The following is a short description of Objectivism given by Ayn Rand in 1962.
by Ayn Rand
At a sales conference at Random House, preceding the publication of Atlas Shrugged, one of the book salesmen asked me whether I could present the essence of my philosophy while standing on one foot. I did as follows:
Metaphysics Objective Reality
Epistemology Reason
Ethics Self-interest
Politics Capitalism
If you want this translated into simple language, it would read: 1. “Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed” or “Wishing won’t make it so.” 2. “You can’t eat your cake and have it, too.” 3. “Man is an end in himself.” 4. “Give me liberty or give me death.”
If you held these concepts with total consistency, as the base of your convictions, you would have a full philosophical system to guide the course of your life. But to hold them with total consistency—to understand, to define, to prove and to apply them—requires volumes of thought. Which is why philosophy cannot be discussed while standing on one foot—nor while standing on two feet on both sides of every fence. This last is the predominant philosophical position today, particularly in the field of politics.
My philosophy, Objectivism, holds that:
Reality exists as an objective absolute—facts are facts, independent of man’s feelings, wishes, hopes or fears.
Reason (the faculty which identifies and integrates the material provided by man’s senses) is man’s only means of perceiving reality, his only source of knowledge, his only guide to action, and his basic means of survival.
Man—every man—is an end in himself, not the means to the ends of others. He must exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself. The pursuit of his own rational self-interest and of his own happiness is the highest moral purpose of his life.
The ideal political-economic system is laissez-faire capitalism. It is a system where men deal with one another, not as victims and executioners, nor as masters and slaves, but as traders, by free, voluntary exchange to mutual benefit. It is a system where no man may obtain any values from others by resorting to physical force, and no man may initiate the use of physical force against others. The government acts only as a policeman that protects man’s rights; it uses physical force only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use, such as criminals or foreign invaders. In a system of full capitalism, there should be (but, historically, has not yet been) a complete separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church.
Copyright © 1962 by Times-Mirror Co.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
A Brief Biography of Ayn Rand ...From The Ayn Rand Institute..
From the internet...From The Ayn Rand Institute..
A Brief Biography of Ayn Rand
Ayn Rand was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, on February 2, 1905. At age six she taught herself to read and two years later discovered her first fictional hero in a French magazine for children, thus capturing the heroic vision which sustained her throughout her life. At the age of nine, she decided to make fiction writing her career. Thoroughly opposed to the mysticism and collectivism of Russian culture, she thought of herself as a European writer, especially after encountering Victor Hugo, the writer she most admired.
During her high school years, she was eyewitness to both the Kerensky Revolution, which she supported, and—in 1917—the Bolshevik Revolution, which she denounced from the outset. In order to escape the fighting, her family went to the Crimea, where she finished high school. The final Communist victory brought the confiscation of her father's pharmacy and periods of near-starvation. When introduced to American history in her last year of high school, she immediately took America as her model of what a nation of free men could be.
When her family returned from the Crimea, she entered the University of Petrograd to study philosophy and history. Graduating in 1924, she experienced the disintegration of free inquiry and the takeover of the university by communist thugs. Amidst the increasingly gray life, her greatest pleasures were Viennese operettas and Western films and plays. Long an admirer of cinema, she entered the State Institute for Cinema Arts in 1924 to study screenwriting. It was at this time that she was first published: a booklet on actress Pola Negri (1925) and a booklet titled “Hollywood: American Movie City” (1926), both reprinted in 1999 in Russian Writings on Hollywood.
In late 1925 she obtained permission to leave Soviet Russia for a visit to relatives in the United States. Although she told Soviet authorities that her visit would be short, she was determined never to return to Russia. She arrived in New York City in February 1926. She spent the next six months with her relatives in Chicago, obtained an extension to her visa, and then left for Hollywood to pursue a career as a screenwriter.
On Ayn Rand’s second day in Hollywood, Cecil B. DeMille saw her standing at the gate of his studio, offered her a ride to the set of his movie The King of Kings, and gave her a job, first as an extra, then as a script reader. During the next week at the studio, she met an actor, Frank O’Connor, whom she married in 1929; they were married until his death fifty years later.
After struggling for several years at various nonwriting jobs, including one in the wardrobe department at the RKO Radio Pictures, Inc., she sold her first screenplay, “Red Pawn,” to Universal Pictures in 1932 and saw her first stage play, Night of January 16th, produced in Hollywood and then on Broadway. Her first novel, We the Living, was completed in 1934 but was rejected by numerous publishers, until The Macmillan Company in the United States and Cassells and Company in England published the book in 1936. The most autobiographical of her novels, it was based on her years under Soviet tyranny.
She began writing The Fountainhead in 1935 (taking a short break in 1937 to write the anti-collectivist novelette Anthem). In the character of the architect Howard Roark, she presented for the first time the kind of hero whose depiction was the chief goal of her writing: the ideal man, man as “he could be and ought to be.” The Fountainhead was rejected by twelve publishers but finally accepted by the Bobbs-Merrill Company. When published in 1943, it made history by becoming a best-seller through word of mouth two years later, and gained for its author lasting recognition as a champion of individualism.
Ayn Rand returned to Hollywood in late 1943 to write the screenplay for The Fountainhead, but wartime restrictions delayed production until 1948. Working part time as a screenwriter for Hal Wallis Productions, she began her major novel Atlas Shrugged, in 1946. In 1951 she moved back to New York City and devoted herself full time to the completion of Atlas Shrugged.
Published in 1957, Atlas Shrugged was her greatest achievement and last work of fiction. In this novel she dramatized her unique philosophy in an intellectual mystery story that integrated ethics, metaphysics, epistemology, politics, economics and sex. Although she considered herself primarily a fiction writer, she realized that in order to create heroic fictional characters, she had to identify the philosophic principles which make such individuals possible.
Thereafter, Ayn Rand wrote and lectured on her philosophy—Objectivism, which she characterized as “a philosophy for living on earth." She published and edited her own periodicals from 1962 to 1976, her essays providing much of the material for six books on Objectivism and its application to the culture. Ayn Rand died on March 6, 1982, in her New York City apartment.
Every book by Ayn Rand published in her lifetime is still in print, and hundreds of thousands of copies are sold each year, so far totaling more than 25 million. Several new volumes have been published posthumously. Her vision of man and her philosophy for living on earth have changed the lives of thousands of readers and launched a philosophic movement with a growing impact on American culture.
Other sources of biographical information on Ayn Rand:
Facets of Ayn Rand, a memoir by Charles and Mary Ann Sures. Complete text available on the Web, or in print from the Ayn Rand Bookstore
Ayn Rand, a biography by Jeff Britting
Documentary movie: Ayn Rand: A Sense of Life
Journals of Ayn Rand, edited by David Harriman
Letters of Ayn Rand, edited by Michael Berliner
“My Thirty Years with Ayn Rand,” by Leonard Peikoff (Free audio recording)
“Ayn Rand’s Life: Highlights and Sidelights,” by Harry Binswanger (Free audio excerpt)
“Ayn Rand and the Atlas Shrugged Years: Reminiscences and Recollections,” by Mary Ann Sures with Harry Binswanger (Free audio recording)
“Centenary Reminiscences of Ayn Rand” by Leonard Peikoff (Free audio recording)
“New York Centenary Reminiscences of Ayn Rand” by Harry Binswanger and Allan Gotthelf (Free audio recording)
A Brief Biography of Ayn Rand
Ayn Rand was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, on February 2, 1905. At age six she taught herself to read and two years later discovered her first fictional hero in a French magazine for children, thus capturing the heroic vision which sustained her throughout her life. At the age of nine, she decided to make fiction writing her career. Thoroughly opposed to the mysticism and collectivism of Russian culture, she thought of herself as a European writer, especially after encountering Victor Hugo, the writer she most admired.
