https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLpfbcXTeo8
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"What's scary is there are people who don't think that's a bad thing."
Is it in all cases?
Hypothetical: There are 100 sailors in a sub stranded on the bottom. There is only enough oxygen (actually CO2 scrubbers) for 20 men to live long enough to be rescued.
Is it better to kill 80 of them to save 20 or for all 100 to suffocate to death equally?
I ask - it is an open question each will have to decide for themselves.
The Donner party and the airplane passengers stranded on a mountain in Peru decided to eat their fellows. The claim is that those eaten had all died naturally. However, there is some evidence (and in other cases than these there is clear proof) that survivors (or someone) may have killed some of those who were eaten, as unhealed tool marks on skulls or ribs indicate a violent death.
So, as usual, nothing is as clearcut as it may seem.
And the damned lawyers gett blamed for it all:
http://www.tahoedailytribune.com/article/20071127/LIFE/71127001
Wickard v. Filburn is 1942. And the court's rejection of many New Deal programs as unconstitutional is what (as you know) drove FDR's court-packing plan - which changed how they ruled (albeit without passing).
Wickard relates to a New Deal program.
Many/most New Deal cases did nott reach the court for final adjudication by the Supremes until after 1937.
Hence the SC was dealing with New Deal and follow-on issues well into the '40s and even to a degree into the '50s.
I stand by what I wrote. Let the SS come. If one can be successfully prosecuted for that post, then the First Amendment is done for and there is no Constitution in force.
You must distinguish between a specific credible threat and a political statement indicating a wished for situation which in no way incites anyone to any specific action.
Do you suppose the drafters of the First Amendment wished to prohibit poitical speech such as "I wish that rat bastard King George was dead as a doornail". Of course not. Such is political speech. It is not a statement indicating that the speaker intends to go kill King George, with or without a doornail.
Besides, the SS is so ineffectual now, they have hookers and drunk driving to attend to.
FDR's Supreme court packing scheme did work. It cowed the Supremes - this is uncontested even among law school faculties. The entire tenor of the Supremes' decisions pivoted once the packing scheme was floated. After that, their jurisprudence gave us a boatload of horrible holdings, like the Wheat Case (Wickard v. Filburn) that the SC is still trying to correct today by carving it back (Logan v. US) (Comptroller v. Wynne), etc.
The packing scheme did work - politically - it intimidated the sitting justices to change how they ruled on New Deal and WW2 related statist Federal usurpations of authority.
"But a country's political system doesn't have to be communist to be statist."
Indeed. Which is why I also included the example of Nazi Germany - highly statist state capitalism with a big dose of socialism.
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=119285601
The US is far more statist now than in 1900. I think Teddy Roosevelt and his jingoism pushed America in the direction of statism, and the real damage was done by the other Roosevelt - with the New Deal socialism, Supreme court intimidation by threatening the court packing plan, and WW2 creating the massive military-industrial complex and the propaganda of WW2 and the social program benefits that tied people to manna from Uncle Sam and dependency upon the state.
The two Roosevelts both should have been hanged in Hong Kong in 1900.
No, he wasn't hanged in Hong Kong. However, he did say that after the first week he was getting claustrophobia on the streets because of how closely packed Hong Kongese are and how little physical personal space one has.
He said he hung ~OUTT ... errr ... stayed mostly in his hotel because he had personal space there, whereas on the streets or in public transport he felt claustrophobic.
Too bad for him, as Hong Kong has some of the best restaurants and shopping in the world. Butt I totally understand his point.
BTW, the guy was (is) a scratch golfer. Two afternoons a week he'd' take off and "play sticks" with various VC and hang ~OUTT ... errr ... solicit new contacts and clients.
