I got the idea of post with a question for the Glibs from a series of posts on this very site. I fear this will be repetitive and cover the same ground, but it has a slightly different flavor and less racism is involved, which muddies the waters these days.
“Is it permissible to use state power to rectify a previous abuse of state power?”
My post is in the same vein, but, I hope, sufficiently different.
Part 1: the abuse
In Eastern Europe, communism was a hard reset of existing societies, and no matter what some nostalgic assholes say, an utter disastrous one. One of the main things “not real communism” did was remove private property via collectivization.
In the particular case of Romania, this meant almost all agricultural land was taken from the owners and grouped in government farms called CAP – “Cooperativa Agricola de Productie”. This was done in stages, as the communist government managed to extend its power throughout society.
The Rural:
Overall, there was not a huge grassroots communist movement in Romania, the system was imposed by force by the Soviets. One of the effects of the situation was that the communist party was made of basically the worst people in the village, the lazy, the thieves, the bullies. Even poor peasants did not want to join. The people that did were often brutal and they had felt disrespected in the past. This was in part due to the fact that Romania was still mostly rural, and in rural villages people generally knew each other. They knew who were honest, hardworking people, and who were not. Those who were no were not seen in a good light.
The propaganda
The first stage was imposing massive quotas of produce to be handed over to the government in the hope of ruining the farmers.
The second stage was confiscating from the “wealthy landowners”, everyone with more than 50 hectares of land. This was done in 1949 and often meant going to houses in the middle of the night and kicking the people out and moving them to old adobo houses in different villages, while the land, house, livestock, farm machinery and most possessions were left behind.
One main hope was that all the poorer peasants would side with the government, but this did not really happen as many poor peasants wanted to work and extend their land holdings themselves. In general, the more prosperous people in the community were seen as community leaders and were respected. Furthermore, the government had imposed quotas on poor peasants as well, so they did not see the communist government in a good light.
The third stage started in 1957 when all property no matter how small was collectivized. Most people were left with basically a small vegetable garden that was attached to the house they lived in. There was some regional difference, as in high hills and mountain areas, where large scale agriculture was more difficult, the collectivization was not complete, as the government saw less economic value there.
In this final stage, the repression was also the worst, as the resistance was highest. Many peasants were arrested, some tortured and killed – especially the ones seen as respected in the community. In order to break communities and solidarity among people, some peasants were deported to different areas of the country, especially from Transylvania to Dobrogea. My father told me that in the village he grew up in multiple chiefs of police shot themselves, not even all commies could live with what they had done. There was also resistance, with some men taking up their hunting rifles which the state could not confiscate and going to the hills and mountains, but, in the end, they could only resist for a while. People were hoping the Western Europeans and Americans would come to kick the Russians out of the area as they did with the Germans, but this off course did not happen.
The reality
The collectivization officially ended in 1962, when the government reported 95% of agricultural land in government ownership. Romania was one of the worst countries for this, most others allowed more private property, only Albania being comparable. Peasants in CAP farms were poorly paid – in part to force them to move to the city for the rapid industrialization that the government wanted, compared to other communist countries in the area. This was also in part due to the fact that, in the absence of significant communist movements in the country, in the central government, just like the minor bureaucrats, the absolute worst people ended in power. As bad as the leadership was in all communist countries, in Romania it was worse.
My paternal grandparents on both sides, who were never boyars just moderately successful, lost pretty much everything.
The economy:
This was fairly straightforward: factories, shops, warehouses and all other elements were simply taken over by the state and given to party members to run. More were built by the state, partially financed by the expropriated wealth, partially funded by international loans. This was done without any real economic knowledge and was in the end disastrous. But, like much of socialism, it seemed to work at first, at least until we ran out of other people’s money, which is what all the modern tankies cling too.
