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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsLarry Summers: “We should not oppose offshoring"
http://billmoyers.com/category/what-matters-today/This economist was not a Heritage Foundation scholar or Ayn Rand Institute fellow. The speaker that June was none other than Lawrence Summers, who had just finished up his role as director of the White House National Economic Council, where he was President Obamas top economic adviser.
While working for the anti-corruption blog Republic Report last year, I reached out to conference organizer Kartik Kilachand to ask him about the speaking fee Summers was given and why his full remarks were never posted to the website (only a snippet was published). Kilachand replied that this was confidential information because the conference had signed a non-disclosure agreement with Summers that concealed both his full remarks and speaking fee. I also made a query to Julie Shample, Summerss assistant at Harvard. I wouldnt have any information about this, you may want to check with the forum, replied Shample.
This practice of giving private paid speeches to big corporations was nothing new for Summers. Before joining the Obama administration, he received hundreds of thousands of dollars in speaking fees from financial institutions that the White House was involved in bailing out and then shielding from more intense regulation. For Summers, the speech at the outsourcing conference was simply a relapse.
Yeah, 'cause what's more American than sending our jobs to third-world shitholes where workers can be exploited with impunity? And this is the guy a twice-elected "Democratic" President endorses. Are we sure that Mitt Romney is not really the President?
Safetykitten
(5,162 posts)el_bryanto
(11,804 posts)Although it might soothe wallstreet I suppose.
Bryant
matthews
(497 posts)money-grubbing opportunist that turns everything he touches to shit.
progressoid
(49,952 posts)Safetykitten
(5,162 posts)lumberjack_jeff
(33,224 posts)russspeakeasy
(6,539 posts)FiveGoodMen
(20,018 posts)hughee99
(16,113 posts)Skittles
(153,122 posts)they'll be on board later when they stop hallucinating
abelenkpe
(9,933 posts)Nice to know Summers is ok with hundreds of my former co workers being out of work and unable to find new jobs in the country.
closeupready
(29,503 posts)To oppose that is to be a "Luddite".
leveymg
(36,418 posts)to each other in secret. The only way their thinking would change will be if CEOs were outsourced and Cabinet Members Offshored, and the 1% were also subject to poverty, hunger and homelessness in the event of layoff.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)WEDNESDAY, JULY 15, 2009
Economic Policy Journal
It has long been a contention of mine that the super elite talk in a kind of code that keeps them out of trouble. They know full well among each other what needs to be done in certain tight situations, but you will never hear any of them speak it. They sort of ride above the fray and think to themselves that they are not manipulating anything, when, in fact, they are attempting to manipulate the entire world!
The recent comments attributed to David Rubenstein at Carlyle Group suggest that he has not yet, and may never, master elite code talk. He may be close to them, but as long as he does not fully understand code talk, he is a tool and nothing more.
SNIP...
Ashley is a Yale University grad, and member of the secret society Skull and Bones along with Bush. Here's the letter:
The Honorable Thomas Ludlow Ashley
Association of Bank Holding Companies
Washington, D.C. 20005
Dear Lud,
Thank you for your good memo December 8th.
I would appreciate any help you can give Neil. He tells me he never had any insider dealings. He got off the Board early--long before I was elected President. The Denver paper apparently ran a very nice editorial about him on that. He is an outside director, and thus I guess has liability, but I can't believe his name would appear in the paper if it was Jones not Bush. In any event, I know that the guy is totally honest. I saw him in Denver and I think he is worried about the publicity and the "shame". I tell him not to worry about that but any advice you can give as this matter unfolds would be greatly appreciated by me. If it turns out there has been some marginal call, or he has done something wrong, needless to say there will be no intervention from his dad. But, I'm quite confident this is not true...
Warm regards,
George
Notice how smooth. No talk about getting Ashley anything for taking care of the matter. The nice touch about if Neil "has done something wrong", but the clear finish, he didn't.
The US Office of Thrift Supervision investigated Silverado's failure and determined that Bush had engaged in numerous "breaches of his fiduciary duties involving multiple conflicts of interest." But Neil was not indicted on criminal charges, a civil action was brought against him and the other Silverado directors. It was eventually settled out of court, with Bush paying $50,000 as part of the settlement.
CONTINUED...
http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2009/07/how-elite-talk-in-code.html
leveymg
(36,418 posts)to the point. If Neil "has done something wrong, needless to say there will be no intervention from his dad." Nudge, nudge, wink, wink.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)These three DUers noticed:
Hootinholler:
Anyone else notice McCane referred to the Kennedy assasination as an intervention?
chimpsrsmarter
From the debate-McCain" before the intervention of the tragedy at Dallas."
stubtoe
The "intervention" at Dallas?
President Kennedy was not killed by an intervention.
