Comments on: A Colossal Failure Of Governance: The Reappointment of Ben Bernanke

By: Barni

Barni — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 18:03:34 +0000

The republic was created by Plato in angered reaction to Greek democrats forcing Socrates to suicide with hemlock because Socrates refused to recant the statement that “Not all government positions should be elected, some need to be appointed because they require skills not necessarily available through general elections.”
As a result Plato created the republic to be the antithesis of democracy, everything a republic is a democracy is not and vice versa.
A republic is run by elites while a democracy is run by the majority of citizens who vote. It is impossible to have a democratic republic – run by wealthy elites and the majority of common voters at the same time. It is either one or the other!
America is a republic which has a lot of votes but the national political system is designed to be stalemated. If government is vacant or stalemated, who wins? The wealthy or the middle class & poor? Wealthy elites win of course. America is set up to be run by wealthy elites not a majority voters through elected officials.
So Bernanke’s reappointment is not a colossal failure of government; it is the American political system doing what it was designed to do – serve the interests of the wealthy elite minority while ignoring the needs and interests of the working class majority!
With the exception of the 30′s to the 80′s – and only as a result of the total economic failure of the conservative political agenda – America has had very little or no regulation, no restriction on greed, and powerless politicians incapable of building a framework of social and personal morality.
Moral is when you know what it is and do it.
Immoral is when you know what it is and don’t do it.
Amoral is when you never consider morals in the first place!
There is not a single human or social value or moral which can be expressed in terms of dollars.
This means that any system in which the final and deciding value before action is dollars, is by definition amoral.
The additional problem is that the costs of implementing social and human morals CAN be expressed in terms of dollars; while the benefits CANNOT directly be expressed in dollars. Conservatives know the cost of social and human morals and can see few or no dollar benefits – they know the cost of everything and the social moral value of nothing.
Government is the only vehicle through which moral values can be expressed in society because private enterprise is defined by and profit/loss is expressed by dollars!
Only through government can social good or human values override the total dictatorship of dollar costs. This is why conservatives & Republicans detest democratic government and do everything to control, frustrate, shrink and kill democratic government.
If government was so ineffective why would Republicans, conservatives and corporations spend hundreds of millions of dollars to corrupt and destroy it? If government was really ineffective if done correctly the wealthy elites wouldn’t spend a dime on politics or politicians!
That government done correctly can prevent the dictatorship of wealthy elites and the creation of only one value – dollars – is the reason the wealthy part with hundred of millions each year to prevent, impoverish and pervert democratic government!

By: doc4096

doc4096 — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 14:14:54 +0000

In a country with an estimated 312 million residents, why is it that the same names have reappeared over and over again for the past three decades, individuals that continue to promote policies that have contributed to the creation of a 3.8 trillion dollar budget complete with a 1.56 trillion dollar deficit. Are you telling me that there are no new ideas or persons available that can inject some innovative solutions to this catastrophe that my children and possibly grandchildren will NEVER be able to pay down. If there are no apparent heirs to these positions, what happens when they ultimately retire or pass away?

By: Chirs Beber

Chirs Beber — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 00:20:10 +0000

Noone mentioned the elephant in the room…..the Marxist(5th Plank) PRIVATE “Federal” Reserve Bank and its PRINTING PRESS Weimar-like FIAT paper “dollars”.

Having CONGRESS(that CREATED the GOVERNMENT-backed MONOPOLY) rescind its vote of 1913 and replace it with..

NOTHING ie follow the Constitution.

THAT is the solution…NOT the “meet the new boss-same as the old boss!” shuffling deckchairs “new’ leader to “fix” the socialist quagmire.

The same old Rockefeller/Goldman Sachs One World regimenting will NOT do.

Stop being a “hacker”…be a ROOT STRIKER!

Thoreau said…
“There are a thousand flailing away and hacking at the branches of the tree of tyranny for one who is striking at the root.”

Urge your Representative to abide by his/her OATH to Honor and OBEY the rules ie THE CONSTITUTION.

