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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsWhat DO you call it when democracy is broken at the behest of business?
http://thefloridasqueeze.com/2015/05/03/what-do-you-call-it-when-democracy-is-broken-at-the-behest-of-business/
Democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. Franklin D. Roosevelt, April 29, 1938 (Letter to Congress on the problem of Curbing Monopolies)
We sometimes forget that private monied interests have been campaigning for small government since long before Grover Norquist dreamt of drowning government in the bathtub. In this letter to Congress on curbing monopolies, Roosevelt warns that government must be strong enough to make corporations play by the rules or else well be playing by their rules. Implicit is the idea that our interests dont necessarily align.
The very next words that he wrote were, that, in its essence, is Fascismownership of Government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. Does the word fascism shock you the way it does me? I read this and thought Didnt FDR know that the first person to mention Nazis loses the argument? But of course he hadnt heard that (Godwins Law was coined in 1990), and he was dealing with real Nazis, so we have to cut him slack here.
When Roosevelt wrote this, I believe he chose his words carefully. In 1933 hed encountered a group of right-wing bankers who tried to convince him to turn over his power to them in a corporatist government backed by the military. By the time he wrote this letter hed already dealt with on attempt by big business to topple democracy in order to muscle its way into power. He called these Wall Street bankers economic royalists and warned: give them their way and they will take the course of every aristocracy of the past power for themselves, enslavement for the public.
Wall Street bankers grabbing power for themselves is a very familiar tune. As a matter of fact, the Trans-Pacific Partnership is an overt attempt to achieve many of the end results of a corporate government that Roosevelt warned about.
The TPP asks us to deputize private interests to run public policy as a profit center. This is antithetical to democracy as FDR points out later in his letter: We believe in a way of living in which political democracy and free private enterprise for profit should serve and protect each otherto ensure a maximum of human liberty not for a few but for all. As a successful capitalist Roosevelt knew that you cant have a healthy business environment without fair rules of the road.
We know through leaks that the TPP seeks to tilt those rules toward the largest, most lawyered-up global businesses. Members of the Senate whove seen the actual TPP document are so alarmed theyre asking for it to be declassified. Currently theyre only allowed to read it with a minder present (no notes, no photos), and arent allowed to discuss it with the public. A staffer can read it only if their Senator is there with them by their side. Thats why Senators Elizabeth Warren and Sherrod Brown challenged President Obama to release the text of the negotiation to the public.
Regardless of the secrecy, we know that the most shocking features of the TPP gives corporate lawyers the ability to preempt non-tariff barriers to trade that could impact expected future profits.
Lets be clear non-tariff barriers are government policies that make it possible to have safe food, good jobs and a clean environment. Basically, this is what Republicans call big government. Under TPP, 500 the lawyers for the 1% were empowered to identify government policies on health, environment, labor and safety, that could impact business future profit with the intent of preempting any barrier to profit. These are the details they wont let us see. On this subject, the usually understated Sierra Club says these provisions elevate corporations to the level of nation states and allow them to sue governments over nearly any law or policy which reduces their future profits.
(more at link)
http://thefloridasqueeze.com/2015/05/03/what-do-you-call-it-when-democracy-is-broken-at-the-behest-of-business/
leveymg
(36,418 posts)The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerated the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than the democratic state itself.
That in its essence is fascism: ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or any controlling private power.
― Franklin D. Roosevelt
gelsdorf
(240 posts)Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)Fascism--the Corporate State.
JEB
(4,748 posts)nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)if we know this to be the case, why are we so complacent?
Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)and it upsets the wildlife when I scream.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)the TPP gives up a perfect opportunity to discuss it.
appalachiablue
(41,131 posts)the powerful who opposed his policies the very first year, in 1933 soon after his inauguration. Major industrialists then planned a coup take over of the WH with the assistance of military leader Smedley Butler and a veterans army. Thankfully Butler said no to the industrialists' Business Plot and had the courage to stand up for democracy and testify about the affair before Congress the next year, in 1934.
ananda
(28,858 posts)..
winetourdriver
(196 posts)When I think of these fascist bastards, I think of the millions of people fighting against fascism during WWII and it makes me SICK! What did all those people die for?
volstork
(5,400 posts)Prescott Bush had his company's assets seized in 1942 under the Trading with the Enemy Act when his support of the founders of Nazism was uncovered. How anyone cannot think the current fascist state of America is not tied to the Bushes is completely beyond me.
If everyone knew this history, the repercussions would be astounding...
