Towards A New Definition of Progressive
-- An analysis of what is missing from the program
of the current progressive movement -- in the hope
that, by re-examining the past, we may rise up and
seize the future. [First published in 1993 in the
North Coast Xpress ] posted now, because its still
goin on, Denny --
The United States today is in the throes of severe
institutional crisis. Budget shortfalls at every level
have gutted many necessary social services. Our civic,
county, and state governments must raise property
taxes, excise taxes, fees, and fines.
The federal government also is in hock and has been
running an annual deficit in excess of three hundred
billion dollars. The people also, for the most part,
are mortgaged for life. Meanwhile, millions of
homeless people -- no one knows the actual number --
wander the streets of cities, sleeping in alleys,
doorways and under bridges.
Massive layoffs at domestic plants of General Motors,
IBM, Texas Instruments, Sears, and many other
corporations, impel hundreds of thousands of high
skilled blue and white-collar workers close to the
same fate, while these same corporations shift their
operations to Mexico and other Third World nations. At
the same time, prisons the new "growth industry"
are being built at a phenomenal rate.
Prisons, however, are black holes in space, incredibly
expensive to build and run, and add substantially to
the state and federal debt. Even after jobbing the
prisoners out to work as slave-labor for corporations
(involuntary servitude and highly illegal under the
Constitution), prisons still run in the red. The only
people besides the staff and guards who benefit are
the bond-holding class who own the debt.
What is the problem? We are told that capitalism is
synonymous with democracy. We are told that the system
we live under is "free enterprise" when in fact it is
a form of usury-finance, monopoly capitalism. We are
told that the "free market economy" (read stock
market) is the greatest system ever devised by the
mind of man. We are told that the proof of this is
that communism and socialism have been "proven" to not
work.
Yet the fabric of our society continues to unravel.
The final phase the Reagan phase of the Cold War, an
enormous scam and boondoggle may or may not have
been the straw that broke the back of the Soviet
Union, but it most assuredly bankrupted the American
economy. We are now the greatest debtor nation on
earth.
Where are the Progressives?
In the midst of this fundamental institutional crisis
in capitalism, what is the progressive movement doing
to make this country a better country, this world a
better world? Does the current "progressive movement"
even have an agenda, a plan, or any clue as to what to
do to address the serious systemic flaws in our social
and financial institutions?
In Berkeley, California, the supposedly radical
Berkeley Citizens Action -- a collection of old
Stalinists and fellow-travellers -- which ran the city
for years, was at the vanguard of instituting creative
new ways of exploiting the people in order to raise
moneys for the civic bureaucracy.
Berkeley was one of the first cities in the country to
divide the city into lettered zones which require
mandatory residential parking registration of
vehicles. In order to obtain a designated
letter-sticker to be able to park for more than two
hours in any zone, one must be able to prove residency
in that zone.
Accidental "offenders" under this system must pay an
exorbitant price for being in the wrong place at the
wrong time. Apart from the highly questionable
constitutionality of such devices -- which clearly
infringe on the freedom of the people (especially
those among the homeless who still possess vehicles)
-- this is a very predatory situation, falling hardest
upon the poor, and is just one more sign of the
institutional crisis of capitalism.
Usury is a Form of Class War
Few people realize that the cities, counties, and
states are experiencing their budget shortfalls
precisely because the Federal and state government(s)
under the current system are not allowed to create
fiat moneys (checkbook money, for starters) in the
name of the People.
Instead, they must issue interest-bearing bonds and
borrow "money" from banks. The State, then becomes the
instrument by which the bond-holding class the
owners of the banks extort and oppress the people in
order to receive back their pound of flesh, the
interest on their bonds, payable either in taxes,
fines, fees, levees, or bail.
The contemporary "progressive movement," unlike the
Farmer-Labor movement, and the Progressive Party of
Robert LaFollette in 1924, is not addressing this
fundamental issue. We must get back to the root of the
problem if we are ever to achieve an egalitarian
society and eliminate the systemic means that
perpetuate class oppression. We must learn the basic
realities (not the academic establishment version) of
economics.
It should be apparent that the obvious place to begin,
is with the Federal Reserve Bank, the institution that
functionally oversees the process of creating Money.
This mysterious, mystical Process -- the how of Money
Creation -- was very simply and clearly de-mystified
and explained in a manner that any school kid could
understand in a book by Elsa Peters Morse, a wonderful
woman and a famous Old Leftie who lived for years in
the Richmond District of San Francisco. Her book was
called "The Key to World Peace -- and Plenty" (1960)
Her book is just one more thing that needs to be
found, scanned, digitized, and put on-line.
What Is Money? -- In the words of Elsa Peters Morse :
"Money is defined as the sum total of currency and
demand deposits. Money as such is a social instrument
a basic utility. It is the medium for easily
exchanging goods and services and storing the value of
wealth.
"Therefore, to have a sound economy, money must be
issued, and its value controlled, by the government
for the general welfare of the nation and its people.
Money should not, as now, be issued as debt against
the collateral of private and public wealth by private
business institutions at interest for their private
profits.
"Few people understand how a dollar bill is issued
into circulation as debt. Nor have they been
informed how the billions of dollars of the national
debt are set up on the books of the private banks
under capitalism as a loan to the nation -- at no
financial cost to the banks -- and yet drawing
interest...
"The money of modern capitalist civilization is
created as debt-credit on the books of the
institutions that have the concession of issue. In the
Process, debt is created credit is created, and
checks and paper bills are put into circulation as
money.
"The system of pump-priming the economy through debt,
otherwise known as credit expansion, is technically
called deficit-financing.
"Deficit-financing through government spending or
borrowing by increasing the public debt is now
necessary to subsidize the whole profit-system
economy-the economy of the entire capitalist world...
