Young kids hooked on paint fumes, living like rats, etc

He rented this documentary called "Children Underground" about
street kids living in a subway station in Romania's capital,
Bucharest. Of course it was sad to see 8, 9 and 10 year olds
hooked on paint fumes, living like rats, etc. Their lives were
very violent and full of despair. Apparently the streets are
full of these kinds of children. They run away from homes
where their parents are too poor to feed them, or they run
away from orphanages. He could vaguely remember hearing about the
horrific overcrowded orphanages that were discovered when
Ceausescu was overthrown and then killed in 1989 but he never
knew how those orphanages became so crowded.

When Ceausescu was in power he banned abortion and contraceptives
so he could increase his workforce -- don't you love communism?
The result was a disaster. Orphanages soon filled up as the
working poor (most of the country) could not feed or support
their unwanted children. The consequences are still felt today
as there are an estimated 20,000 street children in Romania.
Anyway, I just found it interesting that this was mostly the
result of the banning of abortion and contraceptives.

He highly recommends the movie, too. You can rent it from Netflix.

Victor Carter wrote:

He rented this documentary called "Children Underground" about
street kids living in a subway station in Romania's capital,
Bucharest. Of course it was sad to see 8, 9 and 10 year olds
hooked on paint fumes, living like rats, etc. Their lives were
very violent and full of despair. Apparently the streets are
full of these kinds of children. They run away from homes
where their parents are too poor to feed them, or they run
away from orphanages. He could vaguely remember hearing about the
horrific overcrowded orphanages that were discovered when
Ceausescu was overthrown and then killed in 1989 but he never
knew how those orphanages became so crowded.

When Ceausescu was in power he banned abortion and contraceptives
so he could increase his workforce -- don't you love communism?
---------------
That wasn't communism, that was feudalism. He was a dictator who
was supported by the rich.


The result was a disaster. Orphanages soon filled up as the
working poor (most of the country) could not feed or support
their unwanted children. The consequences are still felt today
as there are an estimated 20,000 street children in Romania.
Anyway, I just found it interesting that this was mostly the
result of the banning of abortion and contraceptives.

He highly recommends the movie, too. You can rent it from Netflix.
-----------------
Yup.

Just get your enemies right, the Right is the enemy of humanity,
not the Left. The Right are those who want to be a rich privileged
class who have a majority class of under-paid worker-slaves. The
Right always want to suppress contraception and abortion, because
they allow the poor to prosper economically by controlling family
size.

The Left are those who want Capitalist Feudalism controlled by
Majority Democracy which enforces economic Fairness and Equality,
and an end to the Rich Thief class.
Steve

Xc1-A4_88-16_99 wrote:

R. Steve Walz wrote:

---------------
That wasn't communism, that was feudalism. He was a dictator who
was supported by the rich.

Learn the facts Walz.
------------------------
I KNOW the facts.


Both systems view man and society as purely economic entities; both crush
the human spirit, both lead to enslavement and destruction of culture and
race.
----------------------------------
Nonsense, unless you mean feudalism and capitalism. They are one and
the same.


by John Young

MOST AMERICANS have grown up under the erroneous assumption that capitalism
and communism are polar opposites, because the former system provides for
private ownership of property, whereas the latter does not.
----------------------
Lie. The only "property" that communism collectivizes is the means
of production. It liberates residential property to the resident of
that property, unlike capitalism, which keeps vassal serfs paying
tribute for it monthly to the rich landlord for their whole lives.


Like most effective lies, this misconception is promulgated through the
absence of full information, thereby leading to false conclusions.

On its face, capitalism allows for the ownership of private property; but
upon closer examination, that ownership is illusory and conditional.

Under capitalism, most significant individual property - such as real estate
- is purchased through loans which, if unpaid, serve to relieve the
borrower of ownership of the property without even a court proceeding, even
if the borrower has already paid the lender several times the amount
originally borrowed.

Even if the property is owned outright, it can be seized by just about any
lawyer. If, for example, someone slips and falls while on the property, a
lawyer can quickly relieve the property owner of any ownership rights
unless he has previously agreed to make large and lifelong payments to the
insurance corporations. But insurance comes with myriad clauses and
exemptions, including a long list of things the insured must do - and must
not do - on his property in order to be protected. Thus, the owner is
compelled to give up many of the assumed rights of ownership in exchange
for imperfect protection.

Of course, no insurance protects property against government seizure. The
IRS seizes 10,000 homes a year; and civil property forfeiture - where the
owner of the property need not even be charged with a crime - is used some
3,600 times a day in America to seize everything from cash to cars to real
estate.

