Positive Contribution wrote:
Oh those Rockefellers
there's an old lefty expression - "capitalism will sell you the rope you use to hang it with"
which is a fault of capitalism - it has very little way to deal with events off in the incalculable future. it just wants to get things done today.
it usually works, but has some spectacular fails
Irish valour wrote:
Ireland is neutral. Hitler supported the IRA during ww2 and shipped weapons into Ireland for the IRA for use against GB in their fight for full Independence and a united country.
Wrong dictator wrong wild war moron. Nazi IRA collaboration was a pathetic mess and yielded no results for either side.
agip wrote:
Positive Contribution wrote:Oh those Rockefellers
there's an old lefty expression - "capitalism will sell you the rope you use to hang it with"
which is a fault of capitalism - it has very little way to deal with events off in the incalculable future. it just wants to get things done today.
it usually works, but has some spectacular fails
Don't think that this has much to do with capitalism. Any type of reasonably functional government can limit the actions of companies and individuals within their own jurisdiction.
The British offered Irish government the possibility of Irish unity, if they joined the allies. However, it turned out to be full of caveats.
Well Yeah Butt wrote:
agip wrote:there's an old lefty expression - "capitalism will sell you the rope you use to hang it with"
which is a fault of capitalism - it has very little way to deal with events off in the incalculable future. it just wants to get things done today.
it usually works, but has some spectacular fails
Don't think that this has much to do with capitalism. Any type of reasonably functional government can limit the actions of companies and individuals within their own jurisdiction.
you speak in theory. yes, you are right, in theory. but in reality a government will make rules and companies will find ways around the rules.
this is a perfect example - US companies were not allowed to ship oil to the third reich in 1940, so standard oil apparently used a panamanian subsidiary to do it.
I don't know the details exactly, but that's the heart of it.
agip wrote:
Well Yeah Butt wrote:Don't think that this has much to do with capitalism. Any type of reasonably functional government can limit the actions of companies and individuals within their own jurisdiction.
you speak in theory. yes, you are right, in theory. but in reality a government will make rules and companies will find ways around the rules.
this is a perfect example - US companies were not allowed to ship oil to the third reich in 1940, so standard oil apparently used a panamanian subsidiary to do it.
I don't know the details exactly, but that's the heart of it.
OK, you seem like a reasonable fellow.
So, governments are neither perfect in efficiency nor in motive. Certainly true.
But still I come back to whether this has anything to do with capitalism. Unless you are defining capitalism fairly broadly whereby if there exist any powerful actors outside of national governments then this is defined as capitalism.
Well Yeah Butt wrote:
agip wrote:you speak in theory. yes, you are right, in theory. but in reality a government will make rules and companies will find ways around the rules.
this is a perfect example - US companies were not allowed to ship oil to the third reich in 1940, so standard oil apparently used a panamanian subsidiary to do it.
I don't know the details exactly, but that's the heart of it.
OK, you seem like a reasonable fellow.
So, governments are neither perfect in efficiency nor in motive. Certainly true.
But still I come back to whether this has anything to do with capitalism. Unless you are defining capitalism fairly broadly whereby if there exist any powerful actors outside of national governments then this is defined as capitalism.
well that's how the world is generally set up, no? Two big centers of wealth and ability - government and private enterprise. Under a capitalist society the corporations do what they do to maximize profit. The government sets up rules and taxes to try to stop egregious activity by the corporations.
Not quite getting your argument.
But I was really being a bit oblique - one of my concerns is that capitalism is currently able to wreak huge pain on the world - with overfishing, with poorly run nuke plants, with pollution, with unsustainable farming strategies....all in the name of short term profits.
for example, fertilizer is apparently fairly cheap now, so industrial farms use way, way too much of it. That will cause the elements that make fertilizer to become rarer and rarer, eventually causing farming crises. but now, capitalism encourages these companies to use a lot of cheap fertilizer because that drives up short term profits. By the time fertilizer becomes rare, this crop of executives will be dead or retired, so they won't care.
in teh same sense, standard oil execs needed to hit their quarterly goals, so they sold oil to the third freaking reich, using strategems.
Are we defining terms the same way? Maybe we don't define capitalism the same way.
