Curt Doolittle

Form: Short Note

  • is no “we” in USA. The USA is not a superpower country it is an empire in declin

    http://www.gallup.com/poll/155585/americans-confidence-television-news-drops-new-low.aspxThere is no “we” in USA.

    The USA is not a superpower country it is an empire in decline.

    These numbers as well as the loss of confidence in the government are reflections of the loss of common purpose, and the insufficiency of shared reality.

    There is no “we”.

    Source date (UTC): 2012-07-10 18:07:00 UTC

  • What Policies Have Helped The U.s. Come Out Of Recession While Europe Has Failed To Do So?

    In simplest terms, none.  No policies made the difference. The reason the US began (and has now stopped) coming out of recession, and europe has continued to decline, is that in europe, the protestant germanic states are unwilling to subsidize the catholic mediterranean states.  In the USA, this same  anti-subsidy conflict is conducted along racial and urban rather than national lines. The difference is, that in the USA, we are powerless to stop that subsidy because the monetary and fiscal power is centralized, and the government can inflate away debt across all people, whereas in europe the EU cannot inflate debt away because the monetary (central) and fiscal power (local) is separated.  However, there is very little difference in practice. In the States we are a polarized society, and in Europe they are a polarized society.  So, the difference in the duration of the recessions is structural, not one of policy.  This is why the left economists favor centralization and the right economists favor breakup of the eurozone by german exit: its a moral conflict.

    https://www.quora.com/What-policies-have-helped-the-U-S-come-out-of-recession-while-Europe-has-failed-to-do-so

  • people are almost always members of the middle class who build businesses and ma

    http://business.time.com/2012/07/05/how-the-rich-got-rich/Wealthy people are almost always members of the middle class who build businesses and make windfalls from capital gains when they sell all or part of them.

    Very few people are at the top for more than one or two years. Those that are, are insignificant outliers.

    Source date (UTC): 2012-07-05 14:09:00 UTC

  • AQUANTIVE BUST At the time, I viewed it as an act of executive desperation. It w

    http://business.time.com/2012/07/03/microsoft-writes-off-most-of-its-2007-6-3b-ad-business-bet/MICROSOFT’S AQUANTIVE BUST

    At the time, I viewed it as an act of executive desperation. It was.

    Source date (UTC): 2012-07-05 05:38:00 UTC

  • How Corrupt Is The U.s. Government?

    Government by it’s nature, because it is a monopoly, and concentrates capital, draws corruption.  In the USA, corruption tends to be systemic rather than individual. Meaning that the system encourages politicians to work for special interests, and government workers to collect extraordinary benefits – on avearage have retirement benefits equivalent to something like 750K in savings, compared to 50K for the average citizen — plus they cannot be fired and unlike the rest of us are insulated from market pressures.  Monetary corruption, meaning, the privatization of public funds or goods, in exchange for favors, is actually amazingly rare in the USA.  Almost all of it is systemic.

    Americans are somewhat unique in their belief that it is possible to construct virtuous politicians and insert them into a system that encourages systemic corruption. We attempt to change the human to fit the system, rather than change the system to fit human nature.

    https://www.quora.com/How-corrupt-is-the-U-S-Government

  • Do Machiavellian Philosophies Carry Over Into The Modern World?

    You’d need to define what you mean by Machiavellian tactics.  Machiavelli was the first political scientist after Aristotle, and arguably the father of politics as a scientific endeavor.  He entreated rulers to move away from ancient traditions, religious or abstract moral principles, to material, logical, evidence based, principles necessary for the state to persist in the interests of its citizens. At the time of his writing, trade was moving north, and the principalities were being both threatened externally and undermined from within. 

    In this sense, almost all political action in the contemporary world is Machiavellian.

    So if you mean some other sense, then state it, and I’ll try to answer.

    https://www.quora.com/Do-Machiavellian-philosophies-carry-over-into-the-modern-world

  • How Corrupt Is The U.s. Government?

    Government by it’s nature, because it is a monopoly, and concentrates capital, draws corruption.  In the USA, corruption tends to be systemic rather than individual. Meaning that the system encourages politicians to work for special interests, and government workers to collect extraordinary benefits – on avearage have retirement benefits equivalent to something like 750K in savings, compared to 50K for the average citizen — plus they cannot be fired and unlike the rest of us are insulated from market pressures.  Monetary corruption, meaning, the privatization of public funds or goods, in exchange for favors, is actually amazingly rare in the USA.  Almost all of it is systemic.

    Americans are somewhat unique in their belief that it is possible to construct virtuous politicians and insert them into a system that encourages systemic corruption. We attempt to change the human to fit the system, rather than change the system to fit human nature.

    https://www.quora.com/How-corrupt-is-the-U-S-Government

  • Do Machiavellian Philosophies Carry Over Into The Modern World?

    You’d need to define what you mean by Machiavellian tactics.  Machiavelli was the first political scientist after Aristotle, and arguably the father of politics as a scientific endeavor.  He entreated rulers to move away from ancient traditions, religious or abstract moral principles, to material, logical, evidence based, principles necessary for the state to persist in the interests of its citizens. At the time of his writing, trade was moving north, and the principalities were being both threatened externally and undermined from within. 

    In this sense, almost all political action in the contemporary world is Machiavellian.

    So if you mean some other sense, then state it, and I’ll try to answer.

    https://www.quora.com/Do-Machiavellian-philosophies-carry-over-into-the-modern-world

  • BELONGING We want to belong to the group. Some of us less or more than others. B

    BELONGING

    We want to belong to the group. Some of us less or more than others. But few of us want to ostracized from it.

    We can that sense of belonging through empathy if we are similar, and duty if we are not. Empathy through shared interpretation. Duty through shared action in pursuit of mutually beneficial ends.

    Women vary less. They sense more. At least, on average, they tend to belong through empathy. Men vary more. They sense less. They are action rather than perception oriented.

    Dominance is the corollary of empathy. We must learn to use our dominance against the physical world, and in defense of life and property, and not as a means of self expression or control of others.

    Misused empathy is just as dangerous as misused dominance. The damage we have done to the world by our supposedly charitable activities is as great as the damage we have done by war.

    We have lost the ancient understanding of our dual natures.

    To cohabitate and to cooperate politically we must master both empathy and dominance in relation to how we possess them.

    And in doing so create belonging by both empathy and duty.

    Source date (UTC): 2012-06-30 07:04:00 UTC

  • WELL THE RULING IS UPHELD. AND I UNDERSTAND THE REASONING. I just don’t like wha

    WELL THE RULING IS UPHELD. AND I UNDERSTAND THE REASONING.

    I just don’t like what it means for health care. Glad I can afford to travel to exotic places for good care. Cause I’m going to need to.

    Source date (UTC): 2012-06-28 10:37:00 UTC