In a nutshell (Brazil Nut), a liberal can be summed up as a person who believes that society (and he being a driver/participant in it) works to ensure that yesterday's ills and wrongs can be overcome. The resulting effect of this triumph over the "wrongs," be they technological or wrought by basic human prejudice, is that everyone eventually will live a better, happier life.
In a nutshell, a conservative believes this is all pie-in-sky nonsense and that it is each man for himself, survival of the fittest. And, if the "fittest" have a conscience then they donate to charities of their choices.
The Rule of Thumb
An economist by the name of Arthur Okun stated that when unemployment drops by 1%, GDP drops correspondingly by 2% to 3%. Many hesitate to call this a law so therefore, it is called a "rule of thumb."
Over the past 30 years, our economic ups and downs have all revolved around either the creation of virtual wealth; speculation on bubbles in the investment arena such as internet/techonology and then the real esate bubble; and, ultra-hyper-mass consumption leading to the "virtual ownership" through the abuse of consumer credit.
Conservatives and believers in the tooth fairy still like to claim that tax cuts were responsible for much of the growth of this era but what they are not willing to admit is that the vast Reagan and W tax cuts came during periods of massive deregulation of our banking and financial markets. Perhaps, it was the loss of oversight on these industries which led to the increases in investment?
Progress
30 years ago, we had no internet and the government, led by rising stars like Al Gore and then Bill Clinton, wisely aided the development of this technology. The internet today has arguably had more impact than any development since the creation of electricity. Had W been president, then we would still be mailing letters and calling each other from telephones attached to kitchen walls.
In these 30 years, we have also seen a massive assualt on modernity. The republicans/conservatives, led by their bible-thumping breathen from the Southern states, have reacted in many of the ways that Islam has reacted to US encroachment on their youth cultures via our enticing soft culture: Benjamin Barber a pompous but very wise former-Rutgers professor called it Jihad vs. McWorld. Fundamental, theocratic cultures are being threatened by the internet and its uncontrollable morals and so we see violent reaction.
These reactions manifested themselves on 9/11 and they have united and made powerful the GOP since 1994. Barry Goldwater was liberal in many of his views compared to what the conservatives of today espouse as rational, intellectual thought. They call any progressive behavior communist and as is typical in reactionary, fear-driven, change-adverse societies (I happen to live in one today), forward-looking, intellectual thought is called "pseudo" and "faux."
Yet...tomorrow may not be better
For 30 years, we have seen the lives of Americans made "better" thanks to the increase of consumer credit. Yet, today, we have more Americans bankrupt or in crippling debt than at any other time in our history. We have not seen the advance of any serious, long-lasting technologies, other than in the military industrial complex, during this period.
At the expense of our long-term well-being, for the sake of short-term profits and massive bonuses, conservatives have poohed-poohed investment in any area that might have paved the way for gradual and positive development in our economic infrastructure: what are we capable of leading the world in today other than in the field of arms? Obesity? Soft culture?
Driven by greed and void of the so-called 'invisible hand', big business has been free to make profits off of their profits without showing anything other than virtual wealth and needless consumer goods.
In the never-ending quest for lowered margins so that quarterly bonuses could be ever larger, big business, patriots all of them, "Jesus-sayers" predominately from Southern states and almost always conservatives, willingly drove their businesses out of America. Unemploying the American workers, they espoused that the market, the gospel of the profit incentive, demands such sacrifice. And so, today, we see that as 1% of Americans join the ranks of the unemployed, the GDP is dropping faster than it did in the past--and vice versa: Okun's rule is screamingly conservative compared to today's reality.
Another consequence of our failed experiment at a greed-driven economy void of governmental regulation is that these jobs, it is estimated, won't return to our eonomy after the downturn subsides. The lost jobs are lost for real because places like China and India and Mexico are now doing the work that Americans did just 20 years ago; but, for a mere fraction of the cost and all for the sake of the quarterly profits of that shrinking pool of owners.
Obama's Vision
They obstruct and they obstruct yet the conservatives haven't yet found the key ingredient to dismantling the man's vision. He has vision and being an American, I am addicted to vision and national goals: a man on the moon by the end of the decade, only fear we should fear, ask not what your country can do for you, etc., etc.
President Obama is trying to make the changes we found impossible to make beginning in January 1981 when greed came to town. President Reagan had vision, granted, but he also had an economic understanding that was perfect for the nation in which he came of age. By letting Detroit off the hook on gas emission requirements in the mid-80's and pretty much paving the way for SUV's, Ronald Reagan took our economy back to the post-WWII era of useless consumer crap in all shapes and colors for everyone at the lowest possible price. Which has directly led us to where we are today: nowhere.
