Occupy Wall Street

A lot of us have been wondering how long Americans would remain unconcerned and unquestioning about the economy and issues of social justice in this country. But now a movement has actually started. The only question is where will it (can it) go from here. 

It is unfortunate that the movement took the name "Occupy Wall Street" since there is nothing inherently evil about Wall Street and, in fact, Wall Street serves an important role in the functioning of our economy. If they literally took down Wall Street, they would cause enormous damage to the economy and to themselves; and I don't know what they would put in its place. The real issue here is how the Great Recession of 2007, from which we still suffer, was caused by individual and corporate greed miss-using not only Wall Street but also the entire banking and lending system. On top of that, and running over a much longer period of time, is the way in which the political system has been miss-used in order to favor the production of extreme wealth for a very small number of people at the expense of most people. It is this very chasm of wealth that cripples the nation now since the residual buying power of the 99% is so small that it cannot possibly stimulate investment and job creation. 

I hope that the Occupy movement will begin to take a position of political power. So long as Congress (as well as state houses across the country)  is owned by the 1%, there will be no basic changes in the situation. They will refuse to tax wealth and they will do nothing to promote job creation. They will, instead, waste their time on legislation aimed at taking abortion rights away from women and jeopardizing women's health. The Republicans, at this point, do not want to do anything constructive toward solving our economic problems since they hope that voters will blame everything on Obama in November 2012. That means Americans will be held hostage by the Republicans for more than one more year! But we can't say that they didn't tell us so. Remember in 2010 when they swept into power how they all declared that their primary goal was making Obama a one-term president? Wouldn't it be nice, though, if the Republicans could see service to the people as part of their political obligations?

From Belfast to Palestine

It is hard to estimate the terrible damage that England has brought to the world over the many years of their so-called empire. But, right now, Belfast and Palestine stand out to me as similar atrocities. The English in their cocky and unquestioning royalist views of the world have moved into every imaginable space on earth inhabited by those whom they viewed as "lesser peoples" and treated as though they were not people at all. 

For seven hundred years or so the English took possession of Ireland, pushed the native Irish aside, gave the land to Englishmen, constructed an English government, suppressed and almost destroyed Irish Catholicism. But in the north, they did as they have done in so many places in the world; they colonized. They moved Scotch and English Protestant immigrants into the north of Ireland, gave them the land, secured them in political power by completely disregarding the native Catholic Irish, and that was that. When the English were finally discouraged from their rule of Ireland, they agreed to the Irish Free State only under terms of protecting their colonies in the north --- hence, Northern Ireland, that sad residue of English terrorism that has existed ever since the 1920s.

Why does Palestine look so familiar to me? Once again, it was the English who took command of the region in the east of the Mediterranean which included the area known then as Palestine. What was then Palestine was the whole of what we now call Israel plus the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The population was predominately arab and there was only a minority of Jewish people. However, England, in their inimitable blind way, determined that they would make Palestine into a haven for European Jews. Mind you, I have no problem with the Jewish people as such; it is the English that I am talking about here. At any rate, by the late '40s, Jewish people had successfully colonized Palestine and had successfully pushed the Arab Palestinians into the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. At that point, the dear English grew tired of administering the mess they had created and announced their intention to withdraw. Interestingly, the Jewish people went to the United Nations and requested recognition as the State of Israel. Does that sound familiar? Palestine --- for the Arab inhabitants, that is --- was reduced to those two small territories which were never recognized as a separate state. So now, rather than allowing Palestine to appeal to the UN for statehood, we demand that they settle their status with, you guessed it, Israel. And, believe it or not, the Unites States continues to cover for English idiocy by protecting Israeli interests around the Middle East. 

Class Warfare

Well, the Republicans ought to know class warfare when they see it since they have been waging it against the middle class and the lower class for the last thirty years. Whatever "spin doctor" came up with the present "response" to Obama's tax speech must be an idiot.

Why should 5% of Americans possess the majority of wealth in America? Well, I suppose the practical answer is that they have been aggressive enough and sufficiently well positioned so that they could --- and did.

Why should 5% of Americans --- our wealthiest citizens --- pay taxes at a lower rate than most of the other 95%? Well, the practical answer is that they own the government and possess a Congress that is unwilling to raise their taxes under any circumstances.

Whether or not the first question has a moral answer is, I suppose, debatable. It depends upon what social justice means to you and it also depends upon what being in a community or commonwealth means to you.

But the second question has a much stronger moral and political dimension to it. Taxation is based on the idea that everyone should pay their fair share to keep government functioning. In spite of what the most wealthy would like to tell us, you do not get wealthy completely on your own. The level of support for wealth-production in this country is phenomenal. In fact, the government is possessed by developing and deploying means for supporting business, investment, etc. If you really look into it, the most wealthy people owe an enormous debt to government and should be paying this back in taxes.

Government and Self Reliance

Libertarians seem to pride themselves on being self reliant. They don't want government mucking around in their affairs. But if we take that argument to the extreme, we go back to John Locke's State of Nature and its consequent a State of War. A State of Nature is that situation in which every individual struggles in his own behalf. It seems to me that the Libertarian must argue that the State of Nature does not necessarily lead to a State of War. 

Locke's analysis was heavily based on the protection of property. If I must defend my own property at all times, then I will not have the freedom to leave my home to work toward the accumulation of more property. Hence, the advantage of the Social Contract. When certain protections are institutionalized, we achieve the freedom to act in the social world. But of course we get these benefits at the cost of surrendering some of our self reliance. 

