Thursday, October 23, 2014

Mike Bird — George Soros: 'Wake Up, Europe!'

Multibillionaire investor George Soros has issued a warning to Europe's democracies over the threat that a resurgent Russia poses to the continent.

In an essay published Thursday in the New York Review of Books, Soros calls for more economic and military support for Ukraine, as well as the abandonment of the eurozone's current austerity programs.
Business Insider
George Soros: 'Wake Up, Europe!'
Mike Bird

11 comments:

Ignacio said...

Talking about Soros and his INET initiative, an interesting hypothesis, from 'Real-World Economics Review no.67': George Soros’ INET: an institute to improve the world
or a Trojan horse of the financial oligarchy?

Matt Franko said...

I keep coming back to how Putin/Russia reneged and cut off the gas back in the middle of the last decade... this type of thing doesnt sit well with TPTB...

So Soros says here: "Now Russia is presenting an alternative that poses a fundamental challenge to the values and principles on which the European Union was originally founded. It is based on the use of force that manifests itself in repression at home and aggression abroad, as opposed to the rule of law."

What 'rule of law' did Russia break? All I can think of is that once the nat gas prices went up they tore up the original deal.....

Matt Franko said...

Ignacio from the paper:

"Let’s assume that there is a financial oligarchy..."

right there is a cognitive bias imo...

rsp,

Matt Franko said...

to be scientific wouldnt we not want to assume anything?

Ignacio said...

You assume stuff when you make hypothesis, that's how science is done. Those assumptions should be as coherent as possible with previous observations. This assumptions could be wrong, and eventually be proven wrong by new observation though. We can never observe reality 'as it is', so that's how we make progress on science, always 'knowing better' than the day before but never 'fully knowing' how reality works, and what you think is true one day can be wrong the next. This shouldn't preclude us from making hypothesis.

This happens more often than not when the subject of study is human behaviour. that said, this article is highly speculative I would classify it as "opinion journalism" not as a scientific paper tbh, but still interesting to read and the author himself states that INET and Soros could be honest initiatives after all but some stuff rises an eyebrow. ffs Peter Thiel was invited to an INET conference.

I think there is certain basis for saying there is a 'financial oligarchy', in the classic sense of the word. Not an organised cabal, but there are certainly financial oligarchs with their own interests, and some have direct ties with some of the establishment and try to influence and exploit the system all the time (ie. big banks directly influencing the FED regulators and Treasury operations). We also know these guys try to influence (and sometimes succeed) policy and the academe by the means of financing individuals and operations (ie. Koch or the Petersons etc.

All of this is well documented, so why Soros couldn't be doing the same thing.

Matt Franko said...

Ok about 'assumptions'... maybe I should have asked if we should have evidence that supports any assumptions?

Iow there is no evidence that there is this 'financial oligarchy' so why would we start with that assumption?

Looks to me there are a bunch of self interested wealthy morons jetting all around going to each other's meetings to try to look important. ...

I'd start with that assumption. ... rsp

Matt Franko said...

Those people at Real World Economic Review have a political view that results in a cognitive bias...

So they start with this 'oligarchy' assumption... which is a fantasy...

Its like that Guinan guy Bill wrote about ... "MMT has no political agenda".... these people don't care about the science th e y care about the political results so this causes a cognitive bias...

Its like "the emperor has no clothes" but they support the emperor policy so they can't see him as naked.... they see him as fully dressed. ... ie cognitive bias...

In this case they start hallucinating that there is an ' oligarchy'.... instead of just sticking to the science. ..

We should have to supply evidence for any assumptions. .. rsp

Ignacio said...

"Looks to me there are a bunch of self interested wealthy morons jetting all around going to each other's meetings to try to look important. ..."

In practice this would still work for the hypothesis. They try (important word being try) to influence policy and academe through their own private initiatives to advance their own interests. What is questioned is if in the case of INET: a) it's honest and some of the people that has been involved or connected with the project is just a misfortune because X factors; or b) these efforts are consequential with an ulterior objective by Soros and some friends which are part of the high finance to advance further 'wealth' and/or 'power'.