In practice, then, ownership is illusory since there are a bunch of
government agencies, insurance agencies, and mortgage contracts that tell
people what they can or can't do with their property; and it is conditional
in that missing just a couple of payments, getting sued, or getting in the
crosshairs of the government will terminate even the illusion. What an
owner really has, instead of ownership, is temporary exclusive use within a
set of guidelines established by mortgage companies, insurance companies,
and numerous governmental entities.
-----------------------------
Communism completely exempts residences from ANY AND ALL economic
threats, by removing them totally from commerce, even making it
iollegal to sell residences, but only allowing one to trade his
property for another by mutual agreement. Under Communism the ONLY
value a home has is the value of one home, and it cannot be traded
for anything else. Communism defends everyone's right to their
home, totally without any economic fetter or threat.


Capitalism, in effect, has very little to do with ownership of private
property by ordinary people; and everything to do with their enslavement by
an elite. A closer look at the finances involved in the preceeding
hypothetical house reveals quite a lot.

An important thing to understand is that various governmental and banking
machinations distort the free market and artificially raise the price of
housing. Unlimited immigration - even if the immigrants aren't going to the
particular neighborhood in which a particular house exists, still serves to
raise the price because of the phenomenon of White Flight which raises
demand.
----------------------------
It doesn't have to, they are unrelated. This is a racist allegation
introduced as polluted illogic.


The deductibility of mortgage interest serves to increase the price
of homes, as does the existence of mortgages at all.

Mortgages raise the price of housing by placing buyers who plan to pay back
loans over a period of thirty years in competition with buyers who have
saved up their money to buy the house outright. A person can much more
easily come up with a large loan than actually save money; and the amount
of money accessible by financing far exceeds what the average person is
able to save in a reasonable amount of time. Likewise, the availability of
financing raises demand, and thus prices. Since not all houses go up for
sale simultaneously, just a small proportion of buyers using mortgages can
raise the price of houses outside the range of people who are trying to
save the money to buy a house without a mortgage. In practice, then, wide
availability of mortgages causes prices to rise at a rate faster than the
rise in wages, meaning that saving to buy a house outright without a
mortgage is impossible for most people. So the mechanism of mortgages in
and of itself serves to raise the price of housing high enough that
mortgage loans are required in order to purchase a house at all.
--------------------------
This is true.


Here is a case where capitalism in the form of banking is obviously in play,
but the actual free market is distorted rather than facilitated by capital,
----------------
You don't understand here, the so-called "Free Market" is not
"distorted", instead, IT *IS* the distortion ITSELF!! In ANY
system that permits the stronger to enslave the weaker, this
will happen. It must be forbidden.

The supposed "freedom of price" enables the assignment of phony
prices to things so that labor can be stolen by those who don't
work for a living, the rich!! The so-called "Free Market" is
the SlAVE MARKET!!


and the distortion is to the detriment of people who wish to own a house,
both in terms of absolute price, and in terms of the excessive costs
incurred through purchasing via a mortgage.

In practice, using a mortgage to purchase a house destroys, in absolute
terms, any financial benefits of ownership.
-------------------------
Absolutely!


As an example, take the case of a house purchased for $170,000 using 100%
financing at an interest rate of 7.5%. The average person stays in a
particular home for five years. Assume that the price of the property
appreciates at 4% compounded annually, which is double the rate of
inflation, so that the property sells in five years for $206,830, at which
point he still owes $160,850 on the mortgage - netting the owner $45,980 in
cash, minus the 6% real estate commission of $12,400 for a net profit of
$33,580. Not including any upkeep and maintenance requirements, what did
the owner have to invest in order to net $33,580?

First, he paid about $9,000 in closing costs for the loan. Then he made
sixty monthly payments of $1,189, for a total of $71,340. Then, he paid
$3,100 a year in property taxes for a total of $15,500. Finally, he paid
homeowner's insurance of $710/year for a total of $3,550. The grand total
of his investments over five years, from which he has netted $33,580, is
$99,390. So, over a five year period, even with the value of his house
increasing at a compound rate double the rate of inflation, he has actually
lost $65,810.

So, if the owner has lost - who has gained? Mainly the bank. Over the same
five year period, the bank has collected about $80,000 including closing
costs. The bank's cost for the money from the Federal Reserve was only
$8,500, netting the bank a cool $71,500 without ever breaking a sweat.
Since the property owner needs to earn about $62,000 yearly in order to
afford such a large mortgage, that means that over the prior sixty months,
he has worked fifteen months for the bank - or fully 25% of all of his
productive effort has gone to producing $71,500 in free and clear profit to
the bank and $8,500 to the Federal Reserve. At the end of the five years,
he still has no practical ownership since, if he gets injured and misses
just a couple of payments, the bank will simply take ownership of the
property, sell it themselves for $206,830, and distribute far less than the
$33,580 to the erstwhile owner since they get to deduct all of their
"reasonable" legal costs. In practice then, after sixty months of hard work
- the bank has everything, and the owner has nothing.

