Rising gas prices are due to free market forces...

reply to post by poet1b


Protecting your rights is also your responsibility, as protecting my rights is mine. Nether any government nor any individual can develop a system which will prevent fraud. This is why we establish government, not in the hopeless belief that we can prevent fraud but in the sober realization that there are people who will commit fraud.

No free market advocate sells a "magical system" that would "prevent fraud", free market advocates are not that naive. Indeed, particularly because free market advocates understand this do they insist we limit the authority granted government in hopes to limit the amount of fraud that will take place. It is demonstrably so that big government is symbiotic with fraudulence, this is why in spite of the long standing anti-trust laws we have in place government regulators shoved "too big to fail" down the public's throat. Anti-trust laws were designed to "prevent" companies from becoming "too big to fail" to begin with. It was not the legislation that failed, it was the countless regulators and bureaucrats who let that happen.

Are you going to allow your disdain for free market principles - a market that doesn't even exist - prevent you from fighting for your liberty?

reply to post by mastahunta


The siphoning is a symptom and not the root cause. I decline to condemn becasue it limits the scope of the problem to a lesser evil.

The real problem is big government. Big government is always far away government when you want to talk to it.
Big government wants to manage everything and favors big buisness, because big buisness is easier to control. Fewer decision-makers are involved. Then after a while big buisness tell the goverment what to do because of its economic power.

Pretty good definition of Keynes. IQ college level

Keynes thought that a few highly qualified people at the top should make all of the decisions. That is totalitarian, but since it is economics rather than politics, most people don't notice. Also Keynes says debt doesn't matter as long as money is circulating, and inflation is a good thing.

Inflation has been screwing us about as much as the off shore siphonning, since all of that money they are taking is inflated money. Maybe inflation makes the siphoning look like petty theft.

The gains in the stock market and in the commodities markets are largely due to inflation. The dollar is worth less so the commodities are worth more dollars. Probably gasoline costs the same if you factor in inflation.

Speculation is a way for producers to get money to function. Artificial (central bank) credit gives the specific case of speculation you talk about all of its leverage and its unreal effect on prices.

Kinda long, might be my last post for awhile.

reply to post by poet1b


Fraud is a crime and will occur in any system.

The free market tends to keep organizations smaller because there is less credit and because buisness is consumer oriented rather than capital oriented.

Without credit, a business must sell its product immediately or go out of buisness. That means it must produce what the consumer wants. The consumers decide what is for sale and to some extent what it will cost. When companies fail thier resourses are rebuilt into other companies almost immediately -- no boom or bust in the economy. Prices go down over time due to increased productivity and money under a mattress increases in buying power year to year. Deflation in market basket products.

Our current system is driven by advertising (mind control). You buy what they want to make and credit lets them get away with that. There is a boom from the jobs funded by credit to companies. Credit, at some point, is not enough to support companies making products that people don't want and that is the reason for the buisness cycle and depression.

And that is if you think the Federal Reserve isn't pumping and dumping on purpose.

Originally posted by poet1b
reply to post by hawkiye

hawkiye - Actually up until the latter half of the 20th century our road system was largely created by free enterprise until the government got involved.

Sorry, but no, that is not true.

And where is your evidence that it is not true? It is common knowledge that most roads in the US up till the latter half of the 20th century were created by private free enterprise.

And the fed gov did not grant oil monopoly, the fed gov fought oil monopoly, see the history of Standard oil.

I am familiar with the history of standard oil ad their funding and creation of the Volstead act along with the suffrage movement to which was passed and effectively removed ethanol from the market place allowing them to corner the market on fuel under the guise of morality of drinking being evil. So Yes government effectively granted them a monopoly by passing the Volstead act and other legislation controlling and taxing the production of ethanol to the point of eliminating its ability to fairly compete in the market place and we are still suffering for because of it even thought the Volstead act has been repealed yet we still have plenty oft regulation on ethanol to keep it from competeting.

