Reddit mentions of The Triumph of Conservatism: A Reinterpretation of American History, 1900-1916

Actually, trust me, they're perfectly happy with paid-for Democrats who will push through regulations that set up cartels and monopolies that will ensure more money inevitably finds its way into the Kochs' pockets.

How about a whole book?

https://www.amazon.com/Triumph-Conservatism-Reinterpretation-American-1900-1916/dp/0029166500

Bonus: its written by a progressive! Not that it will matter, sounds like the person already has made their decision and doesn't need to be bothered with evidence or facts.

That's a false narrative propagated by that pack of liars known as the Democrats.

Here, I recommend you read this, to understand the true nature of the problem:

http://www.amazon.com/Triumph-Conservatism-Gabriel-Kolko/dp/0029166500

Basically, you have to distinguish between "good" regulations, and bad ones. Good ones are stuff that keeps corporations from polluting the environment, poisoning our water and air, etc. But there is another role that regulations play in our system - they are also used to erect barriers to entry, set up cartels and monopolies, insulate Big Corporations from competition from smaller, nimbler companies, etc.

And such regulations are why we have an economy dominated by Big Corporations. I.e. regulations (because they're enacted by legislators who are owned by corporate special interests, and they're often even written by industry lobbyists) are a key component of Corporatism.

So the problem is actually a bit subtler than just free-market/deregulatory ideology. The reason why Republicans implement Corporatist measures under the guise, cover of free-market/deregulatory rhetoric is not because they're actually free-marketeers and believers in deregulation. It's actually that 98% of Republicans are corrupt, and simply haven't figured out that there's anything wrong with doing favors for Big Business.

Likewise, Democrats also implement Corporatist measures, but in their case going "Correct free market failures! Correct Free market failures! Protect consumers!" again because 95% of are corrupt douchebags who prioritize getting corporate money for their re-election campaigns, over actually doing what's good for the country.

Anyhow. Ron Paul is in fact quite an obnoxious threat where the Banksters are concerned. His End the Fed rhetoric is actually dangerous to them. Because the Fed is a major tool in Financial Interests' arsenal. See e.g.:

http://www.unelected.org/audit-of-the-federal-reserve-reveals-16-trillion-in-secret-bailouts

And on occasion Ron Paul comes up with absolutely awesome anti-banker stuff, like this:

http://curiouscapitalist.blogs.time.com/2011/07/05/debt-ceiling-could-ron-pauls-plan-save-us-from-disaster-twice/

The Truth About the "Robber Barons" (article)

The Myth of Natural Monopoly (article)

Milton Friedman on Monopoly (video)

The Truth About Monopolies and Anti-Trust Laws (video)

Anti-Trust and Monopoly (video)

Antitrust: The Case for Repeal by Dominick Armentano (book)

The Triumph of Conservatism by Gabriel Kolko (book) (by the way, Kolko is a leftist anti-capitalist)

> Take the "merger movement" at the turn of last century. It was and is popularly believed that competition was at an all-time low, monopoly an all-time high and Theodore Roosevelt's trust-busting the necessary and proper response. But Kolko proves this conventional belief false. In case studies of the big powerhouse industries of the time, he shows that, in spite of (or because of) the merger movement, they were more competitive than they had ever been.

I doubt such a database exists, and I would bet there are too many challenges to make it worth creating. Even if you could get data on something so secretive and specific, there would be a lot of room for subjectivity in categorizing lobbying activity.

But, I'd recommend you look into the research by Gabriel Kolko. He wrote a book called The Triumph of Conservatism that provides a history of regulation in the Progressive era. Contrary to your high school history text book, big business wanted more regulation to keep out smaller competitors and maintain power for their organizations forever (hence the triumph of conservatism).

If you don't want to read a whole book, check out this article. It's still kind of a long read, but gives you a sense of the kind of evidence and "data" out there about big business being on the side of regulation rather than the free market.

What's especially interesting about Kolko is that he was a part of the left, which makes him fun to bring up in conversations with leftists.

