The crazy train that is America keeps rolling. The privilege of wealth, and the tilting of the scales of justice for the rich, were once again apparent when Trump’s $454M Bond requirement was suddenly and inexplicably reduced to $170M and he was given another week to comply. That probably sits well with the thousands of people in jail who can’t meet their bond obligations. But par for the course I suppose.
I just finished reading ‘The Jungle’ by Upton Sinclair. It’s been on my list and on my shelf for years. Terrific narrative that could just as likely have been written today instead of 1905. The book details the brutal working & living conditions in the Chicago stockyards at that time. The systematic and deliberate exploitation of workers in the feverish race for higher and higher profit margins. The companies bust unions, pay local officials to ignore safety and humanitarian laws, bribe inspectors, and continually bring in immigrants who can be easily leveraged to accept terrible working conditions under fear of being deported or imprisoned. So……as I said. Pretty much the way the big slaughterhouses work 120 years later. We have laws in the US that make it illegal to take video or photos inside of animal processing plants. These laws exist to ensure the public does not witness the horrific conditions for the workers or the inhumane treatment of the animals. We have the weakest food safety inspection laws of any developed country in the world. In short, we have the foxes running security in the henhouse.
Capitalism.
As humans on this planet, we are entirely dependent on a complex array of natural systems. The ocean currents, the atmosphere, the inter-connected web of food chains in our ecosystem that feeds 8B+ people. The equilibrium achieved over millions of years that maintain this balance will soon collapse. That can no longer be debatable. The degree of imbalance, the earth’s ability to react, and the impacts to natural systems is still being investigated.
COVID and other animal-to-human viruses are increasingly common in a warming planet determined to eat more animal proteins.
Wealth inequality, climate change, insufficient health care (quality and availability), disregard for negative externalities like pollution, exploitation of human labor, inadequate education systems and nearly every other social ailment we face in the US can to a very large extent be traced back to capitalism. Specifically, modern American Style capitalism, which promotes a growth at any cost mentality. Hence the impact to the globe and humans, in favor of enriching the 1%.
A reasonable profit for large corporations is no longer acceptable. We must have extreme profits which ultimately benefits only a handful of humans to the detriment of the masses.
Walmart hiked prices on its Great Value food brands.
— Robert Reich (@RBReich) March 23, 2024
The result? Its net income spiked 93% to $10.5 billion towards the end of 2023.
Walmart rewarded shareholders with $5.9 billion in buybacks and dividends.
When I say price gouging is driving inflation, this is what I mean.
Capitalism is based on the premise of perpetual growth — which of course is nonsensical. Earth is a closed system that is being asked to support a growing population intent on eating more and more animals and consuming more and more fossil fuels and emitting more and more emissions that will continue to warm the planet. We almost exclusively ignore impacts to humans or the planet if mass profits can be achieved. This system is enabled through corrupt political structures that weaken worker, animal, and environmental protections.
In a long article about Boeing airplane safety in The NY Times, it was reported, not surprisingly, that a big part of the poor safety culture at Boeing is the constant pressure to increase the speed of production. Workers are continually pushed to do more and more in less time. Interestingly, this was a common theme in the stockyards in Chicago in 1900 — so it’s a tried and true technique for getting people killed while pushing up the margins.
This is our capitalism — sacrificing safety in deadly industries where accidents are fatal for dozens or hundreds–all to make the already wealthy even more absurdly wealthy.
“For years, we prioritized the movement of the airplane through the factory over getting it done right, and that’s got to change,”
Brian West, Boeing’s chief financial officer
In the US, our food inspection and enforcement protocols are severely flawed. We allow poison and toxins in our food to maximize profits to food companies.
Our country was founded on principles of unbridled capitalism. From theft of Native American lands, to slavery, to mass slaughter of buffalo, wolves, passenger pigeons and other species that were convenient in pursuit of amassing wealth for a few. We, as in the white invaders of an unblemished continent, set that precedent right out of the gate and so that culture has been deeply institutionalized in our psyche and political and economic structures.
