We went to see Michael Moore’s movie, Capitalism, a Love Story, this weekend. It was enjoyable and moving. If it were a speech, it would be called merely anecdotal. But that’s what art does – it tells a big story through a little one.
This is by far Moore’s best work. This is the film he hinted at with Roger and Me, strongly suggested with Sicko.
Our daughter-in-law hit us right off with what appears a glaring contradiction: Moore makes money with his films. She repeats the oft-misunderstood notion that our daily efforts to make money and stay alive are “capitalism”, which is also known as “free enterprise” which is the essence of “democracy”.
We all strive to make money. People everywhere are committed to this ideal – we must contribute as we are able to take care of ourselves. Earning something for doing nothing is not a healthy thing. But then, that is the definition of capitalism: Earning money on capital. Capitalism has made a religion out of getting something for nothing.
Earning money by means of labor? That is enterprise, for sure, but I do not place traders at Goldman Sachs in the same league with an ordinary plumber or Wal-Mart clerk. One can only earn what his labor allows, while the other can make money on the labor of others. One is a mere worker, the other a capitalist.
Moore takes us to houses in foreclosure, kids in private for-profit detention, workers on strike, and to a bakery in California where everyone earns a living wage. He squeezes every bit of emotion he can out of people removed from their homes and the bastards that do the removing. That’s entertainment 101 – heroes and villains. I especially liked the guy who offered to Moore when ambushed with cameras that he could do us all a service if he would “stop making movies”.
He’s a gifted film maker, and knows to build slowly to a point. And I did not see it coming.
Rep.Marcy Captor, D-OH, has a large part in the movie. She talks about the meltdown before the election last fall, and states her belief that it was a setup, done deliberately as the election drew near to frighten legislators into giving Wall Street the key to the Treasury. George W. Bush used the same scare tactics prior to that bailout that he did with Iraq – a speech predicting doom if we did not turn $700 million in funds (all borrowed) over to Henry Paulson’s Goldman people.
The surprise twist in the plot was the House Republicans. No one in the White House or on Wall Street expected them to balk. But they did. In an extraordinary act of courage, the House voted to turn down the bailout. The Dow crashed, sinking over 700 points in one day.
Here’s where Moore makes his most salient point, one that ought to make every Republican want see the movie. Failing to get what they wanted from the Republicans, Wall Street turned to the Democrats. And sure enough, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi and Barney Frank fell in line, as did Barack Obama. The issue was re-voted, and Wall Street got their money. But it was mostly Republicans on the Maginot line that tried to stop it.
Moore does his usual theatrics, ambushing people on Wall Street, demanding our cash back, speaking to buildings through a megaphone and cordoning off the area with “Crime Scene” tape. (This was clearly done on a Sunday). But he closes with a few thoughts that resonated with me:
One, no matter how bad it gets, it’s very difficult to energize the American public. Obama became the Pied Piper, leading us all down the wrong path, absorbing all the discontent and stuffing it. But beyond that, beyond merely getting people to vote, it is virtually impossible to organize here in the land of the free. We seem unable to get off our collective asses, and are morally bankrupt. Our forebears, even as recently as the 1960’s, knew how to throw fear into leadership. That impulse seems to have dissipated along with the expansion of bellies and preoccupation with John and Kate.
Two, Moore says something like “Hey folks – I can’t do this forever, and I can’t do it alone.” We don’t need leaders, we need organizers, and as the movie so well points out, organization through the Democratic Party is futile.
And finally, he makes clear, our choice is not Capitalism vs. Socialism or Communism. China makes it quite clear that capitalism and communism get along quite well. Capitalism, in fact, can exist comfortably in communist and fascist systems alike. But it threatens to undo our system.
Our choice is between Capitalism, and democracy.
Piece of Mindful 
Re: China and capitalism I have to defer to this:
LikeLike
Now I realize I’z just a pseudo-intellectual and all, but I haz a few questions fer ya, Mark.
