A World Without Billionaires

Are billionaires good for the world?  Is hyper wealth an important and necessary component of capitalism or is it a poison that has a toxic effect on our social compact?  Does it stockpile resources that could otherwise lead to a more harmonious economy if they were more evenly distributed?

The super wealthy capitalist is seen as a lynchpin of the capitalist economy and is fantasized in almost mythological terms.  He or she is the one who will risk all for an ingenious idea, who will mortgage the family home and work 7 days a week to take a tiny Mom and Pop venture to a mega corporation.

The necessity of having the fabulously rich in society is rarely questioned.  But let’s look at the underlying principles and see if they are really so axiomatic.  I can see three basic ideas that are said to undergird this so-called necessity:  (1) the free market will necessarily produce the super wealthy and should not be inhibited, (2) capitalism needs the super wealthy to fund new ventures, and (3) people will not be motivated to create new businesses if the reward of becoming super wealthy is no longer there as an incentive.

The first justification is a circular argument.  The free market and its legendary ‘invisible hand’ is not an absolute.  There are already many adjustments being made to the ‘free market’ because of the complex interwoven nature of post-industrial society and global economies.  The market may allow a huge amount of wealth to move in one direction (the absurd amount of money that is captured by wall street and various money managers is a classic example) but that does not mean that it should stay there or that the ‘market’ would somehow be harmed by its re-direction.

The second argument, that the super wealthy are needed as venture capitalists, is more difficult to counter.  I would argue that the super wealthy and the venture capital ‘society’ become a club and self-fulfilling prophecy for new ventures.  Is the serial entrepreneur repeatedly successful because of some rare genius or simply because he or she now has access to a club of mutually supportive wealthy people who promote one another’s ventures both from a financial and marketing perspective?

I suggest that the new, more egalitarian forms of providing capital – kickstarter and other Internet-based mechanisms - are better sources of funding.  And remember that most great businesses did not need that much capital to get started.  The modern examples of massive venture funding and huge losses before success is achieved are perhaps examples of forced business growth by the plutocracy, rather than organic, democratic growth.

The 3^rd argument, that entrepreneurs would not be motivated to take the risks and sacrifices necessary if they are not hugely rewarded, is amusing to me.  Aren’t capitalists idealized as noble spirits whose passion to create a new concept or business is what drives them?  Isn’t the joy of creation and the feeling of accomplishment sufficient reward?  Isn’t the challenge of building something and seeing it flourish the true motivation for entrepreneurs?  I am quite certain there would be more than enough gallant entrepreneurs who would be inspired by these goals. I suspect they would probably be a better class of entrepreneur in many ways.

And we are not talking about denying successful people their financial rewards.  Any successful entrepreneur will have plenty of money.  We are simply talking about taking the massive wealth – tens of millions or billions of dollars – that are generated by new businesses and feeding them back into society through infrastructure development and tax cuts to the working poor and middle class.

Re-directing the huge wealth that might otherwise go into billionaire’s pockets into a wider population would have many benefits.  The public use for large infrastructure projects would become the basis for the next generation of businesses and technologies.  Education through university, trade school and even graduate school for the entire population could easily be financed.  And the money that would find its way back into the population at large through tax breaks would be spent in normal consumer fashion and thus stimulate the economy much more than it would sitting in the vast holdings of some billionaire.

It is often theorized that the massive wealth of billionaires is necessary for investment.  But investment is neither necessary nor worthwhile unless there is demand.  Returning the profits back to the workers will create that demand.  Investment will surely follow and there will be no dearth of capital.

As to how to achieve a world without billionaires, that is not a simple issue, but it is certainly attainable.  Heavy individual income taxation such as occurred in the 1950’s in the U.S. is one option.  This taxation would have to target stock sales and overall wealth as well as income. The tax would have to be careful to allow full compensation for the investment and sacrifice that is made and provide a reasonable level of wealth without allowing too much to accumulate. 

