I had never imagined that such a thing as Super-delegates could exist in the Democratic Party, until the media finally illuminated for the public this vile aspect of the Party structure; a component to the Democrat’s primary process that is exemplary all of the worse values and qualities that have defined the ethos possessed by the privileged factions in this country, who have endeavored – since this Nation’s inception – to monopolize its political institutions as much as possible while, nevertheless, maintaining a façade of democracy.

These anti-democratic patterns of political behavior – which spawn from ideological convictions that are so deeply entrenched that they qualify as genetic coding: the building blocks of American sociality – are embraced by a status that regards itself as uber-citizens: Those who possess self-alleged prowess and mental fitness enabling them not only to politically advocate their own interests, but to represent others in the process, despite the absence of any consent on the part of those for whom the elitist camp of surrogates will speak.

The core of elitist collaborators, who ultimately control, to a large measure, the American system of government, relish the opportunity to insert complexities into the political operations of this country. This amounts to a hierarchical inter-grouping of political decision-making bodies that distance – through the unnecessary multiplication of entities – the lowest common denominator of the American citizenry from the institutional spaces in which the final determinations, deciding the posture of American governance, are ultimately worked out.

Take for instance, the use of proportionate voting on the part of the Democratic Party. When analyzed in isolation from a detached perspective, this appears to be a relatively simple and straight forward reform that is designed to increase the influence of those who are not members of electoral majorities; providing an alternative to the more conventional American electoral practice in which the winner takes all. However, when purveyed within a scope that includes other provisions, such as the practice of valuating the votes of particular districts in some States higher than the votes cast in other districts in the same State: a device used to reward geographically defined populations that have demonstrated higher levels of electoral support for past Democratic Presidential Candidates – we are quick to fine that no concise and generally intellectually accessible description of the primary processes can possibly be constructed.

To cite another example of these excessively complicated processes, the State of Texas affords citizens the opportunity to vote twice in the Democratic Primary: once through a type of caucusing; the other instance by means of a primary ballot. I would endeavor to go on in further detail describing the primary selection practices, however, in order for me to do so, I would be pressed into conducting extensive investigations; a less than inspiring research project that would involve reading state party bylaws and state statutes as well as the National Democratic Party’s Bylaws, so that I could eventually interrelate all of the various stipulations, emanating from different bodies, when arriving at some sense of the applicable procedures that ultimately dictate how this ridiculous carnival is performed.

Because of this condition – what we can call political scholasticism – an inquiring layman, who is struggling to come to terms with the Primary selection process, will soon find himself lost in the convoluted mesh mash of procedures belonging to this social construct that is awash in a sea of obfuscation. In fact, I would venture to suggest that an accurate and precise conception of these complexities can only be rendered by the Party-hack-scholastics; some of whom were, in part, responsible for crafting this monstrosity. By extension, it surely is not spurious to suggest that there is a circuitous motivation inducing these insider-hacks into concocting what amounts to some kind of esoteric electoral alchemy: If one can monopolize the production of gold by virtue of a mastery of an arcane knowledge, then he would surely want his practices to remain opaque; or else, the precious metal could be produced by most anybody and it would fail to retain its special value.

It would be partially reassuring if the Democratic Primaries were an anomaly when understood comparatively within the full scope of institutions and practices comprising American politics and governance. Unfortunately, however, ranging back to the very inception of the United States, we can trace the same sort of Byzantine procedures, creating the same types of obscure and sometimes convoluted governing practices. To cite an obvious exemplar, consider the Electoral Delegates: super-voters entrusted with the capacity of choosing the President. Collectively, this body – which qualifies as an appendix in the sense that it is utterly extraneous to a democratic polity – counts as a democratically superfluous sub-aggregate, whose political Prerogative procedurally preempt the Popular Will of the Citizenry: The common denominator that could, otherwise, in a more authentic democratic environment, select the President independently and directly; whereby a majority or, even, a plurality of votes cast would act as the final adjudicator when selecting a candidate for the High Office.

The institution of the Electoral College, concocted by our Constitutional Founders, marks a latency in our sociopolitical history: a subtext that follows a pattern in which the uber-citizenry – those feigning the embrace of democracy while, concurrently, enacting political obstructions serving to compromise the Popular Will – has persistently committed to praxis a political philosophy that essentially boils down to a doctrinaire attachment to a Tory exceptionalness. Taking into consideration this pattern of elitist, anti-democratic conduct on the part of the privileged few in our Country’s history, one might ponder why there appears to be no resistance to this muffled, semi-tyrannical hegemony in our society.

