Cheyenne River is the home of the White Buffalo Calf Pipe and its Keeper. It is also one of the poorest places in America as the Lakota refuse to take money for their religion. In point of fact, the refuse to take a settlement for their "Jerusalem" in the Black Hills and the money is being held in escrow by the Federal Government. This story about Wounded Knee is buried in the laws to stop the religion in 1883 because the religion was made up of sacred land cooperatives called Teospayes. As long as the Teospaye existed they would fight to the death for the cooperative ownership of the land. The allottments, as noted in this article today, were simple and did not allow for the Indian people to do more than replace themselves since the nation could not grow without capital. Teach them to be capitalists by removing the land capital that was their property and spreading it amongst the yonega (whites). Now we have a forty acre cemetery in the middle of the most poverty stricken region in the nation, going for millions of dollars. Not long ago the Eastern Cherokee spent several million dollars for the most sacred Mound in our religion. It was much fewer than forty acres and again in a very poor region of North Carolina but the yonega wanted to kick the people once again and the casinos run by the Eastern Band allowed them to stop the desecration of this most sacred place in the Cherokee faith. Before that the farmer was plowing it to plant his crops and destroying it.
After the Eastern band paid millions for the small parcel in 1998, in 2010, they had to fight off the local electric company who decided to build a substation next door and pollute the area. This time, the Eastern Band and the Keetoowah people in Oklahoma created a nationwide response. "You just have to watch those little yonega boogers, they're not only greedy but tricky little bastards." REH http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/12/opinion/save-wounded-knee.html?partner=rss nyt <http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/12/opinion/save-wounded-knee.html?partner=rs snyt&emc=rss> &emc=rss From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Ed Weick Sent: Friday, April 12, 2013 5:12 PM To: 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION' Subject: Re: [Futurework] Gelt You're right, Ray, we are indeed overlooking something much deeper. Not wanting to be an economist anymore, I've taken to rereading some of the stuff I have on existentialism and once again I've encountered Nietzsche and the will to power. I'm also looking at a book by John Gray, "Black Mass", in which the author argues that social and political movements that were intended to develop an ultimately good and equitable society typically turned out to be great disasters. The enlightenment led to the head choppings of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, while the rational arguments posed by Marx led to Stalinist Russia. American democracy was, and still is, a great idea, but we now have a society deeply divided into the 99% and the 1%. (80% and 20% according to Keith.) And this is where Nietzsche comes in. It seems that it's not the acquisition of wealth that's at play, but the acquisition of power. In the case of the US, the accumulation of wealth is a means of achieving great power; the more of the nation's wealth under your control, the more powerful you are. During the past decade or so, and especially during the sub-prime mortgage debacle, there was a major shift toward concentrating wealth in the hands of the few as the finance, insurance and real estate (FIRE) sector became a much larger part of the economy. So, you really have to wonder who it is that holds power. The US strikes me as a deeply divided system. Obama has been under considerable criticism because he can't do what's expected of him as President. But maybe he really can't do it because other more powerful interests won't let him. Americans pretend they live in a democracy, but do they really? I read something today that said there were four lobbyists in Washington for every elected member of the House and Senate. Who pays the lobbyists and sends them in? Who determines what the politicians decide? Not likely the people who voted for their representatives. Having demonstrated that I'm neither an economist nor a philosopher but just an old guy babbling I'll stop here. Ed ----- Original Message ----- From: Ray Harrell <mailto:[email protected]> To: 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION' <mailto:[email protected]> ; 'Ed Weick' <mailto:[email protected]> Sent: Friday, April 12, 2013 2:05 PM Subject: RE: [Futurework] Gelt The problem I would argue, is that balancing the economy is not the same as balancing the national culture. The rise in guns in America is more troubling to the bankers than they know. My parents knew Pretty Boy Floyd and Goldie McIntyre during the Depression. Today there are more guns in the lower classes than ever before. These gun owners have also bought