Anyone familiar with the story of Robin Hood knows how the story
starts. Actually there are multiple versions, but for now we'll use
one of my favorites. Robin Hood is a young man with a mean knack with
the bow and arrow. He wants to be a Forester and guard the Kings Deer.
So he goes to visit the Foresters and try out. They challenge him to
prove his archery skills. He shows one example of prowess after
another until someone challenges him to shoot a deer that is so far
away that the challenger doesn't think anyone could hit it. Robin
Kills the deer, the foresters change expressions from mirth and poking
fun, to anger. They go to arrest him and he is forced to run for his
life. The penalty for killing (Poaching) the Kings deer is death.
This story has many levels, but here we'll take it on one of its
surface levels as about the subject of the commons. Of course if
common folks are able to hunt unrestricted in the "woods" they will
eventually kill all the game, just as permitting large companies in
rival countries to vie for who can catch all the fish in the world has
destroyed one fishery after another, history demonstrates that this
has been so about forests, woods and common lands. To prevent this the
"king" has often forbidden "commoners" from hunting "his game."
Unfortunately, that is not what was going on in 13th century England.
The King wanted to hunt deer, and didn't want anyone poaching "his
deer" -- this was a matter of control and whose the boss more than a
matter of protecting the environment. The "King" even a "good king"
such as Richard The Lionhearted, was a man who believed he owned the
country as his personal property. Moreover, he was supported by
aristocrats whose own ownership was theoretically derived from his.
Each of them claimed "rule" over lands that were not their direct
possessions but encompassed private property (homes and farms) and
"commons".
Moreover, the origins of "nobility" were not in "virtue" and
"integrity" but in warfare, violence, dispossession, and group rights.
King Richard was a Norman. His ancestors had recently conquered
England in their deep thirst for acquisitions. His was a faction of
nobles who by the time of King Richard were in the process of carving
out holdings from Scotland to Sicily, and from Portugal to what is
now Syria. It was Norman knights who led the Albigenesian crusade in
order to assert claims in the South of France, and helped the Italians
and Spaniards resist the "Saracens" for loot. They were originally
vikings who had settled in Normandy, learned French, intermarried with
the "Franks" and turned a claim gained after a kidnapping into the
throne of England. All the nobles of Europe started in much the same
fashion. King Richard was "away" because he was leading a war party to
a disasterous war in Jerusalem where the knights killed, raped, looted
and burned with religious abandon.
One story has it that Robin Hood was the son of a Saxon Noble who had
lost his lands to the Normans. Who knows it could be true. Many
peasants were simply the people who were the younger brothers, the
ones on the wrong side of the battle, or folks who kept their heads
down and went about the business of survival. Some peasants actually
did rise in rank, but that was not an easy thing. At some points in
history they were treated worse than slaves.
So Robins situation was indeed of the "poor" feeling like they were in
"fly over" (or ride over) country trodden by ambitious and ruthless
knights conducting theft and murder under the cover of "honor" and
"duty." Ever wonder where the Mafia learned their standards? But this
is a modern perspective. The King Richard of the Robin Hood Tales is
a noble sort who knights good Robin when he realizes that he was
really the victim of the evil Prince John, but the real Richard the
Lionhearted was a man who would stoop at nothing to fulfill his
ambitions. It was his wars that the peasants were being taxed to pay.
King John has been done a dirty trick by history because King Richard
was a "war king" who was more interested in crusading in the "Holy Land" and in France. It was King John was left to try to clean up after him.
http://historymedren.about.com/library/who/blwwrichard1.htm
But even Robin Hood probably wasn't able to think of his King in such
an unfilial manner. Confucianism would have been at home in Middle
Ages Europe.
sources: http://www.mythfolklore.net/3043mythfolklore/reading/robin/background.htm
http://www.engl.niu.edu/tlorde/carter/mainrobinhoodpage.html
The original term for what is now called "privatization" was
"re-privatization." Re-privatization is the "returning" to private hands of something that had originally been private but acquired by the public. For example when a railroad fails such as the railroads that were made into Amtrak, or when a public utility fails and the State has to pick up the pieces. Privatization is the farming out of work to individuals.
