Michael Moore's new thought provoking film : Capitalism: (Not So Much Of) A Love Story
(Above video clips supplied by Overture Films)
I went to see a preview of Michael Moore's new film: Capitalism, A Love Story at the Bruin Theater in Westwood last week with Howie and Digby and it was a very fun night.
Moore has an incredible sense of humor and it always translates well into his movies and Capitalism is no different. He makes you laugh throughout his new project with images of the Roman Empire to satirical caricatures of Bush and AIG, but then he can also make you cry a second later, which makes his movies all the more powerful. When you see people holding camcorders while the eviction police are breaking down their doors to remove them your heart cries out.
We know that Wall Street and the mortgage industry pulled a monster con game on Americans and the result was that hard-working families lost their most prized position and that is the message at the heart of his movie. What good is "Capitalism" if it can't fill the basic needs of our people? How has it served America? Not how has it served the top 1% wealthy population, but the remaining 99% of the country that is driven by the messaging that you too can become rich and famous if you just work hard enough.
Ahhh, The American Dream.
What Moore believes is that capitalism is an absolute failure and is actually evil because at its heart, it's missing a moral core. The core comes back to the American worker. Does capitalism translate into the kind of America his father was part of while he grew up in Michigan? A place where a person could work hard, earn enough to raise the family and then retire with a pension? To Moore, the answer proves it has been a failure. He doesn't say he wants socialism to take hold, but I thought he was arguing for a sort of Constitutional Capitalism since he liked Capitalism back in the days when he father was able to prosper working at one company his entire life. Corporations should have to take care of their employees just like they do their profits. An equal partnership, so to speak. Is it possible? Moore thinks the system has become too corrupted, too evil to succeed in delivering the promise of a good life for the vast majority of the country.
Corporations are beholden to their stock holders and must maximize profits at all costs, regardless of how that affects their workers. So, even if GM records a huge profit for a particular year, they could then cut thousands of workers from the company the following year just to increase profits. Destroying cities and people's lives in the process don't factor in even when there has been no financial shortfall for them. To Moore that is the real evil and the way he sees it, it may be too late to fix.
He attacks Wall Street and Congress and all the players you think he would over the bailouts and then he asks the viewer to come up with a solution to the problem as he sees it.
Can America survive without Capitalism? Where do we go from here? There is much to see in this new flick and much to like. The one thing that he does is also give his audience plenty to think about.
Much like Jon Stewart and Steve Colbert, Moore can poke fun at the hypocracy in the world, but also shows just how sickening it is. This is what makes these guys so enjoyable to watch.
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Terms of Service? Shall own?
Corporates have invaded every nook and cranny of your life. Want a loan? Pay the bailed out bankers for your credit score first, once enslaved, pay for the pirate hats next. George Bush insured that every move you make is recorded and stored in the Great Rapeublican vault!
Patriots? Legal thieves! Moore didn't even come close to the mark. It is worse, much worse!
This movie looks very interesting indeed. I can't wait to see it.
Moore's interview with Wolfie Blitzer the other day was teh awesome:
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/the-awkward-michae...
Attaboy, Michael!
Hell yeah we could do better. Where the fuck is capitalism mentioned in the constitution? Call me conservative but, I go along with Washington,Jefferson, Adams, etc.
Can this country survive without Capitalism?
Marx was perfectly correct in his analysis of the venality of Capitalism.
He fell short in his prescriptions.
He also knew nothing about peak ecology, peak energy, peak everything.
Capitalism is predicated on endless growth, the same predicate of the cancer cell.
It sees no value outside of profit. Everything outside of profit is called an 'externality'.
Our economy, which is invented, is often described as a pie. This pie will not only not grow without end, it is going to shrink dramatically.
Five to ten years and the system will collapse.
At some point everything we do will determined by the externalities we have previously ignored.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
5 or 10 years? Can it collapse sooner?
I need it to collapse sooner because I already collapsed a couple years ago.
that his cure was worse than the disease.
Hasa Diga Eebowai
.
Who else?
Hasa Diga Eebowai
... who did not really propose a cure, but rather described what a possible social/economic evolution would look like if we were to take capitalism as the starting point.
I just love how Karl Marx gets vilified (even ever so subtly, Alice...) whenever his name comes up in connection with the 'failure' of capitalism! Marx was an amazing philosopher, among the first to undertake a full analysis of humanity's economic behaviors!
In light of current events (we are witnessing the death throes of capitalism), I might assert that Marx was prescient. In reality, he was quite thorough (pedantic?) in his meta-analysis.