Another is to heavily tax corporations that benefit from monopolistic trends, such as Apple, Amazon, Google and others.  This taxation would avoid the negative repercussions of tech dynasties and overly powerful mega-corporations.  The taxation might limit some innovation in these companies, but having that innovation spread more evenly across other companies is a better long-term situation.

In the end, having no billionaires (and eliminating even the next several layers down) and no mega-corporations would lead to a much healthier socio-political environment.  Power and wealth are too closely related, and they make for a toxic mix that is becoming ever more dangerous for our fragile world.

Middle Class Guilt, Ethical Living and Spending Habits

I have always been pretty frugal, though let me qualify this statement.  On a relative scale, my life is extravagant.  I have always had good cars, nice houses, wonderful vacations and most of the possessions that I needed or even wanted.  I eat out fairly frequently at some very nice restaurants and drink good wines and cocktails. I sent my daughters to an International private school and then to expensive colleges.  Compared to most of the earth’s residents I live in luxury.

However, despite all of this I would still classify myself as relatively frugal.  By this I mean that I spend much less than other people of a similar income and wealth level.  I rarely stay at luxury hotels, I don’t buy high end cars, I look for bargains on clothes, furniture, and other goods. I don’t fly first or business class unless I am upgraded.  Basically, I fret over spending money.

Part of this is due to a frugal nature that I believe I inherited from my father.  I am also a risk averse person in financial matters.  This may be caused by the health problems I have always had and which for many years caused me to worry about possibly losing my ability to generate income.

But there is another component to my frugality – the guilt I feel in indulging myself while so many on this earth are struggling to survive.  I wrestle with this guilt partly because of the pangs of my own conscience, and partly because of my wife Karen’s very strong inclinations toward social justice and simple living.  She challenges me on a daily basis on this issue and I find it difficult to argue effectively against her principles. 

Karen has always battled for social justice and if she were not married to me, she would probably be living a much simpler lifestyle.  I have corrupted her somewhat, or perhaps it is more accurate to say she has acquiesced in our higher standard of living.  But if it were not for her persistent challenges there is no doubt that I would be spending much more money.

Choosing a simple (or simpler) lifestyle could potentially be desirable on two levels:  (1) It is possible that simpler living is a healthier and more satisfying way to live, and (2) it may be that living simply is something we can do to make the world a more equitable and more sustainable place.

The first idea, that a simple lifestyle may simply be a better way to live, is a concept that we have all heard many times.  It drove the counter-culture movement of the 60’s and early 70’s, it has been a basic tenet of many of the world’s religions, and it continues to be a topic of contemplation for just about anyone who takes the time to examine life seriously.

The difficult question is what does living simply really mean?  Does it mean driving a Subaru instead of a Mercedes?  Or living in a 2500 sq. ft. house instead of a 4000 sq. ft. one?  Does it mean eating out 1 time a week instead of several times?  These are absurd comparisons, but 'simple' is relative.  

The way most of us who even pretend to care about this topic deal with it is to limit our materialism and try not to have the pursuit of material goods and luxury dominate our thoughts and actions.  Christians have developed impressive logical gymnastics to interpret Jesus’s admonitions about wealth and materialism as warnings about ‘obsession’.  As long as they can convince themselves that they are not ‘obsessed’ with wealth and that they have their ‘eyes on the prize’, then they can accumulate vast holdings and feel perfectly justified and at peace.

And, of course there are lots of people who have no illusions about living simply.  They indulge their every whim and desire and never give the danger of excess or the possible salutary benefits of a less material life a second thought.

I have also seen the other extreme – people whose simple lifestyle is a badge of self-righteousness.  It becomes a chip on their shoulder and a source of resentment for them. They are so obsessed with living simply that they cannot enjoy life.

