Economics and Timeline: Character Deficit

Dinner Topics for Tuesday: Economics without Character

 

 “It’s the Economy, Stupid.” The now-trite phrase from the Clinton Era still doesn’t answer some nagging questions. Exactly what is “stupid”? And, is the economy only about money?

 

The answer to the multi-trillion dollar question of what is “stupid” is obvious. But what happens when the economy is only about money? 

History gives us many examples, for which there is room here to give a few.

1789

Unlike the American Revolution, which was about liberty, the French revolution, put simply, was about vengeance of poverty against wealth. Certainly, not all the “noble” class had noble character. On the other hand, a small but sufficient number of the peasant class possessed so little good character that they became mass murderers. The result was the death of thousands of innocent people, including children, and destruction of a huge portion of the French culture. Why? For money.

1939-45

In addition to the obviously racially and politically motivated Holocaust, Hitler and his regime had thousands of elderly people and birth-defective babies murdered. Why? The State did not want to allocate necessary money to keep them alive.

Christmas Eve, 2009

President Obama's administration, together with a spineless Congress forced the first phases of Obamacare into law, using un-Constitutional means. Why? Money, and power. The result: destruction of the Constitution and people’s liberty.

March 7, 2011

Dr. Daphne Austin, British socialist health care official, said that 23-week premature babies should be left to die. Why? “We’re spending an awful lot of money on treatments” for them. (Blaze.com)

March, 2011

Madison, Wisconsin. Governor Scott Walker, manifesting the restraint of frugal character, tried to increase responsibility in the management of his state’s budget. Some of the changes affected unionized public-sector jobs, only to place some features on a more equal scale with those jobs in the private sector, held by taxpayers. Union mobs, surely not representing all union members, issued death threats, verbal abuse, and injury to persons who disagreed with them, and stormed the state capitol, leaving a wake of filth, trash, and destruction costing millions of dollars to repair or clean up. Why? Money, and greed.

What is the missing factor in each of the above economic “equations?” Character. The list of examples would fill volumes. It is an unalterable lesson of history: a national economy without character ends in destruction.

Copyright © 2011 by C.A. Davidson

American Revolution: Compare to French Revolution

Tale of Two Nations

World History: Compare American Revolution and French Revolution

Dinner Topics for Independence Day

The Americans went on to create a Constitution that is a model of liberty for the rest of the world. This Constitution provides maximum freedom, limited power in the national government, and the majority of the power to the states and people. The success of the nation has been in proportion to the degree of fiscal responsibility and law-abiding character manifest by the elected government officials. 

Charles Dickens’ powerful novel, A Tale of Two Cities, is set during the French Revolution, involving characters in the cities of London and Paris. This moving tale gives one pause to consider a tale of two nations—the differences between the French Revolution and the American Revolution.

Only a few years before the French Revolution, colonial America had rebelled, not against poverty, but against the increasingly tyrannical rule of the British. In America, it was men of property and education, not the poor, who rebelled. For liberty, they invested their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor. Ironically, it was the French nobility who stepped in with naval support and saved the American Revolution from the brink of failure. 

The purpose of the American Revolution was to change the ruling laws, not to kill the king. Many colonists, including Benjamin Franklin, had close ties with England. Franklin was the leader in trying all possible avenues of diplomacy; revolution was the last resort. George Washington scrupulously avoided abusing military power by consistently deferring to the directives of the civilian government, and he always put the needs of his men before his own. He refused to be king. Noble of character he was; greedy and power-hungry he was not. American leaders did all they could to avoid anarchy. They sought the help of God in their endeavor, and received miraculous help when it was needed.

The French Revolution, on the other hand, appears to have been driven by vengeance and hatred. Without a doubt, terrible injustices existed, as vividly depicted by Dickens and in Victor Hugo’s magnificent novel, Les Miserables. The French peasants were at a great disadvantage, because their poverty seemed insurmountable, and they lacked education and money; therefore they had no power to exercise influence on their oppressors. It is unfortunate that they resorted to terror. The mass murder of innocents resembled the ethnic cleansing of evil regimes in the twentieth century. The mindless killing thoroughly disqualified them from any divine assistance. By killing the upper class, and their families, and their servants, and anyone remotely related, they also purged the society of education, law, culture, and other refinements necessary to civilized society.  Only anarchy resulted from their efforts. The old oppressors were merely replaced by a new tyrannical regime, more brutal than ever. It was bad enough that some even looked to figures like Napoleon to save them, but that really didn’t work well, either.

The Americans went on to create a Constitution that is a model of liberty for the rest of the world. This Constitution provides maximum freedom, limited power in the national government, and the majority of the power to the states and people. The success of the nation has been in proportion to the degree of fiscal responsibility and law-abiding character manifest by the elected government officials. Because America was free, she became prosperous. Like many other European countries, France learned the best governing principles from the United States Constitution, only after long years of struggle.

Copyright 2011 © by Christine Davidson