A few bad policy decisions of the 1900s

 

1913 – Implementation of individual taxes led to a bloated government, incentivized 85% of tax lobbyists to represent corporate interests, enabling overburdening of the workforce and the general marketplace, and giving business interests motivation to loot newly created government revenue on the backs of the tax-paying public.

1953 – Military conflicts debt-financed, not tax-funded, leading to enormous growth of national debt. Much of the fruits of our labor (treasure) go to military defense contractors.

1870-1970 – End of century-long trade surplus, leading to diminishing domestic wealth creation, dismantling of US manufacturing, urban decay, violent crime, and the drug war.

1971 – Nixon Shock, causing deep & broad economic instability, and individual wealth & income shrinkage, furthering blight.

1973 – Nixon’s HMO Act, incentivized for-profit speculative trading in medical care providers and pharma. Public medicine further gave-way to market-managed hospital care, pharma and related insurance throughout the 80s & 90s.

1981-1988 – Reagan deregulation led to broad corporate consolidation, destruction of the Fairness Doctrine, escalation of national partisan resentment, furthering corporate favoritism above public interest.

1996 – Telecom bill, enabled massive media consolidation, further diminishing local ownership of media enterprises.

The Great Liquidation: Picking at the Carcass of America

The storefronts are empty, the pension funds are hollow, and the ticker tape continues to roll. To the casual observer, the American economy is a marvel of modern resilience. To the autopsy surgeon, however, it is a body being systematically harvested for its parts. We are no longer living in a period of growth; we are witnessing a global fire sale of the remaining assets of a once-prosperous civilization.

The tragedy of Sears—once the heartbeat of American retail—is not merely a story of bad management. It is a microcosm of the national condition. A venerable institution was stripped of its real estate, its brands were sold off, and its workforce was discarded, all while a few financial engineers extracted billions. This isn't "creative destruction"; it is the liquidation of the American foundation.

The Great Uncoupling (1971–Present)

The dismantling began in earnest a generation after 1972. When we severed the link between the dollar and gold, we didn’t just change a monetary policy; we abandoned a moral constraint. By shifting to a pure fiat system, we enabled a debt-fueled hallucination that masked the systematic destruction of our productive capacity.

Since then, the playbook has been consistent:

• Export Production: We traded our factories for "service economy" promises, sending our middle-class lifeblood to cheaper shores.

• Import Labor: We suppressed domestic wages by importing a cheap workforce, fracturing the social contract that once guaranteed a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work.

• Deregulate & Strip: Under the guise of "efficiency," we stripped away the guardrails that prevented systemic looting.

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Sovereignty for Sale

The political apparatus in Washington is no longer a check on this decline; it is a facilitator. Both major parties have been effectively overtaken by global profiteers. We maintain the "slight of hand" of a functioning democracy—the debates, the elections, the pageantry—but the policy output remains remarkably consistent: the protection of the financier at the expense of the citizen.

When production is exported, sovereignty follows. A nation that cannot feed, clothe, and arm itself through its own industry is not a sovereign power; it is a client state. We have traded the hard power of industrial surplus for the soft illusion of cheap consumer goods.

The Debt as an Autopsy Report

If you want to see the truth of our national failure, look at the National Debt. It is not just a number on a screen; it is a looking glass revealing the melting away of American sovereignty.

$$TotalDebt\approx \text{Future Taxation}+\text{Currency Debasement}$$

The soaring debt is the final stage of the fire sale. We are borrowing against the labor of unborn generations to pay for the "liquidation dividends" of the present. Every trillion added to that tally represents a further erosion of our ability to dictate our own destiny.

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The Final Assessment

The global private equity movement is the clean-up crew of history. They are not builders; they are the specialists who arrive when a firm—or a nation—is worth more dead than alive. By picking at the carcass of the United States, they are merely fulfilling the logic of the system we allowed to take root.

The appearance of a functioning government is the last thing to go. But as the debt climbs and the last of the productive assets are shipped out or sold off, the "looking glass" becomes impossible to ignore. We are watching the sunset of a superpower, one leveraged buyout at a time.

Sam Harris on The Daily Show in 2010

 

Sam Harris on his book, The Moral Landscape; How Science Can Determine Human Values.

Appearance on The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

October 4, 2010

The challenge we’re faced with is to create a global civilization based on shared values, economic, political and social goals. We have to begin giving similar answers to the most important questions in human life. We have to talk about morality and human values in the context of our growing scientific understanding of ourselves in the world.

There is an intellectual and moral emergency. The only people in the world who think they have the right answers to moral questions are religious demagogues who think the universe is 6,000 years old. Everyone else thinks there’s something suspect about the concept of their moral truth.