During her high school years, she was eyewitness to both the Kerensky Revolution, which she supported, and—in 1917—the Bolshevik Revolution, which she denounced from the outset. In order to escape the fighting, her family went to the Crimea, where she finished high school. The final Communist victory brought the confiscation of her father's pharmacy and periods of near-starvation. When introduced to American history in her last year of high school, she immediately took America as her model of what a nation of free men could be.
When her family returned from the Crimea, she entered the University of Petrograd to study philosophy and history. Graduating in 1924, she experienced the disintegration of free inquiry and the takeover of the university by communist thugs. Amidst the increasingly gray life, her greatest pleasures were Viennese operettas and Western films and plays. Long an admirer of cinema, she entered the State Institute for Cinema Arts in 1924 to study screenwriting. It was at this time that she was first published: a booklet on actress Pola Negri (1925) and a booklet titled “Hollywood: American Movie City” (1926), both reprinted in 1999 in Russian Writings on Hollywood.
In late 1925 she obtained permission to leave Soviet Russia for a visit to relatives in the United States. Although she told Soviet authorities that her visit would be short, she was determined never to return to Russia. She arrived in New York City in February 1926. She spent the next six months with her relatives in Chicago, obtained an extension to her visa, and then left for Hollywood to pursue a career as a screenwriter.
On Ayn Rand’s second day in Hollywood, Cecil B. DeMille saw her standing at the gate of his studio, offered her a ride to the set of his movie The King of Kings, and gave her a job, first as an extra, then as a script reader. During the next week at the studio, she met an actor, Frank O’Connor, whom she married in 1929; they were married until his death fifty years later.
After struggling for several years at various nonwriting jobs, including one in the wardrobe department at the RKO Radio Pictures, Inc., she sold her first screenplay, “Red Pawn,” to Universal Pictures in 1932 and saw her first stage play, Night of January 16th, produced in Hollywood and then on Broadway. Her first novel, We the Living, was completed in 1934 but was rejected by numerous publishers, until The Macmillan Company in the United States and Cassells and Company in England published the book in 1936. The most autobiographical of her novels, it was based on her years under Soviet tyranny.
She began writing The Fountainhead in 1935 (taking a short break in 1937 to write the anti-collectivist novelette Anthem). In the character of the architect Howard Roark, she presented for the first time the kind of hero whose depiction was the chief goal of her writing: the ideal man, man as “he could be and ought to be.” The Fountainhead was rejected by twelve publishers but finally accepted by the Bobbs-Merrill Company. When published in 1943, it made history by becoming a best-seller through word of mouth two years later, and gained for its author lasting recognition as a champion of individualism.
Ayn Rand returned to Hollywood in late 1943 to write the screenplay for The Fountainhead, but wartime restrictions delayed production until 1948. Working part time as a screenwriter for Hal Wallis Productions, she began her major novel Atlas Shrugged, in 1946. In 1951 she moved back to New York City and devoted herself full time to the completion of Atlas Shrugged.
Published in 1957, Atlas Shrugged was her greatest achievement and last work of fiction. In this novel she dramatized her unique philosophy in an intellectual mystery story that integrated ethics, metaphysics, epistemology, politics, economics and sex. Although she considered herself primarily a fiction writer, she realized that in order to create heroic fictional characters, she had to identify the philosophic principles which make such individuals possible.
Thereafter, Ayn Rand wrote and lectured on her philosophy—Objectivism, which she characterized as “a philosophy for living on earth." She published and edited her own periodicals from 1962 to 1976, her essays providing much of the material for six books on Objectivism and its application to the culture. Ayn Rand died on March 6, 1982, in her New York City apartment.
Every book by Ayn Rand published in her lifetime is still in print, and hundreds of thousands of copies are sold each year, so far totaling more than 25 million. Several new volumes have been published posthumously. Her vision of man and her philosophy for living on earth have changed the lives of thousands of readers and launched a philosophic movement with a growing impact on American culture.
Other sources of biographical information on Ayn Rand:
Facets of Ayn Rand, a memoir by Charles and Mary Ann Sures. Complete text available on the Web, or in print from the Ayn Rand Bookstore
Ayn Rand, a biography by Jeff Britting
Documentary movie: Ayn Rand: A Sense of Life
Journals of Ayn Rand, edited by David Harriman
Letters of Ayn Rand, edited by Michael Berliner
“My Thirty Years with Ayn Rand,” by Leonard Peikoff (Free audio recording)
“Ayn Rand’s Life: Highlights and Sidelights,” by Harry Binswanger (Free audio excerpt)
“Ayn Rand and the Atlas Shrugged Years: Reminiscences and Recollections,” by Mary Ann Sures with Harry Binswanger (Free audio recording)
“Centenary Reminiscences of Ayn Rand” by Leonard Peikoff (Free audio recording)
“New York Centenary Reminiscences of Ayn Rand” by Harry Binswanger and Allan Gotthelf (Free audio recording)
Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman ....Short biography from The Hoover Institute...see the internet...
Expertise: Monetary and price theory, monetary history
Click here for bio summary.
Milton Friedman, recipient of the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize for economic science, was a senior research fellow at the Hoover Institution from 1977 to 2006. He passed away on Nov. 16, 2006. (Link to obituary.) He was also the Paul Snowden Russell Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Economics at the University of Chicago, where he taught from 1946 to 1976, and a member of the research staff of the National Bureau of Economic Research from 1937 to 1981.
Friedman was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1988 and received the National Medal of Science the same year.
He was widely regarded as the leader of the Chicago School of monetary economics, which stresses the importance of the quantity of money as an instrument of government policy and as a determinant of business cycles and inflation.
In addition to his scientific work, Friedman also wrote extensively on public policy, always with a primary emphasis on the preservation and extension of individual freedom. His most important books in this field are (with Rose D. Friedman) Capitalism and Freedom (University of Chicago Press, 1962); Bright Promises, Dismal Performance (Thomas Horton and Daughters, 1983), which consists mostly of reprints of columns he wrote for Newsweek from 1966 to 1983; (with Rose D. Friedman) Free to Choose (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1980), which complements a ten-part television series of the same name shown over the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) network in early 1980; and (with Rose D. Friedman) Tyranny of the Status Quo (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1984), which complements a three-part television series of the same name, shown over PBS in early 1984.
He was a member of the President's Commission on an All-Volunteer Armed Force and the President's Commission on White House Fellows. He was a member of President Ronald Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board (a group of experts from outside the government named in 1981 by President Reagan).
Friedman was also active in public affairs, serving as an informal economic adviser to Senator Barry Goldwater in his unsuccessful campaign for the presidency in 1964, to Richard Nixon in his successful 1968 campaign, to President Nixon subsequently, and to Ronald Reagan in his 1980 campaign.
He has published many books and articles, most notably A Theory of the Consumption Function, The Optimum Quantity of Money and Other Essays, and (with A. J. Schwartz) A Monetary History of the United States, Monetary Statistics of the United States, and Monetary Trends in the United States and the United Kingdom.
He was a past president of the American Economic Association, the Western Economic Association, and the Mont Pelerin Society and was a member of the American Philosophical Society and the National Academy of Sciences.
He was awarded honorary degrees by universities in the United States, Japan, Israel, and Guatemala, as well as the Grand Cordon of the First Class Order of the Sacred Treasure by the Japanese government in 1986.
Friedman received a B.A. in 1932 from Rutgers University, an M.A. in 1933 from the University of Chicago, and a Ph.D. in 1946 from Columbia University.
Two Lucky People, his and Rose D. Friedman's memoirs, was published in 1998 by the University of Chicago Press.
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Expertise: Monetary and price theory, monetary history
Click here for bio summary.
Milton Friedman, recipient of the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize for economic science, was a senior research fellow at the Hoover Institution from 1977 to 2006. He passed away on Nov. 16, 2006. (Link to obituary.) He was also the Paul Snowden Russell Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Economics at the University of Chicago, where he taught from 1946 to 1976, and a member of the research staff of the National Bureau of Economic Research from 1937 to 1981.
