Cultural Relativism

I was reminded of this important concept in a recent Encore class on Somalia.  I first heard this discussed in a Political Science course during my undergraduate studies at Northwestern.  The term simply means that civilization is not an absolute and that one’s ideas are only valid with respect to one’s own culture.  In other words, people of one culture should not attempt to apply their ideas or standards to another culture.

As obvious as this may be, human history is awash with examples where this concept has not been heeded and has led to conflict.  In many cases the result has been that the physically or militarily stronger culture has dominated the weaker one, planting the seeds for long-term resentment and future problems.  The domination of the American Indian culture by the white man is a prime example of this. 

With respect to present day conflicts, one only needs to consider the history of the Middle East and Africa.  In both cases, the seeds of conflict can be traced back to European colonization and especially the carving up of these territories following the two World Wars.

Without going into great detail, European colonial powers were allowed to divide territories and establish governments that they judged would be appropriate for the various regions.  In many cases, such as in Somalia, British, French and Italian interests split up territories without regard to local cultures or traditions.  Invariably this has led to smoldering resentment and can now be identified as a major factor in present day hostilities.

The Europeans were intent on establishing democracies and the U.S. has routinely supported this concept with the notion that every one favors freedom and deserves the kind of democracy we enjoy in this country.  The problem is, this is a prime example of not considering the concept of cultural relativism.  We are so convinced of the absolute virtues of democracy that we are often unable or unwilling to consider or respect different viewpoints held by other cultures.

If we trace the evolution of these other cultures, it’s possible to gain an understanding of how different viewpoints emerge.  For example, in situations where people have lived for many years with the idea of listening to and being led by a strong monarch, they may feel insecure in a setting where they have greater responsibility for determining their own lives.  While such thinking may be difficult for us to understand, our reaction is also a product of our own, quite different, cultural history.

While we place great value on freedom and self determination and feel that these are basic human rights, we need to be mindful that other cultures which have followed a different evolutionary pattern may not yet have developed the same values we treasure so much.  Attempting to prematurely introduce these values  may more often be resented than appreciated. 

Illegal Immigrants Don't Exist!

Let’s stop talking about “illegal immigrants”.  It’s unfortunate that we ever started calling the people who broke the law by breaching our borders, “illegal immigrants”. They are not immigrants in any sense of the word. They are, plain and simple, international criminals.  Illegal border crossing should be dealt with separately from any “true” immigration issues.  To combine these two groups is a serious disservice and insult to those honest people who have respected our laws for immigrating into this country.  The criminals who sneak across the border do not deserve any consideration by our government, our social institutions or our citizens.  Rewarding these criminals will only encourage further law breaking.  Any person who seriously wants to obtain residency and, perhaps, citizenship in this country must first respect our laws.  The strength of our country is based on the “rule of law” and above all else, that has to be protected.

Our government has failed miserably in protecting the citizens of the U.S. from this invading hoard of international criminals.  All of us who are citizens of the U.S. should demand that our government fulfill its one, single-most important, function of defense and secure our borders.  Not until that first step has been taken will it be appropriate to move on to steps 2 and 3 – dealing with the millions who are already in the U.S. after entering illegally and establishing a fair and honest “guest worker” program.  It’s unfortunate that our politicians soon forget the oaths of office they take upon being elected and soon revert to a strategy of winning votes at all costs, even if it means failure to uphold the constitution and the laws of the land.

Economic Malaise

Malaise is defined as an illness or uneasiness whose exact cause is difficult to define.  Few would argue that the U.S. economy is currently in a state of malaise but there is considerable disagreement as to its cause.  In fact most any discussion of the problem, its cause(s) and possible solutions quickly degenerates into the realm of political argument and spin.  Rarely, if ever, and certainly not in the political arena do we ever encounter a rational approach to problem solving such as has been proposed in my book “A Path To The Gold”.  Why has logic not prevailed in addressing such an important issue?

The following are several excerpts from articles pointing out the extent of the problem and how seriously it threatens the futures of all of us.

    “Long-term unemployment could potentially create even longer-term problems for the nation's budget deficit and the quality of the U.S. workforce. With more than 6.1 million workers reporting that they've been unemployed for more than 26 weeks, the long-term unemployed represent 40.9% of the 14.8 million unemployed workers in March, one of the highest levels ever. The average duration of unemployment for this group is now 29.7 weeks -- nearly seven months.” - Daily Finance (3/12/10)

    “The National Debt is $13.2 Trillion! ! US. Treasury Department report to Congress: U.S debt to rise to $19.6 trillion by 2015.”

--- "Deficit" vs. "Debt"---

“Suppose you want to spend more money this month than your income. This situation is called a "budget deficit". So you borrow (ie; use your credit card). The amount you borrowed (and now owe) is called your debt. You have to pay interest on your debt. If next month you don't have enough money to cover your spending (another deficit), you must borrow some more, and you'll still have to pay the interest on the loan. If you have a deficit every month, you keep borrowing and your debt grows. Soon the interest payment on your loan is bigger than any other item in your budget. Eventually, all you can do is pay the interest payment, and you don't have any money left over for anything else. This situation is known as bankruptcy.