The urban:
Here it was also pretty straightforward. The high-quality houses were mostly confiscated from their owners and given to party members. Much of the cheaper housing was confiscated and torn down to build the cramped brutalist apartment buildings which were to house the workers of the factories that were the pride of the socialist industry. Old owners got apartments in the new buildings or a bullet or a good workout digging the canals – depending on their luck. Some higher quality housing was built for the party members who did not have room in the old high-quality housing.
Part 2: the rectification
While mass confiscation of property was a massive abuse of state power, I do not think that giving it back can count as abuse, and it is certainly not in the same realm as other reparations. So off course I, and every non-commie, support this. Communism ran from 1949 to 1989 so about 40 years.
But the proverbial devil is in the details. And “the details” are how the old commie ruling class stole much valuable stuff and became the new “capitalist” ruling class.
Off course, this was not without controversy. There were people living in houses that needed to be returned to the original owners who did not want to leave. Most of them paid negligible rents to the government for the privilege. Some claimed they lived for 20 years there, why should they move. Others expected the government to give them someplace else in similar conditions. Especially in the old mansions and fancy houses, these were connected people who were used to getting their way. As communism dragged on for 40 years, the original owners were often dead – the communists killed plenty themselves – or fled, and dead abroad from more natural causes, and the rights to the property should go to their next of kin, although that was not always easy to establish.
For rural land, there were no clear deeds of property before 1940, people had informal paper or generally knew who owned what. It was the way of the old village, no paperwork was needed, everyone knew what land belonged to whom. This was better in Transylvania as the Austro-Hungarians were better records keepers. It was a struggle which implied many court dates, lawyers and shenanigans, though, in the end, most houses were returned to private property.
The return of the property was done in such a way as “the right people” – as in the corrupt and connected, often people who were part of the old communist elite and the secret police senior ranks, got a lion’s share. This was done in several ways.
The main one was making it legal for owners to sell the rights to their property, even though they did not yet have the property. So, the courts would drag on and on, until some exhausted owners who no longer afforded the cost sold their right cheap to certain people. After this happened, the trial was over soon and the new owner got himself a cheap property. Other times it was more direct mob death threats to sell rights. Or there were some laws to compensate owners by giving them some equivalent property, which was never equivalent. It was, over all, a shitshow.
Most of the agricultural land was given back in private property, but this was often done via compensation: e.g. someone connected got the land best suited to agriculture, and the people who should have gotten it received an equivalent amount of hectares of less than choice land. And when the big city suburbs started expanding in farmland, some of the owner made really good money, in fact that is how many rich people got rich.
Even beyond the shitshow, how the process should have been done was a different question. And it led to some debates by a proto-libertarian Pie in the comments of a blog I used to frequent in 2010 or so. I am not and never was a purist libertarian. In my view, in the real world, one needs to be pragmatic about some things. I am fully aware that bending principles to much for the sake of pragmatism can lead to those principles being completely compromised, and that it is a delicate balancing act that oft goes wrong. But I do not see an alternative.
One of the main points of debate was what happens to property that is in a completely different state than it was. An empty lot confiscated in 1949 by the communists is now a park in the middle of the city, a railway station, a road, a 10-story building. Most said in this case give monetary compensation to the old owners. Purist libertarians said no, give the original property back. I was in the former camp.
My view is, it is not possible to fully go back to status quo ante. Not all wrongs can be righted. Communism was a great reset, and ending it is another great reset. Any move to actual libertarianism, not that it will ever happen in Romania, needs be gradual. And we need to keep, for now, whatever infrastructure we had. So, no, I did not support suddenly privatizing all muh roads. I did support privatizing the railways, but as a whole not give bits and pieces to a million owners.
Especially when it comes to parks in good parts of Bucharest, that was a very valuable property to build on. And as parks are essential for the well-being of urbanites in high density apartment buildings – of the kind the commies tore down Bucharest to build and the kind that dominate the housing here, this was very contentious. It was additionally contentious when pieces of parkland were torn down by people who were more likely corrupt mobsters who got the property rights than the actual original owners. This did not matter to the purists. In my view, no piece of park should have been given back. This is still my view. Privatizing somewhat the whole park as long as it is kept a park was a different matter. But tearing pieces of park to make buildings should not happen in Bucharest. I am sure some here would agree with the purists, but this is my view. Giving back a large building or a railway station on what was once empty land is basically the same.