It appears he was killed by an act of the state --
or people in authority --
acting together.
And that is what is so hard for people to believe.
Perhaps less so today.
Thanks to Snowden.
mick063
(2,424 posts)Says the President.
Autumn
(44,986 posts)agency or building.
matthews
(497 posts)should be his 'keepers'.
That would increase the safety/security factor of the rest of us exponentially.
whttevrr
(2,345 posts)Right?
jtuck004
(15,882 posts)AngryOldDem
(14,061 posts)KittyWampus
(55,894 posts)is the lack of new job creation.
And rather than argue about the fact I posted in the subject line, here's a link to an old DU thread I just googled:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021104300
And don't take this post to indicate I support Summers for Fed.
Scuba
(53,475 posts)... provided does not back up that claim.
Certainly lack of job creation is a problem, but hardly THE problem. Sending our jobs overseas is a problem too.
Can you provide any citations for the claim regarding Krugman and Reich having supported offshoring?
leveymg
(36,418 posts)BumRushDaShow
(128,527 posts)Robert Reich
Washington Post, November 2, 2003
<snip>
So why don't I believe the outsourcing of high-tech work is something to lose
sleep over?
First, the number of high-tech jobs outsourced abroad still accounts for a tiny
proportion of America's 10-million-strong IT workforce. When the U.S. economy
fully bounces back from recession (as it almost surely will within the next 18
months), a large portion of high-tech jobs that were lost after 2000 will come
back in some form.
<snip>
And just as with laid-off manufacturing workers, we need to ensure that high-
tech workers are adaptive and flexible. They should be able to move quickly and
get the retraining they need. Pensions and health insurance should be more
portable across jobs. High-tech workers who want to polish their skills or gain
new ones should have access to tax credits that make it easy for them to go
back to college for a time.
But it makes no sense for us to try to protect or preserve high-tech jobs in
America or block efforts by American companies to outsource. Our economic
future is wedded to technological change, and most of the jobs of the future
are still ours to invent.
For some reason, this subject got me hunting around and apparently he and Laura Tyson had an academic debate back in the early '90s and he has some papers that were published in the Harvard Business Review from 1990 entitled "Who is US?" and one from 1991 - Who is THEM?" (haven't found any full transcripts of these yet)... both attempting to describe the morphing of the multinational corporation and national identity...
Alot of it (IMHO) seems to be a bit rambling but it apparently took him time to get to what you see today as "Robert Reich the anti-outsourcer". At least early on, he seemed to embrace shipping out the "grunt work" (my words) and having the U.S. be the "innovators" (with the assumption that the U.S. IT industry wasn't going anywhere, which proved to be wrong) - and basically, this is what Apple did to the point where none of their stuff was made in the U.S. and they embarrassingly have stamped on their devicies "Designed by Apple in California, Assembled in China".
Divernan
(15,480 posts)snagglepuss
(12,704 posts)can be created here that wont be offshored?
ForgoTheConsequence
(4,868 posts)-Paul Krugman
http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/opinion/perspectives/paul-krugman-offshoring-vs-outsourcing-one-exports-jobs-both-pick-the-pockets-of-american-workers-643682/#ixzz2aq6SeKB2
Paul Krugman supports fair and balanced trade. Quit making stuff up.
closeupready
(29,503 posts)He has never retracted his support for that, and in supporting it, he effectively supported offshoring and outsourcing even if he refused to do so explicitly.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)burnodo
(2,017 posts)moondust
(19,963 posts)After roughly 30 years of it he's still clueless?
Of course HE personally had no use for those millions of jobs lost to desperate, unprotected, slave labor elsewhere--except, no doubt, to personally profit from the practice as an investor.
ctsnowman
(1,903 posts)would be proud.
on point
(2,506 posts)WillyT
(72,631 posts)& Rec !!!
forestpath
(3,102 posts)truebrit71
(20,805 posts)jtuck004
(15,882 posts)alp227
(32,006 posts)Scuba
(53,475 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)AngryOldDem
(14,061 posts)I can't begin to express how much that sentence outrages me.
The difference between then and now, Mr. Summers, is that people had a chance to reinvent themselves and find new jobs in the new economy. Yes, the anger was there, mainly because people were being forced into something new. Eventually, though, they adapted and thrived.
These days, you get tossed to the curb, which is exactly what these powermongers want. The American worker is nothing more than flotsam and jetsam. The worker who still has the skills and the will to work, if given the chance.
MisterP
(23,730 posts)the first to honestly investigate the Luddites rather than treat them as a punchline--oh, and what's that he found? that the Luddites--and, even better the Swingites--were violently opposed to the notion of starving the weavers of Britain so that the British elite could starve the weavers of Bengal
KamaAina
(78,249 posts)Go Janet Yellen!
