Wisdom From The Rubbish Heap?

I am no economist, this I know to be true. I haven’t attended the years of schooling, read through the scores of over priced textbooks nor worked to accrue the accolades of fellow colleagues who “study” in this ever shifting field of social science.

Despite my ignorance I cannot help but wonder about certain statements made in reference to Capitalism's gleaming White City: Wall Street.

But before I go on, a quick history lesson. Some years back the island of Manhattan was, much to many peoples surprise, not owned by white men. Around 1624 the Dutch setup a trading post on one end of the island. The people inhabiting the island at the time, the Lenape, eventually became viewed as a threat to the further establishment of this trading post and in turn a wall was built to “keep the natives out”.

After a series of hostile clashes and takeovers the British eventually tore down the wall and began to establish what is now modern day Wall Street.

I’ve heard, through unconfirmed sources, that the waste generated by this young, Dutch money making venture was thrown over the wall. If that is the case then you could say that Wall Street has its foundations built upon a dump.

Now on to the statements made about this shaky system called Capitalism (and in turn Wall Street).

Just days before the crash of the stock market in 1929 Yale economist Irving Fisher made this statement about Americas financial future, “The nation is marching along a permanently high plateau of prosperity.” Five days later the stock market crashed, signaling the worst economic crisis America had ever seen. It seems as though you’d have to be “permanently high” to actually believe Mr. Irving’s statement.

I have heard Capitalism referred to as this entity that will somehow always experience infinite growth. David Korten, author of The Post-Corporate World: Life After Capitalism, works from this infinite growth statement by comparing Capitalism to something else that experiences “infinite growth” until all of the resources for it’s “infinite growth” have been exhausted: cancer.

Like Capitalism, cancer preys on the weakness of the body and uses those weaknesses to establish itself in an ever-consuming battle to which the end result is death. Nothing in the natural world is infinite so why are we asked to believe that this man made system can somehow supersede the laws of nature?

It’s almost as if the greed and arrogance that inherently comes with the adoption of this system completely blinds those who buy into it.

And now, some 70 plus years after the last major collapse of this system we are, yet again, on the verge of another.

Guess the “infinite growth” wasn’t so infinite.

The best part in all of this is that the government will be bailing out all of these greedy Wall Street bastards with $700 billion (and more) of your hard earned tax money. Money that won’t be spent on schools, healthcare, paying off the deficit or securing anything stable for future generations to come. Yup, this is a system that truly rewards the greedy.

All of this leads me to ask the following question: Is America a “be greedy or get out” country? If so, where can I go? Are there countries that will take in the economic refugees of a corrupt and enslaved nation state such as mine?

Any takers?