My view was: give the property back if it is in generally the same state. If it was, there should be no compensation or equivalent, just give it back. If someone occupies it, tough, move. Where? I don’t much care. If it cannot be given back, give financial compensation or in that case equivalent. Also, my view was returning should be to the original owner or direct line relatives 3 generations max. No long lost second cousins or uncles – the source of much theft was this. If the owner, children, or at most grandchildren did not exist, do not return it and auction it off.
There was another element to it. The people living in the communist apartment buildings. During communism you could get the chance – after some years on a list- to own an apartment outright by paying what was functionally equivalent to a 20 year mortgage. Or you could rent. Most people rented, and after the fall of communism they got the chance to buy the apartment for what was an almost symbolic sum of money, which most did. This led to 90% of people in Romanian cities owning their apartments, a higher rate than most countries. This was another way of creating private property after communism.
So, Glibs, how would you go about undoing the wrongs of communism in 1990 Romania?
I once had a thought about this, but it is probably unworkable.
All state owned property should be divvied up into individual entities (as makes sense) and an equal amount of stock in each entity given to every citizen. Then let the market go from there.
I think most small businesses would “go private” in short order.
So you dont support my crazy idea then.
I saw it similar to you. Give value in stock to people deprived of property on the railroad. Also straightforward compensation. You will never be able to build a house again where the railroad has gone, but stock may give some value over time to compensate for the loss.
So basically give everyone an equal amount of shares of an index fund of all former state businesses? Or am I reading this wrong.
Not necessarily equal amounts. Did you have 400 acres of confiscated land turned into a railroad? That would be a lot more stock and compensation than someone who had one acre.
That was pretty much my idea. RJ’s is fine too.
But you don’t just have the index fund, you could sell off individual shares.
The local bread shop manager would probably try to become the owner and offer .2 cents per share to buy everyone out. There would have to be some sort of groupings to allow that to happen. Maybe there could be some sort of “trade” mechanism within the fund, that if you wanted to own the bread shop, you could trade an equivalent amount of your other shares to get the bread shop shares.
Its a form of a great reset. Maybe a less shitty version.
this was done for many government owned factories.
there was also this
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fondul_Proprietatea
Swiss likes fondul.
Cheesy.
*narrows gazul*
Sounds familiar.
Exactly, this is what all politics devolves to – people who want power are the people that should never get power.
What do you call “Karens” in Romania?
Commies?
Thanks Pie! That was both interesting and depressing reading. I also have no good answer to your question.
What did they do to small shops and restaurants and the like?
closed them or took made them government owned as far as I know
Note to self: buy ammo.
Indeed. It can’t be reprinted enough:
“And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family?
“Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?… The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If…if…We didn’t love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation…. We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward.”
The problem is knowing when to cross this line. As it happens, in real time, the moment is highly likely to come and go before (enough?) people take up arms. Too early, and you justify a crackdown. Too late, and you’re in the camps.
The problem is knowing when to cross this line.
I fear we are going to find the answer to this question during my lifetime.
Me too.
The correct answer was 2020.
*sad trombone*
Fuck that. I wouldn’t take to the streets for Trump’s sake. He and Biden can fuck right off together.
I’m referring to the lockdowns. And the all out assault on small businesses, restaurants, churches, etc.
Damn straight Sean.
It’s too late now, imo. Even if we had done something then, so, so many were in favor I’m not sure it would have made a difference.
Sean is spot on. We’ve seen the future and it’s limp.
Ah, well then we’re fooked, because far too many of our fellow citizens were on board. You can’t save a republic, or the people, when they demand to be subjects of despotism.
The COVID lockdowns were not the same as secret police arresting people in the middle of the night, never to be seen again.