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/sep/25/usa.secondworldwar
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)cui bono
(19,926 posts)nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)too many view politics like sport where a "team" wins, which ignores policy entirely.
cui bono
(19,926 posts)DirkGently
(12,151 posts)PatrickforO
(14,572 posts)For the last several elections we've been going down the path. Even Obama's election and reelection only slowed the process. And why is he touting the TPP now???
Unless we get a good populist message out and show up at the polls, we're screwed.
Unfortunately, capitalism can't see beyond the end of its nose; short term profit is everything. I've got a friend who says that a capitalist will sell you the rope you're going to use to hang them.
The moral of the story is that capitalism has been such a cancer on the earth that it is now actually destroying the earth.
So if we lose this coming one, our species will lose. Maybe permanently.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)i spend a lot of time on the water kayaking, either in the springs here in FL or around estuaries or coral down in the keys. we're well into a "tipping point" here in FL. we're about to have a water problem like CA, but it will be b/c our water is fouled from salt water intrusion (what happens when we use more water than we have, the ocean seeps into our aquifer). On the other end of the stick, the pH is so off in the keys that the corals are dying...and with them go whole ecosystems. Ugh...i could go on and on. there's so many attacks on our fragile habitat and so little being done to help.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)Lenin was right when he said the capitalists would sell him the rope he would use to hang them.
PatrickforO
(14,572 posts)Very cool.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Globalism isn't what it's cracked up to be.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)in the 90s. I was young and my idea of "globalism" was 'everyone would have SE30s and we'd all telecommute doing fascinating cultural production projects.' which SOME people can do now...getting paid for it is another issue entirely.
I wasn't so much behind Clinton as I was Steve Jobs. I didn't understand about manufacturing, so when it was pitched as "this will be great for the environment" I was like, sign me up. But what was hidden in that is that we'd have no more industrial base, which has been worse for the environment b/c we've switched to resource extraction like fracking which is way dirtier.
they lied to us then, and they're lying to us now. I fell for it once, but i'm not getting fooled again. and neither should anyone else.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)How often have we heard them say, "Globalism is here to stay, better get used to it."
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)there's a stretch of road on I-10 to Tallahassee where a landowner has erected a bunch of signs that say something to the effect of "The UN is coming for our property!!"
how come they're not bothered when there's a real threat of global interests seeking their property?
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)Autumn
(45,066 posts)Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)And then the fight will have only just begun.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)DU gets it.
kentuck
(111,089 posts)moondust
(19,979 posts)though he may not have known what to call it--at least 199 years ago. (see sig line)
I only wish they would have done something to stop it back then.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)when he pointed to the fact that we'd let the military-industrial complex accrue too much power. after that all bets were off.
moondust
(19,979 posts)if some Americans didn't learn the wrong lessons from Vietnam, specifically how profitable long wars can be. It would help explain the long, unwinnable wars in the Middle East started by corporate chickenhawks with little or nothing to lose personally.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)the wrong people learned the wrong lesson.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)Lincoln had a duzy, too:
"Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration." 12/3/1861 at Cooper Union, NYC
DirkGently
(12,151 posts)A lot.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)mountain grammy
(26,620 posts)Amazing what's been going on in Florida and everywhere else for that matter.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)heaven05
(18,124 posts)Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)Unless you maybe wanna argue for 1948 and the Dulles boys with their unholy alliance between the CIA & Wall St.
zeemike
(18,998 posts)But what us little people don't understand is that the PTB plan long term.
They gave up the short term takeover when the Business Plot was uncovered in the 30s and foiled by General Smedley Butler.
But 1963 showed them they could get away with anything as long as they controlled the media, and they have done so effectively ever since.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)it's the same people, too. The Business Plot was Wall Street financiers with the backing of military. they just made the "military" easier and less transparent to outsource with the CIA. it's the same threat, though -- and the same interests lining up in the hierarchy.
Exilednight
(9,359 posts)nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)the action required to fix things.
I've been searching for years for a non-academic word that means "stealing money from poor people" so that the action is implied. rich people need to stop stealing from the poor.
whenever i use plutocracy or kleptocracy, i know i'm leaving people with the feeling that there's nothing to be done. that, it's just the nature of the dystopian future we've created. oh well -- what's on TV tonight.
i think it says something about the culture of progressivism in this country that (from time to time) we find our language to be inadequate to describe things. shows how much "blue sky" there is to work with. there's so much to do we even have to explore our language options.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)and they should know; they invented it.