If Marx had not been so spot-on, capitalists would not work so very hard to denigrate his work. His rather challenging tomes would have faded into relative obscurity long ago, right after their initial printing.
We--all of us--would do well to read and understand Marx. Or, at the very least, we--all of us--should devote sufficient time and energy to understanding our own economic behaviors.
Why? Because we, collectively, are going to have to fix this mess that we, collectively, have created...
I won't forgive the smear job he did on Senator Chris Dodd in his movie. His slanted and vicious character assassination of this fine man is unforgivable.
Are you serious? Do you work for AIG or Counrywide?
over here from RedState? We don't take to ignorance here in the Blue country.
Michael Moore Told to 'Cool It' on Senator Dodd
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sh0cBFZ1FXY
KEEP TELLIN THE TRUTH!
Hmmm, I wonder who phoned Moore. Thanks for the clip, lg!
must be new.
A guy with like 10 posts total feeling confident enough to invoke the royal "we." LOL.
a mouse in his pants! :>)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YssMT0qXYOw
...FYI, I'll be supporting Dodd. More positives then negatives. Joe Lie-berman...Nope!
Study the symptoms not the virus...
Tom... Those we idolize are very likely strolling about on crumbly feet of clay.
Nowhere in the US Constitution does it say that our economy should be a capitalist economy, let alone a corporate capitalist economy.
In fact a Democratic Socialist model would better serve the principle of democracy: our economy should work for the benefit of people.
Nowhere in our Constitution does it say the people should work for the benefit of the corporate capitalists.
A Corporate Capitalist Economy Is UnAmerican Because It Is UnDemocratic
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
"Can America survive without Capitalism?"
Don't you mean, "Will America survive WITH Capitalism?" IMO, the hope for the future lies in collectively-owned (vs. publicly or privately owned) property, resources, and the means of production. We need the steering wheel out of the hands of big government AND big business, and into the hands of the people. One major step in this direction is the idea that workers can own and operate businesses themselves without any top-down coercion from an owner who lives thousands of miles away. I hear that Michael Moore briefly covers worker-owned businesses in his new movie, and this is the primary reason why I'm excited to see this film. If only he were a more ardent supporter of libertarian socialism...
but wasn't this tried a few times with disastrous consequences. Personally I prefer the Social Democratic model which includes, of course, regulated capitalism.
Hasa Diga Eebowai
Noam Chomsky here
Consider libertarian socialism, the antithesis of 'State Socialism' or as I call it Crony Socialism.
Our system is Crony Capitalism.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
with Chomsky's historical perspective. But I think what happened in the Soviet Union was inevitable and there has never been a functioning state to provide a counter example that did not completely subordinate individual rights to the collective. That's what I would call hell. I'm pretty confidant my big mouth would land me in a prison in any such country. Libertarian socialism has it's practical examples too. Notably in Africa where it's real face, tribalism has had such disastrous consequences.
Hasa Diga Eebowai
Tribalism has existed everywhere. I hardly equate that with libertarian socialism, the point being with the latter that there must be justification for authority, from the word justice.
The anarchists of Spain were functioning with individual rights. So much so that they were not prepared to fight in time to withstand Franco.
Human societies are complex and do not reduce themselves to simplistic renderings.
What is perfectly apparent to me now is that for the last thirty years we have an enormous transfer of wealth from those that don't have much, to those that already have a great deal.
This needs to be addressed, very soon.
Meanwhile there seems to be no push to repeal Bush's obscene and unfunded tax cuts for the wealthy, despite campaign promises to contrary.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
"It was generally agreed that Communism was the most perfect form of government; unfortunately it had been demonstrated - at the cost of some hundreds of millions of lives - that it was only applicable to social insects, Robots Class II, and similarly restricted categories. For imperfect human beings, the least-worst answer was Democracy, frequently defined as 'individual greed, moderated by an efficient but not too zealous government.'"
Arthur C. Clarke
3001: The Final Odyssey
While I have appreciated some of Arthur C. Clarkes' work, I don't look to him for social critique per se.
We have had one hundred years of Corporate propaganda screaming at every turn that any social thinking was evil.
Read the Chomsky article here
Consider these clips from the work of the late (d 1988) Australian sociologist Alex Carey
The first and so far only scientifically drawn study of the history of the corporate war on democracy.
CORPORATIONS AND PROPAGANDA
The Attack on Democracy
Part 1 - history through WWII
Part 2 - history after WWII
Mariah Gilardian at TUC radio (user supported) here, produced the clips, there are other interesting works at her site.