First off, it should be mentioned that there have been popular insurrections against the American elites and the conditions they have endeavored to impose by virtue of the networked coordination of their economic and sociopolitical influences. The most salient instance of rebellion among American Plebes consisted of the formation of various Farmer Alliances and the People’s Party they would come to conjointly form.

However, despite the poignancy of the first Populist Movement during the final decades of the Nineteenth Century, this episode in American sociopolitical relations has been predictably left relatively untreated by our educational institutions. This lack of attention to an extraordinary event in American history is understandable, due to the fact that the Agrarian Revolt does not fit into the preemptive interpretive pattern organizing how we are supposed to conceptualize the course of American history. A thorough study and understanding of the People’s Party would expose contradictions to the Whiggish orthodoxy that enforces a dogmatic interpretation of American history in which democracy is in a state of perpetual improvement.

Therefore, the aforementioned question – why no rebellion to sociopolitical elitism? – is in need of reformulation: There have been a few, sparse uprisings to the old guard of American sociopolitical relations. However, why do we fail to treat these instances of American history hermeneutically? We neglect to come to an understanding of these instances according to their own terms and their own political self-understandings, along with the related complaints that they leveled against sociopolitical institutions that they regarded as oppressive; exploitative; unfair; or unfitting for a democracy to instantiate.

Rather, such incidents of insurrection find themselves excluded from the historical alacrity that is directed upon what are conventionally conceived as American sociopolitical accomplishments. In other words, historical events that are contrariwise to the established ideological order are treated as transient deviations; inconsequential digressions, diverting consciousness away from the core thesis embodied by the American Experience: An overall process that tells of advancement and ongoing maturation of American Society and of the American State, as they evolve into a more democratic condition. I would venture to assert that it is almost an Aristotelian metaphysics of political history: The American nation-state possesses an essence that is tantamount to its potentiality that it strives to actualize, which translates into a course of events where the essence of America protrudes and emerges; a process that parallels the advancement of perfecting democratic polity.

The Whiggish character of American historical orthodoxy, however, cannot be attributed with the function of the sole antecedent precipitating the compliant and obedient dispositions that have been all too pervasively exhibited by American Plebes. In order to understand the submissiveness among American Plebes, we need to direct our attention upon another factor; one whose presence is nearly ubiquitously represented by the portraits of our governing elites offered to us by mass media.  We are incited to a state of awe in relation to our institutions of political power by virtue of the fact that our media representations - due to the competition for ratings - are dramatizations of events; not objective reports of the events that have transpired that are of social significance.  From the epic framework in which corporate journalism is packaged, we are induced into believing that our politicos are heroes in the sense attribute to the term by the Ancient Greeks:  Apart from their mortality, they are godlike.  Consequently, we see the elites who govern us not only as competent, but as transcendent, as well.

This necessity is reinforced by the arcane procedures and practices that have come to litter – and, in fact, dilute – American systems of democratic participatory polity. By creating a situation whereby the elites are the limited few who actually possess an operational understanding of the processes through which political decisions are made – whether in the party primaries; or, to cite another example, the parliamentary conventions of Congress – they incite participatory reticence on the part of outsiders – who have neglected to pass through the socializing institutions through which the Power Elite transmits its esoteric knowledge and reproduces itself. Thus, we arrive in our analysis at the concept, wonkish: a self-congratulatory expression chattered in self-reference by the governing elite. This terminology’s meaning essentially boils down to the following definition: a state of public policy expertise.

The professionalization – (a concept that is most always predicated with the notion of expertise) – of politics resembles the historically recent trends in the rest of our society. Especially in the decades following the Information Revolution – which happened to transpire in a time span that overlapped with a movement in the American Academe toward the hyper-specialization of its professionalized disciplinarity – American governance has evolved into a condition that is sometimes referred to as technocracy. This political state can be characterized as one were the ability to formulate and administer public policy has become the province of technocrats in society; a form of plutocracy in which the common masses of citizenry no longer possess the knowledge and ability to fully participate in their political and governmental affairs. The task of governance has become highly compartmentalized, technical, and esoteric; whereas, seemingly, the only members of society who possess the necessary skills to govern are those trained in the specialized knowledge pursuits that are related to public policy concerns.

