South Asian Socialism

#185 by SR on May 16, 2006 4:27pm PT

{On the floor of the United States House, the Republican Representative from the 14th Congressional District in Texas,.....}

FYI....Congressman Ron Paul is more a Libertarian than Republican.

Respectfully submitted,

Hey, where is Hamid?

Thank you, Pardesi, for such an eloquent post. Yes, this is exactly how I feel. As for the poor capitalist (oxymoron), he is being shafted by the whole executive management teams. Yes, there are probably over 75,000 corporations on NYSE, NASDAQ, and all the other boards in the world.

But, the individual innovator, whose company has been taken over by these office politicos, has lost. Anybody rememer LOTUS, and how MS stole that and created Excel. Office mafias are just that they steal.

HP, you are totally wrong. It was the MLK march that created some degree of minority rights and participation in the economic system. Actually, the opportunity is there for all of us to take care of our individual needs, and I am not ranting about that.

What I am ranting is that corporatists has always been Johnny come late to the party. As Pardesi suggests in his post, it is the American people, and when they say enough is enough, then these corporatists @ss are on fire.

One specific example is this new immigration issue that is being discussed in the country. Washington politicians are talking about blah, blah, blah. I have yet to meet a single white anglo, who votes, to be for amnesty. And heck, I live in the most liberal city of my state. So what are these politicians talking about. If they are not Steve Forbes` mouth piece and his coporatist blow horn magazine, then what else is there? Who supports poor mexicans at less than human wages, but the MNC of Monsato or ADM?

Yes, maybe we will end into another kind of debate, but individuals, and only individual`s capitalism is good for the world, and corporatists are the evil (using, my favorite GW`s vocabulary).

Management by the nature of its structure can not collectively be good for the investor. This is basic MBA 101.

Enjoy reading my rants,

Respectfully submitted,

Re: # 186

``But, the individual innovator, whose company has been taken over by these office politicos, has lost. Anybody rememer LOTUS, and how MS stole that and created Excel. Office mafias are just that they steal. ``

Sadly, history starts with your memory... VisiCalc started it all.... LOTUS won... EXCEL prevailed. It is all part of the game. There were predecessor to Einstein`s theory of relativity too, on which he developed his thought process. IBM was not the first to come with computers either.... do you know who was the first?

The rule is if you want name, as you do.... then ensure to choose the right fight .... in street fighter`s lingo...

Digital Reasearch (DR)... no one hears... Microsoft everyone.... IBM went to DR for the operating system... DR founder and his wife chose hang gliding that day... the rest is history... is that how you want to be?

Anil

Re: # 189 Anil {``... IBM went to DR for the operating system... DR founder and his wife chose hang gliding that day... the rest is history... ``}

Not that it really matters, but it wasn`t hang gliding or golf that got in the way of the critical meeting between the DR and IBM top dogs. He had taken the afternoon off and was flying his small plane -- having fun. I head it from the horse`s mouth back in 1993.


#187 behram1 {``... Ron Paul is more a Libertarian than Republican. ...``}

His ideology is more Libertarian, yes, but he is very much a Republican party member and runs on the GOP ticket. This just proves that not all Texas Republicans are idiots or liars. Ron Paul seems to be at least one exception.

# 219 hamidm2 {``... so how do you propose we run GM and GE ?...``}

GE`s time may yet be further into the future, but I doubt if you`ll have to worry much longer for GM. The Japs or the Chinks or some other unsavory characters will have to worry about GM after it finally goes belly up and they buy up its rump for a nickle plus a dime. The bond holders (and other lenders) will be left holding the bag. The stock holders will join the club of MCI and KMT stock owners.

#162 zeemax`s THREE FICTIONS

ONE
{``... Fed doesn`t raise rates to attract investment into the US$. It raises rates to contain inflation and overheating of the economy...``}

TWO
{``...Fed fund rate is ... `neutral` ... in terms of inflation Vs growth at 4.5%. Further raises will go as far as ... 5.5% seems likely...``}


Inflation is always a monetary phenomenon and it is heating up. Even that highly distorted Consumer Price Index was up .6% in April or at a 7.3% annualized rate.

Will Bernanke raise rates again to offset inflation? -- no way, not with housing tipping over -- and now, the stock market!

