[JohnRawls]

That is incorrect. Capitalism has demonstrated its superiority to socialism and all the older systems -- feudalism, primitive despotism, tribal communism, etc. -- but has not defeated geoism -- the system pioneered in Hong Kong since the mid-19th century and in use in China for over 40 years -- and probably won't.

Communism was never a contender. What capitalism defeated in the late 20th century was socialism, however loudly the governing parties of the socialist countries called themselves communist.

No. Despite a very flawed implementation, endemic corruption, and its legacy of socialism and even quite recent feudalism, China's geoist system has achieved the greatest economic miracle in the history of the world. Geoism is just that much superior to capitalism.

Geoism.

Capitalism demonstrated that you don't have to go to all the trouble of actually owning landless working people to treat them like slaves; owning the land is enough:

"During the war I served in a Kentucky regiment in the Federal army. When the war broke out, my father owned sixty slaves. I had not been back to my old Kentucky home for years until a short time ago, when I was met by one of my father's old negroes, who said to me: "Master George, you say you set us free; but before God, I'm worse off than when I belonged to your father." The planters, on the other hand, are contented with the change. They say: "How foolish it was in us to go to war for slavery. We get labor cheaper now than when we owned the slaves." How do they get it cheaper? Why, in the shape of rents they take more of the labor of the negro than they could under slavery, for then they were compelled to return him sufficient food, clothing and medical attendance to keep him well, and were compelled by conscience and public opinion, as well as by law, to keep him when he could no longer work. Now their interest and responsibility cease when they have got all the work out of him they can.

-From a letter by George M. Jackson, St. Louis, August 15, 1883, as reprinted in Henry George's Social Problems

Geoism? I never really heard of it even to be honest with you. And since I post on a politics forum without hearing about a socio-economic system probably means that it is really obscure.

So very unlikely. What I can tell you is that Chinese system is a crony capitalist model sort of like Russia. It is a system rife with corruption, imbalances and other drawbacks which will lead to the same outcome as for Russia of which there are two obvious routes:

1) Stagnation and then the rulling class tries to keep power by other means (In case of Russia war and severe repression)
2) Democratisation of the system and it changes to a vanilla liberal democracy with capitalism.

China is 5-10 years behind Russia on that schedule though by the looks of it.

[Truth To Power]

So that's how much we have to pay rich, greedy, privileged parasites purely for being rich. - Believe this to be your words, no?

Yes.

And in general it was your theme that debt is for the rich to stay richer and poor to stay poor or poorer.

No -- although the debt-money system certainly has that effect.

Now your idea is that the rich are basically getting paid. Reality is that those with money be it people or large institutions use that money to gain more money or to park it somewhere safe which is basically also giving money to somebody just for a lot riskier things.

Money lent to the US government is not at risk.

On the other hand, we see that Luxembourg with its 4000%+ external debt is not dying and is actually a super prosperous society.

No, I already explained why that is irrelevant: it's public and private debt, and not netted against the assets money was borrowed to purchase.

So the rich are not really parasitic, are they?

That is an absurd non sequitur.

They take risk and assume reward and then the rest plays out over time.

Taking risks per se does not earn any return. Criminals take more risks than anyone, and they don't earn anything.

If properly managed on both sides this is actually a win-win.

Yes, and government borrowing at interest from rich, greedy, privileged parasites who should rightly be paying that money in taxes is not proper management on the part of government.

[Hakeer]

Increasing the minimum wage.

A concept that distinguishes those who are aware from those who are not.

A privilege is a legal entitlement to benefit from the abrogation of others' rights without making just compensation: the most important ones are land titles, IP monopolies, bank licenses, oil and mineral rights, and broadcast spectrum allocations. Countervailing privilege is privilege putatively intended to undo the harmful effects of other privileges: some important ones are minimum wages, rent control, union monopolies, welfare, and publicly funded education, pensions and health care.

No. I want to shift the burden of taxation off beneficial economic activity -- production and consumption -- and put it on privilege. That would have the effect of making almost all billionaires pay a lot more tax -- especially indirectly, through reduced value of their privileges -- but it is not directed at billionaires specifically.

See the difference?

Great. We agree on something — not everything — but something. As far as tax code, cut taxes on working class and increase it a lot on billionnaires.

[SpecialOlympian]

I rarely use all caps; and if pith and accuracy make my observations seem like "slogans" to you, that's perhaps a sign that you are encountering some facts that are inconvenient to your beliefs.

