Federated Wisdom
The 2010 election draws near. Our mailboxes are stuffed and our phones are ringing. Every candidate indulges us with promises while the “other candidate” will raise taxes beyond what we earn, raise unemployment to 110% and claim our first borns for indentured servitude (OK, I made some of that up). What really distinguishes the candidates [...]
You can find a quote that supports almost any point of view. A new feature for this web log will be reviewing quotes made by famous people that relate to social balance. My source for quotes will usually be Quotationary by Leonard Roy Frank. “There is in human nature generally more of the fool than [...]
On the face of it, turning Tea Parties into a federation is a good thing from my perspective as a staunch advocate of federation. However, this movement towards “Federation” actually reinforces my earlier criticisms of the Tea Parties as special interest groups. It is really akin to putting lipstick on a pig. For those who [...]
The Bards of Balance are starting a series of video podcasts called “Bard Notes” providing more information on the meaning behind our songs. Here are the Bard Notes for our song “Power and Dough.”
Here is the third question posed to me by the editor of the business magazine Investor.ge, put out by the American Chamber of Commerce in Georgia. (3) Why is it (the middle class) important? Can we say it is more important economically than socially or does it play an important role in both spheres? What [...]
Continue reading about Is the Middle Class a Cause or Effect?
In the last entry I described the Supreme Court as being the most paternal branch of government, with jurisprudence affected by entrenched relationships to wealth and power elites. Yet even if we were to minimize the paternal impact of the Supreme Court we still have a government that has trended steadily towards paternalism since its [...]
Continue reading about Restoring Political Balance – Federation
The one place where you most expect wisdom from government is where authoritarianism has its greatest stranglehold. Supreme Court Justices are nominated for life through party politics. They overwhelmingly represent wealth and power elites, with corporate lawyers in the lead. They establish jurisprudence through arbitrary justifications couched in obtuse legal dogma. Restoring political balance will [...]
Continue reading about Restoring Political Balance – Wise Jurisprudence
Our political system at the federal and state levels features elected officials that are politicians rather than public servants. As politicians their job is to figure out what is best for us, as caring paternal agents, and then practice the politics of implementing the decisions they make. That is the best case scenario. As we [...]
Continue reading about Restoring Political Balance – Public Service
Restoring economic balance will require greater experimentation, as reported in the previous entry for this series, and better information. Most people equate misinformation as being distortions of information. Others maintain that as long as the information is out there somewhere in some format then “Buyer Beware.” Yet hidden or obscured information is essentially misinformation, afflicting [...]
Continue reading about Restoring Economic Balance – Simplified Fiscal Policy
In the book Systems out of Balance my focus was illuminating how social systems work in ways we should not want. This alone was a movement towards restoring balance, since the first step in addressing a problem is recognizing you have one. The book includes a final essay titled “Restoring Balance” that provides some follow-up [...]