If you listen to the propaganda of no-fault capitalism you would think technology is the cat’s meow and government comes from the other end of the cat. Well, having worked in technology for years as an engineer and engineering manager, I can certainly testify to the fact that what folks think about technology (i.e., marketing) and what it actually is diverges greatly (see references below). The new marketing gimmick is “smart”. Smart apps are so incredibly dumbed down compared to the old apps. Open a pdf file in Adobe and then try the new Windows 8 pdf reader. You will notice very few options in the smart app. This is true of all the new smart apps. They only give you a couple choices…all the ‘smarts’ it took to learn Word or Excel are gone now…and they call that smart, I call it dumb. Oh, and let’s not forget the ‘smart car’ which is a go cart with a body (not that there is anything wrong with that).
Oh, and the ‘government’ now is dumb and can’t manage technology. Well forget defense technology or Medicare on-line, the new Obama-Care technology is what is really’ reflective of government (and naturally the root of all evils is Obama). Government conveniently is inadequate compared to free-market technology. Free market technology is competitive and therefore offers the best product at the most competitive price…this is the new Republican ‘smart’ marketing crap. Unfortunately folks the real world is a lot more complicated than this oversimplified ‘smart’ propaganda (see references below).
Here is what I can tell you for sure, if you had cameras following any large corporation around looking for all the dirt they can dig up on the corporation you would be amazed at the lack of morals, the cover-ups, illegalities, inefficiencies, bureaucracies , politics, ignoble greediness, way overhyped marketing Shinola. Don’t believe me, look at how often Yahoo goes down:
As of 10/25/13, see link
There is really no difference between private industry and government. They are both flawed and do some things well. There is no ‘saving grace’ to the free market that indisputably salvages the ‘glitches’ of free market corporatism (and corporations) from the ‘bureaucratic tyranny of government’. When Ted Cruz tells those of us that want Obama-Care, elected a president, obtained a super-majority, had Supreme Court decision to uphold Obama-Care that ‘the American people’ do not want Obama-Care he is also telling a huge amount of us that we are not Americans (or not true Americans). The spin, the marketing, never stops whether it is the private sector or the public sector.
Advocates of the ‘free market’ tell us that competition saves the private sector. Well, in democracy voting saves the public sector as the Republicans have in recent years had a taste of but still have not developed taste buds. The ‘American people’ of Ted Cruz is destined to perpetual reduction…old white guys. Their pink slip will be sent more and more until their desperate attempts to secede, to shut down the government, to refuse to raise the debt ceiling, to say ‘NO’ to everything and anything, their illusory, aspirational belief that the ‘metaphorical’ South will yet rise again’ will inevitably collapse into the oblivion of history. Conservatism will and should certainly survive but not fanaticism. Ted and company are getting fired…even corporations put underperforming employees on the ‘firing track’.
Oh, government does have one certain difference from the private sector. How long do you think a perspective employee would last if they put on their resume that they hated the company and would do everything they could to ‘shrink it so small they could drown it in the bathtub’? Even more, if the company hired the patriotic, god-fearing terrorist and allowed the ingrate to shut down the company and destroy its ability to sell bonds, go public, raise debt to grow and sustain the company we would think that it would be absolutely nuts for the shareholders to elect this maniac to be the CEO. In this then, we see Nietzsche’s modern nihilism, the wish for decline and oblivion. When corporations reward destructive employees whether it is from political power plays, bureaucracies, inadequate and hostile performance the company has become toxic and is doomed.
It may be hard for some to handle this but the private and public sector are no different in fundamental ways. They can both be inadequate, ineffective, competent, provide an important service to the consumer. The can both put Shinola on shit. It is up to the employees and shareholders to either make the organization better or preside over their own ruin. By the way, when Republicans piss and moan about Obama-Care as if it were the worst thing to ever happen they conveniently downplay the private tragedies that occurred daily for decades for millions of uninsured and the increased premium we all paid for emergency room health care (out of site out of mind for them I suppose). Obama has tried to address these tragedies. If you do not like it make it better but don’t advocate the destruction of the company.
Corporations are able to maintain a relatively untarnished reputation because they can contain their blemishes and destructive tendencies. The government has to put it all out to a hungry press motivated by the latest and greatest sensational story to boost their ratings and thus, their dollars. We, the shareholders, need to strain the Shinola from the shit and make sure we keep the positives, the constructive, outweighing the negatives, the destructive. We no longer live in a naive world of heroes and villains. We need to grow up and quit looking for devils to answer our illusory need for a dying metaphysic. There is no pristine holy ‘free market’ and tyrannical government, there is just us. We can kill to protect our religion or we can modify our religious dogmas to preserve the good and constructive in spite of our own collective failings.
References:
Apple: Price Fixing and Collusion
Free Market Either/Or Government?
An Inquiry into Austrian Economics and Steven Horwitz
Fundamentalism in Market Economy: The Austrian School and Regulation
The Free Market: Capitalism and Socialism
(One more thing, anytime you hear folks state socialism as the opposite of capitalism please remind them that there has NEVER been a pure capitalism or socialism in history. Opposites are mutually exclusive. Even Adam Smith spent over a hundred pages on banking regulations in his famous “Wealth of Nations”. The whole ‘smart’ ideal of the United States form of capitalism as opposite socialism is poppycock…get over it, God and the devil inevitably had the same origin if God is everything purported of Him.)…grow up please!