Friedman was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1988 and received the National Medal of Science the same year.
He was widely regarded as the leader of the Chicago School of monetary economics, which stresses the importance of the quantity of money as an instrument of government policy and as a determinant of business cycles and inflation.
In addition to his scientific work, Friedman also wrote extensively on public policy, always with a primary emphasis on the preservation and extension of individual freedom. His most important books in this field are (with Rose D. Friedman) Capitalism and Freedom (University of Chicago Press, 1962); Bright Promises, Dismal Performance (Thomas Horton and Daughters, 1983), which consists mostly of reprints of columns he wrote for Newsweek from 1966 to 1983; (with Rose D. Friedman) Free to Choose (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1980), which complements a ten-part television series of the same name shown over the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) network in early 1980; and (with Rose D. Friedman) Tyranny of the Status Quo (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1984), which complements a three-part television series of the same name, shown over PBS in early 1984.
He was a member of the President's Commission on an All-Volunteer Armed Force and the President's Commission on White House Fellows. He was a member of President Ronald Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board (a group of experts from outside the government named in 1981 by President Reagan).
Friedman was also active in public affairs, serving as an informal economic adviser to Senator Barry Goldwater in his unsuccessful campaign for the presidency in 1964, to Richard Nixon in his successful 1968 campaign, to President Nixon subsequently, and to Ronald Reagan in his 1980 campaign.
He has published many books and articles, most notably A Theory of the Consumption Function, The Optimum Quantity of Money and Other Essays, and (with A. J. Schwartz) A Monetary History of the United States, Monetary Statistics of the United States, and Monetary Trends in the United States and the United Kingdom.
He was a past president of the American Economic Association, the Western Economic Association, and the Mont Pelerin Society and was a member of the American Philosophical Society and the National Academy of Sciences.
He was awarded honorary degrees by universities in the United States, Japan, Israel, and Guatemala, as well as the Grand Cordon of the First Class Order of the Sacred Treasure by the Japanese government in 1986.
Friedman received a B.A. in 1932 from Rutgers University, an M.A. in 1933 from the University of Chicago, and a Ph.D. in 1946 from Columbia University.
Two Lucky People, his and Rose D. Friedman's memoirs, was published in 1998 by the University of Chicago Press.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright © 2009 by the Board of Trustees of Leland Stanford Junior University
Phone: 650-723-1754 QUICK LINKS:
CONTACT US
DIRECTIONS
FELLOW BLOGS:
Gary Becker
Jerry Dorfman
Paul Gregory
Victor Davis Hanson
Alvin Rabushka
Diane Ravitch
Russ Roberts
All of Hoover's site Hoover Press site -------------------------------- About Hoover Library & Archives Task Forces Research Facts on Policy Russian Economy Soviet Archives Research Fellows Publications Hoover Digest Policy Review Education Next China Leadership Monitor Books Essays Multimedia Events Directors" Forum Audio Uncommon Knowledge Public Affairs Op-Eds What"s New News Releases Headlines Events Calendar
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Private I: Was Milton Friedman Pro-Capitalist? by Roger Donway
From the internet...The Atlas Society
Private I: Was Milton Friedman Pro-Capitalist?
by Roger Donway
Last year, on November 16 (the anniversary of the Federal Reserve System, ironically), Milton Friedman died at the age of ninety-four. The editorial in the next day’s Wall Street Journal carried the headline “Capitalism and Friedman,” playing off the title of his 1962 work Capitalism and Freedom. The article’s subtitle read: “The man who made free markets popular again.”
Personally, I learned an inestimable amount about economic liberty from Milton Friedman. My educational debt to him stretches back four decades, to that famous book, which I read in high school shortly after its publication. Over the years, whenever I have set out to gather analyses of economic interventionism and anti-business leftism, I have often turned to Friedman first.
And yet I distinctly remember hearing philosopher Ayn Rand remark that she did not consider Milton Friedman to be a defender of capitalism at all, although she understood why some people thought he was.
Milton Friedman not pro-capitalist? Is the pope Protestant? What did Rand mean?
I had occasion to ask those questions recently when I began writing an article about the anti-business journalism of New York Times financial columnist Gretchen Morgenson (published in this issue of TNI). In preparing to analyze Morgenson’s writings, I went back to re-read Friedman’s famous article in the September 13, 1970, New York Times Magazine, “The Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Profits.” I remembered having enjoyed the essay enormously, having indeed laughed aloud for the sheer joy of hearing such things said amid those appalling, New Left−dominated times. But my re-reading brought disappointment. Not only did I not find a knockdown answer to Morgenson’s collectivist vision—of “shareholder democracy” as a cure for CEO greed—the piece seemed to offer a view of business and businessmen that lent credence to her views.
Friedman’s Thesis
Friedman argued as follows:
In a free-enterprise, private-property system, a corporate executive is an employee of the owners of the business. He has direct responsibility to his employers. That responsibility is to conduct the business in accordance with their desires, which generally will be to make as much money as possible while conforming to the basic rules of society, both those embodied in law and those embodied in ethical custom. Of course, in some cases his employers may have a different objective. A group of persons might establish a corporation for an eleemosynary purpose—for example, a hospital or school. The manager of such a corporation will not have money profit as his objective but the rendering of certain services.
Having laid down this understanding of the businessman’s place, Friedman went on to ask: “What does it mean to say that the corporate executive has a ‘social responsibility’ in his capacity as businessman? If this statement is not pure rhetoric, it must mean that he is to act in some way that is not in the interest of his employers.” Quoting his book Capitalism and Freedom, Friedman concluded: “‘There is one and only one social responsibility of business—to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits so long as it stays within the rules of the game, which is to say, engages in open and free competition without deception or fraud.’”
Does this mean that for-profit corporations may not engage in eleemosynary activities without the express consent of their stockholders? Or, if they may, how are managers to weigh such charity against their supposed responsibility to maximize shareholder wealth?
Friedman took account of corporate philanthropy in his article by considering it no exception to his rule:“It may well be in the long-run interest of a corporation that is a major employer in a small community to devote resources to providing amenities to that community or to improving its government. That may make it easier to attract desirable employees, it may reduce the wage bill or lessen losses from pilferage and sabotage or have other worthwhile effects.” In short, Friedman argued that even for nominally philanthropic expenditures, the test and measure should be: How does this spending serve to maximize profits?
The Businessman as Humble Servant
Back in 1970, when I first read Friedman’s essay, I looked upon it as defending the right of businessmen to pursue their self-interest. This time I saw it differently. By Friedman’s formulation, Walt Disney was not a creative genius who sold stock so that he would have enough capital to pursue his vision on a grand scale. He was just someone who had been hired as “an employee” by his stockholders and thus was obligated to do whatever the majority of his stockholders wished. Friedman presumed that what stockholders wished “generally will be to make as much money as possible.” But will it? Might not today’s stockholders want Disney to make as much money as possible—under the constraint that his cartoons be politically correct?
Or look at it from the other side: Suppose Disney’s stockholders did want only to make money, but believed it could be done best through activities that violated Disney’s personal vision of what cartoons should be. For example, suppose the stockholders, wishing Disney to make as much money as possible, elected directors who insisted that he produce disgusting cartoons like South Park. In the face of his stockholders’ desires, Walt Disney, being a mere servant, would have no right to pursue his own creative entrepreneurial vision of cartoons.
Friedman’s dictum of maximizing profits has another consequence that is even harder to reconcile with his status as a defender of capitalism. According to his theory, it is not enough for a business executive to pursue the maximization of shareholder wealth through production and trade. He must take every and any action that he believes will maximize his shareholders’ wealth, so long as it is within the laws and ethical customs of the society where he operates. But those “laws and customs” may not have anything to do with the principles of individualism, or even individual rights.
