This Conspiracy Appears Well Past the "Theory" Stage
Here is an interesting tale. It appears at The Federalist, entitled "These Screenshots Show How Google Shadowbans Conservative And Pro-Trump Content". Author and commentator, Doug Wead says: "It appears that Google, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter have all gone to war with President Trump, and are punishing anyone who dares to speak up for him."
He presents an extensive account of his own experience as a case study to establish the claim. It seems like Google, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter need to be made to take a long draught of castor oil, served up under US Antitrust laws. (Antitrust laws, also referred to as "competition laws," are statutes developed by the U.S. Government to protect consumers from predatory business practices by ensuring that fair competition exists in an open-market economy. [Investopedia])
Let's hope that the Trump Administration and the Congress are up for serving up the medicine. Ah, if we could only see a re-make of AT&T, Kodak, and Standard Oil. Them's were the days.
We would do well to remember Adam Smith's dictum--when you get a dozen business leaders into the same room, you will be confronted with two dozen self-serving conspiracies. At least that will be the case when mercantilism is the dominant economic theory--as appears to be case among the giant tech media companies.
Showing posts with label Adam Smith. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Adam Smith. Show all posts
Tuesday, 21 August 2018
Saturday, 14 April 2018
Conspiracies Against Public Citizens
The Perpetual Threat Of Robber Barons
We have often pointed out that businesses ought to be treated with perpetual scepticism. Never trust a group of businessmen alone in a room together. They will often quickly end up scheming how to control the market, create a de facto monopoly, and plunder their customers and the market in general. This was Adam Smith's view--as so many on the right often forget.
We are now seeing just such a conspiracy (whether formal or informal) to control the market and the economy for IT services, particularly consumer IT services.
We have a couple of articles to run on this theme. The first is from James Delingpole.
Smash Big Tech’s Robber Baron Cartel Now!
James Delingpole
Breitbart News
The thing that puts me off libertarianism is the “more libertarian than thou” game so many libertarians like to play. “What? You mean you don’t believe that enterprising heroin dealers should be free to ply their wares in kindergartens so as to catch ’em while they’re young? You’re not a real libertarian. You’re a fascist control freak…”
All right, I exaggerate. But the latest libertarian test is very real – and is the subject of a big falling out between two National Review writers Victor Davis Hanson and Kevin Williamson. See where you stand.
Thursday, 16 March 2017
When Scepticism is Healthy
Fraud, Corruption and Business Interests
Adam Smith, the Scottish "free-trader" was deeply sceptical about the ethics of capitalists, or businessmen, or merchants. Not that Smith fell into the ideological trap into which Marx and Engels and subsequent Marxist ideologues fell headlong. With herd instinct, the Marxists trumpeted the moral purity of the proletariat, the working class, while they excoriated the capitalist class. This euphoria over the moral purity of the proletariat lasted until Marxists assumed control of the regime. Then, overnight, the prols became cannon fodder, subject to oppression and torture.
Smith was more influenced by his Christian heritage. He believed in the ubiquity of sin, greed, and selfishness, throughout all mankind, not just the capitalist or merchant classes. His "solution" to the greed, which led to lying, deceit, manipulation, and extortion amongst businessmen and people of property, was to recognize that the free market--the free exchange of goods and services--was a wonderful discipline upon capitalists. The reality is that capitalists hate competition for themselves, but wish it to be the grand reality for everyone else. Smith said that if you left capitalists alone in a room for twenty minutes they would have come up with all sorts of schemes to reduce competition, control supply, and jack up prices. In other words, they would quickly come up with schemes to defraud. If the free market were to work properly, Smith knew that fraud in all its forms must be policed and punished.
His advice was never to trust a man of property further than you could throw him. Self regulation of capitalist groups would always be a joke.
Adam Smith, the Scottish "free-trader" was deeply sceptical about the ethics of capitalists, or businessmen, or merchants. Not that Smith fell into the ideological trap into which Marx and Engels and subsequent Marxist ideologues fell headlong. With herd instinct, the Marxists trumpeted the moral purity of the proletariat, the working class, while they excoriated the capitalist class. This euphoria over the moral purity of the proletariat lasted until Marxists assumed control of the regime. Then, overnight, the prols became cannon fodder, subject to oppression and torture.
