An idea can fail

1. At conception stage (think)

2. At implementation stage (act)

It's unclear to me at which stage socialism fails.

Prussia?

I'm curious to know more about your views. Do you publish anything on this subject? Can you suggest any readings that support or elaborate more on your statements? — neomac

I hate it when I make mistakes like that. Obviously, I meant "Persia" when I wrote "Prussia" and was speaking of the Persian invasion of the Greeks. :grimace:

For years I tried to write a book and I have given up. I have put information into forums and gotten such a negative reaction it seems that my effort is futile. Your response is very surprising!

The notion of Prussian military bureaucracy being applied to citizens may have come from Charles Sarolea's 1912 book "The Anglo-German Problem". Little pieces of information come from different books and my memory is not precise. However, when it comes to understanding the Military-Industrial Complex I think Charles Sarolea's book is the best and it is free online. He uses Prussian quotes that make you feel like a fly on the wall when big decisions were being made. I hate the violence of war, but the strategy of war is thrilling! War strategy and technology go hand and hand and often have dramatic social ramifications. In modern times, the connection between war and technology has great economic ramifications. The internet is the result of government military research and then the genius of men who saw the potential of this technology and how to create a new reality.

A main source of information is an old college text "Public Administration and Public Affairs" by Nicholas Henry. That one confirms the US adopted the German bureaucratic model and explains why that was necessary. The bureaucratic organization we had was extremely inefficient and something like a national pension plan would be impossible without improving the technology of the system we had.

Very important to understanding how Roosevelt and Hoover worked together to radically change the US federal government is the book "Big Government" by Frank Gervasi.

Then we go from those books to the ones that warn the US could be moving in a dangerous direction because of wartime government contracts and those who had those contracts and wanted to keep them. These books were written at the end of WWII. The US demobilized after every war until the Korean war. That is when Eisenhower embedded the Military-Industrial Complex in the US. Part of the reason for doing that was keeping our economy strong. Instead of shutting down the war industry and ending jobs, we repurposed their mission and kept them going.

I lost my best source of information about what Eisenhower did to embed the MIC when the U of O document library decided to digitize the books and removed the books from the shelf! This should be considered a crime against society! Now, none of that information can be accessed without knowing the precise title of what one is looking for. In the past, a person could spend all day looking through the books, made when history was made, and discover unexpected things, like Eisenhower's letter to Germany praising Germany for their contribution to democracy. Or what Eisenhower did to create new links between government and research and new links between government and the media. Setting us up for the insanity we have today and making it possible for Reagan and Bush Jr. to misuse their power to lie to us and use our military might in ways it should not be used. Without access to those books, I can no longer validate what I read.

Those links Eisenhower made, along with the 1958 National Defense Education Act, have serious social, economic, and political ramifications. But then it may be interesting to study the changes Roosevelt and Hoover made more carefully along with having a better understanding of the changes Eisenhower made. Most of us do not pay attention to the political matters that need our attention. Like people have accepted global warming and as not that unusual, we seem to think our government was always as it is today. Unless we are discussing this stuff, the reading can be too boring to interest anyone. It is pretty dry. :brow: But hey, history is dead, this is a new day and our technology has made us so superior we do not need to look back. :worry:

An idea can fail

1. At conception stage (think)

2. At implementation stage (act)

It's unclear to me at which stage socialism fails. — Agent Smith

When the masses are clueless, as they are, democracy is only an illusion.

In another thread, Weber was mentioned so I pulled out a book of Weber Selections and he may have been a genius, but re-reading what he said, it is alarmingly mechanical. A quick scan impresses me as soulless. I may be wrong and I am inviting other opinions.

When the masses are clueless, as they are, democracy is only an illusion — Athena

:clap: :clap:

@Athena

Thanks a lot for your feedback and the references!

> I lost my best source of information about what Eisenhower did to embed the MIC

Isn't Eisenhower also the one who warned the US about the danger of the MIC?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gg-jvHynP9Y

Isn't Eisenhower also the one who warned the US about the danger of the MIC? — neomac

Isn't Eisenhower also the one who warned the US about the danger of the MIC? — neomac

Yes, he was and he knew what he was talking about. I was going through the books that contained the government documents for every year, because I wanted to know more about the National Defense Education Act. After I found the information I wanted, I skimmed through the books to see what else might be interesting. That is how I found the information about new connections between government and research and government and education.

Years later I checked the abstracts for information about the recession that started in 1974 because of OPEC embargoed oil to the US. I noticed all research on poverty disappeared from the abstracts and in its place was research on welfare fraud. (controlled research for a purpose) About a year after the research change the news was talking about welfare fraud as much it takes about covid today (manipulation of the media). Germany never did better. It is what the Germans did when they wanted money for war. Control information to manipulate the public.

This research pitted the public against those bums on welfare and domestic budgets were slashed. Some states discontinued welfare to two-parent families when there were no jobs because of the recession. Forcing men to abandon their families so their families could get help. This created a huge family problem that is still with us today and then Reagan poured money into military spending.

Some of that money is what made Saddam strong because we were bribing oil producers to sell us oil cheap. We had the navy stationed in the Mediterranean Sea, making it clear one way or another we were going to take oil. The recession was caused by OPEC embargoing oil, making just about everything Reagon said about us not needing to conserve, and the poor being lazy bums, a lie. There was a huge shift in wealth and power during the Reagan years.

What I have said is directly related to the dispute about socialism and also concern about families.

@Athena

Thanks a lot for the additional information! I think that your manifest passion and knowledge could be better shared on a dedicated blog where to collect your forum posts, thoughts and findings on these topics. This would certainly let others better explore/assess/popularize your views. If you already did, I'd definitely like to have the link because I've been always fascinated by the subject "family", maybe more from an anthropological and sociological point of view, than from a political or moral point of view, but that's why I also see your approach as complementary.

I watched a video about education last night that explains what is wrong the government attempting to control education. Good mothers and teachers of the past are focused on helping children self-actualize. Fathers are apt to set expectations and expect the young to meet those expectations. Now the teachers in the US no longer have control of their classrooms but are being controlled. The past may have had faults but child care was pretty much left to the mother as teaching children was left to the teacher, not policymakers. I want to share the video and what is wrong with the present male domination and control of education. That is education for the Military-Industrial complex instead of education for well-rounded individual growth.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wX78iKhInsc