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601 [lbo-talk] Qyery re RTB -- rank: 1000

On Feb 28, 2012, at 10:34 AM, Carrol Cox wrote: > In the Reactionary Mind thread Michael Pollack rfers to "RTB." Since Michael has you on autotrash, I'll step in: "read the book," probably. Doug

Document Size:	4633
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Feb 28 07:43:08 PST 2012

602 [lbo-talk] Barack Obama's senate victory -- rank: 1000

On Feb 27, 2012, at 9:02 PM, nathan tankus wrote: > the article about Obama's senate victory. I found this quote very interesting: > > ''I think Barack Obama is one of the most interesting and capable > individuals that is running this time, if not in any election,'' > Senator Jon Corzine of New Jersey, chairman of the Democratic > Senatorial Campaign Committee, said Wednesday. ''Frankly, he will be > one of the easier candidates to raise resources for.'' Ha, so that's where ...

Document Size:	5493
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Feb 28 05:59:18 PST 2012

603 [lbo-talk] interest rate policy -- rank: 1000

On Feb 28, 2012, at 8:48 AM, Tony Rolfe wrote: > Borrow at 0%, buy T-bonds at 2% (or higher, if inflation picks up). > > That's not really speculation is it? Somehow I thought these guys > borrow at 0% and then trade pork bellies. That too. Or anything. The carry trade (borrow at 0, lend at 2) is speculative because if prices turn against you (i.e., long-term rates rise) and you're heavily leveraged, you can lose your shirt.

Document Size:	4951
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Feb 28 05:55:48 PST 2012

604 [lbo-talk] interest rate policy -- rank: 1000

On Feb 25, 2012, at 11:29 PM, nathan tankus wrote: > Second, I would dispute that setting the federal funds > (internationally, and more accurately, referred to as the interbank > lending rate) at zero is an "easy money" policy. I think the > relationship between interest rates and the rate of money creation is > weak at best. It's manna to speculators (see: the Greenspan years). Borrow at 0%, buy T-bonds at 2% (or higher, if inflation picks up). You'd have to regulate a ...

Document Size:	5066
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Feb 28 05:19:38 PST 2012

605 [lbo-talk] MH & DG on university -- rank: 1000

On Feb 27, 2012, at 11:59 AM, Carrol Cox wrote: > What evidence is there that " the bourgeoisie" (as a class) care much either > way. They care about social spending. You profess to love Bruce Franklin. Did you read his 2000 talk at the MLA? I've posted this several times before but perhaps you missed it. <http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~hbf/priscult.html> 4. But the main front in the culture wars was not literary. In April 1969, students sat in at City College of the City Un ...

Document Size:	9985
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Mon Feb 27 11:08:24 PST 2012

606 [lbo-talk] On the Zombie Apocalypse -- rank: 1000

On Feb 26, 2012, at 11:43 AM, Andy wrote: > Has anybody read any insightful commentary on the pop-culture > fascination with the zombie apocalypse? Someone I met last week - friend of a relative - said her brother is in the army and they're training for something like the zombie apocalypse. I.e., people with weird infectious diseases go on zombie-like rampages. Doug

Document Size:	4901
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Sun Feb 26 09:01:41 PST 2012

607 [lbo-talk] MH & DG on university -- rank: 1000

On Feb 25, 2012, at 11:13 PM, // ravi wrote: > My guess is that the OP (to extend the term) meant that bit to counter the usual liberal belief that a college education will somehow make things better for all. The idea that if only we could get everyone a degree then all will be well, which can motivate calls for free college education. All will be well? Of course not. But it can't hurt. Why do you think the bourgeoisie wants to make it expensive? Doug

Document Size:	4987
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Sat Feb 25 20:54:25 PST 2012

608 [lbo-talk] MH & DG on university -- rank: 1000

On Feb 25, 2012, at 9:36 PM, Miles Jackson wrote: > Doug Henwood wrote: > >> On Feb 25, 2012, at 7:40 PM, Jeffrey Fisher wrote: >> >> >>> I love Doug's plug for free higher >>> ed in his LBO article about the expense of it a while back. >>> >> >> "Free college tuition under capitalism is like a reading room in a prison." - Malcolm Harris >> > Well, if I'm in prison anyway--I'll take the reading room. As I told Malc ...

