You say that like those are bad things.

Taking money from the rich? Fuck yes. In case you missed it, they've been taking money from you for decades.

Killing babies? Well, most people would call it "allowing a woman to decide what happens to her body", but either way, there are too many damn people on the planet, so anything that lowers the birth rate is good.

Oppressing business owners? How exactly? Making them pay their employees a fair wage? Not allowing them to discriminate against people? Making sure they don't fuck up the environment? Zero problems with any of that.

Allowing illegal immigrants to enter? Leaving aside the fact that that is completely untrue, immigrants commit less crime, work harder and contribute to your economy. Get rid of the immigrants and watch your country fall apart in a week.

Get rid of capitalism? The fucking DEMOCRATS? Seriously, you think the democrats are socialist? You seriously need to see the rest of the world. In most other developed countries the democrats would be the right wing party.

But capitalism is ultimately on borrowed time anyway. Not in the short to medium term, but in 30-50 years, capitalism won't be sustainable. You can't have a capitalist system if the majority of the populace is unemployable (see automation, AI, etc).

If Hinkley Point C is any indication, you're not going to find someone to finance/build a nuclear power plant, not in a capitalist society.

It's a massive upfront investment that private entities are basically allergic to; it cannot be insured due to the massive damage caused if things go south on you, so you need the government to act as a backstop; the price you'd have to charge per MWh is humongous compared to solar/wind, so you need massive subsidies, and that's without the ridiculous amount of rent-seeking corporations insist on nowadays.

That, to me, sounds like private is out. Hinkley Point C is being built by EDF, aka the French state, and EDF is struggling not be dragged into the abys by Areva, after the EPR in Flamanville is nothing short of a financial disaster. And we're not even talking about the troubles they are in for having fudged the specifications on the pressure vessels of more than 20 French power plants. Cost-cutting measures, as always.

So, which capitalist state is going to pick up the tab? Any volunteers? Over here, we cannot even get bridges fixed before they collapse...

And to be honest, I'm not entirely sure I would want a profit-oriented enterprise or austerity-supporting government construct something like an NPP these days. Look at the construction sites at Flamanville and Olkiluoto, they are modern towers of Babylon, with subcontractors of subcontractors from 30 different countries working for povery wages. Anyone think either of these, should they ever be finished at all, will come even close to the safety standards layed out in their official plans?

The window panes are political quadrants. The lower right corner is punched out, indicating the man is anarcho-capitalist. The lamp is tilted toward the newspaper to bring light upon the Sri Lankan Civil War, which was set off by an ambush the day after this comic was published. (That's why the newspaper is blank. Nothing newsworthy compared to the following days/week.) The meat on the table symbolizes the impending carnage, as thousands would die, and 150,000 made homeless.

In terms of the UK, your average house price was under £10 000 in the 70s. If wages had increased at the same rate as house prices have increased, which is not an unreasonable request, especially if you're mocking them for not having the money, then the average wage would be £87 000. Alternatively, if house prices had increased at the same rate as wages have, the average house would be worth around £60 000. It's no good talking about people buying iPhones when that disparity exists - if anything, the iPhones help distract them from their poverty.

It's been rigged for 40 years now, bob. Who do you think a landlord/renter economy benefits more - the young or the old? You are blind to the reality of life for people just starting out.

Sooner or later, civilisation is going to have to change to account for this. You can call me a lefty all you like, but the numbers don't lie - this isn't sustainable, the cost of living does not match full time pay for a huge number of people, including necessary and skilled jobs like nurses and teachers (in the UK).

It's no longer about aspiration, or working harder at school. Average people are struggling and that should be a concern to you if you care about society at all. In fact, if you're a die-hard, card carrying, flag waving capitalist it should worry you. Landlords aren't wealth creators.

Oh btw, I informed myself better about this case now, and I dont agree with what the source of eric3579 says anymore.

What his source hides is, she was about 5 minutes away from the cabin when she asked about the dogs and her friends. Sure, "Tami" is an ass for agreeing to it at first, but you have to be a very audacious person to drive "hours" with your friends and pets and then ask minutes before you arrive if its ok to bring them. That alone is reason enough to cancel that reservation. Thats why she called her a con artist.
Calling her "Asian" and stuff was just much later, and actually her behavior is that of an Asian stereotype, so... race? No. But of course she interpreted it like that, if you look at her career. Shes an anti-capitalist and other things that fit so very well into her acting.

