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The Forum > Article Comments > False Labor > Comments

False Labor : Comments

By Geoff Davies, published 12/5/2010

Isn’t it time we declared the Labor Party officially dead? The party lost its vision long ago.

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Yes, the original vision of Labor is dead. But it’s not dead because its politicians ever stopped believing that government interventions can re-shape society at will. We have only to look at Rudd’s wake to see that that belief is alive and well. The reason Labor has had to abandon these pretensions is because reality keeps on checking what socialist politicians are trying to do. Socialism doesn’t work, and it doesn’t work for reasons that were pin-pointed by Ludwig von Mises in his 1924 work “Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth”. No socialist has ever been able to refute this. Ignore it at the cost of millions of lives, yes. Refute it, no.

Take the NSW Labor party. They didn’t privatise the NSW electricity industry because they believe in privatisation. If they did, they wouldn’t have done the Claytons privatisation that they did. The reason governments try to divest themselves of these so-called public assets is because, absent the discipline of profit and loss, they are incapable of knowing the more economical way of doing things.

On the other hand, if its any consolation, the original vision of the Liberals is just as dead. They have lost the very idea of liberty, and have become a party of thorough-going interventionists. We have only to look at Turnbull enthusiastically dictating what light-globes people can have in their own homes to see that they have been completely captured by the interventionists’ superstition.

While the population are distracted by the false dichotomy of ‘left’ and ‘right’, the political parties morph into two wings of essentially one political belief system. They would like governmental control of anything and everything to work, and they keep trying it. But since these interventions just keep on failing, they are thrown back on to the system of private property that they despise and attack. The end result is neither liberty nor socialism, but an ugly nationalist socialist amalgam and symbiosis of big government, big business, and big unions. The political class have far more in common with each other than any of them have with the ruled.
Posted by Peter Hume, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 10:08:03 AM
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Come on Geoff,

Reminiscing about Whitlam or former Labor ideals is a bit unrealisitc. The world you were hoping for was a brief illusion as the need to compete in a world of freer trade, which means all nations have a right to benefit from trade, caught up with us.

You may be sad now, but I suspect things a going to get a lot worse as we struggle for the right policy mix to balance competiveness and compassion.

Count your lukcy stars Geoff. We have stuff in the ground; other Western naitons have no such luxury.
Posted by Chris Lewis, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 10:15:27 AM
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Peter and Chris -

Let me be very clear, I do not propose a return to socialism. What I lament is the loss of a party that cared for ordinary people, rather than sucking up to the money power.

The right-left dichotomy is false and we need to move beyond it. We can have a market economy in which the incentives driving markets are managed so they support the kind of society we choose to live in. Unfettered markets do not do that - it is clear in practice and there never was a theoretical justification for this quaint belief. See
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=8644
http://betternature.wordpress.com/2009/03/02/neoliberalism-was-always-rubbish/

Unfettered markets are just economic anarchy, and warlords take over during anarchy, as we have been experiencing. Warlords don't give a damn about ordinary people, only their own power. Labor has yet to figure this out.

Not that we really have unfettered markets of course. In reality most of the incentives are stacked, and they're stacked to favour the already-wealthy. If we just levelled the playing field we'd already do a lot better.
Posted by Geoff Davies, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 10:50:11 AM
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Goeff,

I don't see politics as you do. I do believe that we live in a country where its leaders on both sides of politics (and minor parties) are generally committed people trying to balance compassion and competiveness, although we all are aligned to particular levels of government intervention on a variety of issues.

I am not saying that their quality or decisons cannot be improved. Rather, I am saying that the problems are getting out of hand with few real solutions given present trends, such as out greater reliance upon debt and now the economic fortunes of developing nations.

We will need key reforms, but how we do them effectively will test our sophistication as a nation and as part of humanity. I think about such issues constantly, but I am struggling for the answers.
Posted by Chris Lewis, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 11:07:46 AM
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So what sort of comments are needed?

Talking about false polital situations, what more politically false could be very Conservative John Howard backing British Labor man Tony Blair to back right-wing US George W Bush to illegally attack Iraq?

Or aren't foreign political situations included?
Posted by bushbred, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 12:35:46 PM
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Spot on, Geoff. The rot in Labor's asylum seeker policy started in 1989, when the Hawke government introduced mandatory detention. Refugees inconveniently streaming out of Cambodia were getting in the way of Gareth Evans's Grand Peace Plan To Solve Absolutely Everything In The Universe And In Doing So Attain Global Hero Status, so they simply locked them up.

3 years later under Keating they discovered mandatory detention was illegal, so instead of doing the moral thing and setting them free, they hastily legislated to MAKE it legal. And so it has been ever since. After more than 20 years, this utterly needless practice has become so entrenchedly bipartisan, so fundamentally part of What Australia Does, that I despair of ever seeing it repealed.

When the only steadfast parliamentary voice of dissent against the Pacific Solution in 2001 had to come from the late Peter Andren (Independent, Calare), and Labor hacks went diving under their desks to avoid confronting their moral responsibilities, I figured then that the backbone had entirely disappeared.

Rudd's recent spinelessness on Sri Lankan and Afghani refugees is simply a latter-day confirmation of this 9-year-old conclusion. Gutless, compassless, they waft in the political breeze, drifting rudderlessly from pragmatic backdown to opportunistic backflip.

A plague on them. Bring back Howard. At least, with the Man of Steel, we knew we were dealing with a hard opponent, who would front up and fight, so we could devise our counter strategies accordingly. Fighting the wishy-washy flip-floppers of the ALP is like trying to take a firm grip on tofu.
Posted by Slobodon Meshirtfront, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 1:45:43 PM
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Peter Hume,

Thanks for an interesting post.

I recall an old "z" grade movie called "Strike Bound" about the formation of the Labor Party. Today's ALP is a different creature. The Liberals have never been a true liberal party, and are less so today.

Socialism crossesthe divide. Welfare and subsidies. Payments to single mothers with ten kids and bailing out corporates. In WWII, Mussolini was head of corporations not just head of state. That presence of "socialism" is often missed, under the label of State Capitalism
Posted by Oliver, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 2:27:49 PM
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A few responses to comments so far.

Peter,
I think the reason privatisation has been so popular is simply that it has been used to “balance” budgets. Selling the farm piecemeal, the most blatant violation of good management, but the commentariat lets them get away with it. The reason is the fat cats, who own the commentators, get bargains.

I don’t have a problem with intevention, but it should be done openly, intelligently, coherently and for the benefit of the whole society, not fat cats. And as I indicated earlier, I don’t mean brute socialist micromanagement, I mean judicious management of the incentives that markets follow.

Chris,
You seem to have a very limited view of our economic possibilities. We have one of the most educated populations in the world, we speak most significant languages, we have ample land (if we use it judiciously), vast ocean resources, a moderate (though deteriorating) climate, etc. We are innovative, but our local entrepreneurs are only interested in fast bucks, so we lose most of our best options overseas. Our manufacturing sector has been stunted and repeatedly gutted by stupid policies often based, I’m afraid, on misguided faith in “competition”.

We can make a very good living without relying on debt, the quarry, fickle commodity markets, overseas financiers, or absurd levels of trade (my kiwi fruit turned out to be from Italy, for god’s sake). However our politicians still have a cringing colonial mentality and are captured by an ideology, and our entrepreneurs are only interested in the fast buck.

With some halfway decent leadership we could do very much better I think.

Slobodon (love the handle),
Howard did enormous damage to our society. I had hoped Rudd might repair a bit of it, but he doesn’t seem to have a clue – or doesn’t want to. Howard Lite.
Posted by Geoff Davies, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 4:07:59 PM
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Geoff,

I agree with you that things can be done much better. They have to be.

However, I would argue that the world is so complex and competitive, that all factors have to be taken into account. Take the mining tax. Of course, we need revenue to pay for other schemes such as super, but the miners have some argument that investment opportunities exist elsewhere. Perhaps the govt will have to shift a little to find a better policy mix.

