It amazes me that people wil believe outrageous nonsense about our country’s beginnings, making happy with the natives, but when confronted with recorded facts will argue with you and won’t believe it. We’ve always been about dockage and wealth that’s why the “1619 Project” made their heads explode. I always cringe when I hear politicians of any party proclaim us the greatest nation in the world. First of all it’s such an in your face disrespectful bragging to other democracies and it completely ignores our past. I would say that our founding fathers and framers of our Constitution had a high minded idea of fairness compared to a monarchy but the human fairness was pretty much lacking. There’s no mention of the rights of indigenous people, slavery obviously was overlooked, and women were most certainly left out.
I’d say we’re a country with more wealthy people and that we created more wealthy than other countries from our beginnings, and that we have a good blueprint on how to be a great and fair country, but the people in charge now are destroying that faster than we can even keep up with and are profiting mightily in the process.
I've always felt this country represented a good idea, poorly executed. Power has resisted every positive improvement from women's suffrage to civil rights and unions and rules that make products safe and holding companies accountable for what they do to the environment. Our culture defies logic and common sense over and over and over. And yet we act like we invented freedom and democracy. The founders didn't want democracy, of course, they wanted to retain control over a republic, which is how we got the electoral college rather than majority rule, and the Senate, which tends to always stand in the way of the plans of the people's house. Our laws serve money and profit more than people, and until we find a way to fix that, Mike, things are only going to get worse.
Correct. There is good and bad in everything. Competition for profits will drive business to develop and produce goods and services that benefit us all. But, the bad thing is the competition for profits does not require any consideration for the health, safety and welfare of human beings. In fact, there is a moral hazard embedded in profit-seeking. And that is to create and exploit human suffering because it is a very efficient way to profit.
And so, business has put the ox in the ditch once again. It ignores the human factor and simply competes for profits like savages caught in constant strife. The author provides a timely reminder of the reality of the unmitigated drive for profit using historically accurate facts. Corruption occurs when business is allowed to run amok without a disinterested and non-biased umpire enforcing rules to protect the vulnerable. That umpire is government. And that's why business has now captured it.
And, we have to claw our way back to good government, as we have before.
I think in this case, Cynthia, the clawing is going to be pretty disruptive and could even get bloody. We've never let out country get this far out of the control of the citizenry, and power acquired is never freely relinquished. He may even deploy the military against protestors. I don't think he wants any of us around and views us as chattel. We don't really even know yet how bad this is or how horrible it may become.
One step at a time, Jim Bob. Let's just keep forging ahead with determination and our eyes wide open. There is an even chance it won't come to that. Interesting times indeed.
So, as citizens, what are our brass tacks call-to-action?
Like 50% of America, I'm feeling quite powerless for the first time in my life. The conman insurrectionist, Teflon Don, has control of the Oval Office, Congress, SCOTUS, the fourth estate, which is now social media vs "mainstream" media, and half of American citizens who have WILLINGLY sold their souls to the devil.
As a collective of sane citizens, what specifically can we do to put a stop to Trump's blatant greed and grift?
I'm afraid I don't have a prescriptive, buddy. I never thought it could get this far. In other countries where this has happened, where 95 plus percent of the wealth is owned by one or two percent of the population, there have been only two outcomes. One is bloody revolution and the other is simply the end of the nation state. The first step for this country, though, in any attempt to save us from ourselves, is citizen diligence. We need to be involved and informed and stop letting lies stand. MAGAts have to be called out as the liars and exaggerators they are. Only way truth has an influence is if it is strongly defended. But usually when bad governance oppresses good people, the consequence tends to be bloodshed in the process of renewal. Other than that, how the hell are ya and nice to hear from ya.
Loved it. I have Charles Higham's book Trading With the Enemy on my bookshelf, and you could throw a dart at any big American enterprise, A,T&T, Chase Manhattan, Goodyear, so many were sitting down with the Nazis. FDR had to tolerate it because of the needs of the war effort, like Ford and GM's manufacturing prowess.
This piece should be required reading in high schools. Sadly, our education system is designed to support evil and promote lies. What passes for history in our system of education is actuallt white supremacy marketing.
And worse yet, we now have schools in places like Texas that are rewriting it. Slavery was helpful to the African immigrants and indigenous Americans were savages that had to be done away with for the advance of humankind. We are still rationalizing our racism and misogyny and homophobia and now he is trying to use executive orders to pretend it no longer exists. As bad as things appear, Myra, I think they are going to get much worse. There is no one and nothing to check his power now.
