Merck to pay $950 million to settle U.S. Vioxx charge - Health - msnbc.com

Merck to pay $950 million to settle U.S. Vioxx charge - Health - msnbc.com

This article reinforces the idea that we have returned to the Robber Baron era. For corporations like Merck, breaking the law is simply a cost of doing business. They lack any sense of civic responsibility. The only way to reverse this is to hold the people who run these companies legally responsible and give them jail time for the criminal acts that their companies commit under their leadership. Ultimately, perhaps the solution is to hold their stockholders responsible for financing criminal activity. That would be one small step toward public accountability.

Net Generation as the "Occupant" Generation

 In 2005, Diana Oblinger and James Oblinger first defined what they call the “Net Generation”—a generation born in or after 1982 who have lived their entire lives in the era of the Internet.  If Baby Boomers were defined by television and Generation X by video gaming, the Net Generation is defined by the Web and online communities. 

They are, in effect, the emerging American society.

This month, as the Occupy Wall Street phenomenon morphed from a localized protest in New York to a global movement, it became clear that the Net Generation is also the “Occupant” Generation.   They were born at the beginning of the Reagan Revolution and have lived all their lives in an era where one’s identity in the broader society as “citizen” has been replaced by “consumer.”  They are the increasingly disenfranchised victims of a corporate plutocracy that has reamed out the core of our culture and, one might expect, left little for this generation to strive for—except for righting the wrongs that have been done to their society. 

And, perhaps, creating a very different society in the vacuum that the financial 1 percenters have left in the wake of their greed.

In Educating the Net Generation (EDUCAUSE 2005, available at www.educause.edu/educatingthenetgen/ ) the Oblingers reported several unifying characteristics that Howe and Strauss described of this generation, which has also been called the Millennial Generation:

·      They tend to gravitate toward group activity.

·      They believe that “it’s cool to be smart” and focus on academic performance.

·      They get involved in extracurricular activities.

·      They are close to their parents and identify with their parents’ values.

·      They tend to respect social conventions and institutions.

·      They are fascinated by new technologies.

·      They are racially and ethnically diverse.

They also noted that, while this generation is very mobile, it is also always connected and most are experiential learners—they prefer learning by doing, an exploratory style that, note the Oblingers, “enables them to better retain information and use it in creative, meaningful ways.”  Some other preferences:

·      They prefer to work in teams.

·      They prefer structure to ambiguity.

·      They are oriented toward inductive discovery or observation, formulating hypotheses, and figuring out rules.

·      They crave interactivity.

·      They eagerly participate in community activity.

·      They believe they can make a difference.

The same characteristics that made this a unique generation of learners may also serve to help them confront imbalance between the people, through our government, and increasingly international corporate forces.  The challenge is to create a new balance in society between corporations and our government.  In many ways the task before them is much more difficult than what the Baby Boomers faced in the 1960s.  Then, we still lived in a mixed economy in which there was agreement that government should respond to society’s needs and protect people from the excesses of the private economy.  Today, the government, while still a potential ally, is weakened by a generation of deregulation.  The Net Generation, with its willingness to engage as a community—to be more than consumers—can overcome the current ambiguity about the role of government and create a society that will truly make a difference.

The Occupy movement is an important step toward that goal. 

Sachs' "Mixed Economy"--A Middle Path

I am continuing to read Jeffrey Sachs’ The Price of Civilization.  It is like taking a crash course in modern economics.  Sachs’ discussion of the current political and cultural context of economics makes me think that the struggle is not between two opposing views of how to manage government within the context of our constitutional democracy.  Instead, I am beginning to think that the struggle is between democracy itself and a plutocracy in which a tiny minority of super-rich elites rule on the backs of an increasingly poor working class, buffered by a small professional class. 

           

To find a counterpart, I suspect we need to look back not to the Roaring Twenties or the Gilded Age of the Industrial period, but further to the landed aristocracy of the agrarian Middle Ages.  While that aristocracy was based on land—the proper form of wealth in an agrarian era—today’s aristocracy is based on market wealth, a wealth that manipulates markets rather than produce goods that improve the lives of people.   Just as the landed barons controlled the government of the Middle Ages, the corporate/finance barons are attempting to control democratic government today, rending it in the words of one presidential candidate, “inconsequential” and opening the door to direct corporate control.

Ultimately, I suspect, this is what the Occupy Wall Street demonstrators are really rallying against.  And, I further suspect, it is what concerned the Tea Party before they were taken over by the plutocrats.   At its most absolute, the fight, is not just to determine which political party will control government.  The fight is for idea of democracy itself.  

That said, it is absolutely essential that people not drift to extremes.  Neither a corporate plutocracy, in which government is inconsequential, nor a socialist government, in which the market is controlled centrally, are likely to produce long-term health for society.  What has proven to be successful—and which made the United States the most successful country in the world for most of the 20^th century—according to Sachs is a mixed economy, in which corporations are generally free to produce goods and service and the government serves to do those things that are necessary for a happy life but that do not produce profit:  build roads and train systems, create levees and dams to control rivers and avoid floods, fund basic research that often has no immediate profit value.  And, I would add, regulate the activities of corporations only so that they do not work against the best interests of the population as a whole.

Ultimately, we need to focus not on the extremes, but on the balance—the mix, if you will—between these two aspects of a healthy democratic society.  Government and business are the Yin and Yang of a successful economy.  Together—as we found in the half-century between the Great Depression and the Reagan Revolution—they can create a wonderful society.  As we have seen elsewhere in the world, without that balance one gets failure at either extreme, whether it be the socialism of the USSR or the plutocratic oil dictatorships of the Middle East that are now being dismantled by the Arab Spring. 

Moderation, rather than extreme idealogy, is the key.  We need to reward politicians who have a long view and who are able to see the value of a diverse American “us.”