NutmegYankee
(16,199 posts)Offshore yourself!
AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)Aerows
(39,961 posts)is anything other than sarcasm (despite the lack of a sarcasm tag).
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)Aerows
(39,961 posts)There has already been enough idiocy in this thread that makes my head hang. Not for myself, but that the people posting it think someone could be convinced by such ludicrous arguments about a person with such a horrible track record as Larry Summers. I wouldn't trust him to manage a bake sale without misappropriating funds.
paleotn
(17,884 posts)Aerows
(39,961 posts)that this is sarcasm. LOL.
AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)It is a Godwinism. "Wann dem Führer wuste!"
Aerows
(39,961 posts)but the point stands.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law
lumberjack_jeff
(33,224 posts)rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)from making a fool of myself.............. again.
AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)betrayed me. Now that you've said that, I withdraw my comment. It's my responsibility and I will try to be vigilant. Keep doing what you are doing.
IDemo
(16,926 posts)His spirit will be in the driver's seat regardless of who Obama selects.
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)What makes anyone think that President Obama opposes offshoring?
So why would anyone be surprised if his appointees do not oppose offshoring?
HiPointDem
(20,729 posts)pitbullgirl1965
(564 posts)You will be in the top twenty in line for the guillotine ok? And the revolution will not be outsourced either!
Scuba
(53,475 posts)Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)Aerows
(39,961 posts)"We should not oppose Larry Summers or advocate anything that fails to benefit Larry Summers or the benefactors of Larry Summers. Most importantly, we should focus on how Larry Summers, and his business partners and those he makes campaign donations toward, can potentially benefit from Larry Summers ideas."
Fire Walk With Me
(38,893 posts)a prime driver of Plutonomy and the rich getting ever richer:
http://our99angrypercent.wordpress.com/2011/11/27/download-citigroup-plutonomy-memos/
I say this because Summers currently consults for Citigroup. And was a Wall Street deregulator. And helped end Glass-Steagall.
He's a pure Plutonomy shill. And have been said earlier in this thread, shouldn't be allowed 2000 feet from any government position, ever.
Then again, most of Obama's "economic advisors" have been directly from Wall Street, so the Trend is zero surprise.
nadinbrzezinski
(154,021 posts)YoungDemCA
(5,714 posts)nt
Deep13
(39,154 posts)tritsofme
(17,371 posts)I don't think there are any Obama administration officials, or economists in general that would support banning "offshoring"
Scuba
(53,475 posts)JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)Followed the link in the article to a longer summary of his remarks.
He also mentioned the need for much more international regulation and an education policy to ensure the US stays ahead, and without those, outsourcing hurts our nation, but including any of that context might tamp down some outrage.
Scuba
(53,475 posts)That part I'd like to see.
Aerows
(39,961 posts)that oxygen isn't necessary for breath, since there is a mix of nitrogen and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. It stuns me the wrangling some folks will go through to justify bad policy as though everyone around them is an idiot.
Aerows
(39,961 posts)and justify *Larry Summers*, then I'm really not sure what to say to you. I'd be trying to explain to someone why water isn't *really* wet, but is just somewhat ... damp. It's nearly a desiccant, obviously, in certain situations.
Chef Eric
(1,024 posts)It says that he called for us to have education policies that "sustain the US as the world's primary engine of new science, technology and entrepreneurship."
I don't see what is notable about this. It's practically a cliche. Furthermore, I can't think of too many Americans who DON'T want us to have such education policies.
liberal_at_heart
(12,081 posts)AndyA
(16,993 posts)If it walks like a Republican...
think
(11,641 posts)pay additional taxes since much of our military function is protecting the overseas assets of multinational corporations.
There should also be a code of ethics for standards and conditions to protect workers in those countries.
Workers in those countries should be able to form unions without fear of persecution & death.
But with Eric Holder at the helm of the DOJ fat chance. He'll help the companies that pay to hire mercenaries who murder union leaders like he did for Chiquita:
Dan Kovalik
USW Counsel, Workers Uniting Colombia Committee
Posted: November 6, 2008 05:12 PM
Read Dan Kovalik's original post from 11/6/08, below:
In its recent report entitled, "Breaking the Grip? Obstacles to Justice for Paramilitary Mafias in Colombia," Human Rights Watch (HRW) had specific recommendations for the U.S. Department of Justice. Specifically, HRW recommended that, in order to assist with the process of ending the ties between the Colombian government and paramilitary death squads, the U.S. Department of Justice should, among other things, "[c]reate meaningful legal incentives for paramilitary leaders [a number of whom have already been extradited to the U.S.] to fully disclose information about atrocities and name all Colombian or foreign officials, business or individuals who may have facilitated their criminal activities," and "[c]ollaborate actively with the efforts of Colombian justice officials who are investigating paramilitary networks in Colombia by sharing relevant information possible and granting them access to paramilitary leaders in U.S. custody."
