Not really very unique it seems to have no military.

I’ve already argued Max that Costa Rica as your shining example is just hyperbole.

And as ajohnstone points out that the purpose of the police is really not much different from the military and Costa Rica is not above using the police to repress workers.

Again Max, stop selling Capitalism. It’s defunct and plans to take the entire human race and environment to extinction. (a nod to Don Hawkins :-D)

Do you?

who prefer a lecture room lectern to a soap-box, choosing instead to conference with like-minded academics than address us ordinary souls at public meetings – “Tickets: $65 per person at the door “….

This is an apt description of Chomskyism and the other “left-wing” celebrities. You’ve got Amy Goodman raking on $1,000,000.00/year. This is the one of the biggest contradictions and jokes about the pseudo-”Left”.

Costa Rica has NO military. Is there something missing between your reality ajohnstone “long in the tooth” and Costa Rica’s abolishment of the military in 1948?

Military and Capitalism are two different things Max. This is what you said about Costa Rica …

They are fervently against corporate capitalism…think that Costa Rica is a shining example of what could be…but are not delusional…and so think this will be extremely difficult to accomplish.

Sorry Max. I’ve been to Costa Rica and there are Century 21′s all over the damn place selling out the pristine areas to the highest bidder. They’re pushing out the native habitat of the monkeys down there — the cute critters they are :-D. You can read the Tica News online if you’re interested to gain some perspectives.

I also met a woman down there who got ROBBED of her life savings and was trapped there. Because she required MONEY Max — MONEY — she’s stuck. No way I could help her out Max because I needed money for my own damn self. I wasn’t going to get stuck down there.

Capitalism is rampant in Costa Rica Max and it’s a crying shame.

Sorry Max but I beg to differ. The primary person who is featured on the NE site promotes local currencies. You can’t have both scale and local currencies. If you think the floating exchange rates now are crazy they will be insane under a multitude of local currency exchanges. You can only imagine the wild speculation that would ensue under those conditions.

Also localities will differ in its development and distribution of its local currencies. If there is not enough circulation in a particular locality there will be imbalances and potential for opportunists to hoard the currency. The reason why this is not progressive Max is that you lose the efficiency and the productive capabilities of scale.

The reason why I don’t think you’re ready, DB, is because you have not conceded the problem. And so if we don’t agree on what the problem is then this discussion can not advance.

The problem is inequality Max. All this does is temporarily redistribute some of the surplus to budding Capitalists who now cannot compete under these concentrated condition but these solution do not stem the fundamentals aspects of Capitalism. It will behave like Keynesian economics in delaying Capitalism’s reckoning. It took 30 years for Capitalism to start the rollback Keynesianism and another 40 years for Keynesianism to collapse. It’s now time to stop trying to revive Capitalism or promote schemes that will only divert time and energy from ridding the world of this economic system.

The rest of what you posted still leaves me with: ajohnstone is more talk than action.

Look your socialism has been a big help. (by the way, I’ve done the picket and leafletting and it aint what its cracked up to be in terms of results).

Not particularly thin skinned , but definitely long in the tooth enough not to be fooled by palliatives measures to surface effects that ignore the root causes of the problem.

Oh, and Costa Rica -military expenditure as % of GDP according to the CIA Factbook – same as Hondurus , Nicaragua , El Salvador , more than Guatamala.

Oh , and i have been there too and witnessed very heavily armed riot police handling demonstrators.

That said, the new economics is not localism. There is a focus on scale but it is not about disconnecting human existence and cluster them into separate localities.

The reason why I don’t think you’re ready, DB, is because you have not conceded the problem. And so if we don’t agree on what the problem is then this discussion can not advance.

New Economics is a major challenge (threat to Capitalists) to the general liberal economic establishment such as Robert Kuttner and Paul Krugman
who are tried and true Liberal Keynesian.

The New Economy are not Keynsian. I don’t think, DB, that you are ready to learn. I’ve studied Marxism and Socialism and once held these as positive ideals….but I learned that this did not address many of the fundamental issues.

I think you much of cut class Max. I’m and NOT a student of Marx but I’ve picked up bits and pieces here and there about Marxist ideas to understand his critique of Capitalism. I used to be a Liberal and have been moving Leftward over the years. The importance of Marxism is its critique of the system and helping other get out of the Capitalist indoctrination by introducing not only a critique but real solutions not B.S. or phony ones.

Yes you are correct Max that “New Economics” is not Keynesian in that it is not calling on huge government expenditures to inflate the economy. But localism is not a solution either. Localism creates cliques and enclaves that makes scale impossible. In fact, Localism, is reactionary and not progressive at all.

