(Part 2) Top products from r/occupywallstreet

The Secret Service is no longer a part of the Treasury and is now run under Homeland Security.

I read In the President's Secret Service, a book that takes a look at the birth of the USSS to the modern USSS under Homeland Security and agents that were interviewed and the author all reach the same conclusion - putting the USSS under HS was a huge mistake. The USSS is also still very old fashioned and has not modernized its personnel management in the same way the FBI has, leaving the USSS with a huge attrition rate. USSS agents are extremely valuable because of their training and other agencies and private companies snatch them up whenever they can, making this attrition rate even higher since there is little incentive provided to agents to stay in the Service.

Give the book a read - it's very well written and very interesting. I had a flight from the US to Europe and finished pretty much the entire book while flying over the Atlantic since I couldn't put it down.

I've got to be honest, though I agree entirely with the theory presented in my previous post, I wasn't actually stating my own speculative opinion, I was (accurately) parroting the empirically based works of Chang. I think that if you read his book [Kicking Away The Ladder] (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Kicking-Away-Ladder-Institutions-Globalization/dp/1843310279), or for a more accessible work [Bad Samaritans] (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bad-Samaritans-Secrets-Nations-Prosperity/dp/1905211376) you would be hard pressed to disagree with his account of economic history.

Indeed, almost all predominant advocates of free trade begrudgingly accept Chang's view, but counter that such policies are no longer possible nowadays, given how globalized and intertwined the various national economies are. For an example of this kind of argument see Martin Wolf's [Why Globalization Works] (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Globalization-Works-Yale-Nota-Bene/dp/0300107773).

I didn't really want to challenge your various retorts of my previous comment, because as I stated it's not my argument. But I would like to say that I think it is fair to describe your depiction of South Korea as inaccurate. Whilst true that Korea produce goods that are exported to other developed countries, this is no bad thing - all developed countries trade between each other, as it has been shown to be the most efficient way to produce things. Also, you imply that Korea has a particularly unequal society, but a cursory look at the national [gini-coefficient rankings] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_equality), which ranks countries by income equality, shows that Korea has a more equal society than Canada, France, Belgium, the UK, Ireland, Spain, Italy, New Zealand, and a significantly greater level of equality than the United States.

> It's quite possible for societies to exist and thrive without legal tender.

BTW, We had free-money banking in the US where banks issued their own notes. You know what happened when a bank went under? Often some notes would be declared preferred or prime and would pay out at or near face value. Others would pay at pennies on the dollar. And the bank owners would make this discussion, without disclosure, on their own. This is detailed in A Nation of Counterfeiters if you care to look.

If you think banks have less power in systems without legal tender laws, I'm really curious why.

Heh. You might like my review of A First-Rate Madness: Uncovering the Links Between Leadership and Mental Illness [http://www.amazon.com/exec/.obidos.ASIN/1594202958/ossnet-20]. A favorable treatment of me is in No More Secrets: Open Source Information and the Reshaping of U.S. Intelligence [http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0313391556/ossnet-20. I hope you're opinion of my effort improves over time.

>I was earning my Econ. degree during the supply side "revolution".

You may find this interesting. The guy who developed Reaganomics (Bruce Bartlett) has recently written a book called:

"The New American Economy: The Failure of Reaganomics and A New Way Forward - I highly recommend reading that book!

To me, not many people have the intellectual honesty to go "Yeah, this policy that we implemented 30+ years ago - well that was a bad idea". And the fact that the guy who created Reaganomics is saying this has some weight in my perspective.

Thanks for your thoughts. Please read this.

Be sure to read Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States."

Another great one is Down and Out in London and Paris by George Orwell. Its really a gripping story of just what is is like for those who live in poverty on a day to day basis.

This article needs to back up its sources. Or we should just read the book http://www.amazon.com/National-Security-Government-Michael-Glennon/dp/0190206446 and scrutinize these details.

Otherwise please don't succumb to hyperbolic language and sites

Hi De,

Sorry, I'm not positive I understand why the answer was unsatisfactory to you.

They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.

Who is they?

There are the voice of corporate money -- finance in particular -- which has overwhelmed the power of people's votes. See Food inc, Omnivore Dilema, In Defence of Food, Supersize Me.