Smith was more influenced by his Christian heritage. He believed in the ubiquity of sin, greed, and selfishness, throughout all mankind, not just the capitalist or merchant classes. His "solution" to the greed, which led to lying, deceit, manipulation, and extortion amongst businessmen and people of property, was to recognize that the free market--the free exchange of goods and services--was a wonderful discipline upon capitalists. The reality is that capitalists hate competition for themselves, but wish it to be the grand reality for everyone else. Smith said that if you left capitalists alone in a room for twenty minutes they would have come up with all sorts of schemes to reduce competition, control supply, and jack up prices. In other words, they would quickly come up with schemes to defraud. If the free market were to work properly, Smith knew that fraud in all its forms must be policed and punished.
His advice was never to trust a man of property further than you could throw him. Self regulation of capitalist groups would always be a joke.
Thursday, 19 January 2017
Utopian Dreams Begin to Fade
When Big Money Stops Talking
It's ironic that the standard, classical Marxist indictment of capitalists is that money rigs the political system and political power in favour of the monied. The classes are at war, and capitalists will always exploit their position at the expense of the working stiff.
We should remember that whilst ubiquitous class warfare is an ideological scam--a simplistic view of history's dynamics--that is not to say that capitalists are never perverse when it comes to their interests. We need to remember Adam Smith's timely warning: put a dozen industrialists and capitalists in a room and within minutes they will be engaged in conspiring against the free market. They will be looking to control supply and demand so as to maximise their own collective interests and profits as a group. Smith's answer to this problem of human self-centeredneess was to resist the desire (and conspiracy) to control the system to the advantage of their class by maintaining an open, free, competitive market. Competition is the best regulator of capitalist greed and perversions.
It was always understood that in the matter of Brexit, there would be "winners and losers". For some businesses, it would mean commercial hardship and the need for adjustments. But for others there would be new commercial advantages to be exploited. It seems now that some of the biggest monied donors (that is, owners and deployers of capital) to the Conservative UK government are pushing back against Brexit. It does not accord with their own monied interests.
This boils down to a classic case of who ultimately controls the UK government and its actions: the crony capitalists, or the voters.
It's ironic that the standard, classical Marxist indictment of capitalists is that money rigs the political system and political power in favour of the monied. The classes are at war, and capitalists will always exploit their position at the expense of the working stiff.
We should remember that whilst ubiquitous class warfare is an ideological scam--a simplistic view of history's dynamics--that is not to say that capitalists are never perverse when it comes to their interests. We need to remember Adam Smith's timely warning: put a dozen industrialists and capitalists in a room and within minutes they will be engaged in conspiring against the free market. They will be looking to control supply and demand so as to maximise their own collective interests and profits as a group. Smith's answer to this problem of human self-centeredneess was to resist the desire (and conspiracy) to control the system to the advantage of their class by maintaining an open, free, competitive market. Competition is the best regulator of capitalist greed and perversions.
It was always understood that in the matter of Brexit, there would be "winners and losers". For some businesses, it would mean commercial hardship and the need for adjustments. But for others there would be new commercial advantages to be exploited. It seems now that some of the biggest monied donors (that is, owners and deployers of capital) to the Conservative UK government are pushing back against Brexit. It does not accord with their own monied interests.
This boils down to a classic case of who ultimately controls the UK government and its actions: the crony capitalists, or the voters.
Monday, 19 May 2014
The Fundamentals of the Labour Market
Ravening Pity
NZ Initiative has been producing some excellent pieces on the fundamentals of economics, markets, employment, production, consumption--that is, articles about what consumes the majority of the average citizen's time, effort, and attention. These pieces, therefore, have a good deal to say about life and living.
The philosophical approach of NZ Initiative draws heavily upon Adam Smith, and can be categorised as representing the classical liberal ideological corner. This is a strength. Adam Smith and his intellectual colleague, John Locke have much to teach us. Moreover, much of what is wrong with the dominant mindset of the day with respect to economics--that is, the majority of peoples' lives and focused attention--is due to them having never learned or having forgotten what the classical liberal scholars have taught.