THREE
{``... no sign of danger to the housing market. ...``}

If I`m to believe the charts, the story is that the housing boom is kaput -- it`s over. Please check out the daily charts of three of the biggest builders in the US -- the Ryland Group, Toll Brothers and Lennar Corp. You don`t have to be a ``technicals`` genius to be able to interpret what these three charts are saying. In a word, it`s ``top-out`` -- and I am not even a chartist, you are the one who trades on technicals.

At any rate, what these charts are telling us, I believe, will show up in the economy and in consumer spending before this year is out. And I think it`s going to be deflation of the housing boom in both prices and the number of new houses that will be built.

Here is your second chance to win that crate of Black Label. Though you were wise to not take my wager when we were arguing over the direction of the US Dollar and Gold, you might get lucky this time.

BTW, I hate to rub it in but the USD has since sunk further and Gold continues to head north, though there should be some (temporary) ``correction`` in the near future.

...SR

Re: # 224 by SR on May 17, 2006 5:11pm PT

{Will Bernanke raise rates again to offset inflation? -- no way, not with housing tipping over -- and now, the stock market! }

He has no choice but to continue raising interest rates pass the 6.0% level. He must crank it up a little more than the usual 0.25% rise, preferably 0.5% this time. He would not stop now without cooling down this inflation.

Bond prices should remain down until the fed stops raising interest rates.

Enjoy cash position or money market funds, or buy short term CDs stepping it up as interest rates continue to rise. Cash is king at 5%. Enjoy dividend paying stocks.

{And I think it`s going to be deflation of the housing boom in both prices and the number of new houses that will be built. }

Yes, I do agree. There are tough times ahead for the US economy in general. Lot of foreclosures in the housing markets, and finally individual capitalist should win.

Respectfully submitted,

The Empire and its Dollar Hegemony

On the floor of the United States House, the Republican Representative from the 14th Congressional District in Texas, always has interesting things to say whenever its his turn to speak. On February 25th he spoke about the Dollar Hegemony and the United States role as a modern day world Empire.

Following is an excerpt:

Though money developed naturally in the marketplace, as governments grew in power they assumed monopoly control over money. Sometimes governments succeeded in guaranteeing the quality and purity of gold, but in time governments learned to outspend their revenues. New or higher taxes always incurred the disapproval of the people, so it wasn’t long before Kings and Caesars learned how to inflate their currencies by reducing the amount of gold in each coin-- always hoping their subjects wouldn’t discover the fraud. But the people always did, and they strenuously objected.

This helped pressure leaders to seek more gold by conquering other nations. The people became accustomed to living beyond their means, and enjoyed the circuses and bread. Financing extravagances by conquering foreign lands seemed a logical alternative to working harder and producing more. Besides, conquering nations not only brought home gold, they brought home slaves as well. Taxing the people in conquered territories also provided an incentive to build empires. This system of government worked well for a while, but the moral decline of the people led to an unwillingness to produce for themselves. There was a limit to the number of countries that could be sacked for their wealth, and this always brought empires to an end. When gold no longer could be obtained, their military might crumbled. In those days those who held the gold truly wrote the rules and lived well.

That general rule has held fast throughout the ages. When gold was used, and the rules protected honest commerce, productive nations thrived. Whenever wealthy nations-- those with powerful armies and gold-- strived only for empire and easy fortunes to support welfare at home, those nations failed.

Today the principles are the same, but the process is quite different. Gold no longer is the currency of the realm; paper is. The truth now is: “He who prints the money makes the rules”-- at least for the time being. Although gold is not used, the goals are the same: compel foreign countries to produce and subsidize the country with military superiority and control over the monetary printing presses.

Several paragraphs later the Texas Republican goes on to add this:

In the short run, the issuer of a fiat reserve currency can accrue great economic benefits. In the long run, it poses a threat to the country issuing the world currency. In this case that’s the United States. As long as foreign countries take our dollars in return for real goods, we come out ahead. This is a benefit many in Congress fail to recognize, as they bash China for maintaining a positive trade balance with us. But this leads to a loss of manufacturing jobs to overseas markets, as we become more dependent on others and less self-sufficient. Foreign countries accumulate our dollars due to their high savings rates, and graciously loan them back to us at low interest rates to finance our excessive consumption.

It sounds like a great deal for everyone, except the time will come when our dollars-- due to their depreciation-- will be received less enthusiastically or even be rejected by foreign countries. That could create a whole new ballgame and force us to pay a price for living beyond our means and our production. The shift in sentiment regarding the dollar has already started, but the worst is yet to come.



