Dear Friends,
It seems to me, how can the government hold me to my word when they publicly don’t hold our highest office holders to theirs?
Everyone knows the example of Clinton and Lewinski. Regardless of what was lied about the fact is there was a lie said under oath and it was publicly known. More importantly the negative consequences amounted to a slap on the wrist. So if the President of the United States can lie under oath and have no real consequences then why should other far less important people bend the truth to serve their self interest?
In Vermont a Judge was caught with 35 marijuana plants and 2LBS of processed marijuana. The judge served no jail time, paid no fine, instead got diversion. Less then a year later 2 college students were caught with 2LBS of processed marijuana and the book was thrown at them. The Prosecutor made the statement that an example would be made of them.
Tim Giethner who is in charge of US Treasury was caught not paying income taxes. To the tune of not reporting over 100K dollars. No negative consequences were deemed appropriate. He simply paid the back taxes. No other years were looked into. Charlie Rangel is accused of not reporting hundreds of thousands of dollars over decades. Lets sit back and see what negative consequences are levied against one of the most powerful men in the Congress.
Today the government is hiring thousands of IRS agents to look into your income tax records. They want to make sure you are not chiseling a few dollars here or there. If a discrepancy is found you will be punished, fined and punitive interest levied.
We can clearly see from these very few examples the tip of a much larger iceberg in society. That is the Elite need a peaceful society to enjoy their power in. But they themselves want to live as Thrasymachus claimed. They don’t want to live to the laws they seek to force the rest of society to live up to. So with this fundamental tension going on they must resort to ever more punitive measures to keep the populace in line.
Right out of Confucius. He pointed out this very problem 2500 years ago. But being Confucius he also pointed out the cause and the solution. Ancient Chinese Philosophers were all about causality and the chain of causality.
Confucius pointed out that Dukes and Barons in his day lived by rapine and averous. They lusted and fulfilled those lusts. Yet detested their very own actions when they saw them in others. As did Tonnies. They were and are hypocrites. But that hypocrisy is not lost on the population.
When the people see their leaders lusting after money, luxury and sex they naturally lust after these things themselves. But when all people behave as Dukes and Barons who have no respect for the persons, property or family of others societal advantages break down and society collapses. There is no longer a stable society for the Elite to enjoy their power and wealth.
So the Elite must resort to some means to keep the population virtuous. The answer is always in increasing punitive measures. In fact I believe there is a correlation to the level of punishment meted out in society for infractions to the level of corruption in the upper ranks of that society.
Confucius answer too this intractable problem was as elegant as it was simple. Eliminate the fundamental tension. That is to force the Dukes and Barons to be as virtuous as they need the population to be.
Simple, elegant and next to impossible to do…
