Tioga Herald

God bless Darren Walker, head of the Ford Foundation. Thank you Leslie Stahl and Sixty Minutes for your story about Darren Walker. What a delightful story! What a delightful bit of information about the same love of capitalism which I have written about quite frequently over the last 20 years or more and finally brought to the attention of people. I have frequently tried to point out that the capitalism identified by the wealthy today is really not a capitalism, but merely supply side economics favored by wealthy people and big corporate giants. Thus, we have now ended up today, as Mr. Walker said, with a problem not only for black or Latinx people, but also de-evolving wealth for white people, too. That a small number of the wealthy own as much as 90% of those at the bottom rung of the economy. That capitalism is about opportunities, not just jobs. This last thing, I have spoken out against the liberals and union folks who ONLY talk about jobs, eeven though I am a lifetime union person.

Having lost my stock in a corporation, due to the wealthy supply-siders and friends of Reagan in the 1980s and 1990s, Mr. Walker’s ideas about profit-sharing, not stocks really rang the bell loud and clear for me. It reminded me, too, about the fact that friend of Ayn Rand (lover of the virtue of selfishness), Alan Greenspan, during the Reagan era, had a truly good reason for changing his mind about whether supply-side economics is any good. For many years, I have been saying, over and over again, that supply-side economics is NOT capitalism. The wealthy refuse to buy into this position, out of fear of losing.

I have been stating that capitalism, with the pandemic threat, could be saved by using the example that we once had for war bonds, in order to gain money to fight the war with Hitler and Mussolini. Today, we heard Mr. Walker talk about investment bonds for the Ford Foundation. This also goes along with ideas about raising money through a group like March of Dimes, to pay for the war on polio. Our thanks for the uplifting words by Mr. Walker, as he acknowledged this concept about bonds and other means for raising money for investments.

Mr. Walker, you mention that such actions which means wealthy give their money away and it might mean a loss to them, is “against human nature.” You are darn right about that. However, in stories about the development of the National Parks system in America, there were people such as Steve Mathers who worked within the government, as a wealthy man, to GIVE money to finance this effort AND to pay government employees who did it.

My ancestor for whom I have been admitted to the Sons of the American Revolution, Capt. Frederick J. Schoonmaker, gave money to finance the war effort against the British Crown in the 1770s and 1780s because the fledgling American government was broke.

My point about Mathers and Schoonmaker are about how there are examples which made this nation GREAT of people who DID go against human nature, as does Mr. Walker, and gave their money to efforts to help establish this nation and then one example of building our national parks system and preserving the wilderness in America. Thus, when speaking with Leslie Stahl and saying this sort of action “goes against human nature” and it is correct. But we do need to find all the examples of those who DID go against human nature and helped build this nation to be what it is today, in spite of the imperfections and blemishes over time.

Donald Trump and the Trumpicans and Proud Boys (and others) have no idea what it means to make America great in this respect. They have no clue.

Again, thank you Darren Walker, for the enlightenment provided tonight in the interview by Leslie Stahl on Sixty Minutes. Kudos and bravo to you! Keep up the good work!