Or was it a test of how to shut down large parts of the Internet in case Egypt style revolution starts in USA and the government needs to shut down flow of the information?
Don't bother with this person, he is extremely biased, his views are that of a radical Marxist and he explained that he prefers the violent solution to the so called 'class war' problem.
His bias against Schiff and Austrian economics completely blinds him, he can look directly at evidence and completely ignore it if it doesn't correspond to his views.
Sure. USA, 19 century, capitalism and industrial revolution provided strong economic growth unhindered by too much government, it made the US economy to be top of the world in terms of production capacity, innovation, wealth. Over the 19 century USA became largest creditor nation. The century began with agricultural economy and ended with an industrial economy that allowed people to have all that wealth, which is not money (and US dollar went up in value over the 19 century by a factor of 2, while it lost 98% of its value after the Fed was created) but it is all the goods and services that the residents were enjoying. From indoor plumbing to washing and sewing machines, cars and first airplanes, electrical energy, radio, phones, telegraph, medicines, health insurance (started in 1850s and was actual insurance,) cheap access to medical professionals paid out of pocket and thus very competitive in price, cheap, plentiful and safe foods (thanks free market and refrigeration), cheap clothing, reduced child mortality (by 75% during the Industrial revolution), increased rights of women, who could finally stop being baby making machines for the large farmer families, etc.etc.etc.
You are not a patriot at all, you are a traitor to the idea on which the USA was funded. You are a traitor to the people, you chose the side of government and centralized power, you are against the economic freedoms, which are nearly the most important freedoms - freedoms to make living. Freedom of speech is great, but if you have no freedom of changing your own economic outcomes then you have nothing. Freedom of speech gives you ability to complain about this and not be persecuted but if you only have the power to complain and not do anything, because the system is subverted against you, against private enterprise, against making your own choices in the market, which means against you trading freely with other people without government intervention, then you have no freedoms at all. You can only be a subservient to the government, you can eat the porridge they serve you if they decide so while they can still borrow/print and while somebody still exchanges the fruits of their labor that go into that porridge for the counterfeit money, and all of thise passes for an economy until the moment that the gov't can no longer borrow and nobody wants to take those counterfeit reserve notes.
You are a traitor to the common people, who are hurt by the governments actions, which are on the course of currency destruction. You are a traitor to the common people, who need a working economy, which means it cannot be centrally ran economy and have everything people need.
On the topic of economy: the Austrian school has been dead right on every issue. Keynesians to economy are like astrologists to astronomy. They have nothing to offer at all except printing and spending, which is a way into bankruptcy and monetary collapse and an inflationary depression.
You assign moral values to economic principles for your own political reasons, all of which have been proven bankrupt time and time again with every revolution - when the revolutionary radicals destroyed the wealth of the nation by driving out the capital and investments and by creating the despotic regimes, all of which end up in bloody murders of tens of millions.
As I said, I used to view you as a Marxist ONLY before.
Now I see that you also have terrible personal qualities, which would make you a perfect killer in the name of 'revolution' and then you would force your own view of whatever you think justice is upon everybody who you can submit to your will and anybody who doesn't submit would be made an example of a 'counter-revolutionary' and be executed.
You are basically a common thug that could turn terrorist and then dictator if you were somehow close to the power should a revolution happen.
However your vision is blinded, you are a Marxist and a Keynesian and this prevents you from being able to see that this is not going to be the road of how the next crisis in USA unfolds. You are a blind, pathetic, selfish, destructive, narcissistic person and you won't get your wish.
no, you didn't hurt any feelings, you just put another line on the portrait and it's informative. You should be moderated 'informative' on your comments.
By the way, I went through that link you provided and I see enormous bias against him on that page. It's oozing through the page, everything, from concentrating on the loss of 2008 and not at all paying attention to the years 1998-2008, and then 2009 - now, when all of his investments were outperforming the market.
Even the silver market alone, silver went up from about $8 (point of entry for many) to about $30 now, so even on that single part of investment - where is this 40%-70% loss?
The gold is up from about 300 prior to 2000 to 1373 and it has gone over 1440 already. $100 dips on a day are common in bull markets in gold, but it eventually recovers.
That page was put together with extreme bias against Schiff, but it's OK, people on the 'mainstream' side are the ones putting that page together it looks like. A simple example is when they write about the Senate elections, where Schiff gont 23% in a 3 way run. It doesn't have any facts that are important, like the fact that Schiff was an unknown name before that Senate run, the fact that McMahon outspent him 40:1 easy, and the fact that Rob Simmons got out of the elections but then came back into it after it became too obvious that Schiff could win and the Republican establishment was trying to make sure he doesn't.
He is very popular, he is correct on the economy. The video in my sig shows the guy explain in vivid details the incoming collapse of the housing bubble during a 2006 meeting, where he explained the reasons behind the incoming collapse.
There are probably hundreds of videos with him where he explains what's coming and with these so called 'mainstream economists' laughing at him almost hysterically. He is accurate in his assessment of the economy, much more so than the gov't charlatans like Bernanke quotes - who has been constantly wrong, yet most would say that Bernanke is the person to listen to, while Schiff is 'fringe'. Well then, I prefer the 'fringe' in this case. The 'fringe' in this case has shown itself to be correct, has shown the understanding of the underlying fundamentals of economics.
Also your contention that Schiff is somehow there to get the 'poor' and to 'redistribute' their money to the rich is very offensive. You are normally wrong about things, but in this case you are also displaying your ugly sides. I used to see you only as a Marxist type, but now I also see you as a very unpleasant person.
