Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger
When I was young I would religiously watch the Sunday morning news shows, especially NB
C’s Meet the Press. Beginning in 1947, MTP is the longest running show in television history. While the other networks had comparable shows, clearly MTP with its longevity was seen as the show of record.
“The show’s format consists of an extended one-on-one interview with the host and is sometimes followed by a roundtable discussion or one-on-two interview with figures in adversarial positions, either Congress members from opposite sides of the aisle or political commentators. The show expanded to 60 minutes starting with the September 20, 1992 broadcast” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meet_the_Press#Moderators
Face the Nation, premiering in 1954 is considered to be the other Sunday morning News show of record. FTN’s format is:
“The moderator interviews newsmakers on the latest issues and delivers a short topical commentary at the end of the broadcast. The program broadcasts from Washington, D.C. Guests include government leaders, politicians, and international figures in the news. CBS News correspondents and other contributors engage the guests in a roundtable discussion focusing on current topics.”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Face_the_Nation
What all of these shows have in common is that they are repeatedly populated by the same people, whether politicians, journalists, economists or political operators. This link gives the background of the truth of Sunday morning “journalism”. http://mediamatters.org/search/index?qstring=Sunday+Morning+Talk+Shows&x=9&y=6 The casts rarely change and in all but the rarest of cases these guests make up what could be called our nation’s “Pundit Class”. They are seen as the “Serious People”, who lead America’s national debate on vital issues. I’ve been a “political junkie” since the age of ten. For many years I was misled into believing that these “Serious People” were really my intellectual betters when it came to public affairs and that political discussion must only exist within the ground rules of debate established by our “Pundit Class”. Beginning with the murder of JFK and in the ensuing disillusionment of the Sixties I’ve come to see that not only is this “Pundit Class” inherently corrupt, but only a rare few can barely be called intellectually informative. This group is in reality the paid propagandists of the elite 1% that rule this country and their main task is to limit the scope of our national debate.
In the last two weeks one of the most heard and most esteemed members of the Pundit Class, Fareed Zakaria, has been suspended from Time Magazine and CNN due to the discovery of plagiarism in one of his columns. Zacharia is also a Yale University Trustee and there is talk that his removal from that august position is under consideration. I’ve never particularly cared for Mr. Zakaria, but I was surprised by his plagiarism, more so by the fact he admitted it so readily and so abjectly. An article in the Huffington Post provided an explanation of Mr. Zakaria’s actions with a surprising explanation that I hadn’t expected and yet one that in retrospect makes perfect sense.
On 8/12/12 Eric Zeusse, an investigative historian, posted an article titled: “Fareed Zakaria Is Bitten by His Own Tale: How He Helped Create the System That Bit Him Back”. He began the article in this manner and in doing so exposed me to an idea that frankly hadn’t occurred to me.
“When Fareed Zakaria was suspended on Friday from Time and CNN, for plagiarism, this wasn’t merely justice, it was poetic justice: it rhymed. What it rhymed with was his own lifelong devotion to the global economic star system that he, as a born aristocrat in India, who has always been loyal to the aristocracy, inherited and has always helped to advance, at the expense of the public in every nation. He was suspended because, as a born aristocrat, who is a long-time member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Trilateral Commission, the Bilderberg Group, and many other of the global aristocracy’s primary organizations, he is so well-connected that his writing-commissions are more than any one person can possibly handle, and he consequently cannot possibly actually write all that is attributed to him. He certainly cannot research it all.”
In my naivete it I never thought of the possibility that someone like Mr. Zacharia might not write all, or even most of his material. I wasn’t aware of his aristocratic background, nor of his close connection to some of the secretive groups that shape global policy. I always just saw him as a “middle-of-the-road” pundit, with whom I disagreed on many things. As Mr. Zeusse goes on to explain:
“Like many “writing” stars, he has a staff perform much of the research and maybe even actual writing for him, and many in his situation are actually more editors than they are writers; but, regardless, he cannot let the public know that this is the way things are, because this is simply the way that the star system works in the “writing” fields, and because the public is supposed to think that these stars in the writing fields are writers, more than editors.
