Labour camps in Alaska

A message from fervent and loyal blog reader Gary:

“This Alexander Solsjeneetsin of yesterday.
The one who called capitalism ethically bankrupt.
That guy probably a Commie, right?”

Actually, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was opposed to the Communists running the Soviet Union.
So much so that he was arrested for voicing heretical thoughts.
He was interrogated in the prisons of the Soviet secret police and eventually sentenced to hard labour in Siberia.
After he finished his sentence he was condemned to eternal exile in Kazakhstan.
Once Nikita Khrushchev came to power, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, after 12 years of exile, was pardoned and could come back to Moscow.
But even then he continued to have grave conflicts with the Soviet authorities.

Hence, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was not a Communist at all and that makes his criticism of Capitalism more interesting.

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was in favour of what is called “moral socialism”:

“Present the world with a society in which all relationships, principles and laws would be based on morality and on nothing else.
All calculations like,
-how should children be raised?,
-What should they be trained for?,
-Toward what ends should adult labour be directed?
-How should man spend his leisure?
all this should be decided only on the basis of morality.
Scientific research?
Only research that does not inflict harm on morality, and on the morality of the researchers themselves first of all.
Foreign policy too: so that the question of any frontier would be not how much the action enriches us or strengthens us or raise our prestige, but only: how moral would it be?
Also the economy must be build on morality.

Moral socialism will not motivate people to seek happiness.
For that is an idol of the marketplace.
Moral socialism will direct the people toward loving one another.
The wild animal gnawing at his prey is happy, but only humans can love, and this is the highest thing man can achieve”.

There are several aspects of moral socialism in the plans and ideas of Barack Obama.
But he has to fight a society where people are used to the most extreme version of capitalism.
Where it is me, me, me and to hell with the others.

A salesperson selling a mortgage knowing very well the customer will loose the house in a few years, but who gives nevertheless utmost priority to the bonus he will earn, is a capitalist and the opposite of a moral socialist.

In a more ideal society the salesperson will be aware of the tragedy and misery he is about to inflict on the other person if he sells the mortgage and will refrain of it.
However, there are not many salespersons in a capitalist society who consider the well being of the customer much of an issue.
The rule is to make money no matter what.
The rule is to eat or to be eaten.
The rule is to screw or to be screwed.

Obviously, the thing to do is to change the rules.
People are not going to change their attitudes by themselves.
Hence, the Government must present the society with new rules as a transition measure.
Until people have developed properly their morality and stop acting as animals.
Meanwhile, immoral ways of doing business should be very severely punished.
Labour camps for the CEO’s, like there were in Siberia, but now in Alaska.

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To learn more about Aleksander Solzhenitsyn, click on:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksandr_Solzhenitsyn






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Deflate egos: ban Hummers and the like

The following text might sound like a recent conversation:

“Yes, private enterprise is very flexible, but it’s good only within narrow limits.
If private enterprise isn’t held tight in iron claws, it produces beasts: the people of the stock exchanges, who don’t want to accept any restraint on their desires and their greed.
Capitalism was doomed ethically long before it was doomed economically!”

Isn’t it a surprise to learn that this text was written in 1968?
By Aleksander Solzhenitsyn in his book “The cancer ward”.

Recently we have seen how banks and their representatives in the USA have been selling mortgages to customers of who they knew that they would be unable to re-pay it in the longer term.
The banks and their representatives cashing the bonuses and the profits at the short time.
Selling the dirty mortgages fraudulently as low risks to financial institutions worldwide.
Creating the financial mess we are all in now.

Remarkable is that the persons responsible get away with it without any problem.
They are not investigated nor sued.
And the banks have the best of both worlds: they are now bailed out by public money.
They stole from the people and now they get even more money from the people.
Those bank-CEO’s must be in a constant cramp of laughing how dumb the world is and how richer they become.