The propagation of this class of public-policy-technocrats – which includes the politicians who are trained in the lawmaking rituals from which earmarks and other benefits are procured for constituencies – is justified by the following chimera: In order to administer government, one must possess the technocratic specializations associated with being a Wonk; or else, he would buckle under the enormity of the intellectual, technical challenges he would face, and he will be rendered impotent, incapable of effecting the desired outcomes from participation in the processes of polity and public administration.

To quickly dispel such an polemic that insists upon the necessity of a technocracy in our society, we can refer to recent history: The FBI, following the 9/11 Tragedy and the scrutiny it incited – which was directed upon the agencies of the Federal Government that were previously thought to be protecting us from such calamities – it was found that the FBI possessed an antiquated information technology infrastructure; a partial explanation of the nearly unbelievable inability for the FBI “to Connect the dots.” In short, the FBI’s organization of information had yet to embrace mechanisms and processes associated with the informational economy and its digitalization of documents, that can, subsequently, be manipulated through computational machineries in order to find and establish relational values between and among the various types of information, which, subsequently, can be used in order to adduce inferences regarding additional parameters. Although this seems nearly inconceivable, the FBI’s manipulation of information was actualized, for the most part, in the deployment of pre-digital technologies, involving FBI employees sorting various document types, whose embodiment took the form of ink on paper, into filing cabinets.

It should be mentioned, there was some sort of computerization extant within the FBI. However, the dumb terminals provided to agents where practically left in their state of dumbness, because one could not use them to retrieve – through some effective search engine algorithm – materials relevant to the subject, or topic, that was being addressed by an FBI agent. As a result, the nodes belonging to the FBI’s informational networking – a system, which had, in some extensively qualified capacity, crossed the digital divide; or, at least, had attempted to accomplish as much – was never endowed with the intelligence – or smartness – that is associated with terminals that constitute the nodes belonging to an advanced informational network. It is only through the role assumed by a machine, acquiring a position within many linkages through which information is transferred in and throughout a network, that it becomes a useful tool for an agent looking to increase or intensify his knowledge and understanding of a topic by relating relevant information types to other information types.

As one can anticipate, the FBI, following the revelations related to the antiquated condition of its information management, set out to create an information architecture that was in line with contemporary technologies and procedures. However, the problem with the subsequent efforts made by the FBI, when working to modernize itself, can be characterized through the following: It was the FBI that was left in charge of the project. Consequently, after spending millions upon millions and expending valuable time and man-hours when attempting to install an information management system, the FBI finally had to report to Congress that the entire project had failed; could not be salvaged; and, therefore, had to be scrapped entirely.

Despite their follies, they persist in their arrogance, and continue to adopt a paternalistic posture in their relationship to the common citizenry. The present Administration –impervious to any scrutiny or oversight – continues to treat us like fools, constantly informing us of the attacks upon the domestic United States that it has thwarted; all the while refusing to disclose any convincing evidence to justify such fear mongering. Making it all the more ironic, the Bush Administration has failed to competently perform is duty to protect the American Public, not once, but on three occasions: the 9/11 Tragedy; the hyper-actively and impetuously devised invasion of Iraq; and the national shame and humiliation that was Hurricane Katrina. Nevertheless, despite their ostensible incompetency, these instances of failure are simply submitted through the ordinary propaganda assembly lines – where they are reassembled, packaged up, and refurnished – only to be publicized within the same garbled mess as all of the rest of the fear mongering and baiting with which we are unceasingly bombarded.

This audacity on the part of those who claim to know better than others know for themselves is justified by what amounts to a plutocratic apologia: The popular will of the unrefined and vulgar American people constitutes a threat to the vested interests of those who are endowed with the prudence and sound judgment necessary to advance not only their own interests, but, additionally, the long term interests of the nation as a whole.

This is the type of thinking that spawns absurdities such as “Trickle-down economics:” a theory of convenience, which Naomi Klein has revealed in some of her weblog writings to be a device deployed to obfuscate unbridled greed on the part of corporatists and, more generally, the ownership class in society; economic elitists who were in need of an intellectual diversion so that the swelling of class antagonisms, fomenting among those suffering under supply-side tax reforms, could be assuaged.

Although it might seem unfair to lump together, under the rubric of uber-citizens, elitist factions such as the Clintonian Political Machinery with the neoconservatives who currently control the Executive Branch of Government, we need to remember that the differences between neocons and neoliberals are all too scarce. There remains a thematic congruency between the two uber-factions; a convergence comparable to the opposing sides of a coin: The antithetical representations – where one side is emblazon with the head; the other side, the tale – that, despite their surface distinctions, continue to be of the same ilk; formed within the same mold; and made out of the same alloy.