I'm cribbing from the great investor Grantham - this is a quick bite of his problems with capitalism. He wrote a brilliant 10 page essay about the problem now located somewhere on the GMO website.
http://www.businessinsider.com/jeremy-grantham-phosphate-potash-2012-11
Randy Oldman wrote:
The British offered Irish government the possibility of Irish unity, if they joined the allies. However, it turned out to be full of caveats.
There was also some thinking that a German victory could lead to reunification.
You Morons wrote:
God you guys are dumb
+ 10
US & Western Europe got what they deserved in the end... failed foreign occupations, humiliating military defeats, thousands of US & Western soldiers left to mutilation, cannibalism, rot, anal rape, torture, oral sex.... It's nasty and ugly to see poetic justice take it's toll.
Winston Muthafogging Churchill wrote:
Didn't you idiots learn anything in school? Jesus.
Oh bright one, enlighten us with your version:)
Version? This isn't about versions, it's about facts. This insane nationalist garbage about how the Europeans didn't fight and just waited for cavalry is an embarrassment to all Americans.
Winston Muthafogging Churchill wrote:
Version? This isn't about versions, it's about facts. This insane nationalist garbage about how the Europeans didn't fight and just waited for cavalry is an embarrassment to all Americans.
Dude, OP was obviously trolling. Hope you didn't fall for that.
Rest of the thread has some trolls for sure. But there are also some knowledgable folks posting.
I thought you Limeys had well-developed perception capabilities.
Winston Muthafogging Churchill wrote:
Version? This isn't about versions, it's about facts. This insane nationalist garbage about how the Europeans didn't fight and just waited for cavalry is an embarrassment to all Americans.
The OP may have been trolling, but the fact is you may be right or you may be wrong, regardless you have very little proof (err...facts).
Were you there? No.
What facts do you have and what credible source did you get them from? You do know that people told lies even back then, don't you?
I have a family member who was there on D-Day and died almost 5 years ago. I'm not saying that you are right or wrong, but I assure you that your version from the sidelines and books you've read won't be the same as his version from actually being there.
Carry on.
+1
Winston Muthafogging Churchill wrote:
Version? This isn't about versions, it's about facts. This insane nationalist garbage about how the Europeans didn't fight and just waited for cavalry is an embarrassment to all Americans.
[/quote]
The fact is that the brits lost nearly every battle. They were humiliated in every asian outpost. They got thumped at Dunkirk. Even after the US came to the rescue, the brits managed to continuously f-ck up. In Sicily, in western France,at Arnhem, in Greece, basically everywhere. But what can you expect when your armed forces are led by incompetent dangerously innerbred poofter toffs like Montgomery and Churchill?
And France? Surrender experts trying to break the world's record for cowardly giving up.
GREAT POST! POD for sure. At least someone knows their history. Seriously, nice post.
The fact is that the brits lost nearly every battle. They were humiliated in every asian outpost. They got thumped at Dunkirk. Even after the US came to the rescue, the brits managed to continuously f-ck up. In Sicily, in western France,at Arnhem, in Greece, basically everywhere. But what can you expect when your armed forces are led by incompetent dangerously innerbred poofter toffs like Montgomery and Churchill?
And France? Surrender experts trying to break the world's record for cowardly giving up.[/quote]
GoldenMiles wrote:
Russia bore the humongous brunt of the Allies' casualties in WWII, and the war would've even lost if not for them. That doesn't get enough attention these days,
As for why the French didn't sacrifice more in WWII? Their country was decimated by the horrors of WWII that America almost completely avoided. Huge portions of their population and geography were decimated in e most brutal conflict up to that time. Nothing America had EVER experienced in war compares to the total destruction that hit Germany and France in WWII (and Russia in WWII). We Americans like to talk big, but we've never lost anywhere close to the number of men these countries (and others) suffered in the awful world wars. I don't think anyone here knows what it's like to have your country involved in total war on the scale of the Great War and its successor.
We had the bomb first. If Hitler doesn't attack Russia, we still drop the bomb on Germany and ruin them.
The Irish:
Were more concerned with UK,US than Germany. They wouldn't help and even refused to allow bases in the Republic to allow safe ports for D-Day ships. Participation in the war was out of the question.
They didn't care Britain was being bombed and were quite concerned that if US were present, they wouldn't leave and would act as a UK agent making the Republic a prison colony in post-WW2 Europe.