Seems to me that that there Capitalism is an economic kinda thingy and can (prolly will) exist regardless of whatsoever gubmint is in power in a land. You kinda make that argument y’self. If’n Capitalism can exist in a commie land or a fascist land, why is it that it cain’t exist in a Republic or Democracy?
Okay, enough of the cornpone. It’s awfully shallow to say that capitalism can exist in X or Y, and then throw out the idea that it threatens Z without ever explaining the fundamental acrimony between capitalism and certain governmental devices. Capitalism currently poses a “threat” to Chinese communism and Iranian theocratic oligarchy. The only thing it doesn’t pose a threat to, at any given time, are governmental structures that thoroughly reject it, mostly based on religious ideology, like the Taliban. So, asking seriously, what the hell is it that you are calling for in a change of governmental structure that will ‘defeat’ the threat of capitalism? Need we organize against capitalism or against our current process of governance? Simply asked, what should we be organizing for? Barter economics? A Parliament? (Kindly remember that Japan has it’s own demons based on capitalism.)
Dave has a good, if obscure, point, one you quite handily abuse. You light the warning beacons based on a slice in time and yet call out to other slices in time as a salve for angst. You claim we’re headed in the wrong direction. I agree; one would presume so does Dave. But I can pretty much guarantee that the 3 of us have 3 different answers as to what the ‘right’ direction would be. Speaking way out of turn for the esteemed Mr. Budge, it seems he wants more free market allowance and less interference. Simply put, I want more socialist control of community assets. What do you want, Mark? You may think you’ve made it clear but other than for the Democratic party to DIE!, you really hasn’t. So I’m asking quite simply, Mark, what would you like to see happen in this country? You’ve said you want the people to organize. How and for what?
There’s been a whole lot of jawing in the Montana leftytubes about “principle”, and damned few who are willing to define those objects except for others.
I would be remiss if I don’t point out your obvious change of heart. Just 6 short months ago, you were posting comment after comment about how the people need leaders. And here you say, we don’t need leaders, but organizers. Care to explain your disagreement with yourself in so short a time?
At the risk of being all sudo-intlectul I would point out that you built with the materials you have. You can wish for better stuff, but the only way forward is the stuff presented. It’s been my take on Moore’s movies that he presents that conundrum quite well. We love guns and we love capitalism and we love our health care. These are not the enemy but rather the foundations we have to build on. We have a two party system, established firmly in a Constitution that is winner take all. I could be wrong here, but you seem to want to scrap all in favor of an ideal you have in your head. I’ve asked this of you before and gotten nothing but bullshit derision. How do you get from A to B? How do you take a democratic Republic burdened with a capitalist economic and mold it into whatever utopia you have in mind? In all honesty, Mark, you seem to want to scrap one party of this bipolar dynamic just to give you room for another. You wish to do that by handing supreme power over to a party that will screw us blind. That isn’t a recipe for reform. It’s a recipe for disaster. The same people you think too fat and lazy to do anything about Democrats will be too fat and lazy to stop Republicans from ruining the place, wouldn’t you agree? You will never get your shiny liberal merit badge for the New Reform Party of the New. What you will get is misery and decay and more of what you stand against, in “principle” of course. You have the material you have. Work with it or not.
Okey-dokey, Mark. You wanted to shift the playground over here, egoist. Let’s see if you got game.
LikeLike
That’s quite a disjointed ramble. Let’s get basic.
Buying and selling things is universal. That is not capitalism. Capitalists are the people who collect the surplus wealth we produce and reallocate it. They do so by means of financial instruments, and take risks. Only a few among us dedicate their lives to accumulating capital and investing it. They perform a useful function, but at the same time can be dangerous. As a group, they form what in history has been called the “merchant class”.
It is very important to keep them under thumb. They very easily get out of control, and when they do, usually take control of government.
This is why capitalism and democracy, while compatible, are not the same thing. Capitalism is an economic system that, left unregulated, will destroy democracy. It is very important that government be stronger than private power, but not strong enough to destroy capitalism. Hard to balance that.