We are for all intents and purposes bankrupted as a nation. What is our plan for going forward? More consumption for the sake of consumption? More unregulated profits thanks to super risky mortgages, etc.? President Obama is trying to make us a green nation because he knows that this may be one of our last pillars of world economic leadership. We are America. We used to be the smartest nation until taxs were cut so far that federal funding dried up for research grants resulting in a dumbing down of our universities (although, we still are the best in this area, the world is catching up fast).
Our college grads speak English poorly. Too many are focused on making big and quick profits in finance. We have lost our way and been dumbed down thanks to the cultural battle against modernity. We have to seize the golden opportunity which is sitting before us and we must become the world's leader of all green technologies. Europe and Asia, led of course by China, are making great strides at capturing this new and growing segment of the world's market.
It is time for us to boldly strive forward, like Americans, and to conquer yet another frontier for the betterment of our nation. If this means that we need government leadership and funding then so be it. Because one thing is for sure, the sales of more cans of soda or bigger bags of beef jerky at Wal-Mart are not going to preserve our place at the top for much longer.
Conservative response: "need to cut taxes. The market will make the necessary adjustments and then all will be good again." Been there, tried that and look where it got us.
Showing posts with label greed. Show all posts
Showing posts with label greed. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Here We Go Again
As gas prices rise across America, journalists are making the rounds to service stations. "We just filled up our SUV and it cost $89." Shocked and awed, they ponder about the effects of another season of lost sales earnings caused by frugal Americans: our adolescent recovery, may not make it out of puberty, they threaten.
Yes, it does hurt when you drop a $50 into the tank and it still isn't full. However, the picture is still wrong. Many being interviewed at the gas stations are still driving the wrong cars. Last summer, when gas was sky high, I recall seeing Hummer's and other such monstrous and failed business ideas of the now extinct car companies, sitting in driveways collecting bird droppings.
Then, around New Years, when gas prices were bottoming out again, those lunch-box like cars with their racing strips and tinted windows could be seen idling at lights with tiny mothers chatting gleefully away on cellphones while the kiddies in the back watched movies and ate chips. America's heroin was again cheap.
Lost earnings as a result of less travel this summer caused by high gas prices may slow our recovery but in the long term, it will speed up our national transition from a nation held hostage to 50 years of good, old-fashioned bad American business practices. The whims of the board room and the scavenger hunts for profit at any cost are now considered by many as the causes for our decline. The era of make bigger and worse and less competitive cars has come to an end.
As the end of that era settles, bankruptcy for GM drying in the books, "il Chryler" soon to become part of Fiat, the Obama people have made it a national priority to force big business to actually produce things that can compete in a world economy; and, the main priority of whether to produce or not will no longer be, "by how much will it increase our bonuses at the end of the year?"
Greed
It was the greed of big business which led us to where we are; and, it was the idiocy of government, usually republican led congresses and administrations, that permitted big business to turn our manufacturing core into something that is barely more efficient than Russia's.
Conservative disingenuousness sold the mantra to the masses that government intervention in the market was bad: it was "communist, socialist...liberal even." Yes, democratic presidents have also chosen to believe that the market is self-correcting and usually right. This philosophy may have held some water back when there were some regulations still in place.
But, from the "government is the problem" speech of Reagan to W's dismantling of our government so that there simply were no resources left to properly regulate anything, the profits being made by big business and Wall Street were simply so amazing that really it is hard to blame them for stealing our nation's wealth, our future. Owning islands and box seats for every team would be kind of cool, right?
President Obama, being accussed by those same wealthy patrons of the last 30 years of republican-led theft, is forcing big business to recall that the nation in which they are located, and whose interests they should also consider when they have their board meetings, is America. Islands belong to countries and not corporate "barons." The new Yankee Stadium is farcical in its catering to the corporate world. Whoever heard of paying $2000 for one seat at one game?
These companies, Wall Street, are not "island-companies" inhabiting a world of other "island companies" abusing the world's resources, human and natural, all for the sake of wealth, more wealth and still more wealth. They are corporate entities obligated to give to the national foundation which permits them to exist.
Business, in America, is now being forced to be people, nation-friendly. Perhaps, I am naive to believe such a thing, but, I know one thing for sure, virtually everything President Obama has done since becoming president is a step toward this end goal.
