[Marxism] Karl Marx vs the crisis-deniers ...Re: Michael Heinrich versus the crisis-mongerers

[Steve Palmer]

Interesting example of this kind of fetishism: the argument over the accounting rules, fix incorporated in the handout bill:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/01/business/01audit.html?ref=business

“blaming fair-value accounting for the credit crisis is a lot like going to a doctor for a diagnosis and then blaming him for telling you that you are sick.”

Price is the big issue here and determines how badly we get swindled. I was worried we'd only be allowed to donate $700bn to the banks, but the Republican insurance plan would up that considerably to perhaps $2trn if it gets drawn dawn. Watch for financial arson as some of these financial institutions inflate their values and then get their buds to torch them by calling in loans, precipitating their collapse


--- On Tue, 9/30/08, Ruthless Critic of All that Exists <ok.president+marxml at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: Ruthless Critic of All that Exists <ok.president+marxml at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Marxism] Karl Marx vs the crisis-deniers ...Re: Michael Heinrich versus the crisis-mongerers
> To: "Steve Palmer" <spalmer999 at yahoo.com>
> Date: Tuesday, September 30, 2008, 10:21 PM
> On Tue, Jun 10, 2008 at 6:07 PM, Steve Palmer
> <spalmer999 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> 
> >
> > What is meant by 'collapse', 'crisis'
> etc? In opponents of crisis theory, the
> > straw-man dummy version is usually the idea that
> 'collapse' means that
> > capitalism just falls flat on its face, all of its own
> accord, at some point,
> > unable ever to rise again. I don't think Marx
> thought that, ever, certainly not
> > in 1857-8, and Henryk Grossman didn't think that.
> 
> October 1, 2008
> Op-Ed Contributor
> This Economy Does Not Compute
> By MARK BUCHANAN
> 
> Notre-Dame-de-Courson, France
> 
> <http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/01/opinion/01buchanan.html?ref=opinion>
> 
> "Financial crises may emerge naturally from the very
> makeup of
> markets, as competition between investment enterprises sets
> up a race
> for higher leverage, driving markets toward a precipice
> that we cannot
> recognize even as we approach it. The model offers a
> potential
> explanation of why we have another crisis narrative every
> few years,
> with only the names and details changed. [...]
> 
> Sadly, the academic economics profession remains reluctant
> to embrace
> this new computational approach (and stubbornly wedded to
> the
> traditional equilibrium picture). This seems decidedly
> peculiar given
> that every other branch of science from physics to
> molecular biology
> has embraced computational modeling as an invaluable tool
> for gaining
> insight into complex systems of many interacting parts,
> where the
> links between causes and effect can be tortuously
> convoluted.
> 
> Something of the attitude of economic traditionalists
> spilled out a
> number of years ago at a conference where economists and
> physicists
> met to discuss new approaches to economics. As one
> physicist who was
> there tells me, a prominent economist objected that the use
> of
> computational models amounted to "cheating" or
> "peeping behind the
> curtain," and that respectable economics, by contrast,
> had to be
> pursued through the proof of infallible mathematical
> theorems.
> 
> If we're really going to avoid crises, we're going
> to need something
> more imaginative, starting with a more open-minded attitude
> to how
> science can help us understand how markets really work.
> Done properly,
> computer simulation represents a kind of "telescope
> for the mind,"
> multiplying human powers of analysis and insight just as a
> telescope
> does our powers of vision. With simulations, we can
> discover
> relationships that the unaided human mind, or even the
> human mind
> aided with the best mathematical analysis, would never
> grasp. [...]"
> 
> October 1, 2008
> Op-Ed Contributor
> This Economy Does Not Compute
> By MARK BUCHANAN
> 
> Notre-Dame-de-Courson, France
> 
> ________________________________________________
> YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a
> message.
> Send list submissions to: Marxism at lists.econ.utah.edu
> Set your options at:
> http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/spalmer999%40yahoo.com