Consider Orwell rolls in his grave here
Download here
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
Michael Parenti on terrorism, globalization and conspiracy.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/arti...
capitalism's self-inflicted apocalypse
http://www.michaelparenti.org/capitalism%20ap...
Audio
http://www.archive.org/details/RaisingSandRad...
Thank you, I follow Parenti, another vital voice.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
I think what we need guys is a government that takes care of it's citizens. we need universal health care and pensions. business should be heavily regulated where it's used as a tool for the betterment of the society as a whole. i don't think employers should necessarily "take care" of their employees. but if we had strong worker/citizen rights, then employers would have no choice but to coddle to employees. employees with government guarantees of health and welfare would be truly free to be productive and we wouldn't have everybody scheming against each other to gather every scrap of wealth.
Like star trek. your basic needs are taken care of. if you want to be a musician because that's what your "god" given talent is, then you go do that and try to be the best musician with the idea that your great talent will someday give back and reward the society.
we have 300 million little kings fighting wars everyday in our country for limited resources and some sort of invisible power struggle.
I've always thought about that one commandment we have, "thou shalt not covet thy neighbors wife/goods". that's my favorite. that is capitalism. i covet what the wall street guys have and i am fed this BS line that "if i work hard and play my cards right, I can be just as successful as them". so if a law comes up that some wall street guy says is bad news, then i am supposed to agree with him because if he can't make 100 million this year, when my turn comes around, i won't get to make 100 million either, and that's not America. that's the lie.
Um, the moral core is supposed to be supplied elsewhere --- family, church, TV, President Obama, I dunno, but capitalism is just a vehicle, a machine that produces stuff. The evils stem from the folks running the machine. I'm sure you can think of "isms" that were founded on a core morality yet were perverted to do great evil --- certain religious institutions come to my mind, but of course you may think of communism, National Socialism, or ... ?
Capitalism, like a Buick, needs no moral core. The idea is virtually meaningless. What it needs is a responsible driver. Of course, given THAT, just about any "ism" could be trusted to deliver us to our destination.
like the woman who drank too much water on the dare of a DJ and died. Unregulated capitalism is one of the worst thing I can think of for the future of the world.
I just want to say Michael Moore is FAT. And my encephalus head is killing me. Other than that I got nothin. Oh yeah and David Letterman couldn't carry Sarah Palin's jock. And my head is killing me.
is a way to ferret out all the greedy, war-loving, sociopathic, bastards at birth!
Then, maybe we'd be able to find a way to make a governmental system run by humans work in the interests of all.
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
Well - it's a start ~~
What we have now isn't capitalism.
The film is MARVELOUS -- go see it. Unless you're easily upset OR if you're happy being screwed by these people.
*
Chapter 2
44 And all that believed were together, and had all things in common; 45 And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need.
Jesus: "No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love
the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God
and Money”. (Matthew 6:24)
How richly ironic that the virulently vocal supporters of the vile Corporate Megalomaniacs who now own virtually every valuable resource on this planet self-identify as Christians!
it left me with so many emotions. Perhaps my strongest emotion is one of frustration that we cannot get a movement in this country to protest and raise hell about the pigs at the trough.
Representative Marcy Kaptur received a huge round of applause as well as Kucinich when they were featured in the documentary. These have always been two of my favorite representatives because they speak out for the people not the corporate whores on Wall Street.
This video was not in the documentary thought I would include Kaptur in action.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iUcr0eHbzNs&fe...
Privatizing profits for the top 1% and socializing losses onto the American taxpayers - United Banks of American Peasants is alive and well.
Michael Moore's latest documentary "Capitalism: A Love Story", has run into trouble in attempts to give out free tickets to Unions.
The American Federation of Teachers has turned them down because Moore didn't hire any members of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees. "Michael Moore and one of our sister unions, IATSE, are in discussions about concerns the union has," the AFT told ABC News. "The AFT has decided against accepting tickets until those issues are resolved."
If the AFT (one union not representative of all unions) is going to attack Moore on something like this, then it says alot more about the people running this union than it does of Moore. Moore is a strong supporter of unions as unions have proven to be one of the few things that turns back the tide of corporate raiders taking advantage of the working class.
So the AFT expects Moore to hire their sister unions people while abandoning the people of the unions he is an active member of? (the Writers Guild, the Screen Actors Guild and the Directors Guild)
The unions don't have a chance in hell of changing things on a national level if they continue to fight over petty things such as this.
Vanguy - I question the sincerity of your post and view it as an attempt to stir up shit.
Capitalism is the best system for producing wealth when it is regulated. FDR had a model in place that worked pretty damn well for 60 years, until DLC-Clinton (a new democrat = republican lite) and the repukes dismantled it.
