Would you purchase a big ticket item such as a kitchen appliance or an automobile and put up with the fact that it does not perform properly? In other words, a refrigerator which does not cool properly? Likely, you would be upset and demand something better, right? Or you would just put up with the lack of performance of the product purchased? Would you?
This is called supply AND demand economics. Since Reagan and his lousy despicable statement that “government is the problem,” we have moved to deregulation by government and firm control by the supply side in the economy as we have created these big corporate conglomerates on the supply side. These corporate conglomerates have put small businesses out while CEOs of the big corporate conglomerates have seen salaries rise by 1000% since the 1970s, squelched retirement possibilities (pensions, etc.) for the Middle Class, and literally helped destroy the living wage as prices of housing and other commodities have risen astronomically.
In Jeb Bush’s Florida, the price of a home rose some 125% from 2001 to 2006 and the time of the Great Recession. Short-term greed is winning over America’s ability to have long-term CAPITALIST investment in housing, as had been the case when the Democrats were in charge. These are historical facts speaking, not my emotions and my own facts. It is not meant to impart MY opinion, but to teach by using historical FACTS. It is being done in the name of “free markets.” To the common folk, I have always said, when it comes to flipping homes, be careful what you wish for.
In Florida, Rick the Prick Scott, who now sits in the U.S. Senate, blamed Gov. Crist for all of that and that recession. The election of Gov. Crist was in 2006, just as the housing market burst and before he was in office. He did not take the office of governor until 2007 as this nation was already on the path to recession. Yet, the stupidity of those, particularly Trumpicans, never saw the facts and just relied on what Rick the Prick and Fox News said.
Here we are in 2021. We elected President Joe Biden. And yes, you dumb scum who proclaim fraud when there was little or no fraud, only many black people getting out to vote. If that is fraud than you people can go f**k yourselves. (Is that fork yourselves?). Consider that if the majority in the Georgia and Florida legislatures are REPUBLICANS, then, they, too, must have been elected by fraud. In Florida, it was due to efforts of Republicans like Jebbie and others to get black folks off the voting roles and something called gerrymandering which placed congressional and legislative districts in the hands of white power leadership from internal Florida while screwing the multi-racial areas on the coasts.
In that 2020 election, Trump talked about “keeping healthcare private.” Keep it private, huh? That is such a success story, don’t you know? Success for white wealthy fat cats. The rest of us are damned. During the years preceding the Great Recession, Republicans were in charge in Washington and privatized Medicare by adding this sicko convoluted idea to protect big pharma – big corporate conglomerates – in SUPPLY-SIDE ECONOMICS. It is sicko as convoluted tiers are created and put brand name drugs on tier three and subjected to the “donut hole” or the “medigap” principle in which senior citizens have to pay huge amounts that only wealthy ones in the DEMAND-SIDE of the market can afford in order to purchase brand name medications. Furthermore, these bastards called Republicans REGULATED the market and did NOT allow insurance companies to offer insurance with a premium which COULD be a lower annual cost for these medications because there is a pooled resource to help pay for them.
First of all, there should be no tier three. There should be no “donut hole.” These are all to benefit the SUPPLY-SIDE called big pharma. It’s a fraud. We listen as they whine and whine and whine about the necessity for this. They can have a little cheese with their hate-ridden “wine.” (“H” in whine represents hate).
In capitalist terms, these senior citizens still pay into Medicare with every Social Security check. These senior citizens have paid into Medicare for some 50 or 60 years, so they have built up a CAPITALIST INVESTMENT. The capitalist investment these days goes into private companies like big pharma and big insurance who whine, whine, and whine that they don’t have enough, should they not have this form of SUPPLY-SIDE ECONOMICS which screws the DEMAND-SIDE and no one is there to protect the DEMAND-SIDE, unless one files for “financial assistance.” That is an insult to us because we have already INVESTED in this market and are being treated like a bunch of hoodlum fat cats who own most of the stock in a company and then pull the reverse Robin Hood method of taking from the lower classes and giving to the 1% of s*** which controls the stock. And Trump thought the economy was doing well. For those of the 1% at the top, the fat cats, sure the economy was doing well for them. The rest of us? HUH! Not that well. Some of us better than others. It is disgusting to note that 70M stupid stupido voters went along with that whining 1% as promoted by freaking lousy Fox News and other media outlets.
