kinda apprehensive

ok, so we elected democrats to the house and senate, and we have democratic majorities in both houses now (as long as joe lieberman doesn’t go back on his campaign promise to caucus with the democrats). now what? i am kinda apprehensive. see, george w. bush is still president. and, the public is sort of deeply divided. in iraq the public is also deeply divided. the sunnis and shiites are fighting a civil war, or at least “sectarian violence”. so what is keeping us in the united states from fighting another civil war? i think it is because we have a strong central government, which has a monopoly on the use of lethal force. back in the 90’s we were hearing about anti-government militias that were being formed out west, and that was a supposed threat. but i think nowadays most people are patriotic, or at least most people who own firearms are patriotic. and most people who have guns and hate the government are probably just criminals, a type of person our government is quite effective in apprehending and punishing. for example, rappers often rap about how much they hate the police, which would not be a relevant topic unless the police were quite active in fighting crime very aggressively. usually the rappers also rap about doing drugs and killing people, putting to rest any doubt about whether they are really criminals or not.

anyway, it was rather creepy how bush fired rumsfeld and george “macaca” alan conceded the election in virgina to jim webb, and then bush and nancy pelosi suddenly announced that they were basically soulmates and loved each other. i mean, what the hell is going on here? why is everyone acting so nice, after all the nasty things they said before the election? it is kind of disingenuous and absurd of george w. bush and nancy pelosi to put on this charade of pretending they like each other. and i have heard from many sources that the democrats plan on avoiding divisive issues like gay marriage or abortion, and instead they will pass laws on issues where the vast, overwhelming majority of the american public agrees with them. things like having the rich pay more taxes, having embryonic stem cell research, reforming legislative earmarks for more openness and accountability, allowing medicare to import cheaper drugs from canada and/or negotiate with drug companies for lower costs, raising the minimum wage, balancing the budget, and having oversight hearings to investigate waste, fraud, and abuse among military contractors in iraq. but there is only so much that they can do in this area, and what if bush vetoes it? it is difficult to come up with a comprehensive legislative agenda. and how on earth can the democrats balance the budget? certainly, the republicans failed miserably, because they kept cutting taxes and increasing spending, making the deficit and debt both get bigger each year. obviously, there are only 2 ways to bring the budget back towards being balanced: raising taxes and cutting spending. now, democrats have a certain reputation for raising taxes, but they actually pledged to cut taxes for middle-class families, instead of raising them. they pledged not to raise taxes for the poor or middle class. so, how much money can we get if we tax the wealthy, and tax corporate profits, and go after tax evasion aggressively, and bring back the estate tax (which is set to expire)? republicans claim that if we taxed those things, that would be bad for the economy, and less people would have jobs. republicans like to tax consumption so as to avoid taxing investment. but the poor consume and the rich invest. for a more equitable economy, the government should tax investment and not tax consumption at all. however, at what cost would this equality come? would this prevent future economic growth? the only way to find out for sure is to do a scientific experiment, but unfortunately, that is impossible in the field of macroeconomics. economics is simply a devious form of applied mathematics, used to advance a political agenda. anyway, the republicans believe in the laffer curve, i.e., they believe in reaganomics, the trickle-down theory, the theory that cutting taxes can increase government revenue. the republicans claim the bush tax cuts resulted in increased government revenue. this is nonsense. the bush tax cuts were enacted during a recession, and then the economy continued its normal cyclic behavior. i believe the tax cuts actually made the recession worse and made it last longer, but eventually, it had to end, because the economy is cyclic and alternates between recessions and booms. the current economic boom that the republicans claim credit for is actually fatally flawed, because the uneven income distribution in the current economy means that there are less consumers with significant amounts of disposable income to spend, which means less consumption, and therefore less production, and therefore less economic activity, period. in order for the economy to thrive, we must encourage consumption by raising the minimum wage to create more disposable income for the working poor, and lower sales taxes so people can buy more stuff. the problem with today’s economy is most people cannot afford all the stuff they buy so they go into debt and have money problems, and try to declare bankruptcy to avoid paying off their debts. the pernicious effects of loans and credit cards are ruining our economy, by changing economic interactions from their normal state into a bizarre cat-and-mouse game, with people buying more than they can afford and accumulating debt, and then trying to avoid creditors as best they can. and most businesses cannot afford to go around chasing debtors who cannot pay their bills. our economy has been reduced to a stack of cards that is about to fall over, with the vast numbers of people who are in debt. the government must regulate the credit card industry and organizations which give out loans, in order to prevent those companies from being the enablers for people with bad credit to buy more than they can afford and go into debt. i am sick of seeing ads that say “bad credit? no credit? no problem!” and promise people free cash or free cars if they are willing to sign a contract that puts them into debt for many years. then the people in debt have to work it off. it is basically like a form of slavery for stupid people. so often i see advertisements for things like a monthly service that will deliver jokes to your mobile phone in the form of text messages in exchange for a ridiculously high monthly fee. there is so much economic activity which is simply exploitation of the public’s stupidity. we need a better educational system so people are not dumb enough to waste their hard-earned money on stupid crap they don’t need. capitalism only works if the consumer acts in their own enlightened