I watched the CBS television program Sixty Minutes last night, and there was an interview with our new president, Barack Obama. There was a key statement that President Obama made which motivated me to write this essay.
The "American" Principle of Fairness
I watched the CBS television program Sixty Minutes last night, March 22, 2009, and there was an interview with our new president, Barack Obama. There was a key statement that President Obama made which motivated me to write this essay. He was being questioned about the bailout of A.I.G. & the public’s outrage over A.I.G. executives being given bonuses after having been bailed out by us, the public. The president said, "let’s see if there’s a way here to pass laws that are legal, are Constitutional, and that uphold our basic principle of fairness." By the way, don’t forget that our president was a professor who taught Constitutional law. Furthermore, as Steve Kroft pointed out during the introduction to his interview with President Obama, "A.I.G. is a company largely responsible for bringing the world’s financial system to its knees." For the purposes of this essay, we will explore the so-called "free market," & medical care in America.
To begin with, I am going to try to be brief because I am often long-winded & tend to stray a bit in my arguments. We have heard the praises of the ‘free market’ ad nauseam and for as long as I can remember but if one takes a little time to explore this subject, you will soon see that this is a charade or scam designed to keep the working class & the middle class playing in this rigged game called capitalism. In a nutshell, here are some of the industries subsidized via our tax dollars, which we are coerced into paying & have no say-so as to how they’re spent:
The ‘Defense’ department i.e. The War Dept. (Bechtel, Lockheed, Halliburton, Blackwater, etc.); the Pentagon; all the ‘Intelligence’ agencies like F.B.I., C.I.A., N.S.A., etc.; military; police; fire depts.; Pharmaceuticals; NASA (be especially wary of the new Star Wars program known as Full Spectrum Dominance); University departments that do research & development in weapons programs for the Pentagon & etc.; Gas, Oil, & Power (the Bush administration or cabinet); Chemical (Dow, Monsanto, etc. that brought us Agent Orange & other lovely creations); Transportation i.e. highways, bridges, ports, transit systems which ‘private’ industry uses to do business but doesn’t have to pay for the costs of building or maintaining; Banking & Finance; Public Education (so the elite can control what we’re taught & learn to a large extent); Agriculture (so the giant Agra corporations can force the small farmers into bankruptcy); Coal mining; Tobacco; Lumber; Electronics; & the Telecommunications industries used by the government to spy on us. By the way, did you know that the Internet was a byproduct developed by the Pentagon hence it was paid for by our tax dollars but like all the other so-called ‘private’ industries created by public tax dollars, once they start making a profit, the profits are privatized and we, the silent financial backers, are not given any of the profit which they would never have realized if it weren’t for our taxes that fund the R&D (Research & Development) necessary to their survival.
Former president, Calvin Coolidge said, "The business of America is business..." This is only a part of the quote but it reveals the truth about business in America i.e. the government’s true role is to protect the interests of the wealthy elite against the rest of us here in America & around the world. And our military’s true role is to protect the power elite as they steal the resources of the rest of the world. This is what we’re doing in Iraq & Afghanistan and have been doing for decades in our support, training, & financing of murderous tyrants & dictators. Don’t forget, Saddam Hussein like countless others, were once our friends officially. The central point relevant to what’s going on in these so-called ‘bailouts’ of Wall Street, the giant banks ‘too big to fail,’ the auto industry, etc. is that ‘our’ representatives in Congress pass the laws which favor the various industries because they are bribed by these industries & know that if they ever turned on these corrupt corporations, their asses would be fired in a heartbeat & they’d have to go out and actually work for a living & would no longer enjoy the status, prestige, & perks they have become so accustomed to. Therefore, when the shit occasionally hits the fan like with A.I.G., congressmen will put on a show of indignation in front of the cameras but even the least informed of us know that it’s all a dog & pony show.