Be aware, though, not everybody thinks Kolko was right in his telling of the history. Even some libertarians say we should be wary of using him as a source.

> You do realize we're living in the economic fallout of regulations slashed in the name of "small, ineffective government", right?

No, I don't realize that at all.

First of all, you can't talk about "regulations" like that in blanket terms. You have to ask, regulations for whom, and deregulation for whom? It's a little bit like talking about "free markets." It's not quite correct to say our problem is "free markets" run amock. It's actually more like "brutal free market competition for poor and workers, corporate welfare and socialism for corporations (especially big ones) and plutocrats."

I.e., not enough regulations holding big corporations in check? But on the other hand, tons of regulations protecting big business and corporations from competition from little guys.

So, ultimately the question is why is it that the regulations we do have are for the benefit of corporations and the rich? To set up monopolies and cartels for their benefit? Why is that the socialism and welfare we do have is for the benefit of corporations and the rich?

And that, of course, brings us to the question of who actually controls government, and why. And thence to "what exactly is the nature of this government thing, anyhow?"

Edit: also, pretty damn remarkable that liberals think we have small, ineffective government, when it soaks up, what, like 30% of GDP. And ineffective? It's highly effective at the stuff it does want to do. Imperialism, militarism, domestic police/surveillance state, imprisoning young black males, bailing out and enriching Wall Street bankers, etc etc etc.

In fact, there are plenty of data points that point to the conclusion that the government is HUGE, has enormous resources, and is remarkably efficient and effective at the things it wants to do and wants to be effective at.

So again, perhaps the problem here is that you liberals are incapable of getting over that propaganda lie of what the government is and is supposed to be doing, and just taking at face value the reality of what it does, and is. Cause that reality is... not very pleasant.

BUT MUH REGULATIONS!11

Same thing happened in banking due to Dodd-Frank, etc. Jamie Dimon at JPMorgan Chase said the regulations extend his firm's competitive advantage because small- and mid-size banks can't cope with them.

Regulations are brilliant like that: they sound good, but only hamper competition and let the big players get bigger.

If you want to drop a redpill nuke on any leftist who supports extensive regulations, refer them to this book by a dyed-in-the-wool socialist who argues the Progressive regulations of the early 1900s were a scam to benefit big business. One of my favorite books on the subject.

I did, but after studying the World Bank and IMF I changed my mind again.

http://www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/wbimf/imfwbReport2001.html

http://www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/wbimf/imfwbReport2001.html

http://mrxfromplanetx.com/tag/imf/

Raw Story once quoted Ron Paul as saying the structural adjustments are Keynesian economics, but they are not. They are Milton Freedman economics.

I am still all for ending the Fed, but when you look at what the IMF and World Bank do is privatize everything.

Mind you in the real world, you and I do not have a chance at purchasing anything getting privatized. It all goes to the rich elites that control the World Bank and IMF.

Tragedy and Hope is widely touted as disclosing banker conspiracies, but it also shows something else -- the free market has never existed because rich and powerful business interests always strive to control the market to control their prophets. Read chapter 5 http://ia341238.us.archive.org/0/items/TragedyAndHope/TH.pdf

As Kolko says, there is no system that works https://www.amazon.com/dp/0029166500?tag=alt13-20&camp=213381&creative=390973&linkCode=as4&creativeASIN=0029166500&adid=1XQCCH30FXW7141AWP75&

Walter Lippmann called the collusion "Patronage" and claimed it was the glue that holds the country together. I think Lippmann was on the wrong side, but he was a brilliant man http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Democracy/Lipp_PubOpin_Patronage.html

> Once powerful enough, from a profit perspective it absolutely makes sense to stifle competition with that power, to merge and consolidate workforce and to establish oneself as the only provider in town

I've quoted this book before in this sub... this is written by a left wing historian with many original sources. I point out that he is left wing so people don't dismiss it as some kind of libertarian revisionist history.

