Clayton - this post put a huge smile on my face. Now I just have to read it!
You’re post had me laughing at the sheer…ridiculousness of it all. I know I should be cringing in fear that this is all true, but I have no real world context growing up in a sheltered suburban American home where I can live life in relative peace. We are so damn lucky to even be having this discussion.
“Yes, the elites in every region want to control and enslave the masses under their realm of influence to the service of their own interests. But nukes, international banking, oil conflicts, intelligence agencies and so on have nothing to do with controlling the masses and everything to do with protecting and expanding the turf of one power group at the expense of another. Controlling the masses is a matter of controlling the flow of information and perverting the culture to promote the ends of the ruling elites.”
Wow, we really are just a minor annoyance to them, aren’t we. This insight completely changes the way you think about the world. Amazing stuff.
“the poor benefit from the crumbs of freedom that fall from the table of the rich”
Did you think this up? Mind if I use it?
On a side note, since you bothered to respond to my post in full detail, would you mind explaining how the quote feature works on this forum? I can see the blue quote button below the post I’m responding to, but I’m too stupid to figure out how it works and end up clicking it repeatedly to see what happens.
On another side note, have you read the Song of Ice and Fire series by George R. R. Martin? It’s basically about ruling families in the middle ages jockeying for power back when it was out in the open. It’s fantasy, but it’s well-researched and based in historical fact. Really fun stuff. It makes you wish there were forces like magic out there to change the game. Maybe someday aliens will show the Rockefellers who’s boss. Have you read other history or historical fiction books that explore how these families operate?
I’ll probably have more questions once I read your post a couple more times.
This is the second time I have mixed up “your” and “you’re” on this forum. Great way to make an intelligent impression.
LOL - yeah, I did think it up*… you can use it however you like. Oh, one more term for you is “power elite analysis” I think coined by Rothbard… that is the term he applied to the subject we’re discussing. There is also a good book you should read for more information on this whole subject called… surprise… The Power Elite by C. Wright Mills.
As for the quote thing, it’s been broken since they updated the user interface a couple weeks ago. My workaround is to manually copy the text above the Quote link, then use the “Paste as plain text” button in the toolbar above to paste into the window. Then, I manually type [ quote ] and [ /quote ] tags (no spaces) around the quoted block. Really annoying!
Clayton -
*Note that it is a play on a quote from the New Testament where Jesus says to a Gentile woman that she, as a Gentile, may benefit from the blessings of the Jews just as a dog benefits from the crumbs that fall from its master’s table.
Thanks - that makes me feel better about the quote thing.
I read your article about American financial imperialism and look forward to reading more of your blog.
Since discovering Austrian economics and the Mises Institute I’ve been reading mostly Rothbard, who I find amazingly inspiring. I especially love listening to his lectures on iTunes where his genius and sense of humor really shine through. I was starting to get depressed that he is dead so I’ll never get to see him in person. After reading your article I looked up Hans-Hermann Hoppe for the first time (before I just noticed him in passing and thought “hey that’s a funny name”). Now I get to read all his stuff and maybe even meet him since he’s still alive! I never thought my life ambitions would include meeting some obscure economist named Hoppe, but go figure.
I hope to meet Hoppe one day, as well.
Clayton -
This paper by Hoppe makes interesting insights on the subject.
Clayton - I have been thinking about your “family as the ultimate unit of power” theory. While I think it is most likely, I still can’t get it out of my head that the power elite might have something else motivating them that transcends the securing of family interests. Something like a religion or an ideology that has become an obsession. This is where secret societies get to me. If the people in a secret society have a belief (for example, “we need to create a world empire to spread happiness and stability”) that is more powerful than self-interest, would this change the ballgame?
