Adopting some of the social conservatism from the Right, and combining it with some of the more humane economic policies of the Left. — Agustino

I think it's absolutely hilarious that you are socially conservative, and fiscally liberal. That's literally a joke on 30 Rock.

The alternative is to start some business of your own, you can, in time, make a lot better money that way, than staying on a wage. I really do think more young people should turn to entrepreneurship. It has worked well for me. — Agustino

This is a terrible terrible strategy for the majority of people. US data from 1994-2015 shows that the typical survival rate for a new business drops precipitously within the first five years to 55% likelihood of survival. By year 10 it's around 30%, and these survival rates don't say anything about profit rates, so the owner could just be making ends meet. It's also fair to assume that those who do start businesses tend to not have debt (e.g. student loans), or have a certain socio-economic network that can help support them through investment and guidance. Starting a business while in debt, without a supporting network is highly risky, and lacks stability. If your goal is to save for a wedding than the stable choice for the vast majority of people, for better or worse, is a wage job.

I'm from Eastern Europe, and here weddings are expensive, however, most people recover the money and actually earn much more from the wedding than they spend. That's why many times you'll find that people buy a car, or buy an apartment after a wedding. The reason for this is that here everyone who attends is expected to give money. So, say that a couple attends your wedding, they will give at least $50 (and quite a few will give more). Now if you have ~400 guests, roughly in groups of 2, that is at minimum 200*50 = $10,000 — Agustino

Well I have no idea what currency you are using, but in USD the average wedding costs between $25K - $40K, and typically includes about 100 - 200 guests. Guests give money as well (typically $75 - $125 depending on how close you are with the couple), but often times a registry is set up where guests can purchase certain household items and appliances for the couple (which can be as low as $30). All-in-all no one is making money from a wedding in America.

Well, if promiscuity is seen as acceptable socially, then regardless of how well I try to educate my kids at home, they will attend school, and see all the "cool" kids engaging or talking about such behaviour, and the peer pressure will make them think it is alright. That's just one example. Then I will also have to deal with friends whose marriages fall apart because of it, and so on so forth. It's going to create trouble in all sorts of ways. Do you think I'm wrong about that? I mean, the way people act and behave, and the cultural expectations around certainly influence what is happening. — Agustino

Teenagers have sex. No one is going to stop that. You can either educate your kids about sex, and protection, etc. or impart your delusion by telling them your false, unsubstantiated, quasi-religious views on the matter, but you're not going to stop people from engaging in it. I have no clue how having a few sex partners in your past contributes to divorce, and I've already shown you that 1) the average number of sex partners has decreased from the Boomers to Millennials, and 2) monogamy is, overwhelmingly accepted over polygamy. I can't speak to what occurs in Eastern Europe but we aren't experiencing moral depravity simple in America at least because of sex.

I'm very curious why you think that social conservatism cannot be squared with an unfair or tenous economy? — Agustino

If social conservatism includes getting married young and having children young, which you suggest, then those added expenses are antithetical while living in an uncertain economy or one with stagnate wage growth, and other increased expenses.

The problem is social conservatism cannot be squared with individualism, even in a modest sense of the term, and empirically it can't be squared with an unfair or tenuous economy.

I live in society, it's affecting me, as it happens all around me. My children will live in society too, it will affect them, and so on so forth. You're behaving as if I lived on a mountain, and not sorrounded by the activities that other people engage in. — Agustino

How, exactly, does this affect you?

I agree with your observation. But what do you reckon is the cause? Less opportunities? Too much bureaucracy? Lower salaries? — Agustino

Many are saddled with student debt, most companies don't offer reasonable raises (it's generally accepted that the best way to regularly increase your salary is to change jobs every two years, which isn't always easy to do). There are a number of reasons.

Yes, I recall one fairly valid criticism of Marx's concept of Value was that a commodity with a higher socially necessary labor time should correlate to higher prices, but this is often not the case as you point out. But to Marx's credit, his general method throughout Capital is to work from an abstract ideal of Capitalism, outside of external forces, in order to demonstrate that Capitalism, as posited by the Bourgeois economist, in its abstract-logical workings, contains internal contradictions, manifesting themselves into substantive conflicts. But I think this also limits his arguments in some areas as well.

Nevertheless, Marx offers one of the most penetrating critiques of Capitalism of any economist, and I think his definition and understanding of the process of Capitalism is essentially valid. And when we look at the world today, in which productivity has been increasing for decades, stock value has risen dramatically, company profits or soaring as are executive pay, and yet real wages have stagnated, it's hard not to acknowledge the exploitative nature of the beast and accept that Marx was strongly on to something.

