The Precipice

      I am quite taken by how many people in general are now making comments on the state of affairs in the country lately. Individuals who would not ordinarily involve them self's in comments or concerns are now piping in with two cents worth of opinion. Not much of it is good. In fact it has all been bad. This level of dissatisfaction in the country has not reared it's head in probably 30 years. If you live on main street, what you see are " Foreclosed " signs, window fronts with signs that say " For Sale or Lease " .... call........... homes vacant, or even boarded up. Whole neighborhoods that with the exception of a few small individuals are completely vacant, neighborhoods in decent communities that were once thriving with children and families now show signs of some decay, and empty homes. No one is immune in this country. It is taking it's toll on the psyche of the nation. It will continue for some time in the future. The issue here is not so much a reverberation of what has happened, or why it happened as much as it is about where we are going, and the direction we collectively choose to find ourselves. It will define the success or failure of the nation for a long time to come. It will also define the limits of freedom, for a very long time to come. There is an axiom that power corrupts, I think it is safe to say we all know that axiom, there is another one. Emergency is the plea of the tyrant. As a nation should we choose the direction of continued direction from Washington for economic affairs, and capitalization to be provided by the Federal Reserve than it will be axiomatic that Americans for the first time in the history of this nation will find itself living a lower standard of living, and with that will come a lower level of safety and security. This will become a nation that will cease to nationalize, but rather to localize, for security and protection and service. I do not mean that in a sense that is good either, for what I believe will happen that if government exists at any effective level in the local sense it will be to preserve it's own existence. Think of a triage of police, judges, and prosecutors all working to maintain there existence within a system that is for the most part sterile. I would suggest at some level it has already begun. The knowledge of it's existence will soon enough show it's ugly head, to the extent that is common parlance.
                                                                             Locally here in the Detroit area there were headlines from one of the local newspapers telling how DTE ( Detroit Edison ) was taking streetlights " down " and capping off the power to the poles, and taking the metal poles to the local scrap yards for the cash price for the metal. There was no longer going to be street lighting provided to the municipality because the were not paying the electric bills. Store owners, and what was left of homeowners were paying there electric bills, and keeping there taxes up, however the municipality did not take the money it needed to pay the bills from its operating budget and pay the electric company, but rather continued to pay the officials and employees of the city, and provide for their pensions and benefits. While DTE was taking the poles down, there was no increase in police protection to offset that damage, however Police officers " offered " to those with means to ensure the safety of their property, for a fee of course which is above what is already being paid by the property owner thru the extortion of taxation.
                                                                                 While indeed Atlas Shrugged is a work of fiction, the slow decay that began to creep around the country as the Strike progressed also invited a corruption of pull. If you knew someone who was of any importance than you became very close friends with that person for the use of their influence and ability to get ahead in society. There will always be a sense of that in any structure organization, have the ability to connect with people is a mainstay of any business or organized effort, to rely on that for your existence and as the sole means to keep your existence is to deny a just society. Most of us know and understand this but what I often see missing is the " How " part of that discussion and that brings me to where I have been heading.

                                                                                      The current administration is trying to rally support for more public spending for projects deemed necessary for infrastructure and also spur growth in the economy, which is laughable 400 billion in a 17 trillion dollar economy is barely enough money to spend on the planning of the multitude of some of those projects, let alone pay for all the labor, raw material, and engineering that would be required to make those projects come to fruition. Our system is a " Capital " system, given that there is no incentive on the part of those who own that capital to invest on projects and receive what they themselves deem an equitable return, money is sitting by becoming unproductive, and without the need for productivity labor is then sitting by idle doing absolutely nothing. With out the stimulation of the global equity now available to create wealth, and wealth creation we are seeing the steady decline not just in our economy, but in our safety and security. There are two sides to every coin, and it is time we as a people flip that coin and let the chips fall where they may. There are those that still adhere to private property, and free enterprise, then again there is a complete opposite point of view which is for a large transfer of wealth, to be used for public welfare and benefits provided by a central authority. The latter solution is a complete failure and will always be a failure, because it does not adhere to or obey the necessary adjustment of the price mechanism in the market place, and that failure creates distortions that are not able to self correct. The largest of institutions of that particular failure is the Federal Reserve Bank. It is an institution that distorts the economy by sending the incorrect signals for higher order projects in the economy, think buying a plant or a building, with cheap capital investment in such things appears to be attractive, the only problem is that capital then gets taken away for short term consumer goods. It is the tug of war for those two principles that decide where labor and material are most needed, and without the proper signals someone is going to make huge miscalculations on what is needed in the economy.
                                                                             Government too is in quite a pickle in this scenario, it is borrowing money on what it deems is " cheap " money and does so with the expectation that it can pay this back without any real threat but then when the excess's are more than can be met with the current tax take from the citizenry, there is no longer any choice but to borrow and tax, creating a scenario where capital will  hide for shelter, thus creating more unemployment, and a desire to borrow more  money. What then do we do ? The answer lies again, limit the role government plays in the economy, including the regulation process, and allow freedom to take hold. It is the unhampered market that creates wealth. There is no government on this planet that can offer anyone a job without first taking wealth away from an individual or group of individuals. Just cut out the middle man then. Do you need to have some one interfere with the wage structure in the economy ? A wage is a price. somewhere in free exchange buyer and seller will meet and agree. It is a voluntary exchange that has existed for a long, long time. A free person is more than capable of deciding if they are worth more or less than what someone is offering them. A free person is more than capable of deciding the meat, or milk, or cheese they wish to buy is safe for themselves or their family. There is nothing that stops a person for going to court to seek redress for an exchange or service, in a free society there are options available to pursue happiness. We would be wise to embrace that freedom again in this country, and there are examples the world over even today that freedom works.
                                                                                 Take for example North Korea and South Korea from anecdotal knowledge whom do you think has the most freedom ? Who then also has the greatest prosperity ? If planning an economy is the key to success then North Koreans should be the fattest happiest people on the planet. Even in China, the highest standard of living and wealth is where ? Hong Kong. third largest trade center in the world, and it's wealth is greater than any on the mainland, but also so is it's level of freedom. There are examples in the America's, and Africa. There are unlimited examples of this in history. All we need to do is be more vigilant in the continuing access to that freedom, and ensure it is the reign of order for our society. To choose other wise we will as a nation perish. The decline we are witnessing now CAN get worse. Much worse. There is just now signs of the collective discontent on both sides of the ideological divide, with such diverse views of how we should structure ourselves as a nation as well as the lack of ability to pay for the progressive view of what this nation should be, there needs to be a separation. A physical separation, where one side rules one way, and one side rules another. To do other wise is to increase the discontent to the point where violence becomes the accepted means of expressing that discontent. Then no one wins.Everyone will lose, including their liberty, which is what the governments are created to protect in the first place.

                                                By the way I have been thinking about the separation for some time, but the first person I have seen right about it was Walter Williams when he out right suggested that would be the best thing for this country. Pat Buchanan once suggested that the United States would become " Balkanized "  but the reasons were pretty much the same. We have become a contradiction as "One Nation" and contradictions cannot exist.