What we should switch to is electric/pneumatic hybrids for transportation, vehicles that would last a life time. We should also establish an infrastructure designed around efficiency, as our current system is designed for consumption.

And why is it that you think we haven't done that? Because of the government granted monopolies pure and simple! The Prius doesn't even get as good of mileage as a VW Jetta Diesel and the the Volt is a disaster what a joke! There is your government mandated fixes for you... Sigh! I thought you and I were actually getting somewhere last night but I see this is not the case my friend.

Please explain how the freedom to create any business one desires unencumbered by government intervention is fraudulent?

This has nothing to do with the statement I made. Your version of a free market does not exist in the U.S., and never has. The U.S. has always had a regulated market system, and this is established in the U.S. Constitution.

Please provide the evidence my friend. I have provided you evidence to the contrary and you said you were open to me pointing you to history proving my points so what happened have you changed your mind and decided not to check out where I have pointed you to? Also there is nothing on the US constitution regulating markets periods. Your should try reading it sometime instead of repeating false rhetoric you heard or read somewhere'

By supporting the politicians who claim to support this free market system, you support people who eliminate the laws and the law enforcement that prevents fraud, and so you support the expansion of fraud, whether of not you realize this.

Wait you said we do not have a free market system so how could i support something that does not exist? Now you just jumping on the dishonesty band wagon with the OP trying to falsely characterize me and the system as a free market when you admit it is not. I do not support any political who claim this system is a free market system because it is not a free market system and I know they are liars. How can I be promoting fraud when I insist on telling the truth about the system despite the false rhetoric. You and the OP on the other hand continue to call the system a free market and then use that to say free markets are evil while admitting to us you know it is not a free market system That is blatant dishonesty and promoting fraud.

Your link goes to an entire book. If there is proof of the existence of free markets in this book, then you need to tell me where in this book the evidence is provided.

Read the entire book you might learn something. Here is some relevant parts though.

"In reality, the unhampered free-market economy
will usually increase the supply of goods and services and
thereby bring about a gently falling price level, as happened in
most of the nineteenth century except during wartime."
A History of Money and Banking in the United States: pg 95

73Temin, Jacksonian Economy, passim. See also Hugh Rockoff, “Money,
Prices, and Banks in the Jacksonian Era,” in The Reinterpretation of
American Economic History, R. Fogel and S. Engerman, eds. (New York:
Harper and Row, 1971), pp. 448–58.

from the end of the Civil War until 1879.
Friedman and Schwartz estimated that prices in general fell
from 1869 to 1879 by 3.8 percent per annum... Prices will fall, and the consequences will be not depres-
sion or stagnation, but prosperity (since costs are falling, too)
economic growth, and the spread of the increased living standard.
p156

reply to post by poet1b

Sorry, but no it is not.

The stock market bubble was created by private corporations falsely rating bad loans as good loans, and selling these loans under fraudulent practices. The Fed Gov, nor the Fed Res forced these people to engage in fraud.

You either face this reality or choose to be deluded.

How in the world did you delude yourself enough to believe this? I'm not even going to pose another argument since I already addressed this issue with the videos that you obviously didn't watch a page or two back. The premise is very simple. The Federal Reserve controls monetary policy and values (inflation, interest rates, stock, and bond prices) through various ways. When an organization like the Fed forces low interest rates for example, they are not showing the true values within the society. A bubble forms because the true values are not reflected correctly and everyone thinks the values are higher than what they really are.

In the case of Fannie and Freddie / Bear Sterns (housing bubble) it was the billions upon billions of illusionary capital driven by the Fed that caused people to believe there was more value in housing than what was really present.

We have gotten way off track from oil but many of the principles are the same.

Originally posted by Semicollegiate
reply to post by mastahunta

 

The siphoning is a symptom and not the root cause. I decline to condemn becasue it limits the scope of the problem to a lesser evil.