The COVID lockdowns show the inherent weakness of the bulk of the American people. But they don’t tell us what is going to happen when a certain subset of the population decides to water the tree of liberty.
To be fair, there were plenty of cases where people were arrested for going to church/being outside without their diaper.
So the distinction is pretty thin.
@Bob, and no repercussions to the political people of any type for having decreed this crap or for the so called experts who gave them cover and instigated the lockdowns.
So the distinction is pretty thin.
I disagree.
This is all a bunch of disinformation because we know for a fact socialism is great, that’s why all the kids want it.
Kidding aside, this was a fascinating read. Especially interesting because either you or someone close to you lived through it. Thank you for sharing with us.
That wasn’t real socialism. This was run by the lazy, thieves, and bullies. Not the enlightened gender studies graduates.
They’re the same picture.
I think the gender studies graduates are worse. At least from the thieves and bullies you can get a certain animal cunning. There is no such thinking ability at all from the gender studies grads.
The gender studies graduates will be the first ones shot. They will not be in line for the throne when communism surfaces. Gangsters and bullies will wipe out useless quasi-intellectuals like that to avoid whining. That has happened each time as communism metastasizes.
I think that is the takeaway from this piece, that there isn’t a good group of people who will make sure that everyone gets their fair share, but that the scum always rises to the top.
I have a memory of some Wall St. guy laying it out for someone rooting for collectivism – “all we do is study systems and take advantage of the rules as best we can; we’re hyper-competitive and driven. Switch to some other system and you think you’ll be in charge but, after we learn the new rules, we’ll still end up on top”.
Not saying all Wall St. types are power-hungry scumbags (I’m sure some are) but you setup some new system and it’s “go work in a factory or exploit the system to gain power”, well, not many of them will go for the factory.
For very large percentages of ‘some’.
Like cops, it’s the 90% that make the other 10% look bad.
I’d take my chances with some Wall St types concept of power over anyone you’d find in a state capitol.
I’d take my chances with some Wall St types concept of power over anyone you’d find in a state capitol.
Me too.
If you’re asking whether I trust Jamie Dimon over Chuck Schumer, the answer is unapologetically yes.
all the kids want it
Kids also want dessert for breakfast. And socialism is just as wholesome and sustainable.
At least dessert for breakfast only kills the one eating it.
Thanks, Pie. The recency of your stories makes it a really interesting question.
What happened with you family’s properties? I know your mom has a nice place on the lake – was that originally family land.
Not all wrongs can be righted.
This is the cold, hard reality.
was that originally family land. – no
What happened with you family’s properties – sold on the cheap against my advice before land became valuable
Very true. Thank you for this, Pie.
Yes, an excellent article.
Nice work, Pie.
Now my head hurts.
Not necessarily equal amounts. Did you have 400 acres of confiscated land turned into a railroad? That would be a lot more stock and compensation than someone who had one acre.
Only a super AI-equity-bot, carefully programmed by Top Men, could solve that riddle.
Which is why I went for a straight equal reset.
Everyone gets 1 share in every entity.
Coming here to state something similar. My idea is simple like me so I like it better. The theory of communism is that all of the wealth is for the benefit of all of the people. This was second major reset after a first one and justice is not something likely to be achieved. At best it’s like a bankruptcy and the stakeholders are compensated as well as possible with the dissolution of the entity. Unlike a bankruptcy there are no clear records of who provided what to the defunct firm.
Four legs good… Two legs BETTER!
Cool.
I was just in Hungary for the past few weeks and even though they had a briefer period of “hardcore” communism, man did they ever fucking hate everything about it.
It was so refreshing.
The communists are pushing grass roots organizing here in America all over the place. They have been trying to push the “you are an oppressed immigrant minority” line with the Hispanic community in Miami of late.
Yeah.
That doesn’t work so well down there. They all fled communist oppression – many left behind businesses and professions that had taken a lifetime or more to build… Along with dead relatives and friends who couldn’t escape. The reaction to some 22 year old kid with giant holes in his earlobes explaining that capitalism is the source of all evil is pretty strong around these parts.