Schiff is helping his clients who have very little capital to start with, and he is helping them to keep their money and to invest wisely so hopefully those will be the people with real money and real savings, so they will be able to invest once the US economy crashes (and it will) due to inflation/debt/deficit/government spending/regulations/laws/corruption. It is going to crash and the people investing with Schiff will be the ones in a position to restart investment into US economy when nobody else will be able to, as all their savings vanish.
You have displayed here probably the worst of yourself that I have ever observed so far.
Well, since you are asking the questions on/. and not on his blog, I'll answer for him, though you may want to call his show and directly challenge him, wouldn't that make much more sense?
Gold is in a 10 year bull market, or more precisely the US dollar is falling and falling, charts are here. US dollar is being printed out of existence, other currencies are misguidedly following this, of-course US dollar is the reserve, so many feel they have to. They really don't.
But what exactly is your question? Is gold NOT going up, did it NOT go up and up and up for the last 10 years at least? All the other commodities: sugar, cotton, pork, wheat, rice, oil, metals, etc.
When you call the guy who correctly predicted the Internet and the Housing bubbles and traded on that correctly to be 'fringe', while you consider others to be 'mainstream', then you are doing one thing: you are displaying that mainstream is ridiculous, stupid and most importantly: wrong.
How come most of your clients lost 40%-70% of their worth in 2008,
- I got out of commodities just before that particular event, it was a hunch. However the people with Schiff have been making money for 10 years prior to that and ever since the end of 2008 and they have recovered and made another 50% on top.
Now, can you point out a 'mainstream' economist who has been as right as Schiff for as long as Schiff? They don't exist. There is Jim Rogers, but he is on the same side Peter is on. There is Marc Faber, he certainly tries to make predictions that are a bit more specific in terms of timing.
Schiff is not interested in specifics of timing - that's what separates his advice from advice of speculators. He is an investment adviser.
Do you know the difference, or should I explain further?
Seriously, don't listen to this guy or anyone who tells you to listen to him, they are attempting to engage in class war against you and redistribute your hard earned wealth to themselves
- I am not sure if you are giving this 'advice' to me, but if you are, then keep it. How much of your purchasing power have you lost over the past 15 years? Want to compare to how much I gained? Don't do it, you'll lose. And I am not what you call 'rich'.
No, FDR caused the depression by spending money during a recession on various gov't projects, by running the printing presses and engaging in currency war, by borrowing and generally by mis-allocating resources from private sector, which needed to restructure the debt and capital and labor and instead it got more spending, which prevented the restructuring and mis-allocated the credit.
All of these mistakes are repeated at this time, were repeated by Clinton as well as by Bush and they are continued under Obama. If you think I am some sort of a Republican, you are wrong, I am only looking at it from point of view of real economics (and not Keynesian shamanism).
So when you say: Bush did this and that - clearly he did. But do not forget, he walked into the office just like Obama walked into the office, during the beginning of a new recession. So Bush lowered the interest rates further (amazingly enough there was still space to do so during Bush).
Also nobody should be thanking FDR for anything. Not only did he cause a depression, he also destroyed the rail road system in USA, which used to be the largest private, profitable rail road system in the world. He did it by taxing the airlines and subsidizing the construction of roads.
This eventually lead to destruction of rail roads in USA, made them quite unprofitable, made the airlines bleed and require gov't subsidies and subsidized the car industry and eventually subsidized further reliance on foreign oil (more cars, more roads) and pollution of environment and sprawl of the suburbia, which can't be good and can't be sustained unless it's subsidized, and no subsidies exist forever, they eventually dry out.
So when you say: Reagan lowered taxes and made it harder to maintain roads - well, that's exactly it. There shouldn't have been these roads where once private rail roads existed. If any roads should exist, it's the privately built roads, the kind that do not require government subsidy.
BTW., this is another reason why Obama's plan to build this 'high speed rail' (all American parts, all American labor, etc.) sounds so funny and ridiculous. It's not only that USA has no money (and it doesn't, and US gov't is broke,) but it's also funny because fate is definitely not without a sense of irony.
US gov't has destroyed profitable rail roads to build subsidized roads and make airlines unprofitable and cities spread around with all the problems related to that, and now gov't is saying that to fix the economy they are going to build railroads.
Well, imagine how expensive that's going to be, now that rail in USA is really not profitable, the industry is non-existent. Building it all in USA would be like for Mongolia to build their own space industry without looking at any existing solutions. It's like building it from scratch, and to what end?
The price on that rail road will be such, that nobody would be able to afford a ticket. So the tickets also will be subsidized.
But I am convinced US bond and dollar will collapse before Obama is done with his first term in the office, so US has no money now, it won't have any money at all then, so it's not going to happen unless gov't forces US citizens to be slave labor.
GS selling FB is nothing.
US Treasury selling bonds, States selling bonds, Municipalities selling bonds and Fed monetizing all that debt - THAT is going to make US dollar be 1:1 with Zimbabwe dollar (the way it used to be some time ago, when Zimbabwe dollar was actually worth something.)
Anyway, you may want to check out the link to the video in my signature, to see a real economist talk.
Ok. Clinton, and FDR are two people who came in power, who are left leaning, and who did not destroy the economy
- but your premise is wrong.
FDR and Clinton both did destroy economy.
FDR turned a Fed created recession into Great Depression.