(source: http://www.ub.es/graap/JEP.pdf
"The terms "privatize" and "reprivatize" appear in the 1961 edition of Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language Unabridged. "Privatization" was defined (p. 1,805) as "to alter the status of (a business or industry) from public to private control or ownership." "Re-privatization" was
defined (p. 1,927) as "the act or action of privatizing again: restoration to private ownership or control (as after nationalization)."
Writers give credit to Peter Drucker and others for popularizing the term. and then try to trace its history. One writer, In an article in the "Journal of Economic
Perspectives" the author Germa Bel, writes about this history. He writes:
"Although the origin of the term is often attributed to a 1969 book by
Peter Drucker, I will show that this attribution is incorrect, and
that the terminology of privatization played an evolving role in
German economic policy from the 1930s through the 1950s."
He quotes Drucker:
"Government is a poor manager . . . It has no choice but to be `bureaucratic.'" Drucker's (p. 233) analysis of "how government works leads him to what he takes as "the main lesson of the last fifty years: the government is not a doer."
Anyone who works with the Government knows that when poorly organized and poorly managed (for example when managed by people who feel that "Gubbornment is the enemy") it can be stove-piped and waste time and energy without ever accomplishing mission or protecting the public interest.
"Drucker (p. 234) proposed adopting a "systematic policy of using the
other, the nongovernmental institutions of the society of
organizations, for the actual `doing,' i.e., for performance,
operations, execution. Such a policy might be called
`reprivatization.'" Drucker referred to "reprivatization" because he
proposed giving back to the private sector executive responsibilities
that had been private before the public sector took them over through
nationalization and municipalization starting in the last decades of
the nineteenth century."
So when Peter Drucker wrote about privatization he gained the ears of many people. Privatization became so popular it seemed a panacea for Governmental problems. The trouble was that people were neither cognizant of the history of the practice, nor aware of its darker side....
Some writers saw this darker side in recent events.
In this sense "privatization" has sometimes been successful. The author Bel writes the quotes I just gave us and then goes on to show how the term was used in 1930's to describe a policy for building up the power of the Nationalist Party:
"Sweezy stated that industrialists supported" [Natonal Socialist]
"accession to power and his economic policies: "In return for business
assistance, the" [National Socialists] "hastened to give evidence of
their good will by restoring to private capitalism a number of
monopolies held or controlled by the state" (p. 27). This policy
implied a large-scale program by which "the government transferred
ownership to private hands" (p. 28). One of the main objectives for
this policy was to stimulate the propensity to save, since a war
economy required low levels of private consumption."
"High levels of savings were thought to depend on inequality of
income, which would be increased by inequality of wealth. This,
according to Sweezy (p. 28), "was thus secured by `reprivatization'. .
. ."
The idea, is that increased savings can be funneled into war bonds,
which support war industries. And if all works as intended allow those
already wealthy to get still wealthier.
"The practical significance of the transference of government
enterprises into private hands was thus that the capitalist class
continued to serve as a vessel for the accumulation of income.
Profit-making and the return of property to private hands, moreover,
have assisted the consolidation of Nazi party power." Sweezy (p. 30)
again uses the concept when giving concrete examples of transference
of government ownership to private hands: "The United
Steel Trust is an outstanding example of `reprivatization.'"
Corporativism and privatization were indeed policies of the National
Socialists. But the articles out there on the web would make it seem
that they invented privatization, but the truth is it was invented in the Good old US of A and goes back to merry old England. The Germans were imitating us,
not the other way around.
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RL33777.pdf
"Privatization, however, is not a recent phenomenon. Since the
founding of the Republic, the federal government has hired or
contracted with private firms to provide public goods and services.