Do not expect these recommendations to be carried forward if Eric Holder decides to forgo his lucrative corporate law practice at Covington & Burling and accept the U.S. Attorney General position for which many believe he is the top contendor. Eric Holder would have a troubling conflict of interest in carrying out this work in light of his current work as defense lawyer for Chiquita Brands international in a case in which Colombian plaintiffs seek damages for the murders carried out by the AUC paramilitaries - a designated terrorist organization. Chiquita has already admitted in a criminal case that it paid the AUC around $1.7 million in a 7-year period and that it further provided the AUC with a cache of machine guns as well.
Indeed, Holder himself, using his influence as former deputy attorney general under the Clinton Administration, helped to negotiate Chiquita's sweeheart deal with the Justice Department in the criminal case against Chiquita. Under this deal, no Chiquita official received any jail time. Indeed, the identity of the key officials involved in the assistance to the paramilitaries were kept under seal and confidential. In the end, Chiquita was fined a mere $25 million which it has been allowed to pay over a 5-year period. This is incredible given the havoc wreaked by Chiquita's aid to these Colombian death squards....
Full article:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dan-kovalik/lawyer-for-chiquita-in-co_b_141919.html
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=405x9608
TexasTowelie
(111,980 posts)(from starvation and lack of shelter).
dreamnightwind
(4,775 posts)closeupready
(29,503 posts)here at home disagree strongly.
DJ13
(23,671 posts)He's an example of what caused our problems.
warrprayer
(4,734 posts)Skittles
(153,122 posts)let's see the swooners defend this garbage
kenny blankenship
(15,689 posts)to one of the South Orkney Islands.
duffyduff
(3,251 posts)Nay
(12,051 posts)Divernan
(15,480 posts)Last edited Sat Aug 3, 2013, 05:42 AM - Edit history (1)
Ya know - extremely lucrative corporate Board appointments, speaking gigs at posh meetings in exotic locations, corporate support for future Obama "foundations", etc.
Somehow I don't expect Obama to spend his post-presidential years like humanitarian, peace activist Jimmy Carter. I think his role model is wheelin', dealin' Bill Clinton.
Despite widespread opposition to Summers, Obama refuses to remove Summers from consideration, and now has put off the appointment until October - apparently hoping that opposition will have died down or there will be some other major crisis distracting the public and allowing him to be slipped through.
MotherPetrie
(3,145 posts)99Forever
(14,524 posts)Of, by, and for the 1%.
Just like his boss.
Amonester
(11,541 posts)Money will keep Ruling politics (and politicians).
No surprise there.
And since the day that Money will stop Ruling politics (and politicians) is nowhere to be foreseen...
blackspade
(10,056 posts)And he has no business in government, and much less as an economist.
What a tool.
paleotn
(17,884 posts)...from an economic perspective, I see barely a hairs width of difference between them and what differences that do exist are mainly window dressing. Why is there little appreciable difference between them on actual economic policy? Just follow the money.
After they've gutted the American industrial base for cheaper wages, reduced regulation, in the rush for greater corporate profits, they wonder why so many Americans now have little hope of improving their lot in life. Why 4 out of 5 are either in or within a paycheck or two of poverty. Why so many turn to crime, drug abuse; a whole litany of social problems in this country. To a great extent it's because the engine that built the greatest economy the world has ever seen, supported on the shoulders of a vast, vibrant middle class, has been dismantled and shipped off to every foreign shit hole imaginable.
The idea of getting a good, steady job out of high school or college is a pipe dream for many young Americans, maybe most at this point. Those days are long gone, due to supposed smart guys like Larry Summers, who loves him some unfettered, unrestrained outsourcing. Funny how they conveniently ignore the anti-thesis that is Germany and other industrialized nations that rightly believe that one way (supposedly "free" trade with mercantilists nations (China, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, etc.) who have no intention of ever actually following the rules, is economic suicide.
But even when our trading "partners" follow the rules, NAFTA and Mexico for instance, things still don't always work out the way we planned. The flood of cheap, subsidized (Farm Bill) American corn has destroyed Mexican small farm agriculture. So where do former Mexican farmers and their progeny go? Many flood into the US of course, exacerbating our already troubling immigration mess. Or they could join a drug gang. Good money to be made at that, if you live long enough to enjoy it.
But all that's really beside the point. Summers doesn't give a rats rear end about the little people. The real focus of Summers and all those at the top of this post, whether consciously or unconsciously, is to maximize profits for corporate interests and the wealthy few. At least Rethugs like Romeny and Shrub are honest about it. I'll give them that.