Dear Friends,
It seems to me, fundamental imbalances of power can only lead to tyranny, oppression and unreasonable demands. Why? Because of human nature. “People, like animals, all seek their own best interest.” -Carneades. Self interest is only balanced by consequences for actions. Without consequences almost everyone would become a predator. When the weak are silenced the oppressors don’t even know they’re causing pain. Ignorance of the suffering only increases the powerful’s willingness to increase suffering… for their own benefit. This paradigm holds true on the small scale as well as the large. A husband who beats his wife with impunity, will continue to beat her until she dies, a corporation with a captured bureaucracy can get away with anything, and a government unlimited creates Hell on Earth.
Maturity is the ability to recognize the humanity in others, subvert one’s own interests for greater interests, when it makes sense, and put off instant gratification. When someone has all the power in a relationship, there’s no need to learn any of those things. So the powerful never grow up. Even mature people, given out sized power, become as children eventually. Because that’s who and what we are. We can hope to surpass our limited humanity, but to build a system that depends on us not being human for it to work, is stupid as it is absurd. Imbalances of power then create immature people without empathy. Immature people without empathy invested with total power are unlikely to improve the lot of Mankind, it’s far more likely they’ll lower it… and molest children.
Government’s power is supposed to be balanced by constitutional limits. Before constitutionalism was invented, all governments were unlimited. The historic recounting of the total insanity they did proves my point, far better than I could in a single page essay. The recent history of crimes against humanity, like the Armenian genocide, the Holocaust and the Fauci flu, are nothing new. Herodotus gives some fine examples of tyranny in action. Like a deposed Libyan queen, upon returning by force of Egyptian arms, had the breasts cut off every woman in the city as punishment. Unlimited power leads to unlimited atrocities. Now that governments across the west have abandoned constitutional limits on their power, expect the crimes against humanity to increase in scope, nature and sophistication.
Corporate power is supposed to be limited by regulators. I say supposed, because the reality is, corporate regulators are captured by the firms they regulate. The bureaucrat making well over 100k a year, gold plated benefits, and with an 80% retirement, needs that corporate job when he or she retires from public service. The corporation will pay a former regulator six figures the rest of their life, in bribe money. A great deal for the corporation. That’s why insurance like State Farm, is going up 100% this year and if you cut coverage to worthless, the rate increase is a mere 50%. Corporations are unlimited and so act it. How else could Wells Fargo get a billion dollar fine a year from the SEC and no one ever goes to jail? Because corporations are effectively unlimited in their power over the consumer.
The reality is, our system, one where the elite must be saints for it to work, isn’t functional. For the same reason perpetual motion machines don’t work. They operate outside the laws of physics, or in the case of our political system, outside the laws of human nature. No matter how many times an above the law elite pedophile swears on his pinky finger, that he won’t abuse his power, or kids… he will. Unlimited power makes people children, liars and monsters. When the government including police and the courts, can lie without consequence, and we’re held to the truth by the letter of the law, there is a fundamental imbalance of power. In all spheres of life. Those fundamental imbalances of power is a fatal flaw in our systems. A defect we’re obliged to address.
Sincerely,
John Pepin
