Greetings fellow readers. Thanks for being here. I’ve been discussing my opinions about the future of humanity. I base my assumptions on my readings of other futurists and other science fiction authors, notably Clark, Herbert and Asimov.
Today I’ll discuss my view on the future of economics and governance but first . . . let me say this to my conservative friends: I am not picking on you. I am not conservative but I do respect my friends who believe in conservative issues. I just see a future where the conservative / liberal argument is fairly moot.
One of the things I enjoy about science fiction is the possibility of exploring different paradigms. We can try a new kind of communism or fascism without actually having to live under them.
We simply can’t go on the way we have been. Capitalism has been the paradigm just over two centuries and it’s mucked up the world pretty bad. Certainly capitalism is not the only culprit here but it is in my opinion the main obstacle to a better life for most humans.
You can argue that capitalism is certainly better than the feudalism that came before. I don’t dispute that. What I dispute is that capitalism is the end all of social construction, but rather a cog in the greater machine.
I hear a lot of capitalists arguing on TV how much better than socialism their system is. However, they seem to be arguing against communism instead, which is not the opposite of capitalism. Most of the pundits on TV ignore the fact that the opposite of communism is fascism. If there was a liberal media would they compare fascism with socialism? If they did socialism would look much better to most people.
The facts of the matter are that capitalism did nothing for the common man until socialism ( labor unions ) forced them to care for their workers.
We as a people need to break the strangle hold capitalists have on our society. Their interest is not to better society but to enrich themselves and their shareholders at the expense of everyone else.
I’m not suggesting we replace capitalism with socialism. What I am suggesting is that we need both systems to more forward and a strong regulatory government to insure fairness.
In general I argue that services (education, police, fire, healthcare, national defense) are better provided by socialism and goods are better provided by capitalism.
Even these simple ideas may soon be out the window if we can bring in a new paradigm.
The American government is more conservative than the American people. This is in part because we have a conservatively controlled media. Our media does not report on issues important to liberals. The media and our government increasingly do not represent the views of the American people.
America can produce prodigious “bread and circus”. We can entertain our people so well that they will for a time ignore the problems facing them. Problems that there is no need for them to face. The idea that America can not provide for our poor and needy is simply absurd. The idea that we can not maintain our infrastructure with our taxing the poor more than we do is just wrong.
The corporate interests that are running the American economy into the ditch are very well funded and entrenched. How do we break their stranglehold on our society? They have shown a propensity to throw temper tantrums and a willingness to take a financial hit to make a point that they didn’t like what the people did.
Historically, violent revolution has been the only answer to this kind of situation. I am hopeful that American democracy is strong enough to bring about change without having to resort to this. There are movements starting around the country with the hope to affect change for the better.
Tomorrow I’ll discuss more long term issues. We’ll go further into the future.
Earth Year 2013
Never mix red wine with Oodo.
No comments:
Post a Comment