Collectivism's Creed: The Revolt Against Biological Reality

Escape mechanism is defined by Merriam Webster as a way of behaving or thinking that is used to avoid unpleasant facts or problems

Applied to the world of politics, popular solutions to every known social ill have almost always been framed by the establishment in the context of some sort of utopian requisite conditions.

Think for example corruption, the idea of ‘good governance’ has always been associated with angelic or immaculate virtues that should be espoused by the political leader/s. But when shortcomings or the unfulfillment of expectations emerge, culpability will mostly be blamed on the leader’s individualistic flaws. Legal and or political institutional barriers and or knowledge limitations and or even incentives of political leaders (as human being) operating under the current political economic system itself will hardly ever been questioned.

Hence, the never ending circus of personality based politics; sell "change" by changing leaders.

Yet this penchant to solve society’s imperfections really represents the nirvana fallacy or perfect solution fallacy—the informal fallacy of comparing actual things with unrealistic, idealized alternatives.

And because popular politics signifies the politics of the economically uniformed, it’s easier to connect with the populace’s grievances by matching utopianism as remedy

Thus the escape mechanism-Nirvana fallacy approach serving as the foundations of the creed of collectivism 

At the Mises Blog Ryan McMaken explains:

From Egalitarianism as a Revolt Against Nature and Other Essays by Murray Rothbard: 

“The egalitarian revolt against biological reality, as significant as it is, is only a subset of a deeper revolt: against the ontological structure of reality itself, against the “very organization of nature”; against the universe as such. At the heart of the egalitarian left is the pathological belief that there is no structure of reality; that all the world is a tabula rasa that can be changed at any moment in any desired direction by the mere exercise of human will—in short, that reality can be instantly transformed by the mere wish or whim of human beings. Surely this sort of infantile thinking is at the heart of Herbert Marcuse’s passionate call for the comprehensive negation of the existing structure of reality and for its transformation into what he divines to be its true potential.

Nowhere is the Left Wing attack on ontological reality more apparent than in the Utopian dreams of what the future socialist society will look like. In the socialist future of Charles Fourier, according to Ludwig von Mises:

“all harmful beasts will have disappeared, and in their places will be animals which will assist man in his labors—or even do his work for him. An antibeaver will see to the fishing; an antiwhale will move sailing ships in a calm; an antihippopotamus will tow the river boats. Instead of the lion there will be an antilion, a steed of wonderful swiftness, upon whose back the rider will sit as comfortably as in a well-sprung carriage. “It will be a pleasure to live in a world with such servants.”

Furthermore, according to Fourier, the very oceans would contain lemonade rather than salt water.

Similarly absurd fantasies are at the root of the Marxian utopia of communism. Freed from the supposed confines of specialization and the division of labor (the heart of any production above the most primitive level and hence of any civilized society), each person in the communist utopia would fully develop all of his powers in every direction.17 As Engels wrote in his Anti-Dühring, communism would give “each individual the opportunity to develop and exercise all his faculties, physical and mental, in all directions.” And Lenin looked forward in 1920 to the “abolition of the division of labor among people . . . the education, schooling, and training of people with an all-around development and an all-around training, people able to do everything. Communism is marching and must march toward this goal, and will reach it.”

In his trenchant critique of the communist vision, Alexander Gray charges:

“That each individual should have the opportunity of developing all his faculties, physical and mental, in all directions, is a dream which will cheer the vision only of the simpleminded, oblivious of the restrictions imposed by the narrow limits of human life. For life is a series of acts of choice, and each choice is at the same time a renunciation.

“Even the inhabitant of Engels’s future fairyland will have to decide sooner or later whether he wishes to be Archbishop of Canterbury or First Sea Lord, whether he should seek to excel as a violinist or as a pugilist, whether he should elect to know all about Chinese literature or about the hidden pages in the life of a mackerel.

Of course one way to try to resolve this dilemma is to fantasize that the New Communist Man of the future will be a superman, superhuman in his abilities to transcend nature. William Godwin thought that, once private property was abolished, man would become immortal. The Marxist theoretician Karl Kautsky asserted that in the future communist society, “a new type of man will arise . . . a superman . . . an exalted man.” And Leon Trotsky prophesied that under communism:

“man will become incomparably stronger, wiser, finer. His body more harmonious, his movements more rhythmical, his voice more musical. . . . The human average will rise to the level of an Aristotle, a Goethe, a Marx. Above these other heights new peaks will arise.