https://www.amazon.com/Triumph-Conservatism-Reinterpretation-American-1900-1916/dp/0029166500/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=the+triumph+of+conservatism&qid=1574826960&sr=8-1

The back cover describes it best:

> The Triumph of Conservatism is one of the most influential and important works in moderan American history. This bold reinterpretation of the Progressive Era develops a startling thesis: that the dominant tendancy in business after the turn of the century was toward competition and economic decentralization, not toward concentration and monopoly; and that, unable to halt this trend by their own means, the leaders of big business―and not the political reformers―became the chief initiators of the era's "progressive" regulatory laws. Thus, "progressivism" was a profoundly conservative effort to maintain existing political and social relations in a new economic context.

Why would you do this to yourself?

I'd highly recommend this book: http://www.amazon.com/The-Triumph-Conservatism-Reinterpretation-1900-1916/dp/0029166500

But you should skim through a lot of it because it has a lot of dry information that you don't really need to know unless you're planning to write an academic paper or something similar. You'll see what I mean if you read it.

Look into some Gabriel Kolko books. He shows that the progressive era was basically just large firms using government to limit their competition, all under the guise of consumer protection. (And no, Kolko isn't a libertarian. He's a neo-Marxist.)

http://www.amazon.com/Triumph-Conservatism-Gabriel-Kolko/dp/0029166500
http://www.amazon.com/Railroads-Regulation-1877-1916-Gabriel-Kolko/dp/0393005313/

Before placing myself in the position of defending child labor practices in the Industrial Revolution, let me take a second to refine my objection.

When I read your post, you were obviously exaggerating for effect (I don't think people are clamoring for deregulation of child labor), but I do think that the situation in the Industrial Revolution wasn't as simple as just having some regulations would have put an end to child labor and simultaneously maintained or raised overall living standards for the working class. It is my view that the claim that all corporations were monopolies who were dominant enough in the market that they had full control over wages and wouldn't have raised them without unions and regulation is overstated.

Secondly I do happen to study history when I find the time, so I can avoid putting my foot in my mouth and so that I can support my views about things. Specifically - most of what I know about Progressive regulation comes from the work of Gabriel Kolko (a self-described leftist and anticapitalist with a PhD from Harvard, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Kolko), who wrote the book The Triumph of Conservatism. Its central thesis is that regulations of the era were lobbied for by the corporations themselves (to stifle competition). It's not available online anywhere, but here are some reviews (http://www.amazon.com/Triumph-Conservatism-Gabriel-Kolko/dp/0029166500).

Until you provide substantive evidence of your own views you can't run around claiming that I'm some ignorant buffoon who doesn't know basic history. Maybe if you show some good material I'll change my mind.

A couple of books that buttress these findings:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0029166500

("Progressive" regulations are a myth. Most such regulations were actually implemented at the behest of big business interests, to reduce destructive (to their profits) competition and to set up de facto cartels)

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0226243176

(The policy outcomes the political system produces are a result of special interest and business groups investing in the political system)

Why such outcomes:

Most libs focus almost exclusively on campaign financing, donations, and super-PACs. The problem is possibly even worse than that. We have an extremely sophisticated system of bribery, where political favors are rewarded later:

http://www.republicreport.org/2012/make-it-rain-revolving-door/

(This focuses exclusively on lobbyists, but there is nothing stopping something similar being done by hiring ex-politicians as consultants, corporate officers, giving them seats on corporate boards. Similar things can be done with advisers and staff members to politicians - see how Robert Rubin and Larry Summers were rewarded by Wall Street after the Clinton admin. And you can hire them first, then have them go back to politics, and back and forth - see Dick Cheney and Halliburton)

As far as campaign donations, super-PACs, etc, are concerned, my own $0.02. Note a billionaire who gives $1m to a party, or a partisan political organization, etc, is going to be rewarded with access, attention, and influence. On the other hand, if you and 30,000 "little people" friends of yours each chip in $100 to give to a campaign or a party, do you know what you will get? Spam.

