Time for a change?Corporatism, Capitalism, Fascism, anti-Semitism and The American Way
Moss David Posner M.D.
April 02, 2006
I recently read an article, which was typical of so many others: In it the author denigrated private monetary interests as a primary motivator in the Iraq conflict. As I started to formulate a response, it occurred to me that it would be an excellent basis to discuss our current situation. I would like to share this exchange with you:
On Apr 1, 2006, at 8:42 AM, Michael Schwartz wrote:
"Fascism can be see as a thorough form of corporatism (if we look at the economic arrangements only), and by that definition I think you are absolutely right that the rise of Halliburton and the rest is a fascist relationship. But this is not the way in which the term is generally used these days, so using it in that context would raise a flag... by using the term fascism in that context, we would have to also discuss the erosion of civil liberties in the United States"
My point simply was something that I implied but did not make explicit: "Private" refers to Capitalism. By denigrating "private" in making it synonymous with corporatism/fascism, you effectively indict Capitalism.
Aside from the implication then, the question of Capitalism and its morality is inevitable. I personally understand the definition of Capitalism as a socio-economic system in which the products of labor (or one's own efforts) are owned by the one who earned them--as contra-distinct from being owned by the king, the collective, or by any other sociologic entity. The problem of ownership by the collective (whatever that means) is precisely that--it is indefinable; and therein lays the evil: that in the absence of logic definition, said "collective" ownership inevitably is defined by whatever group has the power to define it as being.
You say, "This is not the way in which the term (fascism) is generally used these days....? If it is not used in this context, I cannot imagine any other context in which it could be properly used. Definitions are crucial to discourse; and nowadays there is far too little precision in this regard.
It's interesting to note--the corporate powers do not even touch the issue or even try to represent what they do as "capitalistic." Ironically, this is not because it would be transparent to the average American but because these powers have only to allow gullible critics to do it for them. And that is to their advantage not only as a distraction but also as a way of deflecting any and all criticism to Socialistic governments and then to call for their demise through a thinly-veiled implication that they are fascist, while at the same time representing themselves as compassionate entities, solely interested in either serving the public (as public utilities) or as supporting a war effort against what Spencer called "The generalized Other."
The really important question is this: Does any attempt to make private ownership legitimate inevitably result in our current situation, or did this situation result from an improper application of our Constitution at some point?
There are those who believe this last alternative to be the correct one. They point to Marbury vs. Madison, or to the fact that even the Founding Fathers (I believe it was Jefferson) suggested that some constitutional restriction be placed on evolving corporate entities.
Then there are others, who constitute the majority of critics, who believe that in any and all cases, causing private property to be legitimate, however sincere and well-intended, must inevitably result in fascism.
Here is the ultimate grim irony: It doesn't matter. We have only one choice open to us:
We must make the concept of private property work. Any other effort will play into the hands of those very entities, which we mutually despise.
History is on my side. Karl Marx, Hitler, Stalin, and a host of others historically, have typically appealed to public greed, fear and ignorance in justifying their assumption of arbitrary power in order to save the masses from the cruel machinations of whatever group they choose to indict.
It is easy--even for one who is sincerely however intentionally misled--to buy into this notion. This is because true Capitalism has never had a chance to come into full bloom. As long as this is the case, and as long as attention is diverted to one group or another, almost anything appears as an improvement.
Incidentally, that group has to be made vaguely and indefinably powerful and evil, yet identifiable and palpable enough--and defenseless enough--towards which to deflect public hostility safely--to serve as a "public pi?" so to speak. This is basically the social root of anti-Semitism.
This is also the reason that we in America have such a difficult time understanding the hostility of most of the world, and difficulty in reconciling our good nature with such anger, accompanied, as it is, by idolization of some form of collectivism, such as Socialism, Communism, or variants thereof. It is because we are only now beginning to see the corporate animals for what they are, and beginning to realize that there is a vast distinction between those corporations--by which other countries define us, on the one hand--and our good and decent natures personally, on the other.
It is the reason why we Americans are so baffled by the hostility of others. We have an intuitive sense of freedom and property as being properly inviolate and therefore we cannot understand why others would grasp some other--collectivist--form of social and economic control. We do not see what is plain and clear to others: that the real and actual behavior of corporations is what others understandably believe to be our own personal definition--and the proper definition--of a capitalist system.
Corporate behavior of our military-industrial complex is not the proper definition of Capitalism; and we had better get our head straight on this issue or we will surely perish by yielding our future to those very entities. How is this to be done?