Dude was a massive rainmaker. Second biggest book of biz in the entire firm (nott just office, butt among all offices of the firm). Super nice guy. I was very lucky to have him as a mentor. We gott along like Cheerios and milk in a bowl. Like vanilla ice cream and chocolate fudge. I really enjoyed that working and personal relationship. He's living his dream now and he deserves it - dude works/worked superhard and was really dedicated to the clients. His goal was to eventually do nothing butt sit on a bunch of boards of directors. He is just about there. Golf, board meetings, and his home a very, very, very short distance away from Joe Montana's home. Like chipping range. And he has golfed with Joe (probably made sure Joe beat him, even if Joe was 12 over).
So, no, he was nott hanged in HK.
"I'd say propaganda and repression working hand-in-hand"
In each case to subjugate the individual to the will of the state (which is the will of whomever wields political power - Stalin, Castro, Kim, Mao, etc.). WHO DECIDES what is the will of the state ? - those who are good at politics and despots - that is what rises to power.
As I wrote before, you are either a free person and an individual (libertarian/individualist) or you are a worker bee in the service of and owned by the state (statist).
Those are the two poles of the principal axis of political ideology.
Libertarianism vs. statism.
(Note: Adolf and Old Joe didn't have that pesky email problem.)
"And force is the distinction!"
Indeed so. Statism requires force - mental, physical, social - to suppress individualism.
You are either a free person and an individual (libertarian/individualist) or you are a worker bee in the service of and owned by the state (statist).
Those are the two poles of the principal axis of political ideology.
Libertarianism vs. statism.
The PRC post-Deng is nott communist except in name only. There are (or will soon be) as many or more Chinese billionaires than US billionaires.
Go to China - you will see that in many aspects they are far more capitalistic than the USA is today.
They are simply using the term 'communism' as a thin veil for a one-party totalitarian state and state-sponsored crony capitalism with a lott of low-scale laissez faire "unbridled" capitalism, 'regulated' only by bribes and kickbacks to government officials as needed.
So, again, all communism requires a repression of individual thought and/or action.
Stalinism is the most physically brutal instantiation on communism to-date, and Shakerism is the least physically brutal butt more mentally and psychologically brutal, using self-doubt, self-hatred as the means of repression.
This has been a helpful discussion. Now I know the basis for the use of your term "Stalinism".
Well, I suppose living in mental and religious bondage is a lesser brutality than being intentionally starved to death per edict of Stalin for purely political reasons (to kill off the antirevolutionary Kulaks from the Ukraine).
Of course, the Shakers pre-date Marx and were bound to a cult and forced to adopt the cult beliefs or be banished or shunned. The strongman who made the ultimate decisions and did the mind-fucking of the herd was the clergyman head of the cult - much like an imam or caliph in Islam.
So the Shakers were, in general, less physically brutal. However, I think that they were as or more mentally brutal than Stalin. People in the USSR, at least many of them, knew Stalin was a dickhead and rejected his propaganda in their own minds. The Shakers were thoroughly mind-fucked into a Koresh-like cult based on their deepest beliefs in the spewing of a clergyman, and the guilt that if they had internal feeling that disagreed with his 'truth' then they must be evil and feel bad.
Sometimes psychological torture and induced self-hatred is far worse than working in the gulags building the Road of Bones.
Of course, one of those inane beliefs was to nott reproduce. So the Shakers slowly died ~OUTT. Another example of how trying to deny their own biological reality (the innate desire for sex and reproduction) leads to nott making the Darwin cut.
Groupthink is both abhorrent and contrary to human biology.
How sad to have been a Shaker and think yourself dirty and evil for having the normal biological drives for sex and reproduction and the guilt for having those 'sinful' urges.
So I will accept your answer for your least objectionable example (Shakers). I will extract from that that your definition of Stalinism is communism with an emphasis on physical abuse and torture of citizens, and the furthest away from Stalinism on the communist side is the Shakers who instead use an emphasis on mental subjugation and the use of guilt, self-hatred, and dictated religion as the means of repression of individualism and human biology.
OK, got it. The spectrum of communism differs principally on whether the form of torture and repression of individualism is physical or mental.