No Middle of the Road between Capitalism and Socialism and between Individualism and Collectivism

In the past I have pointed out why there can be no compromise between capitalism and socialism. This is for the simple reason that every bargain or accommodation for interventionism of various flavors leads to MORE socialism than LESS. Problems that emerges from each intervention would incite for more intervention which eventually leads to total government control. In the political context, "it’s never enough!"

This is specially pronounced during crisis. Austrian economist Robert Higgs calls this the “ratchet effect”. As per FEE.org (bold mine)

The problem in governance that arises when government intervention increases during crises such as wars, natural disasters, or economic depressions.  After the crisis government meets resistance in reversing the intervention, creating a situation where government intervention rarely returns to pre-crisis levels, which lead to a constant ratcheting up effect in growth of government intervention over time.

Expect an explosion of interventions in the coming crisis.

Yet interventionist transitions has almost always been a slippery slope process. Such transition can be seen in two ways. The great Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises explained: (bold mine)

There are two methods available for the transformation of capitalism into socialism. One is to expropriate all farms, plants, and shops and to operate them by a bureaucratic apparatus as departments of the government. The whole of society, says Lenin, becomes "one office and one factory, with equal work and equal pay,"  the whole economy will be organized "like the postal sytem."  The second method is the method of the Hindenburg plan, the originally German pattern of the welfare state and of planning. It forces every firm and every individual to comply strictly with the orders issued by the government's central board of production management. Such was the intention of the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933 which the resistance of business frustrated and the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional. Such is the idea implied in the endeavors to substitute planning for private enterprise…

The middle-of-the-road policy is not an economic system that can last. It is a method for the realization of socialism by installments.

Yet it is not just in the realm of economics but in metaethics too. The great free market champion Ayn Rand said the same: There is no middle of the road between individualism and collectivism.

From Ms Rand’s Textbook of Americanism (fee.org) [bold mine]

The mark of an honest man, as distinguished from a Collectivist, is that he means what he says and knows what he means.

When we say that we hold individual rights to be inalienable, we must mean just that. Inalienable means that which we may not take away, suspend, infringe, restrict or violate — not ever, not at any time, not for any purpose whatsoever.

You cannot say that "man has inalienable rights except in cold weather and on every second Tuesday," just as you cannot say that "man has inalienable rights except in an emergency," or "man's rights cannot be violated except for a good purpose." 

Either man's rights are inalienable, or they are not. You cannot say a thing such as "semi-inalienable" and consider yourself either honest or sane. When you begin making conditions, reservations and exceptions, you admit that there is something or someone above man's rights who may violate them at his discretion. Who? Why, society — that is, the Collective. For what reason? For the good of the Collective. Who decides when rights should be violated? The Collective. If this is what you believe, move over to the side where you belong and admit that you are a Collectivist. Then take all the consequences which Collectivism implies. There is no middle ground here. You cannot have your cake and eat it, too. You are not fooling anyone but yourself. 

Do not hide behind meaningless catch-phrases, such as "the middle of the road." Individualism and Collectivism are not two sides of the same road, with a safe rut for you in the middle. They are two roads going into opposite directions. One leads to freedom, justice and prosperity; the other to slavery, horror and destruction. The choice is yours to make. 

The growing spread of Collectivism throughout the world is not due to any cleverness of the Collectivists, but to the fact that most people who oppose them actually believe in Collectivism themselves. Once a principle is accepted, it is not the man who is half-hearted about it, but the man who is whole-hearted that's going to win; not the man who is least consistent in applying it, but the man who is most consistent. If you enter a race, saying: "I only intend to run the first ten yards," the man who says: "I'll run to the finish line," is going to beat you. When you say: "I only want to violate human rights just a tiny little bit," the Communist or Fascist who says "I'm going to destroy all human rights" will beat you and win. You've opened the way for him.

