The Root Of All Political Evil

As the Empire's Decline accelerates, millions of words are written everyday by pundits, economists, bloggers, and anyone else with 2 cents to throw in about what we should do about it. There are two questions you can ask about all proposed plans.

• Would it work?
• Is it politically possible?

These two simple questions are constantly conflated. Just having a plan is apparently enough. Here's a recent example. The Daily Ticker interviewed Columbia University economics professor Joseph Stiglitz about what we should do about the mess we're in. Naturally, he has a plan. Here it is.

Home Improvement

Instead of bailing out banks, the government should be doing more to bailout homeowners, he says. "An economy in which you have homeless people and empty homes doesn't make any sense and that's where we're heading."

Stiglitz is pushing for debt restructuring for millions of underwater homeowners. He's calling for a Chapter 11 of sorts for homeowners. Just as a corporation remains in control of its business operations as a debtor in possession in Chapter 11, in this scenario, homeowners restructure their debt but stay in their home AND keep paying the mortgage. Banks have been reluctant to accept any principle write-down but if the economy deteriorates and home prices drop they might be out of options.

Debt Relief

When it comes closing the gap on the country's $1+ trillion deficit on $14+ trillion in debt, Stiglitz says the country can turn things around in 4 relatively easy steps:

1. Repeal the Bush-Obama tax cuts for the richest Americans.
2. End the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, "that have not improved our security" and are costing trillions of dollars. In 2010 Stiglitz published the book: The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict.
3. Get Americans back to work. Stimulus and works programs are politically untenable right now but Stiglitz says spending on these programs will ultimately reduce the debt because if we put people to work and "our tax revenues will increase enormously"
4. Reform Medicare Part D - Under the current law, big pharma sets their own prices. Stiglitz says if that provision is eliminated and the government can negotiate drug prices it would save taxpayers $1 trillion over the next 10 years.

We could argue over whether such a plan would put the economy back on track, but it doesn't matter.

What's the point of having such a debate?

It's as though Stiglitz, those interviewing him and countless others pretend everyday that they live on some planet other than Earth, in some country which is not the United States. Assuming a fair, honest, rational world which has little in common with the one we live in, people like Stiglitz argue that we can fix our problems if only we would follow his reasonable recipe for success. In La La Land, his formula might get implemented, but that could never happen in this world.

Of all the ways in which humans generally (and Americans in particular) subscribe to bullshit, I find this one to be the most irritating. For example, how did it come about that the financial system was bailed out, but not underwater homeowners? Why is there a Chapter 11 for corporations but not for homeowners? How did it come about that Big Pharma sets its own prices? What department of the government and "private" industries benefited most from engaging in two useless, destructive, multi-trillion dollar wars?

Stiglitz is dreaming. Everybody is dreaming. Until we have a serious discussion of how flawed, how corrupt, the power structures in this country truly are, nothing good can happen. As long as we keep pretending that our political system works, that everything is on the up and up, nothing good can happen. Until we stop deceiving ourselves about ourselves, nothing good can happen. And until we all face the music, and if you've got a scheme for solving all our problems—everybody does—I don't want to fucking hear your fucking plan. Got it?

This video (below) of Dylan Ratigan's recent rant has gone viral in the blogosphere. Ratigan is slowly coming to the realization that he lives in the United States, not in La La Land where reasonable plans work. He's not quite there yet. (He seems to think Obama is less corrupt than the others.) Near the end of the video, MSNBC contributor Jimmy Williams says—

Money in politics is the root of all political evil

All serious discussions begin with this simple observation. If you skip over it, or pretend money in politics doesn't matter, if you assume politicians are sincere, that they are earnest, you are fooling yourself. Apparently, you prefer to live in a world of bullshit. You have nobody to blame but yourself. Until Americans get serious about solving the root of all political evil, evil is what they will get.

Here's the video.

 

Comments

[JC]

I love how the 2 cyborg talking head pundits, despite the fact that the host has lost his mind, just fall right into their respective roles whenever Dylan takes a breath.