Unless, however, the republicans/conservatives regain some power and then, they will continue to dismantle our national wealth and then it will be too late--the global warming which doesn't exist, they say, will have done its deed and by then Denver will be under water.
Yes, rising gas prices make today difficult, but they remind us of our dependence on foreign oil and on really, really bad business decisions of the past half-century. Business cannot again be allowed to run free without rules and without the interest of the nation at the heart of its mission statement.
Good luck, President Obama!
Yes, it does hurt when you drop a $50 into the tank and it still isn't full. However, the picture is still wrong. Many being interviewed at the gas stations are still driving the wrong cars. Last summer, when gas was sky high, I recall seeing Hummer's and other such monstrous and failed business ideas of the now extinct car companies, sitting in driveways collecting bird droppings.
Then, around New Years, when gas prices were bottoming out again, those lunch-box like cars with their racing strips and tinted windows could be seen idling at lights with tiny mothers chatting gleefully away on cellphones while the kiddies in the back watched movies and ate chips. America's heroin was again cheap.
Lost earnings as a result of less travel this summer caused by high gas prices may slow our recovery but in the long term, it will speed up our national transition from a nation held hostage to 50 years of good, old-fashioned bad American business practices. The whims of the board room and the scavenger hunts for profit at any cost are now considered by many as the causes for our decline. The era of make bigger and worse and less competitive cars has come to an end.
As the end of that era settles, bankruptcy for GM drying in the books, "il Chryler" soon to become part of Fiat, the Obama people have made it a national priority to force big business to actually produce things that can compete in a world economy; and, the main priority of whether to produce or not will no longer be, "by how much will it increase our bonuses at the end of the year?"
Greed
It was the greed of big business which led us to where we are; and, it was the idiocy of government, usually republican led congresses and administrations, that permitted big business to turn our manufacturing core into something that is barely more efficient than Russia's.
Conservative disingenuousness sold the mantra to the masses that government intervention in the market was bad: it was "communist, socialist...liberal even." Yes, democratic presidents have also chosen to believe that the market is self-correcting and usually right. This philosophy may have held some water back when there were some regulations still in place.
But, from the "government is the problem" speech of Reagan to W's dismantling of our government so that there simply were no resources left to properly regulate anything, the profits being made by big business and Wall Street were simply so amazing that really it is hard to blame them for stealing our nation's wealth, our future. Owning islands and box seats for every team would be kind of cool, right?
President Obama, being accussed by those same wealthy patrons of the last 30 years of republican-led theft, is forcing big business to recall that the nation in which they are located, and whose interests they should also consider when they have their board meetings, is America. Islands belong to countries and not corporate "barons." The new Yankee Stadium is farcical in its catering to the corporate world. Whoever heard of paying $2000 for one seat at one game?
These companies, Wall Street, are not "island-companies" inhabiting a world of other "island companies" abusing the world's resources, human and natural, all for the sake of wealth, more wealth and still more wealth. They are corporate entities obligated to give to the national foundation which permits them to exist.
Business, in America, is now being forced to be people, nation-friendly. Perhaps, I am naive to believe such a thing, but, I know one thing for sure, virtually everything President Obama has done since becoming president is a step toward this end goal.
Unless, however, the republicans/conservatives regain some power and then, they will continue to dismantle our national wealth and then it will be too late--the global warming which doesn't exist, they say, will have done its deed and by then Denver will be under water.
Yes, rising gas prices make today difficult, but they remind us of our dependence on foreign oil and on really, really bad business decisions of the past half-century. Business cannot again be allowed to run free without rules and without the interest of the nation at the heart of its mission statement.
Good luck, President Obama!
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
The Clock is Ticking
Yesterday was not about Barack Obama, to beat the drum of so many other commentators and reiterate, it was about America, all of us, and about the 44th president.
Beyond the call to service, beyond the critque of the last 8 years of Bush-Cheney rule, President Obama sent a shot across the bow of all Americans ailing sense of virtue; a virtue whose shine vanished completely under a petina of greed; a 28-year era whose dogma's main principles proclaimed that the lifestyles of the rich and famous were to be rejoiced and goals to which we all should strive.
Yes, it was greed, a frowned upon human flaw mentioned in the Bible over 200 times, that led us, a God-fearing nation to the place we are today.
Harking back to my trip to the US over the recent holiday season, I was still stunned to see how many people refuse to give up their massive vehicles. Lone drivers chug along in their massive Escalades, Expeditions and so on. Massive McMansions, vast swathes of lawn being seeded and then regularly watered, being heated and then cooled and heated and cooled all for 3 and 4 people.