Clinton had Robert Rubin remortgage US debt at low interest, allowing the gov't to spend much more than previously and during his administration the Internet bubble blew up, which prompted Greenspan to set interest rates at 1%, thus fueling the housing bubble (and during his administration the Freddie/Fannie requirement for percentage of 'affordable mortgages' was risen twice.)
Just wanted to note that your entire comment is based on a set of very false assumptions.
I am a self-convinced atheist and I am a libertarian. Liberal on social issues and anti-statist, anti-progressive but also anti-corporatist on the finances.
What I means is this:
Free Market is what people make, it's how people structure their economy.
Government is a strong force that destroys the free market by threat of violence.
OK, Ted and Rob are going to be waiting for you up there, ready to test your theory. The three of you will be able to do as many trials as it takes to get a pregnancy going.
Well, I am not surprised they haven't had any pregnancies yet in all male crews. They may want to try and bring a woman to the space ship before they reach their final conclusion though.
By the way, I listened to that Ted talk and here is my conclusion on it:
While the talk was entertaining, here is what I think about the conclusion: bleh.
So the solution is that more choice is bad and because more choice is problem of the affluent people, who live material lives, it means that these people need to DECREASE their affluence and material well being by what, government intervention? To which end? So that other people can get that money?
But aid to foreign poor people doesn't make those foreign poor people any wealthier. Capital investment makes people's economies grow and make the economies and societies more wealthy and more materially affluent, not charity.
Also isn't it quite funny, to be charitable for the reasons of being selfish, because being charitable in this case supposedly leads to being better off, since your own choices are decreased because you become less wealthy and materially affluent by giving up your stuff to others (making them more affluent and thus making them less happy by your own thesis.)
This is clearly a stupid idea, probably Marxist in nature and needs to be thrown to where it belongs - trash can.
A poor person can't afford to pay even a small percentage of his income for taxes; a wealthy person could easily afford to pay even a very large percentage.
- first, Mr. Robin Hood Marx, whatever somebody can or cannot afford doesn't give anybody the right to take it away.
Everybody is rich compared to somebody else. Should you be paying twice as much for all the goods/services as somebody who is making half your wages? Should you also be paying half for the goods/services as somebody who is making twice your wages?
If we don't discriminate on how much bread costs to a person based on his income, why do we discriminate how much government costs based on income?
I am saying: government costs too much. Especially government that decides economic outcomes for companies and people. That kind of government should not exist, it is immediately too costly to the economy - it immediately raises prices and those who are poor are hit hard because of food/energy/rent prices.
Of-course during the 19 century, when gov't was paid for by excise/luxury consumption/alcohol taxes, the poor had a very simple choice not to pay taxes: do not import things from other countries, do not drink alcohol. And this is FAIR because if you can't afford to pay taxes you have a very simple choice: do not CONSUME things that have taxes in them.
The same thing can be accomplished by tax refund based on means testing of-course, and this allows somebody to pay consumption taxes without giving up their FREEDOM of doing business, without having to tell the government every single thing they actually do to make their living.
On the other hand if you are poor and you can't afford to pay the taxes, you would then sacrifice this freedom, tell the government that you are poor by explaining what you do and how much you make and then the gov't would give you your tax refund. But you must keep the receipts or you get some average refund back.
It's more fair for everyone to pay an amount that is reasonable and which they personally can afford, even if this
- NO IT IS NOT. I completely disagree. Your definition of what's fair does not at all correspond to my definition to what's fair, so how is THAT fair if we have different definitions to go by YOURS and not by MINE?
It's UNFAIR I am telling you, UNFAIR AT ALL to tell somebody: you have to pay 2x for this bread. You have to pay 2x for this government. It's because you make whatever somebody decided was 'too much'.
So coming with this perspective, what would be the point of me arguing with you any further, when we have such completely different definitions of such simple ideas?
Oh, I very much doubt that. The heart of our economy in this country is the middle class, and small business.
- small business person is already and would be (under your definition of fairness) paying much more than somebody working 9-5.
And by the way, when I talk about business, I do not discriminate between 'small' and 'large' but I do discriminate between government sponsored and independent.
When it's government sponsored - it's a monopoly or at least it is protected and has fewer obstacles on its way in terms of competition. Gov't sponsorship removes competition, causes monopolization, destroys market, raises prices, hurts those 'poor' people you seem to be so fond of.
And yes, businesses, regardless of their size (as long as they are NOT government protected monopolies, that KILL competition by government regulations) do provide much more to the economy than any one particular individual. But the founder of the business is the person directly responsible for this and as the person directly responsible he/she is providing much more to the economy and society in total than any one 9-5 worker (and I use the term 9-5 loosely).
Also, there are ways of getting rich without contributing a damn thing. Or would you support a 100% inheri
Neither do a lot of economists. Practitioners of the dismal science never seem to come to much agreement about anything.
- only the Keynesian shamans don't get it. Look at the video in my signature for an example of a real economist. He ain't no Keynesian, that's true. The problem today is that Keynesians are all over the place and gov't loves them, because their 'solution' is what gov't loves: print more money.
I.E. you want government to be funded by the poor and the middle classes
- if it's about fairness for you, then the most fair thing is to tax everybody the same percentage wise. Why are those who create more wealth and make more money doing it are taxed more via this progressive ladder? It's unfair! They are already adding MORE to the economy than your average 9-5 worker. They are adding MUCH more - organization of capital and labor that the society obviously needs, otherwise they wouldn't be rich.