I agree with you, we cannot afford to give up. However, the situation for Western societies is much more complex and competitive that previous decades

Do i have my own ideas. Yes, i intend to offer some in the future. But I will not pretend to think I have any answer will be fool proof. I see more pain ahead. In this climate of policy mediocrity and complexity, it may well be that societies may even turn against themselves. Hence, we will need policy ideas that can transcend party traditions
Posted by Chris Lewis, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 4:47:39 PM
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Geoff,
You said "We can make a very good living without relying on debt, the quarry, fickle commodity markets, overseas financiers, or absurd levels of trade (my kiwi fruit turned out to be from Italy, for god’s sake). However our politicians still have a cringing colonial mentality and are captured by an ideology, and our entrepreneurs are only interested in the fast buck".

This sounds appealing to some. But think about it. How far do you think Australia would get if it downplayed such factors in this world of freer trade with the great powers setting the rules (the US, and EU, its allies, and may be soon china).

I agree that such trends are a bit of a joke in that they are not going to save Western nations, but are you suggesting that Australia goes alone? Are you suggesting we just throw scarce resources at new industries? Where will the money come from as surely someone will have to pay? Are you suggesting that world peace would be more likely without such trade?

The trouble with the blind left is they saw in Rudd a false prophet. People who knew politics knew his potential to deliver was limited. The rest just hoped and prayed, much in the same way that people have faith in other matters.

I have never thought that recent trends are great. Read my early Quadrant pieces. People who blindly believe in free trade as some fool proof model are sadly mistaken, although I am passionate that liberalism is the most realistic of all political concepts in a world of competing nations.

Any other solution will bring other unintended consequences, although I believe that there is little doubt that the level of government intervention will again increase a little in most Western nations (just a little).
Posted by Chris Lewis, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 5:07:28 PM
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Chris,
If you are fixed on GDP growth as the purpose of the economy, then some of what you say might follow. However GDP does not measure wellbeing or quality of life, it measures how busy we are in things that involve money. Our frantic activity is causing us direct harm (stress, poor health, overconsumption, etc.) and grave indirect harm (destruction of our life support system).

If the economy is conceived as existing to support the kind of quality life we choose (and I’m not dictating what that is, beyond pointing out the natural limits of our environment and ourselves), then we can thrive working fewer hours, working smarter, and using far fewer resources as we learn to recycle materials and use materials and energy far more efficiently than we do.

A lot of the fuss about trade, international competitiveness and complexity drops away in this view. Yes, let’s trade only what and how we choose. If we can borrow money overseas we can create it ourselves (we have to create local currency anyway to use the overseas loans locally). Better yet, pay down the debt, which is highly destabilising (Steve Keen, http://cpd.org.au/paper/deeper-debt), and gradually shift to using savings (shock, horror).

And no, world trade doesn’t guarantee peace. That was being claimed in 1913 too.

It’s a different view of the economy, though not so different from the view 50 years ago. I developed it in my book Economia http://betternature.wordpress.com/economia/.
Posted by Geoff Davies, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 7:03:26 PM
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Geoff,

"If you are fixed on GDP growth as the purpose of the economy, then some of what you say might follow. However GDP does not measure wellbeing or quality of life, it measures how busy we are in things that involve money. Our frantic activity is causing us direct harm (stress, poor health, overconsumption, etc.) and grave indirect harm (destruction of our life support system)."

The Human Development Index is a better measure of quality of life. Australia rates very high on the HDI. Anotherless common measure is assets per capita. Australia is high on this measure too. There is also Parity Purchasing Power and a country's Gini co-efficient.
Posted by Oliver, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 7:10:46 PM
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We only have to look at how Kevin and Labor were so easily sucked into this un-necessary bailout.They came into Govt with a $ 20 billion surplus.Within 12mths they have borrowed billions from China and now admit to a $ 40 billion deficit.It is probably much greater.How do you lose $60 billion in one year? This is $11,000 per family of four.The schools education revolution is costing 4 times more than it should.They are throwing money in all directions for no productive outcomes.They were pannicked by advisors and the RBA.

Now the worker has been saddled with debt due to stimulus that has caused inflation in our economy and the RBA increases interest rates to give this money to the big end of town.This further inflates share prices and leaves the ordinary person with more debt,diminished job opportunities and a depreciated currency.The real economy is being sacrificed to prop up the bubble economy.

The result will a collapse of our currencies.The IMF created a $ trillion 12 mths ago and now will create another $ trillion, diluting the values of all our currencies to prop up their failing banks and pryamid ponsy schemes.

Labor are the rotting carcass of a disillusioned faithful.They are the Bonobo Party, when under stress simulates copulation with anything they can touch.The difference being ,Labor is not simulating copulation with our economy.It is real and totally obscene.

That said,the Liberal Party will look after the big end of town manage the economy better, but screw the worker.

There is no such thing as too big to fail.Many of the criminals like the Goldman Sachs directors,should be in gaol.
Posted by Arjay, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 7:34:52 PM
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Arjay,
I don't know of any Labor Government that hasn't depleted the coffers.
Posted by individual, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 8:28:30 PM
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What you all fail to realize is that ALL the societal parties are lie-based and utterly illegitimate. All systems of society, capitalism, socialism, dictatorships etc are simply all slightly modified versions of the same fascist and utterly insane and malevolent societal control systems.

For more information visit My website at www.Truthmedia.8k.com and scroll down and access the "democracy" lecture.
Posted by Seer Travis, Thursday, 13 May 2010 1:28:53 AM
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As a long time Labour supporter, off 40 years, I abandoned the Australian Labor Party in favor of The Greens some time ago. Disillusioned not only with the leadership of those that followed Whitlam, Rudd has done nothing to change my view on that, but also the Parties loss of its humanitarianism in favor of fiscal policy and economic rationalisms. Substance and policy has been replaced with image and popularism, more concerned with this weeks pole than the plight of the common man.

Embracing the American Presidential style Labor has become the Democratic Party with the Liberals the Republicans, no alternative and no real choice. Labor, like their mates the Liberals have no policy, as policy is planning, and planning is socialism, and only a blasphemer would embrace socialism, and as Kevin Rudd will tell you, he is no blasphemer!
I now embrace The Greens as a true Labour Party. Not a Party of 'tree huggers', as the media and some within the Party would have you believe, that's their view, and as a diverse Party that view can easily be accommodated by people such as myself. As I tell others, people know we are an environmental party, but we are also a party of health, a party of education, a party of social justice etc etc etc. So if you, like me, are disillusioned with the big two, then go to the Greens homepage and read their policies, easily the most detailed of any political party within Australia, and like me, you be the judge. We are not a populist party, so not everyone will agree with everything the party stands for, but that's how it should be.
Posted by Paul1405, Thursday, 13 May 2010 6:09:29 AM
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All of you should be hanging your heads in shame. i have never been so disappointed in my life as when i read this article & even worse all the comments on it.

i saw the headline & i thought, some hope for the future at last.

Get out of the halls of academia, get out of a Hawker/Britain focus group & talk to some real people in the street.

i went along on the labour day march. i was once in an industry with compulsory trade unionism. i have never met so many ex red/green/getup/labour voters in one place in my life.

The problem with red/green/getup/labour coalition is the radical. extreme, loony, left, factions whose principles, practical policies would be embraced by between 1% & 2% of the voting population at best.

Anti family, pro child abuse, export jobs overseas & create a new industry of welfare, social talkers.

Try some of the politically incorrect jokes i was told by dozens of them.

1, What does ALP stand for? Abos, Lesbians & Paedophiles, because they always come first.

2, What does ALP stand for? Associated Lesbian Paedophiles, because they have been put in charge of child safety by loony, lefties.

3, What does ALP stand for? Associated Left wing Paedophiles, because the Anti Family law act of 1975 was designed as a poverty creation, family destruction scheme to create progressively, more, neglected, abused children over 4 or 5 generations, in order to create more jobs for social talkers.

4, What does QPS stand for? Queensland Paedophile Service, because Protecting & Serving the interests of Paedophiles (anybody who would neglect or abuse a child in any way is a paedophile) with bogus DVOs is what they do.

http://www.heineraffair.info/

http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/Seeking-justice-for-a-forgotten-victim/

Every body i spoke to was talking about the AFP, Graeme Campbell's, Australia First Party.

http://www.australiafirstparty.com.au/cms/

Or the DLP, the Democratic Labour Party.

http://www.dlp.org.au/

Or the Australian Democrats.

http://www.democrats.org.au/

The Liberal/National coalition will win the next federal election in a landslide, but it will be off the back of preferences from "real minor parties" & independents. (not the red/greens)
Posted by Formersnag, Thursday, 13 May 2010 8:18:37 AM
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Geoff, this is just another hissy fit at the loss of a political platform to drive your obsession with carbon reduction.

