tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3100127470049325112024-03-10T00:36:08.132-08:00Tao JonesingDesperately Seeking the Way ForwardTao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comBlogger302125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-62084011413064765762018-10-09T10:56:00.000-07:002018-10-09T10:56:00.232-07:00Welcome, Justice X<br />
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">On
October 6, 2018, just a week after his “family and name” were “totally and
permanently destroyed” by “a calculated and political hit” undertaken as
“revenge on behalf of the Clintons,” the man formerly known as Judge Brett
Kavanaugh was sworn in as the 114<sup>th</sup> justice of the Supreme Court of
the United States.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Chief Justice John
Roberts administered the oath of office while Judge Kavanaugh’s miraculously
resurrected wife, Ashley, held the bible upon which her now nameless husband swore
his oath, their risen daughters, Liza and Margaret, looking on with pride as
their father ascended to his seat on the most powerful institution in American
politics.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Justice X had lost his name
and family, but he had achieved his dream.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>His accomplishment was deemed so momentous that all involved in the
original ceremony, save Chief Justice Roberts, who was replaced by his
understudy retired Justice Kennedy, reprised their roles only two days later, reenacting the event at
the White House before a partisan audience who the Unknown Justice thanked
profusely for elevating him to the pantheon of American jurisprudence.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">The
Clintons’ revenge was complete.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
Party of Personal Responsibility was no more.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-80394239191957405362014-10-21T21:56:00.002-07:002014-10-21T21:56:31.577-07:00How We Define One Another, Endlessly.No political philosophy, whether premised on rugged individualism or inexorable collectivism, can capture what it means to be human. Each of us defines who we are by those who surround us, whether through crass comparisons of us v. them, or through how we affect others, positively or negatively. And because we are constantly measuring ourselves using those who surround us, who are doing the same thing, who we are changing constantly. No Western political philosophy is capable of capturing this reality. It may be able to hold it bay, as neoliberalism does today, but at some point the differences between what is observed to what a political philosophy forces us to expect become so great that everything breaks.<br />
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Human beings do not experience life, they interpret it. They compare what they observe to what they expect, and react accordingly. You can control how a person interprets his life by controlling what he observes, what he expects, or (usually) both. Unfortunately, if you abuse that control, people are likely to doubt what they observe, what they expect, or (usually) both. That's how revolutions come about: people rise up to force the world to match the expectations that were forced upon them. While neoliberalism successfully avoids the "communistic fiction" of classical liberalism, it still requires fairness, that the game not be rigged, that anybody through hard work and good judgment can rise to the top.Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-5493433002408229072014-03-26T09:28:00.001-07:002014-03-26T09:28:56.195-07:00The Post-Ethical Society, or the Death of Shame<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">As I have previously discussed, my survey of the political philosophy of Plato and Aristotle has led me to conclude that both men were seeking to develop a perfect state that would be highly scalable and long-lasting (if not perpetual). They were trying to establish what I will call here a "Ruling Paradigm," a comprehensive structure for establishing and maintaining social order that could scale infinitely over time and space (within the limits imposed by the confines of the Earth, of course). Their approach was holistic and sought to embrace all aspects of life, public and private. With the exception of Plato's <i>Republic</i>, which was openly totalitarian, both men promoted the idea that the laws of the state should be explained to its citizens so as to persuade them that the laws were just. Further, both men seemed to agree that the purpose and guiding principle of the state is to maximize its citizens' happiness by helping them to lead a virtuous, ethical life. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The Ruling Paradigm of the "states" they proposed have three key features: founding myths, laws and ethics. All three of these features are found are in the first five books of the Hebrew Bible (aka the Torah and the Pentateuch), a fact which, along with other evidence has led me to conclude that the Torah was written as the basis of a Panhellenistic state applying the political philosophy of Plato and Aristotle. These three features have been the foundation of Western Civilization ever since, and may be found in Christianity (a Romanized version of the Greek "Abrahamic" state) and, more recently, in the Classical Liberalism (a secularized version of Christianity) that emerged from the Enlightenment and Protestant reforms and persisted until the mid-1980s.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Neoliberalism-- the current Ruling Paradigm of Western Civilization-- represents a major break from the past because it is wholly lacking in ethics. In their desire to eliminate the "communistic fiction" of Classical Liberalism, the founders of neoliberalism disappeared the Common Good and removed any discussion of ethics, which presupposes the right of the collective to judge the individual. While one could try to argue that the concept of "Liberty" that is a centerpiece of neoliberalism/libertarianism somehow provides a basis of an ethical code, but neoliberal "Liberty" is negative liberty, that is, liberty defined by the limits of state power, not as a positive liberty, which is an individual right. Neoliberal "Liberty" exists so long as there is an area in the individual's life in which he is free to decide without government compulstion. Not coincidentally, neoliberal liberty seems to be the flip-side of the neoliberal conception of the "free market." As long as the individual is free to choose among the goods offered him by the market, then he is fully enjoying "Liberty" according to neoliberals, regardless of what other oppression the government imposes upon him, even if that oppression takes the form of forcing to make a choice that he would not have to make absent government interference (e.g., Obamacare).
