Every Man For Himself!

The Ik, an African people studied and described by Colin Turnbull best typify the kind of thinking that the radical right wing tea party Republicans idealize: Everyone is out for themselves.

Of course, the Ik were starving much of the time Turnbull lived with them as a "participant observer." They were hunter-gatherers, who depended for most of their protein on the game, big and small, that lived on what had become national parks and wildlife preserves. They were forbidden to hunt for the game, and there was effective enough enforcement of the no hunting ordinances, that the Ik found it difficult to survive. They resisted agriculture.

Curiously, the Ik didn't band together for redress, or for common economic activity, like learning how to raise their own food. Everyone was out for himself, except for the children, who organized themselves into loose bands of age cohorts. They gathered what food they could find, but sometimes it was food they ripped out of the hands of aged members of the tribe, who had found something edible, but were too feeble to defend themselves.

Turnbull witnessed only one wedding, while he was living with the Ik (over a year), but daily instances of the above predatory behavior.

How is this relevant to the current campaign between Democrats and Republicans? The two parties really do represent two different ways of looking at the world, and the "I'm in it for myself and everyone is on his own," is only a little less radically sociopathic than the Ik.

Then, there's the apparent inability of Republicans to recognize the contribution of workers, as opposed to "job creators:" anything even mildly smacking of collective action they opposed. Anti-unionism may be natural to the GOP, but even Democrats who are antagonistic to unions, wouldn't think of celebrating Labor Day the way Majority Leader, Erick Cantor articulated it on a twitter message this September: "“Today, we celebrate those who have taken a risk, worked hard, built a business and earned their own success.” Nothing about workers, only about entrepreneurs.

The kind of radical sociopathology demonstrated by the Ik, and only a bit less radically, by the GOP, is a symptom of deep distress in society. In the case of the Ik, it was loss of their sources for survival, and Turnbull recommended that the society be forcibly disbanded before it infects others.

In the case of Republicans, the sociopathology may be a reaction to the imminent loss of a demographic majority: whites are fast diminishing as a proportion of the population, and Republicans depend almost exclusively on whites, largely white men. They can't appeal to them without alienating others, and they can't appeal to others (minorities) without losing their appeal to white men.

That may be the major reason for all their attempts to queer the vote.

The relevance to Rome's collapse? The Ik may well be remnants of an even more ancient empire than the Roman: their language appears derived from ancient Egyptian!

906 in Truman's 'Do Nothing Congress', 176 in 2012

Those numbers are for laws passed by the respective Congresses: 1948 and 2012. Truman, who had been given little chance to win the 1948 election, because of the stalemate in Washington, made a nation-wide whistle-stop campaign (trains worked in those days, before the Interstate Highway system), successfully running against the "Do Nothing Congress."

That gives you an idea of how dysfunctional our national political system is today. Congress has been unable to pass major pieces of legislation, and has passed "stop-gap" measures just to "keep the lights on."

Obama is not to blame, and if he had a personality like Harry Truman, he could easily run against the "Do Nothing Congress" of today. Obama does make the point that Congress, specifically the Republicans in Congress, have played an obstructionist role.

The Republican House of Representatives has passed bills, but most of them were only statements of their agenda, with no expectation that the Senate's Democratic majority could accept them, and they haven't. The Democratic Senate, on the other hand has been stalemated by the Republican Senate minority's routine use of the "filibuster," rendering the 41 Republican Senators the controlling bloc, while the less unified and more diverse 59 Democrats (including two independents) have been unable to advance even a portion of their agenda.

A few Republicans have attempted to compromise with Democrats, to bring something workable to the floor, but, like Senator Lugar, they have been defeated in their party primaries, defeated by the accusation of "Republicans in Name Only," or RINO's. No Democrats have lost primaries for similar reasons.

Long ago, when I taught Political Science in Florida, a colleague exclaimed he'd just proven, beyond a doubt, that Democrats and Republicans in Congress voted more frequently along party lines than they did with the other party! In those days (the 1970's), this was a fairly significant finding, because Democrats and Republicans did what is now unthinkable: they worked together on important pieces of legislation. Votes were often not along party lines. Now, among Republicans, it is almost unthinkable for them to vote for any policy proposed by Democrats, even if many, like Obamacare, were originally proposed by Republicans. Democrats break ranks more often, but much more rarely than in the 1970's.

Today we have a Congress that is probably as stalemated as the Congresses that preceded the Civil War. The Republican Senate minority has been open about what they intend: to do anything possible to prevent Obama's re-election, even if that drives us back into the Great Recession and immiserates their constituents. They can always blame everything on the Democrats.

Rome's Senate in the fifth century was even less functional: the Emperors, meaning, their advisors, and Senators as office-holders, made the only meaningful decisions--usually for their own self-interest.

