Topic: Dissecting the Parasitocracy (Read 2583 times)

That's news to me...  3000+ indictments?

Unfortunately, we could hang every last member of the Elites, and the System would come back to life.  It is nurtured the simple fact that most people don't understand the manipulation of the values money and assets with state power, and its true effects.

Where there is demand (ie the public crying out 'Fck me, just make it complicated enough!') the 'supply' will always come from somewhere!

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Only slightly O/T are all of the rumors about 3000 + sealed indictments handed down over the past few days (apparently normally it's just a few hundred).  Rumor has it that most involve Clintons / Obama / DNC / Debbie W-S / etc.

But, as I just mentioned earlier today at ZH, it seems too much like a fever dream to think the Clintons are going to get the justice they deserve.

However, perhaps Sessions and Trump are really smart old foxes..., laying low, waiting for the right moment to strike his enemies, and he has MANY enemies there in The Swamp.

The Swamp would roughly equal the Parasitocracy.  Maybe a little Kakistrocracy too (rule by the very worst people IIUC).

One of the staples of the modern global state-bank alliance (and I suppose you could call it 'progress' in a certain sense) is this slowness and gradualness of the theft.  A good part of the propaganda used to inflate the elites' assets is actually true.  The grandeur of empire only becomes more illusory over time.

Among empires, the modern state-bank alliance is unique in mixing in a lot of soft power.  'Allying' with Bitcoin, 'allying' with the ideas of freedom and democracy, etc. are all necessary in its quest to leverage a relatively small base of hard power up to global scale.

The higher Bitcoin goes, the more likely Viking!

I am surprised that a cruise ship would have poor WiFi in 2017 given how important it is to everyone these days.

Enjoy your cruise, man! I have never been on one, but hope to someday.

Royal Caribbean, Princess, Viking and Celebrity all call at St P.  Not in winter though.

Russia will have few problems with any sanctions.  They are almost self-contained.  To a degree they are a "one trick pony" (oil and gas price exports), but they have a great military-industrial complex too.

If you like art, the Hermitage is really something, one of the best museums in the world.

Nice to hear you're putting the Bitcoin rise to good use!  Was in St. Pete a long time ago -- never thought you could take a cruise ship ('Aurora'?) there...

It's not surprising... From Putin, to Maduro (Venezuela), to Saddam, to all the European leaders, the system ensures each country is governed even worse than the US in terms of political and economic freedoms.  So voila, the USA is the best country!  It's money and debt are the most respected!

The logic is quite simple -- either a country toes the imperial line, or not.  Regardless of what kind of leader or system it has, a country that toes the imperial line will end up with more financial inflation and/or political corruption than the US.  A country that doesn't toe the line will be attacked to one degree or another by the media, put under pressure by the dominant dollar system, and eventually, its regime will surrender and/or collapse.  When the standoff is sharp and prolonged, even if we have to get a war started (e.g. Syria), we have to send the message.

But I'm sure we view the civilian collateral damage with deep regret.

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I'm in Russia now (St Pete via cruise ship with lousy wifi).

Things here are at least a tad better than described by our Fake News Media, but a one day visit means little (other than my stint as a desk-jockey Cold War participant decades ago when they were the USSR).

Putin is not a lovable guy, but he has huge support here, and America would be wise to make deals, good deals, with him.  The sanctions and Russia-bashing are stupid beyond words.  We can do business with this man.

BTW, St Pete is the only cruise port I have EVER visited where you had to go through a passport control, even on a shore excursion.  But, beyond question Russia <> USSR.


EDIT: Putin is reputed to be the richest man in the world (more than Gates and Buffett combined).  He is a parasite too, few clean hands among people who claw their way to the top of any big organization.

Well, I guess this is the first post-Trump comment...

Speaking of Trump, perhaps my dire warnings of 'political extremism' has been outdone by reality!

Counterparty risk is the famous problem, but the real problem is that paper issued by the elites of the state-bank alliance is guaranteed to be debased over the long term precisely because these elites have the power to prop up its value for a while.  The problem is the incentives for these people to abuse their power.

In a truly free market, counterparty risk would be properly priced into the asset's value, so you get what you pay for.

Unfortunately, in today's world any asset with counterparty risk is directly or indirectly propped up by the elites with state power, and is over-valued, and that's the only reason why we're forced to hide under assets with no counterparty risk.

I don't think any modern politician has a clean past (well, maybe a few do, like Jimmy Carter -- but then no one would work with him.)

Since Andrew Jackson caused the central bank to be buried for seven decades, I wouldn't be surprised if most of his negative press is payback from its advocates.

The slogan is always public good, while the reality is always a very personal 'good!'

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The Parasitocracy also includes (IMO) a large class of liars and grifters.  TPTB now claim to be "looking out for us" when, of course, they are merely looking after themselves.  This has been going on a long time here in the USA, a convenient starting point for this line of thought would be President Andrew Jackson.  Jackson claimed to be a friend of the Native Americans, that he was looking after them like a father, when he was stealing their lands for the benefit of himself and his land-speculating cronies...