You wrote:
Perhaps this is not always true. Perhaps the people in a secret society could be truly “selfless” in the sense that all they really care about is the goal of the society. After all, very few people ever get to the center of an Illuninati-structured society. While all humans are biologically wired to be selfish, people throughout history have overcome this instinct in extraordinary ways. Could the greatest threat to liberty be the groups of people, family or otherwise, who put aside their interests in the quest for power or other goals that destroy liberty? Could these people, free from their own desires, sacrificing everything for a higher purpose, then play on the interests of other selfish elites? Could there be an ultimate string-puller puppeteering even the power elite themselves?
Or is this crazy conspiracy babble?
I think that’s what’s implied in any “secret societies control the world” hypothesis but I go back to the principle that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. The existence of people who do not pursue their self-interest is an extraordinary claim indeed for which I see precious little evidence. People often make the mistake of confusing their overly-narrow definition of self-interest with forsaking self-interest.
Well, they apparently overcome it in many extraordinary ways… but I’m not sure the monk who has taken a vow of celibacy (extraordinary self-sacrifice) is not pursuing his self-interest… he just has a different set of priorities than most people vis-a-vis the relative importance of sexual pleasure on the one hand and a feeling of goodness or moral purity on the other.
I think you’re not consistently applying the idea of self-interest to humans. On the one hand, you say they’re doing it “for the sake of power” but on the other hand, they’re acting selflessly. That doesn’t make sense… they’re simultaneously being selfish and selfless??
You have partly answered your own question above… you said, “very few people ever get to the center of an Illuninati-structured society”. Another way to say it is that very few people are at the top of any hierarchical organization… there are only a handful of joint chiefs who run the entire military, of those, just one is chairman, just one defense secretary and just one commander-in-chief. But the people at the top are the final decision-makers, so their interests determine the whole course of the organization. You will notice that in such organizations, organizational security is reinforced by ensuring that the only senior leaders that rise to the top are individuals who have devoted their entire life to the organization and, preferably, belong to a family who has devoted more than on generation to the organization. It’s the same whether you’re talking about the DoD, CIA or the Vatican. These organizations maintain organizational integrity and security by making it extremely difficult to subvert and infiltrate the organization and very hard for defectors to betray the organization without detection. But they still do, look at Aldrich Ames or Richard Hanssen. What I’m saying is that families are less vulnerable* to these threats to organizational integrity.
That means that a wealthy/powerful family has an edge when its interests collide with the interests of an artificial organization. Sure, the Federal government’s agencies have virtually unlimited funds, something no private family can even begin to compete with. Any one of the richest families in the world have nothing comparing to the Federal government’s $2 trillion defense budget. But they don’t need that budget, they’re not trying to defend and expand a world empire. And they can subvert the instrument of government to their own ends. And we’re talking about a process that has been going on for basically ever - we’re not talking about a wealthy family trying to stage a government takeover from scratch in 2010. We’re talking about wealthy families that have become part of the DNA of the political system going back centuries. “No one cares for the property of others as well as he cares for his own property” - Milton Friedman. The Federal defense bureaucracy budgets, in the final analysis, are “the property of others”. But that doesn’t mean those resources can’t be wielded in ways that are profitable for private interests. It is my contention that the incentive to find ways around the bureaucracy and turn the machine to the service of private interests is overwhelming and public bureaucracies will, inevitably, be subverted to private interests. The government can’t stop the inflow of drugs because there is so much money to be made from drugs that a route will always be found around any obstacle the government attempts to put in the way. I think the same principle describes the essence of all public bureaucracies, most notably the defense bureaucracies.
Secret societies matter but I think the way in which they are important is the way they connect powerful families together. In this sense, such societies have the same effect as alliances through marriage and so on.
Clayton -
*but still not invulnerable
My brain hurts for the moment. I’ll get back to you in a bit.
under a universal world government, at least the Statists would lose the “if you don’t like it, you can leave” line.
And I guess we wouldn’t have any more ‘war’ but would likely have a much bigger police state, and although there might be ‘free trade’ there would probably be more regulation.