self-interest, and it is not in a very good state when people waste money on stupid things like that. or how about gambling? gambling is the exact opposite of insurance, but both of them are scams. with insurance, you pay a relatively small amount of money in order to prevent a situation where you have to pay a ridiculously huge amount of money. with gambling, you pay a relatively small amount of money in order to create a minuscule but nonzero probability that you will suddenly get a ridiculously huge quantity of money because of random chance. in either case, you are wasting money trying to change the outcome of a situation that is almost guaranteed not to occur. but, you ask, what about health insurance, or life insurance, or other types of insurance for things that are probable? health insurance is a scam because the insurance companies make backdoor deals with drug companies and medical providers so that they don’t have to pay as much money as you would pay if you had no insurance. in other words, it is a conspiracy, like o.p.e.c., because all the major companies in the industry have cooperated with each other in order to rip off the consumer, making secret backdoor deals. and this health-care conspiracy has managed to buy the votes of the politicians to help them make even more money through their anti-capitalist collaboration. health insurance companies and drug companies ought to compete with each other, as adam smith envisioned when he wrote about capitalism, rather than collaborating to form a de facto monopoly. have you played the game monopoly? if two players decide they will collaborate with each other and not compete, but instead try to defeat a third player, that is not fair. and if three players are all collaborating and fighting against one, that is totally unfair. i have played the game of monopoly, and i have been the victim of this type of conspiracy, with 3 other players ganging up on me, because i was too smart and they decided i was such a threat that i had to be eliminated from the game and they all had to work together. but i won the game anyway! hell yeah! but that is not what usually happens when 3 gang up against 1, i am just awesome. anyway, that is why we have problems in our health-care system. large corporations are collaborating with their supposed “competitors”, forming de facto monopolies that operate basically the same way as large state-owned companies under communism. so basically we are living under communism, is what i am saying. and that is not a good thing. anyway, the democrats will have to end this system of communism. of course, they will not do it, at least not all at once. they will introduce small, gradual changes to our current system, probably. and the good thing about our current system of corporate communism is, we are not that far away from an actual competitive market economy, and all we have to do is have the government investigate companies for anti-competitive practices, and try to incite the companies to dislike and distrust each other. when large corporations hate each other, this is a good thing, because it promotes competition. for example, ibm and microsoft are bitter enemies, and this is much better than having them conspire together how to rule the world of computers.

so, perhaps it is good if democrats and republicans hate each other. like in the capitalist system of the market economy, this drives both sides to compete, and try to produce a better product for the consumer. just imagine how awful things would be if democrats and republicans collaborated in the oppression of the american people and rendered our system of democracy obsolete. just imagine 2 parties with similar viewpoints and similar politicians who get along and cooperate. there would be no more choice left for the voters! it would be no different from 1-party communist rule! so partisanship is a good thing, from that standpoint. of course, there could be fake partisanship. there could be a system where the politicians all agreed on everything and cooperated together, but only pretended to disagree for the elections, and campaigned on platforms to appeal to their parties’ bases, but once elected, governed from the so-called “center” in a spirit of “bipartisanship”, going back on all the promises they made to their bases. just imagine... a democratic politician campaigning, pretending to be liberal, and a republican politician campaiging, pretending to be conservative, but then they both get elected to congress and have the exact same “centrist” voting record, bought and paid for by special interest money. by the way, “centrist” and “moderate” are washington code-words for “part of the conspiracy of elite special interests to take the power away from the people and give it to the biggest campaign contributors”, or, more briefly, they both mean “corrupt”. so, when i see nancy pelosi and george w. bush acting all nice, i get suspicous, and start thinking, is there some kind of secret backroom deal going on here? is this the start of some new era of bipartisan corruption? they said they want to work together to get work done for the american people. but which people? regular, ordinary people like you and me? or the big shots? honestly, i would really like to believe that the government is actually working on behalf of ordinary people, but i am way too cynical and well-informed to believe something as ridiculous as that. but i think divided government is usually a good thing. that way, any law that gets passed must be agreed upon by both the good party and the evil party (it is up to you to decide which you think is which, but only god and satan know for sure). so, any law that is passed is something that god and satan can both agree on, basically. and anything god and satan can agree on must be a good idea. i mean, satan used to be an angel, and has a lot of experience in that position, plus he is uniquely qualified, as the one and only ruler of hell, and the source of all evil in the cosmos. like, if the media wants to do a story about christianity, they need to cover both sides of the story: god’s side and satan’s side. and they have to give both sides equal time. otherwise, they would not be objective. we cannot allow pro-god or pro-satan bias in our media. if that happens, how can we expect to really know what is going on during the war of armageddon? we need both perspectives: the perspective of jesus once he comes back to earth to save the world, and the perspective of the beast with the number 666 on its forehead, the antichrist. if the media tried to cover things from the same perspective as most americans, i.e., pro-god and anti-satan, they would totally miss the story when satan’s armies converge on jerusalem and kill 1/3 of jews, and instead of covering it from satan’s perspective, they would have reporters