[ANALYSIS and OPINION.]
As I write this, it is the 50th Anniversary of my high school graduation. I won’t get into how Watergate compares to January 6th and/or how the Vietnam War compares to Ukraine etc. Suffice it to say these are extremely precarious, and even dangerous, times both in terms of international relations and in terms of our own domestic political situation here in the U.S.
Not long ago, Elon Musk was reported to be worth around $200 billion. Wikipedia has figures for 216 countries. And of those Musk’s net worth is greater than the Gross Domestic Product of 154 countries, including countries like Hungary, Greece and pre-war Ukraine. That means that Mr. Musk is worth more than the value of all the goods and services produced in any one of those countries.
Bill Gates is said to be worth around $125 billion, Jeff Bezos just under $133 billion and Warren Buffett just under $112 billion. Vladimir Putin is said to be worth $70 Billion (some say much more, and that he is, in fact, the World’s richest man. One would never know in a closed authoritarian country like Russia). And both Gates and Bezos recently went through rather expensive divorces, meaning that just a short while back they were worth even more. But if these figures are correct that means that 5 individuals have a net worth of about $640 billion. That is more than the GDP of 193 countries (being all but 23 of the 216 countries being considered). The combined net worth of these men is thus greater than, for example, the GDPs of Sweden, the United Arab Emirates, Israel and Argentina. [All figures here are supplied by Google and Wikipedia.]
If we also consider Larry Page and Sergey Brin (founders of Google) they add $64.6 and $62.3 billion respectively. That puts the total net worth of 7 individuals at approximately $765 billion (more than three-quarters of a trillion dollars). That’s more than the GDP of all but 21 of the 216 countries on Wikipedia’s list. It is greater than the GDP of countries like Turkey and Poland.
And it’s no small wonder that these corporate leaders have amassed such a dazzling amount of wealth.. Even if we exclude Mr. Putin for obvious reasons, let’s just consider for a moment the take-home pay of a few Presidents and Chief Executive Officers of several more well-known companies. Last year, for example, Expedia Group awarded its chief executive Peter Kern $296 million and Warner Brothers awarded David Zaslav $246 million. The list goes on. (Source: E. Barrett of Fortune Magazine 5/16/22.) Even if all states enacted a modest minimum wage of $15 per hour (roughly $30,000 per year with no benefits) that means that Mr. Kern would have earned almost 10,000 times as much as his average worker and Zaslav would have earned 8,200 times as much. Moreover, as eye opening as those statistics are, in 2018 Tesla awarded Elon Musk $2.3 Billion in bonuses and compensation. Using the same $15 per hour assumption above, that means that Mr. Musk would have made 76,666.66 times as much as one of his employees making $30,000 per year.
Now, admittedly Mr. Musk did take a big cut in pay in the following year. After all, he obviously could afford it. But, let’s assume that Tesla is generous and pays all of its employees at least $45,000 per year. Mr Musk would still have made 51,111 times as much as the lowest paid Tesla employee. Whatever happened to team play? Isn’t corporate business success dependent on team effort? Moreover, and unfortunately, a whole lot of other corporate upper management pay has also gone right through the roof while the pay of lower level employees has languished at lower levels for several decades now.
One big question that pops into mind here is whether it would be conscionable for any of these men to oppose the imposition of any kind of significant estate tax. After all, there used to be one that actually raised some revenue. Back in the late 1970s there was a significant estate tax for anyone with estates larger than $3 million dollars. Virtually no one pays estate tax now. Aside from helping to alleviate the very pressing federal budget deficit problem, re-instituting some kind of meaningful revenue raising estate tax would also help to avoid the creation of what amounts to a modern-day aristocratic, privileged and/or royal class where all of this wealth will get passed on to a bunch of spoiled kids when their CEO parents die. Just more boring reality TV shows to watch—or worse.
And with the debt issues that this country faces, why wouldn’t a higher marginal income tax rate on the wealthy also be in order? Again back in the 1950s and 60s the highest marginal income tax rate for super wealthy folks got into the 70% and even 90% range (see the early 1950 and 60s figures in Wikipedia.) We are obviously way below that right now with a top marginal rate at 37%. Interestingly, we note that the 1950s and early 60s were a period of prosperity when the United States economy dominated the rest of the World. It was also the Leave it to Beaver television period that so many Trump-MAGA supporters apparently want to revisit. So, clearly there is considerable room to very seriously consider adopting higher tax rates for the super wealthy. Unfortunately, too many politicians are beholden to in some way shape or form to the super wealthy, otherwise Congress would have done something.