For example, Congress enacted a statute in 1789 that declared that
it shall be the duty of the Secretary of the Treasury to provide by
contracts, which shall be approved by the President, for building a
lighthouse near the entrance of the Chesapeake Bay, and for rebuilding
when necessary, and keeping in good repair, the lighthouses, beacons,
buoys, and public piers in the several states ...." (1 Stat. 54)"
The US has constantly practiced privatization and sometimes
"reprivatization" as part of a history of party politics and crony
Capitalism that dates back before the founding of the Union. This
should give us some small comfort. But the results are the same
whether it is National Socialists in Germany or in the United States.
Madison was fighting this when he sought to limit the power of the
Federal Government to "build roads, and canals" -- and he was using
the strategy of limited Constitution and States Rights to fight for
the common folks.
On the one hand privatization can be a common good:
"Economic arrangements play a dual role in the promotion of a free
society. On the one hand, freedom in economic arrangements is itself a
component of freedom broadly understood, so economic freedom is an end
in itself. In the second place, economic freedom is also an
indispensable means toward the achievement of political freedom."
But on the other hand, crony capitalism and insider "privatization"
(conversion of public property to private hands) can be a means to
systemic corruption, concentration of power, and the creation of
corrupt regimes. Whether one is talking about Teapot Dome, Tammany
Hall, the creation of the Railroad Barons, corruption at the State
House or at the Federal Level. Or one is talking about Chinese Crony
Capitalism or Nazi Crony Capitalism, the results are the same
atrocious effect.
If the Government moves with deliberative "mission oriented"
tortoise-like speed. Business moves at rapid, mind-dizzying and
sometimes self-destructive speed and can destroy an entire public
system faster than one can say the word "privatize." Putting public
assets in the hands of business is like granting titles of nobility to
the people so honored. And like those people, some will handle it
honorably, others will promptly convert it to swiss or Bahamian bank
accounts. Enron is one example of the result. If private companies
can manage a public asset better, if one gives it to them odds are it
will be withdrawn from public use and converted into a private asset.
That too has been a history of the subject. In reading on the History
of Railroads, Canals, and turnpikes, if one is not careful to give it
a full reading one will hear about how successful "privatization" was.
But that is never the full story. If private canals and roads were so
successful, why did every single one of the original ones end up in
public hands or returned to farmland? The reason is much debated, but
it comes down to what the economists and pseudo economist libertarians
call the "free rider issue." And that "free rider issue" means that a
privatized public asset is a free ride to extreme wealth.
That is why the Chinese made the transition to "Capitalism" so easily.
There is no accident that there is so much scandal. And that the
efforts to "clean up" after a scandal involve finding a scape-goat.
The State went from directly owning everything, to turning those
things over to the hands of the Party Elite. This is a page from the
National Socialists, or Republican Party Railroad Trusts.
And it is the common folks who are dispossessed by these forms of
hierarchical coercive socialism masquerading as "capitalism." These
common properties no longer serve the commons if they are managed and
owned by a few, whether that few is a Party, individuals running
hierarchies, or an incompetent collective. For the commons to be
managed right it has to be managed as a system with each element
managed by people who know what they are doing, and overseen by the
majority because nobody is perfect and the "experts" aren't always as
bright as they seem. Privatization of public assets, as a way to make
a lot of money and create a powerful upper class is a success. As a
short term remedy for stove-piping and poor management, maybe. But in
the long run its a bad deal for democracy or the middle class.
Further reading:
http://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Privatization
Chris
One reason why it is so hard to fight some of the tendentious nonsense
that passes for ideology in the USA is that this fight is very old. The
use of propaganda is old. Herbert Hoover (bless his soul) protested that
Wilson was misusing propaganda to whip up war sentiment for World War
I. And there was a spin machine that helped get us into that war, and
every war since then. Likewise, there are many specious arguments out
there. Here is an example of some of these arguments:
http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=2259
Listen to these arguments and then deconstruct them:
"Similarly, liberals champion the political power of labor unions. But
unions deny the right of individual workers to make their own
agreements with the employer on the terms of work. Time and again,
striking unions use violence to prevent workers from crossing a picket
line. The liberals say nothing as such victims are physically harassed
and even beaten. In the name of "workers' rights," liberals nullify
the actual rights of the individual worker to choose for himself what
conditions of employment to accept."