You might use your intellect to “back up” a little (away from your obsession) and look at “why” the Labor Party changed. There are plenty of examples internationally, of “what” Labor has morphed into.

Peter Hume makes a valid point that Labor has failed to make itself ideologically relevant in today’s modern, complex and economically driven societies. The fundamentals of socialism leave too many compromises for Labor to deal with and still maintain traction with core voters.

To solve this problem, Labor has gradually made itself available to minority groups as a platform for fringe interests. Those minority interests have now developed a parasitic relationship with Labor to promote populist/tokenistic policy initiatives; it is now incapable of ridding itself of the parasites.

We need look no further than Europe to see what has happened to their socialist, committee run society. Nanny State, Politically Correct, Socially engineered economic disaster in the making.

Our ALP is heading in the same direction, “yanking” every economic lever to try to get voter traction. Divisive populism targeting our States, industrial base, heath system, education, tax, population growth and immigration are all setting our society in conflict.

This is socially ugly and economically destructive.
Posted by spindoc, Thursday, 13 May 2010 9:17:39 AM
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All
If we are to move beyond the left/right dichotomy, we must have a better conceptual tool to put in its place.

I humbly commend the following to our readership:
http://www.theadvocates.org/quizp/index.html

Answering the quick quiz leads through to a diagram of much better shema of political opinion, on which we should all be able to agree.

The problem with the left/right range is that it is in one dimension. The above range is in two dimensions: from greater to lesser personal liberty on one axis, and from greater to lesser economic liberty on the other. At least we will then have a clarity which is now lacking under the worse-than-useless 'left/right' dichotomy.

I would be interested to know where people in this thread rate themselves.

I’m pro-choice on everything, so long as people are not aggressing against the person or property of others: libertarian. The problem for libertarians is that we have no acknowledged place on the left/right spectrum. At least socialists *and their opponents* all agree that they belong on the left. But the 'far right' is occupied by Hitler, Mussolini and Franco - totalitarians who are violently opposed to the principles of individual liberty.

On the other hand, libertarians cannot be called middle-of-the-road either, because we are in favour of reducing the size of government by at least 50 percent, and that's not middle of the road. Yet neither are we conservatives like the Republicans, who believe in handouts to industry, government monopoly control of the money supply, overseas military adventures, censorship, and moralistic restrictions of sexual and personal liberty.
Posted by Peter Hume, Thursday, 13 May 2010 10:22:17 AM
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Thanks Peter, an interesting quiz. The range of questions is far too small which tends to make the red dot move too dramatically. Can you point to anything that offers a broader range of issues and perspectives?

As an “epicure” I like to avoid any form of limitation in scope or options. As W.C Fields once said, “just looking for loopholes.”
Posted by spindoc, Thursday, 13 May 2010 10:51:25 AM
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Peter, I think what you said is spot on. i did the test and I was centrist, although i varied amongst the three choices.

I am certainly thankful that Australia is vastly different to the division that exists on many issues in the US, which will indeed complicate its ability to evolve in coming years in a relatively cohesive way.

As you suggest, we need good ideas that will reach out to the common sense people. I am confident that Australian can do it, but it will probably be ideas outside the political parties that inspire change. Politics is too dirty of a game to expect consensus. And with the dud backing down on an ets, I suspect only public anger (if it ever occurs in regards to the environment) will force change, barring an environmental disaster.

But the leadership can be influenced to change. Whether right or wrong, it took many years of pressure to convince govts to reduce industry protectionism. Similarly, with both major parties generally committed to high immigration, public sentiment has moved the Coalition at least to lower its population increase aims.
Posted by Chris Lewis, Thursday, 13 May 2010 11:01:00 AM
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Peter,
The two-axis quiz is certainly an improvement, but still too limited for me.

What if there was no conflict between the health of society and the health of the economy? Or between the health of the environment and the health of the economy? I think markets should be carefully guided, then businesses left free to work within the guidelines. If the guidelines made it profitable to keep people healthy and to keep the environment healthy (far more plausible than you might at first think), then the economy would propel us rapidly in that direction.

Really, what else would we want an economy to do? Other than work to keep us healthy, and to allow us to seek fulfillment (much more substantial than “happiness”). Other than to ensure our life support system (the natural environment) is thriving around us.

It is a measure of how far we have strayed from common sense (or sanity) that these things would be regarded in conventional political circles as wildly idealistic.

Oh and I’m not looking for Utopia. We would still find plenty to squabble about, it’s the natural state of living things to be in tension between competing and cooperating. But at least we might arrest the rapid and terminal decline we are in now.

And Spindoc I’m talking about much more than global warming, though that is the one that is likely to bring us down soonest, despite your colourful characterisations. You can’t last long depleting your soils, wasting and polluting your water, raising obese and cognitively deprived children, etc. etc.

Paul1405,
Yes the Greens are the best thing around. Take Tony Kevin’s advice, vote 1 (Greens) - 0 (Lab) - 0 (Lib) unless a Green is likely to win -
http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=20090
Posted by Geoff Davies, Thursday, 13 May 2010 11:23:53 AM
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Heh - that quiz is spookily accurate for me. Left Liberal, tending to Libertarian/Centrist:

<< LIBERALS usually embrace freedom of choice in personal matters, but tend to support significant government control of the economy. They generally support a government-funded "safety net" to help the disadvantaged, and advocate strict regulation of business. Liberals tend to favor environmental regulations, defend civil liberties and free expression, support government action to promote equality, and tolerate diverse lifestyles. >>

I think I've come across something similar before, but thanks to Peter anyway.

Geoff - I pretty much agree with everything you say in this article. Being a former ALP member who fled to the Greens nearly a decade ago, I also agree with Tony Kevin's advice :)
Posted by CJ Morgan, Thursday, 13 May 2010 11:44:53 AM
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Yes, the Greens and others are an alternative. Sort of makes a joke about people being concerned about Labor changing over the years. Just vote for another party as many in Britain just did with liberal democrats.

But, if the Greens ever get power, they will also change. It is easy to offer different policies from the sidelines, although they do help temper legislation fortunately from the opportunities created by proportional voting in the Senate.

Look what happened to the Democrats once they sought to become a more middle-of-the-road party. Those looking for difference abandoned them.
Posted by Chris Lewis, Thursday, 13 May 2010 11:52:33 AM
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Mr. Davies

Thank you, for your article and thanks to the ones who have so far commented on it.

I was born in 1925, in Italy. Fascism left some marks on my body and soul.

Like you, I have been prisoner of a political discourse, conducted mainly within myself, to which I could have given the whole of my lifetime without reaching any conclusion.

A few sincere, dedicated, articulate of my friends took to politics and some succeeded.

Now I am still around. They died, disappointed.

It was in mourning their death that I was able to discover the reasons for their defeat.

The levers of power they operated failed in having the mechanism respond.

The rigid structure of that mechanism, The ‘State’, frustrated the effort of those honest men.

‘The State’ as bureaucratic structure for administering the wealth of the planet is tardy, rusty and in itself inhuman and cannot but disregard the most fundamental of aspiration; Justice.
Posted by skeptic, Thursday, 13 May 2010 12:48:34 PM
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Posted by Geoff Davies, Wednesday, 12 May 2010 10:50:11 AM
Let me be very clear, I do not propose a return to socialism. What I lament is the loss of a party that cared for ordinary people, rather than sucking up to the money power.

