greenspan's mea culpa - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

roachboy · 10-23-2008, 08:42 AM

this is hilarious.
notice the rhetoric.
i strung together 3 versions of the same story from different sources to make it obvious what i think is so funny in this.

Quote:

Greenspan Concedes Error in Regulatory View
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON (AP) — Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve chairman, said Thursday that the current financial crisis had uncovered a flaw in how the free market system works that had shocked him.

Mr. Greenspan told the House Oversight Committee on Thursday that his belief that banks would be more prudent in their lending practices because of the need to protect their stockholders had proven in the latest crisis to be wrong.

Mr. Greenspan said he had made a “mistake” in believing that banks in operating in their self-interest would be sufficient to protect their shareholders and the equity in their institutions.

Mr. Greenspan said that he had found “a flaw in the model that I perceived is the critical functioning structure that defines how the world works.”

Mr. Greenspan, who headed the nation’s central bank for 18.5 years, said that he and others who believed lending institutions would do a good job of protecting their shareholders are in a “state of shocked disbelief.”

He said that the current crisis had “turned out to be much broader than anything that I could have imagined.”

The committee called Mr. Greenspan to testify along with former Treasury Secretary John Snow and the Securities and Exchange Commission chairman, Christopher Cox, as lawmakers sought to discover if regulatory failings had contributed to the crisis.

The committee chairman, Henry Waxman, said that he believed that the Federal Reserve, which regulates banks, the S.E.C. and the Treasury had all played a role in contributing to the mistakes.

“The list of mistakes is long and the cost to taxpayers is staggering,” Mr. Waxman, a California Democrat, told the three men. “Our regulators became enablers rather than enforcers. Their trust in the wisdom of the markets was infinite. The mantra became that government regulation is wrong. The market is infallible.”

In his testimony, Mr. Greenspan blamed the problems on heavy demand for securities backed by subprime mortgages by investors who did not worry that the boom in home prices might come to a crashing halt.

“Given the financial damage to date, I cannot see how we can avoid a significant rise in layoffs and unemployment,” Mr. Greenspan said. “Fearful American households are attempting to adjust, as best they can, to a rapid contraction in credit availability, threats to retirement funds and increased job insecurity.”

Mr. Greenspan said that a necessary condition for the crisis to end will be a stabilization in home prices but he said that was not likely to occur for “many months in the future.”

When home prices finally stabilize, Mr. Greenspan said, then “the market freeze should begin to measurably thaw and frightened investors will take tentative steps towards re-engagement with risk.”

Mr. Greenspan said until that occurs, the government is correct to move forward aggressively with efforts to support the financial sector. He called the $700 billion rescue package passed by Congress on Oct. 10 “adequate to serve the need” and said that its impact was already being felt in markets.

Mr. Greenspan did not specifically address the criticism he is receiving now as being partly to blame for the current crisis.

Mr. Greenspan’s critics charge that he left interest rates too low in the early part of this decade, spurring an unsustainable housing boom, while also refusing to exercise the Fed’s powers to impose greater regulations on the issuance of new types of mortgages, including subprime loans. It was the collapse of these mortgages and rising defaults a year ago that triggered the current crisis.

In his testimony, Mr. Greenspan put the blame for the subprime collapse on overeager investors who did not properly take into account the threats that would be posed once home prices stopped surging upward.

“It was the failure to properly price such risky assets that precipitated the crisis,” Mr. Greenspan said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/24/bu...hp&oref=slogin

from the washington post lead:

Quote:

Former Federal Reserve chairman acknowledges that the financial crisis had exposed "a flaw" in his view of how the world and markets function.

from the cnn lead:

Quote:

In remarks to the House Oversight and Reform Committee, Greenspan explained that "we are in the midst of a once-in-a century credit tsunami."

so there was a "flaw" in greenspan's thinking--which is that reliance on "self interest" (what exactly is that?) was adequate---instead of oversight, instead of regulation--for the "rational operations" of these fictions called "free markets"....but is a flaw at the level of axiom just a flaw?

this is one of the central television high priests of neoliberalism effectively renouncing the ideology itself.
"i was wrong."
it's an interesting moment.