The full text of his rather longish speach is posted at: THIS SITE

Agree with him or not, its an alternative perspective, that the loyalists could do well to consider.

...SR

Behram1, if it’s any consolation, John Bogle, founder of Vanguard, is on same wave length as you.

He is all over the place on the talk shows with his new book on how corporate chiefs are failing America. He was pretty convincing, at least to me. He said that corporate directors are not doing the job they are supposed to do – hold CEOs accountable. As we know, all these CEOs are on each other’s boards and therefore it has become almost like robbers’ club. He is asking fund managers to look after investors’ interests since 65% or so shares are now owned by institutions. After his life long campaign against fund managers’ over blown expenses, he is now on this new mission.

This internal American debate however, should not be cause of any satisfaction to those who either hate America or think it’s all over for USA. This country’s institutions work like automated feed back control system and they correct themselves. As people feel the pain, they will adjust their behavior, demand and force their leadership to act. We have huge number of problems (e.g., Medicare expenses, entitlement mentality, substandard public education, complex and unproductive tax system, overblown sense of global sheriff mentality) but the pain has not grown high enough yet. On the positive side - people regroup very quickly, they are fair to each other and they take their sense of responsibility to the world and each other very seriously.

Let’s wait; I have faith in American ingenuity.

Great debate between hamidm, HP and behram. I think you are all partly right (i.e. hamidm and HP in crediting corporations, behram in crediting individual innovators like Tesla), with behram coming closest to the truth (with some inaccuracy) I think when he writes: The luxury that the US corporatists had, is not because of their ingenuity. It was because of the American people and their system of governance. And they are mad as hell at the shenanigans of those corporatists.

I think the parts in bold above are correct - it is the cultural ethos of a people along with their system of governance that ultimately determines the overall productivity-level of a society. The rest of the italicized quotes from behram are not correct I think: of course US (and non-US) corporations have demonstrated tremendous ingenuity and literally moved the world economy from the agricultural stage to the industrial and the information age. And it is mere rhetoric to say that the American people are mad as hell at the shenanigans of the corporations.

Hope these two bits to this learned debate helps. :-)

hamidm writes <<< ...... let me tell you something about productivity .......... if us manufacturing productivity has gone up a 100% in the last 20 years it is because of guys like me and our clients, the ``corporatists`` who have invested billions of dollars in plant and equipment ........ >>>

A.Hs like you are responsible for lining their pockets out of what lawfully belongs to the workers working in mean conditions and going back home with a wage that has hardly kept pace with cost of living increases in the past 30 years. You are once again, in your dimwit fashion confusing productivity of individuals with aggregate nation wide data. Technology is a part of the increase but only a PART of it. We can look at productivity gains during the past 5 years alone when there has been a net loss of manufacturing jobs and conclude as I did. You and your ilk want to treat the workers as a cog in a machine in the Fredrick Taylor-esk Scientific Management mumbo jumbo while the coroprations make enormous profits on their backs and do not invest as much in their own workers as they do in speculative investment and consolidation to further increase their power and wealth, and behram sahib still thinks that the US political establishment will rescue us all when it was purchased as a consolidation move, run by corporate executives, long time back.

Behram,

There are more than 1000 US corporations with revenue over $1 Billion.
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune500/full_list/

You may not even have heard abt the last on the list.
1000 Regal-Beloit Rev 1,428.7

There are thousands others that do over $100 million every year.
You picked just a few. Not every citizen is a model citizen. But the overwhelming majority is decent and honest. Among the thousands and thousands of companies you find a few to malign all with a long brush.

“And heck, I am a Republican.”

What kind? There are plenty of views within the Republican Party.
I am a libertarian, if that means something to you.

“an individual Ken Lay of Enron could be a very nice person”

I never said anything abt what people were personally. I don’t know them personally too but you need to look at the overall culture and 90% of corporations provide a positive culture for growth. They help out in the community affairs and they actively promote minorities and their businesses. It may have started out as following the legislature or the regulations but now the whole thing is a part of the US corporate culture. And corporations are taking that abroad too by promoting equal opportunity and work place tolerance in countries where class and caste hierarchies are well entrenched.

Btw, majority of minority businesses are still at the low end. Some have come up and others are coming up fast. So your gripe abt discrimination is just that.