Except for a few moronic outliers, I don't think anyone on this forum thinks billionaires have a reason to exist. Nobody has done enough for society to warrant a billion dollars worth of compensation (Except Muhammed, PBUH).

Like your energy is, "If you aren't as angry as me you're a class traitor." It's really exhausting, dude. I'm really trying to engage with you here and you just make it so fucking tiring to even agree with you.

[SpecialOlympian]

Also @QatzelOk, insane Americans fund AIPAC. Not Israel. I know as someone from Quebekistan you speak feudal peasant French and have no understanding of superior American politics because it doesn't involve a mime juggling imaginary balls. But the money for AIPAC comes from insane Americans and not Israel. Nobody had to be fooled to fund pro-Israel political groups in AMERICA, THE GREATEST COUNTRY, we are just that bloodthirsty. Here is a link you can read (further links and explanations in article)

https://forward.com/news/580248/donations-aipac-has-raised-since-oct-7-lever-howard-kohr-michael-tuchin/

Top benefactors on a list of 2023 donors reviewed by The Lever represent a cross-section of the U.S. elite, including pro sports teams owners; heads of private equity firms; real estate titans; a Maryland congressman now running for the U.S. Senate; the former CEO of Victoria’s Secret; the co-founder of the dance-exercise company Zumba; and the creator of Squishmallows, the beloved children’s toy.

You do not appreciate how insane Americans are. There's a significant portion of the electorate and Congress that thinks funding Israel in any war will lead to the best thing that could ever happen: Jesus descending from the sky to kill everyone who isn't chosen (every person who is rich and rightwing).

[Truth To Power]

Except for a few moronic outliers, I don't think anyone on this forum thinks billionaires have a reason to exist.

It's true that no billionaire I am aware of has obtained even the most righteous $1G of their wealth through commensurate contributions to production (if anyone thinks there is one, please let me know who, so I can investigate their business activities and history). In part this may be because it is so much easier to obtain great wealth by privilege, corruption, and rent seeking than by production. But I am not prepared to rule out the possibility because there is a positive feedback element: managing labor and productive assets to make them more productive earns the additional production such skillful management yields, putting even more labor and productive assets into the most productive hands. That is the great virtue of capitalism. Such a feedback mechanism could result in one person contributing more than $1G to the world's wealth.

Nobody has done enough for society to warrant a billion dollars worth of compensation (Except Muhammed, PBUH).

Oh, please. When I was a kid, nobody paid any attention to Islam because it was a joke, a silly fairy tale for poor people in backward countries on the other side of the world. Every majority-Muslim country in the world was a poor, ignorant, oppressive, and backward dictatorship (to the extent that they had functioning governments at all) run by kleptocrats. Then the 1973 OPEC oil embargo and price hikes started shoveling trillions of dollars into the pockets of a handful of those dictators and potentates who owned the oil, and they gave some of the money to support the spread of the most traditional, radical, and consistent -- i.e., the most irrational and hateful -- forms of Islam. The result? Every majority-Muslim country in the world is still an ignorant, oppressive, and backward dictatorship run by kleptocrats (to the extent that it has a functioning government at all), but a few of them are no longer poor.

If you want to know who has really contributed billions to the world's wealth, it would be Isaac Newton, who single-handedly created the sciences of mechanics and optics, which made mechanical engineering possible, which made the Industrial Revolution possible, which made all of modern civilization possible.

Like your energy is, "If you aren't as angry as me you're a class traitor."

No, a traitor to liberty, justice, truth, reason, and all humanity.

If you are not rich, and you are not angry, then you do not understand what the rich are doing to you.

[Truth To Power]

As far as tax code, cut taxes on working class and increase it a lot on billionnaires.

Which is why I would abolish income tax entirely. I have never understood how anyone could justify taxation of working people's wages, the measure of what they are contributing to the wealth of the community. We should be taxing what people take from the community, not what they contribute!

[Truth To Power]

Geoism? I never really heard of it even to be honest with you.

Of course not. Geoism is justice. How would you ever have heard of it?

What I can tell you is that Chinese system is a crony capitalist model sort of like Russia.

BWAHAHHAHHAAAA!

No wonder you have never heard of geoism: you are unacquainted with even the most basic facts.