As I said, between those two, I'd rather know my thoughts are nott evil and live in the gulag and work on the Road of Bones. they can have my body butt I will never surrender my mind.
"Some were more brutal than others."
In your opinion, which was the least brutal?
Yes, it didn't work. Butt that is nott my question.
Which was the best of the bunch?
Or are you agreeing with my assertion that the term "Stalinism" is a bankrupt apologist term and that there isn't a dime's worth of dfference between all communist governments?
I am seeking to find ~OUTT why people use the term "Stalinism" and what it means to them.
Is all communism Stalinism? If nott, give me an example of some communist government that is better that Stalinism. What's the other extreme from Stalinism in the spectrum of communist governments?
Past or present. Which was the best of the bunch?
Or are you agreeing with my assertion that the term "Stalinism" is a bankrupt apologist term and that there isn't a dime's worth of dfference between all communist governments?
Allow me to clarify: Marxism is as valid a theory as a mathematical theory that 1+1= 49.389228478478478478.
Why is anyone even paying lip service or attention to this absolutely ridiculous ideology that belongs in the long-forgotten dustbin of history?
How can universities justify hiring avowed Marxists as professors and nott, say, also have a Dept of Scientology Sciences or hire math professors who teach that 1+1= SQRT(49.389228478478478478)???
And please, Janice, do give me the example of the least objectionable government (past or present) that you deem Marxist.
I am ASSuming from your prior statements that the USSR under Stalin is the example of your most objectionable. If incorrect, then please correct this ASSumption on my part.
"But the idealized version of Marxism didn't mean everyone would "be alike". They'd pursue different interests, practice different trades or professions, and so on."
So we can all be radiologists and work from home? Cool.
A country full of radiologists.
Butt who will caddy for them? Who mows the fairways and picks up the trash from their empty beer cans?
Does that Marxism idea seem even REMOTELY plausible to you?
My theory is that drinking whiskey cures cancer.
Isn't it fun to construct nonsensical theories and then have people persist in believing them long after the nonsense is proven by repeated experiment?
Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!! We'll all choose to be rich cancer-free retirees.
"It appears the mom lives in a Brooklyn Apartment, and the Dad lives in a $429,000 New Jersey home. Did he buy them art or diamonds?
Judging by his character, he probably hates his parents and didn't give them a wooden nickel."
Or those are the only residences in their names. Maybe they both live in homes in the Hamptons owned by LLCs he controls.
Why pay inheritance/death taxes or be exposed to judgments against elderly parents when they back over the grocery boy in the parking lot as he is loading their groceries in the trunk?
I don't know about you, butt above a fairly low threshold, owning real estate in your own name or the name of relatives is risky - for MANY reasons, tax, inheritance, privacy, and others.
That is why 'god' invented the LLC and other S corps. LLPs are less preferable for various reasons.
Marty may be an ass to his parents, or maybe they really hang their fez and veil in the Hamptons or Montauk owned by one of his LLCs.
If he's as smart as some people credit him with being, he's stashed some cash into judgement-proof entities and vehicles.
Seconded. I agree with that position 100 percent. Indeed if the BOD lets the PPers now, post facto, withdraw from their investment, I would suggest that company shareholders and/or creditors file a shareholder derivative lawsuit.
Further, if the company files bankruptcy soon, any refunds to PPers could be voidable transfers and reversed by the bankruptcy court.
I am used to directors often being representatives of their respective venture funds, so when a financing round is done, an investment by a director (personally, which is rare) is done simultaneously with the closing for all the VC funds.
I have seen an outside director making a personal investment in a round (he bought $100,000 for himself), butt even he wired his funds into the same escrow to be released simultaneously at closing.
So, your experience is vaster than mine. Which is why I asked you about it, and you gave me a perfectly fine explanation that I understand and makes a lott of sense.
That's why I hang on DD - I learn a lott from folks like you.
I appreciate your answers and those of others. There is a lott of knowledge in this crew. I find ~OUTT more new shit here almost every week.
"we're not a very nice species, are we?"