So is Crises of Neoliberalism worth picking up then? I remember when it first came out, but it's been sitting in my Amazon cart for many years.

First off, I didn't need evidence of later ages of marriages but evidence that it's because people "are opposed to "getting tied to someone"" — Benkei

There is a range of factors here, including dating apps which effectively transforms dating into a Pokemon like game, but the strongest factor is that Millennials are, due to economic uncertainty and financial difficulties, establishing their careers first. We're also a generation that is financially worse off than our parent's generation, and wedding are expensive. I have two close friends getting married soon, and they've had to scrap and save a lot in order to afford it, despite one of them being in a committed relationship with the girl for eight years.

I live in the world man! Go speak to some young people, and see what they say. Around me, most guys I know aren't interested to get married. Even those who have girlfriends, even in cases where the girlfriends have asked them to, they refused. And some are well into their 30s. Their reason is simple: independence. In virtually 100% of cases that I know. There are some guys I know who got married early, but they are a minority. — Agustino

Realize that in the Donald Trump thread, you shared a chart that showed "Age At Marriage in the USA". You don't live in the USA, so your anecdata here isn't very useful. It's also weird, to me at least, for a gy to be in a committed relationship, yet say that they don't want to get married because of "independence". That suggests to me that something else is at play.

I don't see how anyone could come through Capital without registering the distinction between value and price. — fdrake

Yeah the distinction between value and price is made evident early on in Capital.

A communist regime with a corrupt and abusive judicial system where people are murdered and abused en masse is really hard to imagine.

It's hard to take these posts seriously. — Hanover

Yet another tired "whataboutism" comment, in which the poster, unable to accept moral flaws of capital accumulation, needs to point to another political extreme that no one here supports.

I followed with Harvey's 17 Contradictions of Capital, which while attempting to provide a contemporary entry point to Marxist theory unfortunately doesn't jettison the theoretical jargon of alienation and value theory — fdrake

It's surprising that Harvey includes the Labor Theory of Value given that (if I recall correctly), he's acknowledged it's not widely accepted anymore.

Within a week, Trump will walk back on today's statements and return to believing Putin over the IC. Whenever he's reined in he just returns to his original comments.

He was no more a product of capitalism than any other sociopathic kidnapper. — Hanover

Except Mr. Ciavarella received bribes ($$$) from the owners of private, for-profit juvenile for sentencing children to extended stays for minor offences. Hard to imagine that a situation in which there is a profitable market for throwing children into prison isn't interrelated to the unrestrained ideal of Capitalism.

Does anyone else hear a strange 'cooing' noise?

Oh yes the Kids For Cash scandal really epitomized American Capitalism at the time.

So much of this is absurd.

No one doubts that he is the legitimate President of the Unites States. He won the electoral college based on a choice that voters made, even if they were influenced by Russian propaganda and agitprop. However, considering that leading members of the inquiry, Mueller, Chris Wray, Rosenstein are Republicans, not to mention that the IG report showed no partisan bias, and that the inquiry itself has been defended by top Republican politicians, it is simply wrong to conclude that this is an attempt by Democrats to legitimize him. That Russia interfered with our election is the accepted conclusion by seven different federal and congressional intelligence groups, including the FBI, CIA, the NSA, and the House and Senate Intelligence Committee, who have warned that we are susceptible to attacks in the future. To think that this inquiry is "against Trump" instead of the broader "protecting the democratic process", is to assume some type of Deep State conspiracy. That several people close to Trump have been indicted is also true.

The proof of this is in the pudding, but Trump would rather slurp on the borscht, and that's deeply concerning.

I do think it's doubtful that if Clinton had won, we'd be seeing this same inquiry into Russian interference, which does suggest that the inquiry is against Trump and not just a sudden desire to clean up our process. — Hanover

You do realize you've reifiied a hypothetical, right?

Amongst Rep he is still at 87%.

About 9 republicans out of 10 still support him, after this weeks revelations. — Akanthinos

Whatever current polls state generally reflect what occurred a week or two ago. Polling isn't instantaneous. That said, there will always be those, as you mentioned, who lap up the Trump punch.

I am very curious to see how his approval rating will look in a week or two.

I feel like today is a major turning point, but it's obviously hard to say with certainty.

"I don't like professors teaching about the facts of race history, so these people should be thrown in jails."

Just learned that Harry and William refused to meet with Trump, who, in 1997, said that he could have "nailed" Diana, but only if she got tested for AIDs first.

