Nationial Debt, Frederick Pohl (Leftist Prophet), "The Space Merchants", Wall Street, and the Age of Obama

There is nothing new under the sun. President Obama, for example, is merely pursung the agenda of the EXTREME left when I was a young man--the agenda that resulted in the Democrat nomination of George McGovern in 1972. The difference, of course, is that the nation rejected George McGovrern by a 60% landslide, in favor of a "crrok" (Richard Nixon). The nation rightly understood that Nixon was not going to lead the nation into the disaster that would result frm a leftist agenda, even if his personal character was questionable (Watergate had already occurred at the time of the 1972 election, although John Dean--the co-connsipirator crook, and probably the prime mover of the whole operation, who is now a HERO to the left and regular on Keith Olbermann's leftist show on MSNBC--and the famous Nixon tapes were still in the impeachment future). The axiom then was that this "pragmatic" country would never vote for the extreme left. Well, Ronald Reagan would rescue us from the initial resurgence of the left after Watergate, but recent events (Bush, Paulson, and Obama--not to mention McCain) have shown us that our modern country--unlike the past--is willing to embrace the idea that the government can solve all of our problems. Who knew what a prophet Frederkick Pohl was.


Frederick Pohl is the science fiction writer who wrote "The Space Merchants"--with Cyril Kornbluth, who must have provided the hard edge thinking. "The Space Merchants" was a science fictiion satire on the stock market, and stock market manipulators, written (1950's) well before the modern excesses/stupidity of the Stupidest People on Earth (Wall Street). But that particular foresight (it is a brilliant science fiction novel, only slightly leftist in tone) is not the reason for this entry.


Pohl was an unrecognized prophet for the present Age of Obama, and the present economic stupidity of the newly minted economic fascists on Wall Street. Pohl is the author of the funniest assertion--seriously made--I have ever seen about economics, and the politics of economics, until the cmic genius of President Obama became evident.


In some science fiction magazine or other, at least 40 years ago, Pohl was addressing concern about the deficit and the nationial debt. I THINK he was doing so in the context of why we should be able to spend unlimited amounts of money on BOTH the space program, and social programs, without worrying about the debt. But my memory on those exact details is a little fuzzy. My memory of Pohl's "modest proposal" to "solve" the problem of our national debt is as clear to me as if I read it yesterday, because it was so ridiculous (or so I thought at the time, not realizing how it would come to represent virtual economic orthodoxy in the Age of Obama).


Pohl said that all we had to do was CANCEL the "national debut (wipe it out with the storke of a pen), since it represented money which we owe to ourselves!!!!!!!


Read the above. Then read the immediately previous entry in this blog. Pohl was really suggesting that all we have to do is PRINT MONEY--that all we have to do is buy our own debt and then CANCEL it. President Obama should recognize Pohl as a prophet for the Age of Obama, and give him some kind of meda (posthumouis, I think).


Now, at the time, Pohl had not quite thought this through, the way the present economic fascists on Wall Street have thought it through (Larry Kudlow and CNBC, this continues to mean YOU!!!). At that time, we did NOT owe the national debut to ourselves. The government issued debut instruments, such as Treasury bills and savings bonds, which PEOPLE (and countries) owned. Canceling that debut would HURT the people that owned those instruments, in realiance on the good faith and credit of the USA. Even today, CHINA owns a conserable part of our debt, and has become nervous about it. That is because we COULD either declare bankruptcy or infalte our currency to the point that our debt is worthless. Yes, that WOULD spell the end of us as a real power in the world.


But that is exactly what we are doing (printing money). We are headling exactly where Pohl suggested we should be. Right now, we are only purchasing NEW debut being issued by the U.S. Government (to artificially keep interest rates low by creating a government demand to match the government supply, in a totally fictional exercise in Pohl economics).


Say the governmment bought up ALL of our national bebt--not just the new debt--and then CANCLEED it? There you have the Pohl "solution"!!!!!!!


There really is nothing new under the sun, and you are living in a fantasy world if you think Obama is proposing anything "new". What is new is that we have never been stupid enough to DO these things before. Now wa are that stupid. We deserve what we get.