For example, in 1989 Friedman told the National Association of Business Economics: “A corporate executive who goes to Washington seeking a tariff for his company's product is pursuing his stockholders’ self-interest, and I cannot blame him for doing so. As an employee of the stockholders, he has a fiduciary responsibility to promote their interest. If he’s made a valid, accurate judgment that a tariff will be in the self-interest of his enterprise, he is justified in lobbying for such a tariff.”
With no theory of natural rights to guide him, Friedman could oppose lobbying only pragmatically, on a case-by-case basis. He could not draw a principled distinction between lobbying to have force initiated on behalf of one’s company (seeking a subsidy, say) and lobbying to be defended against force (for example, seeking protection against a U.S. subsidy of a domestic competitor or against a foreign subsidy of a foreign competitor).
But why stop with lobbying? If Google could reap higher profits by helping China’s dictatorship censor search engines, then clearly it would be obligated to pursue such a course. That is not a happy conclusion for one who defends business as a bulwark of the free society.
To be sure, Friedman did say that a corporation should obey the rules embodied in “ethical custom,” but that is a weak reed in a pluralist, secular society. And it would be an even weaker reed in a fully capitalist society, for defenders of capitalism boast, rightly, that their system is the greatest destroyer of traditional ethical customs and taboos. During the Cold War, it was typically businessmen who rationalized away moral doubts about trade with the Soviet Union; it was labor union leaders like George Meany who insisted that it was simply wrong to trade with a state that enslaved its people.
Friedman also allowed that an individual manager who had qualms about pursuing a particular course of profit-maximizing behavior should quit, though the company itself had no moral right to forgo the behavior in question. Considering how strenuously libertarians urge that the law should permit much behavior that is immoral, the result of applying Friedman’s doctrine in a fully free society would seem to be an endless stream of departing managers, leaving only the most amoral or depraved people willing to become CEOs.
In sum, what many libertarian readers interpreted as Friedman’s stout defense of self-interested businessmen turns out to be nothing of the kind. It was, rather, a way to avoid the need to defend the businessman’s pursuit of self-interest. Friedman’s argument said, in effect: “Don’t blame the poor little businessman for making as much money as he can; he’s just doing his duty as a good servant.” But by trying to extricate business executives from the charge of selfishness, Friedman succeeded only in portraying them as amoral functionaries.
What would a more individualist portrayal of the businessman’s role look like? That is a question for a later column.
The Corporation as Social Tool
Still, one might say, if Friedman disavowed the egoism of businessmen, did he not defend the egoism of the stockholder? He maintained that the money-earning activities of businessmen are only expressions of bounden duty. But he also asserted, did he not, that shareholder-bosses are right to be self-interested money-grubbers, desiring only “to make as much money as possible while conforming to the basic rules of society”? One can certainly read his 1970 article in that fashion, particularly when he quotes his book Capitalism and Freedom as saying that the whole notion of a corporation’s social responsibility is “fundamentally subversive.”
But if that is Friedman’s view, then it would seem that the New York Times’s Gretchen Morgenson is on good grounds when she urges that stockholders be given a greater ability to choose the directors of a company and to hold them responsible for the activities of profligate managers. On October 1, 2006, for example, Morgenson quoted the CEO of a proxy advisory research firm as saying: “Unfortunately, shareholders do not now have the means to assert market influence. . . . A good libertarian would seek an easier way for the market’s participants to order their affairs and provide an oversight mechanism for owners that would help eliminate the call for greater regulation and criminal prosecution.” Friedman’s 1970 attack on the social responsibility of business did seem to lay the groundwork for partisans of “shareholder democracy.”
In his final years, however, Friedman apparently backed away from stressing the (presumed but never consulted) desires of stockholder-owners as the basis for profit-maximization by servant-executives. He turned instead to justifying corporate profit-seeking on the basis of utilitarianism, which obviated the need for shareholder input and thus for shareholder democracy.
For example, in a debate published in the October 2005 Reason magazine, Friedman said: “Note that I refer to social responsibility, not financial, accounting, or legal. . . . Maximizing profits is an end from the private point of view; it is a means from the social point of view. A system based on private property and free markets is a sophisticated means of enabling people to cooperate in their economic activities without compulsion; it enables separated knowledge to assure that each resource is used for its most valuable use, and is combined with other resources in the most efficient way.”
So it appears that, for Friedman, “the social responsibility of business” is after all a perfectly valid concept and not “fundamentally subversive.” The perspective of “social responsibility” looks upon a free-market system not as the social expression of individual rights, but as the means by which society organizes the use of “its” resources so that they are employed in the most valuable way—“valuable,” presumably, in accordance with some utilitarian standard. Within this system, shareholders are, yes, justified in pursuing the maximization of their wealth (through the work of their servant-executives). But they are so justified only because their pursuit of profit happens to be a means employed by society for the general, collective good. In effect, society is employing “its” selfish shareholders to make certain that society’s goods are deployed in the most efficient and value-producing manner. That, according to Friedman, is the overarching justification for the selfish behavior of those who participate in business.
And utilitarianism, not the greed of stockholder-owners, is also the overarching reason that both shareholders and their servant-executives should eschew philanthropic behavior. As Friedman put it: “What reason is there to suppose that the stream of profit distributed in this way would do more good for society than investing that stream of profit in the enterprise itself or paying it out as dividends and letting the stockholders dispose of it? . . . Any funds devoted to [charity] would surely have contributed more to society if they had been devoted to improving still further [the company’s business].” Morally speaking, that is a thoroughly collectivist defense of profit-seeking.
In the end, then, was Milton Friedman an advocate of capitalism or not? Strictly speaking, I believe he was. Friedman did defend political and economic individualism; but, like many before him (notably John Stuart Mill), he defended them on the basis of ethical collectivism, specifically, utilitarianism. And such a defense, ultimately, is indefensible.
Private I: Was Milton Friedman Pro-Capitalist?
by Roger Donway
Last year, on November 16 (the anniversary of the Federal Reserve System, ironically), Milton Friedman died at the age of ninety-four. The editorial in the next day’s Wall Street Journal carried the headline “Capitalism and Friedman,” playing off the title of his 1962 work Capitalism and Freedom. The article’s subtitle read: “The man who made free markets popular again.”
Personally, I learned an inestimable amount about economic liberty from Milton Friedman. My educational debt to him stretches back four decades, to that famous book, which I read in high school shortly after its publication. Over the years, whenever I have set out to gather analyses of economic interventionism and anti-business leftism, I have often turned to Friedman first.
And yet I distinctly remember hearing philosopher Ayn Rand remark that she did not consider Milton Friedman to be a defender of capitalism at all, although she understood why some people thought he was.
Milton Friedman not pro-capitalist? Is the pope Protestant? What did Rand mean?
I had occasion to ask those questions recently when I began writing an article about the anti-business journalism of New York Times financial columnist Gretchen Morgenson (published in this issue of TNI). In preparing to analyze Morgenson’s writings, I went back to re-read Friedman’s famous article in the September 13, 1970, New York Times Magazine, “The Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Profits.” I remembered having enjoyed the essay enormously, having indeed laughed aloud for the sheer joy of hearing such things said amid those appalling, New Left−dominated times. But my re-reading brought disappointment. Not only did I not find a knockdown answer to Morgenson’s collectivist vision—of “shareholder democracy” as a cure for CEO greed—the piece seemed to offer a view of business and businessmen that lent credence to her views.
Friedman’s Thesis
Friedman argued as follows:
In a free-enterprise, private-property system, a corporate executive is an employee of the owners of the business. He has direct responsibility to his employers. That responsibility is to conduct the business in accordance with their desires, which generally will be to make as much money as possible while conforming to the basic rules of society, both those embodied in law and those embodied in ethical custom. Of course, in some cases his employers may have a different objective. A group of persons might establish a corporation for an eleemosynary purpose—for example, a hospital or school. The manager of such a corporation will not have money profit as his objective but the rendering of certain services.