An Empire or Not?

So, the US has sent 200 Marines to Guatemala. So, US arms sales total 78% of global arms sales. So, we have drones in all sorts of unlikely places in addition to Afghanistan and Pakistan--like Australia!

We spend $902 billion a year on so-called 'Defense,' and yet we've effectively lost every major war we've embarked upon after Korea in the 1950's.

Who 'won' in Vietnam? Who 'won' in Iraq? Who's bound to be at least a major party in the government of Afghanistan when we leave? Did you guess the Taliban? We didn't even win in Korea; we fought to a draw, and as a consequence, North Korea is a "rogue nation" that's still very much around. And "our man in Iraq," Nuri el Maliki, Iraq's PM, is tentatively neutral, but actually supportive of Iran vs the US, possibly because of his Shiite connections.

And yet, the US is involved militarily almost everywhere in the world. When a problem erupts, like the Syrian civil war, the first instinct of many Americans is to send in US troops, or air power, or sea power. Progressive hawks (there are many among Democrats) are often even ahead of the GOP, as witness those Marines in Guatemala. They're hunting drug cartels, an example of how we militarize police problems.

At the moment, an "armada" has been assembled in the Persian Gulf, led by the US, of course, but also including the UK and probably some of our Arab "allies." The assembly of the 'armada' could be relatively quiet, apparently, but it has been brought together to confront an enemy that often defies international laws and treaties.

Why? An article I refused to read in the Economist asserted in the first sentence that the US would have to step up vis a vis Syria, because it was supposed to 'police' the world.

Why is our Nobel Peace Prize President, Obama, overseeing so many acts of war all around the globe?

Why do Americans consent to pay such huge defense bills ($902 billions in 2012)? Over 58% of defense money spent by the top ten military powers in the world is spent by the US. And our military complain when China increases its budget!

Defense spending employs relatively few for the money it pays out--war Keynesianism is notoriously inefficient, yet Romney wants to increase spending (to 4% of GDP), possibly because he has no use for diplomacy. He was recently discovered saying on an outrageous video that there was no possibility for an Israeli-Palestine peace agreement, because "the Palestinians don't want peace."

It took Rome a couple centuries to discover it couldn't maintain pax Romanum over the 'known world.' How long before the US exhausts itself in a similar effort? I give us less than 20 years; the explosions over all the Muslim world inspired by a stupid video are only another sign: the US cannot police the world, and shouldn't try.

99%,1%,47%,13%

If you pay no income taxes and receive Social Security and Medicare, both of which you paid for over a long history of work, then you are, according to Romney, one of the 47% who expect government to take care of you--he has no use for you.

What if you've paid $12,000 in property taxes, and have income of no more than $36,000? You are paying an effective tax rate of 33%, but you still pay no income tax, so you're one of the 47%. What if you earn $40,000, on which you pay payroll taxes of 7.65%, and you also have a property tax bill of $10,000. Then your effective rate is about 32%.

Mitt Romney says he paid "about 13%" of his income in "taxes," but didn't specify which taxes. The one tax year that he deigned to show us included a $77,000 tax write-off for what someone referred to as a "dancing horse" and he paid just over 13% on income taxes. While most people in the middle-income brackets pay at about that rate, Romney's no middle-income taxpayer.

In any case, the video revealing his statement about the 47%, brings up the question: is he one of the 47%, as well as one of the 1%? Many corporations pay no income tax, including GE, for example, and like the average for the bottom quintile of income earners, it had a negative rate of tax--it received subsidies that more than cancelled out any taxes due.

More than ever, Romney should release his past tax returns, if he wishes to appeal to more than a minority of American voters. But maybe he can't, because those returns would reveal either: a felony, like voting fraud--claiming Massachusetts residence to vote and California residence for tax purposes in 2008; or he paid no income taxes in some of the past years, despite multi-million dollar incomes.

Is he a member of the 1%? Certainly. Does he get it that most people struggle? No. He sees them as dependents on government (a projection?), and apparently would treat them that way.

He's a true Roman Senator, although instead of owning slaves and serfs, he's had no compunction driving workers from their jobs, and forcing others to accept dramatically reduced incomes, while he made millions.

The fact that he's ready to double-down on his 47% statement is even more eloquent. It demonstrates that he believes he can--and should--win election with only white males, only those who ascribe his statement to 'others' (minorities, especially), and only those who believe they "made it" on their own. It's a piece with Republicans' "we built that" misinterpretation of Obama's reference to government's role in creating the infrastructure necessary for wealth-creation.

If, despite all this, Romney manages to buy and/or steal the election, anyone not in the 1% will get a government that is actively opposed to their interests.