However note, that I do not think what US has now is fair from the get go, it's a huge gov't monopoly driven system, very corrupt and bails out failures and punishes savers, so this has been out of whack for a long time now, it must be reset. Gov't giving money to failing companies - nothing is fair or good about it.
Also realize that your real problem is that with current spending levels of gov't, it is impossible to fund it with income taxes at all, half of gov't spending comes out of debt given to USA by China etc.
Another point is though that today, US 'rich' already pay most of taxes. Taxes come to 50% for many, who have to pay highest brackets in federal, state, municipal, FICO, medicare, etc. This is before various consumption taxes, property taxes.
50% tax for 'rich' - is that fair? I don't think so. It should be no more than anybody else in terms of percentage rate. Are the 'rich' using many times the resources? More water or more air?
If they use more water then they are paying for it, right? Utilities. If they use more electricity - they are paying for it.
But what exactly more of are they using from governments that they must directly subsidize a bunch of poorer people?
Again, they are already providing products and services - which IS WEALTH of SOCIETY that society needs. They are working much longer hours, if they EVER forget about their jobs, and many people live and breath their businesses, it's not a 9-5 deal, that's the way to survive in competitive world.
The wealthy only consume a small proportion of their income, and you'd allow them to not only enjoy their wealth, but by freeing up the bulk of it from taxation, they can grow it further for their own benefit.
- If they INVEST IT instead of consuming it you are saying it is only for THEIR BENEFIT?
Do you understand the concept of investment? Investment is about profit. Profit does not come from nothing, it comes from society ENJOYING the products/services provided. Profit is the measuring stick for business success and that means that the more profit business is making (assuming this is not a government monopoly) the more wealth the business is creating for the society.
You fail to see that success of a business and profit from investment and underconsumption is what society profits more from than the person doing the investment in the first place - this person takes a RISK and society rips the reward IF he succeeds.
We've more or less been doing this in the US for several decades now, and if we continue, we will wind up without a middle class, without class mobility, and if those come to pass, hopefully a bloody revolution so that the wealthy can enjoy the terminal fruits of their, and your, agenda.
Personally, I'd just as soon avoid that end by avoiding its beginning, and by having a society without great wealth disparity.
- you are failing to see the forest for the trees. The culprits of your grievances are governments, not bus
One thing is investment, another thing is spending.
They are different, never mind what Obama/Biden are telling you.
Today USA borrows over 50% of the money it spends on CONSUMABLES. Military, SS, EI, Medicare, etc., over 50% of the money that is spent on those consumables does not come from taxes but comes out of debt bought by other nations and some private banks (though it looks lately that almost all US debt is now bought by either central banks or the Fed. Central banks - because they don't care about profit and they are desperate to keep US going for some reason. Fed - obviously it's completely subverted, it was supposed to take the punch bowl away from Congress years ago, it's totally failed on everything it does, from price stability to being independent.)
When you loan 50% for your consumption, you don't go deeper in debt to try and 'invest'. You CUT CONSUMPTION first. You cut consumption and give back some debt first, because you are in a position, where every single interest rate percent costs you 140billion a year, that's unsustainable.
In reality US gov't is in the same boat with US banks. All of these entities are bankrupt right now. What investment into infrastructure when you can be foreclosed upon any day?
The New Deal thing killed the railroads and airline profits in USA.
The railroads were torn down (before that, USA used to have more railroad than any other country in the world) and those railroads were profitable.
The airline industry was taxed to hell to build the roads (and also of-course there was debt and money printing).
Also after the roads were built, USA became very 'car friendly'. USA gov't subsidized its car manufacturers basically by building all those roads, but they have destroyed the rail and put airlines on gov't dole as well, as then the airlines became dependent on gov't subsidies to survive.
Also the building of the roads allowed the huge suburban areas to be built, and so lots of deforestation, lots of spread out and pollution due to cars driving huge distances to get anywhere - all thanks US gov't. This was pure gov't driven insanity, all under the guise of improving economy, while instead it prolonged the recession, which became the great depression, all thanks to gov't spending and mis-allocation of resources.
There are no projects that gov't should be involved in except defense of the nation, and US military budget needs to be cut by over 90% anyway.
That's why the gov't should stay out of all business. Taxing it or regulating or subsidizing it or protecting it or bailing it out or doing anything with it.
Economy is about people building products and services and exchanging what they built with other people for products services those other people built.
Gov't doesn't understand that, it thinks it can wave a magic wand and create a market or create a useful product or service. Gov't will tell you that it takes the profit motive out, so it's better.
Well if there is no profit then how would a business know that it's doing something market needs/likes/willing to pay for? Taking profit motive out = taking out the measuring stick for success.
Slashdot Mirror
Was it really done mistakenly?
Or was it a test of how to shut down large parts of the Internet in case Egypt style revolution starts in USA and the government needs to shut down flow of the information?
Does the adblock also block your sense of humor? Because they have a greasemonkey script for that condition.
Clearly it's just part of the plan to get more eyeballs on that ad.
So do you need the 500 or not?!
Don't bother with this person, he is extremely biased, his views are that of a radical Marxist and he explained that he prefers the violent solution to the so called 'class war' problem.
His bias against Schiff and Austrian economics completely blinds him, he can look directly at evidence and completely ignore it if it doesn't correspond to his views.