When China under Deng abandoned socialism in the late 1970s, it embraced the market and private ownership of producer goods, but retained all land and natural resources in public ownership. That was the geoist model that Hong Kong had used so successfully for more than a century, often topping lists of the freest and most prosperous economies in the world. Of course, China was not Hong Kong: where HK benefited from reasonably honest and competent British colonial administration, China was still (and remains) under the control of the utterly corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical Communist Party.

By contrast, when Russia abandoned socialism in the early 1990s under Yeltsin (and similar kleptocrats in the other former Soviet republics), it privatized land and natural resources on the Western capitalist model at its neoclassical advisors' insistence, and over the strong objections of dozens of eminent Western economists who recommended it follow the geoist model that was already achieving such extraordinary results in China (see https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Open_let ... chev_(1990)).

The results? Capitalist Russia immediately suffered a dramatic economic collapse worse than America's Great Depression, and turned into a stagnant and corrupt fascist kleptocracy, while geoist China has, despite its many flaws and its legacy of corruption, socialism and feudalism, gone from strength to strength, achieving the greatest economic miracle in the history of the world.

That's how far superior geoism is to capitalism.

It is a system rife with corruption, imbalances and other drawbacks which will lead to the same outcome as for Russia of which there are two obvious routes:

No, because unlike Russia, China is geoist, not capitalist, and is consequently not crippled by private ownership of land and natural resources. The best Russia can hope for is stagnation along the lines of the Philippines, where private landowner privilege is more firmly entrenched than anywhere else in the world. China, by contrast, can aspire to turn out more like Singapore (where ~90% of the land is publicly owned) if it can get out from under the CCP.

1) Stagnation and then the rulling class tries to keep power by other means (In case of Russia war and severe repression)

China is geoist, so stagnation is not an option. But it is also not a democracy, so the political situation is obscure and unpredictable. China could choose to become free, peaceful, prosperous and democratic, leading the world in the 21st century, by thoroughgoing adoption of geoist policies and institutions; but the CCP is unlikely to be interested in that path.

2) Democratisation of the system and it changes to a vanilla liberal democracy with capitalism.

No, capitalism in China would just ensure a stagnant fascist kleptocracy that made democratization impossible, like it has in Russia.

China is 5-10 years behind Russia on that schedule though by the looks of it.

Garbage. China has huge problems, as noted above -- perhaps worst of all, it has adopted the inherently destabilizing debt-money system of Western finance capitalism -- but being geoist, it has every opportunity to soar above the rest of the world in the next few decades. Its problem is its political institutions, not its geoist economy.

[JohnRawls]

Of course not. Geoism is justice. How would you ever have heard of it?

BWAHAHHAHHAAAA!

No wonder you have never heard of geoism: you are unacquainted with even the most basic facts.

When China under Deng abandoned socialism in the late 1970s, it embraced the market and private ownership of producer goods, but retained all land and natural resources in public ownership. That was the geoist model that Hong Kong had used so successfully for more than a century, often topping lists of the freest and most prosperous economies in the world. Of course, China was not Hong Kong: where HK benefited from reasonably honest and competent British colonial administration, China was still (and remains) under the control of the utterly corrupt, incompetent and tyrannical Communist Party.

By contrast, when Russia abandoned socialism in the early 1990s under Yeltsin (and similar kleptocrats in the other former Soviet republics), it privatized land and natural resources on the Western capitalist model at its neoclassical advisors' insistence, and over the strong objections of dozens of eminent Western economists who recommended it follow the geoist model that was already achieving such extraordinary results in China (see https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Open_let ... chev_(1990)).

The results? Capitalist Russia immediately suffered a dramatic economic collapse worse than America's Great Depression, and turned into a stagnant and corrupt fascist kleptocracy, while geoist China has, despite its many flaws and its legacy of corruption, socialism and feudalism, gone from strength to strength, achieving the greatest economic miracle in the history of the world.

That's how far superior geoism is to capitalism.

No, because unlike Russia, China is geoist, not capitalist, and is consequently not crippled by private ownership of land and natural resources. The best Russia can hope for is stagnation along the lines of the Philippines, where private landowner privilege is more firmly entrenched than anywhere else in the world. China, by contrast, can aspire to turn out more like Singapore (where ~90% of the land is publicly owned) if it can get out from under the CCP.

China is geoist, so stagnation is not an option. But it is also not a democracy, so the political situation is obscure and unpredictable. China could choose to become free, peaceful, prosperous and democratic, leading the world in the 21st century, by thoroughgoing adoption of geoist policies and institutions; but the CCP is unlikely to be interested in that path.