Finally got around to reading the Trump-Putin conference and my jaw is on the floor, yet I'm not surprised at Trump's response. Still utterly surreal.

I'm hoping Warren runs in 2020

A fun fact about the phrase 'drain the swamp' is that was first tested by Cambridge Analytica (created by White Nationalist Steve Bannon and the multi-billionaire Mercer family). They pitched to Trump who originally "hated it" and thought it was "hokey", but since it tested positively he kept it.

Well if you are too lazy to expand I won't stop you.

I mean just within the last week Trump called the EU a "foe", criticized May then lied about it, said that Germany was controlled by Russia, and said immigrants are destroying EU culture, called journalists the "enemies of the people", and praised Putin. I mean these are all blunt things, but is this the type of leader the US needs? What do you even think about all this @ArguingWAristotleTiff?

If that is true Maw, then why such an uproar to everything Trump suggests? :chin: — ArguingWAristotleTiff

There is a difference between 'Telling It Like It Is' as saying something true albeit blunt, and 'Telling It Like It Is' as saying something false and blunt. Obviously the uproar stems from the fact that Trump is mostly in the latter category.

“It’s very sad when Germany makes a massive oil and gas deal with Russia where we’re supposed to be guarding against Russia, and Germany goes out and pays billions and billions of dollars a year to Russia,” -President Trump — ArguingWAristotleTiff

This is an example of Trump taking a complicated geo-political subject and transforming it into a coarse accusation that merely alienates allies. Trump is atrocious at diplomacy. Outside of the United States, Russia is the largest exporter of natural gases, and from a geographical/financial pov it makes sense that importing Russian gas to Germany and Europe is cheaper than importing it from the US. Obama also told the EU it needed to reduce dependence on Russian gas and there were talks of a trade agreement. What solutions do you think Trump will propose that the EU? Do you think Germany should simply drop Russia as a source for energy, effectively dropping its energy usage by ~18%? You think the EU will happily accept Trump's proposals now that he's alienated Germany saying that they are "totally controlled by Russia", which is a blunt lie, not to mention that fact that he is objectively more coarse with our allies than with Russia. There are more things in heaven and earth, Tiff, than are dreamt of in Trump's philosophy. He's one dimensional.

Like most shit storms, there was more than one cause and more than one solution. The USA has lead the charge for world health crisis (Eboli and HIV), the USA set to arrive to help in world disasters such as Tsunamis and Earth Quakes. The USA is not only involved in military theaters despite your suggestions. — ArguingWAristotleTiff

Sure, but these are only examples of natural crises (not all of which occur on the "world's stage"). Funny you should mention Ebola because the United States' response was highly criticized, and the United States very arguable worsened the initial response to AIDS thanks to the insouciance of the Reagan administration. I'm not suggesting that the US shouldn't provide aid to foreign countries, but this idea that the world would be far less better off without the United States sounds like jingoism, because in many areas around the world our interference has been detrimental, so it's no surprise that many countries are skeptical of US involvement.

Marx's Capital is such a wonderful book. One of the best tomes that few people read - up there with Leopardi's Ziboldone, Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy, and Montaigne's Essays.

That Trump "tells it like it is", is chicanery in the same vein as Bush being the guy you'd "rather have a beer with", or Reagan being sooo charismatic and funny.

So he could say things bluntly that past presidents would only express gently. — ArguingWAristotleTiff

Like wut? (Direct quotes pls)

how about Ireland handle the "NEXT" shit storm that happens on the world stage — ArguingWAristotleTiff

What's an example of a shit storm on the world's stage in the last 30 years that America solved (that it didn't create).

The Irish have better drinking habits, but America has better beer now.

Yeah when Trump is asked about Brexit during a press conference and instead discusses his property in Scotland and how he won Wisconsin, I'm like wow, what a refreshing, independent, and honest voice.

Everyone, including Obama himself, didn't think he deserved the Nobel Peace Prize.

Not because of compromat but because Putin helped him get elected and he's happy about that — Baden

No, Trump didn't want to become President.

I guess if you're just a dull white dude who doesn't really care about others, then yeah I can kinda imagine not seeing the harm that Trump inflicts.

Are you suggesting that we ignore what the President of the United States says?

I think Trump's comments on how immigration has "ruined European culture" should have received a lot more outrage and news coverage, at least more so than his criticisms of May. As if it weren't obvious before, he's a white nationalist.

@raza is a pigeon on a chess board. Don't feed the fowl.

and it will shape politics for generations. — Hanover

Clearly, for the worse.

yup July 27th 2016