The following post is by Dealbreaker reader and commenter Infinite Guest.
First Nouriel Roubini, soon afterward George Magnus, and since then the vast and vacuous consensusphere have lately given currency to notion that Karl Marx was right after all. “Marx was right” is just the sort of opinion a person might venture late at night during a navel-gazing undergraduate debate, or at a party — if he needed some privacy– or perched on a soapbox in Times Square. A well-heeled literary critic might work it up into a sly, chatty, modestly successful book. It’s difficult to accept at this late date that any serious thinker actually believes that Marx was right. Belief in Marxism serves no one but Marxist thugs. Marxism is dead and buried, and deservedly so, because Karl Marx was wrong. Continue reading »
The following post is by Dealbreaker reader and commenter Infinite Guest.
This is the worst time in decades to try to reduce the deficit. Unemployment is immorally high, growth remains anemic, private deleveraging shows no signs of abatement, infrastructure is rapidly deteriorating and the prospect of a stagflationary double-dip recession is all too imminent. Yet the drum beat for deficit reduction is deafening, with everyone from Standard & Poor’s to the Committee for Economic Development to the AFL-CIO keeping time, and the rest of the world joining in, marching for a cure to our ailing fiscal health. But if Dr. Dominique Strauss-Kahn prescribes it, and Dr. Zhou Xiaohuan concurs, then it’s snake oil. Don’t drink it. Continue reading »
The following post is by Dealbreaker reader and commenter Infinite Guest.
“Margin Call” is not “Wall Street,” “Boiler Room,” or “Glengarry Glen Ross.” It’s not trying to be any of those. There are no fistfights, car chases or explosions. There are no dick jokes. Strippers, hookers and blow are alluded to, but remain off-screen. Despite the short time line and urgency of the situation, nobody races against a literal ticking clock. And the kind of person who hates “Star Wars” because sound doesn’t travel in a vacuum or who gave up on “Full Metal Jacket” when Pyle somehow managed to get a loaded gun off the range will not be able to sit through “Margin Call:” it requires some suspension of disbelief.
On the other hand, if you want to spend two hours reliving the feelings of despair and helplessness from 2008, this might just be your movie. Continue reading »
The following post is by Dealbreaker reader and commenter Infinite Guest.
When Congressman Barney Frank said “money is influential, but votes will kick money’s ass any time they come up against each other,” he wasn’t referring to votes on the floor of the House and Senate, nor to the money our elected officials are paid, nor the money they tax and spend. Those votes and that money are never in conflict, but they should always be. Continue reading »
