Most cultural, sociological, philosophical and other currents that are discussed superficially in contemporary Western European texts can be traced back to Greek society in the fifth century BC, or further. The reason for this is the fact that it is the first European society for which a lot of written source material is available. That triviality is often used as a justification for the existence of a current, while it merely states that not all that much changed in these domains in the last 2500 years. The evolution of thinking is rather slow on average.
There is however no reason to despair. We have all the more motivation to concentrate on what is truely contemporary and new. The surprising fact is rather that so much of the details change continuously, and gain at least temporary importance. These facets are fascinating and we must attempt to concentrate on them.
Friday, December 25, 2009
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Toys for us
There are some baby items that work, and others that don't. For ease of future parents, I post a few that do serve a function.
The play mat by Tiny Love is useful from very early on in stimulating the baby's senses. Our two weeks old Alexander had a few minutes of fun attempting to bite the ape's foot and the elephant's trunk, before becoming hysterical either because he did not succeed or because he is addicted to bodily warmth.
The pet by Sigikid (which we have baptized Siegfried) is flat (and therefore manageable to a very young baby) and has nice contrasting checkered and striped panels. The material is soft enough to be pleasant to the baby, yet rough enough to make itself felt as a definite presence.
The play mat by Tiny Love is useful from very early on in stimulating the baby's senses. Our two weeks old Alexander had a few minutes of fun attempting to bite the ape's foot and the elephant's trunk, before becoming hysterical either because he did not succeed or because he is addicted to bodily warmth.
The pet by Sigikid (which we have baptized Siegfried) is flat (and therefore manageable to a very young baby) and has nice contrasting checkered and striped panels. The material is soft enough to be pleasant to the baby, yet rough enough to make itself felt as a definite presence.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Financial rip-off
The bail-out money spent by (mostly western) governments was a rip-off for a majority of the population. The right course of action would have been, in my rough naive estimate, to have financial institutions go bankrupt for a total value of about half the amount of the bail-out money. The net effect of such politics would have been much more beneficial. A few more banks should have sunk.
Recall that it was argued that the bail-out money would benefit the little man. The immediate fear of the common man was to lose the savings he had in the bank. However, the fast government guarantees of savings up to a certain amount (depending on the country) alleviated that fear immediately, although it lingered irrationally. That guarantee was necessary and sufficient, in a first instance. At that point, in a crude first step approximation, only people with a lot of money in the bank had to worry. And they did, and pressured governments to save all the money they had in their bank, by saving their bank. And guess what the government did.
Therefore, the tax payers money went to saving the surplus savings of the very rich.
The little man's guarantee never came into effect. The limit of the guarantee of savings never came into effect. And that says it all. The rich remained rich.
Really, they became richer. Banks faired well, and bonuses were paid, not only for good results, but also for the most disastrous year since the great depression. You have to wonder how the word bonus applied to those financial specialists who guided their institution to bankruptcy, only saved by the lobbying power of their clients.
Anyway, that was a first step crude approximation. There is no doubt that in the middle term, banks needed to be saved. But only after a few rich had paid, and after a few ordinary people had reclaimed their guaranteed savings. Because the banking system is in effect important, as was correctly argued, to make sure the market is fluid.
This illustrates well how purely ideological left or right reasoning did not apply to the crisis. One needed ideas from both camps to act reasonably. Note how during the crisis, the right wing was mightely quiet, convinced as they were that the government should intervene to save their donors, and their party. Their ideological failing was commented upon, but never really became the center of a public debate. It was said however that the left could not profit from the manifest failing of rightwing ideology. I would argue that the reason is that the left did not realize that for once, it needed to use right wing ideology (- let the free market take care of itself for a while -) to clean up after the rich. Exceptionally, the free market was implementing left wing ideology. Sure enough, ideological flexibility is near zero these days, so none of the above points were thorougly debated, let alone implemented by prominent politicians.
The danger, one would argue against my position, is that the whole system would have collapsed in no time. I don't believe this is the case, because the demand for basic goods as well as for a large number of luxury products never went down. No enormous amount of jobs, except in the financial industry, and in industries that were already in grave difficulties were lost, and this is no accident. If we had saved less banks, we would just have lost more leechers from the system. Only the part of the system that was not essential for satisfying the still existing and persisting demand was in danger. Only that part profited from the massive bail-out.
Recall that it was argued that the bail-out money would benefit the little man. The immediate fear of the common man was to lose the savings he had in the bank. However, the fast government guarantees of savings up to a certain amount (depending on the country) alleviated that fear immediately, although it lingered irrationally. That guarantee was necessary and sufficient, in a first instance. At that point, in a crude first step approximation, only people with a lot of money in the bank had to worry. And they did, and pressured governments to save all the money they had in their bank, by saving their bank. And guess what the government did.
Therefore, the tax payers money went to saving the surplus savings of the very rich.
The little man's guarantee never came into effect. The limit of the guarantee of savings never came into effect. And that says it all. The rich remained rich.
Really, they became richer. Banks faired well, and bonuses were paid, not only for good results, but also for the most disastrous year since the great depression. You have to wonder how the word bonus applied to those financial specialists who guided their institution to bankruptcy, only saved by the lobbying power of their clients.
Anyway, that was a first step crude approximation. There is no doubt that in the middle term, banks needed to be saved. But only after a few rich had paid, and after a few ordinary people had reclaimed their guaranteed savings. Because the banking system is in effect important, as was correctly argued, to make sure the market is fluid.
This illustrates well how purely ideological left or right reasoning did not apply to the crisis. One needed ideas from both camps to act reasonably. Note how during the crisis, the right wing was mightely quiet, convinced as they were that the government should intervene to save their donors, and their party. Their ideological failing was commented upon, but never really became the center of a public debate. It was said however that the left could not profit from the manifest failing of rightwing ideology. I would argue that the reason is that the left did not realize that for once, it needed to use right wing ideology (- let the free market take care of itself for a while -) to clean up after the rich. Exceptionally, the free market was implementing left wing ideology. Sure enough, ideological flexibility is near zero these days, so none of the above points were thorougly debated, let alone implemented by prominent politicians.
The danger, one would argue against my position, is that the whole system would have collapsed in no time. I don't believe this is the case, because the demand for basic goods as well as for a large number of luxury products never went down. No enormous amount of jobs, except in the financial industry, and in industries that were already in grave difficulties were lost, and this is no accident. If we had saved less banks, we would just have lost more leechers from the system. Only the part of the system that was not essential for satisfying the still existing and persisting demand was in danger. Only that part profited from the massive bail-out.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)