I'm nott sure what "nice" means in this context, butt I'll agree with you on that statement for purposes of discussion and try to use the word in the context I think you meant it.
We may nott be a 'nice' species, and that very likely is why we are on top of the biological food chain and totally dominate the landforms of the world as the #1 predator.
The 'nice' species didn't make Darwin's cut. They aren't here, we are. Now the Great Asteroid or Whatever Dinosaur Extinction shirley hepped us make it to #1, and the alligators (also a 'not nice' species) made the cut (so far). "Nice" doesn't seem to work very well in most circumstances in our known universe.
Everybody has to eat. Even grasshoppers, butterflies, and the friendly cricket - vegetarians all - have to eat and there is a limited supply of food - so they compete with each other and among themselves for the resources. Every species does. Bacteria and fungi do. Hence penicillin. Plants try to poison animals that want to eat them, or like the Venus Fly Trap, bite back.
Biology is what it is. Be "nice" and you'll be gone.
This is why Marxism, as either a psychological theory, economic theory, or social theory is IMO totally ridiculous. Marx was nott a biologist, and he wasn't even very thoughtful with the knowledge that he had access to. Marxism is as artificial and contrary to the laws of nature and the human mind as almost anything I can envision. It cannot be useful as a psychology theory, because the human mind is nott organized in any way compatible with Marxist tenets. My contention is further that the human mind is incapable of being "programmed" to comport with Marxism. (We can gett into that specifically later, if you wish.)
To me, folks who retain a belief that Marxism is anything butt a different flavor of Scientology or religion are fooling themselves and in deep denial of biology and, in fact, physical reality.
Which is why I am amazed that people, some of whom are well-read and 'educated', cling to the belief that Marxism is somehow useful as anything butt a failed and dustbinned crackpot theory that has been repeated disproven in experiment and is, upon deeper gedanken experimentation, is inherently fatally flawed and doomed to failure in any attempted implementation in humans.
At MOST, Marxism is useful as a negative example.
http://investorshub.advfn.com/uimage/uploads/2015/7/20/nfpkefeynman_333.jpg
Thanks, that explains it. Makes sense to use checks in that circumstance for convenience.
When you come back, please give me your favorite real world implementation of communism on a scale larger than say the Jamestown colony (which was nott communism, because they had private property and private ownership of production - among other evil capitalist warts).
So, pick a country or something like the Paris Commune and tell me which one is least objectionable - or even least "Stalinist" as you understand that term.
I am trying to elicit how you draw distinctions such that "Stalinism" is somehow distinguishable from any other implementation of communism/Marxism.
I think "Stalinism" is an apologist term used by those who somehow fancy that communism should nott be stained by the real world examples of its implementation and that somehow those are all outliers which do nott undermine the belief that communism is actually viable or even desirable.
Personally, I think that even the idealized version of communism/Marxism is abhorrent, even if it did "work" as an economic or political system. It would be a very, very gray and uninteresting world with everything equal, even, arguendo, if that could be accomplished in an ideal instantiation.
I'm curious after reading your suggestion that the PPs were purchased by check for that amount of money.
In my experiences, PP closings have involved wire transfers, nott cheques/check/Czechs (well no Czechs other than me).
Butt I'm no CFO, and you have a lott more experience than me in the financial arena, so I do not doubt you a bit.
In your experience, is it mostly individuals who pay for PPs by check or do institutional investors sometimes use checks as well?
Certainly there is no need for wires, butt often on financing rounds the wires from the various investors are coordinated to the same day so nobody can back ~OUTT of a financing in case, well, in case the next day the FBI arrests the CEO or sumpin. All investors in a round jump off the same cliff together, Sundance and Butch-style.
May I have an answer to this question though?
Can you cite your most favored actual implementation of communism or Marxism in the world (you may include the Paris Commune if you wish).
Since you've used the term "super-Stalinist", you must have opinions on which implementations of communism are less objectionable to you than others.