the Hollywood myths about a Western US that never was. Criminals like the James brothers and Quantrill were from an earlier generation after a disastrous Civil War and Reconstruction. It wasn't a good romantic time. It was more like the soldiers in "Dances with Wolves." This aggressive ignorance came back in the 1930s Depression which the Rockefellers claimed wasn't happening. Today the upper classes mirror the same entitled arrogance. Howeve today the lower classes have Assault rifles that can take out a whole swat team protecting the banks. Between the images from the violent commercial entertainment and the video games, we have what constitutes "practice" for the conflict to come. If a video game can be practice for an Apache Helicopter, why can't it be practice for a criminal family? Meanwhile is it really only about Gelt? Or are we looking at something much deeper here? What is your understanding of this on the deeper levels of social balance and public mental health? I find the "Invisible Hand" and the preaching of self interest over everything to be narcissistic drivel. I believe economists should police themselves and their Domain, much more rigorously if for nothing else, to protect their children from the people with the assault weapons. REH From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Arthur Cordell Sent: Friday, April 12, 2013 12:24 PM To: 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION'; 'Ed Weick' Subject: Re: [Futurework] Gelt So it looks like a long slow immiseration of the middle class, the savings and pension class. There will be consequences. Hard to predict but equally hard to say that this will all go off smoothly. Arthur From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Keith Hudson Sent: Friday, April 12, 2013 11:58 AM To: RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION; Ed Weick Subject: Re: [Futurework] Gelt Ed, But governments don't print money "recklessly"! Whoever said they did? Certainly not me. Governments print money carefully. In recent years the Fed and the BoE have been printing more than would be strictly justified (productivity alone) in order to make sure that their central bank rates are always less than inflation. For an interesting discussion of this by one of the most respected US economists, Carmen Reinhart, read the following converstion: http://www.spiegel.de/international/business/interview-with-harvard-economis t-carmen-reinhart-on-financial-repression-a-893213.html Keith At 16:30 12/04/2013, you wrote: Undoubtedly, if money were printed recklessly and in large quantities, the result would be runaway inflation. But what modern central bank is going to do reckless printing? Not likely any. Modern central banks don't behave that way. Typically, the money supply rises gradually and inflation is a gradual process, rising by two or three percentage points per year at the most. In Canada, a basket of goods purchased for $100 in 2003 would cost about $120 today. This poses no problem for people who have managed to keep their incomes growing at a rate equivaletn to inflation, but it is hard on people who rely on incomes that do not change or change only slowly. It therefore is a factor in the growing gap between the high incomed and the low incomed. Ed ----- Original Message ----- From: Arthur Cordell <mailto:[email protected]> To: 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION,EDUCATION' <mailto:[email protected]> ; 'Keith Hudson' <mailto:[email protected]> Sent: Friday, April 12, 2013 10:52 AM Subject: Re: [Futurework] Gelt Krugman But the runaway inflation that was supposed to follow reckless money-printing - inflation that the usual suspects have been declaring imminent for four years and more - keeps not happening. Me Stay tuned. From: [email protected] [ mailto:[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ] On Behalf Of Ray Harrell Sent: Friday, April 12, 2013 1:36 AM To: 'Keith Hudson'; 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION' Subject: Re: [Futurework] Gelt http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/12/opinion/krugman-lust-for-gold.html?hp REH From: Keith Hudson [ mailto:[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ] Sent: Thursday, April 11, 2013 11:27 AM To: RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION; Ray Harrell Subject: Re: [Futurework] Gelt The NYT article is all very glib and I'm sure a lot of readers will be encouraged to sell their personal gold. If there was any clear logic in the article it's to be found at the end with what Peter Schiff says. Keith At 14:29 11/04/2013, you wrote: According to the Science Channel, the Ancient Astronauts no longer need gold to run their space ships. REH http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/11/business/gold-long-a-secure-investment-los es-its-luster.html?hp _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework _____ _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
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