We can start by teaching ourselves and then our children the real basics of economics and government can do this. In the context of today, this can hardly be accomplished, given the public education system and its indoctrination.
The only way this can be accomplished is to home-school our children. Home schooling is the educational equivalent of our Second Amendment right to keep our property inviolate--namely the minds of our children. But in order to accomplish this, we must first educate ourselves.
Ironically, we have the best possible chance of doing just that right at this very moment. The transparent nature of the cruelty of military corporate fascism is becoming apparent. The blogosphere--and the Internet per se--is our last hope, our last frontier. The hideous participation and execution of the 9/11 debacle by our own government is rapidly becoming clear.
Before you rush to judgment of this as being a nutty "conspiracy," please look at my article on this subject. Since I wrote this, yet even more incontrovertible evidence has surfaced, including what I had long suspected to be true: that our government accomplished this by infiltrating a terrorist cell, and then pulling a bait-and-switch move by using real explosives in place of the fake ones, which had been the professed plan of defusing the operation.
One immediate indispensable course is to remove us from Iraq--immediately. An identical course was forced upon us in the Viet Nam war by the Tet Offensive and which resulted in only an improvement in our circumstances. The real problem now is that this administration has no intention of leaving the Middle East, and has set up permanent bases in Iraq, as well as in surrounding previous Russian satellites. Still, public pressure and the threat of deposing our government representatives en masse could and would work wonders.
Next, we are left with the task of dismantling the whole structure of government aid and programs and transferring these functions to those private institutions, which can accomplish this. One such program was legislation that put a cap on welfare, and insisted that those capable get jobs and get on with their lives. In many instances this procedure may prove to be impossible and which leave us with the only alternative of abolishing them completely. An example of this is the current fracas over illegal immigration. In this regard, there is nothing more infuriating than to see vociferous protesters sporting not the American flag, but the Mexican flag, and in so doing insist that government violate its own immigration laws.
Finally, we need to apply logic to our own lives and ourselves. All forms of subsidization must be phased out. This can be accomplished by sun-setting most all existing social governmental programs. This task is complex but indispensable. If the government alleges it can do something, it is because you and I can do something, and can do it better than the meddling interference of governmental authority. Some form of temporary subsidization is critical, yet no different than the "temporary subsidization" of a teen-ager while he or she grows to independent adulthood.
In keeping with this last example, isn't about time we did the same?
On Apr 1, 2006, at 8:42 AM, Michael Schwartz wrote:
"Fascism can be see as a thorough form of corporatism (if we look at the economic arrangements only), and by that definition I think you are absolutely right that the rise of Halliburton and the rest is a fascist relationship. But this is not the way in which the term is generally used these days, so using it in that context would raise a flag... by using the term fascism in that context, we would have to also discuss the erosion of civil liberties in the United States"
My point simply was something that I implied but did not make explicit: "Private" refers to Capitalism. By denigrating "private" in making it synonymous with corporatism/fascism, you effectively indict Capitalism.
Aside from the implication then, the question of Capitalism and its morality is inevitable. I personally understand the definition of Capitalism as a socio-economic system in which the products of labor (or one's own efforts) are owned by the one who earned them--as contra-distinct from being owned by the king, the collective, or by any other sociologic entity. The problem of ownership by the collective (whatever that means) is precisely that--it is indefinable; and therein lays the evil: that in the absence of logic definition, said "collective" ownership inevitably is defined by whatever group has the power to define it as being.
You say, "This is not the way in which the term (fascism) is generally used these days....? If it is not used in this context, I cannot imagine any other context in which it could be properly used. Definitions are crucial to discourse; and nowadays there is far too little precision in this regard.
It's interesting to note--the corporate powers do not even touch the issue or even try to represent what they do as "capitalistic." Ironically, this is not because it would be transparent to the average American but because these powers have only to allow gullible critics to do it for them. And that is to their advantage not only as a distraction but also as a way of deflecting any and all criticism to Socialistic governments and then to call for their demise through a thinly-veiled implication that they are fascist, while at the same time representing themselves as compassionate entities, solely interested in either serving the public (as public utilities) or as supporting a war effort against what Spencer called "The generalized Other."
The really important question is this: Does any attempt to make private ownership legitimate inevitably result in our current situation, or did this situation result from an improper application of our Constitution at some point?
