https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLpfbcXTeo8
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"As for "disadvantage", well hey, I've been discriminated against as a woman, as were many of my contemporaries."
Everybody is discriminated all the time by everybody. Tall people make more than short, they (we) also gett elected to political office more often than short people.
Fat people don't have a chance. Go sit in the US Senate gallery when they're in session and find me one fat Senator.
As an atheist, I'm discriminated against, and I discriminate against religious people.
Dress poorly and most people will discriminate against you - I won't, I'll probably hire you, everything else equal.
Income is only one of many 'discriminations' that we all face.
"And we still don't have income equality."
OK, and why do you presume that is a result of a governmental action? Wait, let's start earlier - why do you presume that is an inapropriate outcome? Do you think that male and female employees pursue the same career tracks, are equally competitive, and are equally aggressive in taking risks and demanding more money?
(Note: female investors are notorious for avoiding risk taking and underperform the average male IRA/401(k) because of that - is that discrimination too? Should the government square the final balance of everyone's 401(k) and IRAs too - because there is a 'gender disparity' in portfolio performance?
And now that you've changed your tune, do you think that the government has the authority to treat people differently based on income?
Where will I find that in the Constitution?
How does that comport with 'equal before the law' as you've indicated was meant by the phrase 'created equal" in the DOI?
Can the government impose different prison terms to different individuals under the exact same circumstances - based on income?
Can the government decide that people who earn less than $100,000 a year are irreponsible and cannot own guns, buy liquor, or gett a jury trial?
If government can treat people differently based on their income, then that same principle can apply to any governmental action or law.
Should we assess postal rates based on income too? Amtrak tickets?
Oh my. We are deep into the unequal treatment cave now.
And Stewart was dead wrong about obscenity too. The Supremes have made many, many erroneous decisions.
The "I know it when I see it" is proof of his inability to think deeply about the issue. It is evidence of his weak thinking - an admission that he cannot define a term or provide any guidelines.
And hence 'obscenity' is a vague and capricious standard that leads to tons of unequal outcomes all across the USA, from the 1970s through today.
"Obviously Bob has better luck. But they're both taxed at the same rate."
Butt you just said that the justification for taxing one person at a different rate than another is "good fortune".
So now you're saying that "good fortune" is irrelevant? And lucky Bob should NOTT be taxed more than ED who sacrificed 10 years of his life for the same amount of money?
Oh my!
Wow. How interesting.
"legitimate advantage and disadvantage"
"Legitimate" as defined how, as measured how, as measured by whom?
Please go on.
"I'm afraid I do support the concept of a graduated income tax"
Then you do NOTT believe in equal treatment before the law (bu government).
Quit spouting excerpts from the DOI that clearly you do NOTT agree with.
You believe in government discrimination. Apparently based on "good fortune".
LOL! What a logical mess that leads to.
Hypo: Bob wins $4 million in the lottery. Ed decides to take a job cleaning up nuclear waste in Fukushima, knowing that he will be shortening his life by 10 years - Ed is paid $4 million for his service.
Bob and Ed both made $4 million last year. Which of them has more "good fortune" and thus should be taxed at a higher rate than the other?
Please answer.
In addition, the use of race as a proxy for 'opportunity' is thoroughly absurd.
My neighbors in law school were a white man and a black woman, both lawyers, with a daughter.
She will be given preferences for admission, scholarships, etc. solely because she claims to be black, even though she is more than 50% white (her mother is light skinned) and both her parents make solid six figure incomes.
Whereas a kid like I was - from the dirt, parents who were always struggling to pay the Household Finance monthly bill, would be considered to have a more advantageous position than their daughter in college admissions and scholarships.
Now, is that equality under the law? Really?
You are going to defend that?
"For their good fortune"???
Where is that in your "equal before the law" argument?
Do we now suspend equality before the law and measure "good fortune"?
LOL! How utterly insane (on many grounds).