but notice the ways in which the accounts are written: passive voice---words that minimize the implications of what is being said (there was a mistake, there were flaws) coupled with rhetoric---again--of weather (a "credit tsunami" a natural disaster, part of a "perfect storm"...)

why is this interesting? in part because the dominant ideology of things economic, neo-liberalism, the "washington consensus," the "market fundamentalism" that is falling apart was also the lingua franca for expressing information and perspective on things economic in the american mainstream press. as this ideology gets pulverized, the extent to which the american "free" press is little more than an ideological relay system becomes more and more obvious. and with that, the contours of the soft authoritarian system of which neoliberalism was a central element become more and more evident---if you look.

you see parallel stuff with reference to the implosion of the cowboy capitalist financial system as well---have a look at this:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/23/bu...l?ref=business

which came out this morning (13/23/08) in a context that is obviously being shaped by the ONGOING crisis, and which refers to it entirely in the past tense.

i put all this stuff together--and i could continue with it---to point out what ideological crisis looks like. ideological crisis in this sense is bigger than political trouble---it affects the shared frame of reference that shapes political action for both mainstream political parties, and for the relay functions undertaken by the press, which at all times has to balance the requirement to legitimate the overall political arrangment against its own requirements, which boil down to maintenance of a sense of distance from this ideological function in order to legitimate that function by enabling it to appear NOT as a function, but as the neutral relay of infotainment.

within this, the conservative media apparatus functions as an extremist counterpoint, taking this ideological justification function to a kind of limit by collapsing explicitly reactionary political opinions into the information itself and the whole unseemly stew this creates into a sense of identity---to be conservative is to think this way.

but this ongoing---uh----problem which follows from the "flaws" in thinking particular to the neoliberal worldview and which the weather is now pulverizing...this is interesting.

they say that folk make history every day, and that's true. but we live in a social system--a system of systems---and these systems have what you might think of as higher-order (in the sense of bigger, scale-wise) processes and events that unfold within these processes that are usually associated with History in caps. i think that's what we're living through...a historical mutation of the capitalist system, an ideological mutation, a political faction mutation, a realignment---in the context of which nothing is given in advance and in a context shaped by the inability of folk to see clearly because the frame they use to see is the frame that is being imploded.

i wrote the above while eating a brownie in my office. it's more or less how i've been thinking about the phase through which we are passing now.
maybe you've had a bit of time to acclimate and think about thi s as if from a remove as well.
if you haven't, i recommend eating a brownie and thinking about what's going on in the economic sector of the social world. think big:

what do you think is going on?
where do you see this heading?
how are you holding up through it?

remember that old cliche---i repeat it alot---may you not live in interesting times.
well, these are interesting times.

flstf · 10-23-2008, 02:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

what do you think is going on?
where do you see this heading?
how are you holding up through it?

Like Greenspan I have a hard time believing that banks would sacrifice their existence for some short term profits. I also cannot understand why smart people like Greenspan couldn't see this coming. Myself and many others could see that real estate prices were way out of line and due for a major correction but what I didn't know was that they would take down the banking system and the rest of the economy with them. He should have known better.

I see this resulting in far more government control of the economies around the world. I hope they do not print so much new money that they cause hyper-inflation. If the economy really tanks and we see depression era unemployment then unrest in the population will bring about major changes and an end to anything resembling today's form of capitalism. It seems to have already started.

filtherton · 10-23-2008, 02:49 PM

Welcome to the real world, Mr. Greenspan. Unbridled greed will always trump eventually rational self interest. Really, if ruining banks is profitable (and clearly it is), why should it be shocking that a culture which encourages profit above all else would eventually see something like this happen?

shakran · 10-23-2008, 02:50 PM

it always amazed me that the same people who violently decried communism were so wildly enthusiastic about greenspan's unregulated free market BS. They both have the same weak link: Human greed. Both are excellent systems on paper, but fail to take in to account the fact that there's always a group of greedy SOB's who want to get more than their share out of the system.

roachboy · 10-23-2008, 02:58 PM

i think cowboy capitalism is already finished, but also that it's not yet obvious what the altered norm will look like. this transition is compounded by self-generated problems of coherence, which are a function of the american ideological monocropping practices of the past 30 years or so. you naturalize and ideology and you make it as difficult as possible to adjust to fundamental problems. the only good thing about this is its timing--in the last scene of the last act of the bush administration--if it had happened earlier, i think the political consequences of it would be far more dramatic and far worse for the united states.