In fact, both the Clintonian Third-way neoliberals – who feign empathy with the plight of American labor suffering from free-trade – and the neoconservatives – who do not even bother to express acknowledgement of such hardships – share in the same condescending rhetoric that is used to dismiss voices, emanating from the masses, that raise objection to American trade policies. The elitist corps have fashioned a rhetoric with pejoratives, such as neo-populism, that they use when disdainfully depicting the sociopolitical interpretations and reactions to socioeconomic conditions produced by the populace; which stand in contradiction to the uber-citizenry’s self-allegedly detached and rationally disposed estimates of current affairs and their overall significance within larger historical chains of events; narratives that are structured according to the Whiggish premise that American social conditions are always advancing toward a better state.

So, the final consideration that I shall make in this unwieldy chain of criticisms upon the conditions under which we, as Americans, suffer, can be put simply as follows: For how long are we to entertain this carnivalesque side-show hyper-real-democracy before we impose a realist aesthetic upon this charade and expose this chicanery for what it is?

Tags: clintons, corporations, corporatism, economics, government, neo conservatism, neoconservatism, politics, power, Russell Coles Blog, self governance
Categories: Commentary, Economics, government, Russell Cole's Blog, self-governance, Power, Politics, Corporations, neoconservatism
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An Article by:

Ben Tanosborn

It must have been Harry S. Truman, the plainest amongst our plain presidents, who scared us all into having idiots running our government by saying: “Whenever you have an efficient government, you have a dictatorship.”  Of course, he failed to acknowledge the possibility that we could have the worst of both worlds: inefficient government and dictatorship.  And at this moment, we seem to be marching in step to get there soon. 

Are our nation’s best and brightest so repulsed by the bureaucracy in the public sector that decidedly prefer to take up arms running the predatory wing of the private sector?

Maybe some of the “brightest” are doing that, but they cannot also be called “best” while allowing themselves to be corrupted by a heartless capitalism equally ready to reward its bright leaders as it is to deny countless people from sharing the economic trough. 

It does look more and more as if both public and private sectors are being ran by the very same gang of thieves, all operating from a single “carnivalesque” den, where the larcenous elite pick the lazy, career-politicians as their lead carneys for deceit.

And these lead carneys are seldom the brightest, and definitely never the best! 

Americans have done it in the past… so why not again?  I mean… elect the village idiot to be mayor… well, president and CINC for this US-village we live in.  No disrespect intended, not for the sake of disrespect; certainly not by simply calling a dumb ass who aspires to be America’s supreme leader by a first, middle and last name, all in one.  And every village, we are told, is expected, certainly entitled, to have one.  An idiot, that is!

One would think that hitting on nine out of ten prognostications would make most of us who are humility-challenged, a bit giddy zigzagging in haughty satisfaction; almost as if invited to a seminar conducted, ex officio, by none other than Nostradamus – in spirit, of course.  But to me, this nine out of ten “good guesses” that I’ve attained during this past year lose any and all merit when the error, the incredible miss, involves the man of the hour, Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the soon-to-be standard bearer for the GOP in the coming presidential election.  And that’s how I messed up, big time, when last May in one of my columns I prematurely called this politician a has-been, and laid to rest his presidential ambitions with an obituary that read R.I.W. (Rest in War) instead of R.I.P. 

Foolish me!  Of all the predictions I’ve made throughout the years, this one I thought to be a cinch, a sure thing… an “almost-certainty” with an infinitesimal margin of error.  I was almost embarrassed to even consider it a prediction instead of a factoid.  Pleassse! How can the Grand Old Party consent to be represented by anyone like John McCain… a person irrelevant in just about every aspect of the party’s conservative tradition; a true morbid warmonger just like the present occupant of the White House; a phony funny-racist; an inarticulate man… one lacking minimal brain power?  How, may I ask?

Could it be that Americans prefer not to have anyone smarter than their surrounding mediocrity leading them?  Or that after having been submerged at the bottom of iniquity with George W. Bush for eight years, we might fee the need for a decompression stop presidency before our nation resurfaces without suffering from the bends? Nonsense… a McCain presidency would be no different from a Bush’s third term… equal opportunity idiocy, and more thieveries of the filthy, or cleanly, rich.

