Max Keiser and his sidekick, Stacy, report on their recent trip to Greece where they witnessed a society taking it to the streets.
They also cover the IMF report which just downgraded the United States' GDP rate from 2.7 to 2.5%. Kaiser says these numbers are cooked. Stacy and Max stop and consider the irony in this as Stacy points out the IMF just a few years ago was "bankrupt". Then they focus on how the IMF is playing Hank Paulson type of politics with America, calling for America to increase its debt ceiling ASAP. As Stacy points out, all the IMF wants is more debt posted by America. If America will increase its debt to the banksters, the IMF will cease downgrading American GDP.
They then cover these sentences from a recent piece in the Financial Times by Stephen Roach: "The global economy is being hobbled by a new generation of zombies, the economic walking dead. The US Consumer is in the early stages of an unprecedented retrenchment."
Max Keiser Interviews Professor Steve Keen
After Stacy completes her segment of tossing headlines to Max, Max comes back from a break in the show to interview "The Non-Economist, Non-Economist" Australian Economics Professor Steve Keen. Professor Keen takes Keiser through the differences of private vs. public debt . . . a fascinating explanation of why we are in a Global Debt Crisis today. Keen beautifully explains private created debt drives the economy while government debt is like an ambulance which comes along to rescue the bad drivers in the private sector.
Possibly the most contentious assertion which Keen makes is the only way for us to get out of this mess is to increase private wages. Keen says raising wages will cause inflation; however, he states the only way to reduce the "value" of our debt is to increase inflation.
Lastly, my favorite thought from Steve Keen is how he looks at the banks. He says they are the big villains in the Credit Crisis as they are not in the business of lending money to finance business capitalization any longer, but are in the business of speculation.
Americans would do well to study how the lower and deconstructed middle class of Argentinian people took to the streets after decades of privatization and giveaways to a global corporatocracy. This once public or common wealth of Argentina, when privatized, was usually sold at low slanted bids to criminal insiders at Too Big To Fail Banks, Big Multi-Naitonal Oil Companies, and the like, while Argentinian "insiders" were paid off. These insiders, called Argentinian Mafiocracy in the film, bankrupted their country and destroyed the pensions and healthcare of their people who were the worker bees responsible for building up the wealth over the years.
In this film, you will learn how the richest 10% of Argentina quickly took control of 60% of that nation's wealth through the corrupt machinations of politicians from all parties, and by using corrupt union leaders, lobbyists, bankers, businessmen, the IMF, the World Bank, and other wealthy and soon to be wealthy criminals to do their bidding.
This 10/60 wealth disparity figure galvanized the students, workers and pensioners of Argentina into a Solidarity which took to the streets for years to protest against their corrupt government and Central Bank. Amazingly, here we are in America, at the cusp of 2011 A.D., with 10% of Americans owning 71% of our wealth . . . which is a bigger disparity than that which made Argentinians angry enough to take to the streets!
Instead of a movement of all American workers, retirees, the under-employed/unemployed and the 99ers we have Senators and Congress People trying to block medical care to 9/11 first responders or trying to cut off much needed aid to people who've been unemployed for longer than 99 weeks, while corporate lobbyists for Big Banks, Big Oil, Big Pharma and more are writing bills which Congress rubber stamps, and Wall Street banksters are raking in hundreds of billions of dollars in bonuses and bitching about it in the nation's media.
As you watch this enlightening film about Argentina, keep in mind the allegories your critical mind will find and overlay with what has been going down in America since the "Reagan Revolution".
In many ways, this film is disheartening as it shows un-regulated greed abetted by a compliant government will soon enough bring a country to its knees. But in another context, this film is uplifting because it shows what a angry majority of lower class and middle class people are capable of when they unite:
p.s. I had no sooner put this post up on my blog when I clicked on James Kunstler's latest from his "Clusterfuck Nation Blog" titled The Moment of Convulsion. Here are the first three (continued below Part 1 of the 12 Part Film)
Part 1
paragraphs from it which tie in nicely with the film you are about to watch:
Seeing this residue of history put me in mind of a riddle that one of my college professors presented to us one day years ago: why did Achilles drag Hector around the city of Troy three times? We came up with dozens of reasons ranging from conjectures out of the text of The Iliad to lame bits of Hippie numerology, but nobody could furnish the answer that the prof was looking for, which was eventually revealed: Because he [Achilles] was just that pissed off.
This was the idea that dogged me in the winter twilight of Paris late on Christmas Day as I pondered the fate of my own country back across the cold cold sea. A lot of Americans are beaten down and discouraged these days. They've lost not only jobs, incomes, and houses, but also a sense of purpose, and perhaps faith in the essential fairness of the American venture - as the propane runs out, and families try to subsist on Froot Loops, and the re-po squad turns up to haul away the Ford F-150 Raptor. Meanwhile, in their last remaining refuge from harsh reality, TV, they glimpse the likes of Jamie Dimon, Chloe Kardashian, and Jay-Z emerging from limousines looking hopelessly bored with wealth beyond imagination. When will the folks out theremove from shame and despondency to being really pissed off about the disposition of things?
