America doesn’t have a funding problem—it has an execution problem. The government stopped building, corporations took over, and now we’re stuck paying more for worse results.
Thank you for this work - excellent and on point. It seems you have some idea more than just a general "we have to change it." I see building for a true populist agenda as you are articulating in your columns. That could be spontaneous but history indicates that takes intentionality.
The problem with getting rid of privatization is the one thing is does well is corruption.
They can take some of the profits of their government contracts to bribe politicians to give them less oversight and more contracts.
When those politicians leave office, they know those contractors will give them jobs as execs, lobbyists, lawyers, or consultants that pay several times their public office salary.
Dick Cheney was the poster child for this.
As Bush Sr. Def. Sec, he was tasked with figuring out what Pentagon functions could be privatized. He hired Halliburton to do it, and they came back with a list and said, "By the way, we can do A LOT of those." So Cheney gave them a bunch of contracts to do stuff the military used to do for itself.
When Bush admin ended, Cheney became CEO of Halliburton.
When he was VP under Bush Jr, Halliburton got no-bid contracts for services in the Iraq War.
I live in CA and didn't even realize that the high speed rail project was privatized. This is likely a huge problem across the board -- govt getting blamed for slow/failed projects that were in fact executed by private companies. Public education badly needed here!
Thank you - your solutions are exactly what America needs. But decades of corporate manipulation have sewn up the conversation, the law, the Congress, the policies and the funding to benefit them. More Americans need to wake up to recognize how we’ve been bamboozled, and elect only those candidates who refuse to accept corporate funding. Perhaps the vise grip of pain now being wielded on America will serve the wake up.
The dirty secret is how often the government does the same job CHEAPER than the private sector.
Even my far right dad noticed public utilities charge less than private ones, and the overhead for Medicare and Medicaid is fraction that of private insurance.
Likewise, it would be tough to find a private school that offers what public schools do for the same per pupil cost.
if drug companies charge insane amounts for drugs - open a drug making facility. In fact one closed in West Virginia and the workers asked for intevention before they were laid off. that would have been a useful government service. could even charge enough to break even and not cost the government money to operate.
Citizens United, which allows corporations and wealthy private interests to buy our elections, and thus the government, means that this transformation will not happen. America is being transformed into a playground for global elites to rape and plunder of its resources, its labor and probably even that gold in Fort Knox that Trump seems obsessed with. The people’s interests will not be served unless and until the people rise up and stop this madness.
Privatization of government functions is a cash cow for corporations. Have taxpayers pay corporate expenses, and the executives get the profits and bonuses. That model does not benefit the taxpayer.
This is the response to privatization most Americans have NEVER heard.
Something similar could be said about regulation. Most of it exists because corporations acted irresponsibly and screwed their customers with shoddy products and scams.
They also screwed their workers and poisoned the environment.
If they didn't do those things, the agencies set up to stop them wouldn't exist any more than the agency to stop us from being trampled by invisible elephants exists.
H. Ross Perot was originally an IBM equipment salesman when he began using large computer databases to organize public spending in Texas. He popularized the idea that private business does a better, faster, and less expensive job than government. Perot took just enough votes away from incumbent George H W Bush to allow Bill Clinton to be elected President. I've not seen any studies that supported Perot's assertion.
Everything you talked about requires those in power to believe in an activist government. It is certainly moot in the next 4 years. But building an enticing message to win over the electorate with these ideas is the thing we need to do…
This is what we call corruption. You describe it to a tee. A sickness, a cancer, a mental illness, a spiritual vacuum replaced with Newspeak and Doublethink. Big Brother on steroids.
What brand of intelligence and logic purports to shrink govt. as the population doubles or triples? Insane logic. Since way before humans thought to emulate a round rock by building a wheel, almost every animal society had formed social structures that included rules, teaching, training, security, innovation and means to enforce those behaviors so those social orders did NOT fall apart.
No doubt those animal societies bred a few crazy outliers, DNA suffers as much from entropy and uncertainty as the physics of erosion or rock formation. But when that happens, the social network is still, to this day, strong and ordered enough to quell the idiot savants or outlaws, shunning or outright killing the 'traitors' to social order.
Humans are crazy enough to have 'invented' a get-out-of-jail-free card - religious fantasy relying on gods to keep order - so that bad behaviors could be gaslighted into sins best taken care of by non-existent Judge Dredds. The current mega-lie of 'only I can fix it, trust me' is the end game hypocrisy of the corruption of society. I am constantly stunned that human societies cannot sort out these lies from the simple truths that stare them in the face daily, hourly, by the minute.
