A Nation Starting (Maybe) to Turn
A nation of 300 million souls—richest and most powerful in the world, for all its messes and perturbations—needs a turning radius wide as the future. But you know what—realization precedes intellectual assent, which precedes needed action. There's much to be hopeful about as the nation goes in for its electoral physical.
Valuable realizations are growing upon us. I mention two that might lead to assent and, eventually, action.
First, you gotta have rich people, like it or not—a point evidenced by growing support for renewing all, not just some, of the Bush tax cuts. "I don't think this is the time," says the Connecticut Democrat Joe Lieberman, "to raise anyone's taxes, including those who are wealthiest." So saying, Lieberman evidences understanding of two economic truths: 1) the rich pay most of our taxes to begin with, and 2) tax hikes lead the intended victims to work or invest so as to decrease their tax liability, even if their ensuing decisions reduce economic productivity.
Democratic arguments for cutting the rich out of the tax-cut extension, sure to pass this year, rests upon the premise that class warfare works politically. It does—until the consequences start to show through the seams. A policy of redistributing other people's money doesn't wipe out the rich; it does build into the tax system a bias against wealth accumulation.
Wealth, however, plus the simple desire for it, puts people to work. The price of an expanding middle class is tolerance of other people's success and even greed. Speaking of greed, isn't that just part of Original Sin?—the good old human condition, dating back to Eden? What do we want government to do, after all—overhaul the human condition from top to bottom?
A second realization that grows upon us is that centralized "We'll Do Everything in the World for You (If You'll Keep Voting for Us)" doesn't get the job done. Wasn't that economic stimulus bill a great success? Eight hundred billion, and don't we feel better? We don't? Maybe we're wondering whether cutting taxes and regulations for the private sector isn't the quickest way to get laggard economies off their backs and on their legs again.
Another notable ingredient of centralized government is control of schools, control of curriculum and standards: a general shutdown, so far as government and teacher unions can manage it, of private decisions in educational matters.
Things were bad enough when all decisions began to bunch up at the state capital. Now they cluster at the tip-top—the U.S. Department of Education, may it vanish in the night like a carpet stain soaked in detergent. The Obama administration is currently in the process of trying to set national standards for school performance. It already controls the way federal money is spent at the local level—overmatched experts from colleges of education.
In a much-touted new book (Life Without Lawyers: Liberating America from Too Much Law), Philip K. Howard sets forth five goals of extraordinary relevance to our present discontents, each goal centered on the need to increase personal accountability and responsibility. Howard wants, among other things, to "Push responsibility down to local organizations—give back to Americans the freedom to make a difference—without unnecessary interference of centralized bureaucracy, especially in schools and other social services."
In other words, he hopes we might become again what we once were: a people dedicated to the proposition that those nearest a problem know the most about it. Shouldn't they?
Let's not celebrate just yet. Remember the time and space needful for nations to turn upon their axes: great battleships in a bathtub. Still, what could be nearer our present purposes than some counsel we once heard from within the Obama administration? Never, so the counsel went, let a crisis go to waste—this crisis, flowing from forgetfulness as to what happens when government promises the moon ... and falls flat on delivering the atmospheric gases.
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Mr. Murchison exhibits the nine rules of the English in dealing with the Rich
1) To Flatter
2) To Attend
3) To Remember
4) To Love none
5) To Hate very few
6) To Attack only the defeated
7) To Enrich others by counsel
8) To Enrich oneself by all means whatsoever
9) To Lie
which must be contrasted to the nine English Rules for dealing with the Poor
1) To be courteous
2) To be distant
3) To oppress
4) To exploit
5) To pay little
6) To pay exactly
7) To pitty vaguely
8) To interfere
9) To denounce to the Authrorities
AND a plague on both houses of congress!!
Philip Howard's book's title is interesting.
Any rich nation will have a large number of lawyers, no matter how many the number of laws. Be it few laws or many, the lawyers are here to stay.
I know people don't like such highly paid service sector workers who don't produce anything physical, but until the day comes when we are all Hasedic Jews who can keep our promises purely on oral agreements, the lawyers are here to stay.
Anyway, about taxes, as Paul Craig Roberts and Tom Fleming have often pointed out, there is absolutely no evidence that the introduction of the income tax in the 20th century has done anything to cut down on so-called income inequality or the rich controlling politics. "The poor think it's okay to pay 30% as long as they get to tax the rich at 50%" as Roberts once said.
We must either raise taxes or cut spending. The GOP refuses to do the former, and both the GOP and the Democrats refuse to do the latter, and it is the elite who control these parties. If the American elite wields its considerable power and influence to force the government to cut spending then I will applaud and, once the budget is balanced, support them in their fight against higher taxes. Until then, though, I'm afraid I cannot provide a sympathetic ear for their whining.
America is not the richest country in the world and we do not need the caliber of rich people who now rule.
