The Heart of the Matter: The 2008 U.S. Financial Meltdown

Inside Job is quite possibly the best documentary I have ever seen. It chronicles the financial collapse of 2008 and what led the United States into the current recession. Narrated by Matt Damon and featuring interviews with many prominent politicians, journalists, etc, this film is highly informational while also evoking strong emotions from the viewer. I highly recommend seeing it.

"If you're not enraged by the end of the movie, 

you weren't paying attention" 

- Mary and Richard Corliss, TIME

At the turn of the century president Teddy Roosevelt worked hard as a Progressive Republican to create change in the American workplace by instituting new laws and regulations such as child labor reforms, and shortening the American work day to eight hours. Reform continued in the 1930's, With Franklin Roosevelt working hard to ensure another Great Depression would never again happen. More regulations were put into place to keep America safe from Wall Street wheeling and dealing, which contributed mightily to the Great Depression.

Things continued along well in America with the economy growing and our power in the world increasing. Then, in the 1980's Reagan took office and began to deregulate many institutions in the market, such as the Savings and Loan companies. This had a profound effect; corporations and Wall Street realized that they had the power to lobby in Washington, and by using money they could get their way. With their help the Republican Party moved to continue deregulation and encouraging the free market.

The Clinton presidency did nothing to stave off this flow of money and power to Wall Street. In the 1990's Alan Greenspan argued for deregulation of the mortgage industry, saying that it did not need regulating. This is an absurd proclamation, essentially stating that companies in the free market are trustworthy and honorable and will ensure that American citizens are safe and prosperous. Am I wrong to think that most companies are out to turn a profit, and would never take money out of their own pockets to help some unfortunate soul?

Then in 2000 it was announced that the derivatives market was not going to be regulated in any way, and that companies engaging in derivatives trading were exempt from anti-gambling laws. Essentially this allowed the companies to engage in extremely high risk investing and trading, putting the country at risk of a financial collapse. Politicians saw nothing wrong with this scenario, and continued to advocate for deregulation of the market. Consumers lost an estimated $700 million, while the companies in question made $100 million.

Next comes the George Bush era. Under his watch the housing market grew into a giant bubble just waiting to blow up. Mortgages were being offered to people who could not possibly pay them back, along with other large loans. When these were defaulted upon - in the thousands - the bubble burst. Investement banks bet against these mortgage packages they were selling to other companies, knowing full well that they were likely to default. This insurance is what allowed the investment banks - such as Goldman Sachs - to get even more money out of this scheme.

House ownership was at an all time high in 2007, while savings was at an all time low. Now, one could certainly argue that people are responsible for themselves and their actions. If one does not choose to be responsible with their assets then it is their own fault for winding up in a bad financial situation. However, due to predatory lending and poor education in our country, many people were perfect targets for these companies. They were told by so-called experts that they were making a smart investment, and that they would not have trouble paying back these loans - in fact, they were told that debt is good and American because it builds up the market as well as your personal credit. Too bad these were lies, and most people defaulted quickly on these loans, winding up destitute and homeless.

This seems like a clear case of fraud, however these companies were simply taking advantage of a situation the government created. First, politicians (mostly right wing) helped to deregulate the market, allowing companies full control over the derivatives market. Then they turned a blind eye to what these companies were doing to American citizens. The saddest part is that Obama re-elected many of these politicians to his cabinet, allowing everyone to get away with the terrible economic situation that they created. No one has been or will be punished, and again the American tax payer is left shovelling the shit.

In the end we are left with a choice: do we blame the politicians who allowed this type of behaviour from capitalists, or do we blame the capitalists and companies themselves for taking advantage of our country and people - though technically not doing anything illegal, just highly immoral?

Sources: http://www.sonyclassics.com/insidejob/site/#/events

Why Does McDonald's Taste So Good?

I don't want people to think I'm a hypocrite, so let's get this out of the way right here. I am sitting here writing this while eating a McDonald's sausage burrito and hash brown. I normally try to avoid eating fast food, but there was little in the house to eat this morning, and well it just tastes so good!

What is it about the food that attracts even the wariest of people to eat there, knowing full well how bad it is for you, and how bad their system of food production is for the world? It's certainly not looks. On the commercials the burgers look fresh and amazing, but in reality they are pretty ugly. So why do we continue to eat them?

According to Fast Food Nation, McDonald's secret is a special combination of flavors created in laboratories, along with that infernal scent that wafts out of the buildings and into the street. The United States has a fascination with science, especially chemicals. We tend to assume that science is always a good thing, and that messing around with growing and preparing food will yield results in terms of quantity and quality of food provided.

