Russian Paranoia?

[stumbler]

More re: Theophan's post here: http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl? ... 09/1526251

[Pravoslavnik]

"They (the USSR) had food on their tables and secuirity."

Theophan,

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  Was there food on the table during the widespread famines in the USSR in the 1930's,when millions of people starved to death, and when Russians used to stand in line for hours to buy bread during the Brezhnev era?  When Russia develops an increasingly functional free market economy, the total value and quantity of goods and services available for Russian consumption and international trade increases.  This will also benefit the global economy.  This phenomenon has been observed around the world during the transition from state-controlled communist to free market economies.  (Or consider the economies of East and West Germany during the Soviet era.) When I was in Slovenia in 1988 there were very few goods available in stores.  Since the end of communist state-managed enterprise in 1990, Slovenia has a bustling trade with other nations in the EU and around the world, which benefits everyone.  It is not simply a matter of corporate exploitation --although governments need to set limits on corporate capitalist abuses of the people. 

    Have you studied Adam Smith's [i]The Wealth of Nations?[/i]  You are thinking about the goods and services of the world as a zero sum game--a small, fixed pie--for international corporations to divide at their whim.  There are fixed, limited quantities of some resources, of course, but not all.

       Which is not to say that man should live by bread alone, or that increased freedom and economic prosperity does not allow greater latitude for people to engage in sinful conduct--drug abuse, prostitution, murder, etc.  "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

[stumbler]

You are reaching very far back when you look to "Wealth of Nations" for guidance, and this suggests that you indeed view capitalism as a religion, as Smith is considered the "Old Testament."

The current view of globalism has virtually nothing to do with the original argument for free trade, which is the concept of "comparative advantage."

The traditional example used for pupils is that Scotland is better for grazing than France, so Scotland can more easily make wool while France can more easily make wine, so an exchange is more efficient than for Scotland to try to frow grapes in greenhouses or for France to plow over vineyards to make room for sheep.

Today, the comparative advantage which drives globalization is completely artificial, and is all about exploitation. The reason so much industry is in China is because MNC's are allowed to pollute at will and exploit cheap labour, and sometimes even prison labour.

If America stopped enforcing all environmental laws, we would regain some of our "competitive advantage" in manufacturing, just as if we convicted more people of crimes and rented them out to factories for the 12 cents an hour that our prison labour now pays current convicts. A sweep of the pen is the sum total of "comparative advantage" these days.

Nowhere in there is the goal of efficiency contemplated by NATURAL comparative advantage.

Was there food on the table during the Great Depression in the US, in the 1930's, which followed the gilded age? Seems like a lot of people were hungry in the 30's, and we too had a mass migration westward during that time, including much social upheaval. Ask the "Okies" who settled the Central Valley in California.

You have successfully proven that governments are capable of starving and forcing migration, but no more than that.

No one is nostalgic for bad times, so obviously Theophan was not referring to the negatives. What he WAS referring to was obviously a time before which Yeltsin's fire sale of state property and introduction of feral capitalism allowed the crass exploitation of Russian people to cause such suffering as would not have happened under the USSR government.

Is it so hard to admit that conditions created by feral capitalism can be worse than those enjoyed under oppressive communism, or am I blaspheming your free capitalist religion?

If you really believe that globalism is any mor ethan a Ponzi scheme or an accounting trick, then you need to study economics more closely. Just because numbers rise on a spreadsheet, which is what is referred to as "growth" - does not mean that any real "growth" has occurred.

For instance, prisons account for a huge part of the US economy, and private prison companies are solid stocks. What do we get for causing such misery? Alaska's gross domestic progress increased HUGELY when the Exxon Valdez created a calamity of an oil spill up there - because all the people trying to clean it up spent a lot of money. Was that "growth?" It appeared as "growth" on the books.

There si economics after Smith, and I hope you have the time to look into it, because "free market" arguments based solely on Smith are really embarrassing to the maker and misleading to the hearer.

The US economy is currently considered "strong" by feral free-marketers - because numbers ignore what the growth is for. Bullet makers are doing well, mercenary providing no-bid contract companies are moving a lot of money - but our infrastructure is rotting, education is a mess, our roads are full of holes, our citizens (even veterans) can't get the health care they need - so what does the flow of money measure?

At a certain point, it IS INDEED a zero sum game. I would like to outlaw people trying to use economics to justify poverty and exploitation until they can pass a simple test explaining the terms they try to use, the meaning of the quotes they use from their sources, and solid evidence that the globalism they push is based on NATURAL comparative advantage and not exploitation, and an understanding that a growth in spending and consumption (which in many ways is destruction) is not a universal good.

Why so many Americans in prison and not college, when college is cheaper than incarceration in so many cases? Because prison spending makes the economy look better, as many prisons are privately run by corporate enterprise. By the logic of "free markets" and "economic analysis" - imprisonment is "better" than education. It keeps the economy looking quite robust, while destroying resources.