All the Cuban immigrants I knew hated communism. Also, Cubans pretty much run Miami. Always cracks me up when they’re portrayed as a poor minority working menial jobs on TV and in movies. As if Miami is just LA, but with Cubans instead of Mexicans.
I’ve told the story before about the ignorant American at the tables in Vegas with a Cuban expat. The ignorant American was talking about how beautiful Cuba is, and how happy he is that he’ll have a chance to go there. The expat said he didn’t want anyone to go there, because they’re just giving more money to those puta Castros. It took a while for the ignorant American to understand that the expat still had family and relatives in Cuba, and was trying to figure out ways to get them out.
Yeah, under “how to spot the lefty sock puppet account, I had some guy on r/Miami trying to explain how he had talked to a bunch of his friends who’s parents were from Cuba and they didn’t feel that way anymore. They all hate capitalism now, because they live here and they see how terribly oppressive capitalism is.
Yeah… “Dude, you clearly have never even *met* anyone from Miami ”
Talking like that will get you a lunch in the face pretty quickly.
Punch. Maybe a lunch if you are dining with a Cubana.
After travel to Cuba opened up, my offshore captive board was talking about doing a meeting there. They blathered about how it would help ordinary Cubans. I informed them that the communist government owned the hotels, and the people working there were doing so for nickels a day – everything we spent went into the government’s pocket, even the tips for staff.
I don’t know if that had anything to do with it, but the topic didn’t come up again.
Did you go to the Museum of Terror? It was nice to see a place that gave Nazis and Commies equal billing.
One of the best museums ever. Wow. I almost skipped it because we had kids.
With all the strip clubs in Budapest, the Museum of Terror might be the most wholesome place in the city.
When at Taszar, Hungary…on the way to Bosnia, I talked with an NCO who called Budapest, “Bootyfest” – he wanted to get back there, ASAP.
Oh wow I had no idea about it. I’d definitely go, but darn is it chilling and depressing.
https://www.terrorhaza.hu/en/allando-kiallitas/first_floor/peasants
I have a friend who tells similar stories of the fall of Venezuela. His parents owned a hotel and night club. They were doing well. They sent their sons to America to get an education and one of them stuck, getting a law degree and getting recruited into a start-up by college buddies. It did well.
The state confiscated his parents hotel and his brother tried to work with the state, developing housing on a government contract. They decided not to pay, confiscated the development and arrested him for his troubles.
So now the parents live in a nice house in Boca Raton provided by their lawyer son.
This all happened really early in the Chavez era.
Amazing that the same thing happened halfway around the world, two generations later, and without a Soviet army to make it happen.
Fucking commies, man. It’s the same thing every time, but they never learn.
It’s a pretty thin playbook, for sure.
Oh, they learned just fine. They learned how to seize power and make themselves wealthy by killing and impoverishing everyone else.
If greed and self interest are what drives capitalism, envy seems to be a primary motivator of socialism.
And also… Greed and self interest are the same under socialism. One of the reasons why it doesn’t work.
All humans are motivated by self interest and that’s a good thing.
Igrees and self interest…. Plus nearly limited started power! What could possibly go wrong??
Typing, for starters.
Sheesh. Man sized thumbs on kid sized touch screen…. What could possibly go wrong…..
That was headed in a bad direction until “touch screen”. Good save.
I agree. Self interest and having the freedom of choice is what drives people to better themselves, their community, and their countries. The down side is when you think what is best for you must be best for everyone as well.
Nice story except for the lawyer part.
*narrows gaze*
Envy is a hell of an emotion.
The return of the property was done in such a way as “the right people” – as in the corrupt and connected, often people who were part of the old communist elite and the secret police senior ranks, got a lion’s share. This was done in several ways.
As I said in Raven’s Nation’s article, “the inevitable outcome of such a policy is that the land ends up in the hands of grifters and cronies.”
