I have a grudging respect for Juan Percent. Unlike the majority of strangers who have anonymously faulted my writing Juan has taken part in an honest tit for tat with me. You can find several such chats on the Duluth Reader Pages of my Not Eudora columns.
My last column on Republican Socialists is one such example: Juan’s latest swipe at me was angry and heartfelt. I loved its candor:
JPFriday Apr. 5, 2019
Central planning for a war should be short term, and one would expect that money to be paid back. The central planning the USA has done since FDR has left us 20 Trillion in debt with no way to pay it back. I acknowledge that your generation doesn’t give a shit about leaving your children and grand children an impossible debt load and no way to pay it back (as long as you got yours!)
The boomers have been making terrible decisions since they crawled out. But then your generation has always had a terrible nihilist streak, maybe it’s been your intention to destroy the USA the entire time. As for the rest of us, we can’t afford more short sighted, feel good decisions that will leave us saddled with even more debt and have no guaranteed benefit. Let me ask you this. Why in God’s name should we listen to you?
Maybe we’ll find a technological solution to capture carbon that doesn’t involve the creation of more waste in the form if lithium batteries and whatever other high tech waste the “green” new deal spews out. Is it better to replace baggies with toxic waste?
As I said before, the green new deal has never been about controlling carbon, it’s always been about command and control of the economy. Maybe it’s time to step aside, and take Nancy and Chuck with you. Haven’t the boomers caused enough damage already?
I could ask you to go to the Reader link above to see my reply or the whole preceding dialogue. I’ll save your clicking finger.
This is my reply:
Thank you Juan,
That’s the most honest thing you have ever written. And I agree with you to a shocking degree.
But, being me, I have some quibbles. Baby Boomers own the Republican party and haven’t been shy about boosting those trillions in deficit spending.
As for command and control of a centralized economy. That’s a big consideration. I got a shock years ago in an economy class when Stalin’s command economy was shown to have been vastly more productive than capitalist demand economies. Oh, it had its shortcomings. No consumer goods for one thing and terrible central planning fiascos plus production under the threat of a gun. Look at China today with a massive central command beating the pants off of everybody else.
I recently read that a successful hedge fund manager said that what the world has is a pyramid scheme economy. That perfectly summarizes what I’ve thought for years. We can continue paving over the Earth until there is nothing left to pave over. Humanity needs to prepare for a world where it no longer depends on always getting bigger and bigger until collapse is inevitable. Juan, I have two grandsons who will never know a world like the one I knew existed when I was little.
Your bubble of cynicism may inspire you to lump me with the worst of the Chicken Little greenies but they are not wrong to fret about our future and, based on what you just wrote to me, you evidently agree.
20 years ago I became a part of the anti deficit spending crusade that ironically only democrats acted to bring about. [It was the Concord Coalition and it was 30 years ago] Look at Trump for God’s sake. He only cares about the economy burning bright until he is reelected. That will keep him out of court for another 4 years untill his colestrol finally catches up with him and his kids face the wrath of the people he betrayed..