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The emergent result of the neoliberal experiment is what I am coming to think of as the "Post-Ethical Society," in part because of the deliberate exorcism of ethics from the Ruling Paradigm of neoliberalism, but mostly because of the hubris and venality openly displayed by the Ruling Elites who are able to hide their personal culpability behind the double-blind of the state and the corporation.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">A byproduct of the the Post-Ethical Society is, increasingly, what I call the "Death of Shame," which goes far beyond the hubris and venality of the Ruling Elites and increasingly infects our whole society in increasingly unexpected ways. The desire to be noticed-- Look at me!-- seems to trump everything. Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Tumblr, etc., are all designed to allow the individual to sell himself or herself to the free market for, well, free. But there is a cost: the loss of privacy and the loss of any sense of shame.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The good news is that the neoliberal Ruling Paradigm cannot last for much longer. The cracks are already starting to show themselves, and the secular equivalent of the Protestant Reformation is bound to happen, although it may still take decades for current efforts to metamorphisize into an effective reformation movement.</span></div>
Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-58857987296071668152014-03-09T23:55:00.000-07:002014-03-09T23:55:29.484-07:00Reinvent the Wheel Every Day. It's Good for Your Mental Health.I was recently accused, by a scholar I greatly admire, of "reinventing the wheel."<br />
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While I understand and appreciate his effort to reduce the burden of my sojourn, I was immensely proud that I had, in fact, reinvented the wheel. I did not know that this particular "wheel" actually existed, so the fact that my model of history, which is really a radical departure from current models, reproduced it independently makes me feel pretty darn good.<br />
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Finding your own way is worth it, and doing so may help to confirm that what others have found is, in fact, valid.Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-36553469392435435852014-02-25T00:21:00.001-08:002014-02-25T00:21:08.765-08:00Neoliberalism's Co-option of Postmodern Methodologies as Political-Economic TacticsRecently, I spent some time trying to understand so-called "Postmodernism." While many argue that Postmodernism is incapable of definition, that's only because the word "Postmodernism" itself became a pejorative term applied to anything viewed as contrary to conventional wisdom. If Marx were alive in the "Postmodern" era, he would have been falsely accused of being a Postmodernist.<br />
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Postmodernism is not a regime of word games, as some people seem to convince themselves it is. Rather, at the heart of Postmodernism lies the realization that our words ultimately fail us because the same words mean something different to different people. This is not to say that reality is subjective so much as it is to recognize that our ability to communicate objectively is hampered by the mismatch in understanding between the speaker and the listener. This kind of observation is often reduced to a kind of absurd abstraction that reality is somehow "linguistic," but, frankly, that is pure bullshit peddled either by ignorant assholes or opportunistic assholes.<br />
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What Postmodernism boils down to, at least in political philosophy, is a belief that "meta-narratives" are not possible because our language is incapable of conveying the same objective meaning to all who hear the meta-narrative. Postmodernist theory was developed to extract an understanding of the subjective filters unwittingly applied by speakers to their speech. Ultimately, this is the exercise in optimism, not pessimism, because Postmodernists would not have bothered to try to understand if they believed objective understanding to be impossible.<br />
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For me, Postmodernism ultimately is a misguided and failed attempt to apply Eastern Philosophy to Western Philosophy, an effort first undertaken by Heidegger. Eastern Philosophy and Western Philosophy are entirely incompatible in that the former posits that reality is dynamic unknowable (in a conscious manner) while the latter asserts that the Truth is static and ascertainable. There is no way to harmonize Dynamic Truth and Static Truth, and Postmodernism as a "discipline" proves that. Ultimately, Postmodernism failed to coalesce as a cohesive philosophy because its members did not understand this major disconnect in thinking, which allowed the enemies of Postmodernism to define Postmodernism in Western terms when the Postmodernists themselves could not. In sum, anybody asserting an alternative to "Conventional Wisdom" was branded a Postmodernist, even if the alternative itself was a "meta-narrative" and, therefore, anything but Postmodernist.<br />
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Enter Neoliberalism. I have discussed the "Double Truth" (or Double Lie) of Neoliberal doctrine. Neoliberals are, ultimately, Modern Realists, and they are masters at co-opting the political theory of others to advance their agenda. For example, Neoliberal guru Murray Rothbard openly advocated using Leninist tactics to drive the Neoliberal agenda. As the current establishment is Neoliberal, they have discovered ways to apply Postmodern analytics to protect the establishment rather than attack it. Postmodern tactics in the hands of the State amounts to agnotology, i.e., the deliberate creation of ignorance in the populace. This is really nothing new, as "Postmodernism" was well known in ancient Greece, when folks like Plato and Aristotle were the Frank Lutzes of their time.<br />
