RE: Marx: The Sequel

[John Gelles <jjgelles@xxxxxxxx>]

                   RE:  MARX: THE SEQUEL

        "Marxism: The Sequel", New Yorker 2/13, by Hendrick
   Hertzberg, is subtitled: "There's something oddly familiar
   about Mr. Gingrich's ideology."

        Hertzberg presents the most powerful political
   questioning published or televised since the November
   election. He asks:  Do we have to worry what the Gingrich
   "revolution" means?  Does it mean dimunition of liberty or
   "downsizing" America's economic and moral power to promote
   democratic liberalism?  Libralism that, (in my words,)
   would bring on full automation, full employment, full
   environmental protection, and full international cooperation
   with other liberal nations?

        Hertzberg finds that the "revolution" is influenced by
   a theory of history in three acts; that it is claimed we are
   in the third act; and that this act is marked by inevitable
   decentralization and decline in federal missions, power
   and responsibility.

        This act, (again, in my words,) with its computers,
   compact disks, personal publishing and study networks,
   checks on government interference in the way we make a
   living, and obliteration of feelings of powerlessness,
   will usher in the paradise of our dreams. (And "their"
   dreams too.  Because, now the "revolution" has "come", and
   "we" are "them" and "they" are "gone" forever.

        Older forms of politics, that may have had similar
   heavenly goals, but different ways to achieve them, may have
   to be moved aside to make way for the new "revolution".

        Hertzberg sees the good in the optimism and goals of
   all this, and sees, as well, the danger in religious zeal
   for a patented theory of history used to concentrate power
   by a "party" or propel destructive behavior in the young
   and naive.

        Where does this "revolutionary" zeal and "contract"
   for or on America leave the professional economist?  Can
   any or all of his understanding move us toward decent goals
   and/or protect us from loss of liberty?

        For starters, the Hertzberg essay on Gingrich, two
   Tofflers, Marx, the Manifesto, the Toffler manifesto, Lenin,
   Stalin and Newt, again, may innoculate left and right in
   America and the English speaking world against any
   "revolutionary" virus borne on the winds of November.

        But Hertzberg is hardly a post-Keynesian scholar. Is
   there nothing we can put in the pot?  Don't any of us want
   to play in the biggest game since Bretton Woods?  What can
   be done to make the market do our bidding?

        There are interest rates, reserve requirements,
   observed trends in prices, velocities, aggregate and
   specific outputs, positive and negative indicators of the
   social wellbeing of specific areas and peoples.

        Why try to list here, all the tools you have at hand?
   The issue is do you want to become engaged?  Is there
   nothing to say now, as broad and as deep as the Contract for
   America, that expresses something less flawed by resemblence
   to the Manifesto, than Gingrich and his "revolution"?

        The heart of the matter may be feeling powerless if you are
   male and middle class when in fact you are not powerless at all.
   Can middle class economic opportunity and security be promoted?
   If so, will success in such promotion tend to enhance our
   liberty or place it more at risk?

        (I deliberately leave race out of these questions: Our
   American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars Posts have key
   Black veterans in top positions of responsibility. We are in
   Simi Valley country! (Where police were found innocent in the
   first trial of those who beat Rodney King -- the L.A. Riot
   followed.)  I do not see a return to racism.  I do
   not object to other analysts developing other futures.
   But there is every reason to expect Blacks to enter the
   conservative power structure in the wake of military,
   judicial and celebrity leadership.)

        If you would enhance individual responsibility,
   opportunity, and security, what would you do with the tools
   of the economic trade?

        If one proposes that, (beyond education and training),
   government guarantee credit to finance full employment, what
   is wrong with that?  ** Well -- everything is wrong with it:
   People must compete for credit -- there must be some who
   "fail" to get credit or it will have no value!

   [NOTE: ** The devil's advocate speaks up]

        What do you do with the failures?  ** Nothing, fool!
   Government does nothing. Families, churches and charities
   take care of failures. Else, we will reward failure -- and
   there will be more of it.

        We have here a Mexican standoff. No way to prove who's
   right. Let's make a deal:

             Let me put microloans in the hands of small groups
   of veterans out of work. Let's see what happens.

        Now, what about the anxiety felt by everyone, not just
   male middle class voters -- anxiety over the environment,
   the infrastructure, and public blight.  Where are the
   trillions of dollars needed to address these obvious
   material deficits?  Why not macroloans?  ** Well, I'll tell
   you why not -- because we haven't got the money!

        What about more bonds?  At one percent interest, with the
   redemption value indexed for inflation.  Bonds that serve
   the banking system as reserves for creating new credit.
   Bonds that may not be sold outside the central bank until
   there is market demand for them. We then have the money --
   don't we?  ** No we dont, fool. The money you have will be
   shunned. Everyone who can, will get out of dollars and into
   harder money.

        Another Mexican standoff. Let's make a deal. Let's just
   issue macroloans to build bridges, sewers and water ways.
   Not trillions -- just, say, one trillion. Let's see if
   Americans start doing business in Yen, Swiss Francs and
   Marks. If we get away with it for one trillion, we will
   later go for trillions more -- to be introduced slowly.

        Remember -- tax reform, automation, the whole system
   aimed at managed growth. Growth accompanied, in the end,
   by absolute full employment and relative success in meeting
   public needs.

        Is all this a Gingrinch/Toffler/Marxist utopian grab
   for power in search of fanatic nationalist hysteria?

   (Careful. We have not really foreclosed the possibility that
   the Republicans are liberal in fact, merely trying to
   clean up past practice and reduce waste and confusion.)

        I think the microloan/macroloan solution is not a call
   for hysteria or a trip on the road to serfdom. Why not?
   Because we will do this thing under law. The independent
   judiciary and cultrual respect for liberty will not allow
   economic reform to make us crazy.

    ** How about continuing to allow corruption -- and,
   perhaps, even increasing the ratio of the corrupt to the
   honest in current American practice?  How do you deal with
   that?  The market does not amplify corruption -- legislative
   bodies do. That is their heart -- the deal. The very thing
   you, Gelles, are trying to peddle here.

        I've already told you: Traceable money only. Investiga-
   tive reporting by an independent press. Professional audit
   and inspection. Tough criminal penalties. Look, there is
   imperfection in all human endeavor. I'm only asking for
   reform -- not paradise. The end of the cold war leaves both
   a window of opportunity for the advanced industrial econo-
   mies and a window for mischief too.

        Which of us would prefer mischief to reform?
   Which of us thinks economists have nothing to say
   while politicians talk budgets, deficits,
   taxes, and Toffler?

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   :  John Gelles                 email  jjgelles@xxxxxxxx          :
   :  5706 Loma Vista Road    home page  http://rain.org/~jjgelles/ :
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   :  Tough Toffler,                                                :
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