That was a good description of why that form of argument is successful, but the proposed solution seems unsatisfying. I mean, if you just shut down all contrary views by deleting the posts, banning the posters or ignoring them, it makes it seem like you're just trying to build a comfortable echo chamber. I feel like you've got to preserve the willingness to consider that you might be wrong, even when confronted with trolls.

15:05-15:30: you tell Mr and Mrs Front-Porch that your loonie of 1871 cannot be compared to your loonie of 2013 (year of this interview). You went off the gold standard in '33, you abandoned the peg in '70, and your currency has been free-floating ever since. Yes, the ratio of debt to GDP has some importance, but so does the nature of your currency. Just look at Greece and Japan, where the former uses a foreign currency and the latter uses its own, sovereign, free-floating currency.

Pay back the national debt -- have you thought that through?

First, the Bank of Canada is the monopolist currency issuer for the loonie, so explain to me in detail just how the issuer of the currency is supposed to borrow the currency from someone else? If you're the issuer of the currency, you spend it into existence, and use taxation as a means to create demand for your currency, and to free resources for the government to acquire, because you can only ever buy what is for sale.

Second, every government bond is someone else's asset. An interest-bearing asset. A very safe asset, in the case of Canada, the US, the UK, Japan, etc. "Paying back the debt" means putting a bullet into just about every pension fund in the world that doesn't rely exlusively on private equity or other sorts of volatile toilet paper.

There's a distributional issue with these bonds (they are concentrated in the hands of the non-working class, aka the rich), no doubt about it. But most of the other issues are strictly political, not economical.

What if the interest rate rises 1%? The central bank can lower the interest rate to whatever it damn well pleases, because nobody can ever outbid the currency issuer in its own currency. Remember, the central banks were the banks of the treasuries. The whole notion of an independent central bank was introduced to stop these pesky leftists from spending resources on plebs. That's why central banks were often removed from democratic control and handed over to conservative bankers. If the Treasury wants an interest rate of 2% on its bonds, it tells its central bank to buy any excess that haven't been auctioned off at this rate. End of story.

What if the market stops buying government bonds? Then the central bank buys the whole lot. However, government bonds are safe assets, and regulations demand a certain percentage of safe assets in certain portfolios, so there is always demand for the bonds. Just look at the German Bundesanleihen. You get negative real rates on 10 year bonds, and they are still in very high demand. It's a safe asset in a world of shitty private equity vaporware.

But, but.... inflation! Right, the hyperinflation of 2006 is still right around the corner. Just like Japan hasn't been stuck near deflation for two decades, and all the QE by the BoE and the ECB has thrown both the UK and the Eurozone into double-digit inflation territory. Not! None of these economies are running near maximum capacity/full employment, and very little actual spending (the scary, scary "fiscal policy") has been done.

But I'm going off track here, so.... yeah, you can pay back your public debt. Just be very aware of what exactly that entails.

As for the poster-child Latvia: >10% of the population left the country.

Here's a different poster-child instead, with the hindsight of another 4 years of austerity in Europe after this interview: Portugal. The Portuguese government told Master of Coin Schäube to take a hike, and they are now in better shape than the countries who just keep on slashing.

On a different note: Marx was wrong about the proletariat. Treating them like shit doesn't make them rebellious, it makes them lethargic. Otherwise goons like Mario Rajoy would have had their comeuppance by now.

PS: Blyth's book on Austerity is an absolute must-read for anyone interested in its history or its current effects in particularly the Eurozone.

*backup=[...snipped...]

It's not that easy. It's pretty simple economics. If there are jobs in an area, the people have more money, therefore the house prices go up.

If you move away, you're faced with the prospect of either not working or having a commute that is both a time and money vacuum.

@TheFreak, "work from home" isn't always a solution either. I'm a software developer... I should be the poster child for work from home, and after the earthquakes in 2011, I did for a year while we had no offices. But after a while, we realised that with all the technology in the world, there's no substitute for being in a room with other people to discuss things.

Man, those prison movie posters...

I think you will find that when people post a video about a law enforcement officer that shows a reasonable or heroic action in the line of duty, it gets voted up quite well.

The thing is, and I may be speaking out of my ass here without the statistics, most of our posters are going to post things they are exposed to more often. If they are in North America, it is likely they are going to post more videos about cops that are in the USA. Sadly, law enforcement in the USA is having a crisis of faith among the citizens being policed because we have had a few years of epic failures in duty being caught on camera.

So if you look at the sift in microcosm, you are going to noticed a preponderance of 'bad' cop videos. Whereas if you look at each poster, you will find that when they do find a video of an officer behaving in a laudable manner they will usually submit it.

No, you hate cops as do a lot of the posters on here. You have a problem with authority. Like these wankers, you'll stick up for and side with a complete arsehole who doesnt care if he kills your kids just because you hate the police and the law. No respect.

