Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ryanaka who wrote (1111845)	1/19/2019 6:05:12 PM
From: RetiredNow	Respond to of 1579682

And what was my other choice? Hillary. She is a criminal. We have her emails that prove this. She hates 50% of this country. She would have brought more socialism and fascism into this country. She would have and continues to corrupt all of our key institutions, not the least of which is the FBI. Look, the whole Democratic Party has become a giant cesspool. The Republicans are very barely any better. I hate the Republican Party almost as much as the Democratic Party, but we only have 2 choices in this country, and I'll choose the opposite of Socialism in EVERY ELECTION THEY GIVE ME A CHANCE TO VOTE IN. Socialism is an existential decision and we are losing that war. When Socialism, Ocasio & Bernie Style, comes to this country, we are truly F_CKED. ---------- Cuba, 60 Years On — Misery Is Communism's Only Real Legacy ALVARO VARGAS LLOSA This month marks the 60th anniversary of the triumph of the Cuban Revolution. One way to measure the failure of this prolonged exercise in despotism is to look at its changing narrative. In the beginning, the Bearded Ones vowed that Cuba would become an economic superpower. In 1961 Che Guevara promised that by 1980 (the year of the Mariel exodus of boat people) Cuba's per capita income would overtake that of the United States. Communism soon killed any possibility of prosperity. So the Revolution changed the narrative: Its "ultima ratio" was now the Cold War and Cuba's role in the planetary struggle between socialism and capitalism — a way to justify Cuba becoming a Soviet colony. The rhetoric also pointed to social achievements that were largely the legacy of the pre-revolutionary years. Though underdeveloped, in the 1950s Cuba had Latin America's third-highest per capita income, third-longest life expectancy, and lowest mortality rate. When the Soviet Union collapsed, the narrative changed again. It was time to enlarge the already disproportionate role Cuba had played during the Cold War (sending soldiers to fight in Africa, for instance) by turning it into a world bastion of socialism after Moscow's "treason." Since the end of the Soviet subsidy — several billion dollars a year — had uncovered the truth about Cuba's miserable economy, Fidel Castro also developed a narrative based on a heroic "special period" in which Cubans would re-enact the resistance of Thermopylae against the Persians. Anything that could generate some foreign exchange and social peace was rhetorically justified — even the emergence of a few small private businesses, the arrival of foreign capital in partnership with the Cuban state, tourism (until then symbolic of the ancien regime's subservience to the United States), and prostitution. Cuba: Subsidized Communism Then came Hugo Chavez's oil subsidy. The heroic narrative focused on the domestic front went by the wayside. It was time to talk about world revolution. Cuba's dependence on Venezuela was concealed under rhetoric that depicted Castro as the inspiration of Venezuela's 21st-century Socialism. The new planetary struggle justified Cuba being close to Islamic fundamentalist theocrats (Iran), state-capitalist nationalists (China), and others. Venezuela's subsidy provided an opportunity for Cuba to export "professional services," sending thousands of doctors, nurses, and teachers overseas in exchange for dollars. This was close to slavery since the host country would pay the salaries to the Cuban government in dollars and the Castro regime would pay the doctors and teachers a tiny fraction of the money … in Cuban pesos! The professionals were not allowed to take their families with them lest they defect. Under the new narrative, this cruel exploitation was a service to humanity. When Fidel Castro fell ill in 2006 the narrative evolved. His brother Raul, a China admirer, could not steer too far away from Fidel's legacy but allowed more Cubans to engage in small, closely controlled entrepreneurial activities and invited new foreign capital to partner with the state. Still A Police State The narrative then pushed the fight against bureaucracy and corruption (a Castro legacy!) and the need to prolong the Revolution by promoting a new generation — hence the appointment of Miguel Diaz-Canel as "president," with Raul in control as first secretary of the Communist Party and chief of the armed forces (which control all sizable capitalist ventures). The new constitution dropped the word "communism" but retained the one-party state. As the Venezuelan subsidy dwindled due to Chavismo's catastrophe, Castro expanded the limited reforms with a narrative based on modernization. Today the Revolution continues to be a police state that brutally represses any form of dissidence, and its reforms have yielded nothing but failure. As the well-respected economist Carmelo Mesa-Lago has shown, the private sector represents no more than 7% of GDP. The country is severely undercapitalized (gross capital formation is one half of Latin America's average); and agricultural and industrial production has shrunk in the last decade. The island's largest source of foreign exchange continues to be the export of professional services, that grotesque euphemism. Sixty years on, Cuba has nothing but misery to show for itself — and an extraordinary ability to delude itself and many others. Vargas Llosa is a senior fellow at the Independent Institute. His latest book is " Global Crossings: Immigration, Civilization, and America".

To: ryanaka who wrote (1111845)	1/19/2019 6:08:29 PM
From: RetiredNow	Respond to of 1579682

For Democrats, The Era Of Big Government Is Back, Big Time Big Government: Leading Democrats are pushing an agenda that would more than double the size of the federal government. This comes as a new Gallup Poll finds that the public views government as the most important problem facing the country today. Gallup regularly asks what are the biggest problems facing the country today. The latest shows "government" well in the lead, with "immigration" No. 2. Another Gallup poll finds that, despite all the focus on left-wing celebrities like Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, the country remains far more conservative than liberal — with 35% saying they are conservative compared with 26% who are liberal. The rest fall in the middle. More 'Socialist' Than Sweden Nevertheless, many in the Democratic Party are rushing to embrace policies that would, if enacted, result in government controlling a bigger share of the U.S. economy than "socialist" countries like Sweden or Norway. There's no doubt that each of these proposals has a bumper sticker appeal: "Medicare for all," "universal Pre-K," "universal free college," "guaranteed jobs," "paid family leave," expanded Social Security benefits, a federal $15 minimum wage. They all poll well, at least. But the costs to implement any one of them would be staggering. "Medicare for all," for example, would cost, conservatively, $32 trillion in its first 10 years. The "guaranteed jobs" price tag is about $7 trillion over a decade. Universal Pre-K: $150 billion. Free college: $750 billion. The "Green New Deal" — untold billions. When the Manhattan Institute added up the cost of this expansive agenda, the price tag totaled $42.5 trillion over 10 years, or roughly $4.2 trillion a year. And that's likely a lowball estimate, since government programs almost always end up costing far more than expected. Exactly how big is this tab? Well, consider that in 2018, the federal government spent a grand total of $4.1 trillion. So, we are talking about more than doubling the size of the federal government. 58% of GDP It would result in the federal government controlling more than 40% of the nation's GDP. When you add in state and local spending, the result would be that government would control 58% of the nation's economy. That's a bigger share than supposed socialist role model countries like Finland, where government spending accounts for 57% of that country's economy, Sweden (49%), Norway (48.8%), the Netherlands (44.5%), or the U.K. (42%). In fact, this Democratic agenda would, if enacted, result in a bigger government than any of the other 35 industrialized countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. So much for Democratic President Bill Clinton's declaration that "the era of big government is over." What would it take to finance a government of this magnitude? 225% Tax Hike As it stands today, federal tax revenues are about 17% of GDP. That's about the average since World War II, despite the myriad changes in the tax code over those years. To pay for those new programs — without adding to the already nearly $1 trillion in annual deficits — would require a 225% increase in federal taxes. However appealing this agenda might sound. It would constitute economic suicide.