that said, i still find the recanting of market fundamentalism from greenspan remarkable and the apparent inability of the press to talk about it in a language that does not repeat the problem--that is a language which is stuck inside the same ideology that is the source of this crisis---kinda fascinating.

alongside this, the banking system seems to be getting encouraged to use the "bailout" money to consolidate the system as a whole. why this is a desirable outcome, i do not know. we are far from out of the woods. the future is not at all clear. whcih is another reason this is an interesting time.

tisonlyi · 10-23-2008, 03:26 PM

Greenspan made money incredibly cheap with low interest rates for an incredibly long time. It resulted in many bubbles, most notably the tech bubble which he pricked by raising rates in the run up to the 2000 elections.

The resulting downswing was averted not by 'the great American economic machine' but by even cheaper money. Cheap money, in a system which demands large, short term, perpetual profits, will exhaust every avenue for the creation of profit in the short term... even when the method of producing that profit rips apart the system's own foundations. The axe that chopped away the supports of the system was the 'structured investment vehicle' and it's like, which have been growing exponentially since the eighties.

Basically, incredibly cheap money, the leveraging effect it has through the fractional reserve system - creating vast amounts of debt - has been responsible for almost all the growth of the western world in the past 30-35 years. It's foundation has been built on sand. Less than sand... Imaginary sand for a dream-like system.

Cheap (low interest rate) money is a massive stimulus to money supply. Money supply is inflation, ratcheted up through leverage rates of up to 50 times... that's crazy. Old style inflation measures, applied to the current situation are, frankly, frightening... and the new measures mask an enormous relative wealth transfer to the wealthy and away from middle, lower and working classes over almost 2 generations.

Effectively, inflation kills the wealth of those who live in with cash, and increases the holdings of those who have wealth. Assets.

Now do you see why the FED stopped reporting M3 (measure of total money supply) figures in 2006? ...before the, well foreseen, crash in sub prime loans. Way before the oncoming alt-a apocalypse and the jumbo loan insanity to follow, then we move into CDS and derivatives, which are even bigger markets, even more heavily leveraged... Bernanke hit the decelerator (raising rates) way too late... and now we're through the looking glass.

But the dollar is strengthening!

The current strength of the dollar is due to hedge funds and others exiting the markets. They borrowed money denominated in dollars to invest in higher risk, higher return investments denominated in non-dollar currencies. The margin calls are now in for pretty much all of those investments. Yen also. Euro as well, to a lesser degree than the yen and dollar, but the values of other currencies are falling relative to the Euro...

This is why the markets are collapsing around the world - even before the terrible results that are now being released for q3 08 in the states.

The banks want the capital increased on their margin loans, or they simply want those loans ended. Hedge funds and other funds then need to liquidate their positions (dropping markets), buy dollars (hence recent upswing in the dollar) and pay off their debt.

Other investors have also stampeded to US treasuries as a temporary safe haven - but only the shortest of short term treasuries (not even the most idiotic investor can look past the inflation problems of the dollar economy). This is, barring a series of black swans in favour of the system, the last hurrah.

The financial system and following it the entire capitalist edifice, is gone. Not just laissez faire. Everything. Gone.

Like a headless chicken, it just doesn't realise it yet.

Greenspan's "I didn't know" routine is a flat out lie. The FED and FDIC have overseers looking over bank's inner accounts and reporting in secret, permanently. It's how FDIC knows when to intervene in a bank that's about to collapse.....

Greenspan knew what he was doing as he was doing it, at least to a large degree. Perhaps he didn't know that he was going to end the system, though.