I never said it was the root cause, but if you had cardiac arrest due to a bullet wound would that make
the stopped heart any less detremental? I don't understand why you are trying so hard to down play
the prices at the pump, they are outragious and they effect every nook and cranny of every good we
have to pay for. Why do you and Hawkiey and Jean Paul think paying artificially inflated prices is
our birth right? Don't you care for people at least as much as you care ideas, built on theory? Or
at least don't you have enough respect for your country to champion proactive stances on fraud?
I think you have let your ideas and love for those ideas could you judgement on many different
levels. I shouldn't have to remind you that ideas are just that, ideas.

The real problem is big government. Big government is always far away government when you want to talk to it.
Big government wants to manage everything and favors big buisness, because big buisness is easier to control. Fewer decision-makers are involved. Then after a while big buisness tell the goverment what to do because of its economic power.

The real problem is is that you take a simplistic view on everything. Big Government is one of
many different problems, it certainly is a big problem in some ways, but it is a force and as a
force it can be used to do good and bad.

Big government seems to favor big business because of politicians who say they are for
the Free Market favor them when there is a choice to act for the citizens or the oligarchy. Which is a real problem that exists within conservatism as a national institution. State after state has the line drawn
about ground water pollution for example, who always take the side of legalizing toxic chemical being
dump and disposed of in and around drinking water supplies?

Big Government favoring big Business is typically conservative politicians favoring big business
because they love the "free market". If you guys on this thread were politicians, it would be big
government favors big business because big government just doesn't even care enough to see if
there is fraud.

Big government, loving big business is because politicians are in love with the non interventionist,
free market ideas, which often times equate to PRO ACTIVE big business action on behalf of
supposed free marketeers.

Do I have to start posting senate votes here to prove my point?

And that is the ultimate irony Poet and I keep pointing out. Big government would be much less big business if free market advocates would stop entering into the government they hate in the first place.

Pretty good definition of Keynes. IQ college level

Keynes thought that a few highly qualified people at the top should make all of the decisions. That is totalitarian, but since it is economics rather than politics, most people don't notice. Also Keynes says debt doesn't matter as long as money is circulating, and inflation is a good thing.

In the same breath, conservatism believes that all the people on the top should makes all the decisions
by eliminating the potency of direct representation. Which is what the free market essentially does,

Oh, we cannot do anything to stop the billionaires from ripping you off because that would violate
free market principles.

So what that is also saying is, we the people are not allowed to use our government to challenge
the status quo. Which means that concentrated wealth and money become the true ruling force.
In that, you guys have ensured that a few people at the top make all the decisions.

Inflation has been screwing us about as much as the off shore siphonning, since all of that money they are taking is inflated money. Maybe inflation makes the siphoning look like petty theft.

Petty theft? It is the largest direct transfer of wealth in this nations history, it is shocking to
see what you guys will accept to justify and protect your ideology, you are making the
conscience decision to ignore a real problem because the solution goes against your beliefs,
not because the problem isn't real, valid or massive.

In any case, I appreciate your honesty here, I look forward to your response when you find time.

Originally posted by Semicollegiate
reply to post by poet1b

 

Fraud is a crime and will occur in any system.

So is murder, but I don't see you guys championing that (unless it effected a business's
bottom line maybe Do you see yourself making excuses though??? Can you imagine
if you were a Senator? You would be a BIG GOVERNMENT politician who favors
BIG BUSINESS. Be conscious of yourself and see that you do exactly what you
recognize Big Government doing.

The free market tends to keep organizations smaller because there is less credit and because buisness is consumer oriented rather than capital oriented.

I agree about small business, it is a different beast in many ways, I think the market force do
apply to many small businesses.

Without credit, a business must sell its product immediately or go out of buisness. That means it must produce what the consumer wants. The consumers decide what is for sale and to some extent what it will cost. When companies fail thier resourses are rebuilt into other companies almost immediately -- no boom or bust in the economy. Prices go down over time due to increased productivity and money under a mattress increases in buying power year to year. Deflation in market basket products.

Our current system is driven by advertising (mind control). You buy what they want to make and credit lets them get away with that. There is a boom from the jobs funded by credit to companies. Credit, at some point, is not enough to support companies making products that people don't want and that is the reason for the buisness cycle and depression.