And, it’s a very profitable system for such stars. As Paul Starobin said, headlining “Money Talks,” in the March 2012 Columbia Journalism Review, Zakaria’s speaking fee is $75,000, and “he has been retained for speeches by numerous financial firms, including Baker Capital, Catterton Partners, Dreihaus Capital Management, ING, Merrill Lynch, Oak Investment Partners, Charles Schwab, and T. Rowe Price.”
So, he’s clearly a very busy man, with a considerable staff; he can’t possibly do everything himself.
But he needs to appear as if he does. He needs to present everything “he” does, as “his.”
The last two sentences above ring true and explain why Zakaria is so willing to perform mea culpa, take his suspensions and hope that this will blow over quickly. To admit the possible truth that someone writing for him had actually plagiarized would expose the fact that this “World Class Pundit and Author”, was merely a “front man” representing his privileged class. If this is true of Zakaria, who else of these “serious journalistic stars” is also doing the same thing and more importantly how are they shaping the political debate?
“Fareed Zakaria knows the way it works. So, he cannot afford to admit when he is being credited with the work of his employees. Far less damaging to him is to admit that he has done plagiarism himself, as he has admitted in this particular case — regardless whether it’s true.
If Zakaria didn’t actually do this plagiarism, could he very well announce to the world “I didn’t do it; I didn’t even research or write the article”? No. Romney and the Republicans say that the “job creators” at the top are the engine of the economy, and the aristocracy need to maintain this myth. It’s very important to them — that they are the stars, and that the people who might be the actual creators who work for them are not.
Zakaria wouldn’t want to burst the bubble atop which he is floating. To people in his situation, it’s a bubble of money, and it’s theirs. They don’t want to share it any more than they absolutely have to. (They despise labor unions for that very reason.) And their employees are very dependent upon them, so no one will talk about it — not the stars, not their workers.”
To make Eric Zeusse’s premise even more interesting we have this report on 8/16/12, “Fareed Zakaria Cleared By Time, CNN In Plagiarism Investigation”. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/16/fareed-zakaria-time-columns-review_n_1792081.html .
“We have completed a thorough review of each of Fareed Zakaria’s columns for TIME, and we are entirely satisfied that the language in question in his recent column was an unintentional error and an isolated incident for which he has apologized. We look forward to having Fareed’s thoughtful and important voice back in the magazine with his next column in the issue that comes out on September 7.”
Since Zakaria originally admitted he had made “A terrible mistake” it is heartening to see that his “mistake” was only an isolated incident. I think back to graduate schools papers I’ve written and wonder how I would have fared if I had “made a terrible mistake” in them through plagiarism. Would an investigation of my “isolated incident” and remorse have allowed me to continue in school? However, protecting Mr. Zakaria, one of the chosen, is not only important for his sake, but for the sake of these “News Entities” that rely so heavily on the “connected” pundit class to provide their“cogent” analysis of major issues.
How many other “Pundits” acting as the “serious” people are setting the parameters of the national debate through their appearances on Sunday Morning talk shows, News Channels, the PBS News Hour and it appears as paid guest speakers at supposedly meaningful conferences and conventions? The person who first came to mind as I read this article on Zakaria was Thomas Friedman. Friedman is a son of privilege who married into a billionaire family. He has been a champion of “Globalization”, which to me has always meant unbridled support for the multinational Corporatocracy. He also seems to me to be a very childish writer in that his use of analogies to draw global conclusions is inept to the point of comedy. During my illness my daughter bought me a copy of “Friedman’s “The World is Flat” and in reading it I was blown away by how flimsy a narrative it was for someone so respected as a pundit, who gets so much air time and respect as a serious commentator on global issues. As it was put in his Wikipedia Article:
“A number of critics have taken issue with Friedman’s views, as well as aspects of his writing style. Critics deride his penchant for excessive optimism, a consistently flawed analytical approach, and a habit of trotting out unexamined truisms to support his opinions.”
“Some critics have derided Friedman’s idiosyncratic prose style, with its tendency to use mixed metaphors and analogies”.
