The Zany Czars Continue to Babble

By Robert Ringer

Chairman Obama’s latest appointee to create a media stir is Ron Bloom (affectionately known to his detractors as “Butthead Bloom,” or just “BB” for short). BB is a rather nasty little weasel who sounds pretty much like every other communist czar BHO has appointed. You’ve probably seen the video of his 2008 speech to the sixth annual Distressed Investing Conference in which he said, among other things:

“Generally speaking, we get the joke. We know that the free market is nonsense. We know that the whole point is to game the system, to beat the market, or at least find someone who will pay you a lot of money because they’re convinced that there is a free lunch. We know this is largely about power, that it’s an adults only, no-limit game. We kind of agree with Mao that political power comes largely from the barrel of a gun. And we get it that if you want a friend, you should get a dog.”

Whether BB says incoherent things like this out of ignorance (lack of knowledge), stupidity (lack of intelligence), guilt, or perhaps because his mother took his pacifier away from him prematurely is an unknown. Personally, I’ve grown tired of trying to figure out the psychological problems of every member of the angry, anti-liberty crowd.

But whatever the causes of their mental disorder, we must never forget that their goal is to control our lives — a.k.a. servitude. Which is more than enough reason to pay attention to what they say — no matter how crazy or irrational their statements may be — and be prepared to explain the fallacies of their arguments by employing facts and logic. That said, let’s take a closer look at some of BB’s angry comments.

For starters, he says that “the free market is nonsense.” Sorry, but the reality is that the free market is as pure as new-fallen cash. It is so pure, in fact, that if left to its own devices, it will never fail to mete out just rewards and punishments. The free market can never be wrong, because it is nothing more than a global arena where untold numbers of transactions between consenting adults occur around the clock.

BB makes the same mistake as all Marxist thinkers — confusing the free market with the colluded marketplace where government and big business work together to feather each others’ nests. Herbert Hoover is purported to have said that the only thing wrong with capitalism is capitalists. And he was right. Capitalism is freedom in its purist form. Problems arise only when some capitalists use that freedom to defraud or cheat others.

If BB wants to go after all the politicians and businessmen who intervene in the pure workings of the marketplace, I’m in lockstep with him on that. But, please BB, don’t confuse the free market with the soiled, artificial market brought about by politicians intervening on behalf of companies and special interest groups who repay them with votes and hidden treasure.

Honest entrepreneurs don’t try to “game” the system. Only crooked people do that, and they deserve to be — and often are — criminally prosecuted. Water boarding is too good for those who participate in marketplace aggression and fraud.

But when BB talks about gaming the system, he is not talking about how government and big business are in collusion with one another. He’s talking about people and companies that he believes make too much money — even if they make their money simply by providing people with products and services they actually want.

An even more amazing statement is BB’s assertion that the free market is about free lunches. Huh? Methinks BB has been hitting the Mao-Aid too hard. The free market is about companies earning as much money as possible by providing customers with the best possible products and services. Are companies like Google, Microsoft, and Amazon.com wildly successful because they’ve received “free lunches” — or led anyone to believe that there is such a thing as a free lunch?

The free lunch that most of us are familiar with is the one that results from our perverse tax system. It’s a system that has the top 20 percent of earners paying 91 percent of the income tax, while the bottom half of earners pays less than 3 percent. It is the people who are in this bottom half who are recipients of the free lunch.

Finally, I’m not surprised that BB agrees with Mao that political power comes from the barrel of a gun, given that the use of force is what progressivism/Marxism/communism/statism always get down to. That’s because the use of force is the only way to get people to conform to what those in power deem to be “the common good.”

In a spirit of goodwill, I will go to the trouble of explaining one last thing to comrade BB: Capitalism is not a system. Capitalism is nothing more, and nothing less, than a subcategory of freedom — economic freedom. True capitalism (of the laissez-faire variety) is unfettered and unregulated. People are free to buy and sell what they want to anyone who, without being coerced, is willing to deal with them.

Does that mean that in laissez-faire capitalism anything goes? No. The law of nonaggression always prevails, regardless of what aspect of life is involved. Again, politicians and businessmen who “game” the marketplace should be vigorously prosecuted.

Having said this, the purpose of every business is to make as much money as possible — not by dealing with others “fairly” (which is an abstract word trap), but, rather, without resorting to coercion, fraud, or aggression. Unfortunately, much of the coercion, fraud, and aggression that infests the marketplace — and thus makes it unfree — has its roots in government involvement.

By the way, I agree with BB that if want a friend, you should get a dog. The problem is that I have absolutely no idea what his comment has to do with free-market capitalism. But be patient with me; maybe I’ll eventually figure it out.

_______________________________________

Liberty Education Interview Series

Please encourage your family, friends, and coworkers to listen to the Liberty Education Interview Series. Liberty needs all the support it can get right now.

_______________________________________

To comment on ” The Zany Czars Continue to Babble”, please login below: