The only reason we refer to alternative sources of energy as alternatives is because we’ve put all of our eggs in one basket. Originally that basket was full of wood. Then it was coal. Then came oil. Then nuclear tried to gain a foothold, but the monopoly of oil continues to rule the day.
Throughout the history of the United States the people, as taxpayers, through the government have underwritten the building of the overwhelming majority of the infrastructure of our country and its developing lifestyle. Whenever I hear people whine about the evil waste of government, and how it rips off the taxpayer, and how it is an intrusion upon our lives, and how better off we would be without it, I shake my head over the abject ignorance of so many of my fellow citizens. We have bought and built large parts of the great American lifestyle through the money that we have paid to fuel the government to create the society that we desire.
90% of the 46,837 mile Federal Interstate Highway System (and 16,000 interchanges) was paid for with federal funds. Yet, those highways are owned by the states themselves. We, the people, through taxes we pay, build the highways while maintaining ownership of them through the individual states. Those roads are then maintained through funds from state fuel taxes. Even the speed limits are determined by the individual states. Further, the Federal government contributes about 60% of the money used to repair and maintain the country’s 600,000 bridges. Libraries. Education. Museums. Seaports. Regulatory organizations that are required to monitor business because there are so many people, businesses and organizations attempting to take advantage of America and its people. National parks and monuments. The list of what we, the people, through payment of taxes to grease the wheels of government create and support is largely what contributes to the high standard of living and opportunity in this country.
Before I move on, a brief word about earmarks. Earmarks are an invention designed to circumvent the problem created by the government being so big that Congress doesn’t have the time to even consider many of the things that need to be done. The term “earmark” is used in ways that imply that they are illegal, underhanded ways of congressional people sneaking funds that they shouldn’t. Although that sometimes happens, by and large the thousands of earmarks are for what could be considered valid needs. As far as validity is concerned, one man’s meat is another man’s poison. Actually, earmarks also provide another important function, they allow for certain projects even if the political majority doesn’t always agree, and after all, the political majority is not always right. We’re all well aware of that fact whenever “the other party” is in power. If people want to talk about earmarks, why don’t they also talk about Executive Orders, the President’s way of circumventing having to run things through Congress and the judicial system.
If one reads the founding documents of this country, one finds the declaration that this is a country of the people, by the people, and for the people. All of the mavericks who yell about states’ rights, and who champion secession, and who promote doing things their own way “and all others be damned,” are far from being patriotic citizens. They have about as much of a knowledgeable understanding of what this country is about, and the history that has lead us to our current position of affluence and influence in the world, as a fly speck.
The government of the United States is the people. So when one vociferously condemns the government, they are actually condemning the people. As a part of “the people,” I take such criticism of the government personally and I resent it. How dare you condemn the people of this country. Adam Smith, whom so many capitalists admire, said the wealth of nations is in its people. The individuals who trash the government as though it were an enemy need to understand that just as they claim that capitalism is “self correcting,” so is the government of the United States of America self-correcting. Yet, those who condemn government demand punishment and dismantling of the government and then turn around and demand toleration and a free ticket for their treasured market.
The government of the United States has underwritten physical expansion from the Atlantic to the Pacific, railroads, highways, state and local infrastructure, airplanes, shipping, the auto industry, computers, nuclear power, and on, and on, and on. The business of capitalism would never have made any real headway if it hadn’t been for the help and the support and the extremely laissez faire attitude of the U.S. government that often allowed business to run rampant over the people. Furthermore, if the federal government had not served to standardize many of the laws and pieces of infrastructure of the 50 different states, capitalism would have become a self-destructive free-for-all. And those facts, right there, are why we have government regulation of business. It’s not that government has sought to interfere in business, but rather that “our” government has had to take steps to protect “us” from the rampages of capitalism. My God, read your history. Government regulation is reactive, not proactive. It’s not that the government of the people desires to unfairly limit business. It’s that the government of the people, acts by the people through their elected and appointed representatives to insure for the people that they will not be unduly taken advantage of by business and by corporations.