The whole system is rife, shot through with asymmetries like this. Consider that just by being wealthy and successful, rich people (or their agents, like Summers, Rubin, Greenspan, etc) are rewarded with the presumption that they're experts and specially knowledgeable about their fields. Few stop to consider the way their incentive system is set up, and the systemic consequences of political action to "help" their industry thrive.

So. The study is undoubtedly right. The conclusions are supported not just by empirical observations and data, but also by careful consideration of the nitty-gritty details of how the political system works.

Implications: the real problem people are NOT the voters and the bases of the two parties. They are the rich, and the politicians themselves, who are to a man corrupt. I.e. it is not the Tea Partiers. It is people like Obama, Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, etc, whose incentive structures, after all, are wired EXACTLY like people like George Bush, Dick Cheney, John McCain, Mitch McConnell, and John Boehner's.

Despite the obvious logic of this, the two parties' bases continue to focus on each other. See e.g. the constant non-stop hate directed at Tea Partiers and conservatives by liberals. This is a product of manipulation by the two parties' propaganda systems - I repeat, if you hate Tea Partiers, and think they're the problem, not that Obama and the Democrats are venal and self-serving just like Republican politicians, and that you got stupidly scammed by Obama and the Democrats, then you're a victim of brainwashing and propaganda.

How this propaganda system works is actually excellently illustrated by r/politics. The constant stream of anti-GOP, anti-conservative, anti-Tea Party posts and articles works like "Two Minute Hate" from 1984. Remember, the best, sophisticated propaganda works not at the knowledge/information level, but at the emotional level - you can see this in how, e.g.corporate advertising has advanced from mainly information based in the late 19th/early 20th century, to more lifestyle/identity/emotional appeal and manipulation today. I repeat, the real problem with the propaganda system is not the torrent of false information being fed to Tea Party rubes (although to be sure, that is harmful and dangerous as well), it is in how your emotions, how you relate to leaders and institutions and organizations like Barack Obama, the Democratic or Republican party, liberal democracy, capitalism, the US government, the United States, the UN, etc, are shaped and manipulated.

Finally, the obvious impossibility of making a politico-economic system like ours work acceptably, democratically, in a way that produces rational responses to changing conditions (rather than corrupt rent-extraction policies to benefit whichever special interest group's turn it is at the trough) suggests that liberalism is not a legitimate, real ideology. Rather just like mainstream conservatism, an artifact of the propaganda system, a series of lies and conditioning designed to constrain people's political behavior within acceptable norms, and to shape, channel their reaction and anger at constantly deteriorating conditions and injustices in a direction that is safe and acceptable to the system, the establishment, and the ruling class.

No comment on my educational background.

But can we assume that you're highly accomplished educationally? Perhaps with bachelors and graduate degrees from elite institutions like Ivy league schools or similar?

If so, do you understand why radical Leftists, like Communists and Anarchists, hate and despise the intelligentsia?

And if your schooling has consisted of conventional or mainstream history/political education only, then I'm afraid that perhaps there may be some gaps or flaws in your education. I recommend the following 2 books to remedy those gaps:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Triumph-Conservatism-Reinterpretation-1900-1916/dp/0029166500

http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Rule-Investment-Competition-Money-Driven/dp/0226243176

You want to be armed with Gabriel Kolko's work:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Triumph-Conservatism-Reinterpretation-1900-1916/dp/0029166500

He's a respected Marxist historian who argues that the progressive era was anything but, and happens to agree with the libertarian account of the "history of capitalism" that government/big-business collusion created the heavily regulated and largely cartelized economic structures of the twentieth century in the US.

I forget if it deals with unionism, and it's written by a committed socialist, but you may want to check out The Triumph of Conservatism. It covers with the reforms of the Progressive Era in a very critical manner.

Cue some actual historian to tell me how discredited it is...

Ouch, tough, man. It's always a delicate balance between living in your own bubble (http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2012/03/my_beautiful_bu.html) and making compromises to expand your circle of friends.