Which has been the best real-world implementation of communism in your opinion?
It nott only doesn't work as an economic theory, it also fails as a social theory.
Sociobiology trumps wild idealisms. We are all biological animals and we evolved in a competitive process to survive and reproduce. We cannot choose to nott be who we are.
Every one of us is the descendant of rapists, murderers, despots, warriors, and pillagers. Every one of us.
One cannot train a shark or lion to be an ant or a bee.
I think that as a matter of FACT one cannot implement communism or 'Marxism' without the enforcement of the state to suppress individualism and free thought. All must believe exactly the same on every issue or a dispute will arise and a totalitarian state will need to decide which side of the dispute is defined as "the common will" or "the common good".
It's always WHO DECIDES.
Unless the world is made up of clones who are all exactly the same and all want the same job, the same apple, and the same house and can get it (i.e., they are all living in Bill Gate's house on Lake Washington simultaneously).
"I'd say that communism, as an economic and political theory, isn't necessarily totalitarian.
As I expected. And I completely disagree with that contention.
Can you cite your most favored actual implementation of communism or Marxism in the world (you may include the Paris Commune if you wish).
"Albania was still super-Stalinist"
Since we're now on weekend time on the DD board, I'd like to raise a small kwestshun directed to you regarding the term "Stalinist".
I know this is a common term, and Trots and Maoists etc. bandy about such terms (which I consider apoligisms for communism in general). I also have read a lott about Joe.
The question is this: How does "Stalinism" differ from communism under any other regime?
What is the principal difference(s), for example, between Stalinism, Maoism, Khruschevism, Castroism, Honeckerism, Jaruzelskiism, Kimism, or any other existing or past communist government example?
From my perspective, these are all the same, and differ only slightly in degree of totalitarianism and international adventurism.
Butt since you and I are (I think) towards opposite ends of the statist-individualist spectrum, I'd like to hear how you see these distinctions in the implementations of communism that the world has seen. To me, the semantics of the term "Stalinism" is used to imply that Stalin was an outlier in the implementation of communism and thus should nott be seen as typical of communism, and with that distinction I disagree.
(I have a pretty good background on Iosef from having read - and owning- numerous biographies and historical sources on him and his role in the USSR governance at various times.)
Feel free to follow up later tonight or this weekend if you'd like to think about this a bit before composing a reply.
End note: Gorby tried to salvage communism by turning down the temperature of its inherent repression of the individual and he found that experiment blew up in his face and that without Stalinism/Maoism/Kimism/Castroism/Honeckerism statist repression, there could be no communism. So let's exclude Gorbachevism, which is IMO nott a form of communism as his attempts to make a softer version of communism totally failed and disintegrated the state, thereby he did nott in fact implement communism.
Ulan Baator is pretty harsh punishment for an exile.
If it were not for the heat and the high risk of either a nuclear war in the region or Islamic craziness running amok on the Arabian Peninsula, I'd rather pick Dubai or another of the Emirates.
Given the risks just mentioned, Marty S., if he has funds stashed already in a safe, seizure-proof venue and a second passport, should consider Astana, Kazakhstan. It's a VERY modern city, well run, safe, inexpensive, and lots of ex-pats there already. No extradition to the USA for financial crimes (nor any crimes, AFAIK). Good business opportunities for Marty to restart his career in commerce. Weather sucks in winter, butt you can't have everything when you're an international fugitive fleeing the long arm of the grasping USA and a likely motivated State Dept that will try and extradite you at all costs of diplomatic capital because of the high profile political aspects of your prosecution.
Astana today is like Austin, TX in 1980 or Santa Clara/Sunnyvale, CA 1965. It's gonna be HUGE in 20-40 years - economically speaking. IMO it's the best bet worldwide for launching your career outside the developed world, especially if you are in infrastructure (construction, rail, air freight, telecom, IT, pipelines, metals and materials, nuclear power). They have good private schools (American/UK/French) for your kids, very good food options (their produce quality matches what you'll find in any Western European country), and the people actually LIKE Americans and Brits there.