Yes, it was greed that permitted the likes of Madoff to do what he is accused of having done (and he still sits free at home). It was greed that permitted our nation to vote twice for a man who was so clearly not intelligent enough to have been president; yet, his promise of tax cuts for the wealthy and big business motivated the "interests" and tickled the "dumb Christians" (who seem to forget about greed and its prominent place in the Bible) into action.
Yes, it was greed that led us away from Kyoto and let the White House to completely and totally politicize the facts about global warming by censoring reports from scientists whose sole responsibility was to warn the nation, its people, its elected officials when danger is imminent.
Greed. One single time our new president mentioned that word but, in every single word before and after it, calls for action, recriminations of the last eight years, he was really screaming at the top of his lungs: greed is tearing our nation asunder.
Driven by greed, universal health care was not passed under Bill Clinton--and most Americans, thanks to millions of dollars invested in advertising against universal health care will say that Clinton's program would have been bad for people and too costly--and today, our nation's dwindling resources are filling the pockets of those who did everything they could to destroy that legislation.
Obesity is greed. Driving big cars is greed. Making and selling and living in McMansions is greed. Wal-Mart is greed. The religious right is about greed. It is greed which motivates people to be against green technologies.
Greed, hopefully, left us yesterday when W. flew off into the sunny, blue sky and Mr. Potter was driven away to suburban Virginia.
Today is D-Day and the enemy is not entrenched Germans, drinking tea and waiting, waiting for our boys to assualt the beaches; the enemy is our learned appetites for everything now. Will we win this battle? This war? The clock is ticking. The hidden mines are many but on June 6, 1944, by 11 AM, our boys had moved off of bloody Omaha.
The clock is ticking. 11 AM is not far off. Will be make it to our president and his vision of our nation?
Beyond the call to service, beyond the critque of the last 8 years of Bush-Cheney rule, President Obama sent a shot across the bow of all Americans ailing sense of virtue; a virtue whose shine vanished completely under a petina of greed; a 28-year era whose dogma's main principles proclaimed that the lifestyles of the rich and famous were to be rejoiced and goals to which we all should strive.
Yes, it was greed, a frowned upon human flaw mentioned in the Bible over 200 times, that led us, a God-fearing nation to the place we are today.
Harking back to my trip to the US over the recent holiday season, I was still stunned to see how many people refuse to give up their massive vehicles. Lone drivers chug along in their massive Escalades, Expeditions and so on. Massive McMansions, vast swathes of lawn being seeded and then regularly watered, being heated and then cooled and heated and cooled all for 3 and 4 people.
Yes, it was greed that permitted the likes of Madoff to do what he is accused of having done (and he still sits free at home). It was greed that permitted our nation to vote twice for a man who was so clearly not intelligent enough to have been president; yet, his promise of tax cuts for the wealthy and big business motivated the "interests" and tickled the "dumb Christians" (who seem to forget about greed and its prominent place in the Bible) into action.
Yes, it was greed that led us away from Kyoto and let the White House to completely and totally politicize the facts about global warming by censoring reports from scientists whose sole responsibility was to warn the nation, its people, its elected officials when danger is imminent.
Greed. One single time our new president mentioned that word but, in every single word before and after it, calls for action, recriminations of the last eight years, he was really screaming at the top of his lungs: greed is tearing our nation asunder.
Driven by greed, universal health care was not passed under Bill Clinton--and most Americans, thanks to millions of dollars invested in advertising against universal health care will say that Clinton's program would have been bad for people and too costly--and today, our nation's dwindling resources are filling the pockets of those who did everything they could to destroy that legislation.
Obesity is greed. Driving big cars is greed. Making and selling and living in McMansions is greed. Wal-Mart is greed. The religious right is about greed. It is greed which motivates people to be against green technologies.
Greed, hopefully, left us yesterday when W. flew off into the sunny, blue sky and Mr. Potter was driven away to suburban Virginia.
Today is D-Day and the enemy is not entrenched Germans, drinking tea and waiting, waiting for our boys to assualt the beaches; the enemy is our learned appetites for everything now. Will we win this battle? This war? The clock is ticking. The hidden mines are many but on June 6, 1944, by 11 AM, our boys had moved off of bloody Omaha.
The clock is ticking. 11 AM is not far off. Will be make it to our president and his vision of our nation?
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