Jane Addams and the Tea Party

I am re-reading Jane Addams’ wonderful "Twenty Years at Hull-House." In explaining the spirit with which she founded her settlement house in 1890s Chicago, she wrote that it was driven, in part by “the conviction, in the words of Canon Barnett, that the things that make men alike are finer and better than the things that keep them apart, and that these basic likenesses, if they are properly accentuated, easily transcend the less essential differences of race, language, creed, and tradition." Addams, of course, was speaking about the importance of integrating into American life the millions of immigrants who had been attracted to the United States at the height of the Industrial Revolution.  However, her words also set an expectation for us today.

American-style democracy thrives on our ability to find aworkable middle—a place where are “basic likenesses” outweigh the things thatkeep us apart enough for us to fulfill the purpose of our federal government as declared in the opening sentence of the Constitution: “. . . to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity . . .” I would like to think that I could identify some “basic likenesses” with the Tea Party members of Congress.  However, it does not come easily.

The Tea Party, which declared its purpose during the last election as being “to take back our country” (they did not say from whom), can be expected to become even more radical and less prone to compromise now that they have won a big victory.  These right wing extremists have set themselves so arrogantly apart from the mainstream of our country, that, right now at least, I cannot find common ground with them.  They, in turn,seek no common ground with anyone who does not share their ideology.

I hope that our politicians are able to find a way to build a workable middle ground in this environment.

Civic Virtue

Jeffrey Sachs begins his new book The Price of Civilization with this statement:

At the root of America’s economic crisis lies a moral crisis:  the decline of civic virtue among America’s political and economic elite.  A society of markets, laws, and elections is not enough if the rich and powerful fail to behave with respect, honesty, and compassion toward the rest of society and toward the world.  America has developed the world’s most competitive market society but has squandered it civic virtue along the way.  Without restoring an ethos of social responsibility, there can be no meaningful and sustained economic recovery.

It is a statement that sheds light on the ongoing debate about Social Security. 

            Republican Presidential candidate Rick Perry has called Social Security a “Ponzi scheme”—a fraud by which the government cheats taxpayers—“investors” in Perry’s analogy—by not returning full value on their investment but instead using it to pay out funds to others.   Perry’s accusation is a good example of the civic blindness that has infected conservative thinking in the U.S. 

            Social Security is not the equivalent of an individual retirement account.  Instead, it is a kind of publicly funded insurance policy.  Behind it is a key assumption:  that those of us who have been able to make a good living will ensure that our neighbors who have not done as well will still be able to retire with a modicum of dignity.  The “return on investment” of Society Security is not what the well-off take out of it, but that our elderly neighbors in need don’t go hungry.

            In the early run-up to the 2012 presidential primaries, we have heard candidates for the highest office in the land suggest that those who cannot afford health care should simply die and that those who don’t have jobs should simply go out and get one.  The lack of compassion among these people—and, by extension, in the general population that keeps these folks thinking they have a chance at being our President—is appalling.  Moreover, as Sachs suggests, it bodes ill for our country’s long-term health.

            Sachs’ book suggests that civic virtue and prosperity go hand in hand.  I would love to hear a debate among the candidates about how they define these terms.  What constitutes “civic virtue” for a Presidential candidate who advocates a government that is inconsequential?   Is a society in which one percent of the population control 20 percent of the wealth a “prosperous society?”  Or is it a poor society with a handful of very rich plutocrats?

            I hope that we can get to a debate about these issues in the months ahead.

NYT: Forests dying off as world's climate warms - Technology & science - The New York Times - msnbc.com

Here is a detailed report on how global warming is resulting in a not-so-gradual killing off of forests around the world, as insects that used to be controlled by cold weather are living to become invasive.

The article notes that richer nations will need to fund the work that is needed to stop this trend. Given today's political climate, it is hard to imagine that we can come together as a community to fight global warming at this level. It is sad to think what we stand to lose because of wrong-headed politics and radical ideologies.

We can make progress--and save countless lives--only by working together. It is time for a little humility in our politics.


NYT: Forests dying off as world's climate warms - Technology & science - The New York Times - msnbc.com

Social Security: The Individual and Society

Texas Governor Rick Perry continues to stand behind his comment that Social Security is a “Ponzi scheme.”  He could be more wrong, and his statement reveals much about how he sees the role of government and, indeed, the fundamental nature of a democratic society. 

First, let’s get something straight.  A Ponzi scheme is defined by Wikipedia as “a fraudulent investment operation that pays returns to separate investors, not from any actual profit earned by the organization, but from their own money or money paid by subsequent investors.”   Social Security is not an individual investment.  It is, as its name suggests, a way that the people of the United States, through our constitutional democracy, have agreed, over several generations now, to set aside funds to ensure that everyone who needs it has access to a modicum of income during their retirement years.   The problem with Social Security is not that it was set up to be deceptive; it is that (1) because of the phenomenon of aging Baby Boomers, the ratio of young to old people has changed since Social Security was designed in the 1930s and (2) people are living much longer than they did in the 1930s.  These two factors put a stress on the ability to maintain the Social Security funds:  Relatively fewer people are supporting a relatively larger group of senior citizens who are living longer. 

There is no question that Social Security needs to be adjusted so that it can continue to work in the years ahead.  However, that is no excuse for a Presidential candidate to call it a criminal act.  Either Rick Perry is incredibly uneducated or he is incredibly immoral—willing to knowingly tell lies in order to attract money and support from an ideological fringe group.  Or, perhaps, he simply is unable to see how the interests of individuals relate to the interests of the broader community in which they live.  No wonder, in that case, that, as Governor, he spoke favorably about Texas seceding from the United States. 

One is tempted to laugh at this kind of foolishness.  But that would be a mistake.