Sure. USA, 19 century, capitalism and industrial revolution provided strong economic growth unhindered by too much government, it made the US economy to be top of the world in terms of production capacity, innovation, wealth. Over the 19 century USA became largest creditor nation. The century began with agricultural economy and ended with an industrial economy that allowed people to have all that wealth, which is not money (and US dollar went up in value over the 19 century by a factor of 2, while it lost 98% of its value after the Fed was created) but it is all the goods and services that the residents were enjoying. From indoor plumbing to washing and sewing machines, cars and first airplanes, electrical energy, radio, phones, telegraph, medicines, health insurance (started in 1850s and was actual insurance,) cheap access to medical professionals paid out of pocket and thus very competitive in price, cheap, plentiful and safe foods (thanks free market and refrigeration), cheap clothing, reduced child mortality (by 75% during the Industrial revolution), increased rights of women, who could finally stop being baby making machines for the large farmer families, etc.etc.etc.
You are not a patriot at all, you are a traitor to the idea on which the USA was funded. You are a traitor to the people, you chose the side of government and centralized power, you are against the economic freedoms, which are nearly the most important freedoms - freedoms to make living. Freedom of speech is great, but if you have no freedom of changing your own economic outcomes then you have nothing. Freedom of speech gives you ability to complain about this and not be persecuted but if you only have the power to complain and not do anything, because the system is subverted against you, against private enterprise, against making your own choices in the market, which means against you trading freely with other people without government intervention, then you have no freedoms at all. You can only be a subservient to the government, you can eat the porridge they serve you if they decide so while they can still borrow/print and while somebody still exchanges the fruits of their labor that go into that porridge for the counterfeit money, and all of thise passes for an economy until the moment that the gov't can no longer borrow and nobody wants to take those counterfeit reserve notes.
You are a traitor to the common people, who are hurt by the governments actions, which are on the course of currency destruction. You are a traitor to the common people, who need a working economy, which means it cannot be centrally ran economy and have everything people need.
On the topic of economy: the Austrian school has been dead right on every issue. Keynesians to economy are like astrologists to astronomy. They have nothing to offer at all except printing and spending, which is a way into bankruptcy and monetary collapse and an inflationary depression.
You assign moral values to economic principles for your own political reasons, all of which have been proven bankrupt time and time again with every revolution - when the revolutionary radicals destroyed the wealth of the nation by driving out the capital and investments and by creating the despotic regimes, all of which end up in bloody murders of tens of millions.
As I said, I used to view you as a Marxist ONLY before.
Now I see that you also have terrible personal qualities, which would make you a perfect killer in the name of 'revolution' and then you would force your own view of whatever you think justice is upon everybody who you can submit to your will and anybody who doesn't submit would be made an example of a 'counter-revolutionary' and be executed.
You are basically a common thug that could turn terrorist and then dictator if you were somehow close to the power should a revolution happen.
However your vision is blinded, you are a Marxist and a Keynesian and this prevents you from being able to see that this is not going to be the road of how the next crisis in USA unfolds. You are a blind, pathetic, selfish, destructive, narcissistic person and you won't get your wish.
no, you didn't hurt any feelings, you just put another line on the portrait and it's informative. You should be moderated 'informative' on your comments.
By the way, I went through that link you provided and I see enormous bias against him on that page. It's oozing through the page, everything, from concentrating on the loss of 2008 and not at all paying attention to the years 1998-2008, and then 2009 - now, when all of his investments were outperforming the market.
Even the silver market alone, silver went up from about $8 (point of entry for many) to about $30 now, so even on that single part of investment - where is this 40%-70% loss?
The gold is up from about 300 prior to 2000 to 1373 and it has gone over 1440 already. $100 dips on a day are common in bull markets in gold, but it eventually recovers.
That page was put together with extreme bias against Schiff, but it's OK, people on the 'mainstream' side are the ones putting that page together it looks like. A simple example is when they write about the Senate elections, where Schiff gont 23% in a 3 way run. It doesn't have any facts that are important, like the fact that Schiff was an unknown name before that Senate run, the fact that McMahon outspent him 40:1 easy, and the fact that Rob Simmons got out of the elections but then came back into it after it became too obvious that Schiff could win and the Republican establishment was trying to make sure he doesn't.
He is very popular, he is correct on the economy. The video in my sig shows the guy explain in vivid details the incoming collapse of the housing bubble during a 2006 meeting, where he explained the reasons behind the incoming collapse.
There are probably hundreds of videos with him where he explains what's coming and with these so called 'mainstream economists' laughing at him almost hysterically. He is accurate in his assessment of the economy, much more so than the gov't charlatans like Bernanke quotes - who has been constantly wrong, yet most would say that Bernanke is the person to listen to, while Schiff is 'fringe'. Well then, I prefer the 'fringe' in this case. The 'fringe' in this case has shown itself to be correct, has shown the understanding of the underlying fundamentals of economics.
Also your contention that Schiff is somehow there to get the 'poor' and to 'redistribute' their money to the rich is very offensive. You are normally wrong about things, but in this case you are also displaying your ugly sides. I used to see you only as a Marxist type, but now I also see you as a very unpleasant person.
Schiff is helping his clients who have very little capital to start with, and he is helping them to keep their money and to invest wisely so hopefully those will be the people with real money and real savings, so they will be able to invest once the US economy crashes (and it will) due to inflation/debt/deficit/government spending/regulations/laws/corruption. It is going to crash and the people investing with Schiff will be the ones in a position to restart investment into US economy when nobody else will be able to, as all their savings vanish.
You have displayed here probably the worst of yourself that I have ever observed so far.