“Similarly, journalist Matt Taibbi has said of Friedman’s writing that, “Friedman came up with lines so hilarious you couldn’t make them up even if you were trying – and when you tried to actually picture the ‘illustrative’ figures of speech he offered to explain himself, what you often ended up with was pure physical comedy of the Buster Keaton/Three Stooges school, with whole nations and peoples slipping and falling on the misplaced banana peels of his literary endeavors.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Friedman
While I have no proof of it, I would speculate that Friedman too has people writing much of his stuff and that his journalism is more of the editorial kind. However, what is obvious and known about Friedman is that he is a pundit star, ranking with, or possibly above Zakaria in the firmament of “Serious People” who frame our national debate and dominate our national media. This is really nothing new in our country. In the past the “serious people” were the likes of Walter Lippman http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Lippmann Scotty Reston, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Reston . These past pundits and “cold warriors”, share a commonality with Zakaria and Friedman, in that they all serve(d) the interests of the Corporate and Monied Elite that run this country from behind the scenes. Indeed, I’m sure that you the reader could expand this very small list of those who are deemed acceptable to lead the “serious” discussion of our national/international issues.
I assert that the entire Liberal versus Conservative debate in this country is but a smokescreen that distracts us from the one most vital issue. Our nation and indeed the world is and has been controlled by an Elite representing those with most money and power. Their first allegiance is to themselves, their class and to the belief that they alone are fit to rule us all. Call it what you will, but to me it is the continuation of feudalism in modern guise. Just as in feudalism there were “Courtiers” who gladly did the bidding of their “Royal Masters”, in order to enrich their own lives. Most of the “Courtiers” were either born to, or became part of the elite, while maintaining the pretense of speaking for the benefit of all humanity.
If we the people are ever to cast off the control of those who would leash us for their benefit, we must learn to think for ourselves and critically examine the opinions of those who are represented to us as “serious people”. Unfortunately, this remains a highly individual task because we are surrounded by experts, who in reality are propagandists purveying non-existent mythology to keep us in the thrall of the Elite. Disdain the pundits for their message is false. Become your own pundit and most especially view the world through an iconoclastic perspective. Despite their degrees, their travels, experiences and accolades, few are really that perceptive since they have been co-opted and anointed as members of a Priesthood of Power, blinding them to what real life for most of us is about.
Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger
TonyC,
Thanks for your thoughts. My breeding point was that survivors of autocratic rule with execution of dissenters would select those who tolerated the system and did not stick up their heads.
I still hold that to be the goal of autocrats through the millenia. However I don’t have the genetic facts to back up my surmise.
This selection would have no effect and is not intended to suppress the alpha competition.
Why should that be a matter of concern for an autocrat? On the contrary, he needs leaders, just ones that know their places. And how would the selection of rebellious individuals or persons effect the alpha drive. I see no connection nor claimed any.
If anything, this selection reinforces the “know your place in the alpha order and stay there.”
I had a simple realization just now. It is not the common man who is dangerous to the king, it is his closest who dare to challenge him. Have we not seen this for all the years we record.
And folk heroes are, like David in the bible, just legends to tell by the fireside. Like the ones which tell of heaven which waits for the meek, obedient servant.
Tony C:
I should have said economics as a system of study.
Gene H:
If you think Bastiat’s logic is facile, I think maybe you dont understand what he wrote. He nailed most everything he undertook to write about and in terms that a layman could understand and relate to. Which is what any serious academic should be able to do. If the average man cannot understand it, then either the academic doesnt understand what he is saying or what he is saying makes no sense. Fundamental truths are necessarily simple. If they are not, then that’s proof you have the wrong concepts and principles, because the purpose of concepts and principles is to simplify.
Malisha
“According to the routine, HMDU is “the currency of our culture.” and “One reason suggested for why straight men fear gay men is that they realize that gay men (except those in the closet, obviously) have voluntarily given up some HMDU, and the act of voluntarily giving up any amount of HMDU is scary to HMDU-deficient people and to HMDU addicts as well.”
Thanks for the lightening bolt.
I suggest adding a “W” to those four letters, (making five). W as in white. WHMDU. I have many non-logical weaknesses in me. Your mention of gays in this formula hits the spot. As a youth within my environment and peer group, we all strove to be “alpha males”. Thank goodness, I ain’t 16 no more, (sic) and struggling to achieve some fantacist goal of what I am. Now I am content with my efforts and my simple delusions :o) ..