The big question in the final stage of this argument is how far the Social Contract can or must go. What should Commonwealth ultimately mean? When we look to our Declaration of Independence, we find that "[we] are endowed by [our] Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." The Constitution, some years later, suggests that it is created to "secure the general welfare" among other things. Thus, the Founding Fathers saw much beyond the mere protection of individual property. One could probably say that they desired a commonwealth in which life can flourish. But there was that other nagging expression in the Declaration --- "that all men are created equal." So "flourishing" cannot just mean that we are a place where the most aggressive and privileged get to flourish. In some way, all men are supposed to be able to share the benefits of commonwealth.

It's fine to elevate self reliance as a virtue. But it is sheer stupidity to assume that everyone is in the position to be self reliant in our world. Hence, being part of a common wealth means sacrificing certain things so that the weaker citizens are elevated and made more a part of the whole. Being a common-wealth, means that the state of the whole is more important than the state of any individual.

Trade Unions

The following arguments depend somewhat on whether you value the existence of a "Middle Class" in America. I say this because the rise of trade unions in America is certainly one significant way in which a strong Middle Class was historically established. Personally, I believe that a strong Middle Class is economically essential because these are the people who have sufficient disposable income to purchase products, and purchasing power is essential to a healthy economy. As Robert Reich argues, the extremely rich do very little for the economy on the grand scale because, while they have enormous purchasing power, they do not use it in helpful ways. While those in the middle class (perhaps 85% of Americans) spend almost 100% of their income in the marketplace, wealthy people (perhaps 5% of Americans) can't come anywhere close to that. Thus, a shift in wealth from the Middle Class to the Upper Class has the direct effect of removing a huge amount of purchasing power from the marketplace. That's what has been happening for the last three decades. Little wonder that small businesses are pessimistic about opening or expanding their businesses. 

Why did trade unions arise? The history of unionization in the late 19th Century and early 20th Century is striking. Communities were very often dominated by one or a few big employers. Laborers were paid whatever the employer wanted, usually as low a wage as possible, still keeping the laborers healthy enough to work. If pay was insufficient to meet family needs, the laborer had no chance of improving his position. Basically, he could quit and find some other job. But where? When groups of laborers attempted to unite and fight for higher wages, better working conditions, or health benefits, they were often beaten down by police or murdered by thugs. So long as the wage "negotiation" was between the industry and the individual laborer, the individual didn't have a chance.

Unionization meant that laborers had significant power to negotiate with employers in order to improve their situation. But this usually meant creating a "union shop" where all laborers had to participate and pay dues. This is where the inevitable long argument of the libertarian begins, that no one should be forced to do anything they do not want to do. Of course, the counter-argument here is that laborers who choose not to belong nevertheless reap the benefits of the union's collective bargaining without helping or paying for it. It can be argued that majority rules. If the majority want a union to represent them, then everyone has to participate. This principle runs throughout our society, yet it seems to be something that no libertarian will ever agree to.

The attack on unions today threatens not only the welfare of laborers but also the very existence of a middle class. In that sense, while it seems to make sense to Conservatives and Libertarians, it makes no sense for the health of our economy.

Our National Debt

Here's a link to a very interesting summary of our national debt. http://www.businessinsider.com/to-whom-does-the-us-government-really-owe-money-2011-3 The heart of this article is the pie chart showing to whom the debt is owed.

 Notice first that 68% of the debt is owed to Americans in one form or another. The largest category by far is American individual and institutional investment in America. Much of this investment is through private retirement funds.

But one of the most interesting figures is the 17.9% owed to the Social Security Trust Fund. That fund is fed by the Social Security taxes levied against American incomes. Why should the US owe money to that Fund. The answer, of course, is that the Bush Administration borrowed from the Fund in order to finance wars. So is Social Security really the problem? Basically, the money was stolen from you and I and now the conservative side of our government doesn't want to pay it back.

For Those Who Hate the Federal Government

First of all, it's just way too easy to blame all our problems on the Federal government. It's the one big thing out there that you can easily throw stones at. But if you succeed in shrinking it to oblivion, will you be happy? I doubt it very much.

One of the oft-sited reasons is just wanting government off our backs. We want to do things ourselves. All of that is very dubious however. Do we really have the time (ourselves) to supervise drug and food safety, to help states finance highways and bridges, to monitor aircraft? The true answer must be that we just don't want any of these things done. 

If we do want things like this done, the haters of Federal government always turn to the idea that the states would do a better job. By what evidence do we really believe the states would do a better job? Every state I have lived in has embodied the age-old conflicts between rural interests and urban interests. It's the same old situation, government on top of us, dictating what will be done. Fleeing to the states is not the answer.

Fleeing to the states is the answer in only one important way for some haters of Federal power. It means that in their specific state environment they will be able to get more of what they want. If you hate the EPA, then you can hope that your own state will have nothing to do with environmental protection. Or you can hope that your own state will look the other way when it comes to your company's production of toxic chemicals for agricultural use. Or you can hope that your own state will have no interest in civil rights for minorities. If these people get their way (and they seem to be making remarkable progress), there will be nothing left of what we might call a national identity. Forget about seamlessly traveling from one state to another. You will have to be aware of every state's disposition toward A, B, or C. Kinda makes you want to stay at home.