In the end, we must individually decide what the best lifestyle is for us in terms of how it affects us mentally, spiritually and physically.  And this is in great part determined by our financial means.  A simple lifestyle for a millionaire is likely quite different from that of a blue-collar worker. 

The second possible reason for living simply and curtailing one’s consumption is if one believes that doing so would benefit humankind.  There are two related but somewhat independent lines of reasoning here.  The first says that we have reached a point in human development where we will have to limit our use of resources or face increasingly unpleasant consequences for the planet and its inhabitants.  Such habits as recycling, avoiding the use of plastics, using less carbon-based energy, and creating less waste are the types of behavior that one would choose to support this concept. Additionally, one can argue that limiting a family to two children would make sense in order to avoid over-population.

But there is also the question of how lifestyle impacts the problems of global poverty and inequality.  Consumption is the basis of economic growth, and there are many that would argue that we should consume and acquire at the upper level of our means to ensure continued expansion of the global economy, which in turn creates jobs and lifts people out of poverty into the middle class.  

It is a basic tenet of capitalism that consumption is a good thing and necessary to promote general well-being, i.e. that the engine of capitalism needs the fuel of consumption to work efficiently.  This is basically the ‘rising tide lifts all boats’ argument, sometimes characterized as trickle-down economics.

But there is a counter argument that the long-term health of global society is dependent on a more equitable distribution of wealth and that this will never be achieved if people strive to accumulate in an unlimited manner for their own private use.  Moreover, the worship of wealth and the cult of materialism create an unhealthy disharmony in society that creates a cycle of social upheaval.  The argument here is that a consciousness of moderation and sharing, if embraced by all, would ultimately move our society toward less income disparity and a higher level of community.

Also, if consumption is the necessary fuel for the economic engine, wouldn’t it be just as effective, and much more socially beneficial, for this consumption to be distributed more evenly so that the wealthy don’t consume quite as much, and the less wealthy consume more?  This is not easily done, but the northern European economies seem to have come close to achieving this type of balance.

Like so many other questions about how to live, there is no simple answer.  I do believe that we have a social obligation to carefully consider the impact of our life choices on the world around us.  But it is also clear that the complex nature of our economy, political biases and philosophical inclinations plays a large role in our decisions. The global warming crisis and other ecological issues may in the end dictate much of our future behavior.  That may be a good thing, if we can adapt quickly enough to avoid massive injury and misery in the process.

Is the Evolution of Human Thought the Key to Progress?

Almost no one is in favor of slavery anymore.  Yet a mere 170 years ago there were millions of people in the United States who felt that somehow slavery was a morally acceptable institution.  They justified it through passages in the bible and through various forms of supposedly logical reasoning.  There may still be instances of slavery  in the world today but there is no longer any serious attempt at justification.

Less than one hundred years ago, a majority of people in this country believed that a woman’s place is in the home and that she should not be allowed to vote and should only have a vocation if she is unable to find a husband.  There may still be people who believe that today, but generally one can say that this is no longer an acceptable point of view in society at large.

There is a general ‘consciousness’ in human society that evolves.  It is different from biological evolution in that it may go through pendulum-like cycles of advance and regress, but there can be little doubt that our global consciousness has changed dramatically over the centuries.

Examples of this are the two major shifts mentioned above.  But there are others:  

• The idea of conquest of another society or people is no longer generally accepted.  War still occurs, but for other reasons – ethnic, religious, economic – i.e. for failures of diplomacy rather than outright desire for conquest.

• War itself is now seen as a ‘necessary evil’ rather than a noble calling.  We still venerate war heroes and seem fascinated by war, but the idea of war and battle being a crucible that all men should pass through is no longer embraced by most of the world’s people.
• The idea that some races are innately superior to others has also fallen into disfavor.  There is certainly still racism, sexism and ethnic prejudice and stereotyping, but most people accept, at least in a theoretical sense, that every race and ethnic group should be treated equally.
• Torture is no longer seen as an acceptable form of punishment or interrogation.  There is sadly still plenty of torturing done, but society in general no longer tolerates it.