If one but listens to the out-of-control rants and ravings of the extremely dysfunctional individuals known as radio talk show hosts, one realizes that their top priority is for rampant galloping capitalism. They disguise it with verbal fusillades about freedom for the individual to have access to unlimited opportunity, however the greatest opportunity that the system that they support offers to the overwhelming majority of people is the opportunity to be another cog in the wheel. Now, if you disagree with me, you might ask yourself whether you are a cog or you are the one who owns the machinery. If you are a cog, well, what can I say. You should know by now the reality of the great opportunity. If you are, on the other hand, the owner of the “machinery,” then how many cogs does it require for you to remain a successful owner? Bottom line is that it takes a hell of a lot of cogs to run the machinery of capitalism; therefore most people are going to live their lives as cogs, always on the edge of worrying about the next payment and wondering if their “retirement” will live up to their expectations. Every once in awhile someone will break free and rise above the rest, but it will just require more cogs to support them on their road to success.
A dozen or so years ago, a couple of hotshots came up with two new terms that turned out to be oxymorons. The first term was “compassionate conservatism.” The reason this is an oxymoron is because conservatism is not, by its very nature, compassionate. Nowhere in the doctrines of conservatism, or even more so in the pronouncements of contemporary conservatives themselves will one detect anything having to do with compassion. Compassion has to do with people, more specifically with the treatment of “other” people. The people most often concerned in conservatism are the people “me.” It’s “My” freedoms, and “my” rights and just “leave me alone” and it will all work out. As Lincoln said, conservatism is “adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried.”
The second oxymoron is “compassionate capitalism.” This was an awfully difficult realization for me to acknowledge. I grew up being taught the benefits of capitalism, and in the public school system, to boot. So having to become aware that capitalism cares very little about people was a shock. Capitalism and its principles sound great, at least on the surface. Ah, the freedom, the opportunity, the chance, and anyone can do it. Right. So true. True liberty. But wait a minute. What about the price?
Have you ever heard of cause and effect? You know, for every cause there is an effect. Well that’s only part of the story. There are also results. For instance two trains are on the same track, going in opposite directions and headed straight towards one another. Crash! The two trains on collision course = cause. The crash = effect. But when they crash, they raise up, briefly, as though trying to escape the pull of gravity. This is result. Those who were on the train, if they survive, have to live the rest of their lives with the results of that crash experience. Cause and effect can usually be narrowed down to a brief measurable time period, but results go on over time and quite often mutate into further results.
Well, it’s the same with capitalism. There are cause and effect events, but there are also results. However nobody wants to talk about the results. Yet the results linger far beyond the effects (think about global warming). It is true that in a capitalist system opportunity exists as a possibility for everyone. It’s like being an Amway distributor (I was one for 9 years). I honestly believe that anyone can become a successful Amway distributor. I believe that to be a fact. If one does what they are trained to do in that business and they do it consistently and they do not give up and quit, they will become successful. How long will it take? It doesn’t really matter if one is going to achieve comfortable success. But most people give up far too early. And although the more bitter ones claim that they are giving up on Amway, they are really giving up on themselves.
Another fact, however, is that 90% of the people who sign up as Amway distributors will not be successful. The reason is simple. They won’t do what they are told to do and do it consistently, and they will eventually quit trying to pretend that they are attempting to build a successful business. Nine out of every ten. But that’s why the one in ten can make it. If everybody “worked” the Amway business, they’d tap out the available pool of people in a month. The early ones would build a big business and the later ones would run out of available people to help them build their businesses. If everyone owned a McDonald’s franchise, who would flip the burgers. Who would want to eat there.
Capitalism is like that. In order for it to work, there needs to be an unlimited growing pool of consumers. That’s the result. That’s part of the price. Not everyone can be the boss that opportunity promises. Capitalism thrives on consumption and upon a growing pool of cheap labor. When either of those two factors waiver, the energetic capitalists create new ways to generate wealth. Unfortunately these new ways are not founded in the Capitalist ethic, but rather are invented around the false assumption that one can make money from money. Think about that for a minute.
Money is a symbol. It is not wealth itself. It’s only value is in the belief that it has value. I’ll show you what I mean. I have two bills here.
If I ask you to take the bill of your choice, which one will most people take? The $100 bill, of course. But how can that be? The other bill is $1,000,000. Why not take that one? Because we know that it is not “real,” that it has no real value. But what value does the $100 bill have? Well, years ago, the U.S. printed bills that were called Silver Certificates.
