To Attend to Madame's Answer

Madame M:

Excuse, if you will, the tardiness of my reply!

Do tell our readers how Gibbon would recognize much of our discussion! More light-shedding!

Merely organizations? Au contraire, Madame, these are the kings and the viziers behind the throne! While I may from time to time over-ascribe, and I may need to be en garde against such, as you say, and welcome countervailing evidence, there seems a relative paucity of that countervailing these days. And, not to preview upcoming discussions (), but inverted control structures often need only loose collectives, but as well, often do not fear enough to even hide (or at least, they hide in the open). I am all for individual responsibility, but how to exact that when there is little effective power to hold such accountable? Those in government are rarer to stay there anymore and remain part of the true elite controllers. Therefore, that infers strongly that the government does not do the controlling, or even that it is an equal partner. It is a servant, not of the people, but of a corporate elite and their familiars. And not all or even majority of corporate America belongs to this elite. It is a rather exclusive club, and one can see it for where the money is, where the money stays, and where the money is going.

Trying to hold those in government accountable rarely works if the corporate elites oppose it, and even when it does work, those rarely suffer punishment, but merely go on to the happy hunting grounds they were bound for anyway (in Lobbyville and Corporate America).

Corporations are a far cry from the brief period (the approximately 50 -75 year bubble after the Revolution) when protection of the public interest held sway in the matter of corporations (and why, perhaps the Framers did not focus on this issue). Those corporations have now become legally protected collectivist (and partially anonymous) plutocracies that form one loose huge plutocracy. Control is not complete, but complete control is neither desired nor necessary.

And as for corporations’ purpose or existence: leaving aside for the moment how twisted even that has become—it has gone from serving stockholders in general and the long-run, to institutional stockholders and corporate management and directors in the near toto main, and even then by the quarter primarily—they are chartered by government, and theoretically then by the public. Therefore, unless it is a form inherently corrupt by design and only for their benefit (as some have said), there must be some perceived public good, or at least public control. And there comes the crux: why primarily do we oppose and prosecute organized crime and criminal gangs? Because they are a threat to the general society, and because they injure and undermine both democracy and basic capitalism (legislators, police, judges, witnesses, and juries bought off or intimidated, shopkeepers extorted or even driven from business, etc.). Although the comparison can sometimes be taken too far, there are discomfiting similarities there to the behavior of many corporations and their cooperative elites.

And when government fails to do what our defining documents outline, if the reason is because they are being controlled by corporate powers, who are you holding accountable? I do not think we want to be so willfully excusing as to say to government servant A that we are punishing him because he served evil outside entity C—and then say entity C is just being itself, no need to do anything about the fact it was corrupting the democratic process. We don’t (or we say we don’t) prosecute individuals of organized crime organizations, and then ignore or let slide the organizations themselves. RICO and other measures are there because those individuals both serve and are controlled by those organizations, and the organizations themselves are considered the larger threat.

Of course, much of this kind of dialogue and thought has wisped into academic discussion—the consortium doesn’t really fear us much anymore.

Forty years ago, there was great worry because the number of major media/press/news outlets had shrunk to 30. Today there are five. As we will discuss in a future posts, there is control and direction, and a general lack of investigative reporting, and your links point to that.

Yes, the Founders’ protections, all the things they put in place to inhibit tyranny—they are just that, inhibitors. They are not magic. As Jefferson said, vigilance is the eternal price of liberty. A long pattern of selection and confirmation of judges based on where they came from (serving corporate law and cases) is coming into fruition for the corporations. Same pattern of interlocking elites. Although dressed up nicely, often the result is the same: taking care of your friends. Now, it is more complicated than that, and many justices cannot be quite pigeonholed, and still others change a bit over time, but the general pattern is sufficiently satisfying for corporations, and that’s enough.

10% after the first election? That’s quite the severe, and probably quickly insurmountable, penalty!

Jefferson would be an astute enough observer to perhaps think that the low turnout you cite means that enough people instinctively suspect that voting doesn’t much matter. But yes, we the people have been remiss. And your suggestions about service could indeed have good effect.

Cultures either encourage character, or they promote the enfeebling of it. Ours pays lip service to encouragement, and does all manner of things to enfeeble or even belittle.

Creaking sound? About what in particular?

Will turn to more (and lengthy!) critique on Beck tomorrow or the next day! Must be off to sleep now! Of course, I will understand if you think I’ve been sleepwalking through this entire reply! :)