Yes I was, as my fellow peers were, threatened by the seemingly “lack” of manliness we perceived in gay people. Bashing them verbally was an ego stroker for our juvenile egos. This is not unknown today among youths, and sadly many adults. We were desperately searching for HAMDU CRED. A right of passage into manhood.
Thank goodness, I ain’t 16 no more….. The lightening bolt I refer to, is this proceeding, equally true (to me) observation.
Would I give up, my arbitrarily coincidence of nature, melanin challenged pale skin. I have never experienced life as anyone other than a US. citizen of Irish-German descent. Gay people have been challenged and questioned their entire lives, so that admittance to HAMDU is denied, or VERY reluctantly accepted. I propose in our society the same can be said of People of color.
My personal HAMDU has never had to overcome that, Thus, I also propose WHAMDU. Our country is undeniably headed to being less than 50% pale skinned. (I protest the word white, it is as significant to me as being blond or brunette)
This thought has floated around in my head, your comment, actualized it. I am uncomfortable. Martin Luther King dreamed of a day “When a person is judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin”. What a true and lifting hope this statement is. Write it in stone, teach it in school, realize it in all societies.
Malisha, The weakness I find in me is, My innocence of birth, fate of environment, coincidence of skin color, has given me the qualification of acceptance to WHMADU.
Innocence, environment, and coincidence, all 3 not of my choosing, has given me a privilege I did not earn. I was essentially born on second base in this society.
Our government and society must exist to make a fair playing field to all. Education, Health Care, Balanced Law, Equal Treatment, these are principles everyone should be guided by. I as a person born on second base, recognize the unfairness to those that are not welcomed to “The Game”
I ramble a bit more. We have those in our society born on third and think they deserve it. Some on third rolled in there with razor sharp cleats up, shredded lives strewn behind on their base paths. Applauding and lauding themselves …… and way to many people in the crowd of fandom cheering and adorning them with laurels.
The pretense of punditry guides the sheep to adore the privileged, to see merit instead of greed, holiness instead of lust fulfilled, selfish self centeredness as good opposed to robbing humanity of equal opportunity and experience. …….
yea, Tony, that is the problem I have with Krugman too.
These Neo Liberal economic theories have already failed and will continue to fail because of Multinational Corporations- which create massive income inequality wherever they are allowed to operate.
@Blauw: Ha!
@Elaine: I am not always a fan of Krugman; but that is a good quote; and yes, Ryan is either a blithering idiot or a lying mouthpiece for the Koch brothers and their sociopathic brethren.
Krugman believes adamantly in free trade, and I (most vehemently) do not. It is insanely destructive and is ruining America. Frankly, his callous dimwittedness on this point makes me suspect his overall intelligence; I am not sure he can be trusted to put his ideology aside in assessing something.
The logic is really quite simple. I assume we can agree that the reason corporations complain about regulations that protect employees, consumers, the environment, and their investors is that the regulations are costly, time consuming, and prevent them from doing things they would otherwise do. (Nobody complains about a regulation that does not restrain them in any way or cost them anything, because compliance is automatic.)
Free trade lets corporations avoid those costs and inconveniences by doing as much work as they can in countries with fewer regulations. Any economist can see, by the standard rules of their own profession, that results in a race to the bottom and virtual (or actual) slavery for workers.
Free trade promotes worker exploitation, unsafe working conditions, actual slavery and environmental destruction. From a patriotic point of view, it encourages corporations to ship every possible job that can be done overseas to some remote corner where minimum wages, taxes, and worker protections are non-existent or unenforced, it encourages the corruption of governments and the oppression of citizens.
If you want to see why we have underemployment to the tune of 25%, look to free trade: Our laws protecting the health and safety of our citizens, which are the right thing to do, prevent us from competing on a cost-basis with countries like India and China that consider the lives, limbs and health of their citizens to be expendable resources in the pursuit of business profit. For them, polluting the environment is fine, putting employees in lethal danger, or routinely exposing them to carcinogens, is just fine. If you want to literally beat your employees so they work harder, feel free.
Krugman chooses to ignore the obvious; that free trade lets global corporations shop for laws and corruption they can exploit. He may be considered by some to be a left-wing liberal, but when it comes to free trade, Krugman is as dangerously wrong about what is good for America as Ryan is.