By permitting themselves this initial dishonesty and evasion, men have now fallen into a Collectivist trap on the question of whether a dictatorship is proper or not. Most people give lip-service to denunciations of dictatorship. But very few take a clear-cut stand and recognize dictatorship for what it is: an absolute evil in any form, by anyone, for anyone, anywhere, at any time and for any purpose whatsoever.

A great many people now enter into an obscene kind of bargaining about differences between "a good dictatorship" and a "bad dictatorship," about motives, causes, or reasons that make dictatorship proper. For the question: "Do you want dictatorship?" the Collectivists have substituted the question: "What kind of dictatorship do you want?" They can afford to let you argue from then on; they have won their point. 

A great many people believe that a dictatorship is terrible if it's "for a bad motive," but quite all right and even desirable if it's "for a good motive." Those leaning toward Communism (they usually consider themselves "humanitarians") claim that concentration camps and torture chambers are evil when used "selfishly," "for the sake of one race," as Hitler did, but quite noble when used "unselfishly," "for the sake of the masses," as Stalin does. Those leaning toward Fascism (they usually consider themselves hard-boiled "realists") claim that whips and slave-drivers are impractical when used "inefficiently," as in Russia, but quite practical when used "efficiently," as in Germany.

(And just as an example of where the wrong principle will lead you in practice, observe that the "humanitarians," who are so concerned with relieving the suffering of the masses, endorse, in Russia, a state of misery for a whole population such as no masses have ever had to endure anywhere in history. And the hard-boiled "realists," who are so boastfully eager to be practical, endorse, in Germany, the spectacle of a devastated country in total ruin, the end result of an "efficient" dictatorship.)

When you argue about what is a "good" or a "bad" dictatorship, you have accepted and endorsed the principle of dictatorship. You have accepted a premise of total evil — of your right to enslave others for the sake of what you think is good. From then on, it's only a question of who will run the Gestapo. You will never be able to reach an agreement with your fellow Collectivists on what is a "good" cause for brutality and what is a "bad" one. Your particular pet definition may not be theirs. You might claim that it is good to slaughter men only for the sake of the poor; somebody else might claim that it is good to slaughter men only for the sake of the rich; you might claim that it is immoral to slaughter anyone except members of a certain class; somebody else might claim that it is immoral to slaughter anyone except members of a certain race. All you will agree on is the slaughter. And that is all you will achieve.

Once you advocate the principle of dictatorship, you invite all men to do the same. If they do not want your particular kind or do not like your particular "good motive," they have no choice but to rush to beat you to it and establish their own kind for their own "good motive," to enslave you before you enslave them. A "good dictatorship" is a contradiction in terms.

The issue is not: for what purpose is it proper to enslave men? The issue is: is it proper to enslave men or not? 

There is an unspeakable moral corruption in saying that a dictatorship can be justified by "a good motive" or "an unselfish motive." All the brutal and criminal tendencies which mankind — through centuries of slow climbing out of savagery — has learned to recognize as evil and impractical, have now taken refuge under a "social" cover. Many men now believe that it is evil to rob, murder, and torture for one's own sake, but virtuous to do so for the sake of others. You may not indulge in brutality for your own gain, they say, but go right ahead if it's for the gain of others. Perhaps the most revolting statement one can ever hear is: "Sure, Stalin has butchered millions, but it's justifiable, since it's for the benefit of the masses." Collectivism is the last stand of savagery in men's minds.

Do not ever consider Collectivists as "sincere but deluded idealists." The proposal to enslave some men for the sake of others is not an ideal; brutality is not "idealistic," no matter what its purpose. Do not ever say that the desire to "do good" by force is a good motive. Neither power-lust nor stupidity are good motives.

So Capitalism-Individualism (freedom) are diametric opposites to collectivism-socialism (slavery). This hasn't been a false choice. Real life developments reveal such dynamic at work.

Simon Black of the Sovereign Man tacitly expounds on the consequences of the Middle of the Road policies in the US via his article “America isn’t Communist, It’s only 70% communist” (bold mine)

Within his 1848 Communist Manifesto, Marx outlined a list of ten short-term demands. These, he thought, would be the precursor to the ideal stateless, classless communist society.

Ironically in today’s world, Marx’s demands look pretty much mainstream.