Geoff I am simpatico with your expectations of the Labor party, and why not. The Labor party traditionally has had a humanitarian impact on our society with pro plebian legislations. The other lot looks at the plebs as a commodity, and now modern Labor also see the plebs as a means to an end rather than the destination of their means. How do we find a voice for "us" in the system, vote independent? Our chance of getting some chaff with the wheat is still there... but we’ve got a load of chaff mixed in right now, on both sides. Independents do not have to toe party lines. So the autonomy to make decisions based on what the electorate wants rather than payback policy for vested interests would be a pleasant change from the status quo.
Posted by sonofgloin, Thursday, 13 May 2010 1:00:40 PM
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Formersnag,

Your post adds nothing to the debate. Other than telling us that you went to the Labour Day March. Then producing some useless statistic of yours, straight out of your head, the 1%-2%, why not just say 99% of people agree with you. Then there was that childish rubbish about what does ALP stand for, some silly acronyms. To cap it off you point us in the direction of the politically irrelevant Campbell;s AFP, DLP and Democrats. Your time may be better spent staying at home and playing in the sand pit with the Acronymins, Mr Campbell and his mob, DLP and Demo members.
Posted by Paul1405, Thursday, 13 May 2010 1:36:03 PM
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Chris I must take you to task on your post:
"Yes, the Greens and others are an alternative. Sort of makes a joke about people being concerned about Labor changing over the years. Just vote for another party as many in Britain just did with liberal democrats.
But, if the Greens ever get power, they will also change. It is easy to offer different policies from the sidelines, although they do help temper legislation fortunately from the opportunities created by proportional voting in the Senate.
Look what happened to the Democrats once they sought to become a more middle-of-the-road party. Those looking for difference abandoned them."

Yes it is easy to make policy from the sidelines, to a degree, but if you are putting yourself up as a real alternative, then your policy has to be creditable, constructive and well though out. Once in power there will be some change, that's inevitable not having experienced the constraints of government, but that does not mean you compromise your basic principals, you stay with your party policy, after all that's what got you there in the first place and make change from within.
Please do not compare the Greens with the Democrats. Greens in the main are far more committed and far more idealistic than Democrats ever were, their problem was they were too middle of the road, you just can't be all things for all men, like it or not you have to take a stand. There are those in the Greens who truly want to make a difference, I don't think that kind of person was in the Democrats, or if they were they soon left.
Posted by Paul1405, Thursday, 13 May 2010 2:08:33 PM
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Geoff,
It will only take a leader to restore your lost hope. Poor old Kevin has fallen victim to his own cleverness. He has tried to out smart everyone and in the end managed to do nothing at all.
I agree with you that so many of the values we had as a society have left us. I used to cringe when i heard John Howard talk about the Australian way. I can not imagine us being less Australian than we are at the moment.
We are suffering the "greed is good" generation and unfortunately there are a lot of baby boomers. We seem to believe that we have the right to buy a house and rather than pay it off over 20 - 30 years it should appreciate by 10% a year so that it will give use a lotto win in retirement. We plunge massive amounts into superannuation and then wonder why the stock market is artificially high and we loose money at their gaming tables every time there's a bust.
Our nation was founded by the hard labour of convicts, forged by rebellions like Eureka and characterised by the mateship and guts of the ANZACs. Now it is whittled away by the greed and selfishness of a higher and higher standard of living.
I keep repeating this statement. "Standard of living is not quality of life".
Posted by nairbe, Thursday, 13 May 2010 2:11:17 PM
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Geoff, << And Spindoc I’m talking about much more than global warming, though that is the one that is likely to bring us down soonest, despite your colourful characterisations. You can’t last long depleting your soils, wasting and polluting your water, raising obese and cognitively deprived children, etc. etc. >> Can’t believe you said that. Yuck!

So when are you going to debate the rest of my post?

I have a PhD in Emotive Rhetoric and it is no substitute for absenting yourself from the debate you started.
Posted by spindoc, Thursday, 13 May 2010 3:17:24 PM
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spindoc-
I specifically disavowed socialism early in this thread, so your bashing socialism is irrelevant to me (though your tone suggests the typical and equally narrow bias of the libertarian/anarchist right).

Your other comments support my case. Without its own vision, Labor is prey to fringe groups and special interests.

Chris-
Regarding the what the Greens might do in government, if we all believe nothing will ever change (in politics), we'll be right.
Posted by Geoff Davies, Thursday, 13 May 2010 3:39:31 PM
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Geoff
You talk as if balancing the budget were some kind of unworthy consideration.

However if the budget for a particular service is not to be balanced, that is the same thing as to say it is to run at a loss.

This loss must be paid for one way or another. It can either be paid for voluntarily, or involuntarily. The reason a service runs at a loss, is because the consumers are not willing to pay voluntarily for the amount of the loss, otherwise they’d just pay for it and there would be no problem.

The reason people look to the government to pay for particular services to run at a loss, is because government can get others to pay for it involuntarily.

All socialism and all interventionism consist of various attempts to have services paid for involuntarily, otherwise there would be no reason for government to run them.

Economically, communism, socialism and interventionism are all the same thing. They are attempts to replace production based on voluntary exchange and private property, with production based on governmental ownership or control of some kind.

But the interventionists have learnt not to claim for government the ability to direct the usage of all the means of production, because everyone now knows that total government control of the means of production results in social collapse. (Russia was only saved from collapsing much earlier by its selective abandonment of its own collectivist principles, such as by allowing private landholding, buying food from the west, relying on price catalogues for central planning etc.)

This means that the difference between full communism or socialism on the one hand, and a mixed or interventionist economy on the other, has nothing to do with the governmental part. Government remains completely, 100% incapable of economic calculation, except in reliance on the productive private sector.

The greens are merely a throwback to the reds, who have already proved the anti-social error of dreaming of something for nothing, and believing that public ownership and political expedience are any better for the environment, than they are for human beings.
Posted by Peter Hume, Thursday, 13 May 2010 4:01:46 PM
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Geoff,
In a society such as Australia I would have thought that over the years, 100+ Labor would have formed a natural majority say 60-30 with 10% non committed or fringe dwellers. this time never really existed, or if it did only for a very short period. But the norm seems more like 40-40 with 20% on the fringe. instead of forming this natural majority and thus having others chase them, Labor does all the chasing. Where did things go wrong for them! What's your view on this?
Posted by Paul1405, Thursday, 13 May 2010 4:04:20 PM
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Peter Hume, all 3 of your comments were very insightful, but can i offer you another view of the left, right out dichotomy?

Ever since 1945 historians from both sides of politics have been lying, spinning, propagandising about the true nature of Fascism.

IT ALWAYS WAS, OF THE FAR LEFT.

Adolf Hitler himself was from a socialist workers party originally, which he later merged with a nationalist party to become the national socialist party.

Look in the "cold grey light of dawn" at the nature of the fascist regimes, they are almost identical to China today, a one party system that allowed, encouraged private enterprises to work, so long as they were in government.

The Communist regimes are also totalitarian, as is monarchy, they all, communist, fascist, socialist, monarchy, Stalin, Hitler, Kim Jong Ill, Franco, Cesar, Castro, rely on absolute central authority, belong on the far left.

The far, right is not fascism, but Anarchy, no rule of law.

The liberal, labour, national & red/green parties are all centre left or "Fabian Socialist" in nature.

The Centre right is, "small government" or, "Limited Constitutional Democracy" like the Americans started out with, in their original constitution.

http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/archivos_pdf/nonedarecallit_conspiracy.pdf

This book explains it very well, being written by a couple of originally, left wing hippies, one of them even being Jewish, who later worked out, they had been duped. This sight will allow you to download a PDF copy of it, free & only 93 pages of easy reading.

http://onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=10383

This contribution of mine on the "gender wars" may also interest you. None of the loony, lefties or Fe"Man"Nazis has been able to come up with an answer yet. The gender wars was another "divide & conquer" routine of theirs after all.
Posted by Formersnag, Thursday, 13 May 2010 5:07:54 PM
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Geoff, nairbe, Paul
What do you say is the *economic* difference between the governmental control of production that you acknowledge is non-viable under full socialism, and the governmental control of production that you assert is preferable in a mixed economy?

How and why does partial government control avoid the problems of economic calculation that inhere in full public ownership?

Formersnag
It is true that ‘Nazi’ is short for ‘national socialist’.

When the idea of replacing private property with central planning keeps on not working, socialists deal with this disproof, not by re-thinking their claims, but by keeping on changing the name!: from communism to socialism, from socialism to democratic socialism, from democratic socialism to social democracy, from social democracy to the third way, and so on.

But the program is always the same: forcibly override voluntary decision-making and substitute political decision-making. They keep on dreaming, including in this thread, that by *hope*, or by *belief*, or *commitment*, or *ideals*, they can make socialism "new".

The 1930s was the high tide of socialist popularity, and the intellectual roots of fascism are indeed historically in socialism. The Russian model was ‘international socialism’, the German version was ‘national socialism’, that is all. Both had in common an attempt to replace capitalism with a better, fairer system based on central planning – exactly like the “centre-left” (far left) and Greens today.

