Washington, 7 November 2017*. Yesterday Speaker of the House Dennis Kucinich was sworn in as President, replacing President Jeb Bush, who had fled to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, aboard Air Force One seeking asylum in his father’s well guarded compound on the grounds of the Bin Laden family’s palace. Vice President Dick Cheney, who has been in a coma since August after suffering his fifteenth heart attack, was declared incompetent. President Kucinich immediately announced a wide-ranging package of policies designed to bring an end to the Great Depression, which began with the global financial crisis of 2007. He called for calm and pleaded with leaders of the Revolutionary Tea Party Army that has encircled Washington to call off the attack that had been planned for today, the 100th anniversary of the Bolshevik revolution. Commandant Dick Armey said he is willing to meet for a discussion of a ceasefire so long as his militia can take their weapons home.
President Kucinich apparently ordered the Marines to invade Goldman Sachs headquarters in Manhattan early this morning. While there were some reports of small arms fire, most of the 6000 employees were reportedly removed without struggle and are on their way to various jails and prisons in the greater New York area.
Be still my heart.
*Disclaimer: Some of the events reported here have not been fact-checked**.
**Disclaimer: Actually, none of the events reported here has yet occurred, although some are quite likely.
Indeed, it’s clear capitalism isn’t functioning at all well now. Unemployment is soaring, people are losing homes, and incredibly, the threat of sovereign defaults looms. All this was result of a greed frenzy, aided and abetted by comatose governments, which ended up cratering the economy.
But if capitalism isn’t working, then what would? Some say what we have isn’t capitalism at all, or certainly not what was envisioned by Adam Smith, but more like theftocracy, with a wealthy class siphoning off money from the rest of us. Indeed, the gap between rich and poor is growing, something which historically has generally led to social unrest and sometimes revolution.
Could socialism work? It sounds good in theory but the socialist and communist experiments of the last century weren’t exactly glowing successes. It’s the same problem as capitalism. An entrenched few seize control and don’t let go. But under communism, they control everything, the state as well as business. Besides, a centrally run and managed economy is probably not doable or practical. Such a behemoth would move too slowly to be much use in our ever fast-changing world. Besides, the opportunities for corruption and cronyism are huge and apparent.
Destination unknown. That’s where we’re heading. No one really knows what will come next, except that the old ways aren’t working any more.
What do you think?
I think John Robb has it right: small, viable centers of energy, community, and economy.
I don’t know if the overall economic system matters as long as it’s democratic in structure.
Most of the rest of the world is running on a mix of captialism and socialism. The basic needs of society are socalize, while the fluff is capitalized. The key is, once something is socialized, it stays that way. In the US, many things start out socalized, and then convert to capitalism after the R&D money has produced something profitable. Or, thing that were capitalist are socialized because they’re going defunct (banks in particular), are saved from going under, then re-privatized once they’re stable. It should be a one-way trap door. Every time is swings back and forth in the US, everyone looses. And lately it’s seen more action than a kitchen door at an all night greesy spoon in a hot spring break vacation site.