Societal norms change.  Some may change and then revert back in a reaction to either too rapid or too dramatic a result.  An example of this is sexual practices.  There have been numerous periods of more liberal sexual mores followed by a return to conservative practices.  However, the general trend, or change in consciousness, has been a gradual recognition of the complexity of our sexual nature and an acceptance of more open sexual relations, including the use of birth control, the widespread acceptance of pre-marital sex, depictions of sexual relations in film, TV, books, etc. and the overall willingness of people to openly discuss sexual matters.

The evolution of consciousness can in some cases be accelerated in today’s world where there is instant global dissemination of information and ideas.  The rapid de-criminalization and acceptance of homosexual relationships, including the legalization of marriage in many countries, is an example of this phenomenon.  This has taken place over a period of 50-60 years.

As we look forward to the future and ponder how human society can confront the many ills that still plague it, it seems clear that the path forward is through a global shift in consciousness.  We have learned through painful episodes that humans rebel when forced to do something and that the reaction can sometimes wipe away any progress.  Laws alone cannot change society.

The civil rights movement is a good example.  In the end, it was not Brown vs. Board of Education or the Civil Rights Act that brought in the new era for African Americans, though certainly they helped solidify the gains.  After all, there were laws on the books after the Civil War that should have in theory accomplished much the same thing. It was a tectonic shift in attitudes throughout our post-WWII society that allowed these new behaviors to take root and slowly become part of our societal organism.  And that consciousness is still evolving.

The biggest impediment to progress is and always has been self-interest.  It is only when self-interest can somehow be associated with societal consciousness that advancement is possible.  But how does this occur?  Theories of change such as the tipping point, the hundredth monkey and Gaia have all postulated a kind of organic relationship in society where a critical mass of thinking can rapidly spread more or less uniformly across the entire population.

An example is recycling.  It is inconvenient for people to do the extra effort required for recycling, and they will rationalize their refusal to do so. But if recycling is taken up by enough people to become a societal norm (as it is already in some European countries), then people will feel motivated to embrace it as if it is in their own self-interest, which of course it is in the long run.

Someday it will no longer be acceptable to let people in the world starve or die from preventable diseases.  It will no longer be acceptable to have some members of society go bankrupt paying for chemotherapy.  Someday it will be accepted that we must curtail our use of carbon-based energy to save the planet and it will feel good to accept some limitations on income and material possessions as a part of a world sharing of resources.

These are very idealistic goals for the evolution of consciousness, but human beings have undergone some pretty amazing shifts in thinking over the past two hundred years, so why not hope for the best?

The Trump Wirtschaftswunder? Hardly.

Trump and his true believers make outrageous claims that he has created the best economy in history.  Let’s do a little analysis of those claims.

Let’s take a look at some of the trends.  First, job growth.  The job growth under Trump has been impressive and continuous, but it is continuing a trend that started under Obama and has continued now for 106 months straight.  Here is a graph that depicts that continuous growth:

Looking at the average change, the part of 2019 in this report saw the slowest increase in employment — an increase of 167,000 jobs each month — since the 86,000 added each month on average in 2010. Trump’s overall monthly average is higher than Obama’s, but the average monthly job increase under Trump has been slower than it was in Obama’s second term.  So job growth under Trump is fine, but not worthy of superlatives.

The second, and related, area to analyze is unemployment.  Here is the Bureau of Labor Statistics chart for unemployment since 2010:

Unemployment is at historically low levels, but it is clear from this chart that the decline is a continuation of a steady decline since the start of the recovery in 2010.  Nothing extraordinary here.

The third area to look at is general economic growth – generally considered to be characterized by real GDP.  Here is a chart of real GDP growth from 1990 to 2018. 