Having laid down this understanding of the businessman’s place, Friedman went on to ask: “What does it mean to say that the corporate executive has a ‘social responsibility’ in his capacity as businessman? If this statement is not pure rhetoric, it must mean that he is to act in some way that is not in the interest of his employers.” Quoting his book Capitalism and Freedom, Friedman concluded: “‘There is one and only one social responsibility of business—to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits so long as it stays within the rules of the game, which is to say, engages in open and free competition without deception or fraud.’”
Does this mean that for-profit corporations may not engage in eleemosynary activities without the express consent of their stockholders? Or, if they may, how are managers to weigh such charity against their supposed responsibility to maximize shareholder wealth?
Friedman took account of corporate philanthropy in his article by considering it no exception to his rule:“It may well be in the long-run interest of a corporation that is a major employer in a small community to devote resources to providing amenities to that community or to improving its government. That may make it easier to attract desirable employees, it may reduce the wage bill or lessen losses from pilferage and sabotage or have other worthwhile effects.” In short, Friedman argued that even for nominally philanthropic expenditures, the test and measure should be: How does this spending serve to maximize profits?
The Businessman as Humble Servant
Back in 1970, when I first read Friedman’s essay, I looked upon it as defending the right of businessmen to pursue their self-interest. This time I saw it differently. By Friedman’s formulation, Walt Disney was not a creative genius who sold stock so that he would have enough capital to pursue his vision on a grand scale. He was just someone who had been hired as “an employee” by his stockholders and thus was obligated to do whatever the majority of his stockholders wished. Friedman presumed that what stockholders wished “generally will be to make as much money as possible.” But will it? Might not today’s stockholders want Disney to make as much money as possible—under the constraint that his cartoons be politically correct?
Or look at it from the other side: Suppose Disney’s stockholders did want only to make money, but believed it could be done best through activities that violated Disney’s personal vision of what cartoons should be. For example, suppose the stockholders, wishing Disney to make as much money as possible, elected directors who insisted that he produce disgusting cartoons like South Park. In the face of his stockholders’ desires, Walt Disney, being a mere servant, would have no right to pursue his own creative entrepreneurial vision of cartoons.
Friedman’s dictum of maximizing profits has another consequence that is even harder to reconcile with his status as a defender of capitalism. According to his theory, it is not enough for a business executive to pursue the maximization of shareholder wealth through production and trade. He must take every and any action that he believes will maximize his shareholders’ wealth, so long as it is within the laws and ethical customs of the society where he operates. But those “laws and customs” may not have anything to do with the principles of individualism, or even individual rights.
For example, in 1989 Friedman told the National Association of Business Economics: “A corporate executive who goes to Washington seeking a tariff for his company's product is pursuing his stockholders’ self-interest, and I cannot blame him for doing so. As an employee of the stockholders, he has a fiduciary responsibility to promote their interest. If he’s made a valid, accurate judgment that a tariff will be in the self-interest of his enterprise, he is justified in lobbying for such a tariff.”
With no theory of natural rights to guide him, Friedman could oppose lobbying only pragmatically, on a case-by-case basis. He could not draw a principled distinction between lobbying to have force initiated on behalf of one’s company (seeking a subsidy, say) and lobbying to be defended against force (for example, seeking protection against a U.S. subsidy of a domestic competitor or against a foreign subsidy of a foreign competitor).
But why stop with lobbying? If Google could reap higher profits by helping China’s dictatorship censor search engines, then clearly it would be obligated to pursue such a course. That is not a happy conclusion for one who defends business as a bulwark of the free society.
To be sure, Friedman did say that a corporation should obey the rules embodied in “ethical custom,” but that is a weak reed in a pluralist, secular society. And it would be an even weaker reed in a fully capitalist society, for defenders of capitalism boast, rightly, that their system is the greatest destroyer of traditional ethical customs and taboos. During the Cold War, it was typically businessmen who rationalized away moral doubts about trade with the Soviet Union; it was labor union leaders like George Meany who insisted that it was simply wrong to trade with a state that enslaved its people.
Friedman also allowed that an individual manager who had qualms about pursuing a particular course of profit-maximizing behavior should quit, though the company itself had no moral right to forgo the behavior in question. Considering how strenuously libertarians urge that the law should permit much behavior that is immoral, the result of applying Friedman’s doctrine in a fully free society would seem to be an endless stream of departing managers, leaving only the most amoral or depraved people willing to become CEOs.
In sum, what many libertarian readers interpreted as Friedman’s stout defense of self-interested businessmen turns out to be nothing of the kind. It was, rather, a way to avoid the need to defend the businessman’s pursuit of self-interest. Friedman’s argument said, in effect: “Don’t blame the poor little businessman for making as much money as he can; he’s just doing his duty as a good servant.” But by trying to extricate business executives from the charge of selfishness, Friedman succeeded only in portraying them as amoral functionaries.
What would a more individualist portrayal of the businessman’s role look like? That is a question for a later column.
The Corporation as Social Tool
Still, one might say, if Friedman disavowed the egoism of businessmen, did he not defend the egoism of the stockholder? He maintained that the money-earning activities of businessmen are only expressions of bounden duty. But he also asserted, did he not, that shareholder-bosses are right to be self-interested money-grubbers, desiring only “to make as much money as possible while conforming to the basic rules of society”? One can certainly read his 1970 article in that fashion, particularly when he quotes his book Capitalism and Freedom as saying that the whole notion of a corporation’s social responsibility is “fundamentally subversive.”
But if that is Friedman’s view, then it would seem that the New York Times’s Gretchen Morgenson is on good grounds when she urges that stockholders be given a greater ability to choose the directors of a company and to hold them responsible for the activities of profligate managers. On October 1, 2006, for example, Morgenson quoted the CEO of a proxy advisory research firm as saying: “Unfortunately, shareholders do not now have the means to assert market influence. . . . A good libertarian would seek an easier way for the market’s participants to order their affairs and provide an oversight mechanism for owners that would help eliminate the call for greater regulation and criminal prosecution.” Friedman’s 1970 attack on the social responsibility of business did seem to lay the groundwork for partisans of “shareholder democracy.”
In his final years, however, Friedman apparently backed away from stressing the (presumed but never consulted) desires of stockholder-owners as the basis for profit-maximization by servant-executives. He turned instead to justifying corporate profit-seeking on the basis of utilitarianism, which obviated the need for shareholder input and thus for shareholder democracy.
For example, in a debate published in the October 2005 Reason magazine, Friedman said: “Note that I refer to social responsibility, not financial, accounting, or legal. . . . Maximizing profits is an end from the private point of view; it is a means from the social point of view. A system based on private property and free markets is a sophisticated means of enabling people to cooperate in their economic activities without compulsion; it enables separated knowledge to assure that each resource is used for its most valuable use, and is combined with other resources in the most efficient way.”
So it appears that, for Friedman, “the social responsibility of business” is after all a perfectly valid concept and not “fundamentally subversive.” The perspective of “social responsibility” looks upon a free-market system not as the social expression of individual rights, but as the means by which society organizes the use of “its” resources so that they are employed in the most valuable way—“valuable,” presumably, in accordance with some utilitarian standard. Within this system, shareholders are, yes, justified in pursuing the maximization of their wealth (through the work of their servant-executives). But they are so justified only because their pursuit of profit happens to be a means employed by society for the general, collective good. In effect, society is employing “its” selfish shareholders to make certain that society’s goods are deployed in the most efficient and value-producing manner. That, according to Friedman, is the overarching justification for the selfish behavior of those who participate in business.