Since as long as I can remember we have been told, without evidence or even a serious challenge to the assertion, that without capitalism, innovators would no longer innovate. Jobs would dry up and then disappear. We would become just like Cold War Russia. As if those were the only two options. As if Elon Musk would not create Tesla or SpaceX if he were only able to get rewards of $10B or so.
When I was a child, there was a coal-burning power plant a few miles from our house. It was owned by Dayton Power and Light. When DP&L was ordered by the EPA to install scrubbers to remove the sulphur (remember acid-rain) from their smokestack emissions and also cooling systems to quit filling the Miami River with hot water, they fought the directive through the media and the courts. They levied a huge campaign of fear saying they would have to close that plant and the jobs would go away and the cost of electricity would go so high that no one could afford it.
DP&L lost the court battle, installed the equipment, and reduced the sulphur emissions (not the greenhouse emissions) by 99% or so. The Little Miami River, which had been essentially dead to all fish and other animals for my entire childhood, returned to a lively functioning river with fish and all kinds of other animals dependent on a healthy aquatic ecosystem. And electricity rates continued to go down as they had prior to the upgrades.
And that’s how the game has been played since the beginning of time.
Another good book on the topic is Confronting Capitalism by Phil Kotler.
Below are a few tibdits about capitalism from that text:
- Proposes little or no solution to persistent poverty
- Generates a growing level of income inequality
- Fails to pay a living wage to billions of workers
- Not enough human jobs in the face of growing automation
- Doesn’t charge businesses with the full social costs of their activities
- Exploits the environment and natural resources in the absence of regulation
- Creates business cycles and economic instability
- Emphasizes individualism and self-interest at the expense of community and the commons
- Encourages high consumer debt and leads to a growing financially-driven rather than producer-driven economy
- Lets politicians and business interests collaborate to subvert the economic interests of the majority of citizens
- Favors short-run profit planning over long-run investment planning
- Should have regulations regarding product quality, safety, truth in advertising, and anti-competitive behavior
- Tends to focus narrowly on GDP growth
- Needs to bring social values and happiness into the market equation.
Phil Kotler ‘ Confronting Capitalism: Real Solutions for a Troubled Economic System
I haven’t even started Bernie Sanders’ ‘It’s Okay To Be Angry About Capitalism’ yet. It’s at home on my desk — waiting for me. But I’m already angry. I have been for some time.
It could not be more obvious that our economic and political systems in this country are fatally flawed. I don’t see how anyone could go through the mental gymnastics necessary to refute that. For years, what I’ve heard from friends and colleagues in the US are, ‘we’re still better than most other countries‘ or some other nonsense. Few have lived in any other country and only a handful have even visited another country. Our collective ignorance of geography and relevant details about other countries is well documented. But they repeat (and vote) on what they hear from others.
Comparing ourselves to other countries is not even the right conversation. Why not simply admit our systemic flaws and vow to do better. If we model some countries who have figured out key elements of economic and social framework, then sure, use that as a starting point. But let’s not limit ourselves to any current system of economic or social governance. Let’s invent some new shit that serves everyone but still motivates and inspires ingenuity.
We all know our current systems and structures are insufficient yet we either pretend otherwise, or feel powerless to change. Or, perhaps, a few still think all is fine and dandy.
I’m not so naive to not understand there are some good things about growing up and living in America. We are in top 15% of countries in many ways that are important. But as the richest nation on the planet, should we be satisfied with allowing the poor and least among us to continue to suffer while a handful get richer. Are we satisfied that 5 or 6 people literally have more wealth than the bottom 50% of our nation (~175M people or so). Are we satisfied that we slaughter one another with guns at a rate of several thousand times higher than other developed nations. Are we satisfied that we pay more and get less out of our education systems and healthcare industries? Are we happy to be leaving the planet so much worse off than we when we arrived here and which will almost certainly now curtail all life on the planet significantly over the next several hundred years.