David Blauw,
I like the word Paul Krugman used for pundits–commentariat.
An Unserious Man
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: August 19, 2012
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/20/opinion/krugman-an-unserious-man.html
Excerpt:
Mitt Romney’s choice of Paul Ryan as his running mate led to a wave of pundit accolades. Now, declared writer after writer, we’re going to have a real debate about the nation’s fiscal future. This was predictable: never mind the Tea Party, Mr. Ryan’s true constituency is the commentariat, which years ago decided that he was the Honest, Serious Conservative, whose proposals deserve respect even if you don’t like him.
Tony C.
The reason the free market fails is that greed is the ultimate motivator, and without rules and regulations, certain people without morals or empathy or an ounce of regret will do literally anything for a profit.
This thread is about punditry in the media, What are you talking about Romney for? LOL
@Bron: Since economics is based on either acceptance or criticism of these men.
No it isn’t. Economics existed before those men were born; just as the science of physics and mathematics existed before Newton was born.
Those men were mere humans, they were not infallible gods speaking truths we must accept as inviolate. They were early scientists, like Newton, coming to conclusions based on limited experience, observations and generalizations that could be right, or could be wrong.
Like Newton, some of their insights were solid, and some were not, and all are open to question and disproof by later generations.
This is your fundamental personality flaw, Bron, you trust so much in authority that you have lost the ability to distinguish an argument from a fact and an assertion from a proof.
Simply claiming something is true does not make it true, no matter how famous the claimant may be, no matter how long ago they said it, no matter how many people agree with them or admire them or revere them. Truth is independent of individuals, acclaim, or admiration.
You apparently have blind faith in experts, that is what makes you an ideologue. Without any independent ability to come to your own rational conclusions, all of your knowledge is received dogma, and all you can ever do is parrot others, as if they were infallible. Of course you cannot ever admit to any major flaws in their analysis, because without them you would simply not know what to believe.
he must have annoyed someone,powerful,whats originality,except undetected plagiarism,
luis
Straw man, Bron.
I never said high level mathematics were a requirement of valid science. However, proper application of the scientific method is a requirement. Smith let his observations inform his theories. Von Mises let his theories (particularly his political theories) inform his observations. Because they eschew the use of scientific data and methodology, the Austrian School in general is one giant exercise in confirmation bias, but it isn’t good science. Also, you can be critical of both a man and his ideas, but his ideas should receive primary scrutiny. This is where von Mises fails. I could care less that most people personally found him abrasive and obnoxious. Most people found Newton to be an insufferable b*stard, but that didn’t make his ideas wrong. Personality is what people more often than not based their judgment of other people “as men”. That’s not the same thing as being critical of their ideas. I don’t think Bastiat is wrong because he’s Bastiat. I think he’s wrong because his logic is facile. The same goes with von Mises. He “as a man” has nothing to do with my rejection of his ideas. That’s secondary to his ideas being bad science based in politics instead of observation. Consider Rand. I reject her ideas because they are bad ideas. That her bad ideas came from a demonstrable sociopath is a secondary concern that has more to do with why her ideas are bad, but the grounds for their rejection are inherent to the flaws of the ideas themselves.
Gene H:
You mean like reading Adam Smith, JB Say, David Ricardo and Frederic Bastiat for starters? Since economics is based on either acceptance or criticism of these men. Particularly Adam Smith.
By the way, nothing has value except in regard to a human consciousness. A lump of gold or uranium has no value to a beaver or an aardvark. I didnt see much, actually I didnt see any high level math in The Wealth of Nations. Did I miss it? Yet from my understanding Adam Smith basically created the study of economics. According to you that isnt possible.
shano:
I am doing a little Max Keiser investigation. So far he seems rather interesting. He and I certainly agree about Benny B being an international terrorist hell bent on destruction.
Thanks for posting that video as a way of introduction to MK.
Or you could get your information from more than just think tanks, learn to think critically for yourself and how to evaluate evidence objectively so that evidence informs your theories (proper use of the scientific method and the path to factual information) instead of allowing your theories to inform your evidence (the path to confirmation bias).