What is govt.? It is a unionized decision by individuals that are unmistakably patterned into a familiar unit that comprehends the dangers of rogue agents and destructive behaviors, and creates rules and regulations that enforce adequate, overarching security to keep the unit safe, intact and healthy. Govts. are their citizens, not separate entities that separate members from each other and then play favorites according to which citizens have the most succulent bribes or threatening intimidations.
Govt. is supposed to insure 'parity.' We cannot believe we will 'build it better ourselves' until we have destroyed the outsider, corporate cabals that bribe, extort, intimidate, addict or addle the brains of the citizens. The political cabal of traitors has not only failed us, they have betrayed us, and we have let them do it because we gave up our agency and handed it off to imaginary deities that Do Not Exist.
We do not necessarily 'need' competition. IMO that behavior is part of the corruption. It separates citizens from each other, and declares that some are 'better' than others, more worthy, more powerful, more deserving. Take a hard look at 'DOGE,' the fantasy-hyped super competitor brain trust of frustrated and digitally addled incels and misogynists. They use subjectivity to objectify govt. as Ray Gun's ancient BS that govt. is The Problem, and only 'secret societies' of gifted savants can save us from ourselves because they are 'winners.'
Winners of what? As you point out so perfectly, they have won the game of mediocrity and inefficiency via gaslighting that game as brilliance. And many are too drugged up, stressed out, dumbed down, malnourished, brainwashed and manipulated to see the difference.
We do not need competition, we need cooperation and parity within our society. That is how 'murka survived WWs 1 and 2, the uncivil civil war; and the lack of those decent traits is why we failed so miserably with Covid, the Iraq/Afgha/Viet Nam disasters, the Bush Crime Family Great Recession, the dot com bubble fiasco, and every other corporate trainwreck we have witnessed in the last 45 years, since Ray Gun cheated his way into office.
Things must fall apart before the society can try to put some better version of Humpty Dumpty back together.
We need reasonable regulations and policies that serve all Americans. That is the first rubric. We should get rid of what does not serve us and probably limit congressional terms since they cannot seem to vote other than in their own self interest. There are lots of things that we can do and should do to take back our country. Once we have a prioritized plan we can execute effectively for the people.
Thank you for this work - excellent and on point. It seems you have some idea more than just a general "we have to change it." I see building for a true populist agenda as you are articulating in your columns. That could be spontaneous but history indicates that takes intentionality.
The problem with getting rid of privatization is the one thing is does well is corruption.
They can take some of the profits of their government contracts to bribe politicians to give them less oversight and more contracts.
When those politicians leave office, they know those contractors will give them jobs as execs, lobbyists, lawyers, or consultants that pay several times their public office salary.
Dick Cheney was the poster child for this.
As Bush Sr. Def. Sec, he was tasked with figuring out what Pentagon functions could be privatized. He hired Halliburton to do it, and they came back with a list and said, "By the way, we can do A LOT of those." So Cheney gave them a bunch of contracts to do stuff the military used to do for itself.
When Bush admin ended, Cheney became CEO of Halliburton.
When he was VP under Bush Jr, Halliburton got no-bid contracts for services in the Iraq War.
And so it goes.
I live in CA and didn't even realize that the high speed rail project was privatized. This is likely a huge problem across the board -- govt getting blamed for slow/failed projects that were in fact executed by private companies. Public education badly needed here!
Thank you - your solutions are exactly what America needs. But decades of corporate manipulation have sewn up the conversation, the law, the Congress, the policies and the funding to benefit them. More Americans need to wake up to recognize how we’ve been bamboozled, and elect only those candidates who refuse to accept corporate funding. Perhaps the vise grip of pain now being wielded on America will serve the wake up.
The dirty secret is how often the government does the same job CHEAPER than the private sector.
Even my far right dad noticed public utilities charge less than private ones, and the overhead for Medicare and Medicaid is fraction that of private insurance.
Likewise, it would be tough to find a private school that offers what public schools do for the same per pupil cost.
oh my God yes. so much this.
if drug companies charge insane amounts for drugs - open a drug making facility. In fact one closed in West Virginia and the workers asked for intevention before they were laid off. that would have been a useful government service. could even charge enough to break even and not cost the government money to operate.
If our government were not so profoundly corrupt, every time a plant closed, some level of government would at least try to make that happen.
Citizens United, which allows corporations and wealthy private interests to buy our elections, and thus the government, means that this transformation will not happen. America is being transformed into a playground for global elites to rape and plunder of its resources, its labor and probably even that gold in Fort Knox that Trump seems obsessed with. The people’s interests will not be served unless and until the people rise up and stop this madness.
