Taxes, Tourists, Kias, Socialism and Stuff

For a large society to function properly, long-term, people must be able to earn an income to live on which is independent of the government. Or, conversely, a government must be able to get an income from outside sources other than it's own people.

Government cannot really solve unemployment by simply hiring everyone to work for the government. To avoid stagnation and the eventual gridlock that is pure socialism, there must be an influx of actual "new" capital into the system.

There are two groups of people who are working for the government. First, there are actual workers who go to work each day doing the business of the government. Second are the people who are receiving monthly checks from the government as benefits or help of some kind.

Mostly, a government gets the money to meet these various "payrolls" by (1) making some of it's citizens pay certain taxes, and ALL of it's citizens pay other types of taxes; and (2) by taxing everyone indirectly through the back door by making their money worth less.

We certainly have socialism, to a degree, a large degree, in the United States. That is as it should be, I believe (except I think the proportion is too large right now.) Certainly, some things can only be done by government, and, just as certainly, our more unfortunate brothers and sisters need us to help them get by. We help these fellow citizens by each of us giving some money to the government, and then having the government pass out that money in proportion to need. (Like Karl Marx said.) That's socialism pure and simple, and there is nothing wrong with it unless and until it gets totally out of hand.

Where the danger comes in is when the government tries to take too much upon itself and forgets that "fresh" capital - that which is not simply being recirculated by the government - is necessary for the survival of the system. The second thing that must happen in order for the system to survive is for the government to keep the money supply reasonably finite and not expand it until it is worthless.

What is "fresh" capital? Fresh capital is "outside" capital. It is money a person earns or receives from sources other than the government. And it is money received by governments that they get from sources other than their own citizens - for example by selling natural resources it owns. Examples? When tourists from Japan and Germany visit the U.S. and spend money to eat and sleep and travel and to get into our national parks, that's fresh capital. When Saudi Arabia sells oil to the world that it gets from under it's ground, that's fresh capital for Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia doesn't have to tax its citizens highly (or even at all, probably) because it has this fresh source of income. Saudi Arabia also, one assumes, does not have to make it's money worth less and less every day by "creating" more and more of it on the printing presses. [Incidentally, pure socialism would probably work in Saudi Arabia since the government is making enough money - now, at least - from the outside. Unfortunately a "royal" few are keeping most of it.] When a Canadian farmer sells wheat to some country elsewhere in the world, that's fresh capital for Canada. When China sells plastic toys to the world, that's fresh capital for China. When South Korea sells Kias in the U.S. (as President Obama noted in his recent jobs speech) that's fresh capital for South Korea. I might add that when a country agrees to protect South Korea or Canada so they don't have to pay for the size of army they would normally have to pay for, that is also fresh income for South Korea and Canada (or whatever countries do that.) North Korea could probably cut the size of its military by about 80% and use that money to buy food for its people, and all it would take is for North Korea to start being nice to the rest of the world. There are all kinds of possibilities for "fresh" capital generation. Don't buy U.S. Savings bonds - that's silly to lend yourself money and then pay yourself interest. Invest in British municipal bonds and make Londoners pay you interest instead. See? Fresh, non-governmental, capital for you and me.

Any money you get from sources outside your government is fresh capital. Any money your government gets from sources besides its own citizens is fresh capital. Fresh capital is an object of desire. Fresh capital creates "real" jobs and makes you pay less taxes and makes your money worth something.

In my opinion, one major goal of a government should be to facilitate the influx of fresh (non-tax) income. In my opinion, when the government "borrows" more money and uses that money to hire people (even through private companies) to build bridges and roads, those are fake jobs. They are fake because the workers are getting paid by the government (by proxy) and because the contractors are getting paid by the government (directly.) Good has happened but nothing fresh has really been produced. All this is just another example of the government "churning" tax money.

In order for socialism to work (we have already agreed - at least I've said it - we need some socialism) there must also be some capitalism, some incoming of NEW money. How do we do this? Well, tourism was a good example. Work it more. The government should facilitate tourism more, and it should also encourage private travel companies to aggressively seek out tourists from overseas. Each state has unique attractions. Each state should be working hard to get foreign tourists to come there, not only American tourists. Some already are, of course, but all could probably do more. And food. We need to go back to selling food to the world. We need to stop paving over farmland and start growing crops that other people in other countries want to buy.

And we need to start manufacturing goods for sale again. Somehow we (and most of the rest of the Western World) have got this complex in our heads that cheap is the answer and only China can do that. Well, cheap is NOT the only thing! Innovative quality products are the thing. We can sell farm tractors to the world even if they may be more expensive than China's tractors, if they last longer or if they can do things China's tractors can't do. Inventive countries can always stay ahead of, and beat, copycat countries.