First, you blithely attribute the $400 million to 'good fortune'. I'm sure that person just had the money drop into their lap - and if they did, SO WHAT. It does nott mean they are to be subjected to unequal treatment before the law. You seem to make a strange assumption about how people create value and wealth - as though it's a huge roulette wheel and they just toss chips onto a number and win. Butt the effort needed to obtain the $400 million is nott relevant at all. Even if they won it in a lottery, they should be treated EQUALLY before the law.
Second, if you are now in favor of unequal treatment based on "good fortune", then the same principle applies to all governmental actions - the court can say "yeah, you murdered 10 people, butt since you grew up poor, you can go free under the law, on the other hand, this fellow who had the 'good fortune' to go to Harvard butt committed the same crime will gett the death penalty.
Third, the government is wholly incompetent to measure "good fortune" or "opportunity". It is nothing but political handwaving to claim that as a basis for unequal treatment (like differential taxation or affirmative action).
Finally, the government is nott authorized to make such determinations nor to impose unequal treatment to 'remedy' any such 'opportunity' disparities (however measured and however determined).
So you really do NOTT support equal treatment by the law, you prefer politically-negotiated unequal treatment.
Just admit it. That is indeed your position.
Yes you are - admission to a university is an outcome. An outcome of the application process - which for governmental entities are supposed to be subject to the Due Process requirement - treating all as equal before the law - colorblind as to admissions.
An outcome!
It is the same principal as Jim Crow laws.
Did you miss the "million" after the $400?
And the same principal applies even if the person is domiciled in the USA and earns all $400 million in the USA. He/she should nott be taxed differently than others - equal under the law - he should have the same tax liability as every other citizen.
Nott 41 percent for some and -20 percent for others.
No, the government does nott have the authority nor the 'right' to even determine "equal opportunity". There is no objective way to measure or even define that.
You are using the word "opportunity" as a proxy for outcome.
Equal before the law means the law/government cannot treat us differently than other humans within the jurisdiction.
I agree that is the intended meaning of the phrase "created equal" in the DOI.
Which is why things like affirmative action by governmental entities is as abhorrent as Jim Crow laws.
Which is why a person who earns $400 million (say all of it from overseas sales and the person lives overseas butt are a US citizen) should nott have to pay 41 percent of his income to the US government whereas another citizen pays nothing or in fact getts paid a negative income tax (EITC). THAT is unequal treatment.
Leftists misunderstand that that phrase in the DOI does nott mean the government will impose "equality of outcome". No serious scholar of Jefferson can contend that with a straight face.
Now I'm confused again. What does "equal" mean if other than equal before the law - or, alternatively, literally the same (or substantively indistinguishable from other humans)?
In your view, what does "equal" mean in the phrase "created equal" in the DOI?
My view is that it was intended to mean people are born with the right to be treated equally by the law (and government) without reference to differences among humans.
I don't know. Whenever I travel, right before or right after Czeching into the hotel, I go to a CONvenience store and buy bottled water. Always. (Interesting LA ghetto story to follow.) So I just buy the stuph from Lawsons, 7-11, or vending machines. Don't know who makes it.
