Oliver Cromwell and Barack Obama

By -
From Dec 2008:

The stock-market is down 40%, with middle-class savings decimated, and the finger (sadly) pointed at "Wall Street". On top of this, news just broke of an unprecedented financial scandal, where Bernie Madoff seems to have confessed to a $50 billion fraud! And, the governor of Illinois is accused of blatantly auctioning a senate seat.

These are dangerous times, because uninformed public anger at such events can be harnessed by a demagogue. Imagine Oliver Cromwell, giving his famous speech today:
20 April 1653
It is high time for me to put an end to your sitting in this place, which you have dishonored by your contempt of all virtue, and defiled by your practice of every vice; ye are a factious crew, and enemies to all good government; ye are a pack of mercenary wretches, and would like Esau sell your country for a mess of pottage, and like Judas betray your God for a few pieces of money.

Is there a single virtue now remaining amongst you? Is there one vice you do not possess? Ye have no more religion than my horse; gold is your God; which of you have not barter'd your conscience for bribes? Is there a man amongst you that has the least care for the good of the Commonwealth?

Ye sordid prostitutes have you not defil'd this sacred place, and turn'd the Lord's temple into a den of thieves, by your immoral principles and wicked practices? Ye are grown intolerably odious to the whole nation; you were deputed here by the people to get grievances redress'd, are yourselves gone! So! Take away that shining bauble there, and lock up the doors. In the name of God, go!

Cromwell did not turn out well.

Update Oct 2012: In the U.S., we have had 4 years of similar rants. President Obama talks of good businessmen as if they too belong to a den of thieves. Still, voters get the politicians they deserve, and U.S. voters have no excuse for their ignorance.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Country Shares of World GDP

By -
Image
Here's a chart of world GDP, broken down by country share. ( HT: Carpe Diem ). Careful with the x-axis, it is not at all to scale! The basic idea is that India and China had large shares pre-industrial revolution, after which Europe rose. The U.S. shoots up, to over 40% of world GDP by 1950. Then, Japan begins to grow in the 1960s, and China in the 1980s. Suppose countries end up with GDPs proportionate to their populations. What would that picture look like? I've added a bar to the right, showing the break-down of world-population. Look at the U.S. squished down, with less that 400 million out of a world population of over 7,000 million. The biggest change is in the previously un-noticed 'rest of the world". If Africa, the Middle East and so on moved toward freedom, that could be the story of the century.  What if they do not? Here's a chart with a new assumption. Suppose the "rest-of-world" does not increase its relative s
Read more

von Mises on the Quantity Theory of Money

By -
Reading von Mises a while ago, I was surprised to see him speak against the Quantity theory of Money, but what he said made a lot of sense. A recent Facebook comment sent me back looking for the source, and I decided to blog a few choice quotes, because others may find it interesting. My summary of von Mises's position is as follows: The supply of money is an important factor in its value. This is the element of truth in the Quantity Theory However demand for money is the other factor. The quantity theory gives short shrift to demand for money. (One must look to individual decision-making processes and their objective context to understand the demand for money. One cannot start with the aggregate demand for money.) Even if supply were the only factor, it is wrong to assume the value of money will change in direct proportion to the change in supply It is also wrong to assume that an increase in supply of money changes all prices generally and similarly A good theory o
Read more

U.S. Economy: Federal Debt- How big is it?

By -
Image
( Updated: Dec 2012 ) Lots of numbers:  Trying to get a clear picture of U.S. government debt can be frustrating. The government owes: 60% of GDP : bonds owed to private entities , both foreign and domestic 100% of GDP : if we add bonds owed to the government-itself (e.g. Social Security "trust fund", Federal Reserve) 400%+ : if all Fed promises to social security and medicare recipients are met (they won't be) [Note: the GAO claims that adding another 2% (of payroll) to the current 13% payroll tax would keep social security funded for more than 70 years!] A snapshot: The U.S. government (officially) owes about US $16 trillion to the public, plus to the Fed, plus to the "trust funds".  The GDP of the U.S. is approximately $16 trillion. (Both these were about $15 Tr. last year.) To put this in perspective:  adding up the assets of everyone in the U.S. and subtracting liabilities, we get a "net worth" that adds up to about $ 64 trillion ($5
Read more