Nothing would have changed, if Tami would have said no from the beginning. Because they were almost there anyway. They would have wasted that time on their own account in any case. But she tried to spin a race case out of this, because she didnt get her will. And many many people got fooled by it.
And that alone, driving hours with your friends and pets, and only announcing minutes before arrival that those pets and people are coming with them, and even finding a film crew that quickly, them setting this up so perfectly, makes this story look absolutely planned and the race thing just played into her hands a little bit (not really if you examine it closely). There is no denying it. We all have been fooled.

People like her are even trying to make a race thing out of the United case.

I was about the reply to Bobknight - to say basically the same thing.

Unfortunately, a lot of us who are "liberal" can't understand this. There is truth to it, I'm not going to say that it isn't batshit crazy but for instance, I worked 5 days at a design temp job (before I quit and got the job of a lifetime a week later) and the owner was an older lady. She listened to FOX news ALL DAY long, totally in the box and in the zone for the alt-right mentality.

She, as a small business owner, who probably has other "conservative"(extremist) friends on the Chamber of Commerce (of which she was a part of) really believed that Trump as a "BUSINESS" person would be a great president in creating a better economy for"business"(tax loopholes everywhere, YES!!! No living wage or minimum wage increases, YESSS!!! fucking dicks the lot of em). I had to listen to this shit for those 5 days, but yeah - people really believe(d) it. There are business people out there, who aren't Bobknights eating doritoes in that wheel-less, rusted, mobile home in the trailer park waiting for the next tornado to plop down on tornado alley and give them the ultimate ride to the otherside, that believed in having a business person in the white house a good thing (fucking capitalists and terribly ignorant poor people IMO lol).

Media is in a real shithole these days. I mean, I still listen to Democracy Now! & NPR... but everything is slanted one-way or another...

Your video, John Cleese - Church of JC Capitalist, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

Man being police in a fervently capitalist individualist society awash with firearms just seems like a really bad choice in life. There are clear blue bays in latin america that need fishermen, european cities that need aoustic guitar players..

I've noticed even sharkier tactics employed in the Bay Area - such as a company called Breeze where people lease the car from them and pay @ $200.00/week to Breeze to use the car as a Uber or Lyft driver.

For some reason people refuse to look at the math. I think I was that way when I was in my early twenties so I get it but it's scary; once the drivers figure out that they aren't going to be able to make ends meet they will be in a bind with Breeze who won't accept the car back unless it's absolutely in perfect condition...

I think I read that both Uber & Lyft are trying to go for the "no credit" crowd in loaning cars out to pump up their exploited workforce.

Beware. Capitalist fucks at work.

@bobknight33 --

I continue to agree with you on a lot of what you're saying (but not all).

Trump and Sanders are both riding a wave of frustration in the people, as you say. Their current popularity, even if both only go downhill from here, has already partially sent that message to both parties. I don't think Trump would make a good president, but if he wins the election I think that really hammering home that message of frustration could be a significant positive outcome. Same goes for some hypothetical scenario resulting in Sanders getting elected, although I personally feel quite positive about the other stuff that I think Sanders would bring to the table, unlike how I feel about Trump.

If there's one area where I think the government could stand to get *bigger*, it's in oversight, evaluation, and accountability. Being under the microscope and heavily scrutinized perhaps isn't a recipe for optimal efficiency, but I think we desperately need more of it in government AND the private sector.

Early in my lifetime, a large corporation that had a relatively benign monopoly by today's standards was considered a big enough deal for the government to step in and break it up. AT&T / Bell got split into the "Baby Bells". Corporations now are vast juggernauts compared to that, but since they make gigantic profits I guess we collectively see them as bastions of Capitalism. But I think that in reality they are doing much more harm to Capitalism with their monopolies, collusion, and corruption.

I think Sanders is the candidate most likely to even *try* to do something to roll back that shift, and bring back oversight and accountability to government. Hillary sure as hell wouldn't do it. And I don't think Trump would either -- he is the literal face of a gigantic Corporation himself, after all.

I had high hopes for Obama. He didn't live up to them, but to be fair I think the lion's share of that is on the Legislative branch. That taught me to be careful about putting much of any stock into Presidential campaign promises, particularly about things outside the scope of what the Executive branch can actually do.

