f***ing low wages low hours... f*ck capitalism

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I must admit your response has me on pins and needles. How so?

i don't understand the pins and needles bit, but i meant the comment as a reference to northern european states' relatively generous social welfare programs which result in a lower rate of societal dysfunction at the margins.

Actually, the welfare state is a tacit recognition that we were not all created equal--is it not?

I would also take issue with you that the welfare state results in lower levels of societal dysfunction. In fact, large swathes of many northern European cities are now no-go zones for the natives, including the police. What has happened is that the welfare state has allowed immigrants, particularly Muslim immigrants, not to assimilate.

the immigrant thing is its own discussion and not strictly germaine to the topic of generous social welfare programs in general. if these northern european nations policed their borders and restricted emmigration to more easily assimilated peoples, that problem would fade.

I agree completely. But immigrants consumer social services at much higher rates than do the natives. It is also the case that natives tend to see the system as theirs, and something to take care of, while many immigrants try to milk these systems for all they are worth. I'm not a big fan of Milton Friedman, but I think he was spot-on when he noted that you can't have open borders and a welfare state.

the problem with america is our borders are just too big to effectively and humanely police.

The border with Mexico is no longer than the Iron Curtain was. How could that have been effectively policed but ours can't?

because the old soviet union didn't have anything or anybody against a sufficiently large government to give it the resources it demanded to police its borders. but try and get such past our hopelessly balkanized political system.

Blabby, here is the problem in a nutshell: For decades now, as many jobs as possible have been offshored. At the same time, countless millions of immigrants, both legal and illegal, have been admitted to drive down wages on those jobs that are left. Things now are so bad that young people--and my heart goes out to them--have no way to support themselves. So, things will change; it's just a question of when and how. Here is a current article discussing just that:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/eb265a64 ... ab7de.html

A quote from Karl Marx comes to mind: Reform is what the elites do to maintain their hold on power. If this bunch refuses to reform, then things will get very interesting.

link blocked by paygate. anyways, if things don't improve, one of two possibilities present themselves-

*bread and circuses [general welfare] to maintain peace and order
*some combo of widespread incarceration and slavery/culling of "undesirables" in population to maintain peace and order

Blabby, I've had the same sort of thing happen. Anyway, here is the article, from Britain's Financial Times:

America’s debt-ceiling crisis achieved something quite remarkable. It made the EU look well governed by comparison. Both the EU and the US systems are weighed down with checks and balances that make it hard to get things done. But Europe currently has one thing going for it that America lacks. All the most important decision makers in Brussels are committed to making the system work. There are no Tea Party types who regard compromise as a betrayal.

This broad centrist consensus was an unacknowledged strength of the EU throughout the euro crisis. Although it became routine to complain that European leaders always do “too little, too late”, the markets also realised that – even if Europe’s leaders did not get it right first time – they would just reconvene, at yet another emergency meeting, and keep bashing away at the problem. The fact that all 28 national leaders at EU summits are committed to working together is crucial in keeping the euro alive.

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In the coming year, however, the big danger to the European single currency is that the political consensus that underpins the euro could come unstuck. A weak economy, weariness with austerity, anger about immigration and resentment of a remote-seeming EU are fuelling the ascent of anti-establishment and nationalist political parties across the continent.

These rising political forces are gaining ground in big EU countries such as France, the Netherlands, Britain and Italy – and also in smaller nations such as Greece, Hungary, Finland and Austria. Given that the EU requires unanimity for many big decisions, even a small state that goes rogue could cause real trouble.

As the Tea Party has demonstrated in the US, anti-establishment radicals do not need to capture the position of president or prime minister to gum up the system. Even if traditional pro-EU centrists continue to lead most national governments in Europe, their room for manoeuvre at EU summits is greatly reduced if populist parties are making big gains back home. A Dutch prime minister who fears the anti-EU Freedom party – which is topping the opinion polls at present in the Netherlands – will find it much harder to agree to a new bailout for southern Europe. Similarly, a British leader who is losing ground to the UK Independence party will be driven to take more extreme positions in EU negotiations.

Next year’s elections to the European parliament also look like a possible breakthrough moment for a European Tea Party. The parliament has traditionally been the most federalist institution in Europe, acting as a lobby group for the transfer of more powers to Brussels. But next May’s elections are likely to show a surge in votes for eurosceptic parties across the continent. It is quite feasible that the National Front will top the polls in France, that the Freedom party will win in the Netherlands and that Ukip will be the biggest single bloc from Britain.
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What is more, the European parliament has recently gained new powers. While it lacks the blocking capacity of the US Congress, a rebellious European legislature could reject the EU budget, prevent crucial appointments and refuse to sign off on legislation that is needed to prop up the euro.

Europe’s rebel parties are very far from forming a coherent bloc. They range from proto-fascists such as Hungary’s Jobbik to the far-left Syriza in Greece – and from conservative nationalists such as Poland’s Law and Justice party to semi-anarchists such as the Five Star Movement in Italy. Some of the anti-establishment parties, such as France’s National Front, are trying to make the journey from the far right towards political respectability. A few, such as Ukip and parts of the Italian right, share the tax-cutting, small-government agenda of the Tea Party. Other rebel parties in Europe, including the Dutch Freedom party, have cast themselves as defenders of the traditional welfare state.