Also, while capitalism it is a great way to generate wealth, it tends not to distribute that wealth well. China is right now going through an accumulation phase, where vast fortunes are being built up. A new tyranny is in the making.
We shift back and forth on these things, with the merchants getting out of hand, and then being reined in, and then getting out of hand again. It takes a few generations for us to forget all of the lessons of generations past. Just as in the 1920’s, from 1980 forward, we let our merchant class get out of hand. It has yielded another crash and burn. But this time the merchant class was so powerful that it co-opted the government to bail it out.
You said “Capitalism currently poses a “threat” to Chinese communism and Iranian theocratic oligarchy.”
Not true. Capitalism thrives in authoritarian systems. There is no threat that I can see to the Chinese power structure. The new wealth will blend right in, buying government privileges. Capitalists and tyrants work together quite well. What threatens Iran is not capitalists, but American imperialists. Quite a difference.
Citibank, in a private memo exposed in Moore’s movie, called our current system “plutonomy”. Pretty good word.
The problem of Democrats is really a manifestation of two defects in our system – winner-take-all voting, and private financing of campaigns. Because of the former, we are structurally limited to two parties (there is no mention of political parties in our constitution). Because of the latter, the merchant class is able to pay for politicians of both parties, and we are given no real choice on issues.
The result is what we have – a public that wants important changes, and a political class that cannot give it to us because they are owned by the merchants.
Solutions:
1) Campaign finance reform, public financing of elections. Canada has quite a nice system. Give it a look sometime.
2) Fusion voting, proportional representation. Ross Perot getting almost 20% of the vote in 1992, and not one electoral vote, is absurd.
3) Heavy regulations of corporations, elimination of “personhood” for these artifices.
4) Restoration of progressive taxation, at least back to the rates in effect when Reagan took office, adjusted for inflation so that the top rate doesn’t kick in until a few million have been earned.
5) Restoration of the estate tax at its 1980 levels.
That oughtta do it.
LikeLike
Oh yeah – leaders and organizers – we need both. It’s very hard for leaders to emerge when the media is controlled by the merchant class, and won’t give them any exposure. We have them. They are under the radar.
Organizers and leaders … distinction without a difference?
LikeLike
Somewhat. But you drew the distinction, not me. I was asking for clarification.
It was a whole bunch of questions, “Disjointed” was kinda required by venue. If I’d have just pontificated you would have called it “pseudo-intellectual”, right? I do notice, however, that you answered next to none of those questions.
On this, we have agreed from day one.
Or any other gubmint system, wouldn’t you agree? And if not, why not? I think I pointed that out. Oh yes, I certainly did.
That’s simply another challenge, Mark. I ask again, how do you respond?
OK< you say I didn’t answer your questions. Here’s your questions, such as they are.
Seems to me that that there Capitalism is an economic kinda thingy and can (prolly will) exist regardless of whatsoever gubmint is in power in a land. You kinda make that argument y’self. If’n Capitalism can exist in a commie land or a fascist land, why is it that it cain’t exist in a Republic or Democracy?
Are you talking about ownership of capital, or enterprise activities among people? By definition, “capitalism” cannot exist in a communist state, or a socialist one for that matter. Maybe I can add some clarity – “capitalism” is a complex arrangement of activities which, if allowed to play out without regulation, will defeat democracy. Private power will take over government. If private power controls government, then there is no threat posed to that government by capitalism, except squabbling among factions. Therefore, Pinochet, who was a capitalist and a fascist, was not threatened by “capitalism”.
It can exist in a Republic or Democracy, but needs to be kept tabs on. It can exist in totalitarian states of all stripes, including China and Chile.
Okay, enough of the cornpone. It’s awfully shallow to say that capitalism can exist in X or Y, and then throw out the idea that it threatens Z without ever explaining the fundamental acrimony between capitalism and certain governmental devices. Capitalism currently poses a “threat” to Chinese communism and Iranian theocratic oligarchy. The only thing it doesn’t pose a threat to, at any given time, are governmental structures that thoroughly reject it, mostly based on religious ideology, like the Taliban. So, asking seriously, what the hell is it that you are calling for in a change of governmental structure that will ‘defeat’ the threat of capitalism? Need we organize against capitalism or against our current process of governance? Simply asked, what should we be organizing for? Barter economics? A Parliament? (Kindly remember that Japan has its own demons based on capitalism.)