This is the "ownership of private property" of which capitalists are so
appreciative. In practice, private ownership only serves to force people to
invest 25% of their productive effort into the banks, while reserving for
the banks all of the real power so that anyone who finds himself injured or
out of work for even a relatively short time is quickly reduced to absolute
destitution.
--------------
Absolutely!


The only difference between such Capitalism and Bolshevism is
that the illusion of private ownership serves to keep the workers more
motivated, so they work harder. But they are still slaves in that they have
no real claim of ownership to most of the results of their productive
labor.
------------------
Bolshevism means rule by the Majority, and the Majority would never
vote themselves into such slavery, so you are mistaken.


In the one case the Politburo members lived large, while in the
other case the bankers live large. But in both cases, at the end of the
day, the workers on the global ant farm end up with nothing. Capitalism and
Bolshevism are both, therefore, alternate means to the same end.
----------------------------------
Politburo Feudalism that disguised itself as "communism" in Russia
and China is not Bolshevist Communism AT ALL! They only CALLED it
"communism" because that was a new popular idea among the people
at that time, people who were becoming radicalized toward revolutionary
insurrection.

The Russian Politburo and Chinese "central committee" were actually
the advantaged "aparratchiks" who ran the government apparatus back
during Tsarist rule in Russia and the last Chinese imperium, and
these educated people simply took advantage of the farmers who
had mistakenly placed trust in them, they reconstructed a monarchy
without a head, and then simply enriched themselves with it. Thus
the revolution in both nations were quashed in the womb.


Private ownership of businesses is very little different. Communism is often
described as a system in which ownership of the "means of production" is
vested in the state as a proxy for the people; which in practical terms
means that control of the means of production lies in the hands of a
powerful elite.
-----------------------
Again, that's NOT "communism" at ALL!!


Capitalism is supposed to be different in that ownership,
and therefore control, lies in private hands. In practice, though, this is
not the case since control lies with government rather than the "owners."
In a democracy, elections are controlled through media perception; so
whoever controls the media controls elections in the main; and so, in
practice, control by government also translates into control by a small
elite.

Control of private business becomes vested in the government through the
clever mechanism known as "incorporation." Unincorporated businesses vest
liability in the individuals within that business, especially the owner.
Long ago, lawyerly notions of tort and "joint and several liability"
created an environment in which no individual would be able to do business
productively since all of his profits - and then some - could be gobbled up
by lawyers at the drop of a hat. Thus came the idea of incorporation - in
which the state created a corporation - an artificial person - in law
which, at least in theory, the owners could control as a proxy while
limiting their civil liability. The problem lies in the fact that a
corporation is actually a creation of government rather than the creation
of an individual, and therefore, once created, has to live under laws of
government that would affect corporations but not individuals. Natural
persons have rights, however imperfect; but corporations do not. Likewise,
the laws for corporations were crafted by the very same lawyers from whom
people seeking to gain some protection through incorporating were trying to
shield themselves. As such, incorporation is just another scheme for
vesting all important control in the hands of an elite, while reserving all
the liabilities for the owners.

This has even had an appreciable effect of the separation of church and
state, whereby churches which incorporate in order to shield themselves
from liability from an attendee slipping and falling on the front steps,
have found themselves forced to follow government dictates that would
conflict with their religious views. Government laws against discrimination
on the basis of religion, for example, force incorporated churches to hire
individuals who don't even subscribe to their religion.

So, as a result of government regulatory control of corporations, they
serve, in practice, as extensions of government power rather than as the
portrayed bastions of private initiative and free choice. Corporations
collect federal withholding taxes, enforce affirmative action laws which
take away choice in hiring, enforce political correctness with an iron fist
against people who express disallowed views even when outside the
workplace, and otherwise act as a proxy for government rather than
individuals. They serve as a mechanism for applying economic pressure to
individuals in order to make them conform to societal standards generated
by an elite.

Once a company has become publicly traded, the matter gets even worse in
that, through the action of numerous regulations, the original creators of
the enterprise can be forced out entirely and replaced with individuals who
work better within the corporate framework. This can also be done simply
through a cabal purchasing enough corporate stock. In this way,
corporations can be perverted from their original goals; as happened when
Michael Eisner took over the Disney Corporation and started cranking out
pornography and propaganda destructive to Western peoples and values.
----------------------
That's not true, he merely published what people wanted. Pornography
IS what people in western society want! And so-called "western values"
that are subverted by pornograqphy simply are NOT actually western
values, but are only the minority values of the rightist reactionary
portion of society who are as backward as the Taliban we've been
fighting in the middle east!!!


Controlling a huge media empire, corporations such as Disney can also
control the fate of other corporations and even legislators through
selective and biased reporting giving them enormous power.
--------------------------
To prevent corporations from warring like feudal kingdoms, they must
be brought under Majority government controland ownership, and run for
the Majority's interests, not those of these private rich warlords!!