And that is if you think the Federal Reserve isn't pumping and dumping on purpose.

edit on 27-2-2012 by Semicollegiate because: (no reason given)

I can't say I disagree with your observations here except for business cycles, I think there are
many factors at work there.

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux

Protecting your rights is also your responsibility, as protecting my rights is mine. Nether any government nor any individual can develop a system which will prevent fraud. This is why we establish government, not in the hopeless belief that we can prevent fraud but in the sober realization that there are people who will commit fraud.

The same is true of all crime. If you look at what makes our government so big, it is not the regulatory arms, but the military.

It was not the legislation that failed, it was the countless regulators and bureaucrats who let that happen.

No, it was politicians like Reagan, Bush, and Bush who preached about free markets, and then once in power turned a blind eye towards business corruption.

Originally posted by Bugman82

We have gotten way off track from oil but many of the principles are the same.

edit on 27-2-2012 by Bugman82 because: (no reason given)

yes they are...

People who hold business in the highest regards let their found feelings paint the thought process,
which motivates them to support free market principles even when they agree that there isn't a
free market in place, which ultimately translates into Big Business advocation and
protection. Then they impede any and all efforts to stop or prevent fraudulent business activities
because they believe in free markets. So they become the agitator and the defender when
that agitation is trying to be remedied.

Read that again, you are so far in your own skin, you can not see yourself as you really are as
an expression of your ideas.

Again to all of you, if you do not believe Oil is a free market then why are you so against addressing
fraud that is real? You can't damage a free market that isn't free in the first place. In fact, addressing
fraud where ever it exists would strengthen the free market argument. Otherwise the best the free market
will ever be is fraudulent, as good as its weakest link.

reply to post by Semicollegiate

The real problem is big government.

No, electing politicians who preach free market economics, and instead creates a system that encourages fraud.

Stop supporting politicians who turn all the power over to bankers.

Originally posted by poet1b

It was not the legislation that failed, it was the countless regulators and bureaucrats who let that happen.

No, it was politicians like Reagan, Bush, and Bush who preached about free markets, and then once in power turned a blind eye towards business corruption.

And I think it is because of the adoration for free market ideas, how can you regulate anything
if you do not believe in regulation? Which then looks a lot like collusion, doesn't it?

reply to post by hawkiye


Where is your proof that our road system was created by free enterprise. You make the claim, you should have to find the evidence.

The evidence that your claim is wrong is easy to find.

inventors.about.com...

The creation of the Standard Oil monopoly was not an act of the U.S. government, it was a result of the actions of the people who owned and controlled Standard, and intentionally built it as a monopoly, fighting all attempt of the fed gov to prevent it from happening.

The other factor you ignore is that the automobile became the dominant transportation system because it is what most people wanted. Oil was plentiful, gas was cheap, and driving big cars is lots of fun. Now that the oil is running out, we are trapped in a system that is extremely inefficient, because that created the best short term processes for big business. Doesn't change the reality that big oil is heavily subsidized by the fed gov, and that free enterprise can indeed go astray.

I have yet to see you provide any evidence that the U.S. was ever a free market economy. Your link does not prove this.

The U.S. Constitution clearly established the role of the fed in regulating interstate commerce, and conducting trade treaties with foreign nations. The famous cow catcher on old style trains is in fact a result of a regulation. The history of the regulation of commerce/markets in the U.S. is easy to find.

From you quotes in the book, good points, and I am a fan of Jackson. The bigger problem we face in this modern era is not a shortage of supply, although we are facing a serious shortage of oil with our current system in place. Mainly we have a surplus of goods and service, and a shortage of demand, because instead of spreading the wealth, increased wages and salaries for increased production, we have witnessed the amassing and concentration of wealth, into an unsustainable system, primarily through fraudulent business practices.

Wow, dejavu.

The important thing, is keep this statement of your in mind.

I do not support any political who claim this system is a free market system because it is not a free market system and I know they are liars.