My 0.02c(euro, held outside of a bank)
-----Added 23/10/2008 at 07 : 37 : 17-----

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

i think cowboy capitalism is already finished, but also that it's not yet obvious what the altered norm will look like. this transition is compounded by self-generated problems of coherence, which are a function of the american ideological monocropping practices of the past 30 years or so. you naturalize and ideology and you make it as difficult as possible to adjust to fundamental problems. the only good thing about this is its timing--in the last scene of the last act of the bush administration--if it had happened earlier, i think the political consequences of it would be far more dramatic and far worse for the united states.

that said, i still find the recanting of market fundamentalism from greenspan remarkable and the apparent inability of the press to talk about it in a language that does not repeat the problem--that is a language which is stuck inside the same ideology that is the source of this crisis---kinda fascinating.

alongside this, the banking system seems to be getting encouraged to use the "bailout" money to consolidate the system as a whole. why this is a desirable outcome, i do not know. we are far from out of the woods. the future is not at all clear. whcih is another reason this is an interesting time.

Isn't the dogma of the free market, capitalist tom foolery reminiscent of the cold war rhetoric of freedom and democracy versus the Evil Soviets Menace? (and the soviets suffered from it as well, to be fair)

The first generation, those who devised the myth, know it's a myth. The next generation are true believers. True believers are an order of magnitude more dangerous than those who know the myth to be a myth.

I'm thinking of Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon really knowing that the Soviets and assorted other 'reds' were nowhere near as great a threat as represented to the masses, but used the propaganda for their own ends. The neocons who followed them... well, they're true believers in both ends of that myth.

The more i see and read of them, the more I'm convinced... They are scheming, conniving, ruthless people with a noble goal. It's just that the noble goal is a fiction, as is/was its enemy.

I don't know if anyone else sees parallels with the free marketeers of the 70's and 80's, paired to the true believers now... I do. (possible minority of one)

The creators create a spectacle for others to live in and be controlled by, only to see their subsequent generations sucked into it, powerless.

smooth · 10-23-2008, 04:05 PM

I think this:

Quote:

Originally Posted by tisonlyi

Greenspan knew what he was doing as he was doing it, at least to a large degree. Perhaps he didn't know that he was going to end the system, though.

is linked to this:

Quote:

Mr. Greenspan said he had made a “mistake” in believing that banks in operating in their self-interest would be sufficient to protect their shareholders and the equity in their institutions.

It seems under this is the tacit acknowledgment that human greed and normal self-interest (making profit) is abrading against the common sense belief that reasonable people would never allow their own greed outstrip their long-term interest of remaining viable.

It's like the racoon who sticks his paw through the hole and grabs the shiny object. But he can't pull his clenched fist back out from the hole without dropping the object...but can't because he's must have the shiny object. Then the hunter comes...

tisonlyi · 10-23-2008, 04:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by smooth

I think this:

is linked to this:

It seems under this is the tacit acknowledgment that human greed and normal self-interest (making profit) is abrading against the common sense belief that reasonable people would never allow their own greed outstrip their long-term interest of remaining viable.

It's like the racoon who sticks his paw through the hole and grabs the shiny object. But he can't pull his clenched fist back out from the hole without dropping the object...but can't because he's must have the shiny object. Then the hunter comes...

I was talking not just about the credit crisis though, I was talking about the longer term removal of the only wealth-creating element of any society - those who produce something tangible - and their being decimated at the same time as the monetary system was being raped.

What the middle and lower classes could no longer use cash for, they were being pushed into crazed debts to buy. (Everyone has choices! yeah,go read a marketing book and listen to how brokers rip people off in the small and not-so-small print.)

He knew he was decimating the wealth of those who do not hold significant assets by creating massive inflation (the current 'core inflation' doesn't even include food, fuel or housing... err what's this currency supposed to be facilitating the barter and exchange of? anything important?). He knew about the massive increase in the total amount of debt in the economy up to 2000, he knew what would happen if he slashed interest rates in the early 00's - credit explosion - when really, a corrective paying down of the debt was needed in a protracted, painful recession.

He knew all of this as it was happening, because many economists were tearing out their hair over it - especially as the tax cuts were going through.

(One of them just got a Nobel prize, btw. Another has 2 Nobel prizes, btwbtw.)

He had his opportunity to 'give growth a chance' in the late nineties, and it had to be stopped. The hangover wasn't suffered, he simply went on a bigger, badder and longer bender to cure the pain.

He and his ideological ilk chose this path. He had the figures. He knew what he was doing.

It wasn't innocent.