The collapse of newly liberated Russia into a corrupt oligarchy was paved with this stone.
Similar story with my wife’s family. They got much of their farmland back, but many of the fields and forest are still managed by an agriculture company which they have shares in. The management sucks out most of the profit and distributes meager dividends to the shareholders, and their financial reports are jokes. Because it’s difficult for us to set up a bank account in that country thanks to FATCA, we have a hard time collecting even those dividends.
We bought the apartment my wife had in the center of the city for the kind of money you can get in a single withdrawal from an ATM. The catch was that the attic space, which was supposed to be ours, was sold to the Albanian mafia in an illegal transaction. When we complained to city hall they said, “I know what the law says, but this is what we are going to do.”
It’s been a lot of work getting the ownership of the land back, as the government didn’t just give everything back. It kind of became the life’s work of my wife’s aunts to research everything and file the paperwork. It’s also complicated by the fact that a single plot of land can have a dozen owners due to the stupid way they do inheritance. The process also brought out the worst in some people. My father in-law’s family bamboozled him into signing away his rights to his property. Needless to say, nobody talks to that side of the family anymore, but they made a bundle.
Lol, wut?
Were they storing dead bodies in there?
I think this is one of those situations in where the less you know the better off you are.
They converted the attic to apartments and sold them. Before construction I asked what they were going to do to prevent water from coming into our apartment when it rains. They assured us that they will cover everything so it doesn’t happen. The day after they removed the roof it rained, and our apartment flooded. Good times. At least they repaired our apartment, but what a pain in the neck.
Great piece, Pie, very thought-provoking (and depressing).
Regarding how to return property that was taken and then developed, I think your idea of compensation to the original owners (rather than returning the property in its new and much more valuable state) makes sense. It’s a similar idea to the Takings Clause, that the original owners get compensated for the loss, but not more than the loss. Of course, there can be shenanigans in determining what the proper value is. A complicating factor is that the taking was many years ago, so there was a lost opportunity cost as well, which is hard to determine.
That’s what I suggested in the previous article:
“I think the best way to handle this would be to have victims of takings compensated by the government, like they would have been through eminent domain takings. And obviously, to also strengthen property right laws for everybody so it doesn’t happen again.”
It’s far less disruptive, and doesn’t have the potentially disastrous drawback of taking productive assets and putting them into the hands of people who have no idea what to do with them.
It’s far less disruptive, and doesn’t have the potentially disastrous drawback of taking productive assets and putting them into the hands of people who have no idea what to do with them.
Absolutely.
Also might help with the wrong people getting their hands on the property, though by no means a guarantee.
Or compensation, rather than property.
But real communism has never been tried. Or so I am told.
If we don’t pick up our game, we are about to find out how well the latest iteration will work here.
Been a while since I read Marx, but most of the shit Pie described wasn’t in his book.
It kind of was though
“We have no compassion and we ask no compassion from you. When our turn comes, we shall not make excuses for the terror.”
― Karl Marx
and anyway it is the natural result of what Marx was advocating, this always has happened. Furthermore, critics of Marx before 1920 said this is exactly what would happen . predictions in advance have more power than hindsight. Hell socialists like Bakunin thought so.
Sort of like wondering why when following the same recipe you get the same outcome. I’m following this recipe for Key Lime Pie but every time I follow it I end up with a shit sandwich. I guess I didn’t follow the recipe correctly. Let me try again.
Mmmmm
I never know which type of key to use.
The right kind of lime is key.
Mwa Ha! Ha ha ha!
Does anyone want to watch a leftie from the Majority Report make an ass out of herself while pretending the real issue with banning gay porn from children’s libraries is the dastardly censorship?
One second it’s This Is a Gay Book is a good book she’s familiar of.
The next it’s Tim Pool is pulling out one incendiary example (after she asked him for a specific example).
If you don’t want your 9 year old reading about eating fecal matter, you are a Nazi.
I always want to know, are they arguing for unrestricted internet access in the school computer labs?