The other night, President Obama made a speech to the nation about how to create jobs. One of the good points he made is that our goal should not be to see who can get to the bottom by making things cheaper than everyone else, but by aspiring to get to the top by making things that are better and and more innovative and thus more valuable to buyers around the world.

The Great War, its affect on Hitler, and it's aftermath

Despite Hitler's often unhappy childhood and his disappointment at not being allowed by his father to attend a school where he could pursue his love of art, I am convinced it was the circumstances during and following WWI which were really to shape Hitler's subsequent path.

Here we should pause to note that Adolf Hitler was an Austrian by birth, not a German. However, even though he wouldn't become a German citizen until 1932, his loyalties, since he was a very young man were always with Germany and against the Austrian monarchy. Except for his birth, Hitler never really identified with Austria or the Austro-Hungarian Empire as it was before WWI.

Another reason that occurs to me for Hitler's lack of love for Austria was simply because his father was such a loyal Austrian civil servant who was also loyal to the Austrian crown. Just a thought. He was rebellious sometimes simply for the pleasure of being rebellious.

Of course, most people who lived along the border considered themselves "Austrian Germans" rather than simply Austrians. But Hitler went further and considered himself German. Period.

For all that, he did spend much of his formative years in Austria, and Vienna was at the time the most anti-semitic city in Europe. Hitler himself said it was there he first became an anti-semite.

The undereducated Hitler had a hard time of it during his time in Vienna. He struggled to support himself as a painter. He copied scenes from postcards and tried to sell them to tourists and Merchants. Ironically he was aided in these efforts by Jewish merchants. He was rejected for a second time by an art school. He ran out of money. 1909 found him living in a homeless shelter, then moved to a workhouse for poor men. He regretted his purposeful failing in school to spite his father; the lack of those courses were the reason he kept getting rejected for art school. They told him he was better suited to be an architect, anyway ("Your painting stinks!" I imagine was the underlying sentiment.) Indeed, Hitler did love architecture, but, again, his lack of the educational basics stopped him cold. Then came war.

In the end, though, Bavaria was Hitler's love and it was Munich, not Vienna, that became his stomping grounds. To underscore (for me) his lack of allegiance to Austria, Hitler refused to serve in the Austrian military when the war broke out, running off to Bavaria instead. Unfortunately for Hitler there was a strong alliance with Austria at the time and the Munich police arrested him. Oddly, he was found unfit for service and was allowed to return to Munich. I say "oddly" because there wasn't anything wrong with him. Unless you count being crazy.

Another coincidence I find striking: the judge who decided Hitler was unfit for military service was the SAME JUDGE who, years later would sentence him to prison for treason.

As soon as he was excused from military service to Austria, when Germany entered the war in August, Hitler petitioned King Ludwig III of Bavaria to enter military service under Bavaria, and his petition was granted. So Hitler went off to war.

Hitler served in France and Belgium in the

16th Bavarian Reserve Regiment. Here he is

(left) with some of his comrades in arms.

(click to enlarge)

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World War One didn't have to happen. That's hardly earthshaking news; I can't think of any other war that had to happen, either. If there were ever a textbook example of entangling foreign military alliances, WWI was that example.

So why DID it happen? Serbia had humbly apologized and groveled sufficiently to the Austrians, even enough to satisfy Austria's ally the German Kaiser. Yes, even the Kaiser thought war would no longer be "necessary." But.

Here I must resist going back even further in history to talk about how the Serbs felt themselves put upon by the hated Turks, and Muslims in general, and vowed to retrieve their beloved Kosovo, lost in the 1300s, but Serbs never forget. More recently they made another attempt to reclaim their stolen territory (in their typically clumsy way) but were again rebuffed when Bill Clinton kept bombing Belgrade. They still haven't forgotten, make no mistake about that. So I won't go back that far in history. Sufficient for you to know that the Serbs had no love for the Ottomans OR the Austrians (who were looking to consolidate their ambitions in the Balkins.)

Bottom line: Austria wanted to attack Serbia. Serbia was a hot bed of bomb-throwing terrorists - trained by their buddy Russia, of course. Terrorism was their only weapon against Austria, really. Not much has changed in the world when the underdog feels oppressed. Anyway, Russia has been Serbia's ally forever. Russia is largely Slav, see? In fact, had Russia not been weakened by the fall of the Soviet Union and pretty disorganized at the time, you can bet Bill Clinton et al would not have been bombing Serbia 20 years ago. Back to WWI and Hitler.