From the Christian perspective, Smith and Locke have taken some constructs of the Scriptures, but wrenched them out of the biblical narrative, and settled them within a deistic framework. They made property rights the fundamental construct of a mechanistic world set in place by a god, but left to run as a self-perpetuating machine. Without a true foundation and a biblical construct, the world-view of Smith and Locke cannot be sustained--which is precisely what has happened with the downstream developments and effects of classical liberalism. By making property right an absolute, Smith ironically set in place the destruction of property rights by subsequent generations--which is where we are now.
Nevertheless, Smith has much to teach the modern world--with necessary qualifications and reconstruction notwithstanding. NZ Initiatives piece on "L is for Labour Market" provides a powerful illustration of that.
NZ Initiative has been producing some excellent pieces on the fundamentals of economics, markets, employment, production, consumption--that is, articles about what consumes the majority of the average citizen's time, effort, and attention. These pieces, therefore, have a good deal to say about life and living.
The philosophical approach of NZ Initiative draws heavily upon Adam Smith, and can be categorised as representing the classical liberal ideological corner. This is a strength. Adam Smith and his intellectual colleague, John Locke have much to teach us. Moreover, much of what is wrong with the dominant mindset of the day with respect to economics--that is, the majority of peoples' lives and focused attention--is due to them having never learned or having forgotten what the classical liberal scholars have taught.
From the Christian perspective, Smith and Locke have taken some constructs of the Scriptures, but wrenched them out of the biblical narrative, and settled them within a deistic framework. They made property rights the fundamental construct of a mechanistic world set in place by a god, but left to run as a self-perpetuating machine. Without a true foundation and a biblical construct, the world-view of Smith and Locke cannot be sustained--which is precisely what has happened with the downstream developments and effects of classical liberalism. By making property right an absolute, Smith ironically set in place the destruction of property rights by subsequent generations--which is where we are now.
Nevertheless, Smith has much to teach the modern world--with necessary qualifications and reconstruction notwithstanding. NZ Initiatives piece on "L is for Labour Market" provides a powerful illustration of that.
Monday, 9 December 2013
Keeping Business Honest
Industry Groups and Associations Represent Conspiracies
It may come as a surprise to some to learn that business owners and capital investors are evil people--not in any specific or particular sense (as Marxists believe) but in the general sense of universal human depravity shared by all human beings, born and unborn. This general truth is at the core of the Christian faith, being explicitly declared in Holy Writ, (Romans 5:12-14) and professed in its creeds and confessions (for example, ". . . all mankind descending from him [Adam] by ordinary generation, sinned in him and fell with him in his first transgression." [Shorter Catechism, Question 16].
Business owners and capital investors share, along with all men, the blight of universal human depravity. Therefore, it is a reasonable expectation that given half a chance they will take any opportunity to advance their own position, wealth, and well-being at the expense of fellow men.
It may come as a surprise to some to learn that business owners and capital investors are evil people--not in any specific or particular sense (as Marxists believe) but in the general sense of universal human depravity shared by all human beings, born and unborn. This general truth is at the core of the Christian faith, being explicitly declared in Holy Writ, (Romans 5:12-14) and professed in its creeds and confessions (for example, ". . . all mankind descending from him [Adam] by ordinary generation, sinned in him and fell with him in his first transgression." [Shorter Catechism, Question 16].
Business owners and capital investors share, along with all men, the blight of universal human depravity. Therefore, it is a reasonable expectation that given half a chance they will take any opportunity to advance their own position, wealth, and well-being at the expense of fellow men.
Monday, 7 January 2013
The "Invisible Hand" At Work
Vlad the Impaler Whacks France
Providence has a way of trammelling the avarice and humbling the hubris of the New Model Man. Believing he answers to no-one but himself, the Great Humanist Man steps forth to create, as if ex-nihilo, the perfected human society. His key tool is law--the laws of command and control.
At that point, all of creation seems to conspire against our pathetic Hero, making nugatory his grand designs and utopian schemes. We call this the work of Providence--or what Adam Smith termed the Invisible Hand. Christians know and believe it to be the Hand of the Living God, governing the world to secure His purposes, not those of our pathetic Hero.
Taxing the rich more has become fashionable again in the envy-dripping drawing rooms of our modern Don Quixotes.
