Economic Othello, By Brian37
Offline Economic Othello, By Brian37
Gordan Gecko
Flips his peice
On the green felt
As risk takers do
Ayn Rand
Cheering him on
Libertarians
Slash and burn
And Marx basterdized
By the likes of Stalin
Falsely build
The nanny state
Neither color
Can serve us well
For the real game
Is lust of power
The monopolies
The selfishness
The lack of checks
The lack of oversight
China IS capitalist
It need not democracy
In order to compete
Via one party monopoly
Free stadiums
For billionaires
And escaping taxes
Does Exxon and GE
This is Othello
The game explotation
One via party
The other via class
The result
The same
Indentured slavery
Keeping power in place
And left in this wake
Are the rest of us
When the bubble bursts
We absorb the cost
Economies
Cannot be
Black or white
Either or
Lopsided power
Always kills
Ethical economies
Are ones that care
Higher costs
Stagnant wages
Fewer hours
Cannot susstain
Those at the top
Have the most power
To do the most
To make us better
Unless they do
We will colapse
Into sweat shops
And slave labor
Die Othello
This is no game
People's lives
Are at stake
Profits be damned
If to make such
Others starve
Because of lust
Death to Othello
Enforce anti-trust
Reduce the pay gap
And bring back jobs
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
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Both Ayn Rand and Marx were naive in their positions. Neither took into account that human behavior cannot be solved by one action or one idea and that humans are a range in their motivations. BOTH in practice as their respective ideas can be just as monopolized and exploited.
The extreme example of Ayn Rand's idea of "selfishness" . Selfishness can be good, but by itself does not preclude exploitation. Marx was naive in thinking that we could create a utopia where selfishness could be eliminated.
The lifeguard is taught that if the victim is pulling them under then you have to "selfishly" pull away so that you don't drowned too. Pragmatic but should not be used as a blanket solution for an entire society.
"Best of your ability according to your means" Marx said, sounds nice, but also falsely cannot apply to an entire society and does not take into account the varying motivations of individuals.
What I think is a better model is neither all selfishness or all nanny state. But more like a the temperature in a fish tank. You put a variety of fish in that tank. What counts more is that the variety exists and the balance is maintained.
What can arise in ANY system is monopolies and exploitation. Somalia is an extreme example of Ayn Rand's idea of using selfishness as a default position. The Soviet Union and China are the extreme example of Marx's idea of "we are all in this together". They are both examples of how the GOOD of both ideas ended up being twisted to maximize the power of a monopoly.
This is because humans see short cuts in the forms of ideas and labels as a cure and REAL evolution is never simple and humans reflect a RANGE. As such economies should be based on range, not absolutes.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
It what way does the economy of Somalia have anything to do with Ayn Rand???
And whats wrong with the Gecko? I thought you liked Warren Buffett.
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
There is little or no effective governance and "every man for themselves" is pretty much the norm. It would be the extreme end of the "selfishness" Ayn Rand talks about IF IF IF IF IF IF IF IF people wrongly always use that as the default position. Ayn Rand may not have intended people to take her idea of selfishness being good to that extreme, but they do. Somalia is ruled by selfish people.
I do like Warren Buffet, but unlike the Character in the movie, I think Warren cares about weight class and cares about who works for him, at least more so than many at his pay scale. At a minimum he cares to the extent that we cannot keep the inequity and keep our society stable. Gecko in the movie only cared about making a buck and didn't care who he fucked over.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog