Some Belated Replies

I just noticed the comment thread on the "slouching" post of a week ago and will reply. To Patrick: First, belated happy St. Patrick's Day. If I actually equated your demand for less bureaucracy with fascism/nazism I was mistaken and apologize. (I'm too lazy to search for the reference in question)

As for your notion that "there are supposed to be some regulatory safeguards to prevent that kind of corruption", this is indeed the essence of modern liberalism. It is a quaintly optimistic, and we now know, naively absurd expectation. We now know it is a capitalist state with capitalist courts and it's own capitalist press. And it regulates itself perfectly to serve that end. It's a matter of asking the right questions.

Beak: Who is LWB? I don't have any idea how to block comments even if I find them offensive.Did you say "real Jews"? Because that's a lot like saying "real Germans". And I am not a hack fishing guide, I can send you recommendations. I support many Chavez policies but have no allegiance to the man.

As for the dude with all the guns, he probably just thought he was erring on the side of caution (lots of minorities in Sacramento) and will sue the Govment for infringing on his rights. I know him in the figurative sense.

Now for my comment for the day. Matt Taibbi's article in Rolling Stone about Bank of America has generated lot's of buzz. In "gonzo" style he takes down the culture of corruption Patrick's regulations are supposed to somehow stifle. I like what Baudrillard says about corruption:

"Just as the scorpion threatened by fire shoots it's own venom into itself, democracy encircled by the flames of free-market economics and the new world order pumps the searing venom of corruption into it's veins."

Anyway, after exposing the vile behavior of bankers, Taibbi ends with this:

"In a pure capitalist system, an institution as moronic and corrupt as Bank of America would be swiftly punished by the market.." He agrees with Patrick that Big Government intervened and harmed us all because Matt too is a liberal believer. He continues : "..it's a full-blown assault on the American dream. Where's the incentive to play fair and do well..?" Charming, really, to think such starry eyed folks still exist. He ends with this: "Throughout history, it's precisely this kind of corrupt behavior that has given birth to counter-cultural revolutions."

The "revolution" Matt desires, then, is a change towards "a pure capitalist system", something that never has ,never will and never could exist. But everyone from Obama to Romney to Bill Mc Kibben to Rob Hopkins to David Korten want us to Believe in and Hope for it.