I think Trump and Clinton both put *themselves* first, ahead of all else. I don't think Clinton gives a flying fuck about any of us plebs, beyond attempting to pander to large demographic blocks of us just enough to secure our votes. Maybe Trump cares more for Joe Average than Clinton, but only incidentally -- as a Capitalist he needs Joe Averages to buy his products, and buy into his image.

I don't get the same read from Sanders. I think he actually does give a shit. A lot of his agenda would require a cooperative Legislature, which he wouldn't get -- just like Obama. So in terms of changing the status quo, perhaps his biggest impact would simply be in sending the establishment a loud and clear message that we are no longer content with business as usual in Washington. A message very similar to what electing Trump would send.

It would/ will take me some soul searching, but assuming that Hillary gets the Democrat nomination over Sanders, a desire to send that message might be enough to get me to vote for Trump. But voting for a reasonably tolerable option from a minor party might serve that end just as well. Say Jesse Ventura running as a Libertarian, or Jill Stein from the Green Party. Stein has the very distinct advantage (from my perspective) of being the only current candidate who has said that she would grant a Presidential pardon to Ed Snowden (although Ventura would too, IF he runs). Pardons are one of the few things that a President can actually *do* unilaterally -- and that makes that a pretty damn good "single issue" prompt for my vote, in my opinion.

I think a lot like you do -- big government is a problem. But, while the GOP loudly and constantly *declares* that it is the party opposed to big government, to me it seems pretty clear that that is no longer even remotely true (if it ever was).

Is Clinton even more in bed with all of that than Trump? Probably, yeah. But this isn't an issue that revolves around Republican vs Democrat lines. It absolutely does revolve around corporations.

Yay for Capitalism and everything, but if Capitalism is the ultimate motivator, it stands to reason that these giant corporations *must* be getting a return on their investment when they funnel huge sums of money into politics. Otherwise, as Capitalist enterprises, they wouldn't be doing it.

So while I tend to agree that big government tends to be worse than small government for quite a few reasons (harder to monitor for corruption, less efficient, etc.), I think that big corporations and big government represent a feedback loop that feed off of each other. Thinking that the problem lies in one but not the other is doing yourself a disservice.

Perhaps it would have been better to say that fuel isn't the only reason. The Airbus A320 in this example has roughly 55% better fuel efficiency than a pre oil crisis Boeing 707, although as Jimbo's big bag'o'trivia points out, that's barely better than the 1950s era prop planes like the Douglas DC-7.

Better automation has also allowed the A320 to reduce the staffing requirements, the 707 required 3 or 4 crew to operate the aircraft, but the A320 only requires 2. The DC-7 also requires 3 crew, but only seats half the passengers (doubling the flight crew costs per passenger).

Greater competition is probably a larger factor. Talking about airline profitability and competition, Warren Buffett joked that had a farsighted capitalist had been present at Kitty Hawk for the Wright Brothers' first flight, he would have done his successors a huge favor by shooting Orville down.

It would be a crying shame not to have this man president of the USA. There is such an opportunity right now to bring this capitalist madness back under the people's control, with Corbyn over here and Sanders over there. If it doesn't happen, it might end up being the biggest "what if" of my life. With global warming issues heavily involved - directly and indirectly through lobbying - this could be the last chance we have to save the world.

Not only that, but when you suffer at the hands of cold, calculating oppression lacking entirely in humanistic compassion, when its flashing a badge and looking down on you like lesser than an enemy, but a nothing, a problem, a defect barely worth your time that simply needs handcuffs and a room without a view. The bounds of civil society begin to evaporate, because you no longer have a value to western civilization. Your pursuit of happiness ends and the collapse of your individual capitalist worth plummets.

And then nothing matters. Nothing. I fully understand why some people pick up guns and bombs and go on rampages. Even if it sickens me to consider such atrocity, i get it. Im staring into the darkness and it stares back and it makes sense.

Maybe after years of worthless surveillance, the powers that be will begin to understand this simple and very human truth. Dont devalue other humans.

Ever.

*lies
*fear
8 years of Obama has failed America. Bernie wont be able to fix this.

When Bernie tries to take the rich Hollywood elites pay, try to take the rich politician pay and rich capitalists pay he will be block by the haves. Sounds good on paper but will fail before it even starts.