Eventually, people have to take to the streets in massive numbers, greater than even the Vietnam War protests. Washington needs to be flooded with our anger at what is happening. Every time a member of congress returns home, we have to get up out of our lounge chairs in front of the TV and go confront that person and demand accountability. But I'm afraid we are too far gone for simple democratic processes to work any more. Something worse is likely to happen.
Call them out. Make them own it. Demand they do better. Business is fine, capitalism is fine. We benefit from an array of goods and services at our fingertips. However, capitalism must be based on enforceable rules that protect the vulnerable from the moral hazard inherent in business. And that is putting profits over people.
I read with much interest. I think in the early aughts of this century, Ford issued the results of an internal examination and acknowledged the use of slave labor. I don't believe there were any conclusions about profit margin. Clearly, the German subsidiary was under Nazi control by '41 but Ford kept trying to maintain cash flow and regain influence with the goal of regrouping Fordwerke after the war. I don't believe any revenue ended up stateside. And the fact remains that Ford engines drove the war vehicles of the Nazis as well as the Americans. Ford had a public obligation to disavow Fordwerke and make it clear it no longer owned or operated the German facility and that it had been taken over by the Nazis. Unanswered is the question of what U.S. Ford executives knew about the use of concentration camp labor in their German factories. I am disinclined to believe they were oblivious. How the asset was managed post war, and its books have never, to my knowledge, been subjected to public scrutiny.
Thanks for your reply. As always, there are nuances. (the American public doesn't do nuance...) I appreciate your being always clear and ready to adjust. No one is required to own the truth, just to seek it. You are doing that and have found more than most including, of course, me.
I was going to stop here, but... . When I despair, I am convinced that Mussolini was the true prophet of the 21st century, just ahead of his time. When I'm hopeful I write blogs on my website. Here's my latest, called "Solutions". https://www.hughmoffatt.com/13-solutions
I did not know that about the Bush’s and how they made their money. Good to know!
Not exactly something they’d want us to know. They wanted it all to seem like hard work and insight that made them rich.
It amazes me that people wil believe outrageous nonsense about our country’s beginnings, making happy with the natives, but when confronted with recorded facts will argue with you and won’t believe it. We’ve always been about dockage and wealth that’s why the “1619 Project” made their heads explode. I always cringe when I hear politicians of any party proclaim us the greatest nation in the world. First of all it’s such an in your face disrespectful bragging to other democracies and it completely ignores our past. I would say that our founding fathers and framers of our Constitution had a high minded idea of fairness compared to a monarchy but the human fairness was pretty much lacking. There’s no mention of the rights of indigenous people, slavery obviously was overlooked, and women were most certainly left out.
I’d say we’re a country with more wealthy people and that we created more wealthy than other countries from our beginnings, and that we have a good blueprint on how to be a great and fair country, but the people in charge now are destroying that faster than we can even keep up with and are profiting mightily in the process.
I've always felt this country represented a good idea, poorly executed. Power has resisted every positive improvement from women's suffrage to civil rights and unions and rules that make products safe and holding companies accountable for what they do to the environment. Our culture defies logic and common sense over and over and over. And yet we act like we invented freedom and democracy. The founders didn't want democracy, of course, they wanted to retain control over a republic, which is how we got the electoral college rather than majority rule, and the Senate, which tends to always stand in the way of the plans of the people's house. Our laws serve money and profit more than people, and until we find a way to fix that, Mike, things are only going to get worse.
Correct. There is good and bad in everything. Competition for profits will drive business to develop and produce goods and services that benefit us all. But, the bad thing is the competition for profits does not require any consideration for the health, safety and welfare of human beings. In fact, there is a moral hazard embedded in profit-seeking. And that is to create and exploit human suffering because it is a very efficient way to profit.
And so, business has put the ox in the ditch once again. It ignores the human factor and simply competes for profits like savages caught in constant strife. The author provides a timely reminder of the reality of the unmitigated drive for profit using historically accurate facts. Corruption occurs when business is allowed to run amok without a disinterested and non-biased umpire enforcing rules to protect the vulnerable. That umpire is government. And that's why business has now captured it.
And, we have to claw our way back to good government, as we have before.
