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The Corporate, the Collective and George W. Bush Diane Alden There are several definitions of corporate, but the most common are: done by or characteristic of individuals acting together; "a joint identity"; "the collective mind"; "the corporate good" organized and maintained as a legal corporation; "a special agency set up in corporate form"; "an incorporated town" [ wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn ] A corporation is a legal entity (distinct from a natural person) that often has similar rights in law to those of a natural person. Civil law systems may refer to corporations as "moral persons"; they may also go by the name "AS" (anonymous society) or something similar, depending on language (see below). [ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate ] The collective: a joint identity or a conglomeration of like interests or goals, which have and use power through a corporate form of action or operation. Hmm. Does the notion of corporate and collective have something in common besides similar definitions in various dictionaries or legal books? What both have in common for Americans: rights, power, one's identity are linked to the corporate or collective particularly when one is attempting to impact one's environment, government or world in a positive way or for the benefit of one's own family, city or state. That is Alden's take on the inextricable link between corporate and collective. The other Aldenism I hope you will chew on is that the two are linked in our era – to our detriment. In our times, there is a life-and-death struggle of the corporate-collective against those ideas and concepts that the founders of the United States placed in writing in the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution, and through personal diaries, letters, coda and conversations. Over the years some of their better ideas were adopted, particularly those associated with the Bill of Rights. Now, you may ask why am I rambling on about boring arguments regarding the meaning of corporate and collective. How much easier and much more fun it would be to take apart "The Da Vinci Code" or critique what possessed Tom Cruise to inflict his current wife with a "silent birth." I would much rather let you know about some great films I have seen lately, old and new, than parse out foo-fah like corporate and collective. How much more fun it would be to slam the hypocrisy, hysteria and lack of great ideas from Democrats and the left.
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Nonetheless, it wouldn't do much to inform people who have read this far that their world, their assumptions and their nation are in a heap of trouble thanks to the monolithic corporate-collective that now controls their destiny and that of their children and grandchildren. In our era the corporate and the collective have become one and the same thing. The corporate, on one hand, is not about free market capitalism. The collective, on the other, has little to do with giving power to the people, meaning individuals or the states. Rather, both are about creating "groups" or clumps of interests in which the power and responsibility are taken away from the people or representative government and given to the corporate-collective. For those of you who want to know what I am talking about, do a Google on Hegelian philosophy or write to me and I will explain. In any event, the corporate-collective has an element of "humanity" known as "communitarianism" to it. That aspect runs through much of the Bush family and Bush administration whether it is "kinder, gentler" George H.W. Bush or son Dubya's "compassionate conservative." The corporate-collective plus communitarianism seek to "harmonize" various aspects of life – political, cultural and economic – under the banner of kinder, gentler "communitarianism." Sadly for Americans, the current powers that be, corporate or collective or neoconservative, want to impose this "new" old collective and corporate ideal on the world. The number one cheerleader promoting this disaster is George W. Bush. Unfortunately for Americans, George W. Bush believes he is on a mission from God to "free" the world. This must include changing human nature when thousands of years of human history, in addition to input from Moses, Jesus Christ, prophets, saints, great teachers, philosophers, superb ideologies, wars and turmoil, peace and freedom have failed. Dubya continues to reveal his mind on these "divine" attempts to remake mankind and systems. In a speech to a group in Irvine, California, a few weeks ago, Bush also explained, in unusually stark terms, how his belief in God influences his foreign policy. "I base a lot of my foreign policy decisions on some things that I think are true," he said. "One, I believe there's an Almighty. And secondly, I believe one of the great gifts of the Almighty is the desire in everybody's soul, regardless of what you look like or where you live, to be free. He went onto say: "I believe liberty is universal. I believe people want to be free. And I know that democracies do not war with each other."
