[Reader-list] Death of 'Soul of Capitalism'

[Inder Salim]

Dear Jebeesh

thanks for forwarding very thought provoking pieces on the List, this one too

'inevitable fall of amercia ' is what many people have been
predicting, but this one seems more scientific, although
intrepretation of  'the fall' would be different at differnt levels,
but  frightening in any case, because ' catastrophic' consequences for
the rest of us and them as well.

it was very recent in history that Modern Americanism/Western
amalgmated scinece, arts, literature and other social conceptual
frames to help human being in distress, but it seems that more its '
capitalistic' modes rendered the earlier demons dysfunctional, the
more it gave birth to new ones. Right now, the present, which is
pregnant with  ' a depression'  after it fornicated with ' spending
beyond means' we are likely to inherit  'monostrous results' very
soon, if not by '2012', but but around, and pass on its terrible side
effects to future generations. No choice, perhaps...

The term ' globalisation' then would look different what it defines
itself right now, because the unethical practices of very '
capitalistic ' legacy would function in a very brutal manner and
compel the commoner and strongheaded 'groups' to embrace violence,
violence in its terrible form,  as never seen before, perhaps. Do, we
presently look paranoid, or it is actually?

Although slippery to say, but ironcially the present opposition, such
as Muslim Fundamentalism: Jehad, to this American failing 'Hegemony',
might come handy to slow down its fall.  Because of deep
nexus/intimacy between the two; and the very opposition which is
embedded in the popular anti-west might actually discover a path for
their exit from crises.  So, i dont see Americanism disappearing, but
unfortunately  re-appearing as demon in our own backyards with
different names, forms and colours.

Because the producers of the Oil, and the its Consumers, primarily
West, have manifested a genetic kind of bonding by now, which is
defining modern world politics at the moment. The rest which includes
India, besides china too are running on paths strewn with banana
peels. Who can write a global economy, i guess there will be different
way of looking at it, but not contradicting too radically, i guess.

Oh, this Fall,  so predictable so far,  but holding a strange
unpridictablity, almost hidden within its black hole, if one can say
so, and that might contain some possiblities of good future/hope as
well. The Rest as against the American/West have a long list of left
overs: people stricken with poverty and underdeveloopment, where
modernity failed to heal the wound inflicted by the past demons.
Perhaps, lot of gloss which accompanied with modernity kept it away
from reaching the masses at the  same time. Good, paradoxically, See,
how Indian banks , for their indifference to the right consumer/needy
celebrate 'No Crunch' in their accounts in comparision to Banking
system in the West/America.

So, some Believer kind of Analysts, here, in our part of the world,
might feel that there never was a SOUL in Americanism, but , i feel
there was, which, we could not save. which is sad. But was it the duty
of the west only to protect its 'soul' by looking around its
shoulders, which it failed ?

 for this reason,  we hear most of Believers ( of any religion )
here, complaining that modernity tried to snatch God from their hands,
but we  ( the believers ) always felt otherwise.

No, sorry, the Believers, were holding the tail of spirit only, like
West's  misinterpretation of the very spirit defined , say,
'morality' through  capitalism, which never functioned.  It was always
like, a factory which was designed to produce X number of bags in a
day, but it never, and the moment it was pushed to commit the
machinery to its full potential, it over heated , and a short circuit,
time and again. This applies to our  dogmatic system of Believers too.

So, i guess, something else might bring us closer to  our ' collective
unconscious' , if somehting is terribly wrong with our notion of
facts, which seems  true, and that we may debate..

Yesteday, i happned to see, a book cover, Ancient Futures. i had no
urge to know its contents,  but it was cool on the eye, and eye within
the eye

