Charlie Rose interviews Nassim Taleb who famously compared investment bankers to turkeys. Taleb is best known for his book about the importance of seemingly impossible but inevitable events such as Black Swan sightings after the discovery of Australia, where they exist.
A turkey gets fed very well, until it gets slaughtered. Right up to turkey killing day, turkey analysts and advisors would recommend investing in relationships with farmers to feed and shelter them. So it has been with bankers from the 80s till now.
Rose asks Taleb for a balanced view of how bad the economy will really get, compared to the extreme doomsayers such as Nouriel Roubini, who correctly predicted each step of this ‘great recession’ and who worried Rose’s viewers by saying that it meant the end of American empire.
Taleb’s reply is that it will be worse than Roubini thinks. At which point there is an audible thud as Charlie Rose slams his hands on the desk, aghast.
It has been 20 years since I read the John Berger book: “Ways of Seeing”, which was based on the classic, BAFTA award winning, series of the same name, made in 1972. Until now I hadn’t seen the original, which is a must see for TV connoisseurs. Here is episode 1.
The series deconstructed traditional paintings by reverse engineering the known methods used by advertisers to create their own compelling imagery. Of further interest is how this is a worthy example of an intellectual process that became subsumed within politically driven academia with prior agendas.
Thank you to James who recommended this classic piece of television.
Unfortunately nobody has uploaded the excellent UK Channel 4 documentary version of Niall Ferguson’s timely book about the history of money, but this conversation is a good taster. Have a look out for the series of the same name.
There is much less difference between the Democrats and the Republicans than the polarization of voters would suggest. They both sit to the right relative to most other Western economies, and both are hostage to jingoism and superstition which again registers higher than in other wealthy nations. My main beef with Bush Jnr. was that he showed no intellectual curiosity, a fundamental trait that differentiates us from beasts. But the Obama administration may be less hostile to knowledge, or science, as it is termed from the Latin.
This program imagines a briefing for the new president (it was made just before the election) and asks some well known scientists what they would teach the President.
The first episode from the mammoth 14 hour documentary about America’s Civil Rights Movement. Further parts here.
I don’t like politics, patriotism or politicians, but just once in a while something happens that renders me cynicismless.
Who would have thought that less than a lifetime after American apartheid, less than a decade after someone called Osama became America’s most feared individual and 5 years after America went to war against someone called Hussein, a black man called Barack Hussein Obama would claim the White House? As a marketing challenge, it would have seemed impossible and that is why this is a triumph of truth over fiction.
But it is much more than that, not since Rome, when racism was traditionally directed against Northern Europeans, has someone of African decent been the most powerful person in the world (Rome had a Libyan Emperor).
The tragic news is that poor people in America, in places like Detroit, where the median house price is less than $10,000 are about to feel the devastating affects of a brutal recession. Just when there seemed to be hope, some people might turn to hopelessness and then to anger. The recession had nothing to do with Barack Hussein Obama. I suspect that will be an even bigger challenge for the truth.
This film is interesting because it has all the superficial appeal of FEBL conspiracy theory junk, but is actually pretty good. The charts are genuinely illustrative and the infomation density reasonable and logical. The premise – that debt is America’s biggest problem is plausible, and logically argued.
It took me ages to figure out what the nagging problem I have with it is, and unfortunately I can’t sum it up in a sound bite. The train of objection goes something like this:
Film says: America has culture which creates debt.
Film says: America’s debt burden will reach levels where it has no control over its destiny.
Film says: America’s creditors are not natural allies.
Film says: US creditors can dictate what America does by threatening to dump dollar.
Film says: America dumped pound to dictate what UK and France did in Suez.
Film says: America needs leadership.
The last point is the fallacy. I would argue that ironically what America actually needs is weak leadership.
Here is the problem.
Like a scientific experiment which seeks a particular outcome, there will always be a train of thought that leads, seemingly rationally to an apocalyptic scenario if you look for it.
America’s creditors will not let it run up a $50 trillion debt – the margin call will happen sooner, and may already have happened.
Decline of Empire tends to be long and drawn out, and quite often the society left is tolerable and intact.
America will likely be the cultural center of the world for a while after it has ceased to be the economic one (It will all be over before while fat lady still sings, if you like).
In other words it will be bad, but not that bad, unless…
America ends up in a large conflict.
History suggests America will go to war, jingoistically and come back capitulated. This is what happened to Europe in WW1 and WW2. This would have to be a much larger war than Iraq and Afghanistan, although if it happens, it will undoubtedly take place in the Middle East.
I would argue, that strong leadership will more likely lead America into war, what America needs is weak leadership so that it can naturally decentralize and the more successful areas survive while it transitions into a different country. America’s biggest danger is not the people or the place, but the idea.
Films like this assume that all that a country has to do is find a sustainable model of existence and everything will work out fine. Empires do not need to be sustainable – they profit from other poorer parts of the world. You cannot have the kind of lifestyle that America has and it be sustainable, it is pointless to look for it. The distribution of wealth will never be flat, but a bell curve and what will happen is that someone else will sit on the right of the bell curve.
Interestingly this implies that China will never have the kind of dominant middle class culture that America has, unless it is geographically specific, because there are too many Chinese to fit into the right hand of the bell curve.