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power." -- Benito Mussolini
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)as i was writing this i went down a giant rabbit hole about the history of the usage of the word fascism, and to my astonishment there's confusion about if Mussolini actually ever said that. took more over a week to write this stupid essay b/c i wanted to be very careful about how i addressed that language.
which got me to thinking...we don't have a clear citation for Mussolini saying this, BUT we have FDR using this definition in a letter to congress -- as clear cut as it gets. and, it's kinda a better source. i'd always attributed the definition to BM. my sense now is that it was probably something he said on "the stump" but never in official writings, b/c it seems to be what FDR was alluding to.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)the in-house philosopher of Italian Fascism.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)Thank you -- this was driving me crazy. Writers who I completely trust have posts up where they're stumped.
DirkGently
(12,151 posts)Here's one:
orpupilofnature57
(15,472 posts)Fascism
mckara
(1,708 posts)People are starting to catch on!
Americans are not the brightest bulbs in the knife drawer!
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)We've had it for way before Adderall came along!
Demeter
(85,373 posts)including pollution, hoarding, discrimination, fraud, embezzlement, influence buying.....
I could go on, but I'd like to get something useful done today.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)He talks a lot about non-tariff barriers to trade -- well, not in this video, so much. Check out the HuffPo link.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rep-alan-grayson/time-to-end-the-free-trad_b_3246607.html
His new video totally rocks the top-line issues with TPP, which are enough to fill 9 minutes!
DirkGently
(12,151 posts)Should be required viewing.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)We have to stop this damn thing.
When you're already in a hole, stop digging!
kairos12
(12,858 posts)Bossy Monkey
(15,863 posts)TBF
(32,056 posts)at least for capitalists. The rest of us would use the term "corporatocracy" and/or "fascism".
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)that the work they do helps shift the pieces on the chess board. we're all just doing our jobs.
Response to nashville_brook (Original post)
TRoN33 This message was self-deleted by its author.
GoneFishin
(5,217 posts)"TPP gives corporate lawyers the ability to preempt non-tariff barriers to trade"
The term "non-tariff barrier" is important because it reminds us that TPP has very little to do with trade and everything to do with stopping the government (in this context we the people) from creating rules to keep the corporations from cheating and endangering workers or destroying the planet (faster than it is). For other countries, constraints on their tariffs would be a non-starter because some of them actually use tariffs effectively to protect their industries (otherwise known as bariffs and terriers, but I diverge).
So they have tipped their hand. The thing that might have actually increased U.S. exports to other countries, lower tariffs, was explicitly circumvented by this term. At the same time, it does nothing to slow imports of competing goods because the tariff system for imports into the U.S. has not been used to protect our industries as is demonstrated by the flight from the U.S. of about 5,000 factories a year.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)and i live in his district, AND I'm a nerd about the TPP, but it didn't register with me about "non-tariff barriers to trade" until I sat down to write about TPP fast track. The more i dug, the more I found that this this is where they tip their hand.
of the 29 chapters we know about, only 5 deal with tradition trade issues -- the sort of stuff that would apply to "if we don't write the deal China will write it for us." that leave 24 chapters dealing with non-tariff barriers.
in the whole piece i gave an example of "preemption" that i'm familiar with from here in Central Florida. But there's been preemption measures enacted in many states with those 2010 Koch-funded Tea Party Republican governors.
here's something Alan Grayson wrote in 2013 on non-tariff barriers --> http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rep-alan-grayson/time-to-end-the-free-trad_b_3246607.html
GoneFishin
(5,217 posts)So there is pretty much no law or regulation that will be out of bounds. It's a blank check for big corporations.
"Your laws against slavery and human trafficking are increasing our labor costs and making us less profitable. We are going to challenge those laws under the TPP ISDR provision."
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)DirkGently
(12,151 posts)We shy away from brash ideologically loaded terms like "fascism," because collectively we agree so seldom on when a political system has gone too far that we end up comparing everything to Nazis, and nothing really compares that well to the Nazis. They really went the extra mile in terms of horrifying the world. We may not see their specific brand of terribleness again.
But private money trying to undermine democracy? That's not any kind of special evil unicorn. That's common as dirt. It happens every day. We would be buried by private money tomorrow if we stopped pushing actively against it for a second. It's not unique. It's not even particularly evil, really, although its effects if unchecked certainly are. It's just a thing that money and power do to any kind of civilization.
Like Pinky and the Brain, the privately wealthy and privately powerful wake up every morning, drink some fine, strong Columbian coffee, and decide HOW TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD.