The storyline of my novel, Rao’s Solution, largely centers on how and why these huge income and wealth disparities arise. It also deals with the threats and pitfalls of plutocracy and oligarchy and perhaps most importantly of all, Rao (a political leader in the novel) proposes a uniquely creative first step in solving this problem without the necessity of instituting a communist and/or socialistic system.
The threat of oligarchy and plutocracy is now real in America. Some might even convincingly argue that given the wealth statistics noted above and how only two firms pretty much control the main channel of internet communication that we already live in a plutocracy. We’ve are still muddling through what amounted to an attempted coup on January 6th, where supporters of a billionaire President tried to seditiously wrest control of a Presidential election process that over 60 courts with both Democratic and Republican judges have held legitimately elected Joe Biden.
I can’t help but to interject here that right wing pundits keep raising the specter of a left wing dictatorship and/or the persistent threat of communism, when in fact, and given the events of January 6h, the biggest threat appears to be coming from the political right and not the left.
But be that as it may, in recent articles, I’ve mentioned the inhibiting effect the huge federal debt will have on the government’s ability to tackle inflation. There will be those, who will argue that budgetary impediments and the need for more defense spending (pointing of course, to events in Ukraine and the Taiwan situation) necessitate cutting large federal expenditures on social programs. Some will even argue that the federal government needs to reduce and/or eliminate governmental benefits provided by such important programs as Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Obamacare etc etc. Make no mistake, the federal deficit is a huge concern, however given the high levels of inflation we have, the vast income disparities that exist, an aging population etc cutting federal programs that benefit the disadvantaged and/or needy is probably both inhumane and perhaps even political suicide for those politicians who would vote to cut social entitlement and benefit programs.
However, to add to this political conundrum and to put things in perspective, the United States already spends 38% of what the entire world (China and Russia included) collectively spends on defending itself. The United States defense budget is just over $738 million. China spends $193.3 million and Russia $60.6 Billion on defense. In other words, we already spend about three times as much as our most likely serious adversaries combined. And that does not even take into consideration the size of the defense budgets of the other NATO countries who presumably would side with us in any conflict with Russia or China. In fact, the United States spends more on defense than the next 9 largest defense spending countries combined (including Russia and China). How much protection do we really need? Are we really getting a lot of bang for our defense dollar buck?
When considering the above a few big questions pop into one’s mind:
a. Are we giving the Defense Department a blank check in defense procurement, and is that a good idea? Consider the case of the U.S. Navy’s brand spanking new Littoral Combat ship whose hulls are cracking and may have to be scrapped. The same with new high tech Zumwalt class destroyers which are not living up to expectations.
b. Similarly, given their successful use in Ukraine, are cheap Turkish drones showing us that expensive tanks and perhaps even multi-billion dollar nuclear aircraft carriers now too costly and vulnerable to continue building in the future? Haven’t the Chinese developed missiles capable of taking our carriers out at long range? Even if they can’t do this now, won’t they be able to do so in the near future?
c. Despite the noted difference in defense spending China still has a larger navy than we do and Russia and China both seem to have more advanced hypersonic missile capabilities than we do. How can this possibly have occurred given the fact that we outspend them on defense by such large amounts? Something is amiss.
Given the above and other examples of serious cost overruns and new weapons systems not performing to specification, one can only be amazed at how prescient former President (and Supreme Allied Commander in WWII), Dwight Eisenhower, was when (before he left office in 1960) he expressed his concerns about the dangers of massive military spending, particularly deficit spending and government contracts to private military manufacturers, which he dubbed “the military–industrial complex“. (Quote from Wikipedia on Dwight D. Eisenhower)
Now, let’s put the above aside for a second and consider just one or two other tidbits of information.