What to do about it. That is the question. Well….voting seems massively inadequate. Writing a blog seems inadequate. Where’s our leader in this pending revolution?
We spent last weekend in Pittsburgh with Brit’s family. My first ever baby shower. It was okay–just a lot of baby talk and a few games. Brittany’s family is super cool which made the whole thing fine. All her aunts and uncles accept me in spite of some obvious flaws in what might have been perceived as the ideal boyfriend for their cherished niece. They are all VERY nice. A real close family. And they have some stories to tell and I caught a few new ones.
I learned that when defending her little sister, Brittany had no constraints when it came time to hand down some ass-whuppins on some bitches. Including, apparently, punching a bouncer in the face when he tried to intervene.
Marvin Sr., Brittany’s dad, is super chill. Easy going AF and knows a lot about food and drinks and so we get along fine. He’s also got some stories to tell. Even after being gone from Pittsburgh area for a decade or more, Marvin still knows a lot of the people walking up and down the strip area of town. He knows where to go for coffee and drinks and every kind of food. He knows where the Italian mafia hangs out for espresso and to play cards, and where to find the best focaccia pizza and pastries and a cold beer.
Brittany and her siblings are known in the family by their nicknames. B-Rat, Sunny-Chen and Feef (Brit, Marvin Jr, and Kara). No explanation was offered and I’ve never asked.
So a good weekend. We got a lot of walks with Marti along the river in spite of it being ridiculously cold for late March.
Marti and I returned on Sunday to Black Dog Ridge from Steel City. Lovely drive through the length of West Virginia on a sunny and beautiful late Winter day.
When I was young, I remember older people complaining to me about how much it sucks to get old. Their aches and pains and regrets. They were sincere and they seemed old to me at the time. Although old, when you’re young, can be anything over 50.
At 61 I don’t feel old. Not mentally or temperamentally. But there are aches and pains—no denying that. Knees and shoulders mostly. Sometimes lower back and hips. Broken bones remind me of the trauma imposed on them from some misdeed or another. Knees without cartilage creak and pop like July 4 firecrackers. But mostly all is fine.
24 years of playing rugby probably did not set me up for success in this regard. But I would not change a thing. Never. If I had it do over again I would start playing at a younger age and play into my 50’s instead of my 40’s.
A couple of motorcycle mishaps are also contributing factors.
There is nothing graceful about lying on the floor at 6:00 in the morning, grinding through a series of pushups and planks and sit ups and whatever else instagram tells us we should be doing. And the super fit yoga instructor cheerfully and effortlessly transforming from pose to pose, intimating that we should be following gleefully along. I am barely contorted into the warm-up pose while she is standing on one hand and twirling like a pinwheel. But I soldier on the best I can while the dog looks at me with that annoying little cocked head that seems to convey confusion and pity.
I am told these things are necessary. And there is enough anecdotal evidence that I try to conform. Most days. Movement. Stretching. A little cardio and a little strength. It’s both the least and the best I can muster. I will not walk amiably into decrepitude, nor will I bend completely to its will and give up all that is fun and sporting in the hope of another year or two on this dying planet.
Marti and I walk 5 miles a day; most days. She reminds me when we fall short of that goal. I sometimes moderate my drinking. I pay more attention to nutrition on a good number of days each week. I wear a helmet now on the motorcycle and when I ski.
Brittany is not yet 38, and is strong and agile, so there is inherent motivation to stay on my game, lest she leave me in a Walmart parking lot or on the side of some lonely country road of a dark night.
So that’s that. That’s my view of aging process at this juncture. I’ll check back in 5 years on this topic.
Humbly Submitted from Greenbrier Valley, West ‘by-god’ Virginia, Unites States of America dammit
The Martini Tales 