It is evident that only by putting the mass of people back in control of their governments – at least to the extent they had such influence in the 20^th Century – can a better future for the majority be achieved.   This means removing political control from the hands of the 1% who control the capital markets.  This can be done within the framework of the U.S. Constitution with a handful of amendments that re-emphasize the priority of justice and individual rights over wealth and power, in keeping with the values of the Framers.  Democracy has meant and should continue to mean a form of economic and social justice, not a shadow dance where the rich rob the poor.

The 1% led the stunning bailout of Wall Street, in which American taxpayers transferred about $1.5 trillion to failing financial institutions, to forestall a complete freeze on credit in international finance.  Things got very chilly for a month or two, but in principle the system, such as it is, recovered.  There was not only government acquiescence in this substantial, if temporary, transfer of wealth from taxpayers to Wall Street; the government also assumed the risk that if the bailout failed, the transfer would be permanent.  We are fortunate that the bailout succeeded, that at least half of the transferred funds have been repaid, and that, for example, we still have a domestic auto industry.

Now Europe confronts a similar economic dilemma, but is less able to bail out its capitalists because there is no facility with the ability to tax and print Euros that is willing to do so, unlike our own Treasury Department and Federal Reserve Bank.  The European Central Bank is in the hands of superstitious pre-Keynesians who appear ready to run Europe into the ground.

But the question remains as to what kind of system we have saved here in the USA?  It would appear to be one in which the poor have been coerced into subsidizing the rich, and nothing in the putative democratic process holds out a prospect of redressing the historic imbalance of rights and privileges we are now witnessing.  The significant rights of the mass population, as they evolved through blood, sweat, and tears from the mid-18^th Century to near the last Millennium, were guided by a (not unbroken) series of ethically enlightened elites, starting with the Founding Fathers and running through the Roosevelts.  But those rights have clearly been compromised by a corrupt class of elites in the last 25 years.  Moral disintegration can occur quickly!  A good part of 250 years of progress has been flushed down the drain in a generation.

Now that the grass roots have spoken through the Occupy Wall Street movement and the Tea Party, it is time for those among our Country’s elites who can still see right from wrong to step forward and enunciate a program of reform.  Possibilities for reform would include:

• The criminalization of speculative investment on credit swaps and futures, being those where a significant, directly held interest is not being hedged
• The imposition of exclusively public funding in national and state-wide election campaigns
• The criminalization of lobbying the Congress by parties other than individuals with a significant, vested interest in the issue they are lobbying on
• The confiscatory taxation of salaries beyond some reasonable limit in the low millions
• A new tax on all financial investment transactions.

If you think that people will not invest in business and attempt to accumulate wealth no matter what the barriers may be, you are foolish.  Yet the privileges that flow from wealth have gotten out of hand in the USA and they are in dire need of being trimmed back.  Some of the above could be done through legislation, but if the Temperance movement could pass a Constitutional Amendment, so can Occupy Wall Street.  If it takes 50 years, so what?  History will hardly blink.  Deeply corrupt elites gave us the Third Reich.  Moderately corrupt elites have given us our present situation. I am not comparing the two beyond suggesting that the deeper the corruption, the deeper the wounds.

It appears that young people may be laying the groundwork for beneficial change.  If Obama does not have the imagination to propose reforms to reign in the Masters of Our Universe, who will step forward with a plan that can capture the allegiance of a solid majority?  No civilization thrives without hope.  Where will our leadership come from?  Government must control the behavior of capitalists, not vice versa.

Consider supporting or participating in this movement.

1. More is not better
2. No profit on healthcare
3. Enforce usury; curb Wall Street banks
4. Protect American manufacturing & jobs

Four Principles of Common Sense

1.  More is Not Better

Perhaps the sentiments contained on the following pages are not now fashionable enough to gain popular acceptance.  Many have noted that the long habit of thinking a thing not wrong gives it the superficial appearance of being right.  Slavery jumps to mind as an example; it was accepted for centuries in most of the West as a fact of life.  Yet there is something in the human heart and mind that will at times speak privately to one’s self, saying: “What I’ve just seen is not right. In fact it is very wrong”.  Other persons witnessing the same event may pretend not to have seen anything of note, but they too may have had the same misgivings you did, also without expressing them.