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The key to understanding the difference between a Postmodernist, a modernist and a Neoliberal bullshitter is that a Postmodernist rejects any "meta-narrative" while seeking to understand the social power-driven basis of current meta-narratives, the Modernist offers his own alternative "meta-narrative," and the Neoliberal bullshitter shrugs his shoulders and insists that we can't know anything until everybody agrees (while studiously disagreeing, even when his position is untenable). If you apply this understanding, you will quickly find that a great many people accused of being Postmodernists are actually true blue Modernists while Neoliberals are just opportunists who manufacture dissent and consent at will, as befits their Modern Realist roots.<br />
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<br />Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-79393596873476445472014-02-10T07:08:00.002-08:002014-02-10T07:08:25.898-08:00Not a Currency.Currencies don't <a href="http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-02-10/bitcoin-flash-crashes-drops-80-seconds" target="_blank">"flash crash."</a><br />
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<br />Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-61890802545041495582013-11-07T22:30:00.001-08:002013-11-07T22:30:13.269-08:00Of Two Minds, Both Not All That PerceptiveCharles Hugh Smith posits: "<a href="http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2013/11/could-bitcoin-or-equivalent-become.html" target="_blank"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20.984375px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">Could a non-state issued digital currency like Bitcoin become a global reserve currency</span><b style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20.984375px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify;">?</b></a>"<br />
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Seriously? Really?<br />
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The answer is no. Next.<br />
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First, Bitcoin is no more a digital "currency" than a share of Apple stock. Like any (in)security, Bitcoin is a bet that people swap for value. Nothing more. Nothing less.<br />
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Second, the powers that be will never allow anybody to control the Money Power that is theirs by right. This dictate is thousands of years old and won't be defied by Austrian Cargo Cultists like CHS. I wish you luck.<br />
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But useful idiots are useful. Unfortunately, CHS is most useful to the windmills he believes he tilts against.<br />
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<br />Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-54743165173389608972013-09-19T21:53:00.002-07:002016-03-22T23:46:56.637-07:00Sacrificing Clarity for Precision and Achieving Neither.A lesson I learned early on in my career as a lawyer is to sacrifice precision for clarity. This was, of course, contrary to what I learned as an electrical engineer, when precision was everything.<br />
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In my various endeavors-- whether the Project or IP reform-- I have encountered time and again a level of erudition and over-complexity that arrests my progress, if only because I wonder at what passes for wisdom for these obviously smart people who seem compelled to speak in tongues. <br />
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A part of me assumes they use ridiculous language to make it impossible for the layman to decipher what they're saying. Kind of like parents spelling out "D-I-V-O-R-C-E" around their kids. But I'm a grown ass man, and all I see is a little kid trying to pull one over on the real grown-ups.<br />
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Another part of me wants to argue that these people are enamored with language and use it because they can. In any event, as illustrated by Heidegger, the language they use prevents them from being understood or understandable to anyone, including themselves. They're simply lost in the wonder of their words.<br />
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I'm sure there's a third part of me that has another opinion, but I'm tired of trying to understand why intellectuals immobilize themselves with language that banishes their precious ideas to nowhere other than obscurity.<br />
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The only way your ideas will have the power you think they have is to "vulgarize" them. Aristotle and Plato understood this.Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-41424721409218174112013-07-08T20:19:00.002-07:002013-07-08T21:17:35.670-07:00Three Degrees of Equality. Three Degrees of Liberty.Many so-called conservatives insist on distinguishing between equality and liberty. They say that what makes them conservative is their belief that liberty trumps equality (which does not exist in nature, anyway). Conservatives also assert that what makes so-called liberals liberal is their alleged belief that equality trumps liberty.<br />
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While there is a certain truth in how conservatives characterize the differences between them and liberals, the distinction is, in fact, false. Liberty has no meaning if it is not an absolute. You either have liberty, or you do not. If it is possible for one citizen to have more liberty than another, than nobody truly enjoys liberty.</div>