For example, Monsanto created soy beans that already contain pesticides. This (in theory) should eliminate the extra time needed to spray pesticides on the crops, and would cut down on these poisons entering the ecosystem and destroying other plants and animals as well as habitats. Unfortunately, science is still very mysterious, and we do not fully comprehend the implications of these creations. Who knows what these beans will do to people once the crops have been ingested, or what will happen when these beans inevitable escape the boundaries of the field and enter the environment.

There's no escaping the advertising on the television, Internet, radio, billboards, etc. You know that song in their commercials? That was created by a Berkeley College of Music professor. Yes, it was designed to be simple enough to stick in your head forever and drive you crazy. Much like those car and mattress comercials whose jingles you find yourself singing in the shower every morning.

Is there any escape?

The answer is no. As humans we have evolved to seek out fats, sugars and salts when it comes to food. These are rare in the natural world, which makes us intrinsically designed to stuff as much as we can into our stomachs when we do find these foods. Sadly, McDonald's has tapped into this evolutionary design with their products. It is up to us as individuals to stop and think about our food choices when it comes to meal time. This is a difficult feat, but one worth doing. As I said before, this is still something I'm working on. It gets easier over time, but there will be times when you can't help but eat that large order of french fries. All we can do is try and do our best.


http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/business-brains/green-chemistry-stresses-8216benign-by-design-mindset/16177

The Days Are Numbered For Herman Cain

In recent weeks it has come to light that Herman Cain has been involved in sexual harassment allegations. This is a clear "he said, she said" case, and the truth remains unknown. While these are serious allegations, Cain refuses to take them seriously. At first he denied even knowing about the allegations, then he remembered but was shady about the details. He's clearly hiding something. 

Yesterday on the morning news I listened to Cain's newest accuser, Sharon Bialek. She stated that while looking for a job, she was groped by Cain in a car. When she protested he said "You want a job, right?" This is a clear, cut and dry case of sexual harassment. Cain allegedly put his hand up her skirt, and attempted to force Bialek's head toward his own crotch. 

Cain's campaign has since labelled her a chronically in debt woman who is desperate for money. This is a sad attempt at deflecting responsibility. Cain should own up to his mistakes, try to make things and move on. This leaves American wondering how much longer the Cain campaign can carry on before self-destructing. If more women come forward it would speed up this campaign's demise. 

Sharon Bialek

The NPR Difference

I appreciate transparency in all things, so I was very happy to hear - on NPR - that there has been some controversy surrounding many higher level executives at NPR. As of December first  the president and CEO of the company will be Gary Knell. Knell formerly was the head of Sesame Workshop, the organization that owns Sesame Street. 

The former CEO and president, Vivian Schiller, forcibly resigned in March of this year following the firing of Juan Williams. has been replaced as of Monday. Williams was a contributing analyst at NPR who was fired after stating on Fox News that Muslims make him nervous at the airport. Subsequently NPR has been attacked for having a "liberal bias", and conservatives have been pushing for NPR to lose it's federal funding (which only makes up about two percent of it's annual budget).  According to NPR, "directors came to the conclusion that the controversies under Schiller's watch had become such a distraction that she could no longer effectively lead the organization". 

When Rupert Murdoch was going through that scandal (which is entirely not over) his subsidiary companies dodged the topic like a plague. Fox News did not even hint at the topic; it was as if there was no scandal and life was just plodding along normally. This is NOT transparency. Fox news assures it's audience that there is no spin on their network, and they are the most trusted and reputable news source. All I can say is, if you believe this...think again. 

Hydroponics Could Feed the World

When you hear the word hydroponics, what immediately comes to mind? Most likely you imagine a college kid's closet filled with lamps and marijuana plants. That is what I picture too. However, while working at an organic food store, I started seeing tomatoes labelled as being hydroponically grown. This got me wondering about the growing method - first used as far back as the 1930's - and how it could be beneficial to our society. 


Essentially hydroponics means "the process of growing plants in sand, gravel, or liquid, with added nutrients but without soil". This means that seedlings are placed in some medium (cloth, gravel, etc.) and grown indoors under LED lamps. The plants are fed fertilizers and nutrients along with water through a pumping system that recycles the water to prevent waste. 


This is a very sterile and controlled method of growing plants, and is self-contained, therefore requiring minimal effort on the farmer's part to keep the plants alive and healthy. In addition, these plants can be placed much closer together than in the field, resulting in a greater yield. There are also no pesticides, no weeds, and no pesky insects since the LED lights can be set to a frequency that discourages insect breeding. 


Here are the benefits to hydroponic farming:

• No soil
• Little assistance needed from farmers after everything is set up
• Can be done inside abandoned buildings
• Saves on water by recycling it
• No pesticides
• Organic
• Can be run using alternative energy sources, such as wind or solar power
• Large, uniform crop yields
• Great variety of fruits and veggies can be grown
• Not affected by seasons
• Relatively inexpensive
• Uses CO2 to promote photosynthesis (less CO2 and more oxygen in our atmosphere)
• Safe from bacteria such as E Coli and Listeria --> Remember when spinach was recalled due to contamination? It was due to the fact that sewage leaked into the soil in the farm fields...no soil, no issue! 