That is because nearly every single item on the list has been implemented to varying degrees in the United States.

Think that couldn’t be possible in the Land of the Free? Just take a look.

Topping Marx’s list is the abolition of private property.

True, private property exists, but only until the state wants to take it. With its powers of eminent domain, the government can and does confiscate people’s property when it wants for public use.

Your property isn’t unconditionally yours. Just think of property taxes, for example.

If it’s actually YOUR private property, then why would you need to pay tax on it? And why do they have the authority to take it from you if you don’t pay?

Likewise, while we haven’t seen the complete abolition of inheritance (another Marx demand), the government can take up to 40% of your estate when you die.

So ultimately your estate is not your own. You don’t get to control what happens to your wealth and possessions when you die. It’s just a matter of proportion.

Marx also demanded the centralization of transportation and communication. Check, and check.

Try broadcasting over the airwaves in the Land of the Free without a license and special permission.

Practically the entire electromagnetic spectrum is tightly controlled by the state, centralized by a handful of government agencies.

Same with the network of roads and highways. Because, after all, without government, who would build the roads…

Another point of Marx is state-guided agricultural production and combination of agriculture and manufacturing.

And the Land of the Free does not disappoint. Though its activities may not be as prominent in the news, the US Department of Agriculture is easily one of the busiest government departments.

With a budget of $146 billion a year, and much more for subsidies, USDA tirelessly works to dictate every major and miniscule activity in the sector.

Next on the list, is equal liability of all to labor. If you have at any point wondered, as I have, why politicians are always pushing jobs for the sake of jobs, rather than value and wealth creation—now you know why.

Between minimum wage laws and the constant stream of legislation that promises jobs for all, it is clear that politicians have wholly internalized this Marxian ideal.

Now, you might think that this is just a fluke, just a coincidence that some US policies resemble what’s on Marx’s list of demands.

But then you see these demands, which have not only been fully implemented in the US already, but are thoroughly entrenched in the national psyche:

First, there’s free education for all children, to enable the uniformity of thought. Check.

Then there’s a heavy progressive income tax. Yep, I’m pretty sure you’re familiar with this one, which has actually become so mainstream, that to have any system other than this would be considered revolutionary. Check.

Third, is the confiscation of the property of emigrants (expatriates) and rebels.

Between the IRS bullying of political opposition groups and the imposition of exit taxes for those that renounce their citizenship, the United States is firmly set up to discourage dissent and escape. Check.

And last but not least, the centralization of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank. Check.

Remember, Karl Marx thought central banking was a great idea—the same guy who thought that individual success and private property were evil.

Think about that the next time the Federal Reserve comes up with a plan to help businesses and fix the economy.

So now you know, America isn’t communist. It’s only about 70% communist. No reason to worry.

Slippery slope indeed.

Interventionism: Using Legal Coercion to Get Ahead in Life

Mainstream media (especially in the Philippines) never ceases to inculcate upon her audience of the need to have the "right" morals (mainly based on collectivism) for the political economy to prosper. Yet what they either ignore or omit to explain is how most of the unethical or unscrupulous behaviors have been products of the interventionist policies previously implemented. They also fail to deal with the potential ethical distortions from populist policies they advocate in addressing real time social problems.

At the Epic Times, Austrian economist, Dr. Richard Ebeling explains why this is so (ht: Bob Wenzel) [bold mine]

In an environment in which “public policy” determines individual lives and fortunes and in which social and economic life has become politicized, it is not surprising that many Americans have turned their attention to politics to improve their market position and relative income share. Legalized coercion has become the method by which they get ahead in life.

And make no mistake about it: Every income transfer, every tariff or import quota, every business subsidy, every regulation or prohibition on who may compete or how a product may be produced and marketed, and every restraint on the use and transfer of property is an act of coercion. Political force is interjected into what would otherwise be a system of peaceful and voluntary transactions.

Over time, interventionism blurs the distinction between what is moral and what is not. In ordinary life, most people take for granted that certain forms of conduct are permissible while others are not. These are the Golden Rules we live by. Government’s task in human society is to enforce and protect these rules, which are summarized in two basic principles: Neither force nor fraud shall be practiced in dealings with others; and the rights and property of others must be respected. In the moral order that is the free market economy, these principles are the wellspring of honesty and trust. Without them, America is threatened with ultimate ruin – with a war of all-against-all in the pursuit of plunder.

