Category: Books

The Investment Bankers, Energy Industry Execs and Politicians have always marched in lock step.  These days the “old guard” is fighting the “new guard” and while it is obvious to many that the “new guard” is winning, the old guard is going through a “fight to the death” thingy.  In a recent interview between Ezra Klein the CEO of Stripes, Patrick Collison, stated that the US Election was kind of a Primal Scream for the old guard.

It is unfortunate the older infrastructure companies are fighting innovation so much, despite the fact that it and always has been the best way to strengthen a society.  It doesn’t have to be that way.  But old men, especially old men who grew up wealthy and thought they would always be in charge, be the captain of their ship, their city, their country and yes, the world, they just have a hard time understanding that the Industrial Era is over.  Kaputt. Finished.  So to say. The factories and the financiers that brought their grandfathers such amazing wealth, so much wealth that they are still spending that money today, have been moved to countries that have a more affordable life style to allow people to “live off” menial labor.

Neither Change nor Letting Go is easy

All the posturing will not change the fact that this change from manual labor to robots guided by computers with fabulous microchips and brilliant software has happened.  Anger about it will not roll back time.  The old men who used their daddy’s and granddaddy’s money, which sometimes was earned by bankrolling energy deals to fund the enemy during wars, like the Scaife Mellon Money, or building Factories for Hitler like the Koch Brothers are not willing to bend their will to meet the needs of the middle classes nor the environment. Full Article

Despite dubious histories, some people adapted and learned, like young Ford.  His granddad helped Hitler set up car manufacturing in Germany, but he decided to work with the American people and for the people.  Ford was the only America Automaker firm that didn’t really need to be bailed out by the Obama administration.  Full Article

Corporate Social Responsibility is in and it is good for business

Apple, Google and Microsoft are part of the top 10 global firms and they are in the top 15 of Corporate Social Responsibility ranking as per Forbes.  Why is it that companies that have a higher level of Corporate Social Responsibility grow faster and better than companies in older industries where they lost the entrepreneurial spirit decline?

Psychological Mindset of the Wealthy

Why are the children of these very wealthy people so intent on damaging society by pushing their personal philosophies on them? The Scaife, DeVos, Koch Brothers?  Is it because they have low self-esteem?  Do they not feel loved by their fathers or mothers?   Most likely that is indeed the cause according to a detailed article written by Suniya Luthar, of Columbia University, published in the PMC :

Children of affluence are generally presumed to be at low risk. However, recent studies have suggested problems in several domains—notably, substance use, anxiety, and depression—and 2 sets of potential causes: pressures to achieve and isolation from parents. Recognizing the limited awareness of these issues, the objectives in this paper are to collate evidence on the nature of problems among the wealthy and their likely causes. The first half of the paper is focused on disturbances among affluent children and the second half is focused on characteristics of their families and neighborhoods. Widespread negative sentiments toward the rich are then discussed, and the paper concludes with suggestions for future work with families at the upper end of the socioeconomic spectrum. PMC

Maybe they are trying to make up for their guilt on how their parents obtain their staggering wealth and are trying to make it okay by vehemently agreeing that they are inspired by god, thinking that only they are meant to have access to the tree of knowledge, and only they have a right to decide who lives or dies. Just like their grand parents.

Superpowers need Bankers, Oil Barons and Industrialists

Christopher Higham, a British Author of History book, explained in Trading with the Enemy:

"Here is the extraordinary true story of the American businessmen and government officials who dealt with the Nazis for profit or through conviction throughout the Second World War: Ford. Standard Oil, Chase Bank and members of the State Department were among those who shared in the spoils. Meticulously documented and dispassionately told, this is an alarming story. At its centre is 'The Fraternity', an influential international group associated with the Rockefeller or Morgan banks and linked by the ideology of Business as Usual.

Higham starts with an account of the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland - a Nazi-controlled bank presided over by an American, Thomas H. McKittrick, even in 1944. While Americans were dying in the war, McKittrick sat down with his German, Japanese, Italian, British and American executive staff to discuss the gold bars that had been sent to the Bank earlier that year by the Nazi government for use by its leaders after the war. This was gold that had been looted from the banks of Austria, Belgium, and Czechoslovakia or melted down from teeth fillings, eyeglass frames, and wedding rings of millions of murdered Jews.

In the Past Oil-based fuels determined who ruled the sky and who could be a Superpower

As a highly developed industrial state, Germany was dependent even in peacetime on external sources for an adequate supply of oil. Even though Germany’s 1938 oil consumption of little more than 44 million barrels was considerably less than Great Britain’s 76 million barrels, Russia’s 183 million barrels, and the one billion barrels used by the United States, in wartime Germany’s needs for an adequate supply of liquid fuel would be absolutely essential for successful military operations on the ground and, even more so, in the air. For Germany, it was precisely the outbreak of the war in 1939 and the concurrent termination of overseas imports that most endangered its ability to conduct mobile warfare. Full Article

The Koch Empire

In the past old industrialists who ruled with wealth and provided access to large amount of money were in charge.  The onset of the digital age changed that power and clearly infuriated the old guard.

In 2004 the Koch Brothers founded and funded Americans for Prosperity, a right-wing political advocacy group and by 2009 it become a political powerhouse which funded and launched the Tea Party.  The brothers have a very strong and ideological commitment to world domination.  Their father was in construction and built a major oil refinery in Nazi Germany which was approved by directly Adolf Hitler in person.  While the Koch Brothers make a half-hearted attempt to deny this, there is a rather detailed book by Jane Meyer Dark Money.  And Hitler himself wanted to try Mellon Bank for Treason for going back on some of their promises toward the end of the war. Ironically it was one of the Mellons who negotiated a deal with the Allies that American Companies should not loose all their assets in Germany, but instead Germany should be bailed out.  Clearly this banker had a lot of pull with the US, UK and French governments.

Their new effort to “take over the world” perhaps rooted in the principles with which they were raised by their successful and highly disciplined father have prepared them.  According to the Center for Public Integrity, Americans for Prosperity spent a $122 million as it unsuccessfully attempted to defeat President Barack Obama and congressional Democrats in 2012.  $83 million was spent on communications, ads, and media.  Clearly the Koch Brothers commitment to spend money to influence Americans has rapidly increased since their humble beginnings in 2004.

In a Mother Jones article we find that the Koch Brothers’ meddling with the US Government, Education, the Election, Health Care has grown to an over $400 Million dollar endeavor.

While bankers, corporations and politicians are necessarily tied with each other, it will be a good idea for us to watch carefully, regularly and attentively who is meddling in unison.   Trump’s appointment of the CEO of Exxon, Betsy DeVos, the wife of Eric Prince, to the Department of Education, the appointment of an admitted Neo Nazi, Steve Bannon, combined with Michael Flynn’s relationship with Putin is of grave concern.

In the end this effort to overthrow the democracy will not work since the new economy and the American people are going to deal with this challenge successfully. No one will succeed in selling America out to the Russians, Chinese or any other aspiring super power.