True or False? Corporate/Monoplistic competition = genteel gang warfare

[divideandconquer]

Remember how Michael Corleone wanted to go corporate so badly to escape the stigma of being a crooked and immoral businessman? Remember how Michael's dad killed a worse tyrant to gain his position. Seems like an ironic joke nowadays. "Black Hand", "Invisible Hand", what's the difference? Anybody watch "The Shield", "Damages" or "Sons of Anarchy"? Why doesn't someone write a romantic novel about Goldman Sachs? Ayn Rand style! Here's another great possibility for capitalist romance, Condelezza Rice's secret life at Chevron or Hamid Karzai's secret life at Chevron? Chalabi and Cheney can star in both books. Or how about an historic novel about the "Pilots of Enron One" or better yet, the actual undiscovered video tapes of the flights of Enron One. Then there's Cheney's commericial for Arthur Anderson like an undiscovered home movie similar to Hitler's. America is so failed, "Godwin's Law" has been repealed, so failed, the ironic "Daily Show" is the official record for our intelligentsia. We are a failed state!

America needs to admit it's hit bottom and hard. When the best mythological crooks are morally competitive with America's actual corporate leaders and their politician puppets, it's time for all of us to look in the mirror. We all live In a mythic "Charming" and an actual Pakistan. Did Ethan Zoebelle kill Benizar Bhutto or was it Dick Cheney? Who really killed Karen Silkwood? Would you rather have Jax than Obama? Was killing Opie's wife the equivalent of a contrived 9-11 for Charming? And why must the UK, Spain and India have their own 9-11's? Is that Al Queda's work or something MadMen came up with?

Why won't the American people admit that our fabled "capitalist system" has failed and at this point, is failing terminally? Where's the tipping point between "too much invested/too big to fail" and cowardice/laziness? When do we rebel against " the Emperor's with no clothes" who sell us polluted food from the company stores and charge people with good credit 33% and people with bad credit 39% and laugh about it, while giving less than 2% interest to savers?

When do we "go French"

[27inCali]

1. you are a poet

and I am ready to look at the dark truth with you, sad that it takes others so long to get there and even then they turn their heads and say,"No! It cannot be!"

[dusmcj]

2. there's no fucking competition, American business should be prosecuted under RICO

"deregulate telecomms!!! It'll allow us to deliver choice and innovation to the consumer!!!"

Result: all the shitbags in the US telco game overcharge the same for the same low quality of service with the same lame bundling and pricing structures. They got handed the internet on a silver platter, including a lot of the long-haul backbone infrastructure as well as the networking technology, which was funded either by federal research dollars or by old telco monopoly money, and they've done nothing with it. No investment in infrastructure, no investment in fundamental research, because it all has to serve the quarterly bottom line. Bull Shit.

"deregulate the airlines!!! It'll allow us to deliver choice and innovative services to the consumer!!!"

Wow, Fuck yeah, America, home of the free market, fuck! Three major airlines left after the bloodletting, and now they're getting the hang of not lowering fares once they've raised them in response to fuel price fluctuations, charging the passenger through the nose for breathing (waiting for coin-op restrooms to be introduced by Boeing ? oh wait, I forgot, credit card - "taking a shit ? priceless") and delivering service fit for cattle with young corporate snots (when they can be distracted from their conversations amongst themselves) shooing the proles through the corrals. A Big Win For America!!!

The Auto industry - hey, we don't need no stinkin' CAFE standards, we are El Gringo Macho and we build Beeg Fokin Trocks for Markins, hombre!!! Two companies in bankruptcy and the only one that isn't is the one that always indicated that it still had some professional ability left.

Yah, American business culture's natural tendency is to breed neutered organization men whose autonomy is replaced by a group-derived need for a cart to wheel their shlong around in, it's So Huge, as long as they're a Winner in the Game. And then turn into aging bent silverback retirees who need to remember to pick up their Cialis prescription before they hit the golf course. While the public is jerked off/around by a string of bubble markets that reflect that the economy is structured to provide opportunities to skim marginal returns off cash flows.

The gladhanding club means that there's no competition, there's just the same schmucks in different color suits all basically hawking the same junk to you, which isn't really what you want, and sharing the proceeds amongst themselves one way or another. Monopoly, yes. Competition, no. (Contention, yes, but driving the other guy out of business doesn't mean your product is better than his. Only that "the pure play wasn't enough".) Dipshits.

[aquart]

3. Genteel? Are you thinking there have been no murders?

Heh heh.

[mediaman007]

4. Great thread!

Couldn't agree more!

Of course, the tea baggers would have you believe that more of the same is needed. I guess the real trick is to get people to vote against their own interests.

About four years ago, there was an article in "The Nation" that said the real battle is between populism and corporatism. Issues, like flag burning, abortion, school vouchers, prayer in schools and so many others, are used to camouflage the corporate run government. And, of course, the old standby: class warfare! There has been class warfare in the United States since Richard Nixon became president. Looking at where the wealth is, I can tell you who is winning.

[StarfarerBill]

5. Yes!

You've hit upon the basic truth of the matter: The Republican far-right and its corporate masters have perfected the means of duping citizens to support measures that go against their own best interests. While they've managed to do this in the past on occasion (witness Reagan's coup), they have it down to an (evil) science now; the herd will go wherever the talking-head sheepdogs lead them...usually straight to the slaughter.

One point I have to disagree with you on, though: There's been class warfare in this country ever since capitalism was first introduced in the early-to-mid-1800s. The working class really began hitting back in the latter part of that century, culminating in the labor gains of the 1930s, -40s, and -50s; it's been mostly downhill since.

[mediaman007]

6. Yes, You're right! Along with industrialization came the company stores,

company towns and being in debt to your employer. The mill cities of the northeast, the Lowell girls, the Triangle Shirt factory, the coal mines of Pennsylvania and West Virginia, the iron mines of Minnesota and Northern Michigan and the steel factories of Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Gary. Somehow the workers broke through in the 1930's and 1950's, only to see the companies fail to upgrade their technology and shut down.

Corporations don't care about people...only profit. We are foolish to think that we are of any concern to them as employees. They do care about us as customers though. Unfortunately, we don't have a lot of wealth left, so the corporations are focussed on the Far East: India, China and Indonesia.

[arcadian]

7. This: a story about how we have been planning on invading the Middles East since the 1970s