Take away their assumption that violence is the proper basis of social co-operation, and their fake moral superiority derived from looking down on everyone else’s choices, and their entire belief system vanishes.

What *don’t* the Greens think government should control?

Like religious folk, socialists and greens don’t seem to recognize the concept of rational disproof. Once Mises had shown that economic calculation was impossible under socialism, that should logically have been the end of the belief system. But they persist in dreaming of a better world through public ownership of forced confiscations, forcibly overriding everyone who disagrees with them, changing the name for their creed, and pretending the rational disproof of their belief system doesn’t exist.
Posted by Peter Hume, Thursday, 13 May 2010 7:20:15 PM
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Peter Hume
I didn't notice that i made any references to socialism or government control over production, though that happens now under the headings of things like "capacity constraints" and "skills shortage" all usually developed by government over time due to policy in areas like infrastructure and education.
The point i was eluding to is that the prevailing attitude of the general population is one of self and greed without consequence. It is not for the government to control this mood but rather this mood that drives the government. The only exception to this is when a great leader emerges and can inspire a new mood in the society rather than play on the existing one.
Your play on the repeated failures of socialism is correct but goes both ways, many civilizations have burned out under the wait of their own self indulgence.
So do we really need multi national banks dealing in risky sub-prime mortgages and unstable futures markets so we can all have a lotto win in retirement or are there other values besides money that make up our communities? Would a stable market with slower but more steady returns really make any difference to our Quality of life or would the lower levels of expectation see it improve?
Posted by nairbe, Thursday, 13 May 2010 8:26:07 PM
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Hitler used socialism as a means to an end and all of the political actions he took to gain power were legal under the Weimar constitution.
National Socialism has the same problem as Democratic Socialism and Social Democrats. You have a name which includes both a means and an end. If socialism is not good for the nation, what will the National Socialist choose? This conflict was one of the reasons for the abolition of the SA and the Night of the Long Knives.
What does a Democratic Socialist DO when he can’t GET socialism through democracy?
Posted by Jay Of Melbourne, Thursday, 13 May 2010 8:34:11 PM
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Paul1405

The snag's jokes are ok with the moderator, I am not surprised.

The Labor government took the centrist role and pushed the conservatives further to the right. Now the neo-cons and libertarians are confused about fascism ... the irony.
Posted by qanda, Thursday, 13 May 2010 10:27:41 PM
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In any discussion like this, the lines between politics and policy will inevitably become blurred.

The election of a Party that describes itself as Socialist will never guarantee that the policies they introduce will contain a skerrick of Socialism.

Similarly, a government elected under a right-wing banner will not ensure that true-blue policies will be adopted.

Politics today is all about expedience.

Nothing more, nothing less. Rudd is providing a classic example of this with his selection of battleground on which to fight the next election. Hence the dumping of the ETS, and the jettisoning of anything that looks contentious.

It also explains Abbot's attack-dog position on resource super tax. He thinks it might win him votes.

But it will not necessarily translate into post-election action. He might simply say, as so many in-comers have in the past - "now I see the numbers (which are shocking) I will have to delay that plank of my platform."

Incidentally, Chris Lewis...

>>Just vote for another party as many in Britain just did with liberal democrats.<<

Despite the massive pre-election hype, the Lib-Dems only increased their popular vote by 1% this time around. And actually lost six seats in Parliament.

We are simply playing with labels here. Socialism, and whatever we might select as the antithesis of Socialism, has been unofficially dead for decades.

It just hasn't been given a proper burial, because we can't bear to face the reality that our democracy these days only elects politicians, not a government.
Posted by Pericles, Friday, 14 May 2010 9:42:57 AM
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I'm under the impression that Australia is a mixed society, embracing some of the tenants of socialism (public ownership) with a mix of capitalism (private ownership). I think its unfair to point to Nazi Germany or Communist Russia as examples of failed socialism, no more that its fair to point to the US of 1930 as failed capitalism. In a social democracy such as Australia should be, reform of capitalism has to be done through the democratic process while at the same time safeguarding the virtues of socialism
Posted by Paul1405, Friday, 14 May 2010 10:56:39 AM
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Pericles

True, but the outcome for liberal democrats in the UK was seats, enough to be part of coalition government.
Posted by Chris Lewis, Friday, 14 May 2010 11:05:48 AM
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Paul1405 said "I'm under the impression that Australia is a mixed society, embracing some of the tenants of socialism (public ownership) with a mix of capitalism (private ownership)."

Totally agree Paul. Australians have for some time been unhappy about their assetts being sold off to pay for the mismanagement of some governments. This tendency to see all facets of society as Left or Right is wasted time and gets us nowhere.

People are basically good, but temptation is there for exploitation or for loopholes to disadvantage others, that is why Australians like the balance and tend to sit in the middle ground for the most part.

Hence, why both major parties gravitated to the middle ground some time ago as well as due to global influences; until recently where the Coalition looks like veering off again - as demonstrated with WC.

Getting the balance right within this mix comes from within a much shorter ideological range than it did 30 years ago. Which is why it is funny that we still witness the reds under the beds mentality.
Posted by pelican, Friday, 14 May 2010 11:36:09 AM
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I’ve been otherwise occupied for a little while, but let me pick up a theme via:

Peter Hume said
“Economically, communism, socialism and interventionism are all the same thing. They are attempts to replace production based on voluntary exchange and private property, with production based on governmental ownership or control of some kind.”

I think a lot of this discussion is still very channeled by the old socialist/capitalist false dichotomy. I’ll pick up two points.

Peter – “intervention” does not just mean government ownership. It includes taxes, subsidies and regulations. For example, a recent estimate was that fossil fuels are subsidised, via tax breaks etc., by $9 billion per year in this country. That is a gross distortion of our energy market. We are subsidising greenhouse gas emissions, paying extra to degrade the planet. If we just eliminated such perverse subsidies we’d have a lot healthier society. It’s a straightforward proposition, you don’t have to go off into arcane debates about National Socialism etc. (and remember, whoever mentions Hitler first in a debate loses &#9786; ).

Everyone –
Underpinning most of this discussion is the idea that unfettered markets are intrinsically superior. Call if “voluntary exchange” if you like Peter, but that could include trading heroin, or Shell trashing the Niger delta and BP trashing the Gulf of Mexico. Sensible people want some restraints imposed. Again, you don’t need a great philosophical debate.

More follows -
Posted by Geoff Davies, Friday, 14 May 2010 1:37:56 PM
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Now, the central point. The theory that is purported to demonstrate that free markets are optimal is an absurdly unrealistic theory. It assumes we can all foretell the future, are never influenced by fashion, are “rational”, are not affected by third parties, etc. etc., and that there are no economies of scale. Change any one of these assumptions and you predict, instead of an optimal “general equilibrium”, a system full of instabilities, a complex self-organising system, a system in which it does not even make sense to talk about “optimal”.

This means the core of “free market” economics is nonsense. There is no reason at all to expect free markets to deliver anything desirable, but rather to do what anarchy always does – leave the field free for warlords to take over. The core of neoclassical economics is gone, Hayek is gone, all that stuff about abstract “freedom” is gone. It’s a fantasy.

What is left is what common sense would suggest to many people. We can organise our economy to suit our culture and our goals. We can even organise it to be compatible with the living world instead of trashing it.

You can read my posts
http://betternature.wordpress.com/2009/03/02/neoliberalism-was-always-rubbish/
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=8644

Or read my book
http://betternature.wordpress.com/economia/

The way of living things is that there is a natural and healthy tension between the wants and needs of an individual and the wants and needs of the larger entity – the group, the society, the ecosystem, the total organism, whatever. Maggie Thatcher was right – if we follow her and Hayek then it follows that “there is no such thing as society”. But human beings, like all mammals, are innately social. You balance individual needs and social needs.

The twentieth century featured two great experiments. One was dedicated to total cooperation – it failed. The other was dedicated to total competition – it is failing. These are simplistic and extremely damaging views of the human condition. We need to move on from them.
Posted by Geoff Davies, Friday, 14 May 2010 1:41:16 PM
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Paul, Geoff
You don’t seem to be understanding the issue.

Let’s say our purpose is to safeguard the virtues of socialism or “society”. Well why not do it through a fully socialist government: by complete public ownership of all the means of production?