"Apologies"

Terrible, isn't it that America has to "apologize" for a crude youtube movie! Uhm, an embassy spokesperson, in the Egyptian embassy about to be surrounded by protestors, rightly distanced the US from a rancid anti-Muslim piece of propaganda for which America was not responsible.

Romney called this statement an apology and his politicizing a foreign event has blown up in his face. But it's not as if this is a new position for him. He's previously gone around the nation claiming that Obama apologized rather than standing up for America, so he interpreted the sensible statement of the US Embassy in Egypt in terms of his own campaign propaganda. He was reflexively reacting to Obama's famous speech in Cairo.

What Obama attempted, in that famous speech, was to reach out to Muslims worldwide, to demonstrate his understanding of their concerns and to attempt to move US-Muslim relations forward. He said, "There must be a sustained effort to listen to each other; to learn from each other; to respect one another; and to seek common ground." If that were an apology, then the only alternative would be war---for which Americans have no appetite, after two failed wars in the last ten years.

So, it's not just that Romney demonstrated his ability to put his foot in his mouth, especially on foreign affairs; it's that he has shown an inherent inability to see other people from any but his own perspective.

What's Romney's perspective? Much has been made of his flip-flopping on abortion, on global warming, on health care policy and on war policy. But on the latter, he was for the Vietnam War before he was against it (when campaigning for the Senate in Massachusetts), to paraphrase John Kerry, and now is apparently for any war in prospect. He has consistently advocated a "tough" foreign policy, as in adopting Netanyahu's "red line" on Iran's nuclear policy, thereby justifying an immediate attack, identifying Russia as our primary antagonist and vowing he'd name China a currency manipulator (and initiating a trade war) on his first day in office.

So, Romney's perspective is to see any nation not allied with us as against us, and to discount any concerns other nations have, by saying that any attempt to understand them is "apologizing for America." His unconsidered statement about the Egyptian Embassy attack was consistent with his articulated foreign policy--such as it is.

If Rove's and Saudi Arabia's money still wins Romney the election, the United States might embark on a whole series of "wars of choice," which would also be consistent with Romney's insistence that the Pentagon budget not be cut, but increased to 4% of GDP.

So, every other government program would be cut, people would be left without support and the US would be hollowed out by wars, just like the Roman Empire in the fourth and fifth centuries. Not a pretty prospect, but still a possible one.

Do We Develop or Recover?

Romney says drill more; Obama says push oil, gas and alternative energies.

The differences between Economists Paul Krugman and Jeffrey Sachs come down to whether the above matters. Krugman stresses the need to increase demand, and advocates deficit spending--any deficit spending--in order to "grow" the economy. Sachs points out that what you spend the money on makes a difference.

Krugman would agree that spending on Defense, for example, is not going to increase the nation's long-term wealth the way spending on new technologies like alternative energy and infrastructure modernization would. Smart grids and high-speed trains would improve the economy, not just add to it.

One of the greatest barriers to recovery, however, is the huge amount of debt tied up in real estate that has lost value (28.6% of all mortgages owed by homeowners are underwater). Student loan debt is $914 billion, though credit card debt has fallen from over $800 billion last year to $626 billion now. The overhanging private debt deflates increases in demand created by the Fed, or government stimulus funds--regardless of public debt.

Sachs posits that in order for people to have more money, the economy can't just recover to what it was before, but must develop into something different, because the world economy has changed. People need new skills, businesses need new technologies and both need better infrastructure, from those smart grids and universal broadband, to better roads, rails and vehicles.

One of the unexpected growth spots in this otherwise slack economy is an old-fashioned oil and gas boom, unleashed by the environmentally damaging newish technology of fracking. Some of US growth is from cheap natural gas and (not cheap) domestic oil, not from burgeoning wind and solar power. (Oil isn't cheap, because prices are set in the world market, regardless of where it's pumped). Low natural gas prices make solar and wind less attractive.

It's an energy revival led by dinosaurs. The booms are not only environmentally destructive, they will delay necessary development needed for the US to lead as an advanced economy--unless the money they generate is taxed away to create incentives for alternative energies, smart grids and skills.

If we simply revel in the sudden abundance of fossil fuels, while Germany, China and Japan pursue alternative energies, we insure that global warming intensifies. We'll also fall behind technologically and in creating a sustainable future. We'll be like the Spanish Empire, which drowned in the gold and silver it extracted from the Americas, unable to make anything, able only to buy things--until the gold and silver so inflated the world's currencies that Spain became the poor man of Europe.

This also parallels the extractive conquest model of the Roman Empire. It ripped off the "known" world until it could expand no further. Impoverished by contraction, it finally "fell," when it could no longer swagger even down the Italian peninsula.

Who Holds the Power?

Political conventions are mostly to activate the base these days, since the selection of the nominee has taken place long before. That's when Romney bought the primaries, through his superior funding, the support of Rove's Crossroads GPS and Wall Street.