Aaron Donald, defensive lineman for the World Champion LA Rams just signed a contract that will pay him $31.5 million in 2022.. He, no doubt, is a great, perhaps once in a generation player. However, in reality he is a guy whose only function is to entertain us. His pay is over 1,000 times what a minimum wage worker makes (perhaps one working the concession stand at the football stadium where Donald plays. We won’t digress into a discussion of whether the beer the concession man hands us or Donald’s 20th sack is more enjoyable.) In response to having this factoid pointed out a true capitalists might demurrer and say something like: So, what’s wrong with that? Well, those same capitalists might want to look in their sports history books because, back in the 1960s, a star reliever for the World Champion Pittsburgh Pirates used to have a “regular” job I believe as a carpenter, during the off-season. And he wasn’t alone in working in the off-season. Why? Because he, like all of his teammates had to work in real jobs in order to make ends meet. The point here is, as the characters in Rao’s Solution note, that back in the 1960s the differences in pay between the very top earners and the normal working person were nowhere near as great as they are today. Rao correctly notes that CEO pay was typically only about 100 times more than that of lower level employees in the United States in the early 1960s. And further, that as these differences in income and wealth become greater and greater (which is what is happening), the possibilities for political and economic abuse of power become greater and greater.
[We at reasonandbalance.com, also did a video on this widening wealth gap problem a few years ago which is still available on Youtube.]
Importantly, one might consider how the law deals with this widening wealth disparity issue. To do so one only need consider the Depp-Heard trial that recently concluded in Northern Virginia. That case involved a bunch of domestic squabbling. In essence, it was about name-calling and assertions of abuse and defamation that lasted six long weeks or so. The lawyers in that case (based on my experience as a lawyer) were probably making anywhere from $300 to $800 per hour (maybe even more) depending on whether the lawyer in question was a senior partner, junior partner and/or an associate.
To simplify, let’s say that the average time billed by each lawyer for Depp and Heard was $450 per hour. The trial lasted about 34 days. Let’s assume that during the trial three lawyers were working for both sides, each billing 8 hours per day. That’s 48 hours per day for a 34 day trial.at $450 per hour. That means Depp and Heard combined may have spent over $734,000 in legal fees, However, that’s just for the trial alone. Figuring the legal fees for trial preparation is very tricky in this instance because it’s such an unusually long case for what is really a mere domestic dispute. However, it’s not unreasonable to assume that in civil cases factual investigation, pre-trial discovery depositions, court appearances for preliminary motions and legal research all take much more time than actual trial itself. Preparation is everything. Plus both sides would have to pay for their respective expert witnesses. Also, more lawyers would have probably helped preparing the case than were present at trial. In short, if the someone told me that Depp and Heard collectively spent more than $2.5 million on the case, I wouldn’t be surprised. If that’s correct then both sides spent $1.25 million on legal fees and expenses in the case.
Contrast the above with someone, in this case an indigent (poor) defendant, facing possible jail or imprisonment in Virginia. In class one misdemeanor cases (where one year of jail is a possible punishment) the fee a lawyer gets in a court-appointed case is $120 (assuming just one count is charged). See Virginia Code Section 19.2-163. That’s not a per hour fee, that’s the total fee for everything including trial preparation, travel to and from the courthouse (or jail) interviewing witnesses, consultations and/or negotiations with the prosecution—everything including the trial itself. Moreover, in very serious cases, a lawyer representing an indigent defendant in a single count felony case where life imprisonment or a 20 year sentence is possible, can expect to receive only $1,235 (again that’s the total fee) for a case that might well require 3 or 4 court appearance, some brief writing, and a lot of trial preparation. [The Code admittedly does theoretically provide that more can be awarded under special circumstances, but many of those provisions are subject to availability of funds under that year’s state budget and, frankly, this limitation usually end up causing any requested overage allowance to be ignored or disallowed by the state.] And, normally the judges will pressure the lawyers to get the case completely tired within 1 or 2 days.
The point is that Ms. Heard and Mr. Depp each got 1,012.15 times the legal services in a domestic squabble involving rich celebrities that a poor defendant would get facing life imprisonment. Moreover, the Court granted Heard-Depp about 25 to 40 times more time to try the case than what a serious felony defendant facing life imprisonment would get to try their case. Think about it. The $2.5 million Depp and Heard paid would cover the legal fees in 20,833 indigent criminal single count misdemeanor cases.
Given the foregoing, one has to wonder how serious Virginia is about protecting notions of Due Process of Law, respecting a poor criminal defendant’s right to the presumption of innocence and making sure that indigent defendants get a fair trial.