Morality and values clearly relate to human and animal well-being. Our well-being emerges out of the laws of nature. It’s fantastically complex. Genetics, neurobiology, psychology, sociology and economics and everything that can influence the states of the human brain. All of these domains fall within the purview of science.

There’s a gulf between religious-based morality and the facts we’ve learned. In the best case, religion gives us bad reasons to be good where good reasons are actually available. In the worst case, it separates moral thinking from the actual details of human and animal suffering.

You have an institution like the Catholic church, which, based on its doctrine and actions in the world, is more concerned about preventing contraception than preventing child rape. It’s more concerned about preventing gay marriage than genocide.

Scripture is a real mixed bag. If you want to talk about getting wisdom from scripture, the God of Abraham gets slavery wrong. Slavery is probably the easiest moral questions we’ve ever had to face. If this book was written by an omniscient deity, the true source of moral wisdom in the universe, it should at least get the question of whether it’s right to own people and treat them like farm equipment right. The God of Abraham clearly expects us to keep slaves.

Anyone in this room could improve on the ten commandments in five seconds.

Most people in science believe there’s no place in science to say it’s wrong to oppress women. There’s an intuition that something has happened in the last 200 years of intellectual progress which has made it difficult to say that the Taliban is really wrong in their treatment of women. The moment you realize that the only way to ask whether it’s good for women to be forced to wear burkas is to wonder whether it’s good for human flourishing on any level. Does it make more compassionate men or confident women; does it improve relationships between men and women. We know at this moment in human history that the answer to that question is no. To doubt this scientifically is to pretend that we know nothing about human well-being.

There are so many ways to bring order that are objectively terrible, that make people suffer needlessly. We can understand this at the level of the brain, at the level of society. This is not a no-go area for science. Science of the human mind will understand how to make communities flourish and it’s a myth that we can’t get there through science.

John Deere cut more than $1,300 jobs in Iowa so far this year

I feel for the loyal workers at John Deere, who for decades created wealth for the billionaires, and doing so at great cost to themselves, both physically and mentally. I’m sad for the 1,104 Iowa plants workers that have lost their jobs this year alone.

I think it’s safe to say the jury’s no longer out; the supply-side promise was and remains a failure for the economy at large. The wealth never trickled down and the lower tiers of society, which are on an accelerating decline, and that’s caused all kinds of societal dysfunction (decay, crime, illness, homelessness).

It's a fundamental fact that commerce relies on robust economic activity – a balance between cost of living and living wages – but no one’s explaining how the growing working-poor sector is going to keep Iowa business afloat. Sub-living (& lost) wages for Iowans is cutting into business’ ability to remain a going concern in our state.

Slashing payroll to fund stock dividends and $845 million in buybacks per quarter takes a giant dump on the American dream and the patriotic spirit that grew this country into the world's most prolific maker of goods and creator of wealth.

What's happening now should scare the hell out of every stockholder and corporate executive across the Midwest.

Waterloo	549
Davenport	230
Ankeny	166
Dubuque	100
Urbandale	59
	1,104

 

The Invisible Orchestra: From Farm to Feast

Modern dining, despite its seemingly simple act of consumption, is a carefully orchestrated performance. It involves a complex network of people, from the farmer nurturing the soil to the delivery driver ensuring the meal arrives piping hot. This intricate dance, often invisible to the diner, highlights the value we often take for granted in a convenient, prepared meal.

The "farm to table" movement emphasizes the journey food takes before reaching our plates. Farmers cultivate crops, raise livestock, and ensure responsible practices throughout the process. Processors clean, package, and distribute the ingredients. Chefs, with their creativity and skill, transform these elements into delicious dishes. Restaurants, with their carefully trained staff, provide a seamless dining experience.

While delivery services offer undeniable convenience, the logistics behind them are impressive. They act as conductors, coordinating with farms, restaurants, and delivery drivers to ensure a smooth flow from preparation to your doorstep. Each step requires significant resources – from maintaining refrigerated trucks to employing a network of drivers.

The allure of a delivered meal lies in its ability to bypass the planning, shopping, and cooking involved in a traditional home-cooked dinner. However, this convenience comes at a cost. Delivery services often tack on additional fees, and the final price may not reflect the value of the ingredients or the labor involved.

Understanding the intricate web supporting prepared meals empowers us to make informed choices. We can appreciate the dedication of the unseen figures who bring food to our tables, whether it's a Michelin-starred chef or the delivery driver braving the elements.

Ultimately, the decision rests with the diner. Do we prioritize convenience and are willing to pay a premium for it? Or do we appreciate the value of fresh ingredients, supporting local businesses, and the satisfaction of a home-cooked meal?

Regardless of our choice, recognizing the "invisible orchestra" behind modern dining allows us to savor each bite with a deeper appreciation for the extraordinary effort that goes into putting food on our plates.