Of course, Obama, as incumbent didn't have to fight contested primaries; the nominee had been selected by his previous election, although there was some opposition and lack of interest, especially among activists

If you look at the two conventions as venues to gin up the activists, the Democrats were far more effective. Obama was by far a better speaker than Romney, and the GOP has no one like Bill Clinton, who gave one of the best speeches of his life. The Democratic convention was much more integrated and the many other speakers created a meaningful whole, climaxing with Obama's speech.

It probably wasn't his best, but it was inspirational for anyone listening, by the climax, though it started out slowly.

Former supporters who had cooled to the President, said in the convention's aftermath, "He's doing the best he can, maybe the best anyone can--and I'm going to give money, and/or I'm going to do something for his campaign."

I hope many saw parts, at least, of the two conventions; apparently, not that many did. From my vantage point (admittedly biased towards Democrats, but wary of its Wall Street wing), they did seem to differ, the way Bill Clinton encapsulated it: the Republicans stressed on-your-own-individualism, while Democrats demonstrated, as well as advocated, for a society in which everyone-is-in-it-together. The second model seemed to work for Democrats. Republican stars hardly gave a nod to Romney in their speeches.

Another expression of this difference was the GOP's insistence that the wealthy already paid too much, and should get tax cuts, while Democrats said they should pay their fair share, meaning higher tax rates, above the top rate of 35% as of now, at least back to Clinton's 39.6% (the top rate was 91% under Republican President Eisenhower). The wealthy are already paying the lowest rate since 1931 (only the 20's had a lower rate--25%) and we know where that led.

Some surprises from the conventions: Democrats came across celebrating the military and national security (the execution of Osama bin Laden), Obamacare, the auto bailout, as well as the partial recovery from the economy's depths in 2009, after Obama's inauguration.

Republicans totally missed any military celebration, entertained warnings from neo-cons that Americans should take on Syria, Iran--or threats anywhere--and complained that Obama had failed abroad, and at home with the recovery.

Neither party focused on financial sector abuses, or impunity, indicating that both are heavily beholden to Wall Street--AG Holder just dropped all suits against banks and banksters.

Even if Obama and Democrats win, the selfish class, our Roman Senators, firmly hold the reins, even though it's clear: most of them would prefer Romney. He's one of their own.

Chaos

It's what happened in the Fifth Century, well ahead of the "fall" of Rome, and it can happen here, especially if Romney is elected. Even if he isn't, as long as this nation remains so polarized, it's almost inevitable: we'll have chaos, as in large segments of society no longer acting as if they belong to it.

One of the more poignant quotations coming down from the early Sixth Century: the monasteries reporting they had little time for learning, because of the omnipresence of "war bands," that ripped off whatever of value the monks and their neighbors had managed to gain.

As I've pointed out before, the dream of Grover Norquist is realized in Somalia. There is no government: "war bands" roam the countryside. Government was "drowned in a bathtub." Moreover, different war bands roam the seas: we call them 'Somali pirates.'

Seriously. If the obscenely wealthy gain even more power and wealth, by buying the election, or at least government stalemate, then the working class (which no one mentions anymore) will be even more desperate. The middle class will bifurcate into the few 'successful' and the many even more desperate than the working class--because children of the middle class don't expect to be poor.

I taught Revolution as a Political Science class. One of the leading theories for why revolutions emerge, and why some succeed: the leaders came from the disaffected, but highly educated, middle class. That's even true if their class is a small portion of society, like Mao's rich peasants and Castro's private school elite. Roman bandits came from this class.

Chaos will come if Romney is elected, because his policies make no sense: they'll generate a new depression. Even a new war with Iran would only make it worse, but the very rich will get even wealthier. Romney's tax plan, reportedly, would reduce his tax rate from his claimed (and outrageously low) 13% to 1%.

Okay, here's the recipe: depression, increasing misery, savage cuts to income maintenance programs like Food Stamps, skyrocketing medical costs, by repealing Obamacare, government support for breaking unions, cutting wages and raising taxes on everyone but the wealthy; the wealthy clearly flourish. What do you get?

Perhaps Syria is the model for our future. The peaceful reform movement there was brutally repressed, thereby stoking desperation and violence, which eventually led to civil war, maybe it will lead to revolution, once Assad is ejected.

Leftists, don't take heart. Not all revolutions are leftist: Hitler and Mussolini were revolutionaries. The US could go either way and given past history, Americans have tended to blunder right, not left. FDR and Lincoln were outliers.

So, chaos: even if Obama wins--unless he carries his party's progressives with a real mandate to slash unemployment, control the banks, and radically reduce inequality.

How likely is that? Well, maybe if Elizabeth Warren were the Democratic convention's keynoter, there could be cause for optimism. But she won't be.

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