Yes, there are two systems of justice. One for the rich and one for everyone else. Celebrity reputations, entertainment and show time obviously trumps the risk of an innocent but poor person spending their life behind bars.
In Rao’s Solution the protagonists are very concerned about the ability of drones and government operated cameras (seemingly at every intersection) to spy on the every-move of private citizens. (Moreover, this is not to mention that drones now have the ability to kill people. Given these facts and the ability of a select few firms and their leadership to control the major channels of communication, the ability of one person or perhaps a small wealthy group of people to control everything becomes obvious. Would Vladimir Putin have been able to invade Ukraine, and continue the fight over its independence if he wasn’t able to control the media and fill Russia’s airwaves with anti-Ukraine propaganda?
The point is that we Americans delude ourselves if we think that an authoritarian regime could not take power here. As I write this Fox has announced that it will not cover the January 6th Congressional Committee hearings on whether former President Trump and his supporters are guilty of sedition or some other crime in trying to overturn the 2020 election. Fox’s decision is not only dead wrong, but it is alarming because it demonstrates in the starkest terms that it is unwilling to allow its millions of viewers access to a historically significant news event, one that is clearly more important than any Congressional hearing one can think of–ever. This is because it involves an investigation into the action of an incumbent President and his possible interference in the entire voting and Presidential election certification process. That’s scary-manipulative-behind-the-scenes et tu Brute-Caesar-getting-knifed and death-of-the-Republic stuff. In short, it deals with the very foundations of democracy, respect for the peaceful transfer of power and the legitimacy of the current Presidency. In short, the January 6th Committee hearings make Watergate look like child’s play.
The major point here is that Fox News watchers deserve to be able to watch the January 6th Committee hearings and judge for themselves what happened. Regular Fox viewers should feel insulted that Fox apparently doesn’t trust them to be smart enough to determine if what the Committee is hearing or what it determines is true or false. One can only suspect that what Fox is really afraid of is that the Committee will present convincing evidence that everything Mr. Trump, Tucker Carlson and many of Trump’s more ardent supporters have been saying all along is false. This, of course, would be against the best interest of Fox News because it would greatly diminish the credibility of the Fox News family—not to mention the size of Rupert Murdoch’s pocketbook.
It’s getting late. This article has gone on much longer than I anticipated. But we strive at reasonandblance.com to be a objective, fair and balanced as possible. So, I will close by being very short and to the point with some final observations.
In prior articles and videos we’ve emphasized the urgent need for moderation in terms of rhetoric and philosophy in all political discourse. We’ve criticized the more militant and vociferous wings of both the political right and left. United this country stands. Divided it will be Hell for its inhabitants and the World as well. This is because the very existence of democracy would be placed in great doubt if democracy were to fail in the United States.
In this regard, we’ve criticized Wokeness before. However, it must be said that many of the positions taken by the militant left have some merit. Above we have made a few important points about the wealth and income gap that progressives would probably agree with. However, they would, with some justification, also want to promptly fix this problem.
Moreover, equal protection of law is a fundamental right found in our Constitution. It’s the law of the land, as it should be, and no one should be treated differently because of race, national origin, religion, and/or sexual orientation etc under principles set forth in the Constitution and applicable law. And it should be admitted that current non-discrimination laws need to be enforced more effectively. Police brutality must stop. Police officers need to be more thoroughly vetted and better trained in handling racial and cultural sensitivities and issues. However, the slogan “defund the police” should be dropped because it is either a terrible idea (if taken literally); or it exaggerates the true intent of it’s proponents which, for at least some, merely means that they want more resources devoted to other social and rehabilitation programs instead of to law enforcement.
However, on other issues, much like Abraham Lincoln did, especially prior to and at the start of the American Civil War, when he put national existential considerations first, present circumstances dictate that national unity and domestic peace be given super-priority over all other objectives by all political actors and factions. This is because of the volatile, fragile and therefore dangerous times that we confront here at home. And this is true regardless of how noble or worthwhile all other social, economic and political objectives are. In this last year or so we’ve experienced what amounts to a coup attempt by militant right wingers perhaps lead by the former President himself. They wanted to force the people of this great nation to ignore a legitimately held election where an opposition candidate (Joe Biden) received a significant majority of the popular vote. In short, President Biden received at least 7 million votes more than former President Trump. Seven million is larger than the population of most states. Moreover, over sixty courts held, with Democratic and Republican judges, that the election wasn’t rigged that there was no voter fraud. These and other events clearly demonstrate that there are those amongst us who want to ignore and trample on cherished and long held notions of an elected representative government and force upon the rest of us a government that we don’t want; and perhaps, some sort of authoritarian regime. Unfortunately, several key right wing media outlets and personalities, continue to line their personal pockets, purveying the snake oil that the election was rigged. We are well past the point when enough is enough. Consistently claiming the 2020 election was rigged or stolen can no longer be tolerated, and is, in and of itself, evidence of the continued seditious intentions of those making such claims.