As to how to argue more easily, see

http://voluntaryistreader.wordpress.com/2012/12/22/success-socratic-style/

This will allow you to exploit the weaknesses in your opponent's arguments more easily.

As to the actual topics mentioned, here's what I have:

1. You need to press him on which ones they are. This book is a good overview of why essentially all government regulations suck:
   
   http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/research/files/papers/2006/9/monetarypolicy%20winston/20061003
   
   
2. Check out the article I linked above. I apply the Socratic Method to the claim that deregulation caused the Great Recession
   
   
3. To fix this misconception, you need to understand the competitive process:
   
   http://thelibertyhq.org/learn/index.php?articleID=257&parentID=32
   
   Working conditions are just another condition of employment besides wages, and is set by supply and demand. Furthermore, about OSHA - see the book linked in #1. It shows that OSHA has had no statistically significant impact on safety. You could also try http://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/serials/files/cato-handbook-policymakers/1999/9/hb106-34.pdf
   
   On occupational licensing and other licensing, see
   
   http://econjwatch.org/articles/occupational-licensing-scant-treatment-in-labor-texts
   
   http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2013/06/your_sort_is_pr.html
   
   http://t.co/WQKpPYM8Kw
   
   As well as the book in #1. Summary of all of the above: licensing is useless at best.
   
   
4. This might be a good starting point: http://www.cato-unbound.org/2008/11/10/roderick-t-long/corporations-versus-market-or-whip-conflation-now
   
   After that, try http://www.amazon.com/The-Triumph-Conservatism-Reinterpretation-1900-1916/dp/0029166500
   
   The above book is written by a socialist historian who actually argues that competition was alive and kicking during the Guilded Age, and that it was the big corporations which asked government for more regulations to control competition.
   
   
5. He got that big because he was simply good. He lowered prices and increased quality. Claims of predatory pricing are baseless, upon an economic analysis. See my writeup about Standard Oil on the Mises Wiki: http://wiki.mises.org/wiki/Standard_Oil
   
   
6. Start with http://mises.org/daily/2317#1
   
   Also, point out that the actually bad robber barons got big through help from the government.
   
   
7. See #2. Also, read Meldown, by Tom Woods: http://www.amazon.com/Meltdown-Free-Market-Collapsed-Government-Bailouts/dp/1596985879
   
   See http://www.tomwoods.com/blog/deregulation-caused-the-financial-crisis/
   
   and http://www.tomwoods.com/blog/did-deregulation-cause-the-financial-crisis/
   
   
8. Well, it wouldn't be just ostracism. The police would still get the money back...
   
   
9. Reasons are mixed, I suppose. I don't know enough about Civil War history. You might want to read DiLorenzo on the issue, though I have also heard from some libertarians that he is sometimes dishonest in how he presents the facts.
   
   
10. The facts speak - real per-student funding has more than doubled in the last 30 years with no impact on scores. If full socialism works in education (as is essentially currently the case, and as your friend suggests would be nice), why not have the entire economy be socialistically planned?
    
    More about education: http://thelibertyhq.org/learn/index.php?listID=9
    
    If you want to see the Socratic Method in action, check out this convo of mine:
    
    http://libertyhq.freeforums.org/socratic-method-in-action-t477.html
    
    But once again, I highly recommend reading my article linked in #1. It's a super helpful debate tactic.
    
    Edit: Screw automatic fixing of numbering.

Well we have hundreds of books that you haven't read, and you continue to repeat the assertions of the same self described economist who I am very familiar with and I have reread very recently.

Marx's definition of capitalism is private ownership of the means of production. When the largest government in the history of the world steals tax money and gives it to the wealthiest firms in society, there is nothing capitalist about it. It is simply mercantilism and welfare for the the rich. You have absolutely no idea what the tradition I'm coming from is based on, which is the voluntary acceptance of the concept that property rights are the most just manner of resolving claims to scarce resources in a given area. The recognition that the state is not the spirit of the people, but a criminal organization that will inevitably hand favors out to the wealthiest people in society.