Just bring a down jacket, wool watchcap, and gloves for the winter. Leave the vodka at home, there will be plenty provided to you there, even if you don't want it.
"They are not run by the same group."
WronGGG.
shajandr
Tuesday, 09/08/15 04:16:50 PM
Re: janice shell post# 31983
Post # of 43419
For those to whom this Alex Smid scam profile may be new, here is a nice summary of the scam in the previous iteration:
http://ceo.ca/2013/02/14/golden-guns/
"Adam Carter" will be the next non-corpse fatality in Mexico.
It's where you go to kill off fictitious names, apparently.
At least Alex Smid prefers that venue.
Maybe they drop the invisible executives from the helicopters with the Asians - like Scarface style in Colombia.
"Turing Pharmaceuticals Close to Replacing Martin Shkreli as CEO"
I'm pretty sure Adam Carter is available.
Good catch on that. I did nott know that the Belushi bros were Albanian.
All I know is that the Albanian language(s) is/are nutso and getting translations of the same input text from three different translators will produce three wildly different translations.
Wildly different as exemplified by:
Translation 1: John went to walk his dog and a mud puddle.
Translation 2: John's dog drowned in a pool of a dark-colored beverage.
Translation 3: John's dog submerged him in Lake Coffee and they found a dead body there.
Translation 4 (after you resubmit it to Translator 1 with the three discrepant translations and ask them to clarify): There was a dog named John that liked to water ski on the wide part of the river.
"Obama is not going to be body surfing tomorrow when he wakes up."
That is unfortunate, I was hoping we'd see his body floating in the surf, Omaha Beach-style.
Oh well, there goes that dream of my father. @riptides #undertow #givejoeaturn
I seriously doubt that any of the SS would swim ~OUTT to save him - if they even noticed he was struggling if they glanced upp from vaping their mackerel.
"Seems to me that the Wu Tang album was obtained by the proceeds of the crime so the FBI should grab that in any event"
There is no asset seizure order in effect to authorize that.
However, after he's convicted and/or loses the SEC civil suit, the asset forfeiture order may allow them to seize and auction that album. :)
"“I’m the most successful Albanian to ever walk the face of this Earth…"
Wow, talk about damning yourself with faint praise ...
I'm pretty sure it's still legal to smoke mackerel.
Butt vaping it is the new trend.
Man, the SEC employees are really trying to hit their 'exceeds' goals for 2015 to jack upp their bonuses. Quite the flurry of high-profile PRs in the last week or so.
"It was obvious meant to be a little humorous...
Surely, that's the problem. It shows a degree of personal animus to Shkreli on the part of the FBI and can only be used to further (in a small way) his claim that the Feds are ~OUTT to gett him and humiliate him for reasons other than simply an impartial review of the applicable laws and evidence.
Really stupid thing to tweet.
Consider if the Baltimore PD tweeted: "Did they expect the van driver to have his head on a swivel when Freddie Gray was in the back?" @BaltimorePD #neckbracesmatter
"Shkreli is going to have plenty of opportunities at his future residence to earn a living for a buck. Well, at least for a quarter."
Corrected: Shkreli is going to have plenty of opportunities at his future residence to earn a living for a box of mackerel pouches. Well, at least for a mackerel pouch.
Most BOP facilities use pouches now instead of cans with sharp edges - old pic
That FBI tweet mentioning the Wu Tang Clan album strikes me as inappropriate.
Butt then again Obama, as sitting President, has gone on ESPN live to make his NCAA BB tournament bracket picks.
What's next? The IRS tweeting "Wow, can't believe Don King spent so much on hookers for business entertainment expenses!" @auditteamIRS
That tweet is unprofessional for a government agency that needs to be impartial and serious about its yob.
I'll wait for the Bureau of Prisons to tweet "Didn't find a smartphone during Foley's cavity search - THIS TIME!!!" @BOP @CI-Taft #hisass