When individuals began to ask government to do things for them, rather than merely to secure their individual rights and honestly acquired property, they began asking government to violate other’s rights and property for their benefit.

These demands on government have been rationalized by intellectuals and social engineers who have persuaded people that what they wanted but didn’t have was due to the greed, exploitation, and immorality of others. Basic morality and justice has been transcended in the political arena in order to take from the “haves” and give to the “have not’s.” Theft through political means has become the basis of a “higher” morality: “social justice,” which is supposed to remedy the alleged injustices of the free market economy.

But once the market becomes politicized in this manner, morality begins to disintegrate. Increasingly, the only way to survive in society is to resort to the same types of political methods for gain as others are using, or to devise ways to evade the controls and regulations. More and more people, therefore, have been drawn into the arena of political intrigue and manipulation or violation of the law for economic gain. Human relationships and the political process have become increasingly corrupted.

In the 1920s, Ludwig von Mises explained a crucial aspect of this corruption of morality and law:

“By constantly violating criminal laws and moral decrees [people] lose the ability to distinguish between right and wrong, good and bad. The merchant, who began by violating foreign exchange controls, import and export restrictions, price ceilings, etc., easily proceeds to defraud his partners. The decay of business morals . . . is the inevitable concomitant of the regulations imposed on trade.”

Mises was, of course, repeating the lesson that the French classical economist Frederic Bastiat had attempted to teach in the 1850s in his famous essay, “The Law.” When the state becomes the violator of liberty and property rather than its guarantor, it debases respect for all law. People in society develop an increasing disrespect and disregard for what the law demands. They view the law as the agent for immorality in the form of legalized plunder for the benefit of some at the expense of others. And this same disrespect and disregard sooner or later starts to creep into the ordinary dealings between individuals. Society verges on the brink of lawlessness.

Read the rest here

So proposals to implement more interventionist solutions is like a dog chasing their own tail.

Quote of the Day: EU’s Market Destroying Institutions

As the EU moved from a free trade zone to a political system after the ratification of the Maastricht Treaty in 1992, it also (among many other things) progressively collectivized the risks associated with public spending. Until the euro came along, countries with bad public policies would simply devaluate their currencies. The French government, for instance, devaluated the franc twice (in 1981 and 1982) under Mitterrand’s presidency and in 1983 the Deutsche mark and the florin were reevaluated against all the other European currencies. Under this system the consequences of bad public policies are internalized to a large extent. The euro changed that. Bad policies are now either kept in check at the country level because no currency devaluation is possible (that’s the positive scenario), or the consequences of bad policies are born by the entire system. This, of course, is only if EU authorities want to keep the euro zone intact, otherwise they could simply let Greece and Cyprus out of the euro zone, but this would be to admit the failure of their grandiose currency plan. This is why the European Central Bank is resorting to Stalinist methods to make sure the government in Cyprus does what the EU wants it to do…

The EU today is a case in point of “market-destroying” federalism. As Barry Weingast pointed out in a series of great papers on federalism (The Economic Role of Political Institutions, Federalism as a Commitment to Preserving Market Incentives), the institutions of federalism lead to political competition and the weeding out of bad policies (it is “market preserving”). But if this mechanism is attenuated through transfers from the federal state to lower jurisdictions, the incentives to maintain one’s fiscal house in order disappear. Ultimately the entire system collapses as a result of collectivized risks. This has been slowly happening in the United States throughout the 20^th century, but it is taking place at an even bigger level in the EU because the EU is a hybrid federal system. This is why many want to centralize political and policy powers in the EU so as to make the place more like the US (a European banking union would be a first step in that direction according to the defenders of greater centralization).