For reasons profoundly mysterious, there come certain times in human affairs when someone dares to speak out in public, and others step forward to agree.  Perhaps there is a natural law to which everyone, or nearly everyone, subscribes.  In any event, it can be seen that slavery was abolished in this country, at first in name, and then, 100 years later, in practice.  Those who lose out when such a change occurs will naturally react and try to counter the effects of the change that go against them.  When they are powerful enough, they generally succeed to a significant degree, yet the world is never the same as it was before right-thinking people spoke, acted, and often enough, died.  The morally better sense of the natural order will usually prevail over time, though it may take centuries.

The driving force in the last 300 years of history, at least since a mass of educated people have tried to apply reason to human affairs, has been to make life better for as many people as possible.  Because greed and power often go hand-in-hand, progress has often meant limiting the privileges of the most powerful, be they kings, dictators, or captains of industry.  Every person without a hardened heart, on witnessing a person is great need, will naturally have the thought: I could probably do with a bit less if I had a way to give that person a bit more.  Yet, those whose hearts are infected with greed will banish this thought and look away.  The central point I wish to make is that, in America, our political and popular cultures are now largely in the control of the hard-hearted, those who wish to legitimize greed, against the natural order of things.  Do not be duped by them.  Too many of them seek to tell the story that greed is not wrong.  And far too many of us have found it convenient to believe this untruth, to look away.  But in our hearts, we know that greed is wrong.

Prior generations were not enthralled with money and material success to the extent of those of us alive today.  While everyone the world over agrees that food and a warm, dry place to sleep are much better than anything less, it does not follow from that more, in the way of large screen TVs, fast cars on super-highways, and 2,500 sq. ft. homes is better.  At this point, when it is clear that we are approaching the end of the Earth’s oil-based energy reserves, American popular culture (especially its politics) can’t get off the lie that more is better!  The ethic of ‘every man for himself’ and ‘grab as much as you can’ will not quit.  What no one wants to say is that American culture is now corrupt and ugly.  Yet a common sense view of our current situation makes it clear that this moment calls on us to change our values and our behavior.  To do as we are doing now is to fiddle as Rome burns, except that Rome is now the entire Earth.  There are clear signs that we are a culture whose reach has exceeded its grasp.  It is necessary to pull back our reach, to bring things into balance.  Most of us can do with less, and everyone will be better off.

So the first common sense proposition is that, given the depletion of global resources, more is not better.  Each of us knows this in their heart, yet few step forward to state the obvious.  A turning point in history cannot be far in front of us, yet we go along in feigned obliviousness.  Let one of our political parties pick up this theme in a serious way, or we must start a new party that will speak for this idea.  We should strive to be the right size, not necessarily bigger.

Yes, Capitalism is based on growth.  We need a new ism that is based on stasis.  Growth in the number of people is inevitable, but can we each make do with a bit less?

I have tried here to eliminate everything that is personal here.  I do not speak of individuals, nor even of Democrats or Republicans.  Compliments as well as censure to individuals make no part of this.  Wise thoughts will rise of their own merit; and those whose sentiments are injudicious will cease of themselves.

The cause of America is still in a great measure the cause of all mankind.  Many circumstances have, and will arise, which are not local, but universal, and through which the principles of all lovers of mankind and nature are affected.  Let us end the corruption in our own culture, and again, by our own example, show the world a better way to live.  Let us learn how to live better with less, and try to ensure that each of us has enough.