Because we already know it won’t work, and will produce negative consequences that are much much worse than the original problem.

Now before the Nazis and the Soviets provided the disproof in practice, libertarians already knew from *theory* that it couldn’t work, that it would and could only result in totalitarian government and planned economic chaos.

How did they know this in theory? Because the whole point of economic behaviour, is to be able to know what is a more, and what is a less economic way of doing things. Otherwise we would be more wasteful, we would be using scarce resources to satisfy less urgent needs instead of satisfying more urgent needs – like producing Black Sea holiday dachas for privileged apparatchiks instead of food for the masses; like pink batts to save the planet, instead of teaching children to read and write properly.

Under capitalism, we are able to know whether it’s more economical to build a house out of timber or steel or turf or platinum, because we are able to compare prices, money prices. But prices are a market phenomenon. If there was only one owner of all capital goods – the government - then there would be no market for capital goods. Therefore there would be no prices for capital goods. There would be no prices to tell which of various ways of producing something was more economical. This is the rock on which socialism foundered.

The result would not be an alternative economic system: it would be the abolition of rational economic decision-making. The government central planners could only directly compare quantities of physical goods. But a modern economy is too complex to make that viable.

They would be reduced to the economic competence of a barter economy, and everyone living above that level would be in danger of starvation ...
Posted by Peter Hume, Friday, 14 May 2010 3:06:53 PM
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...and poverty – as well as the abuses of totalitarian power. Which is exactly what happened.

But, you might say, under a mixed economy, we don’t have total government control – we also have private enterprise. That is true, but the same problem of economic calculation affects everything the government does.

Government’s waste, incompetence and destuctiveness, as concerns pink batts, and school buildings, and public transport, and public hospitals, and broadband, and the Niger Delta, is not a coincidence.

So far as government owns or controls the use of particular resources, it is incapable of economic calculation. It can perform this necessary function only by reference to prices issuing out of the private sector. Thus in itself, and the more it grows, government can only generate planned economic chaos and arbitrary political privilege in everything it does, because it can’t do anything else, because it has disabled itself from doing anything else. This is what the leftists keep on not understanding, or ignoring.

In a mixed economy, the government confiscates about 40 to 50 percent of the everything the productive class produces. If the gubbas just took this as salary and didn’t turn up for work, we would actually all be better off. Because all the interventions they spend the money on, are the main cause of the poverty, disadvantage, unemployment, fat-cat privileges, environmental destruction and social divisiveness that the leftists are tying to fix by expanding government.

The real class war is between the exploited productive class who get their money by consent – the private sector - and the exploiting parasitic class who get their money by violence and threats – the gubbas and their dependants.

Geoff, Hayek and the Austrian school never ascribed to markets the fictional assumptions that you rightly dismiss. The vindication of markets does not depend on these fictions; it is not necessary to claim that they produce “optimal”, “equilibrium”, “perfectly rational” outcomes. It suffices to show that public ownership can’t do better – comparing apples with apples.

Now please answer my question showing *how* interventionist government avoids the economic calculation problem.
Posted by Peter Hume, Friday, 14 May 2010 3:08:33 PM
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You might need to open both eyes, Peter Hume.

>>Government’s waste, incompetence and destuctiveness, as concerns pink batts, and school buildings, and public transport, and public hospitals, and broadband, and the Niger Delta, is not a coincidence<<

Under the heading of waste, incompetence and destructiveness I would suggest you might include BP's frolic in the Gulf of Mexico, Goldman Sachs' adventures with mortgage backed securities, Lehman Brothers' long flirtation with cosmetic accounting gimmicks, MCI Worldcom's creative revenue recognition policies, Tyco's light-fingered chairman and CEO, and Parmalat's practice of selling itself its own CDOs, that eventually dug a $14 billon hole in it balance sheet.

Just for starters.

And we haven't even got as far as Enron, Arthur Andersen, HIH, Barings etc. etc.

Now, what was your point again...?
Posted by Pericles, Friday, 14 May 2010 4:26:16 PM
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Ho-hum. Pericles trying to by run the argument into personal remarks and assuming what is in issue again. Three strikes and you’re out Pericles.

Geoff
So, what are the answers to the questions:
a) how is partial government control *economically* different from full government control, apart from the existence of the private sector?
b) How does partial government control avoid the economic calculation problem that inheres in total government control?
Posted by Peter Hume, Friday, 14 May 2010 8:21:17 PM
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When we went off the gold standard in the early sixties,the world reserve banks started to create fiat money like there was no tomorrow.So now this enormous bubble of no worth,that is sitting there hidden in share values,property values and is no way representative of the true productive worth of our economies.

We are facing total economic collapse.The central Banks are doing exactly what they did during the great depression of 1930's.Presently the scammers are getting or Govts to borrow for stimulus while the banking system increases interest rates ,siphoning this money back to the big end of town to prop up the phoney money.The result will be ,the loss of jobs and production.Poverty will prevail and Govts will opt for war to distract the masses from their anger as we have seen in Greece.

History does repeat itself.
Posted by Arjay, Friday, 14 May 2010 10:20:27 PM
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Arjay, spot on mate. its ruling elites from both the loony, left & the raving, right that is behind this.

Yes Geoff Davies, i would like to see you answer Peter Hume's 2 questions some time soon?

Pericles, an excellent half truth as usual. just what i would expect from the loony, left.

News flash, 2 wrongs don't make a right. Who exactly was conspiring with the "international banksters" to introduce an ETS, Economic Treason Scam?

Answer, your colleagues in the red/green/getup/labour coalition.

Geoff Davies, your 2 recent comments appear on the surface to be quite reasonable but are still based on furphys. There is no false dichotomy between socialism/capitalism. Communist, Anarchist, Socialist, Fauxmanista isms have all been proven to be total failures repeatedly for almost a century now.

Australia was spectacularly successful between 1945 & the mid 1960's. Starting in the mid 60's, there were changes in our culture, that were introduced by radical, extreme, loony, left, Fundies.

Primary schools in that time did not "cope" with class sizes of 45 children, but produced excellent results for both boys & girls. What happened? Perhaps this will explain it for you.

http://www.savethemales.ca/160303.html

If your isms are about, "Total Co-operation" why did loony, left fundies start the "gender wars", create racial tension with "multiculturalism", create poverty with both of the above which has left OZ with an ever expanding welfare dependent underclass & welfare/social talker industry to maintain poverty.

Pelican, you & suzeonline are sounding more fair, reasonable, sensible every time you read one of my comments & pretend that you haven't.

The "reds under the beds" is not a mentality but a fact of life. The cold war was not a dream but quite real. Ever since the 1930's, the reds sought to infiltrate every influential area of western culture, not just in America but in OZ as well. Their subversive purpose was to "white ant it from within" as Gareth Evans once said. He even managed to infiltrate the Australian Democrats. Try this.

http://www.savethemales.ca/031001.html
Posted by Formersnag, Saturday, 15 May 2010 2:49:11 PM
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A nice pretend-huff, Peter Hume, so that you can avoid addressing the point, as usual.

>>Ho-hum. Pericles trying to by run the argument into personal remarks and assuming what is in issue again. Three strikes and you’re out Pericles.<<

But you could regain a little credibility if you would care to explain how "waste, incompetence and destructiveness" created by government, differs from "waste, incompetence and destructiveness" created by private enterprise.

Especially when the latter has to be bailed out with taxpayers' money.

Should you be unable to do so, the point you were making so vehemently, kinda falls flat, don't you think?

Talking of credibility, it doesn't help your cause to collect a fan club of "reds under the beds" paranoids.

>>Pericles, an excellent half truth as usual. just what i would expect from the loony, left.<<

Coming from Formersnag, who can write this stuff with, apparently, a straight face...

>>If your isms are about, "Total Co-operation" why did loony, left fundies start the "gender wars", create racial tension with "multiculturalism", create poverty with both of the above which has left OZ with an ever expanding welfare dependent underclass & welfare/social talker industry to maintain poverty.<<

...that has to be a compliment.
Posted by Pericles, Saturday, 15 May 2010 4:11:55 PM
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Pericles
Unless you are going to argue that full socialism is viable, then it is common ground that full socialism is not viable.

That being so, the onus is on the partial socialists, the interventionists, to show how partial government intervention is economically different from total government intervention, apart from by the existence of the private sector.