You’re right. All I did was try to argue that one type of self-interest is more selfless that another type, which is nonsensical. I will assume from now on that nearly all human actions serve to satisfy some desire, whether material, physical, psychological, or spiritual. Okay, now I’ll try to restate my point. I’ll start by summarizing your position as I understand it:
[start of summary]
You said earlier that “the end is always the satisfaction of some want or the alleviation of some suffering. But since the demand for this satisfaction is unlimited, more wealth can always be turned to the greater satisfaction of these ends.” In other words, all people are trying to satisfy their wants or alleviate suffering. The power elite differ from us primarily because they have infinitely more wealth, so they have virtually unlimited access to the means (housing, trasportation, communication, etc.) for achieving these wants.
So what are the wants of the power elite? Obviously, they vary widely if you look at specifics. Some of theses interests have little impact on world politics and human liberty, like Dick Cheney’s desire for constant medical security. This is a defensive interest. But security interests can also become aggressive, and this is when human liberty is destroyed.
This is where your “gang turf” theory comes in. Instead of dividing the world up into countries, we could divide it up into sections of turf controlled by different elite families. Now, new interests comes into play: The protection of one’s own turf against the encroachment of others, or the expansion of one’s turf at the expense of another. In this battle over turf, governments become an invaluable tool, so every government across the globe is subverted to serve the purposes of one gang or another. The masses are merely a minor nuisance, and brainwashing them is a simple task achieved through television, entertainment, left/right “politics,” meaningless elections, etc. The loss of human liberty for the non-elites is just the collateral damage in the battle among the elites. Every now and then we get a “crumb of freedom” when that freedom isn’t important to the strategy of the gang war raging behind the scenes. If the power elites decide they can benefit in their war by taking that freedom, then they will. They are ruthless and paranoid in their constant struggle over turf.
[end of summary]
Well, I don’t know if that summary was accurate, but it helped clear up my mind. It also made me think of some new questions:
What role, if any, does ideology play in the actions of the elite? Does family loyalty always trump political, moral or philosophical principle? Where are the super-rich families, if any, who can’t justify mass-murder and the battle over turf, and instead decide to mind their own business or fight on behalf of the masses? Do they just fall out of the game?
It seems to me that in order to be in the gang war in the first place, you can’t think very far beyond the interests of self and family. You can’t have lofty moral principles. So, naturally, the world is controlled by super-rich, compassionless thugs. It really is just like when we had kings. Nothing has changed.
Another question: Where does the American Revolution fit into all this? Did it prove that elites could value liberty, or were the Founding Fathers not really elite in the sense we are discussing?
So…I completely lost track of my original point about secret societies, which I’ll put aside for now.
I will now lapse into depression at the utter uselessness of trying to do anything to make the world a better place. I am one of the most privileged, free, wealthy, and educated of the 7 billion people on earth, yet I am still just a pawn in a global gang war, doing my part by paying taxes into the war’s engine.
Okay, that won’t get me anywhere, but it’s a pretty realistic reaction, right?
erratum: “Richard Hanssen” should be “Robert Hanssen”
Close enough for government work. 
Well, the elites are just ordinary human beings … with lots of money. I think that when you read about the wealthy families in specific, you find lots of family quirks, “rebels” within the family, ideological patriarchs with crazed notions of using their wealth and power to change the world and so on. I think many powerful people fall into the trap of becoming “punch-drunk” on their power and imagine that they can remake the world of human affairs just like redecorating a house. That is, they apply their aesthetic judgment to society and attempt to use coercion to remake society as they see fit. This mindset is not restricted to the wealthy and powerful, it’s just that those who aren’t wealthy and powerful can’t do as much damage because they simply do not have the means.
But, if you think about it, a powerful individual using his wealth to “remake the world” is acting in an economically irrational way, that is, he is squandering his wealth on non-investments, things that will not increase his assets. Such expenditures might make him feel good but will substantially decrease his net asset value (NAV), the same way going on a credit-funded shopping binge can make a consumer feel good while substantially decreasing his NAV.