The INE offering radical solutions – i don’t think so. They want to retain exchange and trading with some new kind of money. Socialists want a society based on common ownership geared to producing things directly for people to take and use in which exchange and trading, and money as the means of exchange, would be redundant. What’s the point (apart from helping local shopkeepers)? What difference does it make what coloured pieces of paper we have to use to get the things we need to live? The real problem is that in present-day, capitalist society we have to use money at all to obtain these, and that the amount of money we have will always be rationed by what we get as wages . That restricts and distorts our lives.

Money is an anachronism. It is totally useless and designed to control us. All this “localism” like “local money” introduces other problems that Max ignores:

[1] It reduces the velocity of exchange
[2] The local dollars still has to be backed by U.S. Dollars.
[3] It restricts trade and resources.
[4] It ignores the benefits of scale.

What this will do is increase the wealth of local entrepreneurs but it doesn’t guarantee equality. It still require the interference of stupid commodity in order to engage human exchange. Get rid of money and you’ll have more humanity. In other words the rulers will have to be more UPFRONT in order to control us. Money is a form of control and it is time to come to this understanding.

I’ve been to Costa Rica and I can tell you there is a great deal of corruption there and like many places in the world, they have a real estate bubble. When I was there the place was abuzz with real estate speculators who were engage in “development” projects where they were selling Costa Rican real estate for $700,000.00 USD way way more than the typical “middle class” Costa Rican can afford.

These developments were occurring in some of the most pristine areas and the idea was to encourage rich American to live there thus pushing up real estate prices.

Thus Costa Rica is NOT what people make it out to be. San Jose also is a quite a dangerous place. Its a haven for prostitution and a place know for young American to “get the rocks off”.

Sorry Max to burst your bubble but Costa Rica is not immune from Capitalism.

johnstone,
marx did say: to each according to her/his needs. thus, to me, it wld be contradictory for marx not have promoted about equal wages for everybody.

what did marx say about the needs selves? i am assuming: determined by all who want to participate in finding out what the needs actually wld comprise and via a referendum enact them.

the needs wld not include, i suppose, tanks, warships, i pods, tv sets, golf clubs, arenas, private media, wmd, advertising, 10 pair of shoes, spies, ‘experts’, movie ‘stars’ [bloated goons] etc. tnx

New Economics is a major challenge (threat to Capitalists) to the general liberal economic establishment such as Robert Kuttner and Paul Krugman
who are tried and true Liberal Keynesian.

The New Economy are not Keynsian. I don’t think, DB, that you are ready to learn. I’ve studied Marxism and Socialism and once held these as positive ideals….but I learned that this did not address many of the fundamental issues.

The INE offering radical solutions – i don’t think so. They want to retain exchange and trading with some new kind of money. Socialists want a society based on common ownership geared to producing things directly for people to take and use in which exchange and trading, and money as the means of exchange, would be redundant. What’s the point (apart from helping local shopkeepers)? What difference does it make what coloured pieces of paper we have to use to get the things we need to live? The real problem is that in present-day, capitalist society we have to use money at all to obtain these, and that the amount of money we have will always be rationed by what we get as wages . That restricts and distorts our lives.

The Capitalism of the US exists in part because it was a mixture of social programs and a sense (myth?) that one could attain a “better” way of life.

That has and continue to tumble. First the system can nolong support those who live within it the way it appeared to. The cracks and flaws are so extensive they cannot be ignored. Additionally, an alternative must be the reinvention of how we live in order to continue to live on the planet and to flourish.

A glimpse of this may be Costa Rica. It is has eliminated the existence of a military, it has ensured a sustainable eco-system, renewable energy is its primary source of energy, health-care for all. But it is not a socialist state.

Once you realize that the economics of growth is what pushes consumerism, and degrades the planet and human existence; creates massive desparities, then transforming that system becomes an imperative – it is not an ideological dogma, but an imperative born out of the limits of the planet itself.

And since your only statements, ajohnstone, are to attempt to negate every statement with some fairy-tale of socialism that only exists in your mind, I think your “arguments” are baseless. There is, NO socialistic movement.

ajohnstone, simply put where does your fairy-tale exist today after over 100 years of experimentation. This is a new approach that is compelled by circumstances so severe that they cannot be ignored. What’s more this new economics deals with reality and the complexity of change.

Eliminating commoditization of food and labor and other items is part of the New Economics. It just doesn’t lean on Marx and the fabrications of your old-time religion. It deals with life and the planet the way it is.

I would like to hear your examples and the fine work you are doing to make your socialistic world a reality, ajohnstone. Until you can list those I suspect you’re just an armchair wannabe “socialist” with nothing of consequence to back up your religious fervor.

Deadbeat the problem with your “assessment” is that it too ignores everything. You are living in a delusional world whereby there are people who buy what you’re selling. Where is your movement? And like ajohnstone what exactly are you doing to make your “socialism” a reality?