“The man of the flesh judges it a righteous thing, That some men that are cloathed with the objects of the earth, and so called rich men, whether it be got by right or wrong, should be Magistrates to rule over the poor; and that the poor should be servants nay rather slaves to the rich. But the spiritual man, which is Christ, doth judge according to the light of equity and reason, That al man-kinde ought to have a quiet substance and freedome, to live upon earth; and that there shal be no bond-man nor beggar in all his holy mountaine…”
-Gerrard Winstanley “The New Law of Righteousness” (1649)
Here, we find, bolstered, the idea that we should strive for more than we now have. Ideals are utopian, and as such, quite impossible. However, we should never stop moving towards the impossible. Whatever the reasons may be, it seems that humans will not take care of themselves and take care of those around them unless there is some ulterior motivation. Thus, we have a system in which, a mechanic will want to fix my car because I can pay for it to be done. We also have a system in which the government will help someone out when they are in need. The point thrust forth in the excerpt above is that humans should be moving and preparing for a system in which neither of these will be necessary. Even if it never comes to fruition, at the very least, we will be evolving into a more independent species and not into a fully dependent species.
“Predatory capitalism created a complex industrial system and an advanced technology; it permitted a considerable extension of democratic practice and fostered certain liberal values, but within limits that are now being pressed and must be overcome. It is not a fit system for the mid-twentieth century. It is incapable of meeting human needs that can be expressed only in collective terms, and its concept of competitive man who seeks only to maximize wealth and power, who subjects himself to market relationships, to exploitation and external authority, is antihuman and intolerable in the deepest sense. An autocratic state is no acceptable substitute; nor can the militarized state capitalism evolving in the United States or the bureaucratized, centralized welfare state be accepted as the goal of human existence. The only justification for repressive institutions is material and cultural deficit. But such institutions, at certain stages of history, perpetuate and produce such a deficit, and even threaten human survival. Modern science and technology can relieve men of the necessity for specialized, imbecile labor. They may, in principle, provide the basis for a rational social order based on free association and democratic control, if we have the will to create it.”
- Noam Chomsky, “Language and Freedom” (1970)
NYTimes.
Honestly? Truly? Without bending the truth even a little? Without even saying, for my own humble example, that 1 million went to infrastructure in, say, New Jersey, when, really, it went to a unfair, over-inflated, non-competitive contract bid? Impossible.
Still, naive as it may sound, at least there is an attempt to be transparent. Something we have not at all been used to for the past 8 years, at least.
Balkinization has an enlightening article on money.
Gold standard is, conceptually, no different than fiat. Both are based on perceived value. Neither have intrinsic value. If anything, fiat is more utilitarian because it is backed by all of the nation’s goods and services, rather than just one commodity. Still, the debate is a valid one, and one that we SHOULD be having.