No, capitalism in China would just ensure a stagnant fascist kleptocracy that made democratization impossible, like it has in Russia.

Garbage. China has huge problems, as noted above -- perhaps worst of all, it has adopted the inherently destabilizing debt-money system of Western finance capitalism -- but being geoist, it has every opportunity to soar above the rest of the world in the next few decades. Its problem is its political institutions, not its geoist economy.

Just out of curiosity and your obsession. How come then the property prices relative to income are the highest in China if your system is somehow that fair? Also what do you think about government controlling large banking, manufacturing and other businesses that are usually in private hands in the West which creates artificial monopolies and corruption? The so called "national champions" of "commanding heights". While not all large enterprises or jugernauts are state owned or controlled yet in China but its moving in that direction in the same way as it is happened in Russia by the way.

Note the clear distinction between ownership and control. In many cases, the government in Russia technically keeps the company private but they have full control through the owner since they control the owner and decide the rules for the business. In a sense that they control the subsidies, the government contracts, the kickbacks and the rules on top of blackmail on the owner and being able to jail him any time he doesn't "cooperate".

[Truth To Power]

Just out of curiosity and your obsession.

Sorry to be so obsessed with liberty, justice, and truth; I realize they are not exactly up your alley.

How come then the property prices relative to income are the highest in China if your system is somehow that fair?

The Chinese system is technically geoist, but very imperfect because the small fraction of the ruling elite who are not totally corrupt are still communists, and have no idea what they are doing or why their system has worked so well.

As previously mentioned, China has adopted the debt-money system of finance capitalism, which inherently creates a boom-bust asset-price cycle based on debt. That has combined with China's extraordinarily high household savings rate to create a vast pool of money looking for returns, and Chinese culture doesn't have the tradition of investment in stocks and debt vehicles that Western capitalist economies have, and basically only looks for returns in real estate.

Unfortunately, although it is technically geoist, China has allowed land lease holders to pocket immense amounts of publicly created land rent: at least 90% of China's millionaires have got that way at least in part by holding land leases (usually with the help of corrupt officialdom). I have had many homestay guests from the PRC in my house (always from affluent to very affluent families), and they were remarkably single-minded about wanting to invest in land -- even in a game of Monopoly, they were unanimous in spurning the railroads and utilities in favor of the street properties, offering comments like, "Just buy the land!" and "I only want land!"

Also what do you think about government controlling large banking, manufacturing and other businesses that are usually in private hands in the West which creates artificial monopolies and corruption? The so called "national champions" of "commanding heights".

In addition to services like public safety, there are some natural monopolies that are best publicly owned and run, like roads and railroad beds, water, power, and other infrastructure industries, because there is nothing to be gained by private competition. Manufacturing does not fall into that category, nor do agriculture, health care, education, and most services. Banking is a little different because under the debt-money system, private commercial banks issue most of the money, which creates a perverse incentive and destabilizes the economy. Money issuance should be a public utility, and private banks should be limited to doing what they claim to be doing: financial intermediation and risk management. China is riding the debt-money tiger, and I fear it is not going to end well.

While not all large enterprises or jugernauts are state owned or controlled yet in China but its moving in that direction in the same way as it is happened in Russia by the way.

Yes, that's part of its socialist legacy and nominal communist rule, but also an implication of Russia's fascism. As Mussolini observed, "Fascism is state power allied with corporate power," and that seems to be what is happening in both China and Russia.

Note the clear distinction between ownership and control. In many cases, the government in Russia technically keeps the company private but they have full control through the owner since they control the owner and decide the rules for the business. In a sense that they control the subsidies, the government contracts, the kickbacks and the rules on top of blackmail on the owner and being able to jail him any time he doesn't "cooperate".

That is similar in China, although they don't seem to be quite as ruthless as Putin: Jack Ma at least re-appeared, alive and apparently unharmed.

But please try to find a willingness to know how Russia's abandonment of socialism was crucially different from China's -- i.e., Russia went capitalist, China geoist -- and how differently the two countries have consequently fared since then.

[JohnRawls]

Sorry to be so obsessed with liberty, justice, and truth; I realize they are not exactly up your alley.

The Chinese system is technically geoist, but very imperfect because the small fraction of the ruling elite who are not totally corrupt are still communists, and have no idea what they are doing or why their system has worked so well.