I would think that the more cynical individuals who happen to be very wealthy and powerful would be hesitant to waste their money on projects to supposedly “improve society”. Such individuals would spend their money in more useful (to themselves and their business interests and the business interests of their family and associates) ways and would, in the long run, out-do the more ideological holders of wealth and power. The revenue stream of of the wealthiest families is heavily affected by government actions and regulations, so it makes a lot of sense for them to spend money influencing government. Convincing people that oil is good (or, if your businesses are in competition with oil producers, that oil is bad) just makes business sense - when it comes time to lobby the popularly-elected Congress, it helps to have Congresspersons whose constituencies already agree with what you’re lobbying for. So, yes, the wealthy and powerful spend money “brainwashing” or propagandizing us but that, in itself, is not necessarily sinister. It would be silly for them not to spend money in that way.
Wealthy people, just as much as anyone, can be arbitrary and ideological. However, I think the “market” punishes such arbitrariness. Those who are wealthy and powerful have more to lose, so they have a greater incentive to act rationally, that is, not to waste their effort and wealth on remaking society.
Well, how would they know what constitutes “fighting on behalf of the masses”? Let’s say you’re the Rockefeller patriarch and you launch a campaign for real liberty, to spread the message of classical liberalism, and so on. While you would be doing good and your actions would genuinely benefit society, there are two problems with it. First, you would be foregoing the lobbying and other expenditures that you used to invest into keeping government actions aligned with your interests. With your hand removed from the steering wheel of government, the other wealthy interests will turn it exclusively to the pursuit of their interests which often will be antagonistic to your own. That is, you are failing not only to expand your turf as widely as possible, you are failing to defend the turf you do control. Second, populist movements funded by wealthy interests are always interpreted by other power interests as a prelude to some kind of economic or physical war. Every rich and powerful person around the world would be scratching their heads, going, “now what is he up to??” They might conclude that you are preparing for war, revolution or, worse, trying to build a tax haven so you can cause capital flight from other countries into yours, where you can pounce on it for your own enrichment. All of these scenarios would invite aggressive (warlike) response from your peers.
So, I’m not sure that the “failure” of the wealthy and powerful to spread the message of liberty is necessarily indicative of a Darth Vader-like misanthropy. I think it’s more that they have a lot to lose and pursuing such ancillary goals as promoting individual liberty would not only expose them to losses but would invite aggression from their peers.
Yeah, pretty much. I think many wealthy people want to do good for society but they have no reason to think deeply about what really is good for society, which is why there are so many half-baked, nonsense “charities” like Planned Parenthood or other population-control, ecological organizations funded by very wealthy donors. Plus, if you’re at the pinnacle of power, the more people there are, the more likely there will be someone born who will be able to knock you from your position. Status quo is better preserved by low population than high population.
I don’t know.
Well, don’t lose too much heart. The fact that you are forced to serve the regime is not just an artifact of the power of the regime, it’s an artifact of the folly of your fellow men who willingly choose to enslave themselves and, consequently, you along with them. Looked at this way, the slavery is not inescapable, you just have to think outside the box to figure out a way of escape. My current view is that the best way for an un-capitalized individual such as myself to move out of the condition of common slavery is to save up enough money to open a small business (doing anything profitable, makes no difference what) and then take advantage of the tax breaks. The government offers tax incentives for people to go into business not because they want you to keep more of what you earn if you’re a businessman but because businesses help the government collect taxes from the people those businesses employ. The less “cash economy” or “grey market” there is out there, the better for the government. So, by going into business, you essentially become a tax farmer (publican) and help the government tax people more effectively. But since the whole reason we’re in this predicament is the prevailing immoral sentiments among the very people you would be employing - that there ought to be an expropriating Leviathan enslaving all of us - I can’t see feeling guilty about it.
Clayton -