On the Edge
Atlanta, GA
November 7, 2020
Trump insulted the World War I veterans, so they all voted for Biden.
– Michael Malice
Unfortunately, it looks like one of them will win.
Like a mugger in a police line-up, he was identified this morning. Meanwhile, the other crook continues to make his case. He is going to court, trying to stay in the big house.
As one writer put it the other day, all of this…the election, the campaigning, the debates, the claptrap…feels like a sand storm. In the middle of it, you see nothing else. But afterward, despite feeling a little disoriented and quite dirty, all is essentially the same.
Only now, as the dust settles and we rub our eyes, we find ourselves moving little closer to the abyss.
Politics matter far too much. In a free country, elections would be almost irrelevant. Most people, living their lives and tending their flock, shouldn’t know or care who won. The victor would have such little power that it’d barely escape being no power at all.
And that speck of authority would diminish with distance. Over the life of any American, a local alderman should have far more influence than a president of the United States. Had that assurance not been given in the state ratifying conventions, the Constitution would never have been adopted.
The states were sold a bill of goods before they received a bill of rights. Unfortunately, there seems to be no going back, or getting out. The Articles of Confederation are not returning, nor articles of secession forthcoming.
With such obvious, reasonable remedies off the table, we are left with persistent vitriol (and growing violence) among peoples and states that have no business being forced together. But here we are, jackals and lions confined to the same cage.
Inside this pen, and unchained by the Constitution, elections become referendums on which Americans will rule (and lord it over) the others. With stakes so high, charity runs low.
And cults of personality inevitably emerge. Bombastic blowhards, corrupt hacks, and sociopathic non-entities become repositories for the dreams and desires of the deluded denizens of a dead republic.
But the empty vessels that float atop the ballot are ornamental distractions from the true power under the surface. While emotional hypochondriacs are kept unhinged by disrespectful tweets, hyperbolic reactions, and other trivialities, the issue that matters most was, as usual, not even raised.
CS Lewis identified pride as the most insidious of the deadly sins, because it is the fountain and font of all the others. With regard to government grift and corporate graft, the same can be said of monetary malfeasance and counterfeit currency.
A hundred and ten years ago this month, like a sprig of kudzu in a Georgia forest, the Federal Reserve sprouted from the reclusive sands of the Georgia coast. For decades it spread under the soil, almost undetected.
By the 1960s, it had taken firm root. A few years later, it received more fertilizer. Today, this noxious weed covers, and is asphyxiating, the forest. The few large, well-established trees still stand, and gain strength. But those without well-connected root systems have fallen, without making a sound. Almost fifty years ago, they received the initial push.
To paraphrase historian Paul Johnson, the modern world began on August 15, 1971.
It seemed a normal enough day, and around the country families enjoyed familiar Sunday routines. We can imagine a typical scene.
It was the Feast of the Assumption, and began accordingly. In Catholic families, Our Lady was honored. Rosaries were prayed, Masses heard, respects paid. Returning home, grace was said, as prelude to a large mid-day meal.
Laughter, argument, food, and drink raised spirits and filled bellies. As dinner ended and evening approached, thoughts of the coming week crept in, an unwelcome encroachment on the weekend respite.
In the kitchen, dishes were put away, but the booze stayed out. In the living room, feet went up as the sun went down. Before they did, they walked across the room, and turned on the TV. It was Sunday night in the early 70s, and this was America. It was time to watch Bonanza.
Many claim that the thirties started on October 29, 1929, that the sixties didn’t begin till November 22, 1963, and that the twentieth century didn’t really end till September 11, 2001.
Those were all obvious points of demarcation, and departure. Clear before-and-after moments for those who lived thru them, and retrospective ones for those who followed. They represented distinct thresholds from one mood to another, like stepping suddenly from the Hall of Mirrors into a bed of manure.
On August 15, 1971, the need for hip boots was not so obvious. But in retrospect, the gilded reflections started to fade, black flies grew thick, and…like a foul odor from the stables on the Ponderosa Ranch…a distinct stench began to rise.
That evening, President Nixon pre-empted the Cartwrights to tell Americans their prices would be fixed, and to inform foreigners their gold would be confiscated. For the first time since Roosevelt stole gold from his own citizens, the US government explicitly repudiated its debt so it could continue implicitly doing so.
Nixon assured his impatient audience that, if they wanted a real bonanza, these banana-republic maneuvers were temporary yet necessary. The price of goods would soon be unleashed, but the price of the dollar has remained untethered. As Milton Friedman said, there is nothing so permanent as a temporary government program. Unfortunately, Uncle Milty was all for this grotesque, slow motion heist, which continues to this day.
Yet despite its persistence and acceleration, the robbery is rarely part of political dialogue. We hardly debate it, and almost never discuss it. It simply doesn’t come up.
We are allowed to argue whether tax rates should be 39.3% or 34.2%. That’s fine. What we aren’t permitted to contemplate is whether an income tax should exist at all, or if a state-sanctioned cartel should be able to destroy society by counterfeiting the currency.
So, this year, as in every other, we didn’t.
Whoever is president, regardless which party controls the Congress, phony money is the key to everything. It opens the door to endless wars, wealth inequality, twin deficits, COVID lockdowns, crony corruption, pork barrel boondoggles, financial bubbles, Wall Street bail-outs, Main Street decay, and cultural corrosion. It is the fetid fluid of the Deep State swamp…the ultimate source of political patronage, crony connections, and insider wealth.
This foul “liquidity” shortens time horizons, sacrifices saving, discourages production, and washes away even the pretense of limits. And it pushes civilization to the brink, which we seem to be nearing now.
But the subject was not on the ballot last week. Both sides favor the debasement and its bounty, so would rather talk about something…anything…else. So they did.
No society…whether ancient Rome, revolutionary France, Weimar Germany, or modern Venezuela…that has peered into the monetary abyss has failed to fall.
So the US government has taken a different approach…that of Wile E Coyote. They’ve decided not to look.
JD