Now we have had to re-learn the lessons our parents and grandparents learned 80 years ago.
Change will be even more difficult this time, because the corporate fascists have a huge 24/7 propaganda monopoly brainwashing the stupid and ignorant to work for their own destruction. Did you see the teabagger morons on the Stewart show? The corporate fascists know there are millions of people this stupid in america, and they use them to screw the rest of us.
Rush Limbaugh is what a smart person thinks a stupid bigot sounds like.
This so called American Dream is the best CON job on the "American People" the banks and rich set up 50 years ago. This home loan scam in NOT the American Drean for the working to EVER get a home. Yes, you buy your home, you get a loan for 30 years. Has any one ever look at this "good interest rate". ths is the most fucked up loan any one gets. the god damn interest you end up paying is more than what you bought the house for. American Dream, all bullshit. It's a bankers dream, and the people in congress makes sure it stays that way. The banks pay them to keep good money (yours and mone) to make sure this system never changes. Last year MY mortgage (citi) sent me a NEW increase in my house payment. It jumped $500. They said I did not have enouph money to pay my taxs. Did they call me befor the just jumped my house payment, NO, did they try to work out a plan,NO, they just said this is your new house payment. You see, your "house" payment will stay the same. Your escrow can go up for ever. they can demand you pay whwt ever they want in your escrow. You can call them and try to work out a lower payment, good luck. I did make good on my "New House Payment" I bet this pissed them off. I do think they were trying to get me behind on my house so they could take it back. With me making extra payments and the down we put down, my home is worth more than the loan. Thisk I am just thinkinf nuts. I got another letter the other day. guess what, there now saying I am $1350 behind in my Escrow again. this is for my home insurance. Yes I did change insurance. How much did my insurance go up from the old insurance $90.00. So when I called them and ask just how can I be $1350 behind, they said they did an escrow balance check and this will be $1350 behind by May of 2010. I asked HOW. they said because they said so. WTF. What a bunch of shit. Last year I payed over $10,000 in interest to these assholes and only $2,300 off my loan, and now they want more. Yep, this is the American dream.
You have to be asleep to believe it.
comatose...
Or a card-carrying member of the Angry Group (nee Teh Stoopid) Sheeple who're now the nation's walking nightmare...
Utopias and reality, this only applies to imperfect people, all perfect people should stop reading here and save their time. This all sounds like greed/selfishness and I thought to myself... is this natural? I remembered hearing something about a Selfish Gene, so I entered it into a search and it brought up Richard Dawkins.
I've yet to look for a statistical chart that reflects the information of when we went from say the top 30% having more then the remaining 70% or top 80% having more then the remaining 20% to the point we're at now, allegedly where the top 1% to 5% have as much if not more, then the remaining 95% to 99% accordingly. I've seen charts displaying the falling value of our dollar over time, but who acquired that $$$ and or value over that time would be interesting. Until then, I'll just have my vague theories and because money makes the world go round, it's only logical to start looking at the money makers.
This capitalism crap often makes me think of the game of monopoly, keep your eye on the banker and the person with the most money, because they're both in a good position to win the game albeit sometimes there is collusion along the way.
Richard Dawkins Profile by BBC Part 1 of 3
[ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9DC09lDye4 ](9:00)
Richard Dawkins Profile by BBC Part 2 of 3
[ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VC-3e8BUyHw&fe... ](7:34)
Richard Dawkins Profile by BBC Part 3 of 3
[ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7slOLyn4kn8&fe... ](7:12)
I'm looking forward to seeing Michael Moore's new film, as far as that Crooked PA judge thing... it was posted on here some time ago in an open nightly thread, I believe?
Audit the Federal Reserve and see where that leads... I can only imagine? :) Thanks John √
Study the symptoms not the virus...
Good share with the Dawkins links, could be something to his selfish gene theory and the rampant greed threatening to bring us all down. Read the God Delusion too, great stuff.
do you remember how many had their wee panties in a twist over The God Delusion?
Throughout history, our species has denigrated intelligence, or destroyed those whose unusual intellects were deemed threatening in any way.
So, why are we even remotely surprised at where we find ourselves at present?
... is quite simple.
Capitalism only works when everyone has some capital.
When 1% has capital, and 99% work for the 1%, that's not capitalism.
It's feudalism.
It's clear to see that the capitalism that exists today is sick and needs repair at the very least. The role of the financial industry is to allocate capital, but what happens when all the capital (financial and human) is tied up in the financial industry? I hope enough people get out and see the film before they are convinced by the screaming right that Michael Moore is a commie that wants to destroy the country.
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