As previously mentioned, China has adopted the debt-money system of finance capitalism, which inherently creates a boom-bust asset-price cycle based on debt. That has combined with China's extraordinarily high household savings rate to create a vast pool of money looking for returns, and Chinese culture doesn't have the tradition of investment in stocks and debt vehicles that Western capitalist economies have, and basically only looks for returns in real estate.

Unfortunately, although it is technically geoist, China has allowed land lease holders to pocket immense amounts of publicly created land rent: at least 90% of China's millionaires have got that way at least in part by holding land leases (usually with the help of corrupt officialdom). I have had many homestay guests from the PRC in my house (always from affluent to very affluent families), and they were remarkably single-minded about wanting to invest in land -- even in a game of Monopoly, they were unanimous in spurning the railroads and utilities in favor of the street properties, offering comments like, "Just buy the land!" and "I only want land!"

In addition to services like public safety, there are some natural monopolies that are best publicly owned and run, like roads and railroad beds, water, power, and other infrastructure industries, because there is nothing to be gained by private competition. Manufacturing does not fall into that category, nor do agriculture, health care, education, and most services. Banking is a little different because under the debt-money system, private commercial banks issue most of the money, which creates a perverse incentive and destabilizes the economy. Money issuance should be a public utility, and private banks should be limited to doing what they claim to be doing: financial intermediation and risk management. China is riding the debt-money tiger, and I fear it is not going to end well.

Yes, that's part of its socialist legacy and nominal communist rule, but also an implication of Russia's fascism. As Mussolini observed, "Fascism is state power allied with corporate power," and that seems to be what is happening in both China and Russia.

That is similar in China, although they don't seem to be quite as ruthless as Putin: Jack Ma at least re-appeared, alive and apparently unharmed.

But please try to find a willingness to know how Russia's abandonment of socialism was crucially different from China's -- i.e., Russia went capitalist, China geoist -- and how differently the two countries have consequently fared since then.

Russia tried to go at it the wrong way in my opinion. They first went open-press trying to democratise the system and then conducted the reform for capitalism. The problem with that approach is that communism/socialism that the Soviet Union had was massive repression and nobody really liked it so the country exploded before they managed to even start with capitalist reform as a whole. A noble attempt but seems to be China is doing better in this regard. The idea of reforming the economy first and then opening up over time was a better idea without the country exploding.

The socialist ideal is not necessarily bad if its conducted within the framework of capitalism to moderate it. But it can not supersede capitalism because otherwise you can get Soviet Union basically and they return to the starting point.

Your idea isn't bad apparently, since it does address the problem that China has right now in the right way. The Public goods also seems to be okay that is actually debatable depending on society but I am not here to nitpick.

I still don't understand though how is Geoism better than classical capitalism. You have this weird approach to land lease which is hard to understand honestly. You can't buy it and you can't lease it then how do people make sure whatever they do on the land is fine and their own? Technically all land in China belongs well to the Communist party but in practicality it doesn't work that way and they issue 90 year leases. I am a bit not sure how do you even regulate something that nobody owns or leases land. What would stop somebody from coming and just taking over your farm or factory or office building then? And if you say you own the office building then its literally the same thing as owning the land becuase nobody can really use the land under a scyscrapper or whatever.

[Deutschmania]

I think that the main problem here is that @Truth To Power has launched into an immediate self righteous personal attack upon all whom dare to critique their notion of the land value tax , and has neglected to first define what in the world Geoism , also known as Georgism , after it's originator , Henry George , even is . Now I have heard of it , as I happen to be a weird autistic geek , for whom radical social theories such as these constitute a restricted interest of mine . But I don't suppose that all that many other people would have ever known of such a set of ideas . After all , Georgism hasn't caught on in influential impact , the way that Marxism has . And as Marx himself asserted , Geoism is an overly simplistic reductivism , in that it focuses on the value of land , to the exclusion of the value of labor.

https://merionwest.com/2019/06/02/through-letters-the-gap-between-henry-george-and-karl-marx/

Although , with that being said , Leo Tolstoy seemed to have had a favorable view of the idea .

https://www.marxists.org/archive/tolstoy/unknown/tolstoy-on-georgism.html

[Hakeer]

Which is why I would abolish income tax entirely. I have never understood how anyone could justify taxation of working people's wages, the measure of what they are contributing to the wealth of the community. We should be taxing what people take from the community, not what they contribute!