One cannot fathom McCain as the next president of the United States… the new scorn of the gooks and their new replacements, the terrorist Islamo-fascists! Not this burnt scrap from the bottom of Annapolis’ kettle.  But then again, Americans more often than not seem to side with the perceived underdog, particularly when seen as a hero-patriot, and it would be hard to find a greater underdog than the village idiot.

Don’t count McCain out… at least for now!  It’s an indisputable fact that in America, money is total power, and at the end of the day power always grabs the reins.

Tags: Ben Tanosborn, congress, corporations, corporatism, democracy, economics, government, homeland security, imperialism, politics, power, social responsibility
Categories: Commentary, Democracy, Power, Politics, Congress, Corporations, Homeland Security, Imperialism, social responsibility, Ben Tanosborn
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An Article by
Ben Tanosborn
Many members of the military are not so sure they want to welcome the year of the Rat, not that the Pig now exiting was good for them.  In the enlisted ranks, they’ve just about had it with the civilian top-echelon of command and the multiple tours to Iraq.  And the Rat could prove to be not only a carrier of pestilence in 2008 but also provide Bush, and his neocon entourage, with a scabby distraction from the looming economic bloodbath; and if you happen to be thinking “Iran”, my answer to you is… bingo!

Available current data on political contributions by US military personnel to presidential candidates indicate that Ron Paul, a Republican, and Barack Obama, a Democrat, are the leading cash beneficiaries.  Interestingly enough, those are two candidates who, if elected, would bring the troops home… either immediately (Ron Paul), or within a year (Barack Obama).  Or so the promises go!

The collection plate has proven to be somewhat less generous for the hawks (McCain, Romney, Huckabee and Clinton) when it was passed along, and although there are no records of contributions by rank, it’s probably safe to assume that almost all political donations for those hawks came from the commissioned officers’ higher ranks.

What is an officer to do?  “It’s your career, stupid!”  Little or nothing has changed from those medieval times when some people were born to preach while others were piously entrusted to bear arms; in both cases “chosen people” whose destiny was to serve God and country, the two holy banners by which people have been, throughout the millennia, killing each other, replacing love and compassion with hate and righteousness; all done in hero-worshipping ways… and in total denial of obvious criminality.

And that righteousness, forcefully expressed from the pulpit, invariably makes those men of the cloth guardians of the faith, as well as the morals that people must observe; also coming from the White House and Pentagon, assuring us that the brave military are the true defenders of freedom and democracy, sole protectors against terror. That while we are being poisoned with the government’s cocktail – laced with propaganda and pseudo-patriotism… and served daily by the hooker-media – giving in to the crudest of lies from those who have self-designated to be in charge, uncontested claimants as upholders and sole translators of the US Constitution.

For years many Americans have shown resentment against what they believe to be the US role as “the world’s policeman.”  Those assertions have been made as indictments against wasting money overseas, and not as repudiation of systemic belligerence, or a true advocacy for peace – and the sanctity of human life.  Even today, as the American economy graduates from globalization to “bubbleization”… and we stand to become the biggest bubble reality show – where Americans are both actors and audience – it does perplex one’s mind to discover the great majority of our citizenry still believing that this nation is a big Santa Claus feeding and clothing the world; and our military, a pro-bono police force whose “sacrifices” go unappreciated by the international community.

And, saddest of all, those who know better appear to do nothing to enlighten the rest!

Yesterday, January 6, Gerald Seib of the Wall Street Journal, in an article which had the feeling of an editorial, basically subscribed to the fear in our capitalist elite – always well reflected by that newspaper – that wounds being inflicted during this political campaign by and among Democrats may be difficult to heal.  And that could spell serious trouble for an America which has always been united-in-captivity; a nation kept docile and truth- suppressed, as if the clear divide did not exist.  So the elite needs to put the lid on the simmering, at times boiling, pot and hypocritically give the salute: “God bless America.”

So there is a chasm between whites and blacks, Hispanics and non-Hispanics, women and men, young and old; but we don’t like to spread the “horrible” truth of un-American disunity.

Give me a brake!  Ours is a “United States” not a “United People”… and just as some have experienced that “American dream,” many others have had to endure that well-hidden “American nightmare.”  Problems need to surface, be confronted, tackled and, hopefully, solved; we are still many years away from becoming a “United People.”  Our capitalist elite have always wanted to keep us non-rebellious, under the chimera that we are a united people.  That implanted idea is likely to receive, and soon, a major jolt as the economic recession proves to be not just a two-quarter adjustment in the economy, but a true consumption lifetime adjustment that will bare naked social, economic and political flaws in our predatory capitalist system.

