George Rebane
Every now and then one of our progressive commenters takes the time to offer some thought-out remarks that shine a bright light on the hopeless nature of our country’s Great Divide. The most recent came from a leftist reader who call himself Robert Cross. Mr Cross often takes me to task in opposing every facet of my socio-political ideology that he claims to understand.
Under ‘Progressive Pilgrims’ Progress’ we engaged in a thread that he launched with the astute lament that I blamed most of the country’s problems on progressives and their socialistic policies. I encouraged him to read my extensive apologetics supporting such an assertion and responded in part –
“But your main takeaway should be that the overwhelming share of societal problems are directly attributable to the various expressions of hubristic collectivism – and in the US today that happens to be virulent progressivism.”
This motivated Mr Cross to ‘put pen to paper’ and deliver a speech that V. Lenin could easily have made in 1917 from the back of a truck to a crowd of Russians gathered on a blustery snow-covered Moscow street.
1). I don’t have the time or desire to read 12 years of your dissertations so we will have to go at this post by point.
2). As to the above quote: That is strictly your misguided opinion. I would posit that the “overwhelming share of societal problems” is due to the concentration of wealth and power among mostly trust fund children and grandchildren of robber barons and other greed infested oligarchs who have had to do nothing besides getting out of bed to acquire their vast amounts of wealth which they are now using to try and shape the country into their twisted image of how society should/does work.. with them at the top making the decisions via elected goons whom they have sponsored and canned legislation from ALEC and distorted information from think tanks they have also funded and staffed with like-minded people.. all of which further cements their position of power. Especially with gullible people without critical thinking skills who are easily duped.
A new study from UCB called “Global Wealth Inequality” reports that .00025% of the population has more net worth than the bottom 60%. This is the greatest discrepancy since the 1920’s and we all know what happened after that. With corporations now considered human and money equals free speech (thanks to #1 above), in terms of electing like-minded goons, this means that 400 people have way more free speech and, thus, political power than 150,000,000 American people. I would call that, next to climate change, the most serious issue facing humanity. The two go hand in hand … wealthy people with large sums invested in fossil fuels are trying to make as much money as they can while they can, and piss on everyone else.
The problem, George, is not collectivism but GREED. The need for collectivism rises from the human need to feel that one has some control over one’s life. The power of the many will eventually beat the power of the few. That is what gives birth to revolution … the desire of the many to get a fair shake. I think the 2018 midterm elections may have signaled the birth of the next American revolution…
The social problems you refer to are the direct result of the ruling class of wealthy families trying to maintain their power and wealth. What they miss from their gilded nests and greed is that all they would have to do is share the wealth just a little. Most people are more concerned with happiness than wealth unless they are hungry then all bets are off. They need to let the peasants have a little cake instead of wanting it all for themselves and most of those problems would simply go away.
These are sincere beliefs held by Mr Cross and his comrades here in the foothills and across the land. He and his want to bring down the socio-economic system (see also the Green New Deal) that has lifted billions of people from poverty, and daily continues fulfilling their hopes for a better life for themselves and their families. His kind see none of this and perceive only a wholesale theft of the fruit of the workers’ labors, a theft that is motivated by nothing more than “the concentration of wealth and power among mostly trust fund children and grandchildren of robber barons and other greed infested oligarchs who have had to do nothing besides getting out of bed to acquire their vast amounts of wealth”. In the new revised progressive history of America, the list of silver-spoon born wealth concentrators includes such ‘trust fund children’ as – Cornelius Vanderbilt, John D Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, Henry Ford, William Hewlett, David Packard, Sergei Brin, Jeff Bezos, Larry Ellison, Steve Jobs, … . Men such as these, according to the Left, did nothing to build America, employ millions, improve the lives of more tens of millions, and leave a legacy of charities and foundations that pauper the attempts of government bureaucracies to match their benefits to society.
And to put a recent bow on the premise that starting in poverty does not condemn one to a life of poverty, we note the recent remarks from potential presidential candidate and Starbucks founder Howard Schultz, who also started life with very modest means and wound up building a worldwide corporation that employs hundreds of thousands. All these people are witnesses against the class warfare that has been continuously preached by collectivists.
America’s impact on greatly reducing world poverty can be seen in the above graphic (from Our World in Data, a Gates Foundation funded non-profit), and on which I have highlighted the post-WW2 Pax Americana epoch during which the most dramatic reduction of poverty has occurred.
But even such obvious history and its supportive data are anathema to the Left. These publicized results are countered by anthropologist and self-educated Marxist economists (now there’s a non-sequitor) like Jason Hickel. We can set aside the poverty threshold debate on whether to set it at $1.90 or $7.50 or whatever daily income level, because the resulting plots like the one above will all show the same dramatic betterment of human life on the planet. You can read the details and get more information in this report.
What absolutely astounds the numerates who are even casually read in economics is the counter argument by Hickel et al that all such data on poverty rates doesn’t count because the absolute number of poor people is still too high and may even be going up. The double dummy drumbeat continues. I have yet to meet or read a leftwing economist or politician who understands the meaning of ‘diminishing returns’ or what it costs to ‘fix’ the last remaining percent of anything in the affairs of Man or nature. This, of course, also goes a long way to explain why progressive policies always continue throwing good money after bad money. And why they use absolute numbers and illustrate with anecdotal tales of woe in order to substantiate the next tranche of money down the toilet – they simply don’t understand the role of ratios and percents.
There is a lot more to discuss in that huge sea of socialist ignorance – e.g. the function of risk in wealth creation, and the role of enlightened inequality – which we have covered in the past, and will have to review again soon.
[13feb19 update] 319 Square Miles – In their infinite wisdom, the United States’ Founders created the Electoral College to ensure the STATES were fairly represented. Why should one or two densely populated areas speak for the whole of the nation?
- There are 3,141 counties in the United States. Trump won 3,084 of them. Clinton won 57.
- There are 62 counties in New York State. Trump won 46 of them. Clinton won 16.
- Clinton won the popular vote by approx. 1.5 million votes.
In the 5 counties that encompass NYC, (Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Richmond & Queens) Clinton received well over 2 million more votes than Trump. (Clinton only won 4 of these counties; Trump won Richmond.) Therefore, these 5 counties alone more than accounted for Clinton winning the popular vote of the entire country. These 5 counties comprise 319 square miles. The United States is comprised of 3,797,000 square miles. When you have a country that encompasses almost 4 million square miles of territory, it would be ludicrous to even suggest that the vote of those who inhabit a mere 319 square miles should dictate the outcome of a national election.
Large, densely populated Democrat cities (NYC, Chicago, LA, etc.) DO NOT and SHOULD NOT speak for the rest of our country! And it’s been verified and documented that those aforementioned 319 square miles are where the majority of our nation’s problems foment. (H/T to correspondent)
rebanesruminations.com 
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