Saturday, October 25, 2008

Be A Man America, Lets make some Magic

A friend of mine said a great line the other day. With every animal on earth the theme is that the strong survive. Not so with humans. We make sure the weak not only have a shot, but we let them rise to the top.

Case in point the economy. Welfare for the rich. No competition. Free market when in times of boom Socialism in times of bust. No accountability. Market forces are supposed to set prices, not corporate giants in collusion with each other.

But I'm confused, I thought our country practices capitalism, and free market principles so why is the government bailing out firms? Isn't a tenet of the free market theory to not interfere and let the weak die and the strong survive. Your not the only one who is Confused.

Many confusing ideas have grown more evident over the years. For example, are we a Democracy? If so why did the supreme court select the President of the United States in the year 2000 while stopping the vote count, and expressing in its opinion that it would be safer to pick someone that leave doubt while searching for the truth. Oh and they also ruled that no where in the constitution is their a right to vote for president.

Or do we have Fascist tendencies. Everyone hears the word Fascist and immediately thinks of Hitler and concentration camps for Jews. But that was the philosophy of a crazy man. The idea behind Fascism is the merging of Business and State. To me this idea is seen in America where corporations are said to control congress. They sponsor elections. They not only see most bills they support become law they usually help right them in order to increase business. And usually once the author of a bill passes the law for say the telecommunications industry, said congressman gets a meaty offer to quit congress and work for the telecommunications industry. Bribe? Corruption? Coincidence? Or the natural order of a Fascist state?

Or should we all hang our heads and admit that we live under a dictatorship? A prison with goodies. If i put you in jail, but give you a huge cell, like the size of a house. And I give you a job so you can pay for that nice house. And I let renovate the house. And I let you get a nice job. So you can buy a nice car, an ipod, and a laptop. Maybe take a vacation here and there. And I let you have newspapers (run by my prison guards). I supply your children with schools run by my prison guards. Your job is run by my prison guards. Cross my guards and I take it all away. Praise and support my guards and you get more goodies and a bigger house and better vacations and a nicer car.

This sounds like a system that will support the weak and handicap the strong.

Basically what i wanted to say was about the economy. Were most people shocked even me, yes. Should we have been, no. Forgetting about the mortgage crash for a second and look at the obvious.

As a nation we buy more than we sell. We have more credit than savings. Our government borrow money everyday just to function. If we followed this plan on an individual level we would all be in a soup kitchen and sleepy on the sidewalk. As a nation we have lived like a college kid with his first credit card and not like an adult.

The phrase we should leave our kids a better nation/world than we inherited seems lost. What happened?

As individuals and as a nation we need to grow up an start acting like adults. If your name is Bear Sterns, AIG, or Bank of America and you cannot manage your company you are weak and you should fail. Just like all those mom and pop shops that were put out of business when Walmart rolled into town. No one cried for them and they were our blood. Yet our Congress cries for these corporate monsters that have grown larger than some nations. They have no national loyalty yet we are told they are too big to fall. Borrowing from my favorite phrase, REALLY?

If I was in charge and some used the phrase to big to fall around me I would tell them to shrink. If you are too big to fall than you are too freakin big.

Last year when Joe the plumbers cousin, Susan the Walmert clerk, when she got sick had to be hospitalized and couldn't pay her credit card bills or mortgage and is now homeless was she not big enough to fall? When did the corporate machine become more valuable to our nation than an individual down on their luck?

Bear Sterns took excessive risk, gambles like anyone would go to Vegas to do, and they lost. Susan the Walmart clerk was struck by an act of god. She got sick.

Why is it that France has faster Internet service than America? And better cell phone service? Its because they still practice a little something called competition. If two guys own a deli on the same block in a natural world they will compete to win the customer. Service goes up. Deals pop up. Quality goes up. Innovation shows its face. But what we have in America is only two huge deli's that have gotten together and teamed up against the consumer. They keep prices high, service down, and innovation and quality go out the window.

They believe they are doing good. There stock might even go even and they might even turn a profit. But inside their spirit grow weak. Challenges make men, and complacency makes men weak. Weak men create weak nations. Weak nations attract weak leaders, building weak bridges, creating weak dreams, and creating weak schools, to indoctrinate the next generations for the weak culture.

The weak men have conformed and have been chosen to lead the next generation. And they have been rewarded with stock options and islands, and imported vehicles.

Could you are I create a start up bank today to compete with JP Morgan/Chase/ Bear Sterns, or whatever that gigantic company is called now.

Is it any surprise that our Detroit auto makers cannot compete with foreign car makers. They know no matter how bad business is our government will help them out. What kind of motivation is this for them to innovate and improve.

Why is it that there is still a law on the books from the 70's when oil companies couldn't make money that paid them to stay in business. Subsidies. So that last year when the oil companies made record profits quarter after quarter, breaking new records, these oil companies were still getting subsidies from the government.

Why is it that our Government also subsidizes the farm industry. If left on its own, the farming industry in the U.S. would not survive. But instead of making them take responsibility to live or day the Government pays them enough to continue growing so they can stay in business while putting foreign farmers that they compete with out of business.

What is the worry with giving them the opportunity to sink or swim. We are so afraid of sinking that no one is swimming anymore. We are a nation floating with safety tubes on our arms and its time we grow up and take them off. I mean how silly would it be to see a grown man in the pool with swimmies on his arms. Even my 5 year old daughter would giggle(if i had one). (if i had two they both would giggle)(a lot) ( because one would feed off the other one's giggle, which would create a cyclical effect feeding the other one, and so on an so forth, until both would giggle at maximum giggle capacity).

Where are all our innovators? Where have all our leaders gone? The last ones I remember have been taken out, JFK, Bobby Kennedy, Malcolm and Martin.

Remember when the Brooklyn Bridge was built? Remember when we landed men on the Moon? That was magic. That was innovation. Where has all the magic gone? China made magic at the Olympic games during the opening ceremony. It was glorious to watch.

I want my country to make magic again. I want to make magic. Don't tell me I cant. And I better not here you say you cant either.

1 comment:

melissa celeste navia said...

We have to rise to the challenge, and I think we are at a crossroads - both our nation and the world - where very serious, drastic, history-altering decisions are going to have to be made if we're going to make it through these difficult times. You're right, so many of us have forgotten how to swim. We'd prefer to be rocked to sleep every night being told everything is going to be alright rather than stay up all night, burning the midnight oil, figuring out how to make everything better tomorrow, how to do it and do it ourselves. There's no accountability, no responsibility, no integrity. Something has to change, and it has to happen soon. I'm reading Good to Great right now, by Jim Collins...I highly recommend it.