Should you ever feel an interest in pulling back the curtain of this deception, Noam Chomsky is a one-man revolution & will rock your world. The free market, free trade, private industry, etc. are all propaganda tools used to sucker us into fighting in their wars of imperial robbery, paying our taxes, buying their crap, & keeping our mouths shut as we go down the drain. If there were true & free competition in this imaginary global marketplace, then why are we forced to bail out corporation after corporation and industry after industry? Remember Chrysler & Lee Iacoca? We bailed them out and then Iacoca is touted as a great businessman. And why did Obama put in charge several of the guys who helped get us to this point of melt down like Geitner? Why is it that when small businesses fail or working people lose their homes, their medical insurance, their pensions, their jobs, etc., we’re told ‘tough luck,’ but when those who brought us to the brink of a global depression fail, they are saved & even rewarded for doing criminal acts. And Obama & other apologists for the crooked & corrupt tell us that we must honor the contracts with the criminals because otherwise they wouldn’t be able to attract more of these ‘highly qualified’ C.E.O.s to these companies? They truly believe we are a nation of sheep. Lest you should think I’m arguing in favor of communism, no, I am definitely not! I’m simply trying to tell you that we have suckered, lied to, manipulated, ripped-off, maimed, killed, had our spirits crushed, etc. all behind these fallacies of freedom and that the push for ‘globalization,’ is little more than the privatization of every last resource on earth e.g. water, air, food, education, health care, etc. and since the collapse of communism, the gloves have come off in terms of their unbridled greed & lust for power. And the democrats are only slightly less greedy than the so-called conservatives who really don’t want to conserve anything but their own power. As George McGovern pointed out in his book The Essential America: Our Founders and the Liberal Tradition, "...those who want the government to do little except cut taxes for the wealthy and increase federal spending for the Pentagon and its corporate allies," this is the true agenda or ‘values’ of the ‘conservatives.’
This is why I get almost sick to my stomach when I hear Republican reptile representatives stand up & declare their support for ‘family values.’ These snakes in the grass proclaim the sanctity of life but veto every bill to fund the social programs for the poor, for children, for the elderly, for medical care, for the homeless, etc. Since the rise of Reagan the Reactionary, the republicans along with a good number of democrats, have waged a steady propaganda war they implemented in their goal of reversing every last program of Roosevelt’s ‘New Deal.’ Here are some of the things that progressives have fought for as laid out by George McGovern:
They advocated direct primaries; the initiative, referendum, and recall; the direct election of U.S. senators; and women’s right to vote. The Progressives challenged the methods and power of the big-city bosses and attempted to restore more competition to business by breaking up the large trusts. They moved beyond the Jeffersonian view of restricted federal power by calling for federal regulation of the railroads and public utilities. They fought for federal laws to outlaw the exploitation of child labor, the sweatshop, and dangerous conditions in the nation’s mines. The Progressives led the way in calling for the right of laboring people to organize and bargain collectively. Progressives pushed successfully for the enactment of a constitutional amendment authorizing the graduated income tax previously proposed by Populist reformers. They were also instrumental in the passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act...Progressives also spearheaded a nationwide conservation program to protect the nation’s threatened natural resources...’I stand for the square deal,’ Theodore Roosevelt said. ‘But when I say that I am for the square deal, I mean not merely that I stand for fair play under the present rules of the game, but that I stand for having those rules changed so as to work for a more substantial equality of opportunity and of reward for equally good service.’ (Pgs. 86-87)
In spite of the fact that it was the greed of the business elite and the cowardice of the politicians that brought us the ‘Great Depression,’ the cynical bastards have the gall to blame the results of their avarice on progressives & have managed to pervert the word ‘liberal’ to such an extent that many of the poor & the working and middle class to this day believe that it was liberals or democrats who have caused so many of our economic troubles. Just watch the Fox ‘News Channel’ & listen to those cowardly blowhards like O’Reilly, Limbaugh, Coulter, etc. and even though Obama has been president for only two months, they are blaming him for all the dirty deeds of George the Bushwhacker’s eight years in office. It’s truly mind-boggling! These mental & moral midgets are so divorced from reality that they can actually believe the tripe coming out of their mouths & have millions of zombie-like viewers who faithfully tune in & repeat their ratings & ravings as gospel truth.