This argument deliberately reverses the reality of life as experienced
by workers in industries where unions are available. The chief threat
to their individual liberty isn't the Union, but often the very
employers who they have to go to to get a job. Few of them have the
bargaining power to negotiate a contract. Negotiation has
traditionally meant the company demanding pay cuts for workers while
giving bonuses to their bosses. Likewise the reality of strikes is not
worker initiated violence but a history of violent repression. Police,
strike-breakers, and other measures used to violently put down
strikes, break unions and black-list those workers who would join one.
Workers band together in Unions because they perceive that the only way to protect their individual rights is to organize together into self governing groups. Similarly the companies that employ them are organized into legal or illegal syndicates with one another, with local judges, law-enforcement, prosecutors, and other folks invited into their circles. The result is that the real battle is "group against group" not individual against group. Nobodies individual rights are served by either side once the battle is joined until an agreement can be reached.
Individual rights need to be preserved because the individual can never even claim personal property unless those rights are protected. Moreover, those with power are forever trying to corrupt the leaders of groups representing the poor, workers, or others. Sometimes the Union leaders are in the club.
In the name of "right to work" employers regularly nullify individual
workers rights to even have a job. Forcing low wages, and when those
aren't low enough, shipping the jobs to Mexico or China.
If corporations and other collectives didn't arrogate to
themselves so much of the common needs of workers and workers had the
actual power to negotiate, they wouldn't need to form groups to
provide common defense against the collectivist attacks of local
governments and corporations. The issue isn't "individual rights"
against collective rights, but collective groups struggling against
other collective groups.
If the issue can be reduced to individuals with approximately equal
power than the conditions set forth in the paragraph can be made to
have some truth. But that requires that workers have nearly equal
legal and social standing with their bosses.
"Nor is it merely the rights of the workers that liberals abrogate.
For instance, though they claim to defend the elderly, they oppose the
privatization of Social Security. This means they negate the right of
each individual to use his own money to plan for his own retirement.
They negate the right of the individual to take responsibility for the
course of his own life."
Again the stance against the privatization of social security is not a
stance between individual rights and collective rights, but a stance
against the greedy designs of those who would get their hands on
social security and loot it for their own factional collective profit and the other corrupting influences seeking to siphon off private profits from moneys set aside to deal with issues of common concern but that no individual would do anything about.
That is why moderate democrats see nothing wrong with adding moneys to
Social Security programs so that workers don't depend on it, but
resist taking away from the core purpose -- which is to protect
individuals against the greed and rape of large collectives (banks and
investment companies) who whenever they get in trouble invariably loot
their small investors before touching their own assets.
So all these arguments reduce themselves to straw arguments that make
a false argument that the main issue is about "individual" versus
"collective" rights when the real issue is protecting individual
rights from factions conspiring to loot, convert, or infringe them.
"Why do liberals pay lip service to supporting the poor, the elderly,
the worker--while invariably endorsing the violation of the rights of
those very individuals? The answer is that liberals repudiate the
principle of individual rights in favor of collectivism. Only groups
exist in their thinking, and only "group rights" are valid. They see
life only in terms of collectives--the rich versus the poor, the young
versus the elderly, the whites versus the blacks. Individuals have no
reality and no meaning to them."
Indeed this author reveals himself to be thinking as he describes
others thinking. "Only groups" exist for this fellow because he sees
"liberals" as a "collective" and those who think like himself as
defending individual rights -- when in fact that is not so. He also makes other mistakes. If "liberals" violate the rights of individuals they do so for the same reasons and motivations that "conservatives" would do so.