with love
inder salim




On Tue, Oct 20, 2009 at 6:55 PM, Jeebesh <jeebesh at sarai.net> wrote:
> dear all, this text is from the heart of capitalism. warmly jeebesh
>
> Oct. 20, 2009, 12:50 a.m. EDT
>
> Death of 'Soul of Capitalism:' Bogle, Faber, Moore
> 20 reasons America has lost its soul and collapse is inevitable
>
> http://www.marketwatch.com/story/americas-soul-is-lost-and-collapse-is-inevitable-2009-10-20
>
> By Paul B. Farrell, MarketWatch
>
> ARROYO GRANDE, Calif. (MarketWatch) -- Jack Bogle published "The
> Battle for the Soul of Capitalism" four years ago. The battle's over.
> The sequel should be titled: "Capitalism Died a Lost Soul." Worse,
> we've lost "America's Soul." And worldwide the consequences will be
> catastrophic.
>
> That's why a man like Hong Kong's contrarian economist Marc Faber
> warns in his Doom, Boom & Gloom Report: "The future will be a total
> disaster, with a collapse of our capitalistic system as we know it
> today."
>
> No, not just another meltdown, another bear market recession like the
> one recently triggered by Wall Street's "too-greedy-to-fail" banks.
> Farber is warning that the entire system of capitalism will collapse.
> Get it? The engine driving the great "American Economic Empire" for
> 233 years will collapse, a total disaster, a destiny we created.
>
> OK, deny it. But I'll bet you have a nagging feeling maybe he's right,
> the end may be near. I have for a long time: I wrote a column back in
> 1997: "Battling for the Soul of Wall Street." My interest in "The
> Soul" -- what Jung called the "collective unconscious" -- dates back
> to my Ph.D. dissertation: "Modern Man in Search of His Soul," a title
> borrowed from Jung's 1933 book, "Modern Man in Search of a Soul." This
> battle has been on my mind since my days at Morgan Stanley 30 years
> ago, witnessing the decline.
>
> Has capitalism lost its soul? Guys like Bogle and Faber sense it. Read
> more about the soul in physicist Gary Zukav's "The Seat of the Soul,"
> Thomas Moore's "Care of the Soul" and sacred texts.
>
> But for Wall Street and American capitalism, use your gut. You know
> something's very wrong: A year ago "too-greedy-to-fail" banks were
> insolvent, in a near-death experience. Now, magically they're back to
> business as usual, arrogant, pocketing outrageous bonuses while Main
> Street sacrifices, and unemployment and foreclosures continue rising
> as tight credit, inflation, skyrocketing Federal debt killing taxpayers.
>
> Yes, Wall Street has lost its moral compass. They created the mess,
> now, like vultures, they're capitalizing on the carcass. They have
> lost all sense of fiduciary duty, ethical responsibility and public
> obligation.
>
> Here are the Top 20 reasons American capitalism has lost its soul:
>
> 1. Collapse is now inevitable
>
> Capitalism has been the engine driving America and the global
> economies for over two centuries. Faber predicts its collapse will
> trigger global "wars, massive government-debt defaults, and the
> impoverishment of large segments of Western society." Faber knows that
> capitalism is not working, capitalism has peaked, and the collapse of
> capitalism is "inevitable."
>
> When? He hesitates: "But what I don't know is whether this final
> collapse, which is inevitable, will occur tomorrow, or in five or 10
> years, and whether it will occur with the Dow at 100,000 and gold at
> $50,000 per ounce or even confiscated, or with the Dow at 3,000 and
> gold at $1,000." But the end is inevitable, a historical imperative.
>
> 2. Nobody's planning for a 'Black Swan'
>
> While the timing may be uncertain, the trigger is certain. Societies
> collapse because they fail to plan ahead, cannot act fast enough when
> a catastrophic crisis hits. Think "Black Swan" and read evolutionary
> biologist Jared Diamond's "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or
> Succeed."
>
> A crisis hits. We act surprised. Shouldn't. But it's too late:
> "Civilizations share a sharp curve of decline. Indeed, a society's
> demise may begin only a decade or two after it reaches its peak
> population, wealth and power."
>
> Warnings are everywhere. Why not prepare? Why sabotage our power, our
> future? Why set up an entire nation to fail? Diamond says:
> Unfortunately "one of the choices has depended on the courage to
> practice long-term thinking, and to make bold, courageous,
> anticipatory decisions at a time when problems have become perceptible
> but before they reach crisis proportions."
>
> Sound familiar? "This type of decision-making is the opposite of the
> short-term reactive decision-making that too often characterizes our
> elected politicians," thus setting up the "inevitable" collapse.
> Remember, Greenspan, Bernanke, Bush, Paulson all missed the 2007-8
> meltdown: It will happen again, in a bigger crisis.
>
> 3. Wall Street sacked Washington
>
> Bogle warned of a growing three-part threat -- a "happy conspiracy" --
> in "The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism:" "The business and ethical
> standards of corporate America, of investment America, and of mutual
> fund America have been gravely compromised."
>
> But since his book, "Wall Street America" went over to the dark side,
> got mega-greedy and took control of "Washington America." Their spoils
> of war included bailouts, bankruptcies, stimulus, nationalizations and
> $23.7 trillion new debt off-loaded to the Treasury, Fed and American
> people.
>
