Mafia or Government?

Monty Pelerin / EconomicNoise.com

James Howard Kunstler mused about the potential choice of Larry Summers as the next Fed Chairman:

Mr. Summers will be entering the scene the way Vincent Price used to enter a Hammer Studio horror film — reliably delivering some deadly unpleasantness. I don’t think a more perfect figure might be found for piloting the garbage barge of American finance over a Niagara Falls of consequence.

Someone more creative than me should script a movie entitled something like Lizard Men (and women). Washington, DC could staff this horror film. Hollywood has nothing like to compete with the rogue’s gallery available in DC. Bit parts or cameos, if necessary, could be played by various politicians from outside Washington. NYC and San Diego offer some variety.

Albert J. Nock, a libertarian from the first half of the 1900s observed:

Taking the State wherever found, striking into its history at any point, one sees no way to differentiate the activities of its founders, administrators and beneficiaries from those of a professional-criminal class.

His statement does a disservice to “professional-criminal class[es].” Those who rise to the top in organized crime are competent. Those who rise to the top of a government need not be and rarely are. To rise to the top in politics, competence is irrelevant. The ability to fool enough voters is all that matters. Given the increasing ignorance of the American population, this task is easier today than in the past. Prima facie evidence of that is President Ted Baxter now playing the role of president.

continue article at Economic Noise:

http://www.economicnoise.com/2013/08/16/mafia-or-government/