That is the meaning of the People owning the means of production in
common!!


The concept of ownership is tightly linked with the idea of control. If
someone owns something, they control it in nearly every respect that
doesn't harm others. But in the case of corporations, the idea of ownership
has been separated from the idea of control; leaving the least important
decisions in the hands of the owners, while all of the important policy
decisions are made by government. On top of this, the original shield
against liability has long since been compromised, particularly in matters
related to political incorrectness and taxation for which individual
employees can be held liable, along with the corporation.

All of the foregoing should put the capitalist notion of private ownership
of the "means of production" into better perspective. In the case of both
Capitalism and Bolshevism an enterprise's most important decisions are
controlled by the state, thus vesting effective control, and thus
ownership, in the state.
--------------------
IF ONLY that were true!! So far the Rich in the west own the Govt!
The Majority govt has little power over them!


In both cases the personnel running the enterprise
serve at the pleasure of the state, and can be removed from that control at
any time.
--------------------
HAH! If ONLY!!


In both cases, enterprises serve to extend the supervision and
power of the state into the lives of the workers.
----------------------
WRONG, Capitalism extends the POWER OF THE RICH into GOVT, polluting
Democratic Majority control of it. The same is true of the Feudalism
that was Russia and is China, those are merely the Rich absconding
with an entire people's govt!!

That is NOT what Democratic Majority Governent does!!


The only practical
difference is that in a capitalist system, as long as participants play by
the rules, they can derive greater profit without having to hide it from
the workers;
------------------
These rich *******s don't hide it from the workers ANYWHERE!!
Who do you think waits on them!!??


but in all other respects it serves the same end in both
systems, with only a difference in methodology.
----------------------
You're propagating the LIE that Capilalism and supposed communsim are
somehow the same, but as example of communism you are citing ONLY
a Phony Crypto-Feudalism that is NOT True Communism AT ALL but merely
the same as Capitalism!!

Are you trying to claim we can't GET what we want, so we should just
go back to sleep and let the Rich Rule!!!!????? If you're suggesting
that all you are doing is shilling for the Rich ****, by trying to
simply dispirit everyone about EVER getting what the People WANT!!!

{More of his blather]

[Finally:]

The time draws nigh for the revelation of the lies and the unmasking of the
liars. The time draws nigh for free enterprise, true ownership of property,
and freedom from control by purveyors of philosophical poison.
---------------------------
THAT'S ALL NONSENSE!! Those sorts of "freedoms" are what LET these
greedy *******s take over in the FIRST PLACE!! This "Free Enterprise"
you speak of is the unfettered license for the Rich to take over
EVERYTHING and ENSLAVE EVERYONE with their corporations and their
BANKS owning the GOVERNMENT!!

INSTEAD we need Majority Democratic power be used to GUARANTEE OUR
EQUALITY BY BRUTE FORCE, and to hell with these supposed "rights"
that ONLY the rich will be allowed to USE!!


The time
draws nigh when, once again, an American can speak his thoughts without
fear; which means that the slippery ones will have a great deal to fear,
and had best be packing their bags.
-----------------------------
THAT will ONLY happen when the Majority votes for REAL Communism,
wherein EVERYONE'S HOME becomes THEIRS INSTANTLY and which NO one
can take away from them, and where they are guaranteed the SAME
WAGE PER HOUR for work that everyone votes to have done for us,
and where the banks are all destroyed, and everyone is guaranteed
health care and support in their retirement.
Steve

"Xc1-A4_88-16_99" wrote in message
...
R. Steve Walz wrote:

As an example, take the case of a house purchased for $170,000 using 100%
financing at an interest rate of 7.5%. The average person stays in a
particular home for five years. Assume that the price of the property
appreciates at 4% compounded annually, which is double the rate of
inflation, so that the property sells in five years for $206,830, at which
point he still owes $160,850 on the mortgage - netting the owner $45,980
in
cash, minus the 6% real estate commission of $12,400 for a net profit of
$33,580. Not including any upkeep and maintenance requirements, what did
the owner have to invest in order to net $33,580?

I love critiques of capitalism and believe that they have a lot of validity,
but in this particular case not only did the home owner get a net profit of
$33K, you should also calculate into that profit/loss statement the fact
that they had a place to live for five years, which, if you assume a $1000
per month rental rate for a house, is $60,000 worth of rent saved.
Shouldn't their paper profit actually incorporate that?

I know that a house isn't a great invesetment, but unlike other securities,
I can live in it as it appreciates in value.

"Shawn Barnhart" wrote in message
.. .

what did
the owner have to invest in order to net $33,580?

Risk? House prices go down as well as up. Lots of people lost money and some
even their houses in the UK after the 80's boom went bust.