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My take on the "conservative" Roberts Supreme Court is it sees three degrees (or axes) of equality, and it makes decisions regarding equality so as to curtail individual liberty. Specifically, the Roberts Court appears to recognize political equality, economic equality and social equality and seeks to eliminate the political and economic equality of ordinary citizens so as to eliminate their political and economic liberty. Social equality and social liberty are the only things left open for debate, and liberals and citizens alike take the bait and so fail to see that they are being robbed of any semblance of political or economic equality and liberty. <br />
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The equality and liberty that neoliberalism offers the masses is the equal opportunity to choose between the choices offered them. Free to choose indeed.<br />
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Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-55977493396016458532013-06-27T21:07:00.001-07:002013-06-27T21:07:31.211-07:00Leading a Significant Life v. Leading a Meaningful OneI had lunch with a friend today. He told me a story of how Bill Haslam, the current governor of Tennessee, decided to "commit" himself to "public service." Paraphrasing: Haslam decided he was a success but wanted to be significant.<br />
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Now, my friend related this story to me because I informed him of my desire to exit corporate life (and stay gone) and focus on making a difference.<br />
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My response was that there is a difference between being "significant" and being "meaningful." <br />
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Leading a significant life requires that others think you are important. It's all about ego.<br />
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Leading a meaningful life is not about ego. You can be meaningful to others without them even realizing it. Indeed, helping others to find their own way is the most significant thing you can do, and letting them take the credit for their own success is the only right thing to do. Their success is their own. You only helped them find their way.<br />
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May you lead a meaningful life and not a significant one.Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-49039470233090633922013-05-21T23:39:00.001-07:002013-05-21T23:39:26.683-07:00If We Don't Know How the Story Ends, How Do We Live On?CHS has a hard-on for "<a href="http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2013/05/present-shock-and-loss-of-history-and.html" target="_blank">narratives</a>." We needs us some narratives, or we're lost:<br />
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If the causal chains of history and narrative are disrupted, then how can anyone fashion a meaningful context for actions and narratives, and effectively frame problems and solutions? If everything is equally valid in a non-linear flood of data, then what roles can authenticity, experience and knowledge play in making sense of our world?</blockquote>
The reality is that narratives are the beginning of the end, the cause of all conflicts that prove the theory of entropy. Our demand to force reality to fit our narrative is precisely what creates all the strife and suffering in the world.<br />
<br />Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-5929328865050917902013-05-14T21:23:00.001-07:002013-05-15T06:51:31.288-07:00Shorter CHS: BOHICA<a href="http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2013/05/a-brief-history-of-cycles-and-time-part.html" target="_blank">Bend Over</a>. <a href="http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2013/05/a-brief-history-of-cycles-and-time-part_13.html" target="_blank">Here It Comes Again</a>.<br />
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I have a huge problem with the "Fourth Turning" argument. I think it is nonsense, primarily because it is rife with cognitive biases and unrecognized anachronisms that neutralize any real insight into the patterns of history, which patterns I cannot, and therefore do not, deny. The problem is that Fourth Turners appear to have no real understanding of history so the patterns they see don't mean what they think they mean, if they are even there (or meaningful, if they are there).<br />
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On the bright side, Fourth Turning fatalists/nihilists have found a reason to live, i.e, to preserve themselves and their loved ones. That's better than just sitting there and whining. It is also better than standing on a street corner preaching to strangers that the end of the world is near. Not much better, but better. To his credit, Eric A. admits that such preaching is useless and, thus, he and other Fourth Turning nihilists save us all from that kind of embarrassment.<br />
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<br />Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-80254725251732552772013-05-06T19:55:00.001-07:002013-05-06T19:55:07.677-07:00What Should Be Obvious Is There Is No MarketFree thinker Charles Hugh Smith asks <a href="http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2013/05/what-is-obvious-about-this-market.html" target="_blank">"What Is Obvious About This Market?"</a><br />
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He then goes on to say everything an Austrian-inspired person can be expected to say. Indeed, several other members of the Austrian "cargo cult" said much the same thing on the same day, on the same sites. Central banks are blowing bubbles that have caused a "disconnect between the real economy and the stock market [that] is widening [and] obvious."<br />