Charlatan · 10-23-2008, 04:38 PM

I like that idea of the first generation uses the myth and the next generation buys into it... That certainly seems to be the case as far as I can see.

roachboy · 10-23-2008, 04:52 PM

the old marxist notion of ideology presupposed that there was a group of folk who stood outside it and pulled the strings. in the case of folk like greenspan, i think that the cadre who were pulling the strings operated inside the ideological shell, and worse than that in a context that was thoroughly dominated by that ideology such that dissonant information was sheared off. so it was possible to look at, say, statistical information about the social consequences of neoliberal-inspired action and not see them. of course, these same folk knew that the statistical image was constructed around the same kind of arguments that they themselves argued through--but the fit, it seems, was compelling.

at the same time, it is obvious that the logical conclusion of these arguments was: take everything you can get and get out because over the longer run we have no idea what is going to happen. maybe jesus will come. who knows? so get what you can and get out.

this follows from the claim that the bottom line motivation behind neoliberalism was risk reduction in response to radically heightened uncertainty. at the same time, the way neoliberalism was naturalized indicates that folk understood that this uncertainty could be managed. but it all operated inside an amazingly short-term way of thinking. a nihilistic short-term thinking.

i think greenspan et al knew what they were doing, and are directly responsible for the wreckage of the system that they enabled. but i don't think they operated from a remove--they, like alot of the assholes who raped the system for everything they could and got out, simply either took advantage of the risk-reduction dimension to the ideology, figuring more or less "après moi le deluge" or thought that the consequences of this idiot, dysfunctional ideology could be managed politically in a way that would mean that, functionally, they would not exist.

they were almost right about the latter--it is amazing the extent to which there is no real mass action across this. people are absent. they are watching tv. on the former, i think they are being hoisted by their own petard. it's hard not to laugh.

tisonlyi · 10-23-2008, 05:05 PM

The reasons that there's no action are that:

a - The effects on their own lives aren't clear and _pressing_ for the majority yet. (wait for more stories about letters of credit being refused and international trade ceasing up... that might get b) to act up a little...)

b - The media aren't reporting anything but the current crisis with some bland 'this might go on for some time' idea. They aren't showing people the long-term trends, the examples from history and where this is all headed.

c - *dons tinfoil hat* The media, the message and the people are being controlled to keep a lid on things as long as possible.

Japanification is the ABSOLUTE BEST CASE (for the system) to come out of this... In the US, with it's heady blend of militarism, self-interest, faith and absence of proper social support...

Japan's all-time NIKKEI high was ~39k in 1989. It's pushing to go below 8k atm. (Market prices are at best window dressing mostly.)
-----Added 23/10/2008 at 09 : 11 : 28-----
Oh, if memory serves, long-term trend for the DOW is about 7-8k.

(The numbers at the bottom of the depression are about 4k in real terms now, but the DOW revolves it's picks regularly, so any comparison is pretty, well... not useless exactly, but... next to it.)

EDIT FOR GRAPH PORN:

Remember the early nineties? Not good?

DataquickNODQ32008.jpg (image)

EDIT EDIT EDIT for Roubini Porn.

Video link on the right. or just search for roubini. Dr Doom (he's been predicting everything so far, pretty well)

10-23-2008, 02:58 PM	#5 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	i think cowboy capitalism is already finished, but also that it's not yet obvious what the altered norm will look like. this transition is compounded by self-generated problems of coherence, which are a function of the american ideological monocropping practices of the past 30 years or so. you naturalize and ideology and you make it as difficult as possible to adjust to fundamental problems. the only good thing about this is its timing--in the last scene of the last act of the bush administration--if it had happened earlier, i think the political consequences of it would be far more dramatic and far worse for the united states. that said, i still find the recanting of market fundamentalism from greenspan remarkable and the apparent inability of the press to talk about it in a language that does not repeat the problem--that is a language which is stuck inside the same ideology that is the source of this crisis---kinda fascinating. alongside this, the banking system seems to be getting encouraged to use the "bailout" money to consolidate the system as a whole. why this is a desirable outcome, i do not know. we are far from out of the woods. the future is not at all clear. whcih is another reason this is an interesting time. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

10-23-2008, 04:38 PM	#9 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	I like that idea of the first generation uses the myth and the next generation buys into it... That certainly seems to be the case as far as I can see. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

