by Alan Briskin | Humor, Politics
I just published my insights on this intriguing question in the Huffington Post… Here’s how the article starts:
“I don’t want to start rumors, but Gorgeous George the wrestler was thirty-one years old, and already famous, when Donald Trump was born in the borough of Queens, New York City, 1946. Now, I don’t know if it was possible, but with all that travel George did, could he have had a liaison with Donald’s mom? I’m not saying it’s true or not, but I was raised in Queens as well, not that long afterward, and I know for a fact there was plenty of adultery and illicit affairs. So go put two and two together, if you know what I mean.”
Read the post for more!
by Alan Briskin | Collective Folly, Collective Wisdom, Conscious Capitalism, Leadership, Politics
There are consequences to avoiding our fate, especially at the collective level and especially when we have been given stark warning. In this case, the warning came from Franklin D. Roosevelt and it is as much about the interior domain of the collective as well how it manifests at the highest corporate and government levels. Clothed by interest groups shaped by fear and greed, the ensuing garment hides self-interest while emphasizing the fine fit of those who have prospered. The warning Franklin delivers is about ignoring our social responsibility at the same time we scapegoat those who have not succeeded. The consequence is a putrefaction of our thought process, a shrillness to our emotional responses, and a fatalism about a better future.
From Becoming Conscious of Capitalism:
The economic bill of rights highlighted a scar in the American psyche. Roosevelt’s time in office, which included a failed coup d’état directed against him, deepened the resolve of factions opposed to government intervention. From this moment on, a widening split would cleave those who believed in federal intervention from those who perceived arrogance in a government that addressed questions of economic distribution.
Read more…
Filmed presentation of FDR’s speech on an Economic Bill of Rights:
by Alan Briskin | Collective Folly, Conscious Capitalism, Politics
As if on cue, Republican Party nominee for Vice President and current congressman, Paul Ryan, was back in the news warning about “generations of men not even thinking about working or learning to value the culture of work, so there is a real culture problem here that has to be dealt with.”
Ryan then offers a bait and switch, condemning government programs that have historically addressed the consequences of poverty and offering up free market solutions, like limiting long-term unemployment insurance and opposing living wage policies. Somehow his fear of a “dependency culture” has led him to believe in the superior intelligence of private enterprise and the character faults of an underclass bred to depend on government assistance. How I would love to agree with him, but then we would both be horribly wrong.
For some historical antecedents to this debate, read my two-part series from “Becoming Conscious of Capitalism”, beginning with How Wealth Became Concentrated and the Poor Were to Blame: Paupers are Everywhere.
by Alan Briskin | Collective Folly, Conscious Capitalism, Politics
Becoming Conscious of Capitalism:
The Death and Rebirth of Prosperity’s Dream
a serial narrative by Alan Briskin
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Postmark, Oakland, CA, August 11, 2012
Today the Republican nominee for President Mitt Romney chose the Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan to be his vice presidential nominee. The news was filled with many different perspectives about this selection, one of which was the unusual philosophical connection Ryan has with the author Ayn Rand.
Below is an excerpt about Ayn Rand from my new serial narrative, Becoming Conscious of Capitalism, and her unusual link with Paul Ryan.
I wrote the serial over the past few months with an eye to collective folly but also as a serious attempt to discover the links between capitalism and partisan politics. Along with my commentary, I include some of my HDR (high dynamic range) photography as well as FLASH POINTS ripped from today’s headlines and those of earlier historic perspectives.
I hope you will find the serial stimulating, an irreverent romp through history as we polka our way to the Presidential elections. Sometimes trying to keep sane means embracing insanity as an important herald of what to pay attention to. Read on for a “sneak preview” excerpt from Chapter Six of the series…
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by Alan Briskin | Collective Folly, Politics
This is not a post about Michele Bachmann so much as a reflection on the interior of a nation generating leaders who are reflections of our own most discomforting emotions – vengefulness, paranoia, rigidity, fear, and most disturbing, an addiction to the light. And by addiction to the light I mean a wish to believe that there is one path to the divine and that path must be obeyed without reservation. Ms. Bachmann calls this path Jesus or Christian but I strongly suspect these are just symbolic words for believing that one is more righteous than others. We all have these feelings at times – a self righteous sense of being better than others or conversely not feeling valued enough by others – but when this becomes a group phenomenon it carries with it a great wave of destructiveness.