Providence has a way of trammelling the avarice and humbling the hubris of the New Model Man. Believing he answers to no-one but himself, the Great Humanist Man steps forth to create, as if ex-nihilo, the perfected human society. His key tool is law--the laws of command and control.
At that point, all of creation seems to conspire against our pathetic Hero, making nugatory his grand designs and utopian schemes. We call this the work of Providence--or what Adam Smith termed the Invisible Hand. Christians know and believe it to be the Hand of the Living God, governing the world to secure His purposes, not those of our pathetic Hero.
Taxing the rich more has become fashionable again in the envy-dripping drawing rooms of our modern Don Quixotes.
Wednesday, 30 April 2008
The Wolves are Beginning to Feed
Rapacious Capitalists and Their Running Dogs
When a moral imperative is providing a backbone to a capitalist—beware. Of course, not all moral imperatives are wrong. But there remains a sneaking suspicion that the capitalist will attempt to use the moral imperative to skew the market in his favour, weakening competitors and fleecing the public accordingly.
Adam Smith saw this with astounding clarity. Having a realistic view of human nature, Smith characterised capitalists as being motivated by a “mean rapacity”. He said that when in a group, businessmen “seldom meet together, even for merriment or diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.” (Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations, [New York: Modern Library, 1937], p.128.) The only way to restrain such rapacity was to keep the economy open and subject to full blooded competition. It is the dynamic of competition which restrains and controls the innate rapacity of human beings.
When a capitalist pronounces or seizes upon a moral imperative for their particular good or service, however, all bets are off. For almost inevitably they will turn to the political realm to secure particular non-competitive advantage, subsidy, or protection, for their business on the grounds of a greater good or a higher purpose.
In recent days we have been treated to the ugly spectacle of Patricia Woertz, CEO of Archer Daniels Midland Corporation, which just happens to be the largest ethanol producer in the United States, telling us that it would be a terrible mistake to pull back from producing biofuels. (CNN Money, “Archer Daniels Defends Ethanol,” 30th April, 2008) This is an industry which has been built by government subsidies and tax relief. Federal tax breaks alone amounted to $3.2bn last year. Then, on top of that, we have to add the guaranteed minimum price which the Federal government will pay for raw materials and a multitude of related subsidies and supports. Archer Daniels spent just short of a million dollars lobbying the US Federal Government to secure subsidies and government favours for its business.
But, says Woertz, all this is to the good. Why? Because it will “ensure” that the US will be able to meet the rising demand for energy. Adopting the garb of the humanitarian statesman, Woertz issued a litany of warnings about bad consequences that would flow if the US government pulled back from its subsidies to biofuel (that is, to her company). This would be “wrong. It's foolish. I think it's dangerous. I think it's a mistake.”
Yup, we get the picture. But wrong for whom; dangerous for whom? may we inquire.
The problem, according to Woertz, is the stupid, inefficient market. It is the high price of oil which has driven up food prices, not the plague of locusts that is the biofuel industry. Oh, yes—and what has caused the linkage between food and oil prices in the global market? Your company has—because you are rapaciously taking grain out of the food production chain and converting it to ethanol—all the while subsidised and funded by the Federal Government. No, the market is very efficient. It is responding accurately to the gross distortions which Woertz and her ilk have introduced.
But, then, the kicker: “Retreat from biofuels is just an empty gesture. That won't fill anybody's stomach and won't fill anybody's gas tanks,” said Woertz. To which we need to ask a simple moral question of Woertz and her political cronies: which is morally more important—food in the stomach or gas in the tank? In case it has not occurred to you, people can survive without gas in the tank, but no food is lethal. For the solution to the current food crisis which is already causing severe suffering—and looks likely to result in an horrendous global catastrophe—is simple. If the morally and ethically bankrupt ethanol industry were to stop consuming 30 percent of US corn production—as it currently does—and the figure is going to rise rapidly every year from now on—global prices of grains would ease immediately. Within a year, every staple food price would have fallen sharply around the globe—grains, meat, dairy, fish, and vegetables. Vulnerable lives would be saved.
This is a man made crisis. It is an artificially engendered crisis. It is the confluence of loopy global warming fears, coupled with inhuman greenist utopianism, politicians seeking to curry electoral favour by trumpeting “think big” visions, and of capitalists seeking to take advantage and make what is in effect, blood money.