Given our country’s very unfortunate and dangerous situation, all other objectives no matter how worthwhile and meritorious, have to take, at least a temporary, a backseat to the dire need to preserve unity and democracy in the United States. We need a calmer quieter period so that tempers can cool and trust can be built and/or re-built between the left and the right. We have got to get away from the take-no-prisoners, all-or-nothing lynch mob mentality that prevails in many quarters.
And in any event, savvy political leaders know that it is not wise to get too far out in front of what society and the public are ready for. In short, going too far too fast attempting to implement social change, even if that change is needed, can backfire if the circumstances aren’t right. Moreover, in times like these it is probably dangerous to aggressively espouse views that are going to be highly objectionable to a substantial portion of the population—particularly Whites who still constitute a majority of the population and who, by far, constitute the largest and economically most powerful segment of society. The country needs a healthy helping of goodwill gestures and patience by all sides. And for these reasons, militant progressives should put many of their ideas on the backburner, at least for a while, so that they can be debated and considered under calmer conditions that are conducive to civilized rational debate. We say this not to bury those ideas, but to preserve peace, which, in the long run will probably assure that at least some of those ideas, if rationally debated, will ultimately be adopted.
More outspoken progressives need to understand that no group of people constituting a majority of the population is going to readily welcome folks of different skin color or who have come from places with vastly different cultural backgrounds, especially when it threatens to substantially change the way of life of the existing population. No one, regardless of their color or nationality, wants to feel like they are a stranger in their own land –or to walk down the street and, for the first time, suddenly see a bunch of foreign business signs or large numbers of folks wearing strange attire. That’s just the way people are regardless of who they are or what race they are. This is a major reason why right wingers are beginning to accuse progressives and immigrants of purposefully trying to replace the existing White majority with foreign and minority voters, via lenient immigration policies etc. This is otherwise known as “replacement theory”. Not only is it false because nobody has gotten together to intentionally replace anybody, but worse, it all begins to sound too much like something the Nazi’s would have come up with in Germany in the 1930s and 40s to justify arresting, deporting and ultimately murdering millions of Jews, Gypsies and other non-Arian folks whom they deemed to be undesirable or not sufficiently Arian. This kind of talk is dangerous because it engenders fear in the general White population and thus fans the flames of right-wing extremism if not outright Fascism. In any event, to calm things down immigrants may want to think about heeding the old aphorism: “When in Rome do as the Romans do ” and not rock the boat too much. Obviously culture matters a lot. Immigrants and militant progressives are not likely to prevail in any do or die contest with a majority White population that feels threatened or antagonized. And too many Whites already do.
The bottom line is that everyone, whether on the political left or right (and especially minorities and those with foreign backgrounds) would be wise to allow things to calm down and, in the meantime, to support pro-democracy moderate candidates (be they Republican or Democrat) and not left or right-wing firebrands who just further enflame passions on all sides. The election of moderates would benefit everyone because moderates inherently understand the need for both compromise with the opposing party and for overall consensus building in government. Moderates correctly realize that governing is a give- and-take process and that it is often unhealthy and unproductive to be stubbornly insistent on getting one’s own way all of the time. Moderates inherently understand that they are elected to represent everyone, not just those who voted for them. They are more open-minded, fair and balanced in their decision-making. Importantly, this eases the minds of folks who did not vote for them. And, under present circumstances this might well be very important for middle-of-the-road and “swing” White voters whose support is probably crucial in the 2022 mid-term and 2024 Presidential elections. In short, nominating, electing and supporting moderate candidates and leaders is essential to the continued existence of democracy in the United States.
David Dixon Lentz June 11, 2022 corrected on 6/15 and 6/16/22
© Copyright 2022; David Dixon Lentz; All Rights Reserved.