Privatization of government functions is a cash cow for corporations. Have taxpayers pay corporate expenses, and the executives get the profits and bonuses. That model does not benefit the taxpayer.
This is the response to privatization most Americans have NEVER heard.
Something similar could be said about regulation. Most of it exists because corporations acted irresponsibly and screwed their customers with shoddy products and scams.
They also screwed their workers and poisoned the environment.
If they didn't do those things, the agencies set up to stop them wouldn't exist any more than the agency to stop us from being trampled by invisible elephants exists.
H. Ross Perot was originally an IBM equipment salesman when he began using large computer databases to organize public spending in Texas. He popularized the idea that private business does a better, faster, and less expensive job than government. Perot took just enough votes away from incumbent George H W Bush to allow Bill Clinton to be elected President. I've not seen any studies that supported Perot's assertion.
Everything you talked about requires those in power to believe in an activist government. It is certainly moot in the next 4 years. But building an enticing message to win over the electorate with these ideas is the thing we need to do…
Get money out of politics and there might be a chance.
This is what we call corruption. You describe it to a tee. A sickness, a cancer, a mental illness, a spiritual vacuum replaced with Newspeak and Doublethink. Big Brother on steroids.
What brand of intelligence and logic purports to shrink govt. as the population doubles or triples? Insane logic. Since way before humans thought to emulate a round rock by building a wheel, almost every animal society had formed social structures that included rules, teaching, training, security, innovation and means to enforce those behaviors so those social orders did NOT fall apart.
No doubt those animal societies bred a few crazy outliers, DNA suffers as much from entropy and uncertainty as the physics of erosion or rock formation. But when that happens, the social network is still, to this day, strong and ordered enough to quell the idiot savants or outlaws, shunning or outright killing the 'traitors' to social order.
Humans are crazy enough to have 'invented' a get-out-of-jail-free card - religious fantasy relying on gods to keep order - so that bad behaviors could be gaslighted into sins best taken care of by non-existent Judge Dredds. The current mega-lie of 'only I can fix it, trust me' is the end game hypocrisy of the corruption of society. I am constantly stunned that human societies cannot sort out these lies from the simple truths that stare them in the face daily, hourly, by the minute.
What is govt.? It is a unionized decision by individuals that are unmistakably patterned into a familiar unit that comprehends the dangers of rogue agents and destructive behaviors, and creates rules and regulations that enforce adequate, overarching security to keep the unit safe, intact and healthy. Govts. are their citizens, not separate entities that separate members from each other and then play favorites according to which citizens have the most succulent bribes or threatening intimidations.
Govt. is supposed to insure 'parity.' We cannot believe we will 'build it better ourselves' until we have destroyed the outsider, corporate cabals that bribe, extort, intimidate, addict or addle the brains of the citizens. The political cabal of traitors has not only failed us, they have betrayed us, and we have let them do it because we gave up our agency and handed it off to imaginary deities that Do Not Exist.
We do not necessarily 'need' competition. IMO that behavior is part of the corruption. It separates citizens from each other, and declares that some are 'better' than others, more worthy, more powerful, more deserving. Take a hard look at 'DOGE,' the fantasy-hyped super competitor brain trust of frustrated and digitally addled incels and misogynists. They use subjectivity to objectify govt. as Ray Gun's ancient BS that govt. is The Problem, and only 'secret societies' of gifted savants can save us from ourselves because they are 'winners.'
Winners of what? As you point out so perfectly, they have won the game of mediocrity and inefficiency via gaslighting that game as brilliance. And many are too drugged up, stressed out, dumbed down, malnourished, brainwashed and manipulated to see the difference.
We do not need competition, we need cooperation and parity within our society. That is how 'murka survived WWs 1 and 2, the uncivil civil war; and the lack of those decent traits is why we failed so miserably with Covid, the Iraq/Afgha/Viet Nam disasters, the Bush Crime Family Great Recession, the dot com bubble fiasco, and every other corporate trainwreck we have witnessed in the last 45 years, since Ray Gun cheated his way into office.
Things must fall apart before the society can try to put some better version of Humpty Dumpty back together.
We need reasonable regulations and policies that serve all Americans. That is the first rubric. We should get rid of what does not serve us and probably limit congressional terms since they cannot seem to vote other than in their own self interest. There are lots of things that we can do and should do to take back our country. Once we have a prioritized plan we can execute effectively for the people.