The economic school I am convinced by bases its explanation for economic collapse and the business cycle on exactly the type of behavior you describe: the creation of fraudulent fiduciary media leading to artificial expansion of credit and the malinvestment we have experienced since the crash which will certainly lead to a larger crisis.

This is not capitalist behavior to save capitalism, this is fascist behavior to sustain the growth of the state. When American Progressivism rose to popularity along with Nazism and Fascism in the early 1900's, it too did so on the back of Right-Hegelianism and propaganda claiming the death of laissez-faire and the need for a central body to manage the inequity of markets.

A lot of the historical work I value covering this period comes from the New Left, actually, like Gabriel Kolko's https://www.amazon.com/Triumph-Conservatism-Reinterpretation-American-1900-1916/dp/0029166500

This is the prevailing system in the US, where the income tax didn't exist and the government was a shadow of its current self prior to Wilson and FDR.

I'm not going to play dumb and misrepresent Marxism, I disagree with the LTV and the historical process exactly how it is written. If you want to make dismissive blanket assertions about a tradition that has all of its literature available for free all over the internet, much like Marxism, you should at least learn enough about it to know what it is. Or just ignore it... But you don't have any clue about the ideas you're criticizing.

> "industries can be trusted to regulate themselves"

Lol. Kudos to you for keeping at it with someone who is so obviously and blatantly a shithead troll.

I feel like you deserve better than I've been giving you. For being so patient and all.

So: firstly, libertarians are not a unified block as all that. Any more than communists are a unified block who all think alike (there are Marxists, non-Marxists, Leninists, Maoists, Trotskyites, etc etc).

http://c4ss.org/content/12938

Secondly, on the issue of regulations, the question is not so much what corporations would do if left unregulated - the question is actually much more immediate. It's who controls the government NOW, and what are they using government's regulatory power for. Now and in the past.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Triumph-Conservatism-Reinterpretation-1900-1916/dp/0029166500

You should bear in mind, the real difference between liberals like you, and radicals like communists and libertarians isn't one over preferred policies. Radicals don't believe our current system (capitalist + statist) to be workable, at all. I.e. rather than this being some sort of democracy, it's actually a plutocratic kleptocracy/oligarchy, with control maintained with heavy doses of propaganda and emotional manipulation of sheeple. Including disinformation about radical factions like communists, and yes, libertarians.

I shan't defend libertarians further. I'm actually not one myself, or an ideologue of any stripe. I believe that efforts to formulate a "perfect" or even just "right" ideology are futile and doomed to failure. I just think that because libertarians are a small and despised minority, they're powerless and not really the problem. That's more likely you liberals. After all, what has the result of your liberalism been? You guys voted for this, not libertarians.

>Can you explain to me what you mean by much more free market back then?

It would take a while to look at all sectors of the economy, but just look at the health sector.

>Would you argue any and all regulation is bad ?

I would argue that. This book written by a socialist exposes just this fact that regulations are anti-competitive and corrupt.

> I don't see how any Democrat can become a Libertarian.

This book usually helps: http://www.amazon.com/Triumph-Conservatism-Reinterpretation-American-1900-1916/dp/0029166500/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1462798737&sr=1-1&keywords=the+triumph+of+conservatism

>It's more like LargeCorp demands deregulation

Someone needs to learn their history.

I suggest:
http://www.amazon.com/Triumph-Conservatism-Gabriel-Kolko/dp/0029166500/ref=wl_it_dp_o_npd?ie=UTF8&coliid=I2W9M32WBET3KD&colid=3DQ5SJT7U6S2T

by:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Kolko

http://www.amazon.com/Triumph-Conservatism-Gabriel-Kolko/dp/0029166500

Actually, the answer is yes, because the left isn't pro-corporation and it's not pro-monopoly. I recommend you read this book.

hand them this book. "The Triumph of Conservativism"

Calls progressives the true conservatives, and theyre the ones who put corporate special interest in power.

And liberalism doesn't work. Never did.