Elaine:
“One should also check to find out if the moneyed people who are providing the think tanks’ funding are doing it with the express purpose of pushing agendas that will benefit them or their businesses/corporations in some way.”
If a person does that, then there is no way to have source material. Everyone who funds political or economic research is going to give money to organizations whose message/ideology they believe.
George Soros is not going to give money to a pro-free market think tank. John Allison is not going to give money to a socialist think tank.
@Idealist: Fact: It takes about 20 generations to breed from wild
foxes to those who are tame and amiable …
Yes, I saw that show, but breeding doesn’t answer the question, or make sense as an explanation. For example, even though that show was talking about dogs being bred away from the uniform appearance of wolves, it remains true that in any pack of dogs there will be an alpha dog leader. What makes the tame and amiable towards humans does not affect their inbred social dominance hierarchy, it just lets humans be recognized as full pack members, including the right to be the alpha dog.
The fact is that in ANY group of people, including the homeless or the poor or manual laborers or whatever, if they agree to be part of a focus group and come to majority decisions by discussion, there WILL emerge an opinion leader. If a large group sub-divides into two factions, each faction will have a leader.
That is human nature. If breeding were the issue, this could not be true for just any random group, but it really is true for just any random group. Being a leader or follower is not going to be traceable to some gene, which is essentially your contention in claiming that breeding is a factor. If genes were causing deference, then since well over 95% of people defer to a leader, we would frequently (about 60% of the time) run across groups of ten where no leader emerges. But that doesn’t happen.
Variations in development may be a real factor in personality, in experiments it does seem that even five year old children exhibit this tendency to “elect” leaders. But I have never seen anything to suggest that being such a leader is a genetically inherited trait.
An Unserious Man
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: August 19, 2012
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/20/opinion/krugman-an-unserious-man.html
Excerpt:
Mitt Romney’s choice of Paul Ryan as his running mate led to a wave of pundit accolades. Now, declared writer after writer, we’re going to have a real debate about the nation’s fiscal future. This was predictable: never mind the Tea Party, Mr. Ryan’s true constituency is the commentariat, which years ago decided that he was the Honest, Serious Conservative, whose proposals deserve respect even if you don’t like him.
But he isn’t and they don’t. Ryanomics is and always has been a con game, although to be fair, it has become even more of a con since Mr. Ryan joined the ticket.
Let’s talk about what’s actually in the Ryan plan, and let’s distinguish in particular between actual, specific policy proposals and unsupported assertions. To focus things a bit more, let’s talk — as most budget discussions do — about what’s supposed to happen over the next 10 years.
On the tax side, Mr. Ryan proposes big cuts in tax rates on top income brackets and corporations. He has tried to dodge the normal process in which tax proposals are “scored” by independent auditors, but the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center has done the math, and the revenue loss from these cuts comes to $4.3 trillion over the next decade.
On the spending side, Mr. Ryan proposes huge cuts in Medicaid, turning it over to the states while sharply reducing funding relative to projections under current policy. That saves around $800 billion. He proposes similar harsh cuts in food stamps, saving a further $130 billion or so, plus a grab-bag of other cuts, such as reduced aid to college students. Let’s be generous and say that all these cuts would save $1 trillion.
On top of this, Mr. Ryan includes the $716 billion in Medicare savings that are part of Obamacare, even though he wants to scrap everything else in that act. Despite this, Mr. Ryan has now joined Mr. Romney in denouncing President Obama for “cutting Medicare”; more on that in a minute.
So if we add up Mr. Ryan’s specific proposals, we have $4.3 trillion in tax cuts, partially offset by around $1.7 trillion in spending cuts — with the tax cuts, surprise, disproportionately benefiting the top 1 percent, while the spending cuts would primarily come at the expense of low-income families. Over all, the effect would be to increase the deficit by around two and a half trillion dollars.
@Bron: We are not ideologues at all, unlike you, I can take apart any argument you put forth and show you a realistic hypothetical situation that disproves your argument.
The fact is that greed is a powerful motivator, in fact it is so powerful that it has motivated every crime imaginable, from petty shoplifting to genocide. That is why the free market has never worked, and will never work, because without the threat of societal retribution in the form of stiff fines or jail or punishment, greed motivates people to cheat, to lie, to endanger others, to exploit the misfortune of others, to shift risk from themselves to others with deception and trickery, and to use their power and leverage to coerce others into a subjugation trap.