Capitalists could exist quite easily under the Taliban – they simply agree not to interfere with one another. They are religious, but I don’t see how that matters. They have power. If capitalists want to build pipelines and drill for oil, and pay them their dues, what’s the problem? And since the Taliban rule without democratic pretenses, there’s really no way for popular opinion to interfere in any way with them or the capitalists. So there’s no problem.
Dave has a good, if obscure, point, one you quite handily abuse. You light the warning beacons based on a slice in time and yet call out to other slices in time as a salve for angst. You claim we’re headed in the wrong direction. I agree; one would presume so does Dave. But I can pretty much guarantee that the 3 of us have 3 different answers as to what the ‘right’ direction would be. Speaking way out of turn for the esteemed Mr. Budge, it seems he wants more free market allowance and less interference. Simply put, I want more socialist control of community assets. What do you want, Mark? You may think you’ve made it clear but other than for the Democratic party to DIE!, you really hasn’t. So I’m asking quite simply, Mark, what would you like to see happen in this country? You’ve said you want the people to organize. How and for what?
As I have repeatedly said, I favor a more European type of capitalism, or socialism, if you like it. High taxes on wealth, heavy investment in public services and in the public itself by means of publicly financed education at every level. Think of it – the mere fact of being a French citizen entitles one to a minimum wage, guaranteed vacation, 35 hour work week, health care and education paid for. Why is that so difficult to grasp? We are advanced enough in our technology that we can do that. This is how far we have come. We can have good lives, not be worried about losing our homes and retirement to illness, or be saddled with debt when we leave school. They do it. We could.
At the risk of being all sudo-intlectul I would point out that you built with the materials you have. You can wish for better stuff, but the only way forward is the stuff presented. It’s been my take on Moore’s movies that he presents that conundrum quite well. We love guns and we love capitalism and we love our health care. These are not the enemy but rather the foundations we have to build on. We have a two party system, established firmly in a Constitution that is winner take all. I could be wrong here, but you seem to want to scrap all in favor of an ideal you have in your head. I’ve asked this of you before and gotten nothing but bullshit derision. How do you get from A to B? How do you take a democratic Republic burdened with a capitalist economic and mold it into whatever utopia you have in mind? In all honesty, Mark, you seem to want to scrap one party of this bipolar dynamic just to give you room for another. You wish to do that by handing supreme power over to a party that will screw us blind. That isn’t a recipe for reform. It’s a recipe for disaster. The same people you think too fat and lazy to do anything about Democrats will be too fat and lazy to stop Republicans from ruining the place, wouldn’t you agree? You will never get your shiny liberal merit badge for the New Reform Party of the New. What you will get is misery and decay and more of what you stand against, in “principle” of course. You have the material you have. Work with it or not.
See what I mean? That’s disjointed! I think I’ve addressed all of this, but you need to know something you apparently don’t know: Winner-take-all voting is for the lower house is not in the constitution, and states are free to apportion their electoral votes if they so desire. Nebraska and Maine to not do winner-take-all. The governing principle of one man one vote seems to outlaw fusion voting or other means to achieve proportional representation, but that is the result of court decision, and are changeable. Subunits of government can count votes any way they please.
Or [capitalism will destroy] any other gubmint system, wouldn’t you agree? And if not, why not? I think I pointed that out. Oh yes, I certainly did.
I think I talked about fascism up above, and how easy it would be for the Taliban to exist alongside private capital – each precludes democratic interference. Same with China – so long as private capital doesn’t interfere with the state (and the people cannot interfere with either), then everything is cool. I think I’m pretty well done with that point.
Me: Just as in the 1920’s, from 1980 forward, we let our merchant class get out of hand. It has yielded another crash and burn. But this time the merchant class was so powerful that it co-opted the government to bail it out.