I agree is unlikely that this is a 'coordinated effort' to undermine honest advance in economic theory and/or policy in favour of some oligarchs. But that does not point out that Soros intentions could be anything but honest and there is an ulterior objective.

Personally? I think this man is too old and is just trying to do something useful before he dies, save 'open society' (how he describes the post-WWII western consensus) from the current dynamic of the system. Why certain absolute nutjobs have been invited to talk in those events? Maybe because they think they have something interesting to say, or to give an appearance of tolerance and discussion. Anyway, is it important? I don't think so, academe rarely influences political (incl. policy) and social trends, so it's all hopeless IMO, but at least they are funding some interesting research programs better than usign money to gamble it in the financial casino.

Tom Hickey said...

Monarchs and dictators were not necessarily tyrants and oligarchs and aristocrats are not necessarily bad either. In an aristocracy the nobles are supposed to be noble in the sense of noblesse oblige. Where natural leadership prevails this tends to be the case. Where "nobility" is hereditary, not so much. This is the case in hereditary monarchies, hereditary dictatorships (NK, Syria), and hereditary oligarchies including oligarchic democracies in which wealth is inherited and dynasties arise.

These are different types of government that differ from popular democracy. Republics as representative democracies are not popular democracies either and are generally designed to insure that the people as a whole only have limited participation in governance.

The US began as a republic or representative democracy and one only need peruse the thoughts of the founders to understand that they regard popular democracy as rule of the rabble. The only question at the time was how fine a filter to impose in order to insure continued rule of the people "fit to rule."

The way Chief Justice John Jay expressed it was, "Those that own the country should rule the country." This is the traditionally conservative viewpoint and it is opposed by the liberal viewpoint of government of the people, by the people and for the people, or popular democracy.

In popular democracy the people make the laws whereas in a representative democracy they choose representatives that make the laws. That lends itself to oligarchic democracy in a society in which campaigns are expensive and chiefly funded by the wealthy, setting up a conflict of interest.

Tom Hickey said...

"Iow there is no evidence that there is this 'financial oligarchy' so why would we start with that assumption?"

Simon Johnson, Financial Oligarchy and the Crisis.

Journal: In your article, "The Quiet Coup," which appeared in The Atlantic (May 2009), you refer to this phenomenon as cultural capture. Could you explain this term?

Johnson: It refers to a particularly unusual form of oligarchy in the financial industry that rules not through intimidation or corruption, but through convincing people that more finance is good, more unfettered finance is better, and completely unregulated finance is best.


I don't think that "oligarchy" necessarily means conspiracy. It means that there is a group or entire class that enjoys privilege, such as access to the halls of power that other classes don't enjoy at the same level. This is pretty well established in sociology and poli sci, so would not say that it is an assumption other than in the sense of assuming prior knowledge, which all disciplines do without stating it explicitly.

It's basically agreed in soc and poli sci that in contemporary societies there is generally a heterogenous ruling class in which different groups pursue group interest and may even see class interest somewhat differently. In contrast, those not in the ruling class have relatively little participation in decision-making. Technically speaking, this is oligarchy.

Generally speaking, if one is using prior knowledge that is key to one's argument, then the scholarly tradition requires documenting sources. However, in cases where it is presumed that everyone is quite familiar with the debate, citation can be omitted as redundant and too profuse or unnecessary citation can come across as pedantic.

So I'm not concerned with "financial oligarchy" as an assumption, and I would say that Soros fits the profile.

BTW, I was listening to Soros being interviewed on BBC News yesterday about Ukraine, Russia, Putin and the EU. I tuned in after the start so I didn't know it was Soros at first. I though it was one of the rabid neocons. The BBC interviewer brought up the neo-Nazi issue and Soros blew it off by saying that this had little to do with the Ukraine and that it was really a military attack on the EU by Putin that needed to be confronted as such and repulsed.

The next interview was even worse. It was with a pro-Russian Eastern Ukrainian rebel who talked about an Orthodox Christian "Al Qaeda" and the need to march to the Danube to recover territory lost to Rome and the European secular humanists.

Nuttiness on all sides in the heart of Europe — again.

Ignacio said...

Putin is back at it btw: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-10-24/putin-warns-risk-major-conflict-says-dollar-losing-reserve-currency-status