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The problem with laying everything at the feet of central banks is that doing so ignores how private actions have completely destroyed any semblance of a "market" in the so-called stock market. Between dark pools and HFT, there is no possibility of price discovery and, hence, no market. The relatively small positions of retail investors that are traded out in the open of "light pools" such as the NYSE are used as a proxy to set the prices of secret trades in dark pools, and if the retail investor gets weak-kneed, HFT can be counted on to supply the illusion of demand to prop up the proxy pricing.<br />
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Private parties are using dark pools and HFT to create and enforce the decoupling between the "market" and the "real economy," and there is little chance of a true collapse of the stock market unless and until there is a true solvency crisis of a major player.<br />
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<br />Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-75163503501577434492013-04-25T03:18:00.000-07:002013-04-25T03:18:03.912-07:00Knowing Trumps ThinkingOnce you know, there is no need to think. But once you stop thinking, you are trapped in another's truth. The only way to escape is to start thinking, but where will that lead you? Safer to know.Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-91945179637907919482013-04-16T21:55:00.001-07:002013-04-16T21:55:31.099-07:00The Correct ResponseThe correct response to the bombing of the Boston Marathon is for more Americans, including me, to get off their fat asses and start running marathons.<br />
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I have grown tired of both the calls for less "bomb control" (among other things) and more "security measures" (that don't make us safer but make us less free).<br />
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Run towards the danger and demonstrate you are not afraid. Inspire the cognitive dissonance of terrorists who will be left with nothing to do as a result of inspiring the opposite of their intended result.<br />
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Seriously. After a decade of this kind of "debate," shouldn't we "get it" by now?Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-29515170405499557822013-04-03T21:58:00.001-07:002013-04-03T21:58:36.942-07:00Rent = UsuryThere is a species of Christianist out there in the world who seeks to differentiate between Christianity and Judaism by focusing on the fact that Judaism does not have a blanket prohibition against usury. To be fair, these days, neither does Christianity. But once Christianity had what I call a "soft ban" against usury in that it allowed the lending of money at interest, just not by Christians. Of course, that is utter hypocrisy, and the fact that anybody today seeks to damn the Jews of today for a practice countenanced by Christian leaders of yesteryear is beyond my comprehension.<br />
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However, I am not in a position to contravene creed-on-creed crime. There is just too much hate there for anybody to reason with.<br />
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Instead, I'd rather posit that the concept of "usury" reaches far beyond the charging of interest for loans of money but includes the charging of interest for the loan of any of Polanyi's false commodities: money, property and labor. Rent is usury. As are the wages that most employers are willing to pay their workers.<br />
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Anything that works to make the debt-money vortex siphon value from the bottom upwards is usury. This includes things as innocuous as the corporate form, which privatizes profits while socializing the actual cost of those profits.Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-49636115663498494912013-03-11T22:13:00.003-07:002013-03-12T22:36:31.487-07:00The Illusion of "Work Life Balance"The former CFO of Lehman Brothers recently <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/10/opinion/sunday/is-there-life-after-work.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0" target="_blank">bared her soul</a>. The reward for her good deed? Punishment.<br />
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A male journalist over at Business Insider decided to<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/erin-callan-work-life-balance-regrets-2013-3" target="_blank"> psychoanalyze Erin Callan</a>:<br />
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Callan hardly needs advice from me but I'll offer it anyway. She may want to consider that her lack of satisfaction with her life's direction is not a product of the choices she made. Instead, her choices may have been a product of her lack of satisfaction.<u> In my experience, the kind of people who can rise to the level she did at a relatively early age tend to be filling a hole in their psyche</u>, an indistinguishable yearning for something more that is experienced as a kind of pain. </blockquote>
It couldn't possibly be that the meaningless existence that Capitalism leaves us inevitably leads to nihilism for anybody with an ounce of idealism. No. The system is not defective, only the failed executive who cannot be happy at the top of that system is defective:<br />
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Look at Callan's life. She is obviously very ambitious and capable. Yet she describes her life as almost beyond her control. There are no words of happiness about the success she achieved. Instead, she says she wouldn't wish her life on anyone. And now that she is in a new phase of life, she is still filled with regret, worry and unsatisfied ambition. "We are still hoping," she writes. But she means striving, pushing, trying to escape the limits of the ordinary.</blockquote>