One thing we do have in common with Germans and Italians and everyone else who has seen their country go through horrifically destructive political paradigm shifts, is that we *assume things will never get that bad.*
We really do give ourselves the benefit of the doubt. We don't see jackboots in the street or hear bombs exploding above, and we assume things will remain within at least some modicum of sanity.
But that's not true at all. Radical things can happen in an instant, and THE MOST COMMON way is not through crazed painters shooting guns in beerhalls. It's with the stroke of a businessman's pen.
Of COURSE business interests want to force through a sweeping realignment of power, elevating "investors" to the level of nation states and erecting an extra-judicial system run by corporate lawyers to punish countries that interfere with "expected future profits."
It's what they've always wanted. And it's not like we don't see them trying to get there, every single day. It's what lobbyists are for, and lobbyists have all the business they can handle.
We need not to shy away from strong talk. We need to understand that secret international trade agreements are EXACTLY how things can go horribly wrong. Not a shot fired, not a jackboot in sight. But they can still take it all, and they will, and we need to call these massive power grabs out for what they are, and not be bored to sleep by the details, or cowed into not using harsh terminology.
FDR was no conspiracy theorist. He was reporting what he saw, and he'd report the same today if he was here to see this.
Great post.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)it says, essentially, that both parties move their voters based on fear that the other is a "threat to the nation's well-being."
but here's the catch! Democrats are lag R's by 9-points in our ability to raise the threat level. everyone here on this board is sick to death of R's screaming "nazi" at every move obama makes. But they do it for a reason -- b/c it works to move their voters. they don't care if it's TRUE or not.
on our side it actually is TRUE that we're dealing with fascistic elements attempting to amass control...and yet we want to pussyfoot around with academic words like "plutocracy." you know what the average joe thinks Plutocracy is rule by this guy:
If they only realized how close they are b/c it's actually rule by Disney.
sadoldgirl
(3,431 posts)The problem goes farther than corporate and financial control, imho.
They will insist on succeeding with their long term plan, and while
they do they already plan on indirect or even direct physical
control. They realize full well, that there may come a point of
a popular uprising (Bernie's candidacy is an indication), and they
will be ready for this as well.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)in breaking down the situation in Baltimore, for instance, you can't help but come face-to-face with what real physical control looks like. people are arrested before they're old enough to get a job, then they can't get a job b/c of the record, which leads to whole swaths of town where there's nothing but poverty and the streets b/c everything else has been handed over to the prisons.
GoneFishin
(5,217 posts)they exhibit strong fascist behaviors. But their base just perceives it as a pissing match because the rightwing talking heads have been calling Obama a fascist forever.
It is a Rovian tactic to go after your opponents strengths. And since our strongest argument against the right wingers is that they are fascist and destroying the country, it makes sense that they would accuse the Democrats of those same things first in order to neutralize the allegations.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)i think some who carry the Dem banner sit on their hands b/c their campaign coffers depend on Wall Street money. the ones who actually step up and say something get attacked by both sides. there's little incentive to fight the good fight other than to actually win one for real people. and we keep being shown that we're not the priority.
GoneFishin
(5,217 posts)theories. And very few who will call out unfair, unethical, or illegal business practices.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)than thru any kind of physical confrontation.
bobjacksonk2832
(50 posts)Sadly I see no light at the end of the tunnel for this country. Any hope of democracy returning here is pretty much gone. Welcome to the Corporate States of America.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)pampango
(24,692 posts)republicans of that era cut taxes for the rich, cut regulations, cut the safety net, cut immigration, weakened unions, raised tariffs, etc.
FDR (who proposed the ITO) and Truman (who negotiated and signed it) wanted a multilateral organization that would promote and govern trade through consultation and arbitration, not unilateral national actions which they saw as the hallmark of the republican 1920's. And the ITO would have linked trade with labor rights, full employment, business regulation, investment protection and regulation, monopoly prevention, etc.
It is no wonder that a republican congress refused to ratify the ITO saying it gave up too much of our national sovereignty to an international organization. republicans got what they wanted. Now trade is not linked to full employment, labor rights, business regulation, etc.
nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)when these privileges aren't tied to full employment, labor rights, etc...it means that it's these things that are being traded away.
pampango
(24,692 posts)just those things.
NuttyFluffers
(6,811 posts)to the top with you! good readin'.
Erich Bloodaxe BSN
(14,733 posts)nashville_brook
(20,958 posts)Rex
(65,616 posts)And now they make millions off of their snake oil and people buy it up like it was life saving mana. Pathetic.