Each year since 1969, Congress has spent more money than its income. The Treasury Department has to borrow money to meet Congress's appropriations.

We pay interest* on that huge debt. And now the Treasury is having trouble finding lenders!

  
    “With the US trapped in depression, this really is starting to feel like 1932
The US workforce shrank by 652,000 in June, one of the sharpest contractions ever. The rate of hourly earnings fell 0.1pc. Wages are flirting with deflation.”

 "The economy is still in the gravitational pull of the Great Recession," said Robert Reich, former US labour secretary. "All the booster rockets for getting us beyond it are failing."

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard: Comment

"Home sales are down. Retail sales are down. Factory orders in May suffered their biggest tumble since March of last year. So what are we doing about it? Less than nothing," he said.

California is tightening faster than Greece. State workers have seen a 14pc fall in earnings this year due to forced furloughs. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is cutting pay for 200,000 state workers to the minimum wage of $7.25 an hour to cover his $19bn (£15bn) deficit.

Can Illinois be far behind? The state has a deficit of $12bn and is $5bn in arrears to schools, nursing homes, child care centres, and prisons. "It is getting worse every single day," said state comptroller Daniel Hynes. "We are not paying bills for absolutely essential services. That is obscene."

Roughly a million Americans have dropped out of the jobs market altogether over the past two months. That is the only reason why the headline unemployment rate is not exploding to a post-war high.

Let us be honest. The US is still trapped in depression a full 18 months into zero interest rates, quantitative easing (QE), and fiscal stimulus that has pushed the budget deficit above 10pc of GDP.

The share of the US working-age population with jobs in June actually fell from 58.7pc to 58.5pc. This is the real stress indicator. The ratio was 63pc three years ago. Eight million jobs have been lost.

The average time needed to find a job has risen to a record 35.2 weeks. Nothing like this has been seen before in the post-war era. Jeff Weniger, of Harris Private Bank, said this compares with a peak of 21.2 weeks in the Volcker recession of the early 1980s.

"Legions of individuals have been left with stale skills, and little prospect of finding meaningful work, and benefits that are being exhausted. By our math the crop of people who are unemployed but not receiving a check amounts to 9.2m."

Republicans on Capitol Hill are filibustering a bill to extend the dole for up to 1.2m jobless facing an imminent cut-off. Dean Heller from Nevada called them "hobos". This really is starting to feel like 1932.

Washington's fiscal stimulus is draining away. It peaked in the first quarter, yet even then the economy eked out a growth rate of just 2.7pc. This compares with 5.1pc, 9.3pc, 8.1pc and 8.5pc in the four quarters coming off recession in the early 1980s.

The housing market is already crumbling as government props are pulled away. The expiry of homebuyers' tax credit led to a 30pc fall in the number of buyers signing contracts in May. "It is cataclysmic," said David Bloom from HSBC.

Federal tax rises are automatically baked into the pie. The Congressional Budget Office said fiscal policy will swing from
a net +2pc of GDP to -2pc by late 2011. The states and counties may have to cut as much as $180bn.

Investors are starting to chew over the awful possibility that America's recovery will stall just as Asia hits the buffers. China's manufacturing index has been falling since January, with a downward lurch in June to 50.4, just above the break-even line of 50. Momentum seems to be flagging everywhere, whether in Australian building permits, Turkish exports, or Japanese industrial output.

On Friday, Jacques Cailloux from RBS put out a "double-dip alert" for Europe. "The risk is rising fast. Absent an effective policy intervention to tackle the debt crisis on the periphery over coming months, the European economy will double dip in 2011," he said.

It is obvious what that policy should be for Europe, America, and Japan. If budgets are to shrink in an orderly fashion over several years – as they must, to avoid sovereign debt spirals – then central banks will have to cushion the blow keeping monetary policy ultra-loose for as long it takes.

The Fed is already eyeing the printing press again. "It's appropriate to think about what we would do under a deflationary scenario," said Dennis Lockhart for the Atlanta Fed. His colleague Kevin Warsh said the pros and cons of purchasing more bonds should be subject to "strict scrutiny", a comment I took as confirmation that the Fed Board is arguing internally about QE2.

Perhaps naively, I still think central banks have the tools to head off disaster. The question is whether they will do so fast enough, or even whether they wish to resist the chorus of 1930s liquidation taking charge of the debate. Last week the Bank for International Settlements called for combined fiscal and monetary tightening, lending its great authority to the forces of debt-deflation and mass unemployment. If even the BIS has lost the plot, God help us.” -   UK Telegraph 7/4/10


Clearly the massive, trillion dollar, federal stimulus plan has been a colossal failure.  Why?  Because, it is beyond the capability of government to deal with problem solving in a rational way.  They fail at the very initial step of rational problem solving, i.e., setting clear and honest goals.  Unfortunately, as I described in the book “A Path To The Gold”, hidden agendas dominate and the result is massive spending on a disjointed collection of “pork”.  The bottom line is that U.S. taxpayers have seen $1 trillion of their hard earned money wasted and we still have the problems described above.