The statistics for 2019 are similar, with 3.1% in Q1, 2.0% in Q2 and 2.1% in Q3 and Q4 for an average growth rate of 2.3% in 2019.  The overall for 2018 was 2.9%, powered primarily by a sugar high from the 2017 tax break.  These results indicate a stable growing economy, but they are hardly indicative of the astronomical growth that Trump predicted both before his election and after his tax breaks were initiated – predictions from 4% to 6%.  And they are certainly not evidence, as Trump claims, of the best economy in history!

The last category that I will look at is the stock market and corporate earnings.  This is an area where Trump can truly claim to have made a big impact.  The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) has increased about 60% from 17,900 in early November 2016 to approximately 28,800 today.  Corporate profits also soared after the Trump tax break, though not in the same proportion as the stock market increases. 

There is no doubt that people who benefit from equities are much better off (on paper!) today than in 2016.  However, only a small percentage of Americans invest in the stock market.  A greater percentage will benefit because their 401k’s are in the stock market, but a majority of Americans have NO benefit from stock market increases.

So the economy is doing well under Trump, but certainly not as well as he and others claim.  And there are some disturbing statistics underlying these economic gains that could foretell trouble ahead.

Trump has repealed numerous regulations to stimulate the economy.  It is impossible to evaluate the effect of those regulatory changes on the numbers, and it is also impossible to predict the environmental and financial consequences of those regulations no longer being in place.  Suffice it to say that in the past the relaxation of regulations has generally resulted in bad behavior that has serious repercussions for our society.  There is a balance in maintaining a ‘free market’ and protecting the society from bad actors with regulations.  I would guess that Trump has caused the pendulum to swing too far in the laissez faire direction and there will be a price to pay in the near future.

Trump also pushed through major tax breaks, both for corporations and for individuals.  These tax breaks are the mirror side of the stimulus spending that Obama attempted throughout his presidency.  Obama was stymied because of deficit hawk opposition.  Those same hawks remained astonishingly silent as Trump increased our annual deficit to over a trillion dollars (expected deficit for 2020).  Here is a graph of the budget deficit growth as a % of GDP from 2015 to 2019:

  

The deficit was $585 billion in 2016 and was $984 billion in 2019.  That is a 68% increase in the deficit!  The tax break was sold to the public as a break-even deal because the increased revenue from growth would offset the expenses, but that simply did not occur and there is no indication that it will occur in the future.  Trump has traded potential long-term economic ills for short-term economic gains.  The sugar pill that the tax break gave to the economy may wear off very soon.

I will not address in detail the other major Trump initiative of using tariff wars to stimulate the economy and bring industry back to the U.S.  However, it is interesting to note that our trade deficit has actually increased by 30% since Trump took office.  

And manufacturing production has been on a steady decline - hardly the promised ‘made in America’ revival that Trump promised! 

And one last point – the revival of the coal industry, a major platform plank for Trump in 2016, has not occurred.  Coal consumption has dropped about 22% since Trump took office.  It will not return – you can take that to the bank!

So the Trump Wirtschaftswunder is not quite so wonderful or miraculous after all.  The economy is in good shape, unemployment is at record low levels and the stock market is booming.  But these are not entirely attributable to Trump (except perhaps the stock market), and the budget deficit, stock market bubble and manufacturing languor seem to me to be dark clouds on the horizon.

Admittedly, I am not a Trump fan, in fact I detest the man and feel that he is the very antithesis of a good leader.  I believe he has built a house of cards in the last 3 years and I fervently hope that it comes crashing down on him before the election later this year.  Otherwise it is quite possible that a Democratic president will once again inherit (a la Obama) the wreckage of a Republican president’s tenure.  We shall see.

The Illusion of Political Harmony

The current partisan rancor in our society may seem extreme and unusually vicious, but a deep read of history makes it clear that respectful bi-partisanship is the rare exception rather than the rule.  Though we fear that today’s highly emotional political bickering and culture wars may somehow cause irreversible rifts in our national unity, the emotions in play may not be nearly as long-lasting or as corrosive as others in our past.