It is likely, however, that greater centralization would fail because at the end of the day, EU institutions are not geared towards market-preserving federalism. The dominant thinking is one of indicative planning, regulation, and neo-mercantilism. In my opinion, the only course of action to save the EU would be to return to the original free-trade zone agreement of the 1950s and 60s. Trade zones enable political competition, which leads to virtuous outcomes such as lower taxes and lower public spending. Moreover, free trade zones with freely competing currencies, even if they remain government produced (one could adopt the Deutsche mark anywhere in the zone for instance), would bring vast positive benefits to Europeans. This would imply a complete reversal of policies, which shows how far we are from solving the problems in Europe. Ultimately, of course, governments should get out of money production, but that’s maybe for another century.

(bold mine)

This is from Austrian economist Frederic Sautet at the Coordination Problem Blog

Quote of the Day: The Folly of All for One

And is not this the point that we have now reached? What is the cry going up everywhere, from all ranks and classes? All for one! When we say the word one, we think of ourselves, and what we demand is to receive an unearned share in the fruits of the labor of all. In other words, we are creating an organized system of plunder. 

Unquestionably, simple out-and-out plunder is so clearly unjust as to be repugnant to us; but, thanks to the motto, all for one, we can allay our qualms of conscience. We impose on others the duty of working for us. Then, we arrogate to ourselves the right to enjoy the fruits of other men's labor. We call upon the state, the law, to enforce our so-called duty, to protect our so-called right, and we end in the fantastic situation of robbing one another in the name of brotherhood. We live at other men's expense, and then call ourselves heroically self-sacrificing for so doing.

(italics original)

This is stirring quote, posted by Café Hayek’s Prof Don Boudreaux, is from Frederic Bastiat‘s 1850 treatise, Economic Harmonies  based on 1964 W. Hayden Boyers translation. Chapter 12, paragraph 21

Quote of the Day: On Public Property: Ask Not, How You Can Pursue What Government Tells You is Good

Under the institutions of public property, property is held (the use of things is controlled) by political institutions and that property is used to achieve the ends of those political institutions.  Since the function of politics is to reduce the diversity of of individual ends to a set of “common ends” (the ends of the majority, the dictator, the party in power, or whatever persons or group is in effective control of the political institutions), public property imposes those “common ends” on the individual.  ”Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.”  Ask not, in other words, how you can pursue what you believe is good, but how you can pursue what government tells you is good.

I am sharing Café Hayek’s Professor Don Boudreaux’s David D. Friedman’s quote from the latter’s book (page 6 of of the 1978 Arlington House edition 1973 book, The Machinery of Freedom)

Quote of the Day: The Folly of Institutional Worship

The individual is king, and all these other things exist for the service of the king. It is a mere superstition to worship any institution, as an institution, and not to judge it by its effects upon the character and the interests of men. It is here that socialist and Catholic make the same grand mistake. They exalt the organization, which is in truth as mere dust under our feet; they debase the man, for whose sake the organization and all other earthly things exist. They posit a priori the claims of the external organization as supreme and transcending all profit and loss account, and they call upon men to sacrifice a large part of their higher nature for the sake of this organization. They both of them sacrifice man, the king, to the mere dead instrument that exists for man’s service.

(bold mine)

This excerpt is from writer, theorist, and 19th century individualist Auberon Edward Herbert in a splendid rejoinder against socialist J. A. Hobson in 1899. (libertarianism.org)

What the Political Rhetoric “You Didn't Get There on Your Own” Means

When a politician preaches that “you didn't get there on your own” they may only be half right. That’s because our world operates on the principle of division of labor where no one really produces things on their own.

No one, on his own, even knows how to make a simple product like the pencil, as Milton Friedman explained

But what the politicians really mean is that every entrepreneurial success (wealth) has been owed to the government.

The distinguished Thomas Sowell exposes such myth or deception {bold emphasis mine]

Let's stop and think, even though the whole purpose of much political rhetoric is to keep us from thinking, and stir our emotions instead.

Even if we were to assume, just for the sake of argument, that 90 percent of what a successful person has achieved was due to the government, what follows from that? That politicians will make better decisions than individual citizens, that politicians will spend the wealth of the country better than those who created it? That doesn't follow logically -- and certainly not empirically.

Does anyone doubt that most people owe a lot to the parents who raised them? But what follows from that? That they should never become adults who make their own decisions?