What almost all Europe’s anti-establishment parties share with the Tea Party, however, is an anti-elitist rhetoric that casts mainstream politicians as the servants of a remote, globalised elite. Another central theme that unites most of Europe’s anti-establishment parties with the Tea Party is resentment of immigration. When mainstream politicians say – correctly – that their ability to curb immigration is constrained by EU rules on free movement of people, they merely fuel populist rage at “out of touch” elites.

Opinion polls in the richer countries of western Europe show an increasing voter concern about migration – legal and illegal – that is rich fodder for Europe’s Tea Party types. Anger about the economy and about immigration are fusing – and can then be easily directed at the EU itself, which has large powers in both areas. As one British official puts it: “Ukip’s dream is to get Europe, immigration and welfare into the same sentence.”

Beyond particular issues, what Europe’s rebel parties really share with the Tea Party in America is a political style – a rhetoric that holds that the system is rotten, that society is heading for disaster and that therefore compromise is a betrayal. Even in the US – which has built up global confidence in the dollar over centuries – the Tea Party’s political machinations came close to causing a financial panic. For the EU, which is still struggling to rebuild confidence in the euro, the rise of a European Tea Party would risk disaster.

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Amazing how that article buys into the whole "blame the Tea Party" garbage.

Ongoing debt is unsustainable. The Tea Party wasn't against doing anything, they simply did not want more and more spending that we can't pay for without even more borrowing.

There has been no effort by either Democrats or Republicans to reign in spending and say "no" to new programs that don't require more borrowing to pay for. We need to be cutting to the bone to get our way out of debt, not going deeper into it, but it's interesting that the political spin machine can misrepresent the facts to media outlets around the world and say it's the Tea Party who are to blame for our problems.

Hey, I agree. What this article shows is that the hostile liberal elites are past the first two stages of denial, which are ignoring and ridiculing, and on to the third stage, which is showing fear--fear so strong it is palpable. The hostile liberal elites sense their time is just about up.

All this talk about liberal has me believing most people have forgotten the actual word meaning.

Liberal:

adjective

1. open to new behavior or opinions and willing to discard traditional values:
they have more liberal views toward marriage and divorce than some people
favorable to or respectful of individual rights and freedoms:
liberal citizenship laws
(in a political context) favoring maximum individual liberty in political and social reform:
a liberal democratic state
(Liberal) of or characteristic of Liberals or a Liberal Party.
(Liberal) (in the UK) of or relating to the Liberal Democrat Party:
the Liberal leader
Theology regarding many traditional beliefs as dispensable, invalidated by modern thought, or liable to change.

2 [attributive] (of education) concerned mainly with broadening a person’s general knowledge and experience, rather than with technical or professional training.

3. (especially of an interpretation of a law) broadly construed or understood; not strictly literal or exact:
they could have given the 1968 Act a more liberal interpretation

4. given, used, or occurring in generous amounts:
liberal amounts of wine had been consumed
(of a person) giving generously:
Sam was too liberal with the wine

Copied and pasted from the Oxford dictionary.

By the definition everyone is 'liberal' from time to time. No exceptions. Orwell was on to something when he came up with the idea of 'doublespeak.' Words losing meaning and being used for manipulative purposes.

Then again as a country America is approaching the 350 year mark where every 'democratic' society seems to crumble.

“The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public's money.”
― Alexis de Tocqueville

Capitalism, government, money, are all grand delusions. Capitalism is where the poor work hard to make much money for the rich man.

Nothing lasts forever and yeah I don't think our 'economy' is going to get any 'better' soon. We need to be reminded of how we are a community of incredibly social creatures and reassert this into our way of thinking and living. Help everyone around you as we are a small piece of the intricate clock that represents humanity and the universe.

So much anti-education, anti-humanist, anti-caring in this world. We need more self educated, creative people to invent new things that make such positions as low end jobs obsolete. Self automated McDonald's and worker less retail stores are the future as technology will soon permit this as reality. This is the position of most major companies to increase the use of technology and have relatively little to zero staff involved in the production of goods.

Reclassifying 'full time' to be around 30 hours instead of 40 hours would in theory create more jobs. Though with that reclassification we would also have to raise wages to maintain a 'living wage.' For every job available there are 2.5-4 people who need a job in almost every given job category.

I don't know. I could rant all day, however it will never change anything. Only action changes something.

“The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.”
― Socrates

Arguing about how it is instead of working toward how you want it to be is pointless and will only result in people running in circles.

"Willing to discard traditional values"? That's a laugh; modern liberalism demands traditional values be discarded as "racist", "sexist", homophobic, etc. etc. etc.

Liberalism is:

--A belief in change and innovation, oftentimes for its own sake, also called modernism, and now postmodernism.

--A belief that the individual transcends everything else--especially God and reality, oftentimes called secular humanism. Liberal individuality necessarily descends in to narcissism, of which this definition is a good example.

--A belief that in radical egalitarianism that is more conceit than actuality (e.g., a good liberal will tell you in one breath that IQ doesn't matter, and with their next breath that their IQ's are higher than anybody else's).

--A belief in universalism and internationalism, and a strong antipathy toward nationalism that is also more conceit than actuality, since liberalism really only celebrates diversity as long as we're all the same--i.e., like them.

--A conceit that they believe in liberty and democracy. The reality is that people are free to do anything as long as it is within circumscribed liberal values; anything else is "hate". For the liberal, democracy isn't rule by the people, but rule of the people by liberal elites according to what they think the people should want. To the good liberal, the people are nothing more than an abstraction.

Now your just taking an ideology and twisting the actual word meaning.