What is perhaps more remarkable than the current enmity is the predisposition that all humans appear to have for highly emotional opinions and positions on various issues.  The irrational rage and fury that accompany any political activity seem dramatically out of proportion to other human behaviors. 

It may be that the anonymity of political belief is partly to blame, like the driver whose road rage is so explosive until he or she sees a neighbor behind the wheel of the other car.  Most of us develop our political ideology in a cocoon of our own thoughts and the echo chamber of like-minded people.  

Our outrage grows as we see others with the audacity to question our beliefs and come to completely different conclusions.  And sadly, we find it difficult to ‘cross the aisle’ in civil discussion.  Our emotions quickly raise the conversation to a fever pitch and we stop listening or probing thoughtfully.

Another factor in creating disharmony is the media (both traditional and social) scrutiny and amplification of every issue.  People find it expedient to voice extreme and provocative opinions in order to get coverage and ‘views’.  Dog whistle phrases, stereotypes, generalizations and other tropes become ubiquitous.  Thoughtful, data-rich analysis is a rarity.  We are far more entertained by a candidate ‘scoring points’ than elucidating a carefully thought out position.

American political life has always been tumultuous.  From the early battles over federalism versus democratic-republicanism, which led to incredibly vitriolic personal attacks, through the multi-decade battle over slavery, to the violent years of reconstruction, the years of anti-immigrant fever (which has never really abated), the years of industrial robber barons and the opposing worker rights movements, the prohibition years, the years of feverish accusations over communism and socialism, and to the  divide over the Vietnam War and the counter-culture movement, the US has never really had a lengthy period of political harmony.

Remember those oft-romanticized halcyon days of the fifties?  The economy may have been great (we were, after all, the only industrial power left standing after a cataclysmic world war that killed over 100 million people!) but things were not so friendly in the political sphere.  The McCarthy witch hunts and general paranoia about communism created a rather toxic environment for politicians. 

And the sixties brought a potent mix of civil rights, the Great Society, the Vietnam War, the sexual revolution and the general counter-culture movement.  The reactionary Moral Majority of the Nixon period was not so very different from the religious right and tea party of today.

One of the primary examples of presumed bi-partisanship is the era of Ronald Reagan and Tip O’Neill.  Their purported chumminess has been debunked often but the myth persists.  The compromises that were reached in that period only came about after initial hardball efforts that softened up the opponents.  O’Neill referred to Reagan as ‘Herbert Hoover with a smile’ and ‘a cheerleader for selfishness’.  Reagan referred to Tip as ‘a round thing that gobbles up money’.   Like most human beings of different viewpoints, when they actually met and sat down together, they managed to find enough in common – their Irish ancestry for example – to appear cordial.

No, the sad truth is that human beings are simply not good at working rationally through issues.  We quickly become emotional, inarticulate children in the face of opposing views.  Our nation has always had many challenges – it was created and grew through immigrants who conquered and drove out the original inhabitants and then imported slaves to expand the economy.   

Indeed, every nation has a set of ancient ills that continues to plague its modern attempts to create harmony.  The complexity of these issues makes it easy for many divergent opinions to exist.  We just need to become mature enough as human beings to work rationally together to negotiate common goals.  It shouldn’t be so hard.

Middle East War and Peace

Trump’s decision to assassinate one of the most important Iranian military and political figures has ratcheted up the conflict in the Middle East rather dramatically.  The U.S., which until recently appeared to be attempting to reduce its military role in the region, could now easily be drawn into a ‘hot’ war with Iran as response and counter-response to the assassination occur.

Americans love to see the world in black and white, good and evil.  A great many Americans will believe that Trump acted as a force of ‘good’ in killing General Soleimani.  He was, after all, the architect of many military and paramilitary (in our parlance ‘terrorist’) activities throughout the region.  For political expediency, our leaders will frame his death in terms of getting rid of a ‘bad actor’ and portray his end as a powerful deterrent to Iran for future misdeeds.