embedded live with the angels in heaven, asking them what they think. more realistically, what i am trying to talk about (via that long-winded analogy) was how our media in the united states might have a pro-wealthy or pro-republican or even pro-liberal or pro-democrat bias at times, but the real bias, the biggest bias they have, that never goes away, is their pro-american bias. and along with their pro-american bias is their anti-anti-american bias. so, we can never find out about it if our country does something wrong, because our media wants us to think only good thoughts about our nation. only when things get f.u.b.a.r., or fucked up beyond all recognition, is our media willing to talk about something being wrong with the united states of america. but they still approach it with a pro-american attitude, an attitude of “hey, i guess we can’t deny this problem exists, but we americans can solve any problem and i am sure we can easily solve it because we are the greatest people in the world”. like have you heard of narcissism? in ancient greek mythology, narcissus was a young man who fell in love with his own reflection that he saw on the surface of a smooth lake, on a bright and sunny day. and after that, he was so in love with himself, he never fell in love with anyone else, ever again. he was his own soulmate. our entire nation has gotten like that, overcome with nationalist narcissism, and it has become so much of a bias, such a big mental problem for our nation, that we have to be in denial about any problems our nation has, and still think we are #1 and the best, or else our whole national self-image falls apart. now, most nations are not #1, but they still get by. mexico, turkey, france, ... those are all industrialized countries that are not really #1 in anything. they are adequate. they are good enough, but not perfect, not really the best. but people still live in those countries and like them. what countries are #1? well, i think canada, sweden, switzerland, norway, japan, luxembourg, russia, china, india, and of course, the united states. each of those countries comes up #1 in some sort of ranking, by geographic size, population, prosperity, life expectancy, or some sort of quality of life index. it depends on what you are looking for in a country, which one comes out #1. but we can’t be #1 in everything. we should be glad we are #1 in a few categories, even if some of them are bad (like military spending, or number of people in jail). but even if we were not #1 in any categories at all, even if we were a below-average country, it would still be ok. because there are dozens of below-average countries out there that are doing fine, sort of. well not really. but, we can’t just assume we are the best without checking the statistics. life expectancy, infant mortality, per capita income, amount of natural resources, poverty rate, unemployment rate, etc. and, when one company completely dominates an industry, this is called a monopoly, and this is what happens in communism. in an economy like ours there are oligopolies, which i like to call conspiracies, where a few giant companies agree not to compete, and work together, forming a de facto monopoly that is just like communism except it is cleverly disguised and marketed as capitalism. what we need is some good old-fashioned “trust-busting” like what teddy roosevelt did 100 years ago. we need to go after the oligarchs, the plutocrats, the kleptocrats, the illuminati. according to the theories of supply and demand, in a competitive market economy, no company makes a profit; instead, every company has an average profit of zero. any company that can make a profit consistently, and avoid losing money, is either up to something no good, and is somehow cheating, or really is smarter than everybody else. there is a certain minimum amount of corruption needed in order for our economy to function smoothly. if we eliminated all corporate corruption, this would cause chaos and economic collapse and people would lose their jobs and companies would go bankrupt and it would be a disaster. so, we have to draw the line somewhere, and only go after cases where the corruption has clearly crossed the line. if everyone who was corrupt were put on trial and put in jail, this would destroy our economy, if it were all done at once. but if we gradually weed out the bad apples, without going too fast, some of the other bad actors can go legit and then we can leave them alone. i am convinced that corruption is ubiquitous among the large corporations, but since they make most of the stuff i buy, i kind of depend on their continued existence. anyway, i have no idea what this democratic congress is going to do, since all nancy pelosi has spelled out is the first few days or so. after then, who knows what will happen? it is entirely unpredictable. and is bush going to go legit, or is he just playing games with us to get more time and run out the clock until his presidency is over? is he getting something in exchange for giving up rumsfeld? what was the secret deal? i am totally creeped out by this. i don’t know if i can really trust nancy pelosi anymore, since i definitely don’t trust president bush at all. and harry reid definitely cannot be trusted. he is from a red state, is anti-abortion and anti-gun control, and the senate is infamous for making secret backroom deals, especially when it is closely split, like 51-49 or nearby. if you saw fahrenheit 9/11, you saw how nobody in the senate was willing to question the results of the 2000 presidential election. what you may not know is why. there was a secret backroom deal between the democrats and republicans in the u.s. senate. the democrats agreed not to question the presidential election results, and in exchange, the republicans made some concessions on the senate rules or committee assignments or something like that. if one of the democratic senators had questioned the results of the presidential election, it would have broken the deal between the senate democrats and republicans, and there would have been serious retribution from the senate republicans, which would have resulted in the senate democrats having much less power for the next 2 years. in the end, making this deal backfired, at least for tom daschle, the democratic leader in the senate at that time. he ended up losing the next time he was up for re-election. why? he was from a red state, and was labeled an “obstructionist” of president bush, which made the voters of his state not like him. maybe he should have made MORE secret backroom deals, which would have made him LESS of an obstructionist and more of a lapdog, but at least he would have a seat at the table where the important decisions are made... i am sure harry reid has learned that lesson from tom daschle. and that is what worries me.