Sorry, this kind of thing upsets me more than makes me happy the pup is better now, because I had to see it terrified of being touched first.
It reminds me of the aspca commercials with abused animals, trying to touch your heart and get your donation, but that's abusive of the very people they are soliciting, animal lovers.
My wife blocked her sister on Facebook because she constantly posted similar videos and pictures, bumming my wife out to near tears daily.
I can't blame the poster, he labeled it well, but I still wasn't prepared for the screaming terror.
I need to go watch some more playing baby pygmy hippo now.

Edit: I must not have read the description when I said I can't blame the poster, because now that I see the message was his normal "if you eat meat you abuse animals" accusatory tripe, I totally blame him.

I'd guess the Firefly posters were more a nod to geeks. Deadpool 2's director, David Leitch (also directed John Wick), did stunt work in Serenity. Or could be a joke about Ryan Reynolds, Fireflies in the Garden, though that one is a bit more of a stretch. I'd guess it mostly is about just a nod for the sort of geeks who got behind the project in the first place... or perhaps a casting hint at who may be in Deadpool 2...

As for a rehabilitation idea, this may have filmed around the same time Fox said they'd be open to a reboot if Joss himself would be on board. Though given that came news came out in early February, I'd think this had already been filmed and in the bag by that point, unless they cut things that close in film making. If it was filmed after that news, then it certainly was a nod to that news.

I noticed the Firefly posters very prominently.
Their vote for next property to be rehabilitated? Plez?

*ban
Lax Posters
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFZPdIKOgcg

Naw, bro.

I'm talking about the whole embed itself, not yet clicked, sitting idle on a page... when you hover over it the poster starts switches every ~1 second progressively to another frame from the video.

You did good on that joke and on its explanation. I got it just fine without the commentary though.

I left your whole commentary here, because I make it a practice to delete all comments from my wall. Your essay needs to be saved for posterity.

So here is a quirk of Videosift.

If you are ignoring someone, and they make a comment on one of your videos, you will never get another email saying that comments have been made.

I had no idea of the implosion on that comment stream. Dear god in heaven.

What is really sad is I only wanted a temp ban. I honestly didn't know of @gorillaman's propensities. I am all for second, third and fourth chances -- even though some people have left the Sift in the past because the worst abusers were allowed back. I understood their pain, but I'm still all for more chances. If you love something enough, maybe you will change your behavior. I certainly don't change immediately. I will accord others the opportunity to learn over time.

So no edit help, huh? I think I'll use this:

As "Homeland Security" says, if you see something, SAY something. (Because here is the truth: As Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel wrote, "Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.")

Much cleaner. Don't need the snark bit. Quote marks. Gotta love 'em. (Quote marks, not parentheses, to denote snark. I'm getting old.)

I didn't address your tendency to tread lightly with me in my first response. I figured it was made up of three things:

1. My early days on the Sift, I had really thin skin. I was easily hurt and upset. One of the biggest gifts to me in my life was learning on the Sift to be clearer and stronger in my communications. And to walk away from the abusers. And to use the ignore button. I figured that my early reactions were in your brain pan still.

2. That tone of voice thing. It is real. What is a simple, clear declarative sentence in my head can be read as a whine-fest by others.

3. I think it is great that you write carefully when you write to me. Keep it up! It's called caring about the person you are talking to. I have zero problem with that. In fact, I see it as a Great Good. (Because if you aren't, and I lay my own internal tone of voice onto your words in a way that doesn't match the words in your head, you will be hearing from me. And I am just as verbose as you, my friend! A punishment worse than death!)

And yes. We are people who hang in there. It is a blessing and a curse.
Well, only a curse to those who roll their eyes and snort "good grief, just shut up!" I'm cool with it.

Thanks for hanging in with me. And I am truly sorry about gorillaman. He did it to himself, though. He did have other choices.

In solidarity, I say to you -- Fuck Homeland Security and ginned up xenophobia and racism.

(A poet? Do you write epic odes? Surely not haikus!)

Hi everyone - I am a proud citizen born and raised in the good ol' US of A. I'm not sure why this person 'chicchorea' is wanting to ban me, but it sounds like he is accusing me of being the original owner and uploader of the video on YouTube which is absolutely not the case. I found a funny short video on YouTube, read all of the posting guidelines multiple times, and in no way does it show that I am violating any of them.
I apologize as this is my very first video I have posted on VideoSift and If it is not correct to post a link to the original video on YouTube then I will remove it. Again, I am in no way connected to nor affiliated with the original poster on YouTube. I also gave credit to the game CS:GO and posted a link to it on Steam, but if that is not allowed please let me know and I will remove that link as well.
Thank you for your time.

Hmmm, alrighty then, let's see,

Why did/would the poster include and where did the poster derive the following, specifically, the link which is not included anywhere in the YouTube pages for the account holder or the video posting and how is that not a spamming?

Angry gamer smashes his monitor after taking a headshot in Counterstrike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) http://store.steampowered.com/app/730/


Additionally:
Details
For business inquiries: razerage4@gmail.com
Country: Malaysia


I respectfully submit that the ban motion be reinstated.