By the way, when Hitler rose to power he did it through elections and "democracy," which means the people CHOSE the horrific system he brought with him. Many countries have "democracy" but even the Western "democracies" have gone to war with one another. The one thing that brought them together in a sort of peace is a series of very costly wars, World War I, II, the Cold War and some few dust-ups in between. Hamas recently came to power through "democratic" elections. What worries me about George W. Bush is the jurisdiction he keeps handing to the corporate-collective which now set U.S. policy – economically, politically and, it would seem, spiritually. Anyone who agrees with George W. Bush that HE knows what "free" means to everyone on the planet has got to be high on something or so arrogant as to be dangerous to themselves and others. That would include neocons like William Kristol, Fred Barnes and policy wonks from several think tanks including Project for a New American Century, American Enterprise Institute, some members of the Council on Foreign Relations, individuals from various Ivy League universities, and attendees at weekend retreats where the elite meet to "plan" our future. GWB has an odd grasp of history, which I suspect he acquired from the neocon advisers who surround him. Yes, the U.S., France and Germany don't war with each other. What he forgets is that it took three world wars to accomplish that quirk in mankind's history and development. Plus, those democracies shared, by and large, common Western canon and ideas about human beings and individual rights. Japan, a kind of constitutional democracy, had to be bombed into submission to join what amounts to a Western-style system. There is nothing magic about "democracies" not warring with one another. So-called "democracies" in Latin America do it all the time. There are enough passive-aggressive behaviors going on in those "democracies" to have cost the United States trillions in foreign aid and Pax Americana military actions. If bombing a country into submission is Dubya's idea of bringing "democracy" to the world, frankly, the price is too high. It should frighten thinking Christians or Jews that GWB thinks he understands the mind of God Almighty. Does George really believe that "free" to a desert Bedouin is the same as "free" to a Long Island stockbroker or a devout Muslim in Indonesia or an Amish man in Pennsylvania? Bush takes a great deal on himself to decide for mankind what "free" means and that HE is going to impose his version on mankind. It shows a total lack of understanding of history or human nature. Never mind being presumptuous in his stubborn notion that George W. Bush has hacked into the mind of GOD! Minions of George's Second Coming Richard Haas was a Bush appointee to the U.S. State Department as a Secretary of Policy and Planning. He resigned from that job a year or two ago and became president of the infamous CFR, Council on Foreign Relations. The CFR, as far as I can discern, is a bunch of elite policy wonks, intellectuals, well-connected business and government types who seek to plan or discuss the future of America and, in some cases, the world. How successful they are in implementing their policies or plans depends on a number of factors. Think Department of Homeland Security or yet another "guest worker" amnesty/citizenship/cheap labor/trading state phenomenon. The impact of their policy exchanges does change U.S. policy, and many times it is for the worse. In any event, Haas lays out where the current power establishment thinking may lead this nation, particularly the current Bush administration. In an article in the Taipei Times on April 6, 2006, Haas set out what I believe is the Bush family and/or establishment viewpoint regarding the future of the United States and the world. Richard Haas' piece explains a great deal about many things including open borders, illegal migration from Third World nations, badly negotiated trade deals which do little to advance U.S. economic interests, and foreign policy that is utopian and unrealistic to the nth degree. Haas: The world's 190-plus states now co-exist with a larger number of powerful non-sovereign and at least partly (and often largely) independent actors, ranging from corporations to non-government organizations (NGOs), from terrorist groups to drug cartels, from regional and global institutions to banks and private equity funds. They (for better and for worse) influence the sovereign state as much as it is able to influence them. The near monopoly of power once enjoyed by sovereign entities is being eroded. As a result, new mechanisms are needed for regional and global governance that include actors other than states. This is not to argue that Microsoft, Amnesty International or Goldman Sachs be given seats in the United Nations General Assembly, but it does mean including representatives of such organizations in regional and global deliberations when they have the capacity to affect whether and how regional and global challenges are met. What is there about the current crop of U.S. policy-making elite that has turned a blind eye to all things but the needs and wants of commerce and financial interests or that seek to advance THEIR version of globalization at any cost? Why do these ruling groups tend to place economics and materialism as the core value of every human being on earth? Why do they not see diverse human beings or cultures as possessing UNIQUE characteristics that just may not fit their Hegelian notions? All of humanity is NOT running in the SAME direction at the SAME time! Why are the policy-making elite and intellectual breed intent on deconstructing the United States in service to their utopian goals? Combined with Dubya's messianic tendencies, the losers are you and I. Additionally, the United States of America is losing its premier position in the world both as a "shining city on a hill," and the closest thing to reasonable and right relationship between the individual and the State that man is likely to see. Commerce or Materialism Uber Alles It becomes clear daily that far too much of the American system is balanced along commercial or financial lines regardless of the shortsightedness of such policy. Case in point: the Dubai Ports deal was the tip of the iceberg wherein foreign or national security policy did not correspond with economic policy in the best interests of the nation. But our ruling class saw no problem with the Dubai deal because it was about "business as usual." This is bowing to globalization regardless of the participants and disparate agendas. Selling out American infrastructure, lands, waters, ports, to international interests has become an economic game, particularly in the last 25 years, thanks to both political parties in addition to the economic and political establishment, better known as the Iron Triangle in D.C. These entities are simply networks of interests which are hurrying the day when power and control of much of the United States, the Western Hemisphere, the world is in THEIR hands. Sadly, the establishment of both political parties remains clueless. It would be unthinkable to believe that they know and understand what is going on and are doing nothing about it. Meanwhile, our ruling elite prefer "globalization," where ideas about nationhood, sovereignty and one-man-one-vote actually mean something. The establishment would love to see the day when policy is