Jackson was the real founder of the Democrat Party.  The D-Team claims to speak for the poor, especially African-Americans, while their plight has never improved.  Not even after 7+ years of our first African-American president, and Obama had complete control of Congress for a few years.

Reference (and highly recommended): Hillary's America (Dinesh D'Souza)

No worries!

I believe a lot of your issue with responsibility is par for the course for imperial decline.  Over the decades, the system has 'bribed' various constituencies, including most of the Western electorate, into accepting it.  One of the major type of bribes is unearned wealth, in the form of generous safety nets, good jobs from economic and financial distortions, etc.  In a sense, these people believe in sweet lies because they actually lived them for a while.  Eventually, of course, all the chickens come home to roost (and they tend all to come at the same time!)

We are very close to, if not already at, such a time.  The financial deception at the heart of the system has forced the elites to accept Chinese currency manipulation over the last two decades in order to effect the needed artificial support for Western-issued money and other assets.  This has basically emptied out good Western middle class jobs and is the cause of the rise of political extremism as well as financial instability.

I am sorry, but I can't seem to understand your comment about powerful insiders.

My apologies for the late reply, I lost track of this thread and just discovered the link "Show new replies to your posts" at the top.

In a way, I was actually talking about both. If the people I have discussed these types of things with are any indication, the majority of people just don't want to take responsibility for their lives as it is easier to be taken by a sweet lie than to deal with the truth. As for voting, I'm not sure that works any more when the only choices you are given are curry with shit in it, or shit with curry in it.

As for dealing with powerful insiders, or in my case even people who know how to work a broke system, you would be surprised how much your quality of life can be damaged because they were the wrong person to tell what they could go do with their self. That's exactly what got me interested in state-free money.

BTW, one of the funniest episodes of modern finance was during the South Seas bubble, not long after the founding of the Bank of England.  Money flowed into all kinds of equities (driven indirectly by the state's power to inflate debt), including one venture where investors were explicitly told they would not know what they were getting into, just 'an endeavor of great advantage.'

Money should be treated as any other commodity, whose value is totally determined by the marketplace.  This regime has already been tested with great success during the Italian Renaissance and the Scottish 'free banking' era (not due to an enlightened public but due to accidents of geopolitics.)

This is not necessarily (and probably won't be, thankfully) a return to 'hard' money.  Savers could have great confidence in a script I issue in my garage, provided that whatever venture backs that script is determined to be a good bet by the market.  When capital's value and confidence is determined by state-free supply and demand, capital tends to flow in productive directions and savings tend to be safe.

With the right incentives, banking can play its role as financial innovator and a great engine of growth, without destabilizing the economy.

It's only modern economists who tell us money has to be managed by some central authority.  (The same economists who unanimously endorsed the gold standard in its day, and unanimously condemn it today -- both times saying just what the elites want them to.)

It is true that we still won't get total honesty.  Bitcoin has money 'stolen' from 'hacked' exchanges, but if you leave most of your savings on an exchange, you probably should lose it to learn a life lesson!  We can't guarantee honesty, but we can set up the right incentives, which will go a long way.

In the big picture, it's quite possible what the public lack is simply a kind of rough understanding.

In a more philosophical sense, it remains to be seen whether a population not well versed in the conceptual tools required by monetary and financial thinking can ultimately hold to account an elite determined to skim off the cream of their labor and destabilize everything in life.  A blanket rule that imposes simplicity might work, but at this philosophical level all we have are opinions, and nobody knows.  So I'd say let's give it a try, and a really good try.  If we decide to give up, on the other hand, we have to be very, very careful to examine our motivation, in case it's really a form of expedience (not necessarily personal, but possibly over short-term issues in the economy.)

If you take away the management of money away from the state, who do you task to do this? In any organization, private or public, corruption and theft are present. We are dealing with human greed and a lust for power and control. Bitcoin kind of solve that problem with the protocol restrictions and the consensus and public participation, but the developers in charge is still the weak points. < These people can still be bribed and influenced >

What solution are you putting on the table to take out the human element out of this? 

Well yes but the problem with that is the storing of cash and/or gold. But let us talk about gold for this purpose because paper money is nothing more like an IOU that is entrusted banks promising us that it has the said value.

But anyway back to gold. As you said gold is free from counterparty risk but how are you going to store it? You also cannot carry it around with you all the time. This is where the genius of satoshi comes in. Thru technology he knew he can create a new asset that is free of counter party risk, totally controlled by the user and the transactions can also be verified by the users themselves.

If you're referring to taking responsibility for your life under a true market economy, all I can say is, you can't force people to do anything -- all you can do is vote for a system with the right incentives (which also, BTW, protect people who do live responsibly.)

If you're referring to taking the civic responsibility to protect the public against powerful insiders, having state-free money would precisely make it unnecessary to keep track of what the elites are up to, every minute.  I'm convinced that, if there is any involvement with money by the state, the elites will eventually make things complicated enough that the public can't figure out what they're up to, regardless of how educated the public are, and what system we start with.