Let me return to my opening statements about how one would not purchase an appliance with no expectation it would perform well. In addition to Medicare investments by senior citizens like me, many of us have also invested over the long term in private insurance. Many have not, unless we had an employer who provided such insurance. We took a cut in pay as the employer invested in insurance, in order to make the claim that THEY were the ones investing in it for their greedy selfish means only – to make sure their employees were healthy enough to work for them. If not well enought, then POOF – go on your merry way. In the last years of my employment, I was also asked to contribute into this insurance and denied a decent salary raise considering the cost of living in South Florida. All this was RUN by Republicans and I find them all to be a bunch of lousy jerks who were NOT like the Republican Party to which I once belonged.
So I paid into this privatized health insurance debacle and now I am being told I have to cough up tons of money for “tier three” bull manure of privatized Medicare with its donut hole. One plus to such measures is that I identified the medications which were not working and for which me and my employer paid for all those years and asked to have them dropped. In other words, I had been paying for a healthcare “refrigerator” that did not cool very well.
And how does healthcare respond? Mocking me by dropping a brand name medication and replacing it with another brand name medication that does not work as well as the first one and I pay almost as much. I have a brand name “stove” of medication that is not a good quality and I pay almost as much as the lousy “stove.” Am I putting this matter in proper perspective or am I just to be ignored, as always?
Then one of the brand name meds, Ozempic, spends tons of money on commercials, something that, along with lawyer commercials, never existed when America was a better nation in the past (before Reagan and supply-side economics), telling us that “most can reach an A1C below seven.” MOST? Where is the proof? Where is the evidence? Because I can say that Ozempic helped me lower my A1C, but it has yet to go below seven, in spite of the fact I have been taking Ozempic for just about a dozen years now. I guess I am just that lousy minority of people for whom the med does not work as well, in spite of my avid exercise regimen and following diets to reduce my weight by some 40 pounds during 2020. I consider that to be a fraud, but I guess I am wrong. OK. So my medication “dishwasher” works fairly close to high quality, but not that much.
My father’s small business selling big ticket items like “white” appliances no longer exists in this small rural town. Yet, he made a business capable of sending three kids to college and giving him a mobile home in Florida. He did not horde tons of money, as the jackass fat cats at the top of corporations do. But he survived, sometimes financially better than many who bring home revenue from an employer. He was self-employed. How many opportunities like that exist today, now with big box Lowe’s Home Depot, Best Buy, and others being the primary source of appliances these days? They can sell at a lower “high volume” price tag, but then nickel and dime the demand-side of the market with service and installation costs. My dad did not have to do this.
In fact, I recall getting my wisdom teeth removed (in my 20s) because my father traded the surgery for an installation of a washer and drier in the home of the surgeon who removed my teeth. They were Maytag brands and my bet is they might STILL be in operation today, as I have heard others tell me about. In the days before the reverse Robin Hood thieves increased their salaries (ripoff) by 1000%, America made a quality product in Newton, Iowa.
Where is that Maytag factory today? Bet it is not there and Whirlpool makes washers and driers overseas, puts the Maytag name plate on them and people do not even realize the fraud and the lie perpetrated by 1% of the population which has gained 1000% in salary (I said that already), plugged up the tax credits for research and development, and “look for other tax scandal ways to receive tax credits. These yahoos have privatized” things with the advantage of that 1% regulating their own market, rather than the government which is now controlled by such fascist yahoos and rubber stamps what these fascist wealthy do. We get lousy products in America and, according to Trump, are supposed to be impressed by “private” business. These fascist fat cats have created a style of society like that of a communist government in the former Soviet Union where the Russians are now controlled by a freaking lousy one-time KGB agent of that communist government.