There are those who believe this last alternative to be the correct one. They point to Marbury vs. Madison, or to the fact that even the Founding Fathers (I believe it was Jefferson) suggested that some constitutional restriction be placed on evolving corporate entities.
Then there are others, who constitute the majority of critics, who believe that in any and all cases, causing private property to be legitimate, however sincere and well-intended, must inevitably result in fascism.
Here is the ultimate grim irony: It doesn't matter. We have only one choice open to us:
We must make the concept of private property work. Any other effort will play into the hands of those very entities, which we mutually despise.
History is on my side. Karl Marx, Hitler, Stalin, and a host of others historically, have typically appealed to public greed, fear and ignorance in justifying their assumption of arbitrary power in order to save the masses from the cruel machinations of whatever group they choose to indict.
It is easy--even for one who is sincerely however intentionally misled--to buy into this notion. This is because true Capitalism has never had a chance to come into full bloom. As long as this is the case, and as long as attention is diverted to one group or another, almost anything appears as an improvement.
Incidentally, that group has to be made vaguely and indefinably powerful and evil, yet identifiable and palpable enough--and defenseless enough--towards which to deflect public hostility safely--to serve as a "public pi?" so to speak. This is basically the social root of anti-Semitism.
This is also the reason that we in America have such a difficult time understanding the hostility of most of the world, and difficulty in reconciling our good nature with such anger, accompanied, as it is, by idolization of some form of collectivism, such as Socialism, Communism, or variants thereof. It is because we are only now beginning to see the corporate animals for what they are, and beginning to realize that there is a vast distinction between those corporations--by which other countries define us, on the one hand--and our good and decent natures personally, on the other.
It is the reason why we Americans are so baffled by the hostility of others. We have an intuitive sense of freedom and property as being properly inviolate and therefore we cannot understand why others would grasp some other--collectivist--form of social and economic control. We do not see what is plain and clear to others: that the real and actual behavior of corporations is what others understandably believe to be our own personal definition--and the proper definition--of a capitalist system.
Corporate behavior of our military-industrial complex is not the proper definition of Capitalism; and we had better get our head straight on this issue or we will surely perish by yielding our future to those very entities. How is this to be done?
We can start by teaching ourselves and then our children the real basics of economics and government can do this. In the context of today, this can hardly be accomplished, given the public education system and its indoctrination.
The only way this can be accomplished is to home-school our children. Home schooling is the educational equivalent of our Second Amendment right to keep our property inviolate--namely the minds of our children. But in order to accomplish this, we must first educate ourselves.
Ironically, we have the best possible chance of doing just that right at this very moment. The transparent nature of the cruelty of military corporate fascism is becoming apparent. The blogosphere--and the Internet per se--is our last hope, our last frontier. The hideous participation and execution of the 9/11 debacle by our own government is rapidly becoming clear.
Before you rush to judgment of this as being a nutty "conspiracy," please look at my article on this subject. Since I wrote this, yet even more incontrovertible evidence has surfaced, including what I had long suspected to be true: that our government accomplished this by infiltrating a terrorist cell, and then pulling a bait-and-switch move by using real explosives in place of the fake ones, which had been the professed plan of defusing the operation.
One immediate indispensable course is to remove us from Iraq--immediately. An identical course was forced upon us in the Viet Nam war by the Tet Offensive and which resulted in only an improvement in our circumstances. The real problem now is that this administration has no intention of leaving the Middle East, and has set up permanent bases in Iraq, as well as in surrounding previous Russian satellites. Still, public pressure and the threat of deposing our government representatives en masse could and would work wonders.
Next, we are left with the task of dismantling the whole structure of government aid and programs and transferring these functions to those private institutions, which can accomplish this. One such program was legislation that put a cap on welfare, and insisted that those capable get jobs and get on with their lives. In many instances this procedure may prove to be impossible and which leave us with the only alternative of abolishing them completely. An example of this is the current fracas over illegal immigration. In this regard, there is nothing more infuriating than to see vociferous protesters sporting not the American flag, but the Mexican flag, and in so doing insist that government violate its own immigration laws.
Finally, we need to apply logic to our own lives and ourselves. All forms of subsidization must be phased out. This can be accomplished by sun-setting most all existing social governmental programs. This task is complex but indispensable. If the government alleges it can do something, it is because you and I can do something, and can do it better than the meddling interference of governmental authority. Some form of temporary subsidization is critical, yet no different than the "temporary subsidization" of a teen-ager while he or she grows to independent adulthood.
In keeping with this last example, isn't about time we did the same?
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