LA ghetto story (Integral will grok this)
As I wrote, I always buy bottled water before or after Czeching into my hotel. I often fly to LAX, sometimes very often, so I have a routine. I pick up my rental car, drive down La Cienega past the Burger King and hang a right on Century. Right there on your right is an ARCO station where I stop to buy my water (either before or after taking a quick run down to Yoshinoya on the corner of Century and Hawthorne in the deep dark crevasses of Inglewood). so one time I pull up and start walking into the ARCO and I see the clerk coming ~OUTT and looking around. I keep walking towards the door. The clerk waves his hands and tells me "No, we are closed. We were just robbed. Did you see him?" Well, I didn't, and I had to find another CONvenience store around. So I start heading back towards Yoshinoya on Century and find the ghetto liquor store on the right a few blocks down - I go in and pick up two 1.5 liter bottles of water and my drug of choice, a spicy V-8. I walk up to the Czech~OUTT area and I'll be damned if the whole area behind the broad, long counter isn't behind 2.5 inch thick bullet resistant plexiglass - and they keep the cigarettes behind this wall of plexiglass that guards the clerks and cash registers. They have a rotatable plexiglass pass-thru where you can pay and the clerk can pass change and any behind-the-counter items to you. The woman ahead of me was negotiating to buy cigarettes; she didn't have enough money and the clerks wouldn't sell here individual cigarettes, only whole packs. After listening to her try tho negotiate with them, and since she was obviously drunk, and since smoking is bad for her and will probably kill her early, I gave her a $5 bill and said "it's on me - buy yourself a pack". So finally I gett to the counter and pay for my water and V-8 through this massive wall of bullet-resistant plexiglass with speakers and microphone to communicate to the clerk. I told him that I'm there because the ARCO was just robbed and is closed. He says "oh, that happens a lot to them and the Shell station too".
When I walked ~OUTT of the store, the woman to whom I gave the $5 so she could buy her smokes and gett ~OUTT of my way to Czech ~OUTT is waiting and in her drunken slur she wants to "date" me to thank me for the smokes. Wow. A $5 whore. First time I ever met one of those. She was overpricing herself by about $6.
Welcome to the 'hood.
That's why I love slumming. You gett to have all these memories of weird shit happening. I have a few Yoshinoya stories too - BTW, that Yoshinoya has a full time armed guard inside after dark. There are at least a dozen bros hanging ... errr ... loitering in the parking lott offering to sell you crack rocks, weed, or eightballs.
Way more fun than sitting in the lounge of a Four Seasons.
"Created equal" is nott the same as being equal. And in fact it is false even as stated - we are nott all created the same.
Do you have cystic fibrosis? Hydrocephaly? Teratology of Fallot? Cerebral palsy? Down's Syndrome? Turner's Syndrome?
The Declaration of Independence is nott unflawed, it makes statements which are provably wrong. That does nott indict the entire document as incorrect.
We are neither created equal nor do we later merge into equality. However, the law should treat everyone blindly, without regard for these many differences. Each citizen is to be accorded the same equal treatment.
Japan is an interesting place. I like their beverage (basically water) called Pocari Sweat. I bring the empty bottles home and use them for chilling tap water in. Every once in awhile somebody will ask me what the hell I'm drinking. I tell them it's Japanese sweat collected from sumo wrestlers called 'Pocari' in Japanese.
And I have always thought (since middle school or high school - certainly by the time I had world history in high school) that communism, in theory, was inherently evil.
First, I knew that nott everyone could be equal. It's an impossibility. Those who are smart, have physical prowess, have better communication skills will always have advantages over others. Everyone is unique and has their own ideas and desires.
I would never wish to live in a world where everybody eats chocolate ice cream (perhaps because I prefer vanilla). Thinks the same things. Acts the same way. Has the same stuff.
Aside from the obvious fact that pure equality is an absolute impossibility (how many people can fit into Bill Gates' house?), the homogeneity of equality is repugnant to me.
Will the Clippers tie the Lakers every game? Will Spud Webb gett as many rebounds as Shaq, and Shaq sink as many freethrows (percentagewise) as Jordan?
New York and Paris are a helluva lott more fun than Osaka or Pyongyang. Because everyone is NOTT the same there.
Who the HELL wants to be equal?
I want to be equal before the law - so that government treats me equally with others. Butt the concept that people can BE equal is simply absurd. Or if they could be in all respects (WHO makes the menu selections for dinner - a vegan or a steakeater?) (WHO decides where you will live and what job you will have and how long you will work?) who would WANT to be static and equal? IMO, only the foolish or the insane.
Finally, somebody has to make the decisions. Some force has to enforce those decisions on the group. That perforce requires repression of individual choice and even speech and thought.
Thus, even as a theory, communism is horrible.
"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.