Unless you or any interventionist can show how and why partial government intervention is any less incapable of economic calculation than full socialism – apart from by the existence of the private sector - then you have made no case for me or anyone else to answer.

Pointing out the problems you have pointed out, does not establish whether these problems are *because of* or *despite* government interventions.

Thus you have assumed what is in issue twice in the one post.

Strike two, Pericles.

Geoff
You disavow full socialism - why?
Posted by Peter Hume, Saturday, 15 May 2010 8:27:57 PM
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Formersnag,

I studied Nazi Germany 40 years ago and have maintained an interest in the period ever since, but the first time I had ever heard any suggestion that Hitler was a socialist or left-wing was very recent indeed – on the Andrew Bolt Forum. The word “socialist” in the party’s name was as meaningful as the word “democratic” in the name of the German Democratic Republic. The left wing of the party was destroyed in the Night of the Long Knives. Hitler allied himself with the old conservative right-wing nationalist party. He did not nationalise industry. He made no pretence that mankind was qual. He was racist and nationalistic.

Remember that the terms “right” and “left” come for the French National Assembly of more than 200 years ago. The supporters of the king, the established authority in a most unequal state, sat on the right of the chamber; those who wanted more democracy and equality sat on the left. The right are the supporters of authority and inequality. The left are the supporters of freedom and equality. Now, both sides have their extremists, but the legitimate debate is around the middle and looks at how you balance of competing principles.

There has been a modern attempt to redefine those terms, but it makes no sense.

The DLP was also a centre left or social democratic party. In fact, the DLP was more left wing on economic matters and IR than the current ALP is. So by tour classification system, it needs to be bunged in with the Liberals, Labor, Nationals, Greens and reds as “Fabian Socialist”. Once you put so many parties in the one class, you really lose the ability to discriminate sensibly.
Posted by Chris C, Sunday, 16 May 2010 4:07:27 PM
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That's two neat sidesteps, Peter Hume. Much more and it could be described as dancing.

>>Pointing out the problems you have pointed out, does not establish whether these problems are *because of* or *despite* government interventions.<<

I still couldn't spot the answer to my request for clarification.

I'll try it again, even though I am beginning to suspect it may be a question that for some reason holds some terrors for you.

I asked if you would care to explain how "waste, incompetence and destructiveness" created by government, differs from "waste, incompetence and destructiveness" created by private enterprise.

Any chance of a response, or do you intend to keep on ignoring it?
Posted by Pericles, Sunday, 16 May 2010 11:03:24 PM
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I'll give you an answer Pericles.

Waste & incompetence by a company costs no one but the companies share holders. It does not last for long, because those share holders change the management, to people who are more efficient, or the company goes broke, & disappears.

Waste by government can & does go on for years. Prior to this totally incompetent government, growth in tax reciepts allowed public services to grow to a redicules extent, almost unnoticed by the general public. With this lot, it has grown so bad, that they have to introduce new taxes to cover the cost. That's getting noticed.

Telstra is a perfect example. In government hands it was massively overmanned. In private hands, despite a 50% increase in business,. & a 55% reduction in the work force, it is still over manned to such an extent, that it can not compete with the new competition, which has not suffered from public service feather beading.

These new telcos achieve 4 times the productivity that the slimmed down Telstra, still suffering from a public service model structure, can achieve.

When you get into actual departments it's much worse.

Have you ever been involved in one of the government consultation processes. Unfortunately I have. At one recent such bit of fluff on water conservation, an old dairy farmer got up & stated that he had checked his records.

He found he had attended 31 of these meetings, over 6 years. The only thing he could see that had been achieved was the number of public servants attending had increased from 15 to 25, 4 had retired, & 3 had been promoted, & not one decision had been made. Result, 10 more government pay packets, for stuff all result, & a bigger pension bill for us to pay.

He was not cheered, but he did get a standing ovation.
Posted by Hasbeen, Monday, 17 May 2010 2:29:24 AM
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I'm at a loss, are there those here who advocate a complete free market society, with no government? I believe government weather right wing, left wing, center, run by Adolph Hitler or Mother Teresa by nature are interventionist, just not on economics but on most things that rule our daily lives. We need government to make laws, impose standards, run services, we demand it. Where would we be without government, some where in 19th century England?

Then some bring up the argument, I know of a specific case of dar da, dar da, dar da etc, I don't know what their point is, is that the justification for the abolition of government altogether? That line of argument is as absurd as if I said Lindy Chamberlain was wrongly convicted of murder therefor all those convicted of murder should be set free, but then again, without government there would be no murder convictions, problem solved.

I'm in agreement governments make mistakes, they get things wrong, but they also get things rights, so on balance are we better off with or without government? I'll take government any day over no government at all, and lets work to improve it, and make it better, not destroy it.
Posted by Paul1405, Monday, 17 May 2010 5:48:43 AM
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Well I don't know why people bother being Left or Right and centre this and that in our binary political system. It's got so we can't tell one party from the other anymore. I often visualize pollies of both parties lunching together and laughing at the passionate but pointless allegiances of all us humble mugs.

I haven't voted for either major party (ie: the ONE party, IMO) for a long, long time. I do my bit to try and get some variety in there. Like I plan to vote for the Pirate Party and I vote for independents now when the opportunity arises. Got to revitalize the political corpse if we can.

However, I'd have very much liked to see Kim Beazley have a go as PM.
I'd have voted for him. Still would.
Posted by Pynchme, Monday, 17 May 2010 7:09:34 AM
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Well I’ve been off having a life, specifically at the Canberra International Music Festival. I recommend both. But as the discussion is still ticking along, I’ll come back in.

Peter,
You seem to make some assumptions. One assumption seems to be that ‘society’ is the same thing as ‘socialism’. I don’t even know what to do with that, except to recommend a dictionary. And perhaps some study of the natural history of mammals.

Apparently another assumption is that the only way Government can intervene is by owning some of the means of production. You then argue that it won’t know how to price what it produces. I understand your argument – Hayek’s point that markets facilitate an immense amount of information processing. But I don’t accept your premise. Government can regulate traffic intersections and most people think that’s a good idea. Government can redistribute income and most people go along with that, though it’s a clumsy mechanism, because most people agree it’s OK to help out the less fortunate, within reason. (And there will always be debates about where to draw the line. My preference would be to neutralise all the mechanisms that redistribute income in the other direction, to the rich from the rest of us. Many of those mechanisms are already a result of intervention, so intervening to eliminate them shouldn't be a problem.) You might wish it do be done differently, but it’s hard to argue that it leads inexorably to breakdown.

In the roles just mentioned the government is being the referee, without owning anything. Of course the government’s interventions can affect prices, but who says “the market” gets the “right” price? You apparently don’t accept the neoclassical argument that it does, and I agree with you.

So that gets back to my central point. I understand Hayek’s argument about information processing, but that doesn’t mean the “processing” gets a good answer, or is rational, well-informed, etc. etc. It is patently obvious that financial market prices are inaccurate – they changed by 40% overnight in1987, without any change in objective reality.

Continued -
Posted by Geoff Davies, Monday, 17 May 2010 12:22:09 PM
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There are many other examples of market malfunction. So markets may process information, but we need to look at the answer they get and adjust it if it’s doing harm – like making honest people broke or trashing the Niger delta.

If you’re going to attribute Shell’s destruction of people’s livelihoods, BP’s destruction of the Gulf of Mexico and (?) the GFC all to government intervention then I don’t think I can have any more useful discussion with you. Our perceptions of the world don’t overlap enough. I think Pericles has been asking a very reasonable question.

Your basic question (a), how is partial “control” (I said "manage") different from full control, is hard for me to answer definitively because I struggle to imagine why you would think they are the same. I’m *guessing* you think the only intervention is through ownership, and that’s rather obviously not true. So that's my answer to that one.

Question (b). Government refereeing (of the markets) avoids the ‘calculation’ (or processing) problem by only nudging what the markets do, rather than trying to supplant the markets completely, as in communism. I agree with you modern societies are far too complex for the latter to work.

Paul1405 has raised the question of the role of government. My take is that governments (and the political process in general) are the way we collectively organise ourselves when we are in groups too large for our innate face-to-face social behaviroural repertoire to suffice. In other words when the groups are larger than a few tens (or possibly hundreds) of people.