Meantime the US military will continue to be kept as the overworked, underpaid police force of the US capitalist elite… hoping, perhaps, for reinforcements from the NATO vassals; or, God save us, the reinstitution of the military draft.  A not too promising Year of the Rat for the United States, the Middle East, parts of South Asia… and, definitely, not the United States military.

Tags: Ben Tanosborn, economics, empire, neoconservatism, politics, war
Categories: Commentary, Economics, War, Empire, neoconservatism, Ben Tanosborn
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An Article by:

Ben Tanosborn
A yes answer to a question with such scary implications begs postponement ‘til another day… perhaps it is a question that should never be answered, not out loud.  Let’s just say that Uncle Sam has always appeared to the world as an affable, worldly relative that they never quite really knew, or understood; one who visited occasionally wearing fancy duds and displaying graying hairs – and cocky airs – exuding both stability and success; someone who made the world his oyster… and all the relatives envious.

Unfortunately, that uncle who visited his family during the last two decades was more of a jobless, penniless relative who had whittled away his fortune in fancy living and lousy gambling – warmongering and selective globalization may be more apropos – schemes.  And his visits started to be more frequent, now inviting one and all to share in his “good fortune”… apparently by investing in many of those schemes.

The reality of a recession is finally talked about by both imbecilic and sage members of America’s Hope Springs Eternal society, and that includes super-greedy Wall Street, a government in lying perpetuity and the amenable Fed.  Now, after all this time, when we know that we are already there… or, at least, at the entry way!

Actually it’s not the “R” word that scares me, but the possibility of the unmentionable capital “D” for depression.  An “R” with fair penmanship for much of the world, and a “D” with illegible calligraphy for the US of A!  Of course, there’s a chance that the White House and Congress might create enough hocus pocus – perhaps by “having” the Fed cut its rate 2 or even 3 points and throwing away another 150 to 200 billion dollars on the shoulders of future generations – to decelerate the economic bloodbath until past the November elections, but the observed (even if hidden by the government) rate of true inflation won’t allow smoke and mirrors to cloud reality, and America’s economy will appear buck naked before the world, directed behind curtains by the Wizard of Oz.

On Monday and Tuesday Asian and European markets gave us a preview of their own nervousness with the US, even if this nation’s share of the world’s GDP (now at just 28 percent) keeps, understandably, declining.  Combined losses averaged over 10 percent overseas, if mildly affected by Wall Street losses on Tuesday (1.1 and 2 percent for the Dow and NASDEQ), told us that America’s actions still weigh heavily in economic world affairs.  And it was also an icy reminder that the credit largesse by those creditor nations may soon be coming to an end.  Then, whose money will Americans be able to spend, er…waste?  Isn’t the US really following on the footsteps of Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and third world nations whose economic policies America has criticized for so long?

America, the should-be creditor nation par excellence, has become instead a parasite to the savings of the world, becoming the largest debtor nation in the planet with only two possibilities left: one, allowing America’s creditors to liquidate the paper for hard assets, permitting once-proud Americans to become vassals to foreign capital; or two, change America’s consumption habits… and learn to live within our means.

The precarious economic fix does not seem to be understood by most economists, and even the very elite in the profession make questionable statements which seem out of the ballpark.  Like Paul Krugman, whose judgment I usually respect, asserting how complex the US economy is, when the adjective should have been deceptive.  Weren’t derivates supposed to have disappeared after the dot-com fiasco?   Instead, additional crooked financial instruments were allowed to debut without proper scrutiny by a hands-off government happy to see capitalism run amuck in predatory ways to once again redistribute wealth from middle-class to rich.  Not complex, Dr. Krugman, just deceptive!

And all the while, those in the trade-brotherhood of economics in solemn silence!

As I am writing this article engaged in the thought of the applicability of physics’ laws of thermodynamics to the art-science of economics, I came up with what I thought to be a proper term to describe it: econodynamics (or movement in economics).  After googling the word, however, I discovered that it wasn’t for me to coin, that it had been used once before, probably in a different context to mine, or in its seriousness.