No because in that case the dangerous words on the screen they may encounter are literal violence. Just like it’s not censorship when big tech colludes with three letter government agencies and politicians to censor right wing hate.
It wouldn’t be hard to put together pretty anodyne books showing gay people (and even other alphabet people) as just normal folks.
The fact that what they are pushing isn’t that, but is explicit, even graphic, depictions and instructions for perverse sex acts, tells you that they don’t want to kids to grow up without anti-gay prejudice. They want to groom them.
The far-right politicized my political agenda.
Fink spoke at the Aspen Ideas Festival, announcing the term Environment, Social, and Governance (ESG) investing is now past, arguing it has been “politically weaponized” and he is “ashamed’ to be part of the debate.
“When I write these [investment] letters, it was never meant to be a political statement. … They were written to identify long-term issues to our long-term investors,” he said.
However, when pressed on his statement, he backtracked, saying, “I never said I was ashamed. I’m not ashamed. I do believe in conscientious capitalism.”
Fink said ESG has been “misused” by the far left and the far right.
Rat fuck claiming he didn’t intent completely political act done at the behest of former political hacks to be called political. Film at 11.
Well that’s a bunch of straight up lies.
“it was never meant to be a political statement”
Harnessing corporations to political causes wasn’t meant to be political?
Moron, or liar? Ima go with “liar”.
Why not both?
Fink isn’t a moron by any stretch of the imagination.
However, when pressed on his statement, he backtracked, saying, “I never said I was ashamed. I’m not ashamed. I do believe in conscientious capitalism.”
Fink said ESG has been “misused” by the far left and the far right.
I think they’re going to go with “ethical” now.
To distance themselves from us unethical investors looking at returns.
And like every other attempt to rebrand the left has ever done, the new words will get the same negative connotations as the old ones. Then the cycle repeats.
Every time.
…I do believe in conscientious capitalism.”
And just like that, the re-brand was complete.
Perhaps in the sense that climate policies result in excessive printing and spending, which causes inflation.
ECB boss Christine Lagarde claims: Inflation is due to climate change! 🤡
It is never their own policies or printings trillions of Euros or $$$ or ZIRP.
It’s climate change and you need to pay more taxes to fix it.
Said as they privately jet from world conference to world conference.
You’d have to burn a pizza stove 849 years to equal one year of John Kerry’s private jet
Or a month of him talking out his ass.
many poor peasants wanted to work and extend their land holdings themselves
So yeah, we hate commies – boo commies.
Here’s the thing. This isn’t just about commies. This is about every follower of Rousseau. Kropotkin experienced the same damn thing because he was another Romantic with a noble ideal about mankind. Except he didn’t actually understand real humans – peasants in particular. His rabble-rousing (roughly a generation before the Bolsheviks) should have taught anyone proclaiming themselves to be peasant class saviors something about the disappointment they were going to experience; of course the bright minds absorbed in revolution have no interest in dealing with messy realities. We have a utopia to create!
Here’s looking at only you NJ!
https://www.oregonlive.com/commuting/2023/06/oregon-lawmakers-vote-to-allow-self-serve-gas-statewide-ending-decades-long-ban.html
Sensei, you really don’t think Princeton and Rutgers students are capable of pumping their own gas do you?
There’s always Monmouth College. You need an IQ slightly better than room temperature.
https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/monmouth-college-1725/applying#:~:text=Monmouth%20College%20admissions%20is%20selective,score%20of%2022%20and%2028.
“But I’m a Repooblican.”
“The Hunter Biden story, the scandal, the this, the that, it’s also a story of a father’s love, and Joe Biden has never and will never give up on his son Hunter and will never treat him lesser than. He is a father first. Take it or leave it. That’s who he is. That is part of his heart,” Navarro said. …
Navarro said Monday, “I’ve known Joe Biden since he was a senator, so about 20-something years. I can’t tell you how much his life has been marked by losing not one child but two, two children. And once you lost a child, I think you are absolutely determined, it’s even more urgent, it’s an even bigger issue that you will not lose another.”