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Sarajevo in June of 1914 was a lovely city, the capital of Bosnia. Generations later, this beauty would be highlighted when the winter olympics were held there, in 1984. Then came another war, and the city became a devastated hell on earth. Then another recovery: life goes on. But in June of 1914, the heir to the Austrian throne paid a diplomatic visit to the beautiful city of Sarajevo. This visit was just too attractive a target for the Russian-trained Serbian terrorists to resist, and so it came to pass three of them were in Bosnia watching the parade in downtown Sarajevo that Sunday.

The terrorists were pretty inept, as terrorists often are. Two of them were supposed to bomb the archduke's carriage but were thwarted when the parade took an unexpected turn. But a 19-year-old devotee to the Serb cause was where he needed to be and blasted away with his gun at the carriage as it passed, killing Franz Ferdinand and his wife.

Suddenly, the old Emperor Franz Josef's prayers were answered and he had his excuse to attack Serbia. Not that he cared that much that his nephew had just been killed. The old man didn't even like his heir-apparent and his commoner wife. Franz Ferdinand had become crown prince only after the Emperor-geezer's own son Rudolf had blown the top of his head off in a suicide pact with his mistress Marie earlier on, and had to wear a bandage turban to his own funeral. But I digress.

So it came to pass that Austria sent Serbia an ultimatum so insulting and so degrading in its terms that no country with any pride could possibly endure to be so insulted. War was inevitable.

But the Serbs agreed! They agreed to all the major terms and only declined a few of the unimportant terms. Surely this was an opening for diplomacy. Even the Kaiser assumed that war was averted.

All of you know what REALLY happened though. Picking on the minor points of the demand that Serbia declined, Austria attacked Serbia anyway, and those tangled European military alliances kicked in to start Armageddon:

Austria attacked Serbia;

Russia declared war on Austria;

Germany declared war on Russia;

France declared war on Germany;

The UK joined France.

Since all major participants had colonies, the conflict soon spread around the world.

The treaty binding Russia, France and the UK was called the Triple Entente. Austria and Germany and Italy (no, I don't know why Italy) and the Ottoman Empire were called the Central Powers. The millions of soon to be dead people of Europe called it a nightmare.

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Next: Hitler's service in WWI. Did mustard gas blindness produce his first epiphany?

Adolf Hitler: Patriot? German Teabagger? Or simply your average monster?

If this gets too long, I will stop and do another post later.

I had intended to do a "time line" post on the space shuttle Columbia in this space, but that can wait until I get riled up again about it.

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There is a debate of sorts going on about Adolf Hitler, between a reader of this blog and myself, but I sincerely hope the debate is joined by other readers with an interest in history after this post; I need some fresh input.

The debate stems from two different interests. My own is mostly my deep interest in history, and her interest MAY stem from an interest in the character development of fictional villains. She can speak for herself. Either way, there is a debate regarding the motivations and circumstances of Adolf Hitler; we speculate on why he turned out like he did. If any of you would like to add to the debate, or mention things I have left out, I hope you will.

For my part, I am trying to put forward and support a theory that Adolf Hitler's rise to power, or his DESIRE to rise to power in Germany, was, originally, at least, more to restore or rescue Germany from its national humiliation from its defeat in World War One, than it was some sort of deranged megalomania or superman complex.

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This is one of those subjects that, when you try to find the root causes of this or that part of his personality, you find yourself having to go further and further back in his history. I wanted to find a starting point later than simply his birth. I would have liked to start at the beginning of WWII and simply say Hitler was a German nationalist who hated Jews, but how can you make statements like that without offering some background? After all, it was trying to come up with the backgrounds that makes a "villain" either merely a bad person or a truly evil person that started this debate in the first place.

I think there are 4 points that need to be considered if we are to understand what underlying forces and beliefs drove Hitler, and I don't think being a big man in the eyes of others had much to do with it. I don't think one can kill 6 million people - and many millions more when you count the people killed in the actual fighting - simply because one is on a power trip, or because he was beaten by his father as a child.

1. German nationalism.

2. Hatred of Jews.

3. His interest in war and things military.

4. How - no matter what his beliefs - could such an insignificant person rise to national power.

A few of the things I am going to assert in my assessment of his beliefs, motivations, and his rise to power come simply from Wikipedia articles, but mostly I relied on biographies and "expert" analyses of historians (there are dozens), both online and in my personal library. My historical facts regarding the earlier events leading up to WWI come from C. L. Sulzberger's magnificent account detailing the end of the imperial era, "The Fall of Eagles."

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I'm going to stop here at the end of my introduction.