But when has the death of an adversary’s leader ever done anything but inflame passions and lead to further hatred, defiance and bloodshed?  There are dozens of Soleimani’s ready to step into his role, and they will certainly be emboldened to make even more radical antagonistic moves in the future.

And can we really say that Soleimani was any more 'evil' or dasterdly than a host of other strongmen throughout the world?  Assassinating powerful men has never been the path to more security or a better world.  It may satisfy our yearning for frontier justice, but it will do nothing but inflame the passions of our adversaries and lessen any potential for easing tensions.

The Middle East is a quagmire of tribal and religious divisions, further exacerbated by the constant irritant that Israel and its increasing settlement of formerly Palestinian territory provide.  There is ultimately no right and wrong here.  These are age-old resentments and power struggles that have been made worse by the unintended but foreseeable consequences of meddling by world powers over the last 150 years – the dismantlement of the Ottoman empire, the Balfour Agreement, the formation of Israel, the CIA-sponsored coup in Iran that installed the Shah, and the exploitation of oil by multi-national corporations and their super-wealthy Arab sponsors and benefactors, to name a few.

Our foreign policy in this region over the last 40 years is characterized by one bone-headed mistake after the next – our cold-war support of Jihadists and Islamic extremism to counter the Soviet Union in Afghanistan (which contributed, over time, to the rise of Al Qaeda, Daesh/Islamic State and a long list of other Islamic extremist groups); our support of Iraq and Saddam Hussein in the Iraq/Iran war followed by our two wars on Iraq, thus alienating, radicalizing and impoverishing those two nations and creating an ever closer bond between them; our continued unequivocal support for and armament of Saudi Arabia, the source of the most extreme form of fundamentalist Islam in the region and a horribly repressive regime; our unwillingness to use our influence with Israel to stop their settlement of the West Bank and push them to work toward an equitable Palestinian state solution.  Our post-9/11 wars and subsequent attempts at nation-building in Iraq and Afghanistan may go down in history as one of the greatest ‘empire’ mistakes ever.

The region presents complex problems to be sure.  The U.S. has operated partially on the basic principle that it must be the guarantor of stability in the region to protect world oil supplies.  But like so many world powers before us, the U.S. has let hubris and personal (Presidential) animus or caprice drive its foreign policy in this region.  Jimmy Carter’s weak position in the latter part of his presidency led to an over-reaction to Soviet incursions into Afghanistan, which were then increased substantially under the hawkish Reagan.  The first Bush also allowed his own political weakness and need to show decisiveness push him beyond economic measures to war against Iraq in 1990-91.  And the second Bush was clearly personally motivated to allow his gang of neo-cons to push a combined war and ill-fated regional nation-building after 9/11.

Would the Middle East be in a worse state today if none of these wars had been prosecuted?  Can the expense of lives, limbs and treasure be seen as anything but an incredible debacle for the U.S.?  How many millions of lives have been shattered by our military prowess?  Iraq and Afghanistan are horribly broken countries now.  Can we really convince ourselves that we have been a force for good in this region?

As we head toward a climate disaster fueled by carbon emissions from oil and gas, this region may eventually become as unimportant and neglected by the U.S. as Africa and Latin America are now. How quickly we learn to ignore hot spots in the world (remember Somalia?  Bosnia?) once they no longer seem to have 'strategic' relevance. What kind of moral high road is that?

Iran, Saudi Arabia, Israel and Turkey are all vying for regional power in the Middle East.  Now is not the time for more war and saber-rattling.  Now is the time for decreasing tensions and creating opportunites for dialog between nations.  Now is the time for diplomacy and rational strategies for conflict resolution.  Alas, our head of state is neither diplomatic or rational.  And so it goes.