We are now getting a similar situation with the USA auto industry.
Last week, General Motors posted a $2.5 billion third-quarter loss and ominously said it could run out of money before the end of the year.
Ford reported a $129 million loss but said it burned up $7.7 billion in cash for the period.
The Detroit Three are closer to collapse than ever, and likely won't make it without billions in government loans.

Now, why is that?
While companies elsewhere like BMW in Germany and Toyota in Japan are doing relatively well?

"There's been 30 years of denial," said Noel Tichy, a University of Michigan business professor and author who ran General Electric Co. (GE)'s leadership program from 1985-87 and once worked as a consultant for Ford.
"They did not make themselves competitive.
They didn't deal with the union issues, the cost structures long ago, everything that makes a successful company."

At Ford Motor Co. they called it "Blue," a team set up around the year 2000 to design an array of small, fuel-efficient cars to compete with the Japanese.
It didn't get far because no one could figure out how to make money on low-priced compacts with Ford's high labour costs.

Besides, the automaker was racking up billions in profits by selling pickups and sport utility vehicles.
Times were good and gas was cheap.
The Government helping by putting import restrictions on small fuel-efficient cars from Europe.

"Blue" is only a small blip in automotive history, but it tells a big part of the story about why Detroit automakers are in a mess so critical they could be only months away from bankruptcy.

What are those Detroit CEO’s, who were generously paid over the last years for their mismanagement, screaming now?
The Government has to bail them out.
Expecting now billions of Dollars from Washington to stay alive.

How about nationalizing the American auto industry?
Like some banks were recently in Europe.
Send home those incompetent and greedy CEO’s.
And force the auto industry to make cars that are more making sense.
Small.
Fuel efficient.
Environmentally friendly.
Nobody is served with a Hummer except as to inflate ego.






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A dog on the moon

This week there is this one thought that pushes itself dominantly into the consciousness many times every day.
It is not a thought that is desired or wanted; hence it is like a dominatrix in a dungeon.

Under compulsion currently to have the thought snake into the awareness, the fervent and loyal blog readers may definitely like to know what issue for Christ’s sake is brought up constantly.

It is this: the idea to make a dog walk with a lower drag of gravity.
This is achieved by putting a net around his body with cables going up to a balloon filled with helium.
The net lifts the dog up and this as much as if the animal was walking on the moon.
He will be able to run at tremendous speed and make high jumps.

This is the thought that comes to mind all the time.

We may wonder why this fabulous idea has never been done before.
Not necessarily with dogs only.
Because it could be applied to human beings also.
A parachute filled with a balloon containing helium lifting up slightly the person.
Making a Neil Armstrong of the man.
Or an Amelia Earhart of the woman.

It is OK to have neurotic events happening in the brains.
As long as they deal with solutions for dogs concerning gravity.

But nevertheless we may wonder why this is happening.
These days the book “The cancer ward” by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn is read.
A story in a hospital for cancer patients.
This is why a new thought has come to mind explaining that this invention of having dogs walk like if they were on the moon is the result of a tumour in the brains.
A cancerous growth pushing against a lobe in the brains where original and unique thoughts are produced.

So now the thought of the floating dogs pops up followed by the thought that a tumour is at work.
This is a scaring situation.
Because the idea that a tumour is possibly growing and pushing is no good.
It has to be countered with the new thought that this is an imagination coming from reading a book.

Most fervent and loyal blog readers are able to imagine that this dramatic situation results in a train of thoughts ending any man in an asylum.
The dog in a net with a balloon, a tumour pushing a lobe and labelling anything coming to mind as corrupt.
Call the men in white coats!

We often believe that the mind we have is there to think.
In specific cases this is true.
Like playing a chess game.
But in most other cases it is not true.
The mind tends to want to control.
To lead us into trouble.

The thing to do is to learn not to think.
This is, to allow the mind its way without paying too much attention to it.
And when ideas pop up, the thing is to perform the idea.
To simply do it and the mind has no more reason to bring it back up.

So, today a net will be made around the body of Rocky the dog and a garbage bag will serve as his balloon.
Only thing is, where to find helium?





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