As for the subject of health care, I am going to be brief and mostly just quote from another empowering individual named George Lakoff but first let me point out that the very same congressmen & congresswomen who write & pass the laws against universal health care for the 95% or more of us who desperately want it, are the recipients of the best health insurance available and its paid for by us, the uninsured. Once again, the audacity and callousness of the privileged. And as in the ‘free market,’ where private industries are subsidized by the public but the profits are the property of the elite, the health industry is a case in point and one of the most disgraceful examples of the hypocrisy and hollowness of their arguments against public welfare which really isn’t an entitlement or a charity but rather a right every living human being should have if we want to truly consider ourselves civilized. Speaking of ‘civilized,’ I feel this quote of Dostoyevsky’s, should include a nation’s health care system, "The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons." Further, my intellectual hero, Noam Chomsky sums it all up succinctly with his observation that America offers us in reality, "Socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor." But don’t lose heart my friend. George Lakoff, another notable linguist like Chomsky, in his book don’t think of an elephant!: Know Your Values and Frame the Debate gives us some important tools to use in our fight against the Robber Barons but first let me remind you of some of what passes for business philosophy or wisdom in this land of the free and home of the brave:
He who dies with the most toys, wins. Business is dog eat dog. Reagan "this is the me decade." The central crook in Oliver Stone’s movie Wall Street played by Michael Douglas delivers a speech to his cronies proudly announcing, "Greed is Good!" And in the same movie, it is revealed that Sun Tzu’s The Art of War is revered on Wall Street as the bible of corporate America. Well, you get the idea, in the worldview of the ‘successful,’ to be concerned with ethics, fairness, etc. is sentimental hogwash and the more ruthless you are, the more ‘successful’ you will be. We are witnessing sadly another tragic chapter in world history that is the result of this barbarian ideology and I want to leave you with Lakoff’s words on the subject of ‘framing the debate’ on the issue of universal health care as an example:
"Always start with values, preferably values all Americans share like security, prosperity, opportunity, freedom, and so on. Pick the values most relevant to the frame you want to shift to. Try to win the argument at the values level. Pick a frame where your position exemplifies a value everyone holds---like fairness. Example: Suppose someone argues against a form of universal health care. If people don’t have health care, he argues, it’s their own fault. They’re not working hard enough or not managing their money properly. We shouldn’t have to pay for their lack of initiative or their financial mismanagement. Frame shift: Most of the forty million people who can’t afford health care work full-time at essential jobs that cannot pay enough to get them health care. Yet these working people support the lifestyles of the top three-quarters of our population. Some forty million people have to do those hard jobs---or you don’t have your lifestyle. America promises a decent standard of living in return for hard work. These workers have earned their health care by doing essential jobs to support the economy. There is money in the economy to pay them. Tax credits are the easiest mechanism. Their health care would be covered by having the top 2 percent pay the same taxes they used to pay. It’s only fair that the wealthy pay for their own lifestyles, and that people who provide those lifestyles get paid fairly for it." (Pgs. 116-117)
What is fairness? It’s candor, charity, civility, decency, duty, equitableness, equity, fair shake, fair-mindedness, give & take, good faith, goodness, honesty, honor, humanity, integrity, justness, justness, legitimacy, moderation, open-mindedness, rationality, square deal, tolerance, truth, & uprightness to name just some of its attributes. The major moral & political principles this country was founded on were liberty, equality, justice, truthfulness, & compassion. How can Obama or any of the politicians speak of fairness in America in terms of health care when nearly fifty million Americans aren’t covered by any health insurance & over 20,000 Americans die every year because they have no health insurance? How can we speak of equality in America when there is a Grand Canyon of a gap between the power elite who really hold the power & get the best medical care in the world, pay little if any taxes because they’re allowed to hide their assets in offshore accounts, & have blocked medical care reform for the past fifty years or better? Is justice possible in such a rigged system as ours? We all know that money does indeed allow many of these vipers to get away with murder. Or how about the fact that Rush Limbaugh, that chubby front man for the morally bankrupt republicrats was addicted to oxycontin & had his maid buy it for him illegally for years but he never saw a day in jail & he screams the loudest for callous treatment of the unfortunate amongst us? It’s become common wisdom that politicians are liars & it’s not coincidental that most politicians are lawyers and are equally reprehensible. Lawyers become politicians because they know that’s where the true power is i.e. in making the laws that the rest of us are forced to abide by but they aren’t. And forget about compassion, that’s an idea as foreign to these reprobates as a man from Mars.