Money and Politics - A Toxic Combination

Ponder running for public office.  You want to serve your country and perhaps ultimately become a member of congress or a senator.  How would you start the process?  One path is to run for a local office, a county or city commissioner perhaps, and then slowly work your way up to more senior positions.  But even at the lowest levels of elected office it is necessary to raise money or spend your own.  One needs flyers and posters.  There are meetings to host.

At higher levels the amount of money necessary to run for office is staggering.  Even a modest run at a congressional seat requires over a million dollars on average.  For the senate, it is a whopping ten million!  Unsurprisingly, the necessary amount has risen dramatically since the supreme court case of Citizens United versus the Federal Election Commission that basically allowed unlimited spending by corporations to influence elections.  The total for presidential elections now exceeds a billion dollars each election cycle.  Here is the growth in presidential election spending from 1976 to 2016 (blue is money raised and black is money spent)

When you add congressional election spending the total explodes to over $6B in the 2016 election cycle!  And the 2018 election spending was $5.7B just for congress.  Compare this to 2000 - $3B – and you can see the rapid growth.  In this spreadsheet the column on the left is the total, the next column is the congressional spending and the third column is the presidential spending.

Running for office is a money game rather than a process of finding good citizens to represent the people.  A friend of mine recently ran for congress.  He spent most of his time fundraising and contributed quite a bit of his own money.  The only reason he was able to compete at all was due to a large network of relatively wealthy friends.  There are rare exceptions to this rule, the recent election of AOC being a good example, but generally, election to higher office is limited to people with lots of money and connections.

How does our election process and campaign spending compare with other developed countries?  The costs for elections in France, Germany and the UK are a tiny fraction of those of the U.S.  Most other developed nations limit their election process to a few weeks or months before elections, whereas the U.S. is in almost a continuous election process.  

In other countries many of the election costs are publicly financed and parties are limited to a few spots on television and radio.  Candidates spend very little time running for office except for the weeks before the election.  They almost never do personal fundraising – the emphasis is on the party and its platform rather than individual candidates.

And the irony is that the percentage of eligible voters who vote in the U.S. is close to the bottom of the developed nations – about 58% in the last presidential election and much less in non-presidential years.  Of course, that may be due to the obstacles placed in front of potential voters – the registration process, the fact that elections occur on workdays, etc.

What does all this money do to our political ecosystem?  If a candidate relies on powerful and wealthy individuals or interest groups to fund his or her campaign, then clearly there is an expectation of quid pro quo from these groups.  Donors may say otherwise – that they are supporting a candidate because they believe in the person and their political beliefs – but if a candidate needs large amounts of money to stay in office then it is illogical and naïve to believe that he or she will not act in a way that ensures the continuing flow of those funds.  Money buys influence.

The growth in spending in our elections seems likely to be intimately related to the rancor in our politics.  With so much money being spent, the stakes grow ever higher for political actors and they stake out more extreme positions with less room for compromise or negotiation.  Donors and PACs are not giving huge sums because they have moderate political aims.  On the contrary, the more radical the agenda, the more generous the spending.  The radical nature of the giving and expectations is amplified dramatically through social media.  The actual election spending is dwarfed by the money spent to sway voters through facebook, youtube and their more unsavory cousins on the fringes.

Our political health would benefit from a massive overhaul of our election process.  Here are some suggestions:

1. Limit the timeframe for the campaign process.  Primaries should be 1 month, and the final election process should be 3 months for the President, 2 months for congress.
2. Spending for each party should be limited based on the election.  Platform descriptions and campaign ads should be reviewed by a bi-partisan panel for ‘reasonable’ accuracy.
3. A single website for detailed information about the candidates and parties should be maintained by an election commission as a way for every citizen to fully access accurate and less partisan data.
4. Elections should be held on Sundays and early on-line voting should be made easily accessible for all voters.

If we do nothing to address the growing chaos and waste of our political process, then we face a very frightening future of instability and civil discord.