2.  No Profit on Healthcare

It is merely common sense to say that if the organizations that run the health care system are in business to make money, they will be in conflict when a sick person needs an expensive treatment.  Whether the written laws of man may have sufficient force to overcome this conflict is subject to debate.  But common sense would dictate the expedient of removing the conflict.  This is much easier than trying to control its consequences.  Again the greedy have triumphed over the masses.  It is morally wrong to make money on another person’s sickness.  This is a basic proposition.  So why do we allow profit on sickness to continue?  Do we think there aren’t enough smart people who will do medicine for the love of it?  Doctors will do very well in any event merely because everyone seeks to be healthy.  Large corporations in the middle skimming off the pot need to be eliminated.  Single payer is the way to go.  The fact that it is complicated does not mean we need to ignore basic propositions.  Do not be misled by demagogues.  At the very least, a nationwide non-profit healthcare organization needs to be established.  Whether or not it is part of the government doesn’t make that much of a difference.  That its leaders be morally upright is what’s critical.  There are many talented health administrators who are right-thinking and not greedy.  Let us clean up our culture and put them in charge.  We should review the past actions of any high-level administrator who had a hand in denying coverage to a person who died for lack of treatment, and ban them from the industry.  In the egregious cases, criminal charges should be filed.  That is the core purpose of the Criminal Law: to say what will not be tolerated in a just society.

3.  Enforce Usury

Usury is a biblical concept.  Both Old and New Testaments (and other religious texts) say you can’t charge people too much if you lend them money.  Over the centuries, 5% or 10% a year was the going rate.  The Common Law embraced it as a natural rate, and set a limit around 15%.  Every state in the Union had such a law 50 years ago.  Then the greedy bankers bought the legislators and got the limits raised.  Now they charge 20% or 30% without blinking an eye.  Wake up people!  Use your common sense!  Use the law to force them back down.  While we’re at it, let’s cap the salaries of the captains of industry at $10 million a year; just tax the rest.  How can anyone possibly be worth any more than that?  The concept is disgusting and corrupt.

4.  Protect American Industry and Jobs

China is eating our lunch.  We should not be surprised.  Given the opportunity, a hungry person may well steal the food of a person who is eating well.  Most of us probably do not begrudge the Chinese their desire to improve themselves, nor their success at doing so.  Still, for an adult not to have a job, whether here or elsewhere, is a great wrong.  If we were to stand up for our rights here, it would not be so hard to provide a job to every able-bodied person.  Yet in our lassitude, we are nearing a point where the skills needed to manufacture are disappearing from our land.  We cannot allow this to happen!  We should view the large corporations as a necessary evil, yet acknowledge that they think and operate within a narrow view of competing with one and other for market share.  Their leaders have taken control our culture and have run it aground.  They have proven it’s no problem for them to lay off millions, as long as they can make more money at, and pay themselves tens of millions, preferably guaranteed by the government.  It’s our government, at least in principle, but now we must fight to take it back.  Globalization and free trade have served to aid worldwide economic growth, but they are also the drivers of the loss of our manufacturing skills.

We have a pressing need to support advanced research, build up a large-scale infrastructure to provide renewable energy, and to improve public transit in urban areas.  These are undertakings that could easily employ millions, yet we are letting our corporations give these opportunities to Asia because they can make more money having the work done there.  Hello!!!  Why should we put up with the plans of these greedy leaders selling us out?  We do not need a free trade policy with China.  If they keep the value of their currency too low, we can put up trade barriers.  We have lost our skill at manufacturing in exchange for cheap goods, many of which we don’t really need.  Can we keep our eye on the ball?  Whether it is done through government or not, we should articulate a ten-year plan for building up the infrastructure we need, and set up training programs where we pay the unemployed to learn the needed skills, and put them to work.  In this country, we would all win with this approach.  Why are we letting our public transit agencies buy their rolling stock abroad?  We should be building it here.  Can’t the laid-off engineers in Detroit design good subways?  Why are we letting others get ahead of us in the manufacture of solar panels, wind turbines, and batteries?  We need to put up tariffs to support the development and manufacture of these things here in this country.  We’ll still wind up buying plenty abroad, but at least we can give ourselves a chance at a future.  We need to insist on these things or our greedy leaders will run us into the ditch, as they have been doing since the 1980’s.  We are Americans.  We can do better and we must do better.  Get a moral compass and take power back from the greedy and corrupt.  Use your common sense and learn to make the things you need.

Well worth reading.  Not a track like here.