I think in this case, Cynthia, the clawing is going to be pretty disruptive and could even get bloody. We've never let out country get this far out of the control of the citizenry, and power acquired is never freely relinquished. He may even deploy the military against protestors. I don't think he wants any of us around and views us as chattel. We don't really even know yet how bad this is or how horrible it may become.
One step at a time, Jim Bob. Let's just keep forging ahead with determination and our eyes wide open. There is an even chance it won't come to that. Interesting times indeed.
So, as citizens, what are our brass tacks call-to-action?
Like 50% of America, I'm feeling quite powerless for the first time in my life. The conman insurrectionist, Teflon Don, has control of the Oval Office, Congress, SCOTUS, the fourth estate, which is now social media vs "mainstream" media, and half of American citizens who have WILLINGLY sold their souls to the devil.
As a collective of sane citizens, what specifically can we do to put a stop to Trump's blatant greed and grift?
I'm afraid I don't have a prescriptive, buddy. I never thought it could get this far. In other countries where this has happened, where 95 plus percent of the wealth is owned by one or two percent of the population, there have been only two outcomes. One is bloody revolution and the other is simply the end of the nation state. The first step for this country, though, in any attempt to save us from ourselves, is citizen diligence. We need to be involved and informed and stop letting lies stand. MAGAts have to be called out as the liars and exaggerators they are. Only way truth has an influence is if it is strongly defended. But usually when bad governance oppresses good people, the consequence tends to be bloodshed in the process of renewal. Other than that, how the hell are ya and nice to hear from ya.
Loved it. I have Charles Higham's book Trading With the Enemy on my bookshelf, and you could throw a dart at any big American enterprise, A,T&T, Chase Manhattan, Goodyear, so many were sitting down with the Nazis. FDR had to tolerate it because of the needs of the war effort, like Ford and GM's manufacturing prowess.
This piece should be required reading in high schools. Sadly, our education system is designed to support evil and promote lies. What passes for history in our system of education is actuallt white supremacy marketing.
And worse yet, we now have schools in places like Texas that are rewriting it. Slavery was helpful to the African immigrants and indigenous Americans were savages that had to be done away with for the advance of humankind. We are still rationalizing our racism and misogyny and homophobia and now he is trying to use executive orders to pretend it no longer exists. As bad as things appear, Myra, I think they are going to get much worse. There is no one and nothing to check his power now.
You're right. It's all gone to shit.
What can we do?
Eventually, people have to take to the streets in massive numbers, greater than even the Vietnam War protests. Washington needs to be flooded with our anger at what is happening. Every time a member of congress returns home, we have to get up out of our lounge chairs in front of the TV and go confront that person and demand accountability. But I'm afraid we are too far gone for simple democratic processes to work any more. Something worse is likely to happen.
Call them out. Make them own it. Demand they do better. Business is fine, capitalism is fine. We benefit from an array of goods and services at our fingertips. However, capitalism must be based on enforceable rules that protect the vulnerable from the moral hazard inherent in business. And that is putting profits over people.
To be, or not to be, that is the question...
Here's a credible counter to the assertion about Ford and Nazi Germany
https://www.adl.org/resources/news/ford-motor-company-and-third-reich
I read with much interest. I think in the early aughts of this century, Ford issued the results of an internal examination and acknowledged the use of slave labor. I don't believe there were any conclusions about profit margin. Clearly, the German subsidiary was under Nazi control by '41 but Ford kept trying to maintain cash flow and regain influence with the goal of regrouping Fordwerke after the war. I don't believe any revenue ended up stateside. And the fact remains that Ford engines drove the war vehicles of the Nazis as well as the Americans. Ford had a public obligation to disavow Fordwerke and make it clear it no longer owned or operated the German facility and that it had been taken over by the Nazis. Unanswered is the question of what U.S. Ford executives knew about the use of concentration camp labor in their German factories. I am disinclined to believe they were oblivious. How the asset was managed post war, and its books have never, to my knowledge, been subjected to public scrutiny.
Thanks for your reply. As always, there are nuances. (the American public doesn't do nuance...) I appreciate your being always clear and ready to adjust. No one is required to own the truth, just to seek it. You are doing that and have found more than most including, of course, me.
Thanks, Hugh. I greatly appreciate your interest and reading my work.
I was going to stop here, but... . When I despair, I am convinced that Mussolini was the true prophet of the 21st century, just ahead of his time. When I'm hopeful I write blogs on my website. Here's my latest, called "Solutions". https://www.hughmoffatt.com/13-solutions