On Tue, Dec 2, 2008 at 9:13 AM, Jim Devine <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Is there something wrong with trying to understand what's likely to > happen in the future? should we simply stop worrying and learn to love > the Obama?
No, but how about some *constructive* criticism? To be fair, Steve Fraser does offer some of that in his article. We could use more in that spirit on PEN-L and elsewhere - and less premature fear-mongering. A real democratic nationalization of the banks -- good value for our money > rather than good money to add to their value -- should be part of the policy > agenda up for discussion in the Obama era. As things now stand, the public > supplies the loans and the investment capital, but the key decisions about > how they are to be deployed remain in private hands. A democratic version of > nationalizing the financial system would transfer these critical decisions > to new institutions created by the Congress and designed to pursue public, > not private, objectives. How to subject the flow of credit and investment > capital to public control ought to be on the drawing boards if we are to > look beyond the old New Deal to a new one. > > Or, for instance, if we are to bail out the auto industry, which we should > -- millions of jobs, businesses, communities, and what's left of once > powerful and proud unions are at stake -- then why not talk about its > nationalization, too? Why not create a representative body of workers, > consumers, environmentalists, suppliers, and other interested parties to > supervise the industry's reorganization and retooling to produce, just as > the president-elect says he wants, new green means of transportation -- and > not just cars? > > Why not apply the same model to the rehabilitation of the nation's > infrastructure; indeed, why not to the reindustrialization of the country as > a whole? If, as so many commentators are now claiming, what lies ahead is > the kind of massive, crippling deflation characteristic of such crises, then > why not consider creating democratic mechanisms to impose an incomes policy > on wages and prices that works against that deflation? > -raghu. -- Did you hear about the dyslexic Satanist? He sold his soul to Santa.
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