By: MAK

MAK — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 15:51:01 +0000

Agreed. This is the Depession its just that everything hasn’t yet hit the fan

By: fred

fred — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 14:24:10 +0000

Read this quote from Simon Johnson: Sunday, April 5, 2009

“If he succeeds in restarting growth while avoiding high inflation, Bernanke may well become the most revered economist in modern history. But for the moment, he is operating in uncharted territory. ”

Seems like growth is bank, Johnson.
Johnson, how do you have any credibility now, in saying that its a colossal failure to reappoint him? Seems you’re just trying to get noticed, screeching at the top of your voice and ride on populism, its pathtetic.

By: fred

fred — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 14:15:18 +0000

What a bunch of rubbish, I can’t believe you are a professor at MIT Mr. Johnson. You clearly are an angry man, but I yet to have read a sensible argument coming from you. What’s your argument against Bernanke – that the supporters of Greenspan were wrong ? Sounds like something from Kindergarten to me. What a waste of time.

By: Sid Finster

Sid Finster — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 10:38:09 +0000

aRE YOU A cOMMUNIST? wHY DO YOU HATE aMERICA?!?

By: Namazu

Namazu — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 14:11:57 +0000

I’m trying to square this eminently sensible argument with your foolish suggestion of Paul Krugman as an alternative, and it keeps coming up a circle.

By: new kid here...

new kid here... — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 02:31:38 +0000

To understand it all watch and read these….
The Committee of 300

Watch:
http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/esp_sociopol_committee300_13.ht

The story of the Committee of 300 300
http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/esp_sociopol_committee300.htm

To learn more….watch this….

http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/esp_sociopol_committee300_12.htm

To learn more…..watch this…..

http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/esp_sociopol_911_68.htm

By: Petros

Petros — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 18:30:36 +0000

AJ, there you go again with that First, Second thing, LOL

By: Petros

Petros — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 18:20:07 +0000

Listen and learn sonny boy…
http://www.viewip.net/WMI/Hearing/2010-01-28/

By: eyore

eyore — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 13:43:49 +0000

Well said. Helicopter Ben along with Greenspan is the architect of this crisis. His foolish PhD thesis about the great depression has permitted (because we can avoid depression through the printing press, duh) the financial elite to recreate the same conditions.

I have dubbed this crisis the Great Impoverishment. It is bigger in size than the Great Depression. By arresting the liquidation of bad assets and propping up and officializing the too big to fail financial institutions, we have avoided the immediate depression but the underlying issues remain unaddressed. Worse, we have torn the heart out of the principles that made America great; gone is the freedom to succeed, since it cannot logically exist without the freedom to fail.

There will be no recovery from this crisis. We will lurch from crisis to crisis, destroying and consuming what is left. Through inflation or through deflation and probably episodes of both, our standard of living will decline. The middle class will be decimated and society will devolve towards the 3rd world structure of super rich elite and the masses.

Worse yet, I am not aware of any historical precedent of this magnitude that did not lead to the W word. It is truly a horrifying prospect. Yet it also seems a fitting conclusion to a crisis of this magnitude. These debt abominations do not dissipate and die over time. They can only be cured by currency destruction that makes the previous debt meaningless. Wars create the perfect backdrop for destroying currencies and taking/transfering wealth by fiat.

The worst is yet to come.

By: lambert strether

lambert strether — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 13:34:44 +0000

Johnson asks:

Have we really reached the situation where the Senate as a body and individual Senators – accomplished men and women, who stand on the shoulders of giants – must bow down before financial markets and high-ranking executives who are really just talking their book?

Simple answers to simple questions: Yes.

By: Redleg

Redleg — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 02:46:26 +0000

exactly

By: Redleg

Redleg — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 02:45:49 +0000

While it may be appropriate to be paranoid, there needs to be a whistleblower to get reform that will work. IOW not all people with connections to oligarchs are enemies – it is a herculean task to identify the ones that are trojan horses before they can do additional damage. But the most effective reforms will come from insiders (see Chester Arthur and civil service reform).