No my friends, fairness is just an illusion in a system such as ours. Fairness is idealism & is mocked in the boardrooms & the country clubs of the rich & famous, the private clubs of the politicians, the pundits, & the executives who have made America a despised name around the globe because of their unquenchable thirst for power. The AMA has perhaps the most powerful lobby in Washington D.C. and we will never have a fair, equitable, truthful, just, or compassionate medical care system in America until & unless we can successfully make lobbying & filibustering illegal. There are four or more lobbyists for every politician in our national capitol & the health insurance companies, one of which is A.I.G. and the pharma giants like Pfizer bribe doctors constantly and have their drugs rushed through the laughable FDA because money talks. No politician dares to stand up to them & even if they dared, they would be chopped-off at the knees before you could say Michael Moore. Medical insurance companies & the pharmaceutical industry are subsidized by us & spend billions in making sure that we are never going to get anything even vaguely resembling a fair deal in terms of health care. Socialism & socialized medicine are the sinister concepts these rapacious reptiles have demonized to blind the uninformed & prevent us from even attempting to realize a quality of health care that most of the other industrialized nations enjoy. And speaking of Michael Moore, I heartily recommend you go out & rent a copy of his film Sicko if you want to be more fully informed & you’ll become sick to your stomach at what has been allowed to happen in this tyranny masquerading as a democracy we call America. Moore points out that we have socialized our police forces, our fire departments, & medical care for our soldiers (of course as soon as they are discharged & even before, their ‘exotic’ diseases are denied & they are often denied medical care). I have been reading, researching, & writing for over thirty years and for the past five years working on a major writing project I call truth against the world. At the risk of gross oversimplification, I can narrow most of our major problems or those things, which threaten not only the quality of our lives but also our very existence, down to a single thing i.e. the power of corporations. With the recognition of corporations as persons, Pandora’s Box was opened and like the evil released from that "box," corporations, especially the ones "too big to fail," have slowly & steadily taken over the world. By humanizing corporations, the businessmen have dehumanized all of us to the point where we are merely consumers & living tools to be used & discarded when we are no longer useful to our masters. I hope and pray that I live long enough to see corporations stripped of all their power & corrupt and criminal businessmen locked up in hardcore prisons for lengthy terms every time they violate the law!
In conclusion, the major values or principles which this country was founded on e.g. liberty, equality, justice, truthfulness, & compassion, can be briefly summed up in the concept of ‘fairness.’ President Obama’s central message throughout his campaign for the presidency was "Change." Only time will tell if he was one of those rare exceptions, an honest politician, or he’s just another persuasive and charming rhetorician? And I hope and pray that he does indeed give a damn about fairness because if he doesn’t & if we continue down the course that Bush has set us on, the world and America will only become ever more dangerous & susceptible to terrorist attacks. And living in the constant shadow of catastrophic climate change, nuclear war, exotic diseases brought on by industrial & environmental pollution, mind-numbing anxiety, death, dread, & despair will be the legacy we leave our children. It’s up to each and every one of us to get involved, inform ourselves, argue & teach one another, and to fight the greed & corruption of Wall Street and Washington D.C.
Persevere!
---Rob DeLoss, March 23, 2009