It is the regulations that punish cheating, lying, endangerment, deception and trickery. It is the regulations that protect the weak from being coerced by the strong. Every single thing you think the free market would allow is false, every single thing you claim as a benefit of the free market is actually the benefit of a properly regulated market.
The regulations we have are not there to benefit the rich, or the rich would not be complaining about them. The regulations we have are there due to free market failures, because in the past, the rich were violating those yet-to-be regulations, and no free market solution presented itself, and that went on for so long that the people decided that the “free market” would not work and the bad practice would have to be outlawed.
It is why we have a minimum wage, social security, medicare, banking laws, OSHA, the patent office, the FDA, the FAA, all the way up to the EPA, the whole of the law is there to correct free market failures, one after another, that prior to their passage the market could have corrected but did not.
The reason it did not is quite simple, the “free market” principles imagine sources of profit or entrepreneurship or concessions that simply do not exist. No plant or factory is going to give access to an “inspector” without the force of the law behind them. If they think information would damage them, they will not reveal it, and they will take steps to ensure nobody else reveals it either.
When NO factories exist that are safe for workers, no factory is really going to pay the high cost of safety, the added cost will put them out of business. If workers try to strike for safe workplaces, they will be fired and replaced, until they starve enough to keep their mouth shut.
The free market fails because of logic and reality, not because of ideology. It has been tried in one culture after another since the dawn of time, and it always, always fails. In fact, it is plausible that the first laws ever passed, against murder and theft, are the very first corrections to the free market: When people are free to kill and steal to make a profit, greed will motivate them to do just that, and the only route with any hope of protecting people against being murdered in their sleep or robbed by a gang of thieves is a group agreement to refrain from and punish such activity. A regulation, that will not eliminate the behavior, but will make it costly enough that it is seldom the rational choice, and almost always an emotional choice.
The reason the free market fails is that greed is the ultimate motivator, and without rules and regulations, certain people without morals or empathy or an ounce of regret will do literally anything for a profit.
Rebellions. There have been. But deadly consequences for the rebellious and their families has resulted in enrichment of “docile” genes in the pool.
Breeding in other words.
Fact: It takes about 20 generatios to breed from wild
foxes to those who are tame and aimiable to human contact like a dog will be. Russian research demonstrated on TV program.
TonyC,
I thought my “animal model” explanation covered it.
One. Survival by avoiding conflict.
Two. Procreation if possible, fight to the death by those with little procreative lifetime left (old bulls).
Three Avoidance of bodily damage which is costly to repair and can diminish chances of survival. Hence demonstrative tactics not physical ones chosen first.
It get’s more complicated with humans. But it must bottom in some man’s needs whcih normal procreative patterns can not satisfy. Ie an abnormality.
Cooperation implies deference, deferance even of your needs in favor of getting them satisfied later, or on the promise of the person you are negotiating with.
There are of course a complex mix of personalities:
Some others, of the same temperament like the one mentioned above are quite willing to cooperate, lending their influence to his expansion, in return for a smaller cake but an assured one.
Acqusition of a marginally better ecnomomic position which eases buying influence or support is also a factor.
A persuasive tongue using not only carrots but sticks to entice and drive the underling, an organized society where titles of respect can be had and bought, and kings who can be killed by newcomers, establishing a new dynasty for how long or short time.
Those with low drive, lacking in persuasive skills and the other requisites will remain in the low man position.
Order which assures his dynasty will be the primary goal for the pathologicl leader. Why pathological?
Because his need for not only a thousand sheep, but also a thousand sons to assure his genes pass on is not good for others nor the gene pool. Homozygotism is promoted.
The early Aryans who invaded Indian subcontinent were led by elected chiefs, one for each tribe. It was not
hereditary. The new one could be elected any year, and was based on warcraft, not money. How this was “corrupted” and changed is outside my kin. But indications are that this is key subject for much study of just the Aryans. How they then went from nomadism to sedentary life styles and occupations and societal forms as well.
Just speculations and ruminations.