If instead of setting up straw arguments to support collectivist corporativist agendas such as doing away with Unions, Social Security, or Welfare, this fellow would concentrate on things that actually promote human rights, he'd be better off. His arguments only make "ersatz" sense. In other words, they are nonsense.
Chris
I wish I could save you
I wish I could save you.
I wish I could save you,
I wish I could save you from yourself.
I wish I could save me,
I wish it were guaranteed,
but eventually I have to let go
We both await salvation at our peril,
Godot never comes;
we have to save ourselves.
I cannot judge you, I cannot save you,
But I really wish I could.
If I could save you, if I could reach you,
I hope you know I would.
I'm not even sure I can save me,
at least until I know what I need salvation from.
People tell me that God will save me,
But how can they speak for God?
People tell me that the Buddha is within me,
If so then the Buddha is shedding tears.
I can't save me from other human beings,
but at least I can save me from myself.
I can be me, I can be a better me,
and pray that that is enough.
If all is burning all around us,
and in this center place all is well.
I may not be able to save me from barbarians without,
But I can civilize the barbarian within.
I can tame myself.
If all is burning all around us,
then we need to get out of the shell,
and realize that in the final analysis,
within us are both heaven and hell.
We are as near as an invisible curtain,
that only requires us letting go of our lies.
What is important?
I'll save what I can for a while,
and then I'll let go,
goodbye.
Chris
One reason I like Nichiren is that he was a critic. I never was impressed by Buddhism prior to running into Buddhism. As Dharma Jim notes Buddhism is frequently been seen as an almost nihilistic religion:
(see this thread: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dharma-house/message/1888)
"Freedom from attachments" meaning a kind of spirituality divorced from the material world. This is seen in Theravada. A kind of resigned acceptance of the world is seen in Zen. In history Buddhism was a "refuge" for people seeking to escape the world -- with the consequence that the Confucian inspired king of China was forced to forcibly disrobe monks and attack the sangha. The Tibetan monks before being kicked out of their country were most famous for living in palaces of relative wealth and luxury at the expense of their people.
The major historic persecutions of Buddhists weren't inspired by shear nastiness, but by the behavior of Buddhists. By seeking to live in ivory towers they invited
barbarians to attack those towers. Just as the greed of Christian monks inspired
barbarian Magyars and Vikings to attack them.
Both Nichiren, and the founder of Tendai, sought to create a Buddhism that would directly benefit the common folks -- and it is that that i liked about Buddhism.
Chris
Congress just wimped out on the issue of legalizing the President's terror campaign against the 4th amendment. My Congressman voted for (and was a co-sponsor) for the alternative legal plan. But some Congress-criters who I otherwise respect caved into the President's pressure. Mikulsky, Feinstein, others, all caved for some reason I don't fathom.
This President (or at the very least his VP and AG) needs to be frog marched out of the White House, not caved to. I sent emails to my Congresspeople and to Mikulsky. I didn't save the text. I hope they develop some backbone when they get back from recess.
Go to http://www.house.gov or http://www.senate.gov
Chris
http://tinyurl.com/2remlg
and;
http://tinyurl.com/3372sr
The constitution prescribes that when there is evidence of wrong doing in the Executive, that the Legislature, specifically the House, has the duty to act as if it were a grand jury, and vote articles of impeachment. There is evidence of massive wrong doing by the Federal Government aimed at our individual liberties. Congress is investigating this. If the House finds that there is sufficient evidence for further action, and if obstruction of justice is found to be occurring then it has no choice but to vote articles of impeachment so that a proper trial can be conducted by the Senate and the actual guilt or innocence of the offenders be determined.
Gonzales is claiming that there are super secret programs http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/att/
which are so secret that even the courts or our congress are not privy to them, all of which ignore the constitution and violate standing law by executive order.