I really wish people understood economics better than they understand propaganda.

[Jean-Serge]

No relation with what you were talking about, but the title of the thread remembered me some things. In my last ROCIE parish, everyone was suspected of being a KGB now FSB agent. If all the suspected persons were indeed Moscow agent, the vast majority of the faithful would be actually KGB agent... So, yes I think Russians are quite striken by paranoia.

[GOCTheophan]

Pravoslavnik,

Please lay aside your conditioning and examine these facts-

http://reformed-theology.org/html/books ... index.html

http://reformed-theology.org/html/books ... index.html

http://reformed-theology.org/jbs/books/ ... index.html

Those who control the stock markets and resources of this world are not "anti-Communist". The struggle is not between "free" and "closed" societies but between Christ and Satan, Revolution and Tradition.

One could also ask is the society you advocate Free in what sense? Free of the tryanny of the flesh, the world and the devil or free to lets say have an abortion? Or maybe free to starve?

Theophan.

[Pravoslavnik]

Gentlemen,

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 There are several major questions being raised on this thread.  One central question is whether a "free market" economy leads to a better standard of living for a people than does a state-controlled, communist economy.   I can assure you that I am far from being an advocate of laissez faire, "feral" capitalism, but, surely, history has given us an unequivocal answer to the above question!  Consider the highly functional economies of Western Europe--including that of pre-Gorbachev West Germany, the leading export economy in the world even before the fall of the Iron Curtain--in comparison with those of Eastern Europe or the USSR.  Imperial Russia, itself, had a significantly positive balance of trade prior to 1917.  Unbridled capitalism has serious flaws, but state-managed, communist economies simply do not work.  The Marxist-Leninist economic experiments in the USSR, Cuba, and North Korea all ended in unmitigated disaster.  

    The original question on this thread is whether the Putin administration, and the modern Russian Federation, is paranoid about the West, experiencing exaggerated or imaginary fears.  My own, amateur opinion is that Russia is now experiencing a surge of fascist sentiment--nationalistic pride, state-controlled media, scape-goating of minority groups, blind submission to police authority, and paranoia about "outsiders" who question or attempt to discuss what is happening.  This phenomenon is all too familiar to those who have studied the history of previous fascist movements in modern Europe--those in Spain, Italy, or Nazi Germany, for example.

      A related question, raised by Theophan, is whether wealth and economic prosperity are sinful.   Certainly, there have been "righteous" saints who have been wealthy.  One thinks of the Patriarch Abraham--the "friend" of God, who showed hospitality to the Holy Trinity at Hebron--or the Tsar-Martyr Nicholas II, possibly the wealthiest man in the world, who was a generous, devoted patron of the Orthodox Churches throughout the world.  St. John Chrysotomos wrote at length about this issue in his sermons on the parable of Lazarus and the rich man.  What, I wonder, do the Fathers say about capitalism, in particular?  Is it a sin to buy stocks? To invest in machinery or technology?   To own and rent land or other resources? To operate a business and hire laborers?

[stumbler]

"The original question on this thread is whether the Putin administration, and the modern Russian Federation, is paranoid about the West, experiencing exaggerated or imaginary fears. My own, amateur opinion is that Russia is now experiencing a surge of fascist sentiment--nationalistic pride, state-controlled media, scape-goating of minority groups, blind submission to police authority, and paranoia about "outsiders" who question or attempt to discuss what is happening."

This is a perfect description of modern day America. So I am not sure I understand your point exactly.

If you are against feral capitalism, then you are in favour of a "state managed economy" - and all the rest is a matter of degree and method.

So, I am left here asking myself, what exactly is left in what Pravoslavnik asks, other than racism? Is it OK for America to exhibit fascism, and this does nor scare him, but Russian fascism scares him? Is it OK for Putin to consolidate the media, but not the supporters of Bush? (Let's not forget that Clear Channel, the "non state controlled" controller of well over a thousand radio stations outlawed any song which might be considered anti-war when Bush (who allowed them to buy up so many stations) started his Iraq war. That is state control of media - economic control, but control nonetheless.

The question Pravoslavnik poses is not about the methods, techniques, etc - but about who does them.

This, I find racist.

How about admitting the racism and asking a fair question about how society is governed in general?

Why do you not wonder why Bush is so paranoid that he must illegally eviscerate the Constitution and illegally spy on people and keep his own aides from telling Congress what he has been up to? Is that paranoia? Or would it only be paranoia if he were Russian?

On a certain level, you mistrust Russians. On a certain level, you think of Russians as the enemy. On a certain level, you see things that you do as suspicious if Russians do them.

On a certain level, that is racism, pure and simple.

I mistrust Putin, not because he is Russian but because of his history. I mistrust Bush not because he is American, but because of his history. What is your excuse?