How do I know these interior feelings are gaining traction in the collective rather than simply being about the person of Michele Bachmann? Well, because one of the Republican candidates for President, Tim Pawlenty, told me so. On his leaving the presidential race he acknowledged a slight misstep. He thought he brought a “rational, established, credible, strong record…” However, he added “But I think the audience, so to speak, was looking for something different.” So much is suggested when a Midwesterner uses the phrase “so to speak.” The words that come to my mind as different from “rational” “credible” “established” and “strong” are irrational, unreliable, temporary, and desperate. How is that for a shadow job description of a role considered the most powerful in the world?
The collective has a way of flirting with disaster by generating leaders who exhibit extreme forms of polarization. The leaders themselves are often empty vessels for the collective, opportunistic and inflated about their talents, accomplishments, and vision. No wonder politicians, literally the manifestation of the people, sometimes get a bad name.
What has become particularly clear is that the collective ability to engage the irrational, unreliable, temporary, and desperate is not a matter of compromise. It is a matter of necessity, and it takes compassion. You say what?
I say compassion, but an unrelenting compassion that goes for the jugular, meaning an ability to cut to the throat of the matter. This is a form of compassion that uses speech, as opposed to physical violence, as a means to break the trance that carries groups to the edge of the cliff and beyond. This is a particular kind of speech that uses humor, surprise, sojourns into common sense, and makes the most of persuasive skills to make a point, counter a false argument, and rally the collective to something larger than itself. It is not simply telling people it will be hard or that it will take compromise. This is common sense but it is also paternal and patronizing. We need to wake ourselves up, find new images, and take on directly those dark emotions that are smoldering in the heat of uncertainty, ambiguity, and flickering violence. And it is not a job for one person but for all of us who care about birthing a new consciousness.
by Alan Briskin | Collective Folly, Politics
In the Jewish tradition, there is a song beloved on Passover. It’s called Dayenu (pronounced DI A NU) and its meaning is that even in the most difficult of times, it is critical that we appreciate what we have – that what has been done for us is sufficient. Loosely translated, dayenu means “it would have been enough.” It is a song sung to God and I remember this song more than others because on Passover, as a child, I sung it with such exuberance, banging my fist on the table and screaming at the top of my lungs, I was asked to leave.
These memories come back to me as I read Bernie Sanders, the son of Jewish immigrants, who also happens to be Vermont’s U.S. Senator. He is an independent and socialist and I suspect others things outside the normal way business is done. If the Senate could ask him to leave, I’m sure they would, because he deals in solutions that nobody wants to hear.
And he has found a way to make dayenu relevant again at the Congressional table, although not in exactly the same way it had originally been intended. He asks the wealthy in America if there is ever going to be enough for them.
He has an ear for rhythm:
In 2007, the top 1% of all income earners in the U.S. made 23.5% of all income.
NOT ENOUGH
The percentage of income going to the top 1% has nearly tripled since the mid-1970’s.
NOT ENOUGH
80% of all new income earned from 1980 to 2005 has gone to the top 1 percent.
NOT ENOUGH
The top 1 percent now owns more wealth than the bottom 90 percent.
NOT ENOUGH
Wall Street executives now earn more than they did before the financial bail out of Wall Street firms.
NOT ENOUGH
The United States now has, by far, the most unequal distribution of income and wealth of any major country on earth.
NOT ENOUGH
You see Sanders has the melody so critical to deep understanding. For many at the top there is such a feeling of scarcity and privilege that it can never be enough. Lo Dayenu would be their song – Never Enough.
And so Sanders has proposed solutions, believing if a raggedy group of slaves fleeing through the desert and being attacked from all sides could sing about having enough, then it’s possible that even in the most wealthy country in the world, it might again be possible.
In his speech to the Senate on June 27th, he listed 13 measures that could reduce the deficit without cutting Social Security, Medicare or other programs.
End the tax breaks for oil and gas companies.
AND THERE WOULD STILL BE ENOUGH FOR EVERYONE
Eliminate offshore tax havens, bringing the deficit down by $40 billion over the next decade.
AND THERE WOULD STILL BE ENOUGH FOR EVERYONE
Repeal the Bush-era tax cuts for the top two percent of earners, generating $700 billion.
AND THERE WOULD STILL BE ENOUGH FOR EVERYONE
Establish an estate tax on inherited wealth of more than $3.5 million, raising another $70 billion over a decade.
AND THERE WOULD STILL BE ENOUGH FOR EVERYONE
Shrink military spending and bring the Iraq and Afghanistan wars to an end as soon as possible.
AND THERE WOULD STILL BE ENOUGH FOR EVERYONE
Dayenu is a reminder that to live psychologically with the concept of scarcity is to remain a slave. It must never be used as a justification for social inequality. Rather, it is a call for community, that we are grateful for what we have and most notably for laws that bind us together and make us appreciate ourselves as a community.