She explained, “Part of the reason that Hunter Biden was able to get out of addiction is because Joe Biden embraced him entirely, the entire time when he was vice president, when he was a candidate, when he was out of office and now as president.”
After the clip of Navarro’s defense went viral, she attacked critics of her argument as “sad” for blasting “a father’s unconditional love for his child.”
“[Right-wing] troll machine got me trending, attacking me for saying this on @TheView. Imagine calling yourself the ‘family values party’ & being outraged I’m talking about a father’s unconditional love for his child. Imagine thinking a dad not giving up on his kid, is a bad thing. #Sad,” Navarro tweeted.
Keep the graft in the family.
Boy, she bashed the total shit out of that strawman. Good job, Ana!
If my son asks me to help him by engaging in graft, I would be looking for a better way to help him. But that’s just me.
This is of course assuming that Hunter was the one asking which I highly doubt.
That seems to be the narrative they’re trying now. He was addicted to a horrible drug and that made him do terrible things. Fine, if you want to go that route, in recovery they want you to make amends. So when is Hunter going to return those millions of ill-gotten dollars?
Running cover for gropey Joe Biden, a new low for establishment Republicans.
Biden was a piece of shit before either of his kids died.
Ouch.
Additional ouch.
Missing context – was that a road the Russians were using, or the Ukrainians?
Who cares?
Never learning lessons and killing youngsters is the issue.
Depends on the date
Fake news. Only the evil Russians use conscripts. Ukraine is about freedom and democracy.
And money laundering!
Same thing.
Well I don’t think this war is quite as cynical as WWI.
Worse, since we have 100 years of data.
No, this one is nowhere near the scale of the other.
Yet. Big things start small.
True, if Europe wants to commit suicide we can’t really stop them. We didn’t the last time either.
At this moment, the EU is not really interested in a large scale conflict. They’d rather this drag out and watch Russia and the US bleed each other.
The Brits are ready to go full retard though.
Word. I’m a grower, not a show-er.
And finally, the coup de grâce.
War pigs really are good at their jobs.
Lest we forget, Sullivan is a Hillary Clinton acolyte. There are no rules that won’t be broken or lies that won’t be told.
I’m trying to figure out what federal agencies have to do with voting.
What’s happening: A group of Democratic senators are requesting an update from Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra on the department’s efforts to implement a Biden executive order and expand voting access.
Details: In a letter first obtained by POLITICO, Democratic senators led by Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) requested the agency provide an update on efforts HHS has put forth to fulfill President Joe Biden’s executive order to help expand access to the ballot box.
The executive order, issued back in March 2021, required federal agencies to consider ways they could expand voter registration and circulate election information, with a focus on federal employees, voters with disabilities, active duty military voters, overseas voters, and those held in federal custody.
Are those agencies serving the interests of the DNC? Then there’s nothing more to ask. Move along citizen.
New York man shot crossbow that killed infant daughter, authorities say
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/new-york-man-allegedly-shot-crossbow-at-wife-holding-newborn-killing-baby-girl/
Words, as is a frequent occurrence, fail me.
He had a history of domestic incidents with the victim and there was an active order of protection in place, authorities say.
Odds that despite this she invited where she was shot and the infant killed are what?
I’m opposed to the death penalty, but I’d throw the switch on this guy – after I jiggle back and forth a few times.
I’d execute the person who constructed that abomination of a sentence.
This was better in Transylvania as the Austro-Hungarians were better records keepers.
That, and the old Count was able to remember where all the bodies were buried.
My people!
Thanks for this, Pie.
Reality can be depressing. Some say cream rises to the top. I say, shit floats.
I neglected to add – Thanks, Pie! Interesting and depressing write-up.
Too late.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/gone-gone-anheuser-busch-fires-pro-trans-marketing-execs-who-destroyed-brand
Not a bad article for a vampire, Pie. Sorry your people’s wealth was stolen and then sold too quickly once returned in part.