<strike>Fuck you, John Carney.</strike> Okay, that was harsh. Let me try it this way: what happens when you fight your way to the land of milk and honey only to find it a vast desert, a wasteland devoid of any real meaning or purpose?<br />
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The bad news for Erin Callan is that she is getting it from all sides. Emily Peck<strike>er</strike>, er, Peck, over at HuffPo <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/emily-peck/erin-callan-lehman-brothers_b_2854965.html" target="_blank">managed to find a feminist angle for attacking Ms. Callan</a>, snidely declaring:<br />
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You can add Callan's editorial to the "guilt pantheon" -- the legions of women who ascend to the top of their field only to tell you how badly they feel about it.</blockquote>
<strike>Fuck you, Emily Peck.</strike> Oops, too harsh again. Let me try it this way: the fact that Erin Callan happens to have a vagina does not mean that her sentiments about the work-life balance are hormonal or gender-specific. Peck, in trying to paint Callan as an anti-feminist attacking her own gender, actually demonstrates her own sexism, and she tries to play that off by demeaning Callan's femininity (or alleged lack thereof):<br />
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I'm miles away from the C-suite and also space exploration, but I have two very young kids at home and not that much guilt about spending most of my work day at my desk.</blockquote>
Ms. Peck changes the topic without realizing it. Callan's point was that she did not have a "work day" that was separate and distinct from her "life day." This is one of the things that frustrate me about many women who proclaim themselves to be feminists: they view work as a choice and have no conception of work as men understand it: life. But she can't help her ignorant snark:<br />
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I'm not defending anyone's decision to avoid spending time with their children. Personal decisions are just that: personal. However, in the wake of all the hubbub over Sandberg's book, the controversy of Yahoo's decision to ban working from home and the general excitement about how women (typically mothers) should feel about working, the time seems right to look a little closer at who is doing the hand-wringing about work-life balance.</blockquote>
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Is it too obvious of me to point out that it is almost never men?</blockquote>
First, as Callan makes clear, she has no children, but wants them. So, who are you talking to, Emily? <br />
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As to the observation that "successful" men don't complain about work-life balance, maybe that's because most men who make it to the C-suite don't have the self-awareness and/or balls to realize and admit they are not happy, usually because work is all a man is officially good for in this culture. Instead, such men tend to punish those around them for their unrecognized lack of . . . something . . .usually by using their position power to force their "lessers" pay homage to their magnificence. Such egotistical behavior is rampant in C-suites for a reason.<br />
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And those of us men who feel exactly like Callan have the good sense to realize that what we feel is better left unsaid because we will only be attacked as losers or self-loathers by haters that could never bring themselves to play what turns out to be a false, empty game, all the while revering that game because they never had the courage or skill to play it. <br />
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As a man who achieved the C-suite, I can say that Callan's analysis is spot-on and not gender-specific. I'd love to compare notes.Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-29043505605823866312013-03-06T21:02:00.001-08:002013-03-06T22:35:33.306-08:00Of Two Minds, Both EmptyToday, <a href="http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-look-at-us-taxes-and-hausers-law.html" target="_blank">CHS channels Austrian Cargo Cult dogma</a> and calls for a flat tax regime, blinded by the fact that <a href="http://taojonesing.blogspot.com/2010/10/complexity-and-what-it-means-to-what-we.html" target="_blank">tax policy is not really about collecting taxes</a> but about <a href="http://taojonesing.blogspot.com/2010/12/rethinking-function-of-taxation.html" target="_blank">allocating how savings and surplus are allocate between gambling</a> (i.e., "investing" in secondary financial markets) and entrepreneurship (i.e., directly investing in U.S. businesses).<br />
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That's the reason, Chuck, that income taxes collected don't change much as a percentage of GDP: taxes are more a means than an ends.</div>
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If you think you were the first to discover that obvious fact, you're wrong. <br />
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And, believe it or not, tax policy can actually improve GDP growth if it rewards domestic entrepreneurship and discourages the gambling known as "investing" in the secondary stock and bond markets. If, instead of encouraging domestic corporations to offshore profits through tax policy, you encourage them to invest profits domestically, you can get a great result. If you make it such that shifting operations overseas will cost corporations money, they won't do it.<br />