Document Size:	5217
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Sat Feb 25 18:40:43 PST 2012

609 [lbo-talk] MH & DG on university -- rank: 1000

On Feb 25, 2012, at 9:10 PM, Jeffrey Fisher wrote: > ha! i knew i needed to watch that. I just don't have the patience to watch anything but very short videos on the web. I'd much rather read.

Document Size:	4716
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Sat Feb 25 18:17:43 PST 2012

610 [lbo-talk] MH & DG on university -- rank: 1000

On Feb 25, 2012, at 9:03 PM, Jeffrey Fisher wrote: > On Sat, Feb 25, 2012 at 7:44 PM, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote: > >> The infamous Jacobin debate on OWS, featuring Jodi Dean, Chris Maisano, >> and me vs. the anarchists MH and Natasha Lennard, and moderated by Seth >> Ackerman. Seth asked how anarchist organizing might lead to free college >> tuition. Natasha was agin' that because David Cameron went to a free >> university, and MH was op ...

Document Size:	5431
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Sat Feb 25 18:07:33 PST 2012

611 [lbo-talk] MH & DG on university -- rank: 1000

On Feb 25, 2012, at 8:29 PM, Jeffrey Fisher wrote: > On Sat, Feb 25, 2012 at 7:29 PM, Jeffrey Fisher <jeff.jfisher at gmail.com>wrote: > >> >> >> On Sat, Feb 25, 2012 at 7:01 PM, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote: >> >>> >>> On Feb 25, 2012, at 7:40 PM, Jeffrey Fisher wrote: >>> >>>> I love Doug's plug for free higher >>>> ed in his LBO article about the expense of it a while back. >>> ...

Document Size:	6096
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Sat Feb 25 17:44:45 PST 2012

612 [lbo-talk] interest rate policy -- rank: 1000

On Feb 25, 2012, at 6:34 PM, nathan tankus wrote: > i find myself supporting what Rochon terms the "kansas city rule" > where the nominal interest rate is "parked" at zero. What do others > think though? What does that get you? Easy money isn't a solution to the problems of capitalism. Doug

Document Size:	4820
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Sat Feb 25 17:02:45 PST 2012

613 [lbo-talk] MH & DG on university -- rank: 1000

On Feb 25, 2012, at 7:40 PM, Jeffrey Fisher wrote: > I love Doug's plug for free higher > ed in his LBO article about the expense of it a while back. "Free college tuition under capitalism is like a reading room in a prison." - Malcolm Harris

Document Size:	4790
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Sat Feb 25 17:01:43 PST 2012

614 [lbo-talk] MH & DG on university -- rank: 1000

On Feb 25, 2012, at 9:55 AM, shag carpet bomb wrote: > At a forum on the future of OWS, Malcolm Harris asks about student debt and how the university could ever be a place worth saving as a place that ignites the political imagination if the only thing the university has done so far is to immiserate people to the point that they are now capable of an insurrectionary political imagination. Doesn't that outcome please Malcolm, even if the mechanism wasn't what one might have predicted? But, rea ...

Document Size:	5745
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Sat Feb 25 07:12:52 PST 2012

615 [lbo-talk] Graeber on wars -- rank: 1000

On Feb 24, 2012, at 3:17 PM, Wojtek S wrote: > I am in full agreement, for a change ;). What makes this > recession and its fallout fundamentally different form the Great > Depression of 1929 is the non-existence of the so-called "communist > threat" in the form of a state supporting revolutionary ambitions in > the US and Europe. Note that the USSR disappears in Graeber's account of the Vietnam and Central American wars. Doug

Document Size:	4931
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Fri Feb 24 12:27:43 PST 2012