Well, since you are asking the questions on /. and not on his blog, I'll answer for him, though you may want to call his show and directly challenge him, wouldn't that make much more sense?
Where is the price of gold now Peter?
- http://www.kitco.com/ says:1373 in US dollars.
Gold is in a 10 year bull market, or more precisely the US dollar is falling and falling, charts are here. US dollar is being printed out of existence, other currencies are misguidedly following this, of-course US dollar is the reserve, so many feel they have to. They really don't.
But what exactly is your question? Is gold NOT going up, did it NOT go up and up and up for the last 10 years at least? All the other commodities: sugar, cotton, pork, wheat, rice, oil, metals, etc.
When you call the guy who correctly predicted the Internet and the Housing bubbles and traded on that correctly to be 'fringe', while you consider others to be 'mainstream', then you are doing one thing: you are displaying that mainstream is ridiculous, stupid and most importantly: wrong.
How come most of your clients lost 40%-70% of their worth in 2008,
- I got out of commodities just before that particular event, it was a hunch. However the people with Schiff have been making money for 10 years prior to that and ever since the end of 2008 and they have recovered and made another 50% on top.
Now, can you point out a 'mainstream' economist who has been as right as Schiff for as long as Schiff? They don't exist. There is Jim Rogers, but he is on the same side Peter is on. There is Marc Faber, he certainly tries to make predictions that are a bit more specific in terms of timing.
Schiff is not interested in specifics of timing - that's what separates his advice from advice of speculators. He is an investment adviser.
Do you know the difference, or should I explain further?
Seriously, don't listen to this guy or anyone who tells you to listen to him, they are attempting to engage in class war against you and redistribute your hard earned wealth to themselves
- I am not sure if you are giving this 'advice' to me, but if you are, then keep it. How much of your purchasing power have you lost over the past 15 years? Want to compare to how much I gained? Don't do it, you'll lose. And I am not what you call 'rich'.
No, FDR caused the depression by spending money during a recession on various gov't projects, by running the printing presses and engaging in currency war, by borrowing and generally by mis-allocating resources from private sector, which needed to restructure the debt and capital and labor and instead it got more spending, which prevented the restructuring and mis-allocated the credit.
All of these mistakes are repeated at this time, were repeated by Clinton as well as by Bush and they are continued under Obama. If you think I am some sort of a Republican, you are wrong, I am only looking at it from point of view of real economics (and not Keynesian shamanism).
So when you say: Bush did this and that - clearly he did. But do not forget, he walked into the office just like Obama walked into the office, during the beginning of a new recession. So Bush lowered the interest rates further (amazingly enough there was still space to do so during Bush).
Also nobody should be thanking FDR for anything. Not only did he cause a depression, he also destroyed the rail road system in USA, which used to be the largest private, profitable rail road system in the world. He did it by taxing the airlines and subsidizing the construction of roads.
This eventually lead to destruction of rail roads in USA, made them quite unprofitable, made the airlines bleed and require gov't subsidies and subsidized the car industry and eventually subsidized further reliance on foreign oil (more cars, more roads) and pollution of environment and sprawl of the suburbia, which can't be good and can't be sustained unless it's subsidized, and no subsidies exist forever, they eventually dry out.
So when you say: Reagan lowered taxes and made it harder to maintain roads - well, that's exactly it. There shouldn't have been these roads where once private rail roads existed. If any roads should exist, it's the privately built roads, the kind that do not require government subsidy.
BTW., this is another reason why Obama's plan to build this 'high speed rail' (all American parts, all American labor, etc.) sounds so funny and ridiculous. It's not only that USA has no money (and it doesn't, and US gov't is broke,) but it's also funny because fate is definitely not without a sense of irony.
US gov't has destroyed profitable rail roads to build subsidized roads and make airlines unprofitable and cities spread around with all the problems related to that, and now gov't is saying that to fix the economy they are going to build railroads.
Well, imagine how expensive that's going to be, now that rail in USA is really not profitable, the industry is non-existent. Building it all in USA would be like for Mongolia to build their own space industry without looking at any existing solutions. It's like building it from scratch, and to what end?
The price on that rail road will be such, that nobody would be able to afford a ticket. So the tickets also will be subsidized.
But I am convinced US bond and dollar will collapse before Obama is done with his first term in the office, so US has no money now, it won't have any money at all then, so it's not going to happen unless gov't forces US citizens to be slave labor.
GS selling FB is nothing.
US Treasury selling bonds, States selling bonds, Municipalities selling bonds and Fed monetizing all that debt - THAT is going to make US dollar be 1:1 with Zimbabwe dollar (the way it used to be some time ago, when Zimbabwe dollar was actually worth something.)
Anyway, you may want to check out the link to the video in my signature, to see a real economist talk.
Ok. Clinton, and FDR are two people who came in power, who are left leaning, and who did not destroy the economy
- but your premise is wrong.
FDR and Clinton both did destroy economy.
FDR turned a Fed created recession into Great Depression.
Clinton had Robert Rubin remortgage US debt at low interest, allowing the gov't to spend much more than previously and during his administration the Internet bubble blew up, which prompted Greenspan to set interest rates at 1%, thus fueling the housing bubble (and during his administration the Freddie/Fannie requirement for percentage of 'affordable mortgages' was risen twice.)
Just wanted to note that your entire comment is based on a set of very false assumptions.
I am a self-convinced atheist and I am a libertarian. Liberal on social issues and anti-statist, anti-progressive but also anti-corporatist on the finances.