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Really sad.<br />
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Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-86233169171420763032013-03-03T22:05:00.000-08:002013-03-03T22:05:57.084-08:00Dave Grohl's Sound City ProjectI don't admire anybody. But sometimes I stare in wonder at what a person does, and I find more often than not that Dave Grohl's body of work leaves me with a sense of wonder.<br />
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The man LOVES music, and his definition of music is extremely broad.<br />
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Better yet, he makes music FUN, as it should be.<br />
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His latest music project is involves a bunch of new tracks with artists he worked with as part of his movie about Sound City, a now defunct recording studio. The movie is currently available for purchase pretty much everywhere, and a new album comes out this Tuesday. I already have the track with Paul McCartney, and I've heard the tracks with Corey Taylor (of Slipknot and Stone Sour) and Stevie Nicks, both of which are phenomenal.<br />
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Music is one of the few things that makes us human, that differentiates us from all the other automata out there. Music is our soul and our spirit and our joy. There is nothing we can do as human beings that is more rewarding or more profound than making music. <br />
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Even the most banal pop music can be a wonder, if you look at it properly. For example, imagine the Beatles' "I feel fine," which is a great pop song in its own right, told from <u>her</u> perspective, but as a blues song. I personally look forward to Sheryl Crow's "The Difficult Kind" recast as a hard rock power ballad told from <u>his</u> perspective. Take a song, speed it up or slow it down, arrange it differently with different instruments as an ode to a different genre of music, and you can discover a whole new world.Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-234284404576481152013-02-28T22:31:00.001-08:002013-02-28T22:31:35.746-08:00What Nino Scalia Really MeantMy first reaction to Antonin Scalia's claim that the Voting Rights Act is a "racial entitlement" was pretty much the same as the author of <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/closeread/2013/02/in-voting-rights-scalia-sees-a-racial-entitlement.html" target="_blank">this New Yorker article</a>.<br />
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While I continue to believe that Nino (as Scalia's friends call him) is a racist (for lack of a better word), that does not fully explain what he said.<br />
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How does requiring federal scrutiny of changes to voting laws in states that historically used their voting laws to prevent blacks from voting result in a "racial entitlement"?<br />
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Well, the only way you can solve this riddle is by recognizing that race is not the only variable at play in its equation. The other variable is class.<br />
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So what Unka Nino actually meant was that there is no impediment to screwing poor white people out of their vote in states that don't have a history discriminating against racial minorities. Screwing poor people out of their vote is the real goal, and the Voting Rights Act makes that harder to do in states that have a history of screwing poor racial minorities out of their vote. But for the fact that the po' folk tend to be black in such states, they would-- and should-- be fair game.<br />
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So says Unka Nino.<br />
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<br />Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-3629873352018965902013-02-28T21:41:00.003-08:002013-02-28T21:41:27.208-08:00The Politics of Disimagination <a href="http://truth-out.org/news/item/14814-the-politics-of-disimagination-and-the-pathologies-of-power" target="_blank">This piece from Henry A.Giroux</a> is the kind of thing I instinctively find appealing. Thoughtful, insightful, aware.<br />
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But there is something very wrong with it. What?<br />
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The piece itself seems to be part of the "Disimagination Machine" Giroux bemoans. Giroux describes "that the politics of disimagination refers to images, and I would argue institutions, discourses, and other modes of representation, that undermine the capacity of individuals to bear witness to a different and critical sense of remembering, agency, ethics and collective resistance." And what is Giroux's solution to this problem?<br />
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Against the politics of disimagination, progressives, workers, educators, young people and others need to develop a a new language of radical reform and create new public spheres that provide the pedagogical conditions for critical thought, dialogue and thoughtful deliberation. At stake here is a notion of pedagogy that both informs the mind and creates the conditions for modes of agency that are critical, informed, engaged and socially responsible. The radical imagination can be nurtured around the merging of critique and hope, the capacity to connect private troubles with broader social considerations, and the production of alternative formative cultures that provide the precondition for political engagement and for energizing democratic movements for social change - movements willing to think beyond isolated struggles and the limits of a savage global capitalism.</blockquote>