Following up on Dr. Wilson's comment, the U.S. recently didn't make Newsweek's top ten list of best places to live in the world:
http://www.newsweek.com/2010/08/15/interactive-infographic-of-the-worlds-best-countries.html
It surprised me that Newsweek would demote the U.S. with the Great One still in office.
#5
Yes, I was amused by the fact that a moderately progressive outlet like Newsweek would choose Finland.
So Newsweek prefers an ethnically 97% homogenuous, 100% practicing Lutheran country of mostly old people?
As opposed to the enriched, multicultural, cosmopolitan, diverse, youth-oriented, religiously flexible America?
Dare I say Newsweek's choice may have been...conservative?
The smarter of the liberals realize that many of their ideals only "work" in smaller homogenous countries. For instance, as Robert Putnam has noted, socialism has only "worked" in smaller, homogenous countries.
What to do? The left may praise European countries for healthcare, but criticize the same countries for their lack of prescribed multiculturalism and growing anti-immigrant sentiment.
Exhibit A:
"But I think that you’ll find if you look at Europe through the eyes of the liberal agenda that while the German left has certainly been more successful than the American left at securing universal health care, it’s been much less successful at promoting a tolerant, integrated, multicultural society. And allowing for the errors implicit in making any kind of sweeping generalization, I’d say that’s pretty generally the case across Europe. This Swiss People’s Party campaign poster would, I think, make Jesse Helms blush. And I’m not even sure which of the Northern League posters from Italy is the most egregious."
http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/2009/10/race-in-america-and-europe/
"The smarter of the liberals realize that many of their ideals only “work” in smaller homogenous countries. For instance, as Robert Putnam has noted, socialism has only “worked” in smaller, homogenous countries."
That may be true (many people have said this, I think), but I never understood what the precise connection is. Perhaps there is none.
If pervasive state-run programs can work on a smaller scale, why haven't the smaller American states adopted the Scandinavian model within their own jurisdiction? If ethnic homogeneity has to do with it, why? Why is it that a country with Irish, Italians, Puerto Ricans, Poles, and Jews can't implement dreamed-up utopias of free medical care? What do the Irish, Italians, Puerto Ricans, Poles, and Jews have to do with it? I wonder if anybody dealt with the topic in greater detail.
Like every country, we will have with us always the poor, and also the rich. Our problem is that we have let goverment become the effective dispenser of not just remedy but also the underpinning morality. Government is not up to either job, especially the latter. The result is that the greed of our rich largely goes unchecked by shame. And our poor, unprepared to distinguish need from envy, are without gratitude. It's what happens when politics is the religion, or more precisely, when Republican and Democrat are the religions, and politicians are the priests.
we have let goverment become the effective dispenser of not just remedy but also the underpinning morality....
"The result is that the greed of our rich largely goes unchecked by shame. And our poor, unprepared to distinguish need from envy, are without gratitude."
Well said. The loss of shame is so obvious, it is hard to find people who still blush from it.
And the rich seem to have lost not just shame but the slightest interest in patriotism and citizenship. In a word, they're deracinated--people from nowhere who don't care to be anywhere in particular, and the fewer commitments to others, the better from their perspective. Don't expect them to care enough to even acknowledge decentralization of power, let alone get their lackeys in elective office to do anything to realize it. Ditto for decreasing government spending, since, as my life-long Republican father once told me, "Big corporations don't pay taxes. They collect them."
Who are the "rich"? Just earning $60,000 a year puts you in the top 20% of earners in the US.
And most people in the top 20% are elderly people, who came there by seniority in job. Many Chronicles commenters could fall in that bracket by sole virtue of age.
Go a little higher into the top 1% that consists of 3 million Americans in all, and the millionaires up there include Noam Chomsky, Michael Moore, Paul Krugman, Joseph Stiglitz, Rahm Emmanuel, and many other anti-rich class warriors who all make the exact same statements about the rich.
The "rich" or the "elite" is nothing but a non-existent, faceless entity on whom people blame problems, including fairly wealthy people themselves. Name the names, people, name the names!
Who are the “rich”? Just earning $60,000 a year puts you in the top 20% of earners in the US."
Probably would not be them. As that crowd must be full of civil servants.
"The “rich” or the “elite” is nothing but a non-existent, faceless entity on whom people blame problems, including fairly wealthy people themselves. Name the names, people, name the names!"
This would be a great exercise for someone to undertake. It is constantly tried and mostly exaggerated but still interesting to see how peoples opinions are formed today in the political arena and how damned expensive it is getting to form such opinions.
Rupert Murdoch is a former Australian Labour Party worker, who owns an ultranationalist American news network. He is not the one who forms opinions; those opinions were already there. He had to put his own Labour Party views aside, put his own environmentalist views aside to appeal to an American audience that would loathe both. His children were otherwise raised in progressive beliefs. His Saudi friends, who also invest in his media network, swallow their pride, and allow anti-Muslim comments to air on American television. Because it's either the mass consumer's way or the highway.