“What do we see with GM and their begging the American people to take over their benefit package? Do we not remeber Jimmy Carter`s bail out of Chrysler? Corporations are doomed to failure, albeit a slow death. And it is fashionable for people in the US to be against Walmart.”

Companies die because of bad business practices or they lose the ability to compete in the market for several reasons. Failures of a few companies or bailouts don’t mean a whole lot. Every year thousands of businesses die in the US and that has not stopped the other thousands to start new businesses. That is capitalism for you and the new breed of corporate leaders are taking the system to the new heights and making it more democratic.

Lee Iacocca turned the whole Chrysler around and he started out as a car salesman. Chrysler is still around and GM may go under or maybe bought out by some other corp. That is business for you. Companies are not going to close shops because GM is in loss or made bad decisions some thirty years ago.

Sorry Walmart is a bad citizen. They can’t use govt programs to subsidize their HR operations. They need to do what all major corporations do. Though they are changing and that is the sign of democracy in the corporate world.

“Nadirshaw Eduljee Dinshaw was a capitalists and all his contribution was taken away by the regime.”

Good man. College still bears his name. I think he was not even alive when NED was taken over. But these are just limited individual acts they can’t come near what corporations do. All major NGOs/Non profits are supported by the corporation and the scope of work is just gigantic.

Corporations are good for business and good for America. No one wants to work in sweatshops anymore. The kind they used to, when the families controlled wealth in the US.

#178 by behram1 on May 16, 2006 12:35pm PT


Expensive, as compared to his pay?


Umm..if costs go up because of SOX compliance, what`s more likely

1. CEO takes a pay cut
2. Cost is passed on to consumers.
3. Employees will see a smaller pay hike or some will get laid off..


the CEO has to acknowledge the accounting procedure that he submits to the shareholders. He has to validate whatever the heck he is saying. He must take responsibility of his job.


You clearly have not been involved in a SOX compliance exercise..It`s not the CEOs bitching about it..the CEO will just issue a decree demanding compliance because his bazillion stock options depend on compliance..It`s the average worker bee who has to deal with the crap..

If anything, the deloitte will give the CEO tickets to sporting events in exchange for them getting a SOX consulting gig...

re#174, #175
The disagreement b/w Zeemax and Arjun is probably due to
misunderstanding about billionaires in rupees vs billionaires in
US dollars???

I don`t see any one with Pak citizenship in Forbes list of some 750 billionaires.

Isn`t the world waiting for the colonialism & Imperialism of the United Satans of America to end?
Has Ibleeesi Bush not been invited to christianity by AhmediNedjad?

Where there is a murmur of a fall, the thunder is not far.
(Did they ever talk like this earlier?)

Decline and Fall of the American Empire

EDITOR`S NOTE: With laboratory job applications from Chinese American scientists at an all-time low, the future of U.S. weapons production hangs in the balance. Energy officials are busy trying to limit this fallout from the Wen Ho Lee controversy, but only Lee`s release from jail and an apology from the White House will rebuild trust from the Chinese American scientific community, says Pacific News Service commentator George Koo, a business consultant and a member of Committee of 100, a national organization of prominent Chinese Americans The Wen Ho Lee case could become the historical marker associated with the beginning of the decline of U.S. hegemony over the world. Some historians attribute the decline and fall of the Roman Empire to the introduction of lead utensils for use by the privileged class. While the resulting lead-induced sterility and lunacy was self-inflicted, at least it was out of ignorance
..continued (click above)

as Iqbal wrote so prophetically:``tuumharee tehzeeb, upnay khanjar sey, aap hee...``

facts from an alternate universe don`t count..

http://www.forbes.com/billionaires/

#172 by arjun_m

... there are no paki billionaires ...

Wrong. I know of at-least three. Asif Zardari, Humayun Akhtar, and Ejaz-ul-Haq. Check your facts pal!

Oak,

Re your query on the lost opportunity board, the merchandise exports in Feb 2006 were $1,274.7 million and imports $2,210.5 million. This does not include services which run a net deficit of around $500-600 million per month.

Page 24 on latest release of Balance of Payments:
http://www.sbp.org.pk/reports/stat_reviews/May06/Pakistan_Balance_of_Payment.pdf

Half yearly BOP 2005-06:
http://www.sbp.org.pk/ecodata/BOP_Summary.pdf