Economist Joseph Stiglitz speaks to the Wall Street Occupiers

As reported at Slate, economist Joseph Stiglitz spoke words of support to the Occupiers of Wall Street:

You are right to be indignant. The fact is the system is not working right. It is not right that we have so many people without jobs when we have so many needs that we have to fulfill. It’s not right that we are throwing people out of their houses when we have so many homeless people. Our financial markets have an important role to play. They’re supposed to allocate capital, manage risks. But they misallocated capital, and they created risk. We are bearing the cost of their misdeeds. There’s a system where we’ve socialized losses and privatized gains. That’s not capitalism; that’s not a market economy. That’s a distorted economy, and if we continue with that, we won’t succeed in growing, and we won't succeed in creating a just society.

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Chris Hedges demands that you take a stand

At Truthout, Chris Hedges argues that by doing nothing, you are taking the wrong position regarding the pillaging of America by predatory corporations:

To be declared innocent in a country where the rule of law means nothing, where we have undergone a corporate coup, where the poor and working men and women are reduced to joblessness and hunger, where war, financial speculation and internal surveillance are the only real business of the state, where even habeas corpus no longer exists, where you, as a citizen, are nothing more than a commodity to corporate systems of power, one to be used and discarded, is to be complicit in this radical evil. To stand on the sidelines and say “I am innocent” is to bear the mark of Cain; it is to do nothing to reach out and help the weak, the oppressed and the suffering, to save the planet. To be innocent in times like these is to be a criminal.

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Matt Taibbi challenges the notion of “rogue traders”

Swiss bank UBS recently announced that a "rogue trader" caused the bank to lose $2 billion. At Common Dreams, Matt Taibbi argues that what this "rogue trader" was doing was par for the course on Wall Street, even since the intentional destruction of the Glass-Steagall Act. Therefore, allegations that "rogue traders" cause losses at Wall Street banks is yet another fraud on behalf of these "banks."

Investment bankers do not see it as their jobs to tend to the dreary business of making sure Ma and Pa Main Street get their $8.03 in savings account interest every month. Nothing about traditional commercial banking – historically, the dullest of businesses, taking customer deposits and making conservative investments with them in search of a percentage point of profit here and there – turns them on. . . . Nonetheless, thanks to the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act passed in 1998 with the help of Bob Rubin, Larry Summers, Bill Clinton, Alan Greenspan, Phil Gramm and a host of other short-sighted politicians, we now have a situation where trillions in federally-insured commercial bank deposits have been wedded at the end of a shotgun to exactly such career investment bankers from places like Salomon Brothers (now part of Citi), Merrill Lynch (Bank of America), Bear Stearns (Chase), and so on. These marriages have been a disaster. The influx of i-banking types into the once-boring worlds of commercial bank accounts, home mortgages, and consumer credit has helped turn every part of the financial universe into a casino. That’s why I can’t stand the term "rogue trader," which is always tossed out there when some investment-banker asshole loses a billion dollars betting with someone else’s money. They’re not "rogue" for the simple reason that making insanely irresponsible decisions with other peoples’ money is exactly the job description of a lot of people on Wall Street. Hell, they don’t call these guys "rogue traders" when they make a billion dollars gambling.
Reckless Wall Street "banks" are mostly not-banks. They only make about 15% of their money raising capital for businesses. Instead, they are gamblers who are using what's left of their bank function as a human shield so that when their reckless bets go bad they can call out to Congress for yet another mega-wad of cash to save them from going under. You can almost hear them shouting, "Save the banks! Save the banks!" If the federal government hadn't killed Glass-Steagall, Congress would be much better situated to respond to what would have been only a reckless gambler, "Sorry, but it's time you suffered the natural consequences of your actions . . . no federal money for you." If only Glass-Steagall were still in place, those stodgy and boring bank accounts of people like you and me would be safely segregated from the uncontrolled avarice of huge gambling corporations that currently call themselves "banks."

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Republican blackmail schemes endanger American prosperity

It has been said that the whole debacle surrounding the recent debt ceiling legislation was a “manufactured crisis.” Republicans have taken control of the US House of Representatives and effectively use their threat of filibuster to stymie any progressive legislation from passing the US Senate. Republicans picked the “debt ceiling crisis” as their latest and greatest fight to wrest blackmail from the country in the furtherance of The Republican War on Christmas. And see here. Republicans have posited a series of ever more extremist and radical plans to restructure government under the guise of “fighting the deficit.” But, Republicans have offered more of the same failed and fatally flawed economic polices of the Bush era with more and better tax breaks for corporations, millionaires and billionaires with the added twist of abolishing Medicare and gutting Social Security.  And see here, here and here. Recent revelations by a high ranking Republican Budget Committee staffer confirms the Republicans’ blackmail as their chief strategy to preserve the privileges and incomes of the corporations, millionaires and billionaires to the economic damage of the rest of us Americans. [More. . . ]

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The world through the lens of a college English teacher

At Orion Magazine, college English Instructor Erik Reece has written an excellent essay exploring the role of schools in modern society. The conversation is expansive (covering such things as John Gatto, Citizens United and the trashing of the environment), yet the bases of his essay are his personal interactions with thousands of English students. Here's the launching point for Reece's essay.   He asked his college freshmen English students to write an essay on the following topic: "Evaluate the education you received over the last four years."   Here is his summary of types of responses he received:

  • Many teachers show no passion for their subjects.
  • Many teachers don’t seem to know their subjects very well.
  • Teachers often have very low expectations for their students and very lax standards (late work is rarely penalized).
  • Many teachers are afraid to engage students in real critical thinking or actual dialogue; they simply rely on handouts and lectures.
  • Assignments don’t seem relevant to students’ “real” lives.
  • Many teachers only “teach to the test.”
  • The majority of the work is far too easy and leads to boredom.
  • Students express an overwhelming feeling that only their attendance and test scores are important to teachers and administrators.
Again, this is the starting point for a highly worthwhile piece of writing.   I invite you to take a look.

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