Even among lobbyists, the funding ends up going to ideologically opposed candidates. Dan Loeb, a millionaire funder of Obama's campaign, frequently keeps saying that Obama is ignorant in the fields of law and business; he funded him only because he thought he was a saleable candidate who'd do less damage. So much for the establishment - the establishment doesn't have much control over the establishment. America is not like South Korea, where four mafia-like families ran the entire nation.
Fox News is 'ultranationalist'? You must not have seen it Sanjay; it's completely WSJ-style neocon.
Sanjay,
The relationship between Fox news and Chronicles is zero. Where, other than here, are these types of conversations occuring? Thank you in advance because it is a sincere question.
I never made the connection between Fox News and Chronicles, heavens forbid.
I am just responding to "interesting to see how peoples opinions are formed today in the political arena and how damned expensive it is getting to form such opinions." As I understood, you are saying that there is a rich elite that spends a lot of money on forming public opinion, and I just mentioned that even Murdoch's own views are not reflected by Fox.
Mr. Maxwell, I am sorry, but I did mean it in the same sense as you did, although it seems you feel ultranationalist is the wrong word. I meant a pro-militarisation, pro-central state news outlet that condones getting citizens at home to tow the line forcefully and believes in punishing presumed enemies abroad. Around my own upbringing, ultranationalist is the word used for that, but words are words.
Prateek,
"As I understood, you are saying that there is a rich elite that spends a lot of money on forming public opinion, and I just mentioned that even Murdoch’s own views are not reflected by Fox."
HEAVENS NO!!! I AM NOT SAYING THAT AT ALL!!!
The only folks who can run for elective office these days are folks who can raise alot of money or have alot of money of their own to spend on the election.
As for Murdoch, the views you described as his own are precisely those of Fox news, but only in the stupid sense. To know only ones self is to win half the time, to know your enemy and ones self is to win all of the ...... The only way for a "Christian man" like ,President Obama, to win is to have "Christian enemies" dressed up like Fox news.
But enough of this. If I wanted to really understand Hinduism I would move to India, if you want to understand American politics you must know something of what George Orwell meant with his principle of the living contradiction or the Red's use of the BIG LIE or what Solzhenitsyn meant when he argued that moral impoverishment leads to a debased definition of freedom that makes no distinction between "freedoms for good" and "freedoms for evil. Or in his words "all this freedom with no purpose" but for the "satisfaction of whims";
And how are such whims satisfied today at the political level? With large baskets of money and lies. Such as the little one you apparently believe: "rich people in America make around $60,000.00 dollars a year" and compose 20% of the top earners .... or did you mean "wage earners" ???
I understand. Thanks for the clarification.
I generally sympathize with many of Mr. Murchison's views, but with this piece I feel I must point out some flawed analysis.
I would not suggest that what ails the US Senate, or the broader government, is a lacking of understanding that is preventing their "intellectual assent" or even their intellectual ascent. US senators have at their disposal any and all means of gathering knowledge. One might think several 7-year terms is enough of a learning curve for most of these public-servents-for-life. No, what eludes them is a moral compass and a patriotism that would enable them to make the right decisions. If any happens to change his position on a particular policy point to one that may suit us, it likely has nothing to do with "us" and there is surely a bag of special interest money behind it.
Let's also not pretend that the rich have ever been in peril. Perhaps the upper class has been, but that is a mostly distinguishable, culturally very different, dying class as opposed to the merely wealthy who have always set the rules and opinion in this country. One might correctly argue the middle income stratum is at risk, but the rich is not and never has been. Some commentators below the article are confusing two different, even if overlapping, things: wealth and class. The latter has been under attack by cultural marxists, even rich ones like Murdoch who masquerade as conservatives, for a long time.
I wouldn't guess that Mr. Murchison really believes that organic communities would magically blossom if the intervening mess of government lawyers and bureaucracies suddenly disappeared. This would pre-suppose that we are - that thing that Prof. Clyde Wilson rightly reminds us we have long ceased to be - a people. One would have to assess the economic and especially the cultural perversions that are as much to blame for the continued decline (of local institutions) to get a full understanding of what barriers there are to regaining community and nationhood.
There is a day of reckoning coming and Vae Victus!
The rich are a faceless and imaginary thing upon which to lay blame.
Ask David Rockefeller and Goldman Sachs.
@21 Rick:
If you mean the upcoming elections, I wish I could be as hopeful. Unfortunately, as the recent republican polls have shown, the "base" views Mitt Romney and Sarah Palin as ideal Presidential material. I have no hope for the political state of the union.
If you mean the ultimate Dies Irae, then I am with you!
Tim,I would be honored to be in your company!