What I means is this:
Free Market is what people make, it's how people structure their economy.
Government is a strong force that destroys the free market by threat of violence.
Free Market provides healthy, wealthy, free society.
Gov't destroys wealth, health and freedom of society.
Gov't does not equal society, gov't is a system that exists to serve itself, people who work for it.
Gov't is in business of stealing wealth from the free market produced wealth.
Gov't is in business of destroying capitalism and capitalism is savings and investment, and savings and investment is what makes free market work.
Unfortunately people choose gov't when they are presented with an option: hard choices vs easy choices.
OK, Ted and Rob are going to be waiting for you up there, ready to test your theory. The three of you will be able to do as many trials as it takes to get a pregnancy going.
Well, I am not surprised they haven't had any pregnancies yet in all male crews. They may want to try and bring a woman to the space ship before they reach their final conclusion though.
the link I attached was to comments for a video about some of those ideas.
my comments on Chomsky - if you care to read, it's obvious romanmir01. I don't have anything good to say about his ideas.
By the way, I listened to that Ted talk and here is my conclusion on it:
While the talk was entertaining, here is what I think about the conclusion: bleh.
So the solution is that more choice is bad and because more choice is problem of the affluent people, who live material lives, it means that these people need to DECREASE their affluence and material well being by what, government intervention? To which end? So that other people can get that money?
But aid to foreign poor people doesn't make those foreign poor people any wealthier. Capital investment makes people's economies grow and make the economies and societies more wealthy and more materially affluent, not charity.
Also isn't it quite funny, to be charitable for the reasons of being selfish, because being charitable in this case supposedly leads to being better off, since your own choices are decreased because you become less wealthy and materially affluent by giving up your stuff to others (making them more affluent and thus making them less happy by your own thesis.)
This is clearly a stupid idea, probably Marxist in nature and needs to be thrown to where it belongs - trash can.
If one million is good enough, then think how much easier it is to get just 1000. But where 1000 will do, 1 can do even better.
Gentlemen, ONE DOLLAR.
ONE FREAKING DOLLAR OR THIS WORLD GETS IT!
A poor person can't afford to pay even a small percentage of his income for taxes; a wealthy person could easily afford to pay even a very large percentage.
- first, Mr. Robin Hood Marx, whatever somebody can or cannot afford doesn't give anybody the right to take it away.
Everybody is rich compared to somebody else. Should you be paying twice as much for all the goods/services as somebody who is making half your wages? Should you also be paying half for the goods/services as somebody who is making twice your wages?
If we don't discriminate on how much bread costs to a person based on his income, why do we discriminate how much government costs based on income?
I am saying: government costs too much. Especially government that decides economic outcomes for companies and people. That kind of government should not exist, it is immediately too costly to the economy - it immediately raises prices and those who are poor are hit hard because of food/energy/rent prices.
Of-course during the 19 century, when gov't was paid for by excise/luxury consumption/alcohol taxes, the poor had a very simple choice not to pay taxes: do not import things from other countries, do not drink alcohol. And this is FAIR because if you can't afford to pay taxes you have a very simple choice: do not CONSUME things that have taxes in them.
The same thing can be accomplished by tax refund based on means testing of-course, and this allows somebody to pay consumption taxes without giving up their FREEDOM of doing business, without having to tell the government every single thing they actually do to make their living.
On the other hand if you are poor and you can't afford to pay the taxes, you would then sacrifice this freedom, tell the government that you are poor by explaining what you do and how much you make and then the gov't would give you your tax refund. But you must keep the receipts or you get some average refund back.
It's more fair for everyone to pay an amount that is reasonable and which they personally can afford, even if this
- NO IT IS NOT. I completely disagree. Your definition of what's fair does not at all correspond to my definition to what's fair, so how is THAT fair if we have different definitions to go by YOURS and not by MINE?
It's UNFAIR I am telling you, UNFAIR AT ALL to tell somebody: you have to pay 2x for this bread. You have to pay 2x for this government. It's because you make whatever somebody decided was 'too much'.
So coming with this perspective, what would be the point of me arguing with you any further, when we have such completely different definitions of such simple ideas?
Oh, I very much doubt that. The heart of our economy in this country is the middle class, and small business.
- small business person is already and would be (under your definition of fairness) paying much more than somebody working 9-5.
And by the way, when I talk about business, I do not discriminate between 'small' and 'large' but I do discriminate between government sponsored and independent.
When it's government sponsored - it's a monopoly or at least it is protected and has fewer obstacles on its way in terms of competition. Gov't sponsorship removes competition, causes monopolization, destroys market, raises prices, hurts those 'poor' people you seem to be so fond of.
And yes, businesses, regardless of their size (as long as they are NOT government protected monopolies, that KILL competition by government regulations) do provide much more to the economy than any one particular individual. But the founder of the business is the person directly responsible for this and as the person directly responsible he/she is providing much more to the economy and society in total than any one 9-5 worker (and I use the term 9-5 loosely).
Also, there are ways of getting rich without contributing a damn thing. Or would you support a 100% inheri
And I am saying that calling any of the mainstream Keynesians economist is like calling astrologists and sign readers - astronomers.
Neither do a lot of economists. Practitioners of the dismal science never seem to come to much agreement about anything.
- only the Keynesian shamans don't get it. Look at the video in my signature for an example of a real economist. He ain't no Keynesian, that's true. The problem today is that Keynesians are all over the place and gov't loves them, because their 'solution' is what gov't loves: print more money.