If you imagine, as libertarians apparently do, that we don’t need any organisation of larger groups, then (given my argument that markets don’t yield desirable outcomes) I think you don’t understand the social nature of human beings, nor the central tension in all living systems between the welfare of the individual and the welfare of the larger system of which it is a part, and on which it depends.
Posted by Geoff Davies, Monday, 17 May 2010 12:27:21 PM
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I'm not sure that is the case, Hasbeen.

>>Waste & incompetence by a company costs no one but the companies share holders.<<

Tell that to the inhabitants of the Gulf coast watching the approach of a massive oil slick.

http://theenergycollective.com/TheEnergyCollective/64831

Or to the Alaskans still waiting for compensation for Exxon Valdez.

Tell that to the folks who find themselves without a home, thanks to the sales strategies of numerous US mortgage outfits.

http://www.theepochtimes.com/n2/content/view/32069/

Tell that to the farmer policyholders of HIH who couldn't spray their crops because their Public Liability cover had evaporated.

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1P1-44235310.html

In fact, tell all the "little people" who had their daily lives disrupted with the demise of their public liability insurance at HIH:

"Many small businesses that required public liability insurance only, ‘stand alone public liability’ could not obtain the cover, and the same phenomenon was experienced throughout Australian society affecting everything from community association activities to special events such as school fetes through to high risk activates as bungee-jumping or horse riding and to the mundane such as public liability insurance required by a council for a wedding taking place in a park."

http://tinyurl.com/28kup5e (n.b.: this downloads a .pdf file)

Tell that to the working mothers who saw the doors of their childcare centres closed to them.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/12/10/2442837.htm

There is absolutely no need to explain to me how wasteful and fundamentally corrupt are any dealings with government agencies. I too have war stories that make the hair stand on end.

This isn't about a pissing contest between the relative goodness and badness of government and private industry. It's about keeping the debate honest.

And I'm afraid waste, incompetence and destructiveness are not the sole province of governments, as Peter Hume would wish us to believe.
Posted by Pericles, Monday, 17 May 2010 12:50:52 PM
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With voters like Chris Lewis, both the parties can rest assured that the situation will remain unaltered and they can continue to grab for power, financed by the big end of town without actually doing anything to improve the environment or quality of life.
It does not matter which of the Big Two are in at the moment it is SNAFU.
The economy will continue to be run by the big banks to their profit, the environment will continue to be ruined by Big coal, big forestry and oil for their profit and we will continue to support two illegal invasions of countries that had not harmed Australia.
It is very hard to understand how anyone can be so blinkered or perhaps naďve.
The so called Democracy we have will never be anything other than an organization for Big Business to run the country until we manage to introduce citizen initiated referendums and can check the wild excesses we have to endure now.
Them maybe Labor will really be a party for the workers and not a thinly veiled party of sycophants lying in bed with big business.
Posted by sarnian, Wednesday, 19 May 2010 9:08:33 AM
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Sarnian,

I'm in agreement with the majority of what you have posted, but I can't understand this bit:

" until we manage to introduce citizen initiated referendums and can check the wild excesses we have to endure now"

Referendums are not that easy to hold, the logistics involved is huge, the cost is astronomical and can the result be decided by a slim majority in the smallest States vetoing the proposal.

How do 'citzens' initiate the referendum in the first place?

Would voting be compulsory?

Could the Christian Light Society initiate a referendum to ban Noddy and Big Ears as blasphemers, and those that don't vote would they be fined?

I think, like it or not governments are there to govern for the elected period.
Posted by Paul1405, Wednesday, 19 May 2010 9:51:54 AM
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Sarnian, thanks for the feedback. I obviously need to re-evaluate my thinking. I did not realise I was merely a status quo person.
Posted by Chris Lewis, Wednesday, 19 May 2010 9:54:00 AM
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Paul,

A good intro to referendums
http://direct-democracy.geschichte-schweiz.ch/switzerlands-system-ref here .
The Swiss model has been working successfully for years and would be a good model to base an Australian system on.
They are quite easy to hold, not astronomically expensive and the result is no different to any other election. In Switzerland Citizen's initiatives at the federal level need to collect 100,000 valid signatures within 18 months, and must not contradict international laws or treaties.
I do not know if voting is compulsory in them but I do know that the only two countries in the World where voting in an election is compulsory are Russia and Australia.
“Could the Christian Light Society initiate a referendum to ban Noddy and Big Ears as blasphemers, and those that don't vote would they be fined?”
Not if the vote went against it.
Would the population in Australia have voted to invade Iraq and Afghanistan?
I believe not.
But if it did at least we would all be tarred with the same brush and equally responsible.
“Like it or not governments are there to govern for the elected period.”
Yes but it could not commit an act that went against a referendum result that went against such an act.
Then we would be on the right track towards democracy.

Chris Lewis, I was not being offensive in my answer but rather pointing out that you were readily accepting the integrity of elected politicians and as we have seen in the last day even Mr. Abbot t has admitted that he does not always tell the truth
Posted by sarnian, Wednesday, 19 May 2010 10:30:28 AM
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Sarnian, it is always good to be reminded about how one's message comes across to different people.

I would agree that I do not really promote a great contrast to existing views. My perspective is limited from analysis that (wrongly or rightly) looks at factors obstructing policy change.

However, I too am looking for a policy mix that is vastly different from what is being offered. I hope to offer some ideas, based on two different scenarios, in the near future.
Posted by Chris Lewis, Wednesday, 19 May 2010 10:51:21 AM
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Sarnian,

I'm not convinced referendums are the way to go. Would people vote to invade given 18 months and 100,000 sigs. I think it would be more a case by then of voting to withdraw. I see the Swiss voted to ban minarets in a referendum brought on by a small right wing political party. That's one of my big concerns referendums to 'ban things' brought on by well organized vested interest groups, political parties large and small, religious nuts, media, unions, big business and alike, the use of front groups. Who checks the 100,000 I might sign 10 times and add 10 false names and 10 names of people I know.
Posted by Paul1405, Wednesday, 19 May 2010 11:41:13 AM
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Paul,
Would you sooner have one man, say John Howard, telling us that we are going to invade a sovereign country because he believed it was the right thing to do or have the mechanism in place to allow the whole country to vote on the issue even if it did take a while.
As I understand the law, it does not take eighteen months for it to be voted on but it must be finalized within eighteen months.
A small right wing party brought on the ban on minarets but the whole of Switzerland had to vote on it to have the ban brought in.
That to me is democracy.
Posted by sarnian, Wednesday, 19 May 2010 5:11:41 PM
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Sarnian

I'm sure there is a place in our society for referendum. A country as large as Australia 500,000 sigs would suit, with an absolute majority only required to get it passed, none of this States rubbish. But I still have concerns about 'ratbags' putting up questions and then having media sensationalism pushing their view unfairly. The big end of town can pour vast amounts of money into a campaign, how are the arguments financed? Its still going to be a slow process. Take the proposed mining tax, big mining would pour millions into a campaign to bring it down, the media would back them. The war in Afghanistan and Iraq, I'm totally opposed, but what the voters have to remember is a vote for the Conservatives is a vote for war, vote for Abbott and if there is a war around the corner he'll be right in it, war oils the wheels of capitalism, they can't do without it. Maybe a referendum to see if we want referendums is in order. I still like to vote for a party, The Greens, who are committed and have real policies and are not beholding to big business. They wont go to war unless Australia is in real danger and they wont be influenced unduly by any pressure group, with The Greens what you see is what you get.

p/s A vote for Rudd may well be a vote for war.
Posted by Paul1405, Thursday, 20 May 2010 5:45:37 AM
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The Prime Minister,Kevin Rudd, recently co-wrote and published a children's book called "Jasper and Abby and the Great Australia Day Kerfuffle".

Given the Australian government's lamentable response at the UN to the Israeli army's assault on the people of Gaza and its even more woeful response to the subsequent United Nations' report condemning aspects of the assault as a war crime, I wonder if the Prime Minister would care to write a book for the Palestinian children still alive in besieged Gaza.

He can dedicate it to the 350 or so Palestinian children who were killed in the air raids and subsequent on the ground military incursion and to the many children who were maimed and injured. He could also hold a competition amongst the members of the "fair go for all" party, the Australian Labor Party, to see who can come up with the best warm and fuzzy title.
Posted by Sentel, Thursday, 20 May 2010 4:22:57 PM
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