Capitalism and the Power of Money

When any political system is controlled by the Power of Money (capitalism), you may predict - and expect - the invariable consequences. Many results of capitalism are good, even wonderful, to be sure, but some are bad, and some are downright dangerous to health, to the environment, and indeed possibly to civilization itself. Global warming, or climate change (or whatever the term of the moment is), is a good example of that.

The problem arises when good things resulting from capitalism and the Power of Money are outweighed by the injurious things.

Vested capital ALWAYS resists any change to the status quo threatening itself (the anticipation of profit), which is only to be expected when you think about it. Vested interests always spend and do whatever it takes to protect themselves, including, but not limited to murder, intrigue, lying, obfuscation, and cheating. To capitalism, money itself is the ONLY worthwhile motivation which really counts in the end.

This is because of these facts about money:

1. Money has no conscience;

2. Money has no sense of justice;

3. Money has no morality;

4. Money has no regrets;

5. Money has zero interest in ANYTHING except as how it affects profit;

6.  Having absolutely no conscience, the Power of Money is utterly ruthless when pitted against anything else, including people, the environment or cultures;

7. Money invariably controls the political system wherever it can, as it manifestly does in our country, and indeed as it does in most so-called ‘free’ countries in the world wherever so-called ‘capitalism’ holds sway. This is because control of the purse strings is ultimate control in capitalist systems.

In the past century we witnessed many catastrophes and disasters directly attributable to capitalism and its voracious greed. All these disasters have affected humanity and human lives, usually to a huge extent.  A few recent examples offer sufficient demonstrations of this:

Stock market crash of 1929;
Wars for oil, the ‘black gold’;
US savings and loan crisis of 1989;
The financial crisis of 2007 - 2010 (and very possibly far beyond)

The list is much, much longer of course - these are only some of the major highlights. The true cost in human lives and suffering is unspeakable and incalculable. For one thing, the excesses and outrages of capitalism are the direct reason for the rise of communism, and the human suffering which followed and continues to the present day. And, I’d like to point out right here that objecting to the excesses of capitalism is in no way the endorsement of communism, a favorite, dead-end argument of diehard capitalists.

There have been many efforts to rein in capitalistic malfeasance, some of which have been modestly effective, such as the phenomenon known as ‘democratic socialism’ in Europe. Nonetheless, capitalism remains the implacable enemy of anything that seeks to limit it in any way, and all efforts to control the Power of Money are met with strenuous and imaginative resistance. All controls invariably fall under continuous attack after being imposed, the Power of Money being satisfied with nothing less than complete dominance over anything else.

Unfortunately for the United States of America, capitalism is the Ultimate God and the Holy Grail of the Republican Party in our country today. Not that many Democrats do not also bow down to that exact same God. Would be that we as citizens, might change that. There are two political acts which have even the faintest hope of replacing the dominance of the Power of Money with the interests of the people of the nation:

1. The imposition of meaningful campaign finance reform to prohibit financial special interest and corporate control of our political system, and;

2.  The imposition of political term limits to prevent bought and paid for politicians establishing impregnable dynasties.

Unless and until we do those two things we will be at the mercy of the Power of Money forevermore.  And, you can bet your bottom dollar all these things will be fought tooth and nail by the Power of Money.