I.E. you want government to be funded by the poor and the middle classes
- if it's about fairness for you, then the most fair thing is to tax everybody the same percentage wise. Why are those who create more wealth and make more money doing it are taxed more via this progressive ladder? It's unfair! They are already adding MORE to the economy than your average 9-5 worker. They are adding MUCH more - organization of capital and labor that the society obviously needs, otherwise they wouldn't be rich.
However note, that I do not think what US has now is fair from the get go, it's a huge gov't monopoly driven system, very corrupt and bails out failures and punishes savers, so this has been out of whack for a long time now, it must be reset. Gov't giving money to failing companies - nothing is fair or good about it.
Also realize that your real problem is that with current spending levels of gov't, it is impossible to fund it with income taxes at all, half of gov't spending comes out of debt given to USA by China etc.
Another point is though that today, US 'rich' already pay most of taxes. Taxes come to 50% for many, who have to pay highest brackets in federal, state, municipal, FICO, medicare, etc. This is before various consumption taxes, property taxes.
50% tax for 'rich' - is that fair? I don't think so. It should be no more than anybody else in terms of percentage rate. Are the 'rich' using many times the resources? More water or more air?
If they use more water then they are paying for it, right? Utilities. If they use more electricity - they are paying for it.
But what exactly more of are they using from governments that they must directly subsidize a bunch of poorer people?
Again, they are already providing products and services - which IS WEALTH of SOCIETY that society needs. They are working much longer hours, if they EVER forget about their jobs, and many people live and breath their businesses, it's not a 9-5 deal, that's the way to survive in competitive world.
The wealthy only consume a small proportion of their income, and you'd allow them to not only enjoy their wealth, but by freeing up the bulk of it from taxation, they can grow it further for their own benefit.
- If they INVEST IT instead of consuming it you are saying it is only for THEIR BENEFIT?
Do you understand the concept of investment? Investment is about profit. Profit does not come from nothing, it comes from society ENJOYING the products/services provided. Profit is the measuring stick for business success and that means that the more profit business is making (assuming this is not a government monopoly) the more wealth the business is creating for the society.
You fail to see that success of a business and profit from investment and underconsumption is what society profits more from than the person doing the investment in the first place - this person takes a RISK and society rips the reward IF he succeeds.
We've more or less been doing this in the US for several decades now, and if we continue, we will wind up without a middle class, without class mobility, and if those come to pass, hopefully a bloody revolution so that the wealthy can enjoy the terminal fruits of their, and your, agenda.
Personally, I'd just as soon avoid that end by avoiding its beginning, and by having a society without great wealth disparity.
- you are failing to see the forest for the trees. The culprits of your grievances are governments, not bus
One thing is investment, another thing is spending.
They are different, never mind what Obama/Biden are telling you.
Today USA borrows over 50% of the money it spends on CONSUMABLES. Military, SS, EI, Medicare, etc., over 50% of the money that is spent on those consumables does not come from taxes but comes out of debt bought by other nations and some private banks (though it looks lately that almost all US debt is now bought by either central banks or the Fed. Central banks - because they don't care about profit and they are desperate to keep US going for some reason. Fed - obviously it's completely subverted, it was supposed to take the punch bowl away from Congress years ago, it's totally failed on everything it does, from price stability to being independent.)
When you loan 50% for your consumption, you don't go deeper in debt to try and 'invest'. You CUT CONSUMPTION first. You cut consumption and give back some debt first, because you are in a position, where every single interest rate percent costs you 140billion a year, that's unsustainable.
In reality US gov't is in the same boat with US banks. All of these entities are bankrupt right now. What investment into infrastructure when you can be foreclosed upon any day?
US gov't should have NEVER been building roads.
The New Deal thing killed the railroads and airline profits in USA.
The railroads were torn down (before that, USA used to have more railroad than any other country in the world) and those railroads were profitable.
The airline industry was taxed to hell to build the roads (and also of-course there was debt and money printing).
Also after the roads were built, USA became very 'car friendly'. USA gov't subsidized its car manufacturers basically by building all those roads, but they have destroyed the rail and put airlines on gov't dole as well, as then the airlines became dependent on gov't subsidies to survive.
Also the building of the roads allowed the huge suburban areas to be built, and so lots of deforestation, lots of spread out and pollution due to cars driving huge distances to get anywhere - all thanks US gov't. This was pure gov't driven insanity, all under the guise of improving economy, while instead it prolonged the recession, which became the great depression, all thanks to gov't spending and mis-allocation of resources.
There are no projects that gov't should be involved in except defense of the nation, and US military budget needs to be cut by over 90% anyway.
That's why the gov't should stay out of all business. Taxing it or regulating or subsidizing it or protecting it or bailing it out or doing anything with it.
Economy is about people building products and services and exchanging what they built with other people for products services those other people built.
Gov't doesn't understand that, it thinks it can wave a magic wand and create a market or create a useful product or service. Gov't will tell you that it takes the profit motive out, so it's better.
Well if there is no profit then how would a business know that it's doing something market needs/likes/willing to pay for? Taking profit motive out = taking out the measuring stick for success.
Yes yes yes yes yes yes yes.
See?
Just because I say 'yes' a bunch of times doesn't change anything.
I also disagree with you completely on Ayn Rand.
She was not as bad an economist as all the accepted "economists" of current era are: Krugman, Bernanke, Geithner, Greenspan etc.