totally in their hands; when they control the direction of the nation; when lip service is paid to citizenship, voting and true freedom for the states and individuals. Yet neither party seems interested in what is happening, as they do all in their power to disconnect Americans from their birthright in search of some polyglot utopia or economic or political empire. In our era, utopia is a multi-dimensional attempt to integrate or "harmonize" political and foreign and economic policy regionally and internationally. Think about trying to "harmonize" an inner-city Detroit high school with a suburban school in, say, Orange County, California, or Roswell, Georgia. Think about sewing polyester and handkerchief linen together and expecting the item to remain intact. Think of the dynamic fitting factor where you pound on two different-sized pipes until they fit, but the fit is weak and won't hold water under stress. Harmonizing includes integrating all kinds of various economic, cultural and political interest groups and expecting them all to work together like a Swiss watch. Only a nitwit expects good results from that kind of "harmonization." For that effort America and its people are going to pay a heavy price in freedom, sovereignty, representative government and true economic justice and prosperity. The thoughtless agenda of the ruling class, globalization, is a replacement for any sensible post-Cold War international policy based on reality. In fact, the kind of globalization we are presently engaged in is not the same as when Columbus sailed the ocean blue; nor does it parallel the economic trading activities of the British East India Trading Company. The "new" globalization is the about recreating humanity along the lines set by the "new" ruling class. It covers more areas than economics. The globalization we are talking about means the end of the nation-state, sovereignty and individual freedom and rights. It will be accomplished by war or by "agreements" that incrementally take more power away from nations and peoples. International "groups" like the American-led IMF are at this moment taking power upon themselves to "guide" or centrally plan economies or impose their set of rules and punishments on any nation that decides to belong to their growing stateless empire of appointed or self-selected "interests." According to a Reuters report in September 2005, The International Monetary Fund won new powers to police the world economy after its 184 member countries endorsed a new framework to monitor how the economic policies of one country affects others. The countries, represented by finance ministers or central bank governors, also agreed that some emerging economies needed more say in IMF decision-making that could lead to a proposal for ad hoc increases in their voting shares by the next IMF gathering in September. "We resolve to make the IMF more fit for purpose in a global economy and more able to address challenges that are quite different from those of 1945, when the IMF was created," Chancellor Gordon Brown, who also chairs the IMF's policy-setting committee, told a news conference. "The IMF should be more able to address global questions with multilateral surveillance," Brown said. The American and international ruling class keep telling us that globalization is unstoppable. Of course in the past, wars and turmoil have successfully halted globalization. World War I, II, the Cold War come to mind. According to these policymakers and great thinkers there is nothing WE can do about it or about preventing THEM from implementing policies neither our representatives nor we voted for. Regardless of reality and what OTHER nations may or may not be doing, we are stuck with their grand design. Unfortunately for us, globalization is about more than economics and commerce. There are a few in the business realm who are sending up the alarm, but certainly Congress, the media and the various White House cliques rarely pay attention. In an interview in the April 17 Manufacturing & Technology News, former TCI and Global Crossing CEO Leo Hindery said that the incentives of globalization have disconnected U.S. corporations from U.S. interests. "No economy," Hindery said, "can survive the offshoring of both manufacturing and services concurrently. In fact, no society can even take excessive offshoring of manufacturing alone." According to Hindery, offshoring serves the short-term interests of shareholders and executive pay at the long-term expense of U.S. economic strength. Hindery notes that in 1981 the Business Roundtable defined its constituency as "employees, shareholders, community, customers, and the nation." Today the constituency is quarterly earnings. A country whose business class has no sense of the nation is not a superpower. Meanwhile, the great American investor Warren Buffett recently stated that the U.S. is moving away from an "ownership society" and is instead becoming a "sharecropper's society." Someone should add: Nor can a nation that no longer believes in its own nationhood be able to remain economically, politically, culturally FREE for long. If nations are being replaced by the boards of directors of Microsoft, Amnesty International, the Ford Foundation, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, or the IMF, WTO, CPAC or the DNC, then that nation can put its head between its knees and kiss its nether parts goodbye. The marriage of the corporate and the collective and the messianic tendencies of current leadership will end in disaster. Whether they accomplish their ends through unrestricted migration from the Third World to create a new underclass to displace Americans born or naturalized citizens or placing more and more power in the hands of unelected "groups" or commercial entities, corporations, etc., disastrous consequences for the United States and its system, its way of life will be the result. What can we do about it? Wish I had the answer. We can start by encouraging responsible members of Congress to put the skids on the ambitions of the Bush White House. We can seek term limits for elected officials. We can, as former Georgia Senator Zell Miller stated, get rid of the 17th Amendment and place choosing senators back in the state Legislatures, where it was until 1916. Senators have too much power and by and large are bought and paid for by some aspect of the corporate-collective coalition of interests. What concerns me as a Christian and a conservative is that George W. Bush has taken it upon himself to decide what is in the mind of God and that he is God's primary instrument on earth. Shades of the apocalypse and tales of the antichrist. Less dramatic: maybe the same kind of hubris and arrogance that have driven far too many leaders and governments since time immemorial and created misery and grief for all human beings. America does not have to become isolationist by any means. We shouldn't, and we really can't. It would be grand, however, to have a president content with being president of the United States rather than president of the world. It would be wonderful if the corporate-collective didn't own most of the governing bodies of the United States and set our course for destruction and oblivion thanks to their disloyalty, short-sightedness, narcissism and lies. Listen to Diane Alden on Marc Bernier's Show, WNDB, Bristol, Tennessee, and Daytona Beach, Florida: 11 a.m. EST.
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