Adam Smith was right. Beware the capitalist trumpeting a moral imperative and his politician-running dogs. A mean and cruel rapacity is being cloaked. In the end, the wolves will come out to feed. They have now emerged and are starting to feed on the carcases of the destitute and the vulnerable the poor, and the wretched of the earth.
When a moral imperative is providing a backbone to a capitalist—beware. Of course, not all moral imperatives are wrong. But there remains a sneaking suspicion that the capitalist will attempt to use the moral imperative to skew the market in his favour, weakening competitors and fleecing the public accordingly.
Adam Smith saw this with astounding clarity. Having a realistic view of human nature, Smith characterised capitalists as being motivated by a “mean rapacity”. He said that when in a group, businessmen “seldom meet together, even for merriment or diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.” (Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations, [New York: Modern Library, 1937], p.128.) The only way to restrain such rapacity was to keep the economy open and subject to full blooded competition. It is the dynamic of competition which restrains and controls the innate rapacity of human beings.
When a capitalist pronounces or seizes upon a moral imperative for their particular good or service, however, all bets are off. For almost inevitably they will turn to the political realm to secure particular non-competitive advantage, subsidy, or protection, for their business on the grounds of a greater good or a higher purpose.
In recent days we have been treated to the ugly spectacle of Patricia Woertz, CEO of Archer Daniels Midland Corporation, which just happens to be the largest ethanol producer in the United States, telling us that it would be a terrible mistake to pull back from producing biofuels. (CNN Money, “Archer Daniels Defends Ethanol,” 30th April, 2008) This is an industry which has been built by government subsidies and tax relief. Federal tax breaks alone amounted to $3.2bn last year. Then, on top of that, we have to add the guaranteed minimum price which the Federal government will pay for raw materials and a multitude of related subsidies and supports. Archer Daniels spent just short of a million dollars lobbying the US Federal Government to secure subsidies and government favours for its business.
But, says Woertz, all this is to the good. Why? Because it will “ensure” that the US will be able to meet the rising demand for energy. Adopting the garb of the humanitarian statesman, Woertz issued a litany of warnings about bad consequences that would flow if the US government pulled back from its subsidies to biofuel (that is, to her company). This would be “wrong. It's foolish. I think it's dangerous. I think it's a mistake.”
Yup, we get the picture. But wrong for whom; dangerous for whom? may we inquire.
The problem, according to Woertz, is the stupid, inefficient market. It is the high price of oil which has driven up food prices, not the plague of locusts that is the biofuel industry. Oh, yes—and what has caused the linkage between food and oil prices in the global market? Your company has—because you are rapaciously taking grain out of the food production chain and converting it to ethanol—all the while subsidised and funded by the Federal Government. No, the market is very efficient. It is responding accurately to the gross distortions which Woertz and her ilk have introduced.
But, then, the kicker: “Retreat from biofuels is just an empty gesture. That won't fill anybody's stomach and won't fill anybody's gas tanks,” said Woertz. To which we need to ask a simple moral question of Woertz and her political cronies: which is morally more important—food in the stomach or gas in the tank? In case it has not occurred to you, people can survive without gas in the tank, but no food is lethal. For the solution to the current food crisis which is already causing severe suffering—and looks likely to result in an horrendous global catastrophe—is simple. If the morally and ethically bankrupt ethanol industry were to stop consuming 30 percent of US corn production—as it currently does—and the figure is going to rise rapidly every year from now on—global prices of grains would ease immediately. Within a year, every staple food price would have fallen sharply around the globe—grains, meat, dairy, fish, and vegetables. Vulnerable lives would be saved.
This is a man made crisis. It is an artificially engendered crisis. It is the confluence of loopy global warming fears, coupled with inhuman greenist utopianism, politicians seeking to curry electoral favour by trumpeting “think big” visions, and of capitalists seeking to take advantage and make what is in effect, blood money.
Adam Smith was right. Beware the capitalist trumpeting a moral imperative and his politician-running dogs. A mean and cruel rapacity is being cloaked. In the end, the wolves will come out to feed. They have now emerged and are starting to feed on the carcases of the destitute and the vulnerable the poor, and the wretched of the earth.
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