Well Done, Oren. I aggressively disparaged Oren's last missive for several reasons. It was Oren at his worst. This is Oren at his best.
The one thing I'd like to see addressed relative to Libertarian "free market" dogma is the idea that wealth is Power. Wealth confers agency. The more of it, the more agency. The less of it, the less agenc…
Well Done, Oren. I aggressively disparaged Oren's last missive for several reasons. It was Oren at his worst. This is Oren at his best.
The one thing I'd like to see addressed relative to Libertarian "free market" dogma is the idea that wealth is Power. Wealth confers agency. The more of it, the more agency. The less of it, the less agency. This is an independent general observation, separate from the agency of an individual working to improve his lot in life. Extreme wealth renders its owner extreme power. Buying politicians and party platforms is one way that power is exercised. Political corruption requires underdeveloped ethical restraint and it seems there's no shortage of that. But, to use the WSJ metaphor in a different way, Wealth is like gravity. Gravity is a force, a quality of mass that attracts mass innately. High quantities and densities of mass distort the space around them. Stars with orbiting planets, black holes so powerful not even light escapes them. Wealth does so similarly with economic activity and peoples' lives involved in or subject to that activity. At this point I'm not making a judgement good or bad, just an observation.
In our culture and most (but not all) cultures, wealth accrues wealth to itself. That's true in capitalist culture as well as controlled market authoritarian cultures. The social and political structures all support wealth as power in this way. In authoritarian systems, the political direction and the economic direction all flow to the top few. Democracy, however, points in the opposite direction of Capitalism. An uncorrupted democracy Tends toward distributing an equal share of well being among all citizens. That would include wealth. Capitalism by its nature tends toward monopoly and (an ultimately self defeating) concentration of wealth to very few people and is not inherently interested in well being. Theory and reality show that to be true. Democracy resists extreme capitalist concentration when things are working well. But the power of wealth has gotten the upper hand presently in our country and elsewhere. That power is the Republican Brand pretty explicitly. But, also, it is the reason ultimately that the Democratic Brand is disparaged.
So I completely agree with Vance on the specific notion that "the market" and its capitalist form are tools that should be employed for the well being of all citizens. A very few politicians say that and I don't trust that most of them mean it enough to do something about it. Trump/Vought/Musk/MAGA is not the answer and will cause huge damage to our country over the next two years. They certainly don't believe the market and capitalism are tools to be used for the common good, but rather, their own good. That damage will take a decade or more to recover from absent a serious movement toward uncorrupted democracy. Without violence, how can that happen? To be clear, I mean violence is not an option. Realistically Fox News is mainstream media now. Its Libertarian underpinning and MAGA sycophancy stand in the way of an informed citizenry that could in theory vote to end money in politics and extreme wealth for that matter. The only avenue I see right now is a social media movement that expands past social media. And those major outlets are starting to bend toward authoritarian rationalization and control.
Things seem hopeless right now. However, a charismatic politician with Sanders' economic policy notions (same as Oren's) and moderate social identity issue stances could emerge that could lead an overwhelming voter turnout to end the power of wealth in politics. Either party or no party, I'll take it.
Well Done, Oren. I aggressively disparaged Oren's last missive for several reasons. It was Oren at his worst. This is Oren at his best.
The one thing I'd like to see addressed relative to Libertarian "free market" dogma is the idea that wealth is Power. Wealth confers agency. The more of it, the more agency. The less of it, the less agency. This is an independent general observation, separate from the agency of an individual working to improve his lot in life. Extreme wealth renders its owner extreme power. Buying politicians and party platforms is one way that power is exercised. Political corruption requires underdeveloped ethical restraint and it seems there's no shortage of that. But, to use the WSJ metaphor in a different way, Wealth is like gravity. Gravity is a force, a quality of mass that attracts mass innately. High quantities and densities of mass distort the space around them. Stars with orbiting planets, black holes so powerful not even light escapes them. Wealth does so similarly with economic activity and peoples' lives involved in or subject to that activity. At this point I'm not making a judgement good or bad, just an observation.
In our culture and most (but not all) cultures, wealth accrues wealth to itself. That's true in capitalist culture as well as controlled market authoritarian cultures. The social and political structures all support wealth as power in this way. In authoritarian systems, the political direction and the economic direction all flow to the top few. Democracy, however, points in the opposite direction of Capitalism. An uncorrupted democracy Tends toward distributing an equal share of well being among all citizens. That would include wealth. Capitalism by its nature tends toward monopoly and (an ultimately self defeating) concentration of wealth to very few people and is not inherently interested in well being. Theory and reality show that to be true. Democracy resists extreme capitalist concentration when things are working well. But the power of wealth has gotten the upper hand presently in our country and elsewhere. That power is the Republican Brand pretty explicitly. But, also, it is the reason ultimately that the Democratic Brand is disparaged.
So I completely agree with Vance on the specific notion that "the market" and its capitalist form are tools that should be employed for the well being of all citizens. A very few politicians say that and I don't trust that most of them mean it enough to do something about it. Trump/Vought/Musk/MAGA is not the answer and will cause huge damage to our country over the next two years. They certainly don't believe the market and capitalism are tools to be used for the common good, but rather, their own good. That damage will take a decade or more to recover from absent a serious movement toward uncorrupted democracy. Without violence, how can that happen? To be clear, I mean violence is not an option. Realistically Fox News is mainstream media now. Its Libertarian underpinning and MAGA sycophancy stand in the way of an informed citizenry that could in theory vote to end money in politics and extreme wealth for that matter. The only avenue I see right now is a social media movement that expands past social media. And those major outlets are starting to bend toward authoritarian rationalization and control.
Things seem hopeless right now. However, a charismatic politician with Sanders' economic policy notions (same as Oren's) and moderate social identity issue stances could emerge that could lead an overwhelming voter turnout to end the power of wealth in politics. Either party or no party, I'll take it.