On those bills it said “This certifies that there is on deposit in the Treasury of the United States of America One Silver Dollar payable to the bearer on demand.” In other words, the money was backed by silver on deposit.
Those got replaced by United States Notes.
They said “The United States Will Pay To The Bearer On Demand One Dollar.” Unlike the Silver Certificate, it does not say what constitutes “One Dollar.” Since it is a United States note, the assumption is that it is backed by the United States Of America.
Next came the Federal Reserve Note.
This merely says that it is “legal tender for all debts public and private” and implies that it is backed by the Federal Reserve Bank. It doesn’t say that it has any value or that it is backed with anything of value. And that is the money that we use today.
The only value that money has anymore is that of belief. If it is believed to have value, then it has value for all of the believers. And the amount of value is directly attributable to the level of the belief of the believers.
The reason I went through all of this is to show you that money has no value of its own. So why would anyone think that they could wring additional value out of something that has no real intrinsic value to begin with. But isn’t that exactly what “interest” is all about. A loans B money and then expects to be repaid with that initial “value” of money plus more. B has to generate additional wealth so A can merely sit back and collect wealth without doing anything to generate it. Well, where the hell does the “more” come from?
Smoke and mirrors, my friend. It’s a lot of smoke and mirrors. Our friend Dr. Fred Alan Wolf says that reality is nothing more than a whole lot of agreement. And that applies so astutely to the “value” of money. And that should be so obvious to everyone in our current economic system and our current economic condition.
An additional problem from all of this economic stuff arises from the fact that a major portion of the economy is nothing but a big crapshoot. And God, do we love to gamble. Always on the lookout for the next sure thing. I have lost track of all of the companies that I have worked for, and known of, whose founders were only in it long enough to go public so that they, the owners, could cash in by cashing out bigtime.
Recently, I was told by a knowledgeable friend that in the late 1990’s a bill was passed by Congress and signed into law wherein it was essentially made illegal to use the term “gaming” in reference to the stock market. But that’s exactly what the stock market is. And with the possibilities offered through today’s computer systems when linked to some of today’s deviously creative minds we now have a world economy seemingly in freefall.
Oh, woe is me; what to do.
This all goes back to the founding of this country. Let me ask you a question. What rights and freedoms does the Constitution of the United States offer or guarantee to you as a United States citizen? None! Read it for yourself. Oh, now you might say, “what about the amendments, the Bill of Rights.” Well, what about them? Why are they amendments instead of a part of the “original” document. The Constitution of the United States was adopted by the Constitutional Convention on September 17, 1787 and became the “law of the land” when ratified by New Hampshire (the 9th state to do so) on June 21, 1788. It took until May 29, 1790 for the last of the original 13 states (Rhode Island) to ratify the Constitution. The first 10 Amendments, known as the Bill of Rights, was introduced to Congress by James Madison on June 8, 1789 and ratified into the Constitution on December 15, 1791. As an aside, Connecticut, Georgia, and Massachusetts did not ratify the Bill of Rights until 1939 (that was not a typo, it was 1939, the 150th anniversary of the first 10 amendments to the Constitution of the United States of America). So it took 4 years after the adoption of the Constitution to guarantee the rights of the people, by the people, and for the people who had been the foundation of this entire enterprise in the first place.
The Federalists of the time believed that the Preamble to the Constitution guaranteed the people’s rights when it professed to “form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, ensure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” That obviously didn’t cut it, for we never hear anyone complaining about not honoring the preamble, but instead of not honoring the Bill of Rights. One of the other reasons the freedoms were held up to be added later as amendments was because the major players in the founding of this country knew that, number one, they needed a Constitution as a foundation from which to function. Number two, they needed to have all of the states join in this effort so that they would truly be united. And number three, they knew that some of the colonies would argue over any number of individual rights ad infinitum, so they left that part out of the Constitution itself so as to better insure its rapid acceptance and ratification. Once the Constitution was ratified, they could then work on adding guaranteed freedoms to the already existing document. It took 4 years to get those freedoms into the guaranteed fabric of this country’s foundation; quite a remarkable feat, considering that this was done by Congress.
We haven’t talked here about the fact that the original Constitution supported slavery. That’s another story, and one that those who like to deify the founders of this country conveniently overlook.
Well, that was all before our time. Now it is the 21st Century, the world’s economy is in chaos. And the question is, “What are we going to do?”
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