And utilitarianism, not the greed of stockholder-owners, is also the overarching reason that both shareholders and their servant-executives should eschew philanthropic behavior. As Friedman put it: “What reason is there to suppose that the stream of profit distributed in this way would do more good for society than investing that stream of profit in the enterprise itself or paying it out as dividends and letting the stockholders dispose of it? . . . Any funds devoted to [charity] would surely have contributed more to society if they had been devoted to improving still further [the company’s business].” Morally speaking, that is a thoroughly collectivist defense of profit-seeking.
In the end, then, was Milton Friedman an advocate of capitalism or not? Strictly speaking, I believe he was. Friedman did defend political and economic individualism; but, like many before him (notably John Stuart Mill), he defended them on the basis of ethical collectivism, specifically, utilitarianism. And such a defense, ultimately, is indefensible.
Friday, February 20, 2009
Illinois governor says Sen. Burris should resign
Illinois governor says Sen. Burris should resign
Delicious Digg Facebook Fark Newsvine Reddit StumbleUpon Technorati Yahoo! Bookmarks Print 2 mins ago Play Video CBS 2 Chicago – More And More Calls For Burris To Come Clean
Slideshow:Sen. Roland Burris Play Video Video:Illinois governor calls on Sen. Burris to resign AP Play Video Video:Burris says he'll talk, but not to reporters
AP AP – Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn responds to a question after calling on Sen. Roland Burris, D-Ill., to resign … CHICAGO – Gov. Pat Quinn on Friday called on fellow Democrat Roland Burris to resign from the U.S. Senate, saying the controversy surrounding Burris' appointment to the seat was hurting the state and his constituents. Meanwhile, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Burris must explain the conflicting statements that have put his appointment in peril and should take time this weekend to "certainly think of what lays in his future."
Quinn praised Burris as an honorable man, but said a shadow hangs over him after revelations the senator attempted to raise money for disgraced former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who appointed him, and failed to disclose multiple conversations with Blagojevich advisers.
"To step aside and resign is, I think, a heroic act and I ask Roland to do that," Quinn said at a news conference.
In the event Burris does resign, Quinn said lawmakers should quickly pass legislation to fill any Senate vacancy by special election, rather than gubernatorial appointment.
"At no time should our state go without full and fair representation in the United States Senate," Quinn said. He declined to say who he might temporarily appoint if Burris resigns.
Burris has given no indication of heeding the many calls for his job, including from other Democratic lawmakers. He was on a listening tour of the state Friday and is refusing to speak publicly about the controversy. Spokesman Jim O'Connor said he would not respond specifically to Quinn's statements.
"Like he said before, he's asked the public and officials to stop the rush to judgment and to allow all of the facts to come out," O'Connor said Friday.
Burris, a former Illinois attorney general, testified before the Illinois House committee that recommended Blagojevich's impeachment in January that he hadn't had contact with key Blagojevich staffers or offered anything in return for the Senate seat vacated by President Barack Obama.
Last weekend, however, Burris released an affidavit saying he had spoken to several Blagojevich advisers, including Robert Blagojevich, the former governor's brother and finance chairman, who Burris said called three times last fall asking for fundraising help. Burris, a former state attorney general, changed his story again this week when he admitted trying, unsuccessfully, to raise money for Blagojevich.
Illinois lawmakers have asked local prosecutors to look into perjury charges, and a preliminary U.S. Senate Ethics Committee inquiry is under way. Burris denies lying under oath.
___
Associated Press writer Tammy Webber contributed to this report.
Delicious Digg Facebook Fark Newsvine Reddit StumbleUpon Technorati Yahoo! Bookmarks Print 2 mins ago Play Video CBS 2 Chicago – More And More Calls For Burris To Come Clean
Slideshow:Sen. Roland Burris Play Video Video:Illinois governor calls on Sen. Burris to resign AP Play Video Video:Burris says he'll talk, but not to reporters
AP AP – Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn responds to a question after calling on Sen. Roland Burris, D-Ill., to resign … CHICAGO – Gov. Pat Quinn on Friday called on fellow Democrat Roland Burris to resign from the U.S. Senate, saying the controversy surrounding Burris' appointment to the seat was hurting the state and his constituents. Meanwhile, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Burris must explain the conflicting statements that have put his appointment in peril and should take time this weekend to "certainly think of what lays in his future."
Quinn praised Burris as an honorable man, but said a shadow hangs over him after revelations the senator attempted to raise money for disgraced former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who appointed him, and failed to disclose multiple conversations with Blagojevich advisers.
"To step aside and resign is, I think, a heroic act and I ask Roland to do that," Quinn said at a news conference.
In the event Burris does resign, Quinn said lawmakers should quickly pass legislation to fill any Senate vacancy by special election, rather than gubernatorial appointment.
"At no time should our state go without full and fair representation in the United States Senate," Quinn said. He declined to say who he might temporarily appoint if Burris resigns.
Burris has given no indication of heeding the many calls for his job, including from other Democratic lawmakers. He was on a listening tour of the state Friday and is refusing to speak publicly about the controversy. Spokesman Jim O'Connor said he would not respond specifically to Quinn's statements.
"Like he said before, he's asked the public and officials to stop the rush to judgment and to allow all of the facts to come out," O'Connor said Friday.
Burris, a former Illinois attorney general, testified before the Illinois House committee that recommended Blagojevich's impeachment in January that he hadn't had contact with key Blagojevich staffers or offered anything in return for the Senate seat vacated by President Barack Obama.
Last weekend, however, Burris released an affidavit saying he had spoken to several Blagojevich advisers, including Robert Blagojevich, the former governor's brother and finance chairman, who Burris said called three times last fall asking for fundraising help. Burris, a former state attorney general, changed his story again this week when he admitted trying, unsuccessfully, to raise money for Blagojevich.
Illinois lawmakers have asked local prosecutors to look into perjury charges, and a preliminary U.S. Senate Ethics Committee inquiry is under way. Burris denies lying under oath.
___
Associated Press writer Tammy Webber contributed to this report.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Obama: Stimulus bill 'major milestone'
Obama: Stimulus bill 'major milestone'
Delicious Digg Facebook Fark Newsvine Reddit StumbleUpon Technorati Yahoo! Bookmarks Print By DAVID ESPO, AP Special Correspondent David Espo, Ap Special Correspondent – Sat Feb 14, 7:25 am ET
Featured Topics: Barack Obama Presidential Transition Play Video ABC News – Government Stimulus and Consumers
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama, savoring his first major victory in Congress, said Saturday that newly passed $787 billion economic stimulus legislation marks a "major milestone on our road to recovery."
Speaking in his weekly radio and Internet address, Obama said, "I will sign this legislation into law shortly, and we'll begin making the immediate investments necessary to put people back to work doing the work America needs done."
At the same time, he cautioned, "This historic step won't be the end of what we do to turn our economy around, but rather the beginning. The problems that led us into this crisis are deep and widespread, and our response must be equal to the task."
The bill passed Congress on Friday on party-line votes, allowing Democratic leaders to deliver on their promise of clearing the legislation by mid-February.
Obama "now has a bill to sign that will create millions of good-paying jobs and help families and businesses stay afloat financially," said Sen. Max Baucus, a Montana Democrat who was a leading architect of the measure.
"It will shore up our schools and roads and bridges, and infuse cash into new sectors like green energy and technology that will sustain our economy for the long term," he added in a statement.
Hours earlier, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell offered a different prediction for a bill he said was loaded with wasteful spending.
"A stimulus bill that was supposed to be timely, targeted and temporary is none of the above," he said in remarks on the Senate floor. "And this means Congress is about to approve a stimulus that's unlikely to have much stimulative effect."
In a struggle lasting several weeks, lawmakers in the two political parties both emphasized they wanted to pass legislation to revitalize the economy and ease frozen credit markets. But the plan that the administration and its allies eventually came up drew the support of only three Republicans in Congress — moderate Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania.