If all you have is various kinds of consumption tax, billionaires would love it! They would gladly trade that for no tax on their income.

[Truth To Power]

A server glitch duplicated my post. Delete.

[Truth To Power]

Russia tried to go at it the wrong way in my opinion.

They went the wrong way, by choosing capitalism over geoism even after the open letter to Gorbachev had proved exactly why it was wrong.

They first went open-press trying to democratise the system and then conducted the reform for capitalism. The problem with that approach is that communism/socialism that the Soviet Union had was massive repression and nobody really liked it so the country exploded before they managed to even start with capitalist reform as a whole.

Garbage. They went full-bore capitalism immediately by selling off all the state assets to private interests, especially the land, and the consequences were exactly as the open letter to Gorbachev predicted.

A noble attempt

Garbage. The "noble attempt" was designed to create a parasitic capitalist oligarchy out of the Yeltsin clique, and that is exactly what it did.

but seems to be China is doing better in this regard. The idea of reforming the economy first and then opening up over time was a better idea without the country exploding.

China has made no attempt to open up politically.

The socialist ideal is not necessarily bad if its conducted within the framework of capitalism to moderate it.

The socialist ideal is necessarily bad because when socialists steal factories, there are fewer factories available for production. When capitalists steal land, the amount of land available for production stays exactly the same.

But it can not supersede capitalism because otherwise you can get Soviet Union basically and they return to the starting point.

Socialism has failed convincingly in every way but one: as an excuse for seeking power.

I still don't understand though how is Geoism better than classical capitalism.

Is justice better than injustice?

You have this weird approach to land lease which is hard to understand honestly. You can't buy it and you can't lease it then how do people make sure whatever they do on the land is fine and their own?

In effect you lease it by paying the community for what it provides instead of paying taxes to fund desirable public services and infrastructure and then paying a private parasite for permission to access the same desirable public services and infrastructure your taxes just paid for. You pay for government once instead of twice.

Technically all land in China belongs well to the Communist party but in practicality it doesn't work that way

Sure it does.

and they issue 90 year leases. I am a bit not sure how do you even regulate something that nobody owns or leases land.

There are various lease terms, depending mainly on what the land is to be used for. In theory they are auctioned off, but in practice the Party decides who gets them and at what rent. There are three huge problems with the Chinese implementation:
1. The allocation is by the Party, not the market.
2. The rent doesn't increase. It should track GDP, as land rents typically do.
3. There is no compensation for the removal of people's liberty to use land.

What would stop somebody from coming and just taking over your farm or factory or office building then?

Secure, exclusive tenure is one of the publicly provided services you would be willing to pay the land rent for. People willingly pay private landlords for it, why wouldn't they be willing to pay the community that actually provides it?

And if you say you own the office building then its literally the same thing as owning the land becuase nobody can really use the land under a scyscrapper or whatever.

The difference is that the building's value comes from the initial rightful owner -- the builder -- who was rightly paid for it. The land's value comes from the community. Why pay greedy, parasitic private landowners for it?

[SpecialOlympian]

Don't do that annoying shit where you quote everyone line by line. I ain't reading that.

[Potemkin]

Don't do that annoying shit where you quote everyone line by line. I ain't reading that.

I’d be a lot more impressed if he quoted everyone word by word.

[Hakeer]

Don't do that annoying shit where you quote everyone line by line. I ain't reading that.

I know. He has a psychological compulsion to contradict every single sentence you write.

[SpecialOlympian]

I’d

YOU ARE A CLASS TRAITOR

be

YOU ARE A CLASS TRAITOR

You get where ths is going I'm not putting in any more effort.

[SpecialOlympian]

I know. He has a psychological compulsion to contradict every single sentence you write.

It's so. fucking. annyoing.

Even when you fundamentally agree with him. I rarely see anyone so grating, like the emotional equivalent of rubbing pumice on your hands. Yes, I'm cleaning and taking care of myself but this still sucks, I hate this.

Truth To Power, you are at a minimum 30 years old if you're posting on this forum. It is time you to learn to socialize with other adults. I'm willing to slow roll you through this proces, which I assume will be extremely painful for both of us, but you need to calm the fuck down first.

I will teach you how to make frands and keep them. I'm literally a professional friend: you give my company a million dollars and I'm there on the phone for you during office hours. I'm a praciiced listener.