10-23-2008, 04:52 PM	#10 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	the old marxist notion of ideology presupposed that there was a group of folk who stood outside it and pulled the strings. in the case of folk like greenspan, i think that the cadre who were pulling the strings operated inside the ideological shell, and worse than that in a context that was thoroughly dominated by that ideology such that dissonant information was sheared off. so it was possible to look at, say, statistical information about the social consequences of neoliberal-inspired action and not see them. of course, these same folk knew that the statistical image was constructed around the same kind of arguments that they themselves argued through--but the fit, it seems, was compelling. at the same time, it is obvious that the logical conclusion of these arguments was: take everything you can get and get out because over the longer run we have no idea what is going to happen. maybe jesus will come. who knows? so get what you can and get out. this follows from the claim that the bottom line motivation behind neoliberalism was risk reduction in response to radically heightened uncertainty. at the same time, the way neoliberalism was naturalized indicates that folk understood that this uncertainty could be managed. but it all operated inside an amazingly short-term way of thinking. a nihilistic short-term thinking. i think greenspan et al knew what they were doing, and are directly responsible for the wreckage of the system that they enabled. but i don't think they operated from a remove--they, like alot of the assholes who raped the system for everything they could and got out, simply either took advantage of the risk-reduction dimension to the ideology, figuring more or less "après moi le deluge" or thought that the consequences of this idiot, dysfunctional ideology could be managed politically in a way that would mean that, functionally, they would not exist. they were almost right about the latter--it is amazing the extent to which there is no real mass action across this. people are absent. they are watching tv. on the former, i think they are being hoisted by their own petard. it's hard not to laugh. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

10-23-2008, 05:05 PM	#11 (permalink)
tisonlyi Nothing	The reasons that there's no action are that: a - The effects on their own lives aren't clear and _pressing_ for the majority yet. (wait for more stories about letters of credit being refused and international trade ceasing up... that might get b) to act up a little...) b - The media aren't reporting anything but the current crisis with some bland 'this might go on for some time' idea. They aren't showing people the long-term trends, the examples from history and where this is all headed. c - dons tinfoil hat The media, the message and the people are being controlled to keep a lid on things as long as possible. Japanification is the ABSOLUTE BEST CASE (for the system) to come out of this... In the US, with it's heady blend of militarism, self-interest, faith and absence of proper social support... Japan's all-time NIKKEI high was ~39k in 1989. It's pushing to go below 8k atm. (Market prices are at best window dressing mostly.) -----Added 23/10/2008 at 09 : 11 : 28----- Oh, if memory serves, long-term trend for the DOW is about 7-8k. (The numbers at the bottom of the depression are about 4k in real terms now, but the DOW revolves it's picks regularly, so any comparison is pretty, well... not useless exactly, but... next to it.) EDIT FOR GRAPH PORN: Remember the early nineties? Not good? DataquickNODQ32008.jpg (image) EDIT EDIT EDIT for Roubini Porn. Video link on the right. or just search for roubini. Dr Doom (he's been predicting everything so far, pretty well) __________________ "I do not agree that the dog in a manger has the final right to the manger even though he may have lain there for a very long time. I do not admit that right. I do not admit for instance, that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America or the black people of Australia. I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher-grade race, a more worldly wise race to put it that way, has come in and taken their place." - Winston Churchill, 1937 --{ORLY?}-- Last edited by tisonlyi; 10-23-2008 at 05:27 PM.. Reason: Automerged Doublepost

10-23-2008, 02:49 PM	#3 (permalink)
filtherton Junkie Location: In the land of ice and snow.	Welcome to the real world, Mr. Greenspan. Unbridled greed will always trump eventually rational self interest. Really, if ruining banks is profitable (and clearly it is), why should it be shocking that a culture which encourages profit above all else would eventually see something like this happen?

10-23-2008, 02:50 PM	#4 (permalink)
shakran Tone.	it always amazed me that the same people who violently decried communism were so wildly enthusiastic about greenspan's unregulated free market BS. They both have the same weak link: Human greed. Both are excellent systems on paper, but fail to take in to account the fact that there's always a group of greedy SOB's who want to get more than their share out of the system.