For our purpose here, let’s just say that it would probably be worth considering if our graduate schools of economics required their Ph. D. candidates to have an academic background in engineering, at least through the junior year, with at least knowledge of thermodynamics and quantum physics – I might add that it has helped me.  Certainly a more appropriate complementary background than that of politics!  Knowledge about conservation of energy, entropy and absolute zero temperature (the three laws of thermodynamics) can certainly prove insightful to the understanding of economic growth, and the treatment of production, consumption and savings… plus much more.

Perhaps Arnold Sommerfeld, the German physicist, had it right, if this attribution to him is correct: “Thermodynamics is a funny subject.  The first time you go through it, you don’t understand it at all.  The second time you go through it, you think you understand it, except for one or two small points.  The third time you go through it, you know you don’t understand it, but by that time you are so used to it, it doesn’t bother you any more.”  Substitute thermodynamics with economics and you may understand what most economists are all about.

Religion, to have value for the human condition, must be much more than just faith.  In like fashion, economics should aspire to become more of a science, and its practitioners must be more than just charlatans, at someone’s service, with a fast sleight of hands.

Since both foreign policy and economic policy are thoroughly enmeshed in the US, an economic bloodbath coming sooner than later might give Americans a much needed push to finally clamor for the impeachment of Bush and Cheney, the two men at the top who have brought this nation to such level of plight and misery; concurrently heralding impending exits from both Afghanistan and Iraq; and also giving credence to the idea, that in the future, America will only be solicitous with Israel when that nation brings to a halt its dominance over Palestinians and engages in true negotiations for territorial co-existence in peace; that Israel will remain a good friend and ally but will not be allowed to hold the key to US foreign policy as it has done up to now.

Tags: Ben Tanosborn, economics, empire, globalization
Categories: Commentary, Economics, Empire, Ben Tanosborn
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An Article by:

Steve Hammons

also published in AmericanChronicle.com

Results from Diebold electronic voting machines used in New Hampshire’s primary are being questioned this week as apparent anomalies in voting patterns there are examined.

According to published reports, in areas of New Hampshire where Diebold machines were used, Hillary Clinton may have received significantly more votes than Barack Obama, compared to regions where Diebold machines were not used.

Despite repeated reports by experts that these types of voting machines can be hacked and voting results altered, the devices continue to be used around the country.

Questions were raised in 2004 presidential election about the accuracy of voting results in Ohio.

Some of these concerns were also related to Diebold electronic voting machines.

After the 2000 presidential election and problems counting Florida’s punch-card ballots, federal funds were made available for local jurisdictions to purchase different voting technologies.

Many of these funds were spent on electronic machines such as the Diebold devices.

DEMOCRACY AT RISK

Vote tampering in the U.S. and elsewhere is nothing new. But, reasonable efforts have often been implemented to attempt to minimize some of the more egregious activities regarding election fraud.

Now, with questionable electronic voting devices used throughout the nation, high-tech election manipulation is clearly a possibility, probability or maybe even established fact, according to some researchers and experts who have investigated the situation.

Because election and voting procedures vary around the country, there are not uniform and consistent standards for voting devices and other elements of election processes.

Although many people have called for increased universal standards to assist in maintaining the integrity of elections, little has been done.

In addition to questionable voting machines, other irregularities have been documented, reported and investigated. These include confusing ballots, inadequate numbers of polling places, polling places strategically located to influence voting patterns, removal of qualified citizens from voting eligibility lists and other concerns.

According to some observers, these kinds of circumstances may have significantly affected national and local elections in recent years.

CORRECTIVE ACTION

What can be done to improve the integrity and accuracy of our election processes? Experts and researchers of all kinds have made many valuable suggestions, based on extensive investigations of many aspects of current election problems.

Yet, there does not seem to be an adequate consensus about what steps should be taken.

Do we implement mandatory national standards or keep elections in local hands? And, how will decisions be made about things like electronic voting technology. Unwise and corrupt decisions can just as easily be made at the federal level as at the local level, as we know all too well.

Politically neutral organizations could create groups of experts to make logical recommendations about how to proceed. In fact, many such groups already have. But the problems persist.

In the case of Ohio’s 2004 elections, other similar questionable election processes and now in the New Hampshire primary, real or perceived irregularities are damaging American democracy.

If it is true that flawed voting machine technology is inadvertently making errors or allowing outright criminal voter fraud, we have a serious problem.

If other aspects of our election processes, inadvertently or intentionally, are also wrongly disenfranchising citizens, creating phony election results and helping put people in office who were not truly elected, our democratic system is truly damaged.