One theme that recurs through out these four works on the politics of food is that the will of the people gets overruled by corporate money once it gets to Washington. That money, in turn, is required to be this amoral by the atmosphere in Wall St.

---
It's possible that you are asking for a simple answer to a complicated question. I can understand that, to someone who hasn't invested a fair amount of effort educating themselves on the issue, the one-liners used in the manifesto might seem trite. But they refer to very specific organizational behaviors that are well documented.

I'm happy to continue the conversation, though at one point you will have to read a long-form book or watch a documentary or two, in order to understand the conversation on the ground at Liberty Square.

https://smile.amazon.com/Capital-Twenty-First-Century-Thomas-Piketty/dp/0674979850/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1519230254&sr=8-1&keywords=pikkety

You asked to see anarchism. This is a landmass in Southeast Asia (the size of Europe) whose peoples have been fleeing the state for thousands of years.

Here's the book

this book i think:

http://www.amazon.com/Best-Way-Rob-Bank-Own/dp/0292706383

the author has been a guest on his show

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wealth_of_Nations

Or read this book

http://www.amazon.com/Antitrust-Law-Second-Richard-Posner/dp/0226675769

The only resource you really need.

> This is ironic, because, to my understanding, Nietsche probably would have scorned Hitler and the Nazis (if only he were consciously able to do so).

http://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Are-Not-Nietzscheans/dp/0226244814

Well aware of that. But the trend is a LOT older than you think. Read this:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Bill-Rights-Creation-Reconstruction/dp/0300082770

...and for best results this too:

http://www.amazon.com/Day-Freedom-Died-Massacre-Reconstruction/dp/0805089225/ref=sr_1_1?s=books

What you'll find is there was an entire civil rights movement from 1865-1876 led by a white Ohio congressman name of John Bingham, who tried to make sure the newly freed slaves were armed against the early Klan.

He was the primary author of the 14th Amendment, which didn't become all that useful as a civil rights tool until 1954 and still isn't up to it's full potential.

In fact, there was an attempt to restore it to full effect in the summer of 2010, in the McDonald v. Chicago case. It was a three-way fight:

• In this corner, the city of Chicago which was saying "guns 'r bad, mkay?" and was scheduled to get steamrollered. They did.
  
  
• In the next corner, lawyers with a Libertarian streak formerly associated with the Cato institute and backed by a smaller breakaway faction from the NRA, the Second Amendment Foundation in the Seattle area. They were pushing for "full incorporation of the Bill Of Rights" as limits on the states, which would have been a very good and direct path to gay marriage. Seriously.
  
  
• In the final corner, the NRA arguing that the 2nd Amendment should be "selectively incorporated" as a limit on state power, but nothing else should be "incorporated" at the same time, thus cock-blocking gay marriage on behalf of, guess who? The GOP's conservative "Christian" wing.
  
  And the NRA won.
  
  Fuck.
  
  If you want to know what the hell I'm talking about, read Amar's book, first link above.

http://www.amazon.com/Benevolent-Assimilation-American-Philippines-1899-1903/dp/0300030819
I am puzzled by the complete lack of most Americans' knowledge about history. There are no bad, or mediocre reviews of this great book; the best history book I ever read.

In the argument as to whether GWB was stupid or evil, I'd say he's both.

Read Bush on the Couch http://www.amazon.com/Bush-Couch-Inside-Mind-President/dp/0060736704 for details.

He's a pretty fucked up individual. He has some serious daddy-issues, and he has an internal mindset that actively suppresses any feelings of empathy towards others, so he often acts as a bully.

He also is a dry-drunk - stopped drinking (or did he?) but never dealt with the psychological issues that got him drinking to excess in the first place.

Overall, he's a real piece of work, certainly with some psychopathic tendencies.

You are telling other people to 'do more reading to better understand how this system works', but you are totally clueless.

The banks did NOT pay back everything plus interest. The banks paid back a small portion of the bailout. The banks stole trillions of dollars, they paid back millions.

Read this book before you ever talk to anyone about the financial crisis again, because I can assure you that if you ever talk to anyone who actually understands what happened, it is obvious that you are completely ignorant and are just spouting off talking points.