On Tue, 7 Jan 1997, Doug Henwood wrote: > Think of it this way: getting the government to buy stocks from rich folks > - what tech analysts on Wall Street call "distribution," the transfer of > stocks from smart to dumb, rich to poor, or whatever unfavorable binary you > want to use - would be a great use of public money, no? But they're not buying from the rich. They're buying from firms, which are owned by the rich, and they're becoming co-owners. Investment bankers will now have trillions in new funds to play around with, investing them in marginal companies and screwing everyone else over, including the rest of the bourgeoisie. The only thing I can figure out is that the people on Wall Street aren't Marxists so they don't see it this way. But somehow I don't think you have to be a Marxist to see the potential effect on stock prices. It may be good for JP Morgan, but it sure as hell won't be good for any of their clients or stockholders. So aside from the traders themselves, who would want such a thing? > But as they also say on Wall Street, a bear market is when money returns to > its rightful owners (like the Rockefellers). Could you elaborate on this, Doug? As far as I know, a bear market is when money returns to those who are either lucky enough to have predicted it or cautious or rich enough to have diversified their portfolios and everyone else (including some Rockerfellers) gets royally fucked. Either way, a bear market of this proportion strikes me as the "massive destruction of capital values" or whatever it was that Marx called a depression that many claim the government has been doing its damnedest to stave off for twenty-five years. Why the sudden change of heart? Is there a new ruling-class consensus or faction that wants this to happen, like those German industrialists who supported Hitler's autarky program? I just really don't get it. Becoming more of a dogmatic essentialist through the course of the discussion, Tavis