"The servicing of the public debt, or the paying of
the interest charge (profit to the banks or other bond
holders) on the capitalist nation's state, city, or
country bonds, is reflected in higher and higher tax
rates as the debt load deepens. The injections of
debt-credit money are steadily increasing through the
entire capitalist world.
"All money should be issued directly by the nation
by the government and not run through the books of
the banks as a dole to the bankers and a debt to the
people, thus throttling the overall economy through
the toll of interest in the debt-profit system of
issuing money.
"As long as Capitalism exists, it is obvious the debt
can never be paid off, for then there would be no
money in circulation. And any attempt to reduce it
will bring a corresponding drop in the national
prosperity. To get rid of the debt the people must get
rid of the profit system." - end quote.
The Fed operates beyond public scrutiny and enjoys a
mystical reputation for positively controlling the
American economy. The Fed can and does create and
destroy "credit money" at will. The myth that
"inflation" is caused merely by the overproduction of
printing-press money is a fatal misunderstanding.
At the present time [1993- auth] cash is actually
being gradually taken out of the system. The real
problem is the manipulation, i.e., the periodic
inflation and subsequent restriction of "credit money"
by the Federal Reserve and the banking system as a
whole.
A distinction must be made between "inflation,"
defined as an expansion of cash money in the system,
and "inflation," defined as the artificial creation
and manipulation of "credit money" by banks. The one
is good for the middle-class, the small business
people, and the working poor. The other is good only
for the bankers.
Thirty-five to forty percent of the federal budget
(government agencies "cook the books" and the figures
are highly nebulous) is currently channeled just to
service the interest on the debt. Consider what this
enormous expenditure could do for the nation and the
body politic if it were channeled in other, more
productive directions!
For example, homelessness could be eliminated, and
millions of presently unemployed people could be put
to useful work. The Democratic Party, however, is just
as committed as the Republican Party to the principle
that government spending should return a tidy profit
in interest to the banks and the bond-holding class.
The Progressive Alternative
To really eliminate first the deficit, and then the
debt altogether, the government should cease the
practice of borrowing money at interest from the
private banking system. This was the thrust of the
Farmer-Labor Party platform in the twenties and
thirties, and of Robert LaFollette Sr.'s Progressive
Party of 1924.
To do this, the federal government would have to
purchase back the capital stock of the privately owned
Federal Reserve Bank and cease issuing
interest-bearing bonds, notes, and securities, as
Jerry Voorhis, the radical Congressman from Whittier (
who was Richard Nixon's first prey on his rise to
power) suggested in his wonderful book, "Beyond
Victory," (1944).
The 1932 Farmer-Labor platform began with Article 1,
Section 8, Clause 5 of the U.S. Constitution and
called for legislation to abolish the Federal Reserve
Banking System-private ownership of the currency
system-by repealing the present unconstitutional
banking laws and then placing the currency system in
the hands of federal, state, and local governments, so
that the profits, if any, would accrue to them,
thereby preventing panics, depressions and crises and
private control of money.
That Platform called for non-interest-bearing U.S.
notes to be issued as Fiat money by the government in
the name of the people and for the mints to be opened
to the free coinage of gold and silver. The coins,
however, were not to be stamped in dollar
denominations, but rather according to their weight
and the fineness of the metal (e.g., one ounce, .999
fine), circulating as commodity money alongside the
Fiat paper money.
Historically, former progressives knew these things
and had an agenda to address the issue. In the 1920s,
the entire spectrum of the American left addressed the
issue of nationalizing the Federal Reserve, the
Central Bank, and eliminating usury. Their chief
differences were of a tactical nature.
The Farmer-Labor, Progressive, and Socialist Parties
believed that it could be done through the electoral
process, by the ballot, while the Communist and
Socialist-Labor Parties advocated revolution. Today,
even most of the "revolutionary" elements no longer
address this issue, at least not to a degree
proportionate to its importance.
The process by which the American left was co-opted
and decimated to the point that it abandoned the
struggle to reform the government along the lines of
nationalizing Credit is easily the subject of several
long articles, if not a book.
In a nutshell, the left has had to give up on this
issue because it has become dependent upon money from
the tax-exempt foundations. The problem, however, has
not gone away; it has only increased. The words of the
Minnesota Farmer-labor platform of 1934, which
advocated nationalization of credit and of the Central
Bank, still ring true:
"...the United States has the most wonderful
resources, great factories, machinery of production,
steam power and electric power and the millions of
capable workers and farmers ready and able to produce
food, clothing and shelter in great abundance for all.
"At this time when all of us could live in prosperity
and happiness we find that there are millions of
working men and women in poverty, want, and
degradation and that there are also hundreds of
thousands of farmers, business and professional people
who have become poverty-stricken and bankrupt and
millions of people in all walks of life are compelled
to eat the bread of charity. Palliative measures will
continue to fail.
"Only a complete reorganization of our social
structure into a cooperative commonwealth will bring
economic security and prevent a prolonged period of
further suffering among the people.
"We, therefore, declare that Capitalism has failed and
immediate steps must be taken by the people to abolish
Capitalism in a peaceful and lawful manner, and that a
new sane and just society must be established: a
system where all the natural resources, machinery of
production, transportation and communication shall be
owned by the government and operated democratically
for the benefit of all the people and not for the
benefit of the few."
-- [F-L Platform, 1934]
Unless the current "Progressive" movement moves to
address the issue of money and credit and to present
and advocate genuinely progressive solutions to the
current crisis in capitalism, it will continue to find
itself as a disengaged wheel, spinning in space, and
the American people, the workers and the middle class,
will continue to be easy prey to right-wing
charlatans, demagogues and "friendly fascists.
-- Mark Walter Evans
Writ in 93, and, by cracky, still
true.
What are we going to do?
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