The whole point of the collectivist mindset is to concentrate power in the hands of the collectivists -- which is to say, to take away our freedom. They do this in stages, starting with some group that others envy or resent -- Jews in Nazi Germany, capitalists in the Soviet Union, foreign investors in Third World countries that confiscate their investments and call this theft "nationalization."

Freedom is seldom destroyed all at once. More often it is eroded, bit by bit, until it is gone. This can happen so gradually that there is no sudden change that would alert people to the danger. By the time everybody realizes what has happened, it can be too late, because their freedom is gone.

All the high-flown talk about how people who are successful in business should "give back" to the community that created the things that facilitated their success is, again, something that sounds plausible to people who do not stop and think through what is being said. After years of dumbed-down education, that apparently includes a lot of people.

Take Obama's example of the business that benefits from being able to ship their products on roads that the government built. How does that create a need to "give back"?

Did the taxpayers, including business taxpayers, not pay for that road when it was built? Why should they have to pay for it twice?

What about the workers that businesses hire, whose education is usually created in government-financed schools? The government doesn't have any wealth of its own, except what it takes from taxpayers, whether individuals or businesses. They have already paid for that education. It is not a gift that they have to "give back" by letting politicians take more of their money and freedom.

When businesses hire highly educated people, such as chemists or engineers, competition in the labor market forces them to pay higher salaries for people with longer years of valuable education. That education is not a government gift to the employers. It is paid for while it is being created in schools and universities, and it is paid for in higher salaries when highly educated people are hired.

One of the tricks of professional magicians is to distract the audience's attention from what they are doing while they are creating an illusion of magic. Pious talk about "giving back" distracts our attention from the cold fact that politicians are taking away more and more of our money and our freedom.

Bottom line: Reading between the lines helps to protect one from getting hoodwinked by political glib talkers.

Jay Leno's Pseudo Altruism?

Media is inherently predisposed to preach about "collectivism" (particularly in the Philippines).

For us, the implicit motivation or the reason for this is about saleability.

People buy mostly on emotions. And to generate more audience means to connect with people's emotions. And collectivist themes of 'equality', 'fairness', 'justice', 'charity' etc... greatly appeals to emotions. And more audiences translate to more ad revenues. Audience plus ad revenues equals the life of the show.

Thus, media content-whether it is news, soap opera, talk shows, movie or reality shows-are almost always scripted or produced to appeal to the emotions.

Occasionally some of these pseudo acts of altruism are unmasked, especially when they "diss" the markets.

An example is from a recent amusing incident where the popular US comedian Jay Leno brings his show to Michigan aimed at helping autoworkers and those displaced by today's recession by giving away free tickets.

Unexpected to Mr. Leno, one of the recipient attempts to sell the "donated" ticket at ebay. The donor discovers the attempt and vehemently objects!

From Mr. Leno, ``Here is something that annoys me. I look on eBay today and I see four tickets to my show for sale. ... You're out of your mind to pay $800 to see me. ... I would like to ask the people on eBay to take the tickets down. There is nothing for sale here.”

Picture from insidesocal.com

Harvard's Greg Mankiw on his blog wrote a caustic but deserving remark (bold highlights mine)...

``So I wonder: If a person down on his luck prefers the cash to the opportunity to watch Leno live, why would Leno object? Is it altruism that is really motivating Leno here? Is he really sure that the unemployed person in Detroit would be better off with an evening of laughs than $800 in his pocket? Or does Leno want to play to a live audience of unemployed workers so he will seem altruistic to his television audience?"

Ouch!

Again Mr. Mankiw, ``Absent externalities, markets improve the allocation of resources. Both the buyer and the seller of the ticket must be better off: otherwise they would not engage in the transaction. The only significant negative externality that I can see here falls on Mr Leno himself. In other words, Leno's objection to the eBay sale is an understandable and fundamentally self-interested act in that the sale impedes his abilty to appear selfless."

This reminds us of a quote from D.W. McKenzie who, in an article at the Misis.org, wrote,``Altruism alone does not harmonize social interaction. On the contrary, a world of altruistic people could easily be more rancorous than the world we know. It is not enough for people to want to promote the interests of others. We must also comprehend the interests of others, and this is impossible."

Showmanship-yes, comprehend the interests of others-no.

So much for altruism.