I’m normally a firm advocate of civility, but this particular manifesto’s level of economic ignorance is so stunning I feel compelled to make an exception. Sweet mother of Ahura Mazda, this stuff is so bad it makes the drivel spouted by the (NZ, but it’s the same in the US anyway) National Socialist Public Radio network look like Mencius Moldbug in comparison. This stuff defines the “Too Smart for Econ” demographic mocked in Freedom Images. So, let’s (both for the sake of my sanity and readability) take it down bit by bit, shall we?
“Demand one: Restoration of the living wage. This demand can only be met by ending “Freetrade” by re-imposing trade tariffs on all imported goods entering the American market to level the playing field for domestic family farming and domestic manufacturing as most nations that are dumping cheap products onto the American market have radical wage and environmental regulation advantages. Another policy that must be instituted is raise the minimum wage to twenty dollars an hr.”
This is like an unholy hybrid of the “Fair Trade” nutters and the worst of the protectionist-paleocon writings I’ve seen. Have these people ever read a serious history of tariffs in America, let alone Britain, Europe or the Orient? Even Paul Krugman is supportive of breaking down tariffs and global markets. To paraphrase RJMII, I don’t want to be associated with anyone who is worse than Paul Krugman.
I’ll hold off on the raising the minimum wage commentary for now, for reasons that will soon become apparent as we head further down the list.
“Demand two: Institute a universal single payer healthcare system. To do this all private insurers must be banned from the healthcare market as their only effect on the health of patients is to take money away from doctors, nurses and hospitals preventing them from doing their jobs and hand that money to wall st. investors.”
Rinse and repeat the above, but with Obama standing in for Krugman. The logic in this one is beyond belief. This same crowd bangs on and on about the “40 million uninsured” statistic, so their solution is to eliminate the providers of the very services these people claim that 40 million are lacking in, and replacing with a monopoly (like, say, the ever wonderful and efficient Postal Service). All the while ranting on about the evils of “monopolies” like Standard Oil.
“Demand three: Guaranteed living wage income regardless of employment.”
And… this means what, exactly? What is the difference between this and food stamps? A living wage by whose standards? Pretty much everybody in America lives in luxury by the standards of most of the world. Of course, I doubt the poorest percentile of Americans make up more than 1% of this alleged “99% Group”, or give a hoot about it, and as Exhibit A for this claim I present…
“Demand four: Free college education.”
Bingo! Hipster college kids ahoy! And how do they intend to pay for the “human right” to an education that until about half a century ago was the exclusive province of the nobility? Just watch this space and see…
“Demand five: Begin a fast track process to bring the fossil fuel economy to an end while at the same bringing the alternative energy economy up to energy demand.”
I’m holding off on this one too, since it’s going to expose it’s flaws in all their glory in just two demands…
“Demand six: One trillion dollars in infrastructure (Water, Sewer, Rail, Roads and Bridges and Electrical Grid) spending now.”
See demand four. The plot thickens. How are they going to pay for it all?
“Demand seven: One trillion dollars in ecological restoration planting forests, reestablishing wetlands and the natural flow of river systems and decommissioning of all of America’s nuclear power plants.”
And here we go with demand five to boot! If they hate fossil fuels so badly and want to save the world from global cooling warming climate change TM from carbon dioxide emissions, why do they want to close the only viable, clean and efficient energy source currently available with modern technology? What’s their timetable for closing these plants? What are they going to do with all the people fired from closing these plants? What are they going to do with all the leftover land and waste? So many questions, so little time… and of course, there’s still the question of funding.
And to close the point I was about to make in demand one, a $20 minimum wage will probably be a pay cut with all the new trillions flowing into the economy.
“Demand eight: Racial and gender equal rights amendment.”
Holy guacamole, THIS is a blast to the past! Seriously, what do they think the US is, Apartheid South Africa? Are there still seperate drinking fountains, is there some active counter suffrage movement? Not to mention the overwhelmingly WASP makeup of these protesters… who died and gave these trustafarians the right to speak for the working poor?
“Demand nine: Open borders migration. anyone can travel anywhere to work and live.”
Free trade is bad, but open borders is good! I know people here have their disagreements on the immigration side, but surely we can all agree that is some pretty damn strange logic going on there.
“Demand ten: Bring American elections up to international standards of a paper ballot precinct counted and recounted in front of an independent and party observers system.”
There are few words I despise with greater passion than “international community”, “world opinion” and “international standards”. Whose standards? The UN, who can’t even stop their own “peacekeepers” running sex trafficking rings in the Congo? The EU, who have all the respect for national sovereignty and public opinion of Abraham Lincoln? Bulawayo’s standards? Cuba’s standards? Zimbabwe’s standards? Not that I’m defending the US system here, but whose standards are we going by here?
“Demand eleven: Immediate across the board debt forgiveness for all. Debt forgiveness of sovereign debt, commercial loans, home mortgages, home equity loans, credit card debt, student loans and personal loans now! All debt must be stricken from the “Books.” World Bank Loans to all Nations, Bank to Bank Debt and all Bonds and Margin Call Debt in the stock market including all Derivatives or Credit Default Swaps, all 65 trillion dollars of them must also be stricken from the “Books.” And I don’t mean debt that is in default, I mean all debt on the entire planet period.”
Ah-ha! Now we see their plan for paying for it all? Just “Drop the Debt”, like Bono says (or is it Robbie Williams? It’s hard to keep track…) and we can have free love and free doobies for all!
How do they intend to get all 200 of the world’s countries (if you want to be generous, you could cut it down to the dozen or two nations that are creditors) to give up their debts by slowing a few New York commutes? How do they intend to pay for at least 2,000,000,000,000 dollars of spending (and obviously a lot more when you factor in the free college) after they magically cancel all debts? Do these people realise that’s nearly 3 times the annual operating budget of the entire Department of Defense? And what of Social Security and Medicare, which already have many trillions in unfunded liabilities, and which these people will undoubtedly expand? How are they going to pay for all this?
They’ll probably cry “Tax the rich!”, but leaving aside the fact “the rich” (a percentile which encompasses everyone from a small businessman with a million in the bank to Bill Gates, the difference between which is as large as the difference between that small businessman and a Zulu tribesman) already pay the lions share (I believe it’s either 64% or 70%, but feel free to correct me on that one) of federal taxes (even when you factor in offshore tax shelters and the like), an 100% income tax on every person on Earth would not be sufficient to pay off the US national debt within years, and that’s not even counting the aforementioned unfunded liabilities. And even assuming this magical debt forgiveness works, their policies are just going to pile on the debt, except replace “trillion dollar bailouts” with “trillion dollar tree reforestation programs”.
“Demand twelve: Outlaw all credit reporting agencies.”
This is the economic equivalent of demanding the banning of fire alarms for causing fires. And is eerily close to measure 5 of old Karl’s manifesto, to boot:
“Centralization of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.”
“Demand thirteen: Allow all workers to sign a ballot at any time during a union organizing campaign or at any time that represents their yeah or nay to having a union represent them in collective bargaining or to form a union.”
Errm… alrighty, then.
If this is the Great Depression, these folks are like the red headed stepchildren of the Share Our Wealth movement.
Anyone else want to dissect this trainwreck?
