Now they are caught in their own trap. It took the wages, the Unions, the training, the skill of productive men and women of the western world to produce the products and structures to feed the system.
The commentator on the Canadian CTV program, "The Lang and O'Leary Exchange" who is also on the Dragon's Den that says "Greed is Good," Kevin O'Leary, is all wrong, completely wrong. He is the mascot for the cause of the Wall Street protests and failings of the economic system.
I watched and lived the Conservative lifestyle as I grew up. I even benefited. Our dad, due to his connections in the political and legal world, ensured we were never treated like the commoner, the "Blue Collar" man. We were expected to be part of the "White Collar" crowd. Mom was horrified when I became a Heavy Duty Mechanic and went to work at the Coal mines in BC. We were supposed to become one of the takers, living a high life without doing a damn productive thing.
In the late sixties I recall a Minister addressing the uprising against the corporate world that is very similar to the Wall Street protests today. He advised how the protesters couldn't tear down the system until they had something to replace it with. There was nothing then and it appears there is nothing being put forward today.
On September 22, 2011 on BBC's show, "The Hub' with Nik Gowing, the head of the IMF (The International Monetary Fund), Christine Lagarde, spoke about her role as the new IMF leader. Just prior to her statements a question was asked by a viewer, "Will the IMF have the ability to lead?" referring to the economic crisis facing the world. A panelist with Lagarde, Mohamed El-Erian spoke first. He said...
"The key issue is we need a conductor, right? Think of an orchestra. You have Europe wanting to play its own music, you have the USA wanting to play its own music and the emerging world wanting to play its own music and it looks up to the conductor. The US can no longer play the role of the conductor. The G7 is not represented enough. The G20 is still in a development phase so people will look to the IMF. People expect the IMF to be the conductor and if we don't get that conductor it's going to be a messy orchestra."
Gowing then turned to Lagarde and asked, "How is your conducting Madame Lagarde?"
She replied referring to the world economists in the audience...
"In this building there is a fantastic orchestra; huge talents, incredible. Now as far as conducting, all I can do is roll up my sleeves, but it's more complicated than that because what we need to do is facilitate for political leaders to take the credit for the solution. That we are prepared to engineer, suggest, propose, measure, identify the road map we can provide. The credit for it the politicians will want to have. And that's fine, I don't want to be a conductor but I'm very pleased to be a facilitator and if that has to be behind the scenes, that's fine."
This quote above was word for word from the leader of the entire western world, in fact the entire world's financial regulation organization. How comfortable are you after reading that bit of baffle-gab idiocy?
Dominique Strauss-Kahn was the previous leader of the IMF and he didn't want to be a facilitator, he wanted to be a conductor. He spoke about the large financial institutions exposing all the countries of the world to the problems, crossing borders to take advantage of countries with weaker regulations. He demanded that all countries work together to play (continuing the analogy) beautiful music. He identified many of the difficulties the common working "blue collar" worker faced with the typical IMF "austerity measures." He was also a socialist and a promoter of policies to assist a peaceful civilization. He stated at a conference in April 2010 that a good comprehensive economic policy would provide economic and social stability. Without this there would be instability and war. He complained that all the G20 nations were not working together and he was attempting to reign them in.
He openly stated that he was likely going to be set up, and shortly thereafter he was, with the sexual assault allegation.
My boy brought some homework to the house last week. It was about the fall of the Roman Empire. As I said earlier, the solution to the economic crisis we all face is easy enough for a child to understand. Facilitators are the last thing we need. We need people to work. We need to stop expecting to get something for nothing.
Like our present day Democracies, the paper describes the Roman political system; Romans ignored their past traditions and concentrated only on the easiest way of governing. They forgot about a senate that would debate issues and gave the ruler the sole Power of Authority in all matters.
This is the way our democracies run today, even in the First Nation's Communities where, as we recently reported, the Haisla took away their Hereditary Chiefs' right to offer sober second thought. Read this article here.
The Roman office of the Tribune, the protector of the rights of the poor and the defender of morals was forgotten. The paper states it was armies, not politics, that settled political issues. The police and military became a way to hold power, not against invaders but against their own people.
And finally, the point of this entire writing, one of the identified reasons for Rome meeting its demise was "The virtues of hard work and self control ... lost out to greed laziness, and pleasure."
Today our society is hooked on Viagra, mood-altering drugs and investment returns while sitting on the couch. People want to "facilitate" without breaking a bead of sweat.
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