And he knows what he is doing:
http://www.firedoglake.com/2007/07/30/update-on-bushs-illegal-spying/
"The controversy over the Bush Administration’s illegal surveillance of Americans and the Attorney General’s role in concealing it became more intense over the weekend. Much of the focus was on the side show of whether Attorney General Gonzales did or did not mislead or lie to Congress when he claimed there was never any significant disagreement over the “program the President has confirmed.” But the “underlying crime,” which the Administration keeps trying to sweep under the rug, is and always has been the illegal spying on Americans. And bit by bit, the Administration has been forced to concede it engaged in these crimes for years."
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/04/03/271/
http://impeachgonzales.com/2007/05/
This information has been "out there" but unpursued by those responsible for protecting our liberties -- for years now.
http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Surveillance/NSA/
"In 2002 the President issued an Executive Order authorizing the National Security Agency (NSA) to wiretap phone and email communications involving United States persons within the U.S., without obtaining a warrant or court order pursuant to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA), which prohibits unauthorized electronic surveillance."
"EFF believes the program violates the Fourth Amendment, FISA, the Wiretap Act, and most likely the Electronic Communications Privacy Act. Moreover, it is neither authorized nor justified by the Constitutional power of the executive. EFF is investigating the legal and factual bases for litigation to stop this illegal program, and urges its members to contact their Congressional representatives to get to the bottom of the program and ask their telecommunications providers about any collaboration."
If this doesn't call for impeachment I don't know what does. The administration is not going to accept any compromise. They believe what they are doing is legal. And we cannot even be sure that the Supreme Court would take up this case unless prodded to by new laws.
Leahy: Gonzales Must Clarify Statements
"By HOPE YEN The Associated Press Sunday, July 29, 2007; 3:39 PM
"WASHINGTON -- Attorney General Alberto Gonzales must quickly clarify
apparent contradictions in his testimony about warrantless spying or
risk a possible perjury investigation, the chairman of the Senate
Judiciary Committee said Sunday."
"This is going to have a devastating effect on law enforcement
throughout the country if it's not cleared up," said Sen. Patrick
Leahy, D-Vt."
....
"On Sunday, Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter, the top Republican on
Leahy's committee, made clear that he believed the Justice Department
would be better off without Gonzales. But he said it would be
premature to begin a perjury investigation until the committee could
find out the facts."
Gonzales is not going to appoint a special prosecutor. The House has
only one constitutionally applicable course. It has to seek evidence,
and then vote articles of impeachment.
additional articles:
http://tinyurl.com/39dte2
http://tinyurl.com/ypgy3k
Some like John Dean have been trying to do something about it:
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20070724.html
http://news.findlaw.com/ap/o/51/07-31-2007/d4e00018c635e209.html
John Dean was astonished (back in 2005 when this material first came out):
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20051230.html
Of course he's been a prophet yelling into the wind. He warned about
military tribunals and the direction the Exec. was headed back in 2001:
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20011207.html
But, I've been practicing my advocacy skills here long enough to know
by now, that as long as the government doesn't threaten to raise some
people's taxes they can do just about anything. All the talk about
liberty just devolves to a selfish desire to avoid paying taxes or
being held to the same standards as other people.
I met one fellow who told me how his father was a self-declared
libertarian -- except in his house which he ruled as a tyrant.
Liberty was for him and him alone in practice -- for everyone else
there ought to be severe rules.
Things really haven't changed. John Dean writes:
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20070724.html
"Republicans like to boast of their hard-nosed, no-nonsense beliefs
about law and order. Their motto is, 'Do the crime, do the time.'
However, President Bush's commutation of Libby's sentence of 30 months
in jail again has showed how authoritarian conservatives want the
world to 'Do as we say, not as we do.'"
John Stewart: http://tinyurl.com/3ytr28
It almost happened before:
http://tinyurl.com/yqsomy
Abuse at the national level reflects abusiveness at the local level:
http://tinyurl.com/2pegfu
John Edwards agrees:
http://blog.johnedwards.com/story/2007/4/2/3851/30457
ACLU: http://www.aclu.org/safefree/general/28275prs20070207.html?s_src=RSS