You: That’s simply another challenge, Mark. I ask again, how do you respond?
This is where you lose me. If we agree that Hitler was a bad Dude, does that mean I have to propose a remedy to Hitler? There was no remedy! We had to fight a war, a horrible war, to dislodge him.
And the same with the current structure of our society. Private capital is so deeply embedded in government that we cannot dislodge it. We either live under its rule (or pretend, like you Democrats do, that we don’t),or we dislodge it. But power does not voluntarily give up power. It is going to take violence and insurrection. And here is where we come up short.
One, the American public is sorely lacking in education, and doesn’t much comprehend what is happening to it. I don’t mean that to mean that they don’t agree with me, and are therefore uneducated. I mean to say that they really cannot formulate the necessary thoughts to help them understand their predicament. A third of them are either truly or funcationally illiterate. This would include Montana Cowgirl.
In the the sixties democratic movements got out of hand – and now we have a population that, for the most part, cannot put two and two together and get pissed about it. Instead they go after immigrants and labor leaders. It’s quite marvelous to witness this dumbing down taht has gone on.
I can’t really say whether people in this country were as dumb in 1916, when Wilson snookered them into an unnecessary war, and 2003 when Bush did.
Anyway, this is where Moore is valuable. He’s a leader and an organizer who can relate to common people. But there doesn’t seem to be many like him. But for me to propose solutions? No can do. I only know this – it is not Democrats.
I strongly disagree. imperialism threatens all, as we agree. But Iran is threatened by its own urges towards Democracy, as the uprisings this summer showed well. What is truly funny is that you deny them the ability to rise up while calling for Americans to rise up. You don’t find anything self-defeating in that?
Iran is a truly interesting country, with an educated population and lots of dissent underneath. They know far more about us than we them. Whatever develops there, I’m sorry to tell you that the U.S. is not a disinterested bystander, and that the U.S. is not backing “pro-democratic” forces. The US would be just as happy with the Shah back in power. Our only problem with Iran is that they are not under our thumb. Democracy is never more than window dressing in our foreign policy.
Iran is threatened by imperialism from without, and this defeats democracy from within. So long as the government there is threatened by a foreign enemy, it will not tolerate dissent within, as it would be too easy for that foreign enemy to use internal dissent as a means of undermining the government. So it should not surprise you that the US invested $400 million in subverting Iran’s elections and fomenting dissent, and that is what you might refer to as a democracy movement within.
Very complicated situation there. Much like the people of Cuba, the Iranians can be screwed by their own government, or screwed by the US. Some choice.
You should be calling for a Constitutional Convention rather than trolling Montana websites. Just saying …
Trolling is the hijacking of threads for nefarious purposes. Debating points, especially raising awareness within a Democratic web site of the defects of the Democratic Party, is a worthy pursuit. Would you have everyone only go to rooms where they put powder on each other’s noses? Seems to me you want that – right wingers here, Democrats here, and if you don’t like either, stay away from both.
Instead, to you, the Democrats are the enemy. Your enemy is the Constitution. Be specific and honest, Mark. And admit your chances of success.
Democrats are not the “enemy”. They are the “problem”. They absorb all of the energy for reform, and transform it to mush. Without them, we would have movement parties, health care reform, election finance reform … it is not Republicans who stop these things. They cannot do it on their own, as there are not enough of them. They need Democrats, and Democrats, by definition have to stand for things they don’t stand for to get elected and thereby prevent reform.
LikeLike
Tsk tsk.
That wasn’t my point, or yours. The point was that capitalism can destroy other gubmint systems, yet you see it as exclusively destroying ours. You are taking a slice in time as a given.
Sorry pal. Makes perfect sense to me, regardless of your critique of the aesthetic. It’s real simple. You start at point A and go to point B. You don’t seem to want to do that. You want to start at a point Zed that doesn’t exist. You want to eleviate the problem of Democrats which will give us Republicans and a worse situation. My question still stands. How do you get from point A (corporate control structures infiltrating government) to point B?
On this we agree.