Several companies world wide are experimenting with this method of farming, including one in Ithaca New York called AeroFarms. This start-up seeks to transform abandoned buildings into "vertical farms". 

So, a building like this

could easily be turned into something like this

Helping to feed our growing populations while simultaneously eliminating factory farming, a practice which is killing our environment as well as human beings. 




Sources:
http://innoplex.org/eng/2010/12/aerofarms/ 
http://www.farmsanctuary.org/issues/factoryfarming/
http://www.epicurious.com/tools/fooddictionary/entry/?id=3006

The Fate of Humanity

The new documentary 2012: Time For Change discusses modern society and it's lack of connection to the natural world. I stumbled on this documentary yesterday while looking through Netflix. This is now one of my favorite documentaries!

The gods first created people out of mud, but they were not well beings; they lacked emotions and insight. They were then destroyed by a great storm. Next the gods made people out of wood, but they had no direction. They were destroyed by a great flood. Finally the gods made people out of corn. They had great insight, balance, and were powerful, so the gods blew a mist over their eyes. They slowly moved away from the natural world, and so we are today. The end of this era is coming. We need to evolve our consciousness to reconnect with the natural world. The age of wisdom is coming, and we must change in order to continue our survival on earth. 


Our consumer culture is a "materialist prison" (Daniel Pinchbeck). We're running out of resources, and we are ruining the earth. We must change our consciousness and actions. Can we escape this routine of destruction that is our way of living? Why does congress refuse to fund alternative energy or fund the creation of bike trails and better sidewalks for pedestrians? Are these politicians all in the pocket of big businesses such as oil and agriculture? We need to free ourselves! 


We had a lack of elders to lead the new movement for change in the 1960's. Now these once-children are the elders we need to lead us out of the dark and into the new era. If we can all change our consciousness and our actions, with the guidance of elders, we can become more spiritual and save our earth and existence. 

Armageddon really means transformation. This does not need to be the end of time, or the demise of humanity, but ti does need to be a time of change. We cannot continue living this way, or this will become a time of destruction and death. 


If people are constantly being reminded of the dire situation our society is in, and the doom we're facing now, why are they not mobilized to do something about it and affect change? This is because people cannot really grasp what they are being told. It's a tough thing to accept emotionally. Also, change is difficult for everyone, even small change. We are programmed to resist change. Not to mention the fact that we're effectively controlled by the system (in a way similar to the Matrix), where capitalism has us and we do not want to escape. We cannot even fathom living differently, and our politicians continually tell us that resistance is futile and nothing will ever change, so just relax and go with it. 


According to Einstein, we cannot fix the problems by using the same mindset we used to create them, instead we must change our way of thinking. 

Alex Grey painting of Pres. Obama

Analysis of Candidates: Stewart Alexander

Now we look at...

Stewart Alexander

Stewart Alexander is a Democratic Socialist politician who is running for president of the US. Formerly a member of the Air Force Reserve, Alexander is a fine example of the self-made man. He paid for his college education through hard work, eventually becoming a well-known politician who ran for for Mayor of California, Lieutenant Governor of California, and for Vice President in 2008. Each campaign was highly unsuccessful. Alexander currently resides in Virginia and works closely with the Socialist Party.


Alexander's campaign webpage lists his stance on many important issues of our time:


"The Socialist Party stands for the abolition of every form of domination and exploitation, whether based on social class, gender, race/ethnicity, age, education, sexual orientation, or other characteristics.

We are committed to the transformation of capitalism through the creation of a democratic socialist society based on compassion, empathy, and respect as well as the development of new social structures.  Socialism will establish a new social and economic order in which workers and community members will take responsibility for and control of their interpersonal relationships, their neighborhoods, their local government, and the production and distribution of all goods and services.

For these reasons we call for social ownership and democratic control of productive resources, for a guarantee to all of the right to participate in societal production, and to a fair share of society's product, in accordance with individual needs.

As we pursue a socialist transformation of society, we join with others in making radical demands on the existing system: demands that challenge the basic assumptions of a capitalist market economy while pointing the way to a new society. Although reforms will not in themselves bring about socialism, the fight for them will advance the cause by demonstrating the inherent limitations and injustice of the capitalist system. As we build the socialist movement, we organize around a platform committed to our common and interdependent struggles and aspirations."

"We stand in total opposition to U.S. imperialism and the current “war on terror”."


"focusing on production for need not profit"


"municipal ownership and control of energy plants, in a non-profit and decentralized, but coordinated, system that ensures the most careful use of natural resources."

http://vote-socialist.org/p08/questionnaires/alexander.html 



http://www.stewartalexandercares.com/