Three-penny Op-ed: Democracy and Economics (17 Apr. 2021, The Economist)
Recently, I wrote about Queen Victoria, based on dramatization of her life. At one point in her early years of ruling during the 19th Century, Queen Victoria addressed protestors who were part of mobs attacking the palace where she lived. The scene depicted incendiary weapon of the time which was hurled through the windows of the palace. Those devices made one think of the “Molotov cocktails,” used in the 20th Century and derived the name from Vyacheslav Molotov. The name comes from a time period in which comes after the reign of Queen Victoria. When used in London during the queen’s reign, it approximates to the time of the residency of Karl Marx in London. Due to the time period, I come under criticism for using the words, Molotov Cocktail when they did not exist. People dwell too much on use of words and not on the fact that the name used in my writing referenced a weapon which was generic and could help understand what was actually used by the protestors.
Wording is so important when it comes to the false ideas passed down to our day from the likes of Karl Marx and Adam Smith of Scotland. Marx falsely claimed capitalism was “the problem” in the same way Reagan claimed “government is the problem.” People, particularly the lovers of Fox News, just grab at what was said and don’t give a damn about those of us who speak out about the false ideas which permeate the “herd” mentality from a Nazi propaganda machine like Fox News and other extreme right-wing news outlets.
Marx was wrong in blaming capitalism as a problem because capitalism was like a “new kid on the block” and barely understandable to others. The aristocracy grabbed at the ideas of Adam Smith with gratitude and simply twisted the ideas of capitalism to suit their ideas of aristocratic supply-side economics which disdains the demand side of the market. What would have happened if Marx had actually identified what the true problem was? What would have happened if the media of the day had revealed Adam Smith’s turnaround AGAINST the ideas of “free markets” because he felt humans did not have a natural human ethics and morality (The Theory of Moral Sentiments), so therefore there needs to be a “referee” with a third-party group regulating supply AND demand for the purposes of checks and balances in economics. (Also see Economics professor, Dr. Jonathan Wight’s book, Saving Adam Smith). After all, Adam Smith was a contemporary of the American Deists and Forefathers who saw a lack of chaos in the universe due to a Creator who worked with checks and balances, so they devised a political system and U.S. Constitution with checks and balances. Interesting to note that too many Americans grasp at Marx’s theory that “religion is the opioid of the masses” rather than what Jesus Christ said which applies to Adam Smith’s ideas about “moral sentiment.” Why? I ask. What if we changed this false notion? Shameful that human beings claim to follow Jesus Christ (as Smith was a Christian theologian, too), but really don’t grasp his notions.
Smith promoted the idea that ultimately, “free markets” end up giving us monopolies, regulation of an economy by autocratic big corporations (“deregulation,” as Reagan proclaimed) to their self-serving interests which destroy competition and small business. This is similar to what happened in Ancient China when the small business Mandarin class was destroyed and China imploded on itself (see Zakaria).
In stating, “business and politics are growing closer in America, with worrying consequences,” there is agreement with what is proposed in the text above. The fact that American business in the late 19th Century created a rich commerce for America makes quite a bit of sense. However, with J.P. Morgan and others in the 20th Century, America began to steer away from such a pathway. Teddy Roosevelt, the “trust buster,” worked to regulate the huge corporations. This continued after World War II, even as corporations became larger. International Business Machines (IBM) was created by Thomas J. Watson. However, he and the other executives at NCR where he originally was employed, worked to destroy competition and the government came down hard on them. In the process, Watson became a benevolent autocratic CEO at IBM and the company flourished. But once benevolent ones depart this life, they are often replaced with barbaric, ruthless, and vicious dictators. It is seen that IBM was later headed by such vicious men and this became the norm in America, as we watched as CEOs increased their salaries and bonuses so astronomically that it has been a 1000% rise since the 1970s. Ayn Rand and others promoted, with Reagan, supply-side economics and deregulation. Teams of lawyers in big corporations and the proliferation of so many lawyers in the American economy (creating jobs for themselves as ambulance-chasing vicious ones who attack one against the other in a destructive and greedy manner) meant corporations could better protect themselves than the small little business person. As with what happened to the Ancient Chinese Mandarin small business class, these people were put out of business. Fast food magnate like ruthless and vicious Ray Kroc hired people to scout areas with small mom and pop diners and place McDonald’s near those areas, for the purpose of destroying the competition, with the same regard as Republicans under Trump destroy and destroy and destroy, beginning with the ACA which has a goal of extending competition in health insurance in order to help lower the prices which are ripoffs and nickel and diming the demand-side of the capitalist market.