On this, we disagree. I am not willing, yet, to consign my fellows in this country to death and poverty, the results of civil war. We have mechanisms to subvert the corporate power structures; we simply need to use them wisely. Our greatest disagreement to date is one of patience. I think these structures can work. You have have decided that since they haven’t worked so far, they simply can’t.
Allow me to retort. The President does not control out legal structure. Congress does. Proportional representation is achievable in the lower house, and is in fact somewhat a necessity. Yet you deride those who wish Denny’s political demise. Why would that be, unless the representation that you favor does not have popular appeal? The Constitution set the makeup of our law makers. You can’t deny that that’s point A from which you have to work.
We’re not as far apart as you desperately wish to think we are.
LikeLike
See below. Getting too skinny.
LikeLike
Without corporate money neither party exists in its current form. Admitting Democrats won’t/can’t adjust to a voter shift toward progressive principles sums up why such a movement is timely and so scary to corrupt Democrats in power. Is it capitalism, or its ability to corrupt unprincipled politicians of all stripes that raws fire from artists like Moore. Only when neoliberal Democrats tipped the scales toward deregulation and privatization did the corruption, subsidies and economic dysfunction overtake the Constitution, and the ability of government to control big money. Democrats changed, and now can’t live without big money. Too bad, so sad, but it was self-inflicted.
LikeLike
That wasn’t my point, or yours. The point was that capitalism can destroy other gubmint systems, yet you see it as exclusively destroying ours. You are taking a slice in time as a given.
No. Finer point. Authoritarian systems not subject to democratic discipline get along quite well. Capitalism is an economic system that has little political fallout, that is, just because a country is capitalist, it is not necessarily democratic, nor will capitalism lead naturally or otherwise to more democratic rule. It can exist in a democracy, but will eventually take it down if not severely regulated. That is what happened to us. We failed to regulate us, and now we are ruled by private power. Capitalism is authoritarian, and existed with ease in Saddam’s Iraq and China.
You start at point A and go to point B. You don’t seem to want to do that. You want to start at a point Zed that doesn’t exist. You want to eleviate the problem of Democrats which will give us Republicans and a worse situation. My question still stands. How do you get from point A (corporate control structures infiltrating government) to point B?
It takes upheaval. Power concedes nothing without a fight. We’re not up to it.
On this, we disagree. I am not willing, yet, to consign my fellows in this country to death and poverty, the results of civil war. We have mechanisms to subvert the corporate power structures; we simply need to use them wisely. Our greatest disagreement to date is one of patience. I think these structures can work. You have decided that since they haven’t worked so far, they simply can’t.
Ah yes, incremental progress and clever negotiation. In case you haven’t noticed, we have crept along, but to the right. Please see post above on ratcheting. In the last great episode of rule by private power and economic collapse it took a depression to being about structural reform. Some say a war too.
The President does not control out legal structure. Congress does. Proportional representation is achievable in the lower house, and is in fact somewhat a necessity. Yet you deride those who wish Denny’s political demise. Why would that be, unless the representation that you favor does not have popular appeal? The Constitution set the makeup of our law makers. You can’t deny that that’s point A from which you have to work.
I’m tempted to concede that point just because I don’t understand what you’re saying. Denny represents one side of an honorable debate about popular government. He represents the wealthy. Bring him down if you want. Not my concern. I want the other side, representation of common people, to balance the picture. In that we are lacking, and the reason for that is the me-too party, the pawl in the ratchet, the Democrats. We don’t have a balanced debate. We have two right wing parties, one existing solely ro prevent true opposition to Denny from organizing.
That is, if we replace Denny with a Democrats, so what? Hasn’t the 2008 election taught you that electing Democrats does not change things?
This is the natural result of winner-take-all voting combined with private financing of campaigns. Radical change is needed but is not on the horizon. In the meantime, don’t try to convince me that Democrats are an adequate stopgap. They are nothing of the kind. They aid and abet.
We’re not as far apart as you desperately wish to think we are.
I don’t desperately wish to think anything. I just react to your words.
LikeLike