moore, Simon Johnson, US Rep. Marcy Kaptur
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by ilene - October 6th, 2009 4:58 pm
Vitaliy writes a heartfelt essay on Michael Moore’s Capitalism: A Love Story. I didn’t see the movie but trust his impressions are accurate. Even so, I disagree with part of his argument. Vitaliy states that: "the fact that corruption and bribery are the rare exception in the US, not the rule (as in Russia), is never mentioned." I think we have a sort of capitalism laced with crime, and a system that cannot rid itself of corruption, to me, does not make for a true love story. – Ilene
Now that I’ve tossed in my two cents, here’s Vitaliy N. Katsenelson introduction.
My writing is a byproduct of my investment process, I think through writing. I don’t do movie reviews and don’t watch Michael Moore’s movies. But when a Denver Post reporter invited me to a private showing of Moore’s latest flick last Monday Capitalism: A Love Story, I decided to check it out since it had to do with Capitalism. It stirred up a lot of memories and I recently finished reading Atlas Shrugged which had a great impact on me. A combination of all those things motivated me to write this. I hope you enjoy it.
Courtesy of Vitaliy N. Katsenelson at Contrarian Edge
In the 1980s, in Soviet Russia, a few times a year, my class walked to a movie theater, where we were shown a documentary. Attendance was mandatory. The documentaries were different but the themes were the same: to the accompaniment of patriotic music, we learned about the righteousness of socialism, the greatness of Mother Russia, and the intelligence and foresight of our great leaders. To demonstrate how good we had it, we were shown images of “decaying” American capitalism. Of course, capitalism did not get the benefit of patriotic music as we were shown the poverty-stricken homeless, the KKK burning crosses and lynching blacks, and Russia-hating capitalists being poisoned by hamburgers (of course, later I learned this part about hamburgers was not a complete lie).
Past weekend Americans voluntarily spent a few million dollars to see a documentary by Michael Moore – Capitalism: the Love Story. But don’t kid yourself, this piece of work is not a documentary, it lacks objectivity and has no intention of seeking the truth. It is anti-American and anti-capitalist propaganda. Mr. Moore is a talented propagandist; in…
Tags: Capitalism: the Love Story, Defense of Capitalism, Michael Moore, Propaganda, Socialism
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by ilene - September 26th, 2009 10:36 am
Courtesy of Lawrence Delevingne at Clusterstock
Relax TARP execs, the mobs aren’t coming for you.
Reuters: President Barack Obama’s "pay czar" said on Friday he will not cap compensation for the top employees at bailed-out companies, and will not reveal names, when he releases the first wave of decisions within a few weeks.
"We don’t want specific names next to dollars," said Kenneth Feinberg, who was appointed in June to decide compensation packages for the highest-paid personnel at companies that received U.S. government bailouts.
So Kenneth Feinberg has probably taken the first step towards making his office irrelevent, though theoretically he still has the power to intervene when a pay package is somehow excessive or likely to induce risk. In reality, he probably won’t do much of anything.
Folks, the pay issue is fading, even if the G20 promises a "coordinated effort ."
At least until Michael Moore’s "Capitalism" drops in October…
See Also:
Citi Is Pissed Off About The Pay Czar’s Comp Restrictions (C)
Obama’s Pay Czar Ready To Crack Heads On Wall Street
Pandit Says He’s Embarrassed By Andrew Hall’s $100 Million Bonus (C)
Tags: AIG, Bailout, Bonus, bonuses, capitalism, compensation, Financial Crisis, Michael Moore, Pay Czar, Payment Plan, regulation, TARP, Wall Street
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Philip R. Davis is a founder Phil's Stock World, a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders...
Ilene is editor and affiliate program
coordinator for PSW.