> Who's in power? Irrelevant. The "happy conspiracy" controls both
> parties, writes the laws to suit its needs, with absolute control of
> America's fiscal and monetary policies. Sorry Jack, but the "Battle
> for the Soul of Capitalism" really was lost.
>
> 4. When greed was legalized
>
> Go see Michael Moore's documentary, "Capitalism: A Love Story."
> "Disaster Capitalism" author Naomi Klein recently interviewed Moore in
> The Nation magazine: "Capitalism is the legalization of this greed.
> Greed has been with human beings forever. We have a number of things
> in our species that you would call the dark side, and greed is one of
> them. If you don't put certain structures in place or restrictions on
> those parts of our being that come from that dark place, then it gets
> out of control."
>
> Greed's OK, within limits, like the 10 Commandments. Yes, the soul can
> thrive around greed, if there are structures and restrictions to keep
> it from going out of control. But Moore warns: "Capitalism does the
> opposite of that. It not only doesn't really put any structure or
> restrictions on it. It encourages it, it rewards" greed, creating
> bigger, more frequent bubble/bust cycles.
>
> It happens because capitalism is now in "the hands of people whose
> only concern is their fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders
> or to their own pockets." Yes, greed was legalized in America, with
> Wall Street running Washington.
>
> 5. Triggering the end of our 'life cycle'
>
> Like Diamond, Faber also sees the historical imperative: "Every
> successful society" grows "out of some kind of challenge." Today, the
> "life cycle" of capitalism is on the decline.
>
> He asks himself: "How are you so sure about this final collapse?" The
> answer: "Of all the questions I have about the future, this is the
> easiest one to answer. Once a society becomes successful it becomes
> arrogant, righteous, overconfident, corrupt, and decadent ...
> overspends ... costly wars ... wealth inequity and social tensions
> increase; and society enters a secular decline." Success makes us our
> own worst enemy.
>
> Quoting 18th century Scottish historian Alexander Fraser Tytler: "The
> average life span of the world's greatest civilizations has been 200
> years" progressing from "bondage to spiritual faith ... to great
> courage ... to liberty ... to abundance ... to selfishness ... to
> complacency ... to apathy ... to dependence and ... back into bondage!"
>
> Where is America in the cycle? "It is most unlikely that Western
> societies, and especially the U.S., will be an exception to this
> typical 'society cycle.' ... The U.S. is somewhere between the phase
> where it moves 'from complacency to apathy' and 'from apathy to
> dependence.'"
>
> In short, America is a grumpy old man with hardening of the arteries.
> Our capitalism is near the tipping point, unprepared for a
> catastrophe, set up for collapse and rapid decline.
>
> 15 more clues capitalism lost its soul ... is a disaster waiting to
> happen
>
> Much more evidence litters the battlefield:
>
> Wall Street wealth now calls the shots in Congress, the White House
>
> America's top 1% own more than 90% of America's wealth
>
> The average worker's income has declined in three decades while CEO
> compensation exploded over ten times
>
> The Fed is now the 'fourth branch of government' operating
> autonomously, secretly printing money at will
>
> Since Goldman and Morgan became bank holding companies, all banks are
> back gambling with taxpayer bailout money plus retail customer deposits
>
> Bill Gross warns of a "new normal" with slow growth, low earnings and
> stock prices
>
> While the White House's chief economist retorts with hype of a
> recovery unimpeded by the "new normal"
>
> Wall Street's high-frequency junkies make billions trading zombie
> stocks like AIG, FNMA, FMAC that have no fundamental value beyond a
> Treasury guarantee
>
> 401(k)s have lost 26.7% of their value in the past decade
>
> Oil and energy costs will skyrocket
>
> Foreign nations and sovereign funds have started dumping dollars,
> signaling the end of the dollar as the world's reserve currency
>
> In two years federal debt exploded from $11.2 to $23.7 trillion
>
> New financial reforms will do little to prevent the next meltdown
>
> The "forever war" between Western and Islamic fundamentalists will widen
>
> As will environmental threats and unfunded entitlements
>
> "America Capitalism" is a "Lost Soul" ... we've lost our moral
> compass ... the coming collapse is the end of an "inevitable"
> historical cycle stalking all great empires to their graves. Downsize
> your lifestyle expectations, trust no one, not even media.
>
> Faber is uncertain about timing, we are not. There is a high
> probability of a crisis and collapse by 2012. The "Great Depression 2"
> is dead ahead. Unfortunately, there's absolutely nothing you can do to
> hide from this unfolding reality or prevent the rush of the historical
> imperative dead ahead.
> _________________________________________
> reader-list: an open discussion list on media and the city.
> Critiques & Collaborations
> To subscribe: send an email to reader-list-request at sarai.net with subscribe in the subject header.
> To unsubscribe: https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/reader-list
> List archive: &lt;https://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/reader-list/>



-- 

http://indersalim.livejournal.com