Rick Scott in the U.S. Senate is responsible for the Hospital Corporation of America which is a huge corporate conglomerate begun during the Reagan years with the purpose to destroy the “competition” of public health facilities. The loss of such public facilities really hurt the American people during this pandemic. People like Rick Scott, Jeb Bush, Ron DeSantis and Trump Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, had designs on creating big corporation in America which could be called “Education Corporation of America.”
Jeb Bush and other Republicans like him also privatized the prison system of Florida. The net result has been, to make a profit, by putting more people in jails (concentration camps?). Most of those people are black people who then are removed from the voting rolls. In a recent referendum in Florida, the voters of Florida voted to stop that type of treatment of those who served their time in jails by getting them back on the voting rolls. This applied to non-felony criminals or minor criminal activities, particularly possession of marijuana or cocaine, etc. This push to get black people in jails from these minor offenses is reminiscent of what was portrayed which happened to Billie Holiday when latent homosexual, J. Edgar Hoover, headed the FBI. (See the movie, The United States v. Billie Holiday).
It was very eloquently stated in The April 17 Economist article: “we also believe that concentrations of power are dangerous. Business people will always lobby for their own advantage, but the closer they get to the government, the more harm they threaten to both the economy and politics.” However, to frame this issue as “classic liberals” really puts this too much on the political spectrum, when I know many conservatives who support this ideal, too. As Dr. Howard Dean, one-time candidate for president of the USA, said, “we need to frame the issues to make them more acceptable to more people.” Putting in the word, liberal, sad to say in today’s world, gives ammunition to the fat cats of America who follow fascist Trump and push their own agenda with lies and the re-telling of lies. It is bad enough that they have ammunition with guns and the NRA, let alone words used as ammunition.
Speaking of Dr. Dean. He comes from a state which puts restrictions on big box corporate retailers, not allowing them to build in low density areas where they can become more monopolized by destroying the small business competition. Current U.S. Senator, Bernie Sanders, is from the same state and should nix what Rick Scott of Florida says in his fascist white racist business-loving, greedy, selfish way.
George W. Bush may have had SOME good ideas (i.e., use of switch grass as a renewable energy source). But the worst thing he said, as applied to this article in the Economist about the “political CEO,” “what’s good for business is good for America.” I am glad to read this article which does a good job at shooting holes in this asinine statement made by a former president.
The examples of successful challenges to the pandemic were in nations which were democracies which worked together in good alliances with business and health systems to defeat the “war” of the pandemic.
In the late 19th Century, one could have said, “what’s good for government is good for business.” Ronald Reagan, in his stupidity, destroyed that notion and we are being forced to live by such destruction. It needs to change and we need to rid our economic system of the words of individualist, selfish, greedy, lovers of money and materialism. We need to work on the same principles of checks and balances which our Forefathers used in setting up our political system.
There is evidence that Adam Smith recognized the same thing for our economic system, but the autocratic aristocrats in the monarchies of his day proclaimed they had a “divine right to rule” and grabbed and used Smith’s ideas to their own advantage. They twisted Smith’s ideas in order to keep the status quo of the system they controlled, while playing lip service to the Smith ideas about “capitalism.”
The result was that Karl Marx gave capitalism a bum rap rather than acknowledging how the system of supply-side economics was the problem. In essence, Lenin and Stalin set up the same type of centrally planned supply-side economic system in Russia. The Ancient Chinese did the same thing many years ago. These systems of supply-side economics failed. When will people recognize this?
Even General Douglas MacArthur, as Supreme Commander of Japan, following World War II, worked to destroy two things in Japan: (1) the communist party and (2) the aristocratic autocratic supply-side economic system which had existed for many years. This system made the Japanese so ruthless that they refused to abide by the international humane rules for POWs, often murdering American POWs and stuffing the genitalia down the throats of dead men (see Ken Burns documentary about World War II, The War).
If America does not wake up, learn and gain wisdom about these circumstances today, then the negative components is described in this article about the “political CEO” might happen.
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democracy, Economics, Regulated Capitalism, Commerce, New Comments, Op-ed
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