Thanks Col Rouge.

It seems I was the only person to predict a one percent cut. I had written shock and awe in there too as part of the RBA strategy but edited it out because my comment went over 350 words. I basically thought that if the Australian economy was about to begin a slide into deep recession (as some economists are predicting)the RBA would provide some shock and awe with a one per cent cut to stimulate the economy because the banks would have to pass on a substantial amount of the cut.

I still think that the pressure in the long term in Australia may well be to increase rates as the US exports the cost of the bailout to the rest of the world through inflation.

Col Rouge, I suggest you read some of the early Marx, with his soaring passages about liberation and its possibilities, or even his views on the division of labour and how in a real human society we would poet, farmer, hunter etc in one day.

Again, you mistake Stalinism for Marxism. They have nothing in common. Stalinism and the slow destruction of the soul it created mirrors the same processes going on in the West. Not surprising since alienation is inherent to capitalism, which is what the West and stalinism both are.

*and replace it with a democratically planned economy run by workers - socialism.*

Hehe Passy, you really do live in fanatsy land. Next those workers
apoint leaders, next those leaders screw the workers, for their
own selfish interests, as we have seen time and time again.

Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutaly, so we have the
dear Leader living it up in North Korea, whilst his people starve,
etc etc.

What we have in say Australia today, is that if banks or BHP make
record profits and pay record dividends, those dividends are
paid to workers super funds, 1 trillion $ and growing is sitting
there, in their names, as ultimate owners of these large companies.
Marx never even dreamed of this kind of possibility or outcome and
its not allowed for in your dogma, so you don't know how to deal with
it.

Passy, you are free to put your wierd ideas to the Australian
public if you wish, at any elections. You might get the donkey
vote and a couple or so more, thats about it. Dream on!

I know what is good for me, you don't. I will work if there is a
reason and an incentive to work. No profit means no work!
All very simple but it is clearly beyond you.

BN

I note the IMF predicts that the bailout would cost at least doouble the $700 bn estimated. Ihe old double up rule is coming in to play.

Yabby, I mean no disrespect, but an image of the Black Knight from Monty Python came into my mind when I read your latest post. As the castle of capitlaism collapses there you are on the bridge screaming "Come back and I'll bite your bloody arms off."

You seemed obsessed with superannuation and the idea this gives workers control of companies. We have no control over those companies. I'd like BHP to go totally renewable next year, or the year after, or the year after, or the year after ... Fat chance of me or my super fund or any group of super funds imposing that, or even getting it on the agenda.

Super funds hold about $1 trillion in assets, most but not all of them in Australia.
Australia's GDP is about $1.1 trillion. Assume the return on net productive assets in Australia is five per cent. That means that total net productive assets in Australia is about 20 trillion. In other words super funds have investments totalling about 5% of the total net productive assets in Australia. That's not huge.

I would need to look up offical figures to confirm, but even if the figure is a ten per cent return, then super funds would hold only ten per cent of productive assets in Australia.

Part of the 9 percent super gurantee came from workers foregoing wage inceases. Thoe wage increases are lost forever.

In addition we subsidise super funds and superannuants about $30 bn a year through tax exemptions etc. In the next year or so this figure will surpass what we spend on the pension.

And now super funds are having their worst year, possibly ever, (so why did I retire and defer my benefit till November?) so much so that fund values are now back to what they were 3 years ago and the fall may have only just begun.

Passy thank you for suggestion I read Marx.

I will wait until the movie comes out… then realized, it has…

“A day at the races”

Regarding “Stalinism for Marxism. They have nothing in common.”
It is like this

Marxism begat Stalinism
just as Lenin wrote
“the goal of socialism is communism”

The idea that you can set up a centrally controlled authoritarian government in the name of “Socialism” which will not succumb to the despotism and tyranny which is “Stalinism” is to suggest that

If you a sink piece of iron into acid, it will not corrode.

The nature of socialism has an inescapable and fatal defect. That defect being the centralized control instituted and required by socialism is vulnerable to entryism and takeover by more malevolent forces than the “gullible souls” of socialism can resist.

Really confirming Lenin’s observation to the nature of his “useful idiots”

“Stalinism and the slow destruction of the soul it created mirrors the same processes going on in the West.”

Hardly, the socialist souls were raped and destroyed by communists, who were, far from mirroring the “capitalists”, seen to collapse before the overwhelming superiority and strength of capitalism.

As for "slow destruction of the soul", my soul thrives ion capitalism, I achieve what I want to acheive and am who I choose tobe. I am not constrained by the uniformity of socialism (nor the third rate uniforms, so popular among socialists)
I must agree with Yabby, your idealism is fine for text books but even before Cromwell was promoted by his “levelers”, to the role of Lord Protector and hence to despot in chief and Robespierre introduced the “Terror” in the name of Liberty, Fraternity and Equality, the forces of “socialism have been the cause of almost as much misery as the Communists they repeatedly get overrun by.

*As the castle of capitlaism collapses*

Passy, I remind you that the present problems were caused by bad
politics. I certainly don't see the US as you do, or they would
not prop up their production of say ag products, with huge subsidies.
So capitalism in name only, not in what they do.

Have you also noticed what is happening with smart investors? They
are licking their lips at bargains waiting to be bought. Warren
Buffett has now spent 6 billion of his 45 billion cash hoard, just
last week. Does it look like he is panicking? There is huge cash
there, waiting for bargains, but IMHO its too early to buy just now,
wait until people have to sell. Those who got it wrong are panicking,
not those who got it right. Just as expected.

* Fat chance of me or my super fund or any group of super funds imposing that, or even getting it on the agenda.*

Look up the share registry of the top 20 shareholders in nearly all
listed ASX companies, they appear in every annual report. They are
nearly all super funds, local and overseas funds. They have the
power to sack the board, enforce their vote, tell the companies to
do whatever they want. They represent the owners, which are the
workers. You convince all those other workers that you are right,
then they have the power, but I doubt if you can do that, so you
just blame the system.

*so much so that fund values are now back to what they were 3 years ago*

Umm so what? Before that you had had 15 years or so of growth.
Are you so greedy Passy, that you are never satisfied and always
want more?

I note that some of the Rio workers now want to go on strike.
125k-200k$ a year and they still want to strike. How greedy are
these people?

Thanks Col Rouge

A day at the races would have more chance of success than investing in capitalist enterprises or ventures at the moment.

I can almost imagine Rudd announcing we are investing the Budget Surplus on the favourite in the fourth at Sandown.

Yabby, stop trying to defend the indefensible. How many superannuation fund investors actually influence let alone control one top 200 company? None. How many funds actually control one top 200 company (Together since they have limits on how much they can invest individually). None.

I wonder how much my super fund investments went down today? I pity the next generation of workers who will have to fund the baby boomers in retirement. The cost will be staggering.

Ah, isn't capitalism grand? We are on the path to the possible immiseration of all. As the AFR asked a few weeks ago, can it survive?

Rio Tinto workers are super exploited and merely trying to win back some of the surplus value they create which their boss company then steals from them.

I am not greedy. I have lived off the sale of my labour power for the last 30 years. I have been forced to set aside amounts from my wage into a super fund for 30 years and want to live in retirement on a decent pension, as I want all retirees to.

The consequences of the collapse of the Australian and world stock markets mean that is becoming less likely each day. That's not greed; it is merely responding to the expectations created in super by a range of people over many years, including Costello in the last two years.

My loss of forthcoming pension income is but one small example of the misery that will hit workers around the world in the form of unemployment, longer hours, lower wages, less conditions, if we let the bosses get away with that. As the BLF used to say, if you don't fight you lose.