Giroux sees the many problems of the current system, but he places the blame at the rulers of that system instead of the system itself. And he assumes that if we just educate people and teach them how to think critically, we will somehow overcome the inherent nature of the system and find Nirvana. Talk about a lack of imagination! <br />
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You can lead a person to knowledge, but you can't make him think. Giroux simultaneously demonstrates and ignores this sad fact.Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-16065756913161484182013-02-25T20:51:00.001-08:002013-02-25T21:47:36.520-08:00Three Blogs, Three Takes on "Being"Contrary to the assumptions of Western Thought, "Being" is a process, not a state. We can only change what it means "to be" if we change the inputs to that process.<br />
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<a href="http://thdrussell.blogspot.com/2013/02/technological-unemployment-genuine.html" target="_blank">Toby gets this</a>. By changing how we think about value in society, we can change the magnitude and direction of the output of the process that is Being. Note: "Being" can only be measured by a vector, not by a scalar.</div>
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<a href="http://attempter.wordpress.com/2013/02/25/an-example-of-the-corporate-secession-of-power/" target="_blank">Russ gets this, too</a>. By taking responsibility for our own power, we can take it back and, thereby, change the magnitude and direction of the output of the process that is Being.</div>
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<a href="http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2013/02/what-if-obamacare-too-big-to-fail-banks.html" target="_blank">CHS does not get this</a>. CHS concentrates on the "right size of units" of Capitalism. i.e., its state as quantified by a scalar, while ignoring that the process of Capitalism, which he champions, is inherently violent to competition and actually demands "one firm (ring) to rule them all." In other words, the magnitude and direction of Capitalism is inherently the centralized power that CHS claims to abhor. CHS clearly blinds himself to the process of Being, just as we are all encouraged to do by Western Thought. As a result, CHS champions Capitalism while he demands something that is not Capitalism. The term "useful idiot" comes to mind, and for that I apologize to CHS, who seems to be a genuine "good guy" (like so many other commentators I like and respect but disagree with, e.g., Krugman, Yves, Bill Black, etc.).<br />
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Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-72445280837239162682013-02-03T22:51:00.001-08:002013-02-03T22:51:38.603-08:00Survival of the Fittest ConspiracySocial Darwinism is a lie. No individual, regardless of his or her worth, can hope to compete against a conspiracy. Indeed, the concept of Social Darwinism is a conspiracy that has enticed many an individual who is/was otherwise not self-aware.<br />
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The social power of any individual is determined not by his or her personal evolved state but by the deference of others. The power you wield is entirely a function of the power others yield to you. Without the collective, the individual is nothing.<br />
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Chew on that.Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-33744239897280010542013-01-31T23:12:00.002-08:002013-01-31T23:12:23.849-08:00Capitalism without Consumption = CollapseMarx got the description mostly right and the prescription mostly wrong. The proletariat's power was never physical and ever economic. If the proletariat stops consuming what the bourgeoisie peddles, the bourgeoisie will cease to exist (at least as presently constituted).<br />
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<br />Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-310012747004932511.post-16149481455445433352013-01-23T19:07:00.001-08:002013-01-23T19:07:56.359-08:00Jim Quinn Demonstrates My PointThe more words you use to make a point, the more likely you are to prove you are a fool.<br />
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In<a href="http://www.theburningplatform.com/?p=47568" target="_blank"> a recent and typically long-winded post</a>, Jim uses a lot of data and graphs to make many otherwise valid points. Unfortunately, he does not understand what those data and graphs actually mean-- and that they don't actually support his arguments-- thus undermining (destroying) his credibility (at least with me).<br />
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For example, Jim uses<a href="http://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/2013/01/if-you-remember-nothing-else-about.html" target="_blank"> the same exact data and graph</a> that prompted<a href="http://taojonesing.blogspot.com/2013/01/be-wary-of-government-statistics.html" target="_blank"> my post here</a> to argue:<br />
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A country that allows bankers to syphon off 35% of all the profits in the country without producing any benefits to society is destined to fail, with the dire consequences that follow.</blockquote>
But so-callled "Domestic Corporate Profits" are actually <u style="font-weight: bold;">NOT</u> generated "in the country." In fact, there is no way to correlate these so-called "Domestic Corporate Profits" with the U.S. economy. My best guess is that substantially <b><u>ALL </u></b>of the profits indicated by data and graph were generated and continue to be held outside of the U.S.<br />
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<br />Tao Jonesinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10041034009270339963noreply@blogger.com