Stop supporting politicians whose real goal is not the creation of a free market as you envision it to be, but whose real goal is to turn all power over to the bankers.

reply to post by Bugman82


It is called reality.

How are you not aware at this time of the false rating of mortgage loans and fraudulent bundling practice that kept the whole con going? Google "mortgage false rated loans" and you will find tons of information how this fraud was carried out.

Educate theyself.

reply to post by mastahunta


I think a lot of very intelligent people were taken in by a very intelligent con.

And it is extremely hard to admit that something one believed in very strongly, is just not feasible.

Originally posted by poet1b
reply to post by mastahunta

 

I think a lot of very intelligent people were taken in by a very intelligent con.

And it is extremely hard to admit that something one believed in very strongly, is just not feasible.

I know, which is why I think we have heard a fairly long list of excuses and distractions
thus far. From, stop driving a car to refine your own gas...

How about stopping fraud? THAT IS UNREASONABLE

I plan on chipping away at this nut more and more, I hope you will join me

reply to post by poet1b


If politicians lying is the problem, then take the politicians out of the power structure. Smaller government means less people in control of your life.

Originally posted by mastahunta

Originally posted by poet1b
reply to post by mastahunta

 

I think a lot of very intelligent people were taken in by a very intelligent con.

And it is extremely hard to admit that something one believed in very strongly, is just not feasible.

I know, which is why I think we have heard a fairly long list of excuses and distractions
thus far. From, stop driving a car to refine your own gas...

How about stopping fraud?

THAT IS UNREASONABLE

I plan on chipping away at this nut more and more, I hope you will join me

edit on 27-2-2012 by mastahunta because: (no reason given)

You go on and on about stopping fraud.. how are you going to do that by yourself? And let's be realistic here, friend. You are alone.

How is "Not driving" an excuse or a distraction?

How is your whining about being cheated more beneficial than not giving ANY MONEY to those that cheat?

Oh, I see.. you LOVE your gasoline and want as much of it as you can get for as little as you can get it for! Guess what, chum? Petrochemicals are a finite resource. We are running out. They will -never- be as cheap as they once were because every second of the day there are less of them than there were the day before.

Originally posted by Furbs

Originally posted by mastahunta

Originally posted by poet1b
reply to post by mastahunta

 

I think a lot of very intelligent people were taken in by a very intelligent con.

And it is extremely hard to admit that something one believed in very strongly, is just not feasible.

I know, which is why I think we have heard a fairly long list of excuses and distractions
thus far. From, stop driving a car to refine your own gas...

How about stopping fraud?

THAT IS UNREASONABLE

I plan on chipping away at this nut more and more, I hope you will join me

edit on 27-2-2012 by mastahunta because: (no reason given)

You go on and on about stopping fraud.. how are you going to do that by yourself? And let's be realistic here, friend. You are alone.

How is "Not driving" an excuse or a distraction?

How is your whining about being cheated more beneficial than not giving ANY MONEY to those that cheat?

Oh, I see.. you LOVE your gasoline and want as much of it as you can get for as little as you can get it for! Guess what, chum? Petrochemicals are a finite resource. We are running out. They will -never- be as cheap as they once were because every second of the day there are less of them than there were the day before.

They certainly won't be as cheap because people like the lot of you wont even consider
investigating fraud that is severely hindering this economy. You fail to admit that this economy
is not just me or you, high gas prices make their way in to every single retail item. I am not asking
for free gas, I am asking for abuse to stop.

reply to post by Semicollegiate


It is the corporate politicians, CEOs, CFOs and such who are the biggest liars.

Taking these corporate execs out of power would be the best thing for liberty of the people, and cutting government is not going to do that.

reply to post by Furbs


Actually the Obama admn is conducting a large number of fraud cases, more than has been conducted in a long time, and convicting people for crimes.

They have succeeded in cleaning up Wall street corruption in the past, and they will do it again.

You should decide which side you are going to on, the Banking Crooks or the elected officials putting in the effort to bring those crooks to justice.