Their support was critical, though, in helping the bill squeak through the Senate on a vote of 60-38, precisely the number needed for passage. Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown cast the 60th vote in favor in a nearly deserted Senate, hours after the roll call began. He arrived after a flight aboard a government plane from Ohio, where he was mourning the death of his mother earlier in the week.
The House vote was 246-183.
The legislation, among the costliest ever considered in Congress, provides billions of dollars to aid victims of the recession through unemployment benefits, food stamps, medical care, job retraining and more. Tens of billions are ticketed for the states to offset cuts they might otherwise have to make in aid to schools and local governments, and there is more than $48 billion for transportation projects such as road and bridge construction, mass transit and high-speed rail.
Democrats said the bill's tax cuts would help 95 percent of all Americans, much of the relief in the form of a break of $400 for individuals and $800 for couples. At the insistence of the White House, people who do not earn enough money to owe income taxes are eligible, an attempt to offset the payroll taxes they pay.
In a bow to political reality, lawmakers included $70 billion to shelter upper middle-class and wealthier taxpayers from an income tax increase that would otherwise hit them, a provision that the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said would do relatively little to create jobs.
Also included were funds for two of Obama's initiatives, the expansion of computerized information technology in the health care industry and billions to create so-called green jobs the administration says will begin reducing the country's dependence on foreign oil.
Friday's events capped an early period of accomplishment for the Democrats, who won control of the White House and expanded their majorities in Congress in last fall's elections.
Since taking office on Jan. 20, the president has signed legislation extending government-financed health care to millions of lower-income children who lack it, a bill that President George W. Bush twice vetoed. He also has placed his signature on a measure making it easier for workers to sue their employers for alleged job discrimination, effectively overturning a ruling by the Supreme Court's conservative majority.
___
Delicious Digg Facebook Fark Newsvine Reddit StumbleUpon Technorati Yahoo! Bookmarks Print By DAVID ESPO, AP Special Correspondent David Espo, Ap Special Correspondent – Sat Feb 14, 7:25 am ET
Featured Topics: Barack Obama Presidential Transition Play Video ABC News – Government Stimulus and Consumers
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama, savoring his first major victory in Congress, said Saturday that newly passed $787 billion economic stimulus legislation marks a "major milestone on our road to recovery."
Speaking in his weekly radio and Internet address, Obama said, "I will sign this legislation into law shortly, and we'll begin making the immediate investments necessary to put people back to work doing the work America needs done."
At the same time, he cautioned, "This historic step won't be the end of what we do to turn our economy around, but rather the beginning. The problems that led us into this crisis are deep and widespread, and our response must be equal to the task."
The bill passed Congress on Friday on party-line votes, allowing Democratic leaders to deliver on their promise of clearing the legislation by mid-February.
Obama "now has a bill to sign that will create millions of good-paying jobs and help families and businesses stay afloat financially," said Sen. Max Baucus, a Montana Democrat who was a leading architect of the measure.
"It will shore up our schools and roads and bridges, and infuse cash into new sectors like green energy and technology that will sustain our economy for the long term," he added in a statement.
Hours earlier, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell offered a different prediction for a bill he said was loaded with wasteful spending.
"A stimulus bill that was supposed to be timely, targeted and temporary is none of the above," he said in remarks on the Senate floor. "And this means Congress is about to approve a stimulus that's unlikely to have much stimulative effect."
In a struggle lasting several weeks, lawmakers in the two political parties both emphasized they wanted to pass legislation to revitalize the economy and ease frozen credit markets. But the plan that the administration and its allies eventually came up drew the support of only three Republicans in Congress — moderate Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania.
Their support was critical, though, in helping the bill squeak through the Senate on a vote of 60-38, precisely the number needed for passage. Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown cast the 60th vote in favor in a nearly deserted Senate, hours after the roll call began. He arrived after a flight aboard a government plane from Ohio, where he was mourning the death of his mother earlier in the week.
The House vote was 246-183.
The legislation, among the costliest ever considered in Congress, provides billions of dollars to aid victims of the recession through unemployment benefits, food stamps, medical care, job retraining and more. Tens of billions are ticketed for the states to offset cuts they might otherwise have to make in aid to schools and local governments, and there is more than $48 billion for transportation projects such as road and bridge construction, mass transit and high-speed rail.
Democrats said the bill's tax cuts would help 95 percent of all Americans, much of the relief in the form of a break of $400 for individuals and $800 for couples. At the insistence of the White House, people who do not earn enough money to owe income taxes are eligible, an attempt to offset the payroll taxes they pay.
In a bow to political reality, lawmakers included $70 billion to shelter upper middle-class and wealthier taxpayers from an income tax increase that would otherwise hit them, a provision that the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said would do relatively little to create jobs.
Also included were funds for two of Obama's initiatives, the expansion of computerized information technology in the health care industry and billions to create so-called green jobs the administration says will begin reducing the country's dependence on foreign oil.
Friday's events capped an early period of accomplishment for the Democrats, who won control of the White House and expanded their majorities in Congress in last fall's elections.
Since taking office on Jan. 20, the president has signed legislation extending government-financed health care to millions of lower-income children who lack it, a bill that President George W. Bush twice vetoed. He also has placed his signature on a measure making it easier for workers to sue their employers for alleged job discrimination, effectively overturning a ruling by the Supreme Court's conservative majority.
___
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
On Lobbyism, Special Interest Groups -- and Washington
The goal of Washington -- and Ottawa -- should not be to eliminate lobbyist and special interest groups altogether but rather to make them more democratically and dialectically visible, transparent -- and accountable for the potential and/or actual 'democratic side-effects' of their special interest requests and/or demands.
I am a philosopher by day and a taxi/mobility dispatcher by night. (Not too long ago, it was the other way around.) So as a taxi and a wheel-chair mobility dispatcher, I know a thing or two about 'lobbyism' and 'special interest groups'. Within the context of my industry, I know how they work. The 'taxi democrats' are on the taxi radio working the radio for their taxi calls, their business. In contrast, the 'taxi lobbyists' work the back rooms, the dispatch office, and the manager's office, looking for 'lobbyst handouts'. In the terminology of the business, they want to be 'fed'. If the 'ethics' in the dispatch and/or manager's office is really bad, then this 'lobbyist process' can go one step further. The dispatcher and/or the manager can get -- or demand (subtly or bluntly) -- a 'kickback' of a part of the proceeds of what the driver is being fed.
Gee, that almost sounds like Blagojevich putting up the Illinois Senator's job 'for sale' to the highest bidder. Lobbyism is not only rampant in Washington and Ottawa. It is likely rampant in any political and/or private corporate office where someone of questionable ethics believes that there is something significant to be gained by 'lobbying'. Indeed, the roots of lobbying can even be seen in kids 'lobbying' this or that parent -- obviously the parent with the least amount of (ethical) or any other form of resistance.
The issue is this: The number of people in Ottawa or Washington may involve hundreds, or indeed even, thousands of different people and/or groups of 'special interest' people all working towards their particular goal of gaining more political-legal power, corporate power, organizational power, and/or simply money. If there are government 'handouts' to be had, you will definitely find lobbyists lobbying this or that politician looking to get one of the available handouts. You might even find these lobbyists contributing significant amounts of money to this political party or that political party or this charitable organization or that charitable organization. Or a certain politician might get some 'free work done' on their Alaska house. At its crudest worst, there might be a 'briefcase of money' exchanged in a very private, covert, meeting place. No cheque, please. Cheques leave a paper trail. Just cash, please. Just cash. Are you listening Mr. Mulroney? Or here's a new idea. How about trying this: Bankrupt your bank or automobile business. (Maybe you ate up too much of the business profits.) Then start throwing your employees out of work. Hundreds of them. Better still, thousands of them. If you are a banker start closing down people's Retirement Investments, Savings, and Bank Accounts. Then watch Washington panic, throw billions and billions of 'new money' at you -- enough for you to gobble up even more profits, a huge surprise surplus for an even better spa vacation, another jet, another house (How many did you say you had, Senator McCain? Hey, but you are not interested in more houses even if they are earned the right way; you and Sarah Palin are interested in 'Joe The Plumber'), more and more lavish spending, a better and better retirement package worth millions and millions of more dollars, while Main Street America is losing more and more billions and billions of dollars. What an astronomical windfall! And now all of a sudden, The Republicans are interested in cutting spending. (When the spending doesn't involve them.)
Is this fair to the rest of the American people?
Is this fair to the democratic process?
Of course not.
Lobbyism must become a dialectically and democratically transparent, negotiated, integrated, and balanced process.
For every vocal, rhetorical, demanding, wheedling, whining, and/or money-giving political lobbyist special interest minority group, there is a hugely important 'silent majority' -- or a 'silent, invisible, Anti-Thesis Lobbyist-Special Interest Group' that needs to be democratically heard from too.
Lobbyism has to be pried out of the backrooms of Washington and Ottawa. There can be no money exchanging hands. That is so blatantly obvious that it barely needs to be said. But it does need to be said. Political charity funds need to be watched over.
So too, obviously, do Political Party Funds. These for far too long, have involved lobbyists 'buying America'.
'The squeeky wheel gets the oil.' (So too does the wheel with the most money and/or power of leverage.)
Conflict of interest issues need to be watched over with a microscope.
Do 'ethical watch dog groups' ever do any good'?
Or do they simply turn a blind eye to whatever their narcissistic political partners are doing -- or not doing?
Is Obama going to make a difference on the issue of lobbying in Washington?
Or are these 'bankruptcy-prone' banks and bankers going to keep getting more and more money while the better, more ethical, and financially solvent banks and bankers -- continue to get nothing? Why not reward the better banks and bankers and let them become bigger and better still -- rather than keep rewarding these inefficient, dyfunctional, money out the back door, banks and bankers that/who keep gobbling up more and more American taxpayer money -- are not accountable for it -- and then keep coming back for more. Or better still, give the 'stimulus' money back to Main Street America rather than to Corporate Wall Street America -- where the money keeps getting used, used up, and 'lost', and then back come the Corporate Lobbysts to Washington again. The biggest irony of this whole situation is that these 'Corporate Lobbysts' consist of the some of the wealthiest, most powerful men in America who when they are not lobbying, are extolling and trumpeting the virtues of 'Government-Unregulated-Adam Smith-Free Trade-Capitalism' and calling 'Socialism' 'The Scourge and The Enemy of America'.
That is -- when it is not in their own 'self-interest'.
President Obama...
Over to you.
-- dgb, February 10th, 2009
-- David Gordon Bain
-- Democracy Goes Beyond Narcissism
-- Dialectic Gap-Bridging Negotiations...
-- Are Still In Process...
I am a philosopher by day and a taxi/mobility dispatcher by night. (Not too long ago, it was the other way around.) So as a taxi and a wheel-chair mobility dispatcher, I know a thing or two about 'lobbyism' and 'special interest groups'. Within the context of my industry, I know how they work. The 'taxi democrats' are on the taxi radio working the radio for their taxi calls, their business. In contrast, the 'taxi lobbyists' work the back rooms, the dispatch office, and the manager's office, looking for 'lobbyst handouts'. In the terminology of the business, they want to be 'fed'. If the 'ethics' in the dispatch and/or manager's office is really bad, then this 'lobbyist process' can go one step further. The dispatcher and/or the manager can get -- or demand (subtly or bluntly) -- a 'kickback' of a part of the proceeds of what the driver is being fed.
Gee, that almost sounds like Blagojevich putting up the Illinois Senator's job 'for sale' to the highest bidder. Lobbyism is not only rampant in Washington and Ottawa. It is likely rampant in any political and/or private corporate office where someone of questionable ethics believes that there is something significant to be gained by 'lobbying'. Indeed, the roots of lobbying can even be seen in kids 'lobbying' this or that parent -- obviously the parent with the least amount of (ethical) or any other form of resistance.
The issue is this: The number of people in Ottawa or Washington may involve hundreds, or indeed even, thousands of different people and/or groups of 'special interest' people all working towards their particular goal of gaining more political-legal power, corporate power, organizational power, and/or simply money. If there are government 'handouts' to be had, you will definitely find lobbyists lobbying this or that politician looking to get one of the available handouts. You might even find these lobbyists contributing significant amounts of money to this political party or that political party or this charitable organization or that charitable organization. Or a certain politician might get some 'free work done' on their Alaska house. At its crudest worst, there might be a 'briefcase of money' exchanged in a very private, covert, meeting place. No cheque, please. Cheques leave a paper trail. Just cash, please. Just cash. Are you listening Mr. Mulroney? Or here's a new idea. How about trying this: Bankrupt your bank or automobile business. (Maybe you ate up too much of the business profits.) Then start throwing your employees out of work. Hundreds of them. Better still, thousands of them. If you are a banker start closing down people's Retirement Investments, Savings, and Bank Accounts. Then watch Washington panic, throw billions and billions of 'new money' at you -- enough for you to gobble up even more profits, a huge surprise surplus for an even better spa vacation, another jet, another house (How many did you say you had, Senator McCain? Hey, but you are not interested in more houses even if they are earned the right way; you and Sarah Palin are interested in 'Joe The Plumber'), more and more lavish spending, a better and better retirement package worth millions and millions of more dollars, while Main Street America is losing more and more billions and billions of dollars. What an astronomical windfall! And now all of a sudden, The Republicans are interested in cutting spending. (When the spending doesn't involve them.)
Is this fair to the rest of the American people?
Is this fair to the democratic process?
Of course not.
Lobbyism must become a dialectically and democratically transparent, negotiated, integrated, and balanced process.
For every vocal, rhetorical, demanding, wheedling, whining, and/or money-giving political lobbyist special interest minority group, there is a hugely important 'silent majority' -- or a 'silent, invisible, Anti-Thesis Lobbyist-Special Interest Group' that needs to be democratically heard from too.
Lobbyism has to be pried out of the backrooms of Washington and Ottawa. There can be no money exchanging hands. That is so blatantly obvious that it barely needs to be said. But it does need to be said. Political charity funds need to be watched over.
So too, obviously, do Political Party Funds. These for far too long, have involved lobbyists 'buying America'.
'The squeeky wheel gets the oil.' (So too does the wheel with the most money and/or power of leverage.)
Conflict of interest issues need to be watched over with a microscope.
Do 'ethical watch dog groups' ever do any good'?
Or do they simply turn a blind eye to whatever their narcissistic political partners are doing -- or not doing?
Is Obama going to make a difference on the issue of lobbying in Washington?
Or are these 'bankruptcy-prone' banks and bankers going to keep getting more and more money while the better, more ethical, and financially solvent banks and bankers -- continue to get nothing? Why not reward the better banks and bankers and let them become bigger and better still -- rather than keep rewarding these inefficient, dyfunctional, money out the back door, banks and bankers that/who keep gobbling up more and more American taxpayer money -- are not accountable for it -- and then keep coming back for more. Or better still, give the 'stimulus' money back to Main Street America rather than to Corporate Wall Street America -- where the money keeps getting used, used up, and 'lost', and then back come the Corporate Lobbysts to Washington again. The biggest irony of this whole situation is that these 'Corporate Lobbysts' consist of the some of the wealthiest, most powerful men in America who when they are not lobbying, are extolling and trumpeting the virtues of 'Government-Unregulated-Adam Smith-Free Trade-Capitalism' and calling 'Socialism' 'The Scourge and The Enemy of America'.
That is -- when it is not in their own 'self-interest'.
President Obama...
Over to you.
-- dgb, February 10th, 2009
-- David Gordon Bain
-- Democracy Goes Beyond Narcissism
-- Dialectic Gap-Bridging Negotiations...
-- Are Still In Process...
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