Michael Hoexter

http://www.futurelab.net/company/people/michael_hoexter

• Occupation:  I work in the marketing of energy efficient products and services and renewable energy in California
• Organisation: Freelance

Profile

• I’m a LEED-AP, have a background in psychology (Ph.D. from Michigan) with a focus on linguistics and semiotics, software development and sales.
• My Green Thoughts blog and site, is a place to read about and discuss issues related to clean energy policy, the marketing and selling of greener products and services as well as the technical issues that impact the market.

Passionate about: Seeing both the reasons why people don’t do “the right thing” as well as why they do.

Michael Hoexter

http://www.futurelab.net/tags/Michael-Hoexter

Book Announcement from Danny Harvey: Energy and the New Reality Vols. 1&2

I recently became acquainted with the work of Danny Harvey, Prof. of Geography and a climate scientist at U. Toronto. Over the last few years, Danny has been putting together a large-scale energy plan that might be called a Renewable Electron Economy, to which a portion of this website is devoted. I believe Danny’s work is invaluable because he presents a great deal of detail about a wide range of technological solutions and also links these to climate scenarios.

Read more ...

Politics 2100: Blogging as if the Future Mattered

http://politics2100.wordpress.com/

Today, the debate in Washington about the debt ceiling and budget deficits has been skewed beyond recognition, endangering the viability of government as an effective instrument of popular will.  The intent to cut federal spending in the face of a crisis of demand in the private economy is currently shared by mainstream political actors of both Parties, even though many distinguished economists and enlightened businesspeople see a severe economic downturn ahead if government spending is cut dramatically.  Those few who have an understanding of macroeconomics have been until now effectively shut out of the discussion.  Fragments of real economic concerns are embedded in largely false narratives about the economy and trotted out for the political and economic benefit of established players or added to a chaotic whirl of words that benefits no one.

Official Washington’s alarm about rising public budget deficits is entirely mistimed from the point of view of the welfare of the American people and the stability of the economy; politicians are striving to appear as the most virtuous budget cutter at a time when households are struggling under past debts and can’t afford to buy new goods and services, shrinking the overall economy.   Government spending is, for the economy as a whole, the only way out at this time, even if at a later date this spending will need to be curbed.  On top of deficit mania, is the use of the threat of not raising the debt ceiling by Republicans to demand even more savage cuts to the economic role of government and to the already fragile social safety net.  These deficit terrorists are trying to realize their quixotic, nostalgic dream of a “limited government” society that will start to look more and more like the world of Mad Max or 19^th Century America with grinding depressions every decade or two, vast social inequality, and violent social unrest.

The debt ceiling crisis in Washington has exposed President Obama as an easily manipulated leader of the party that might have stood against the push to cut public spending and tank the economy, i.e. the Democrats.  Obama has attempted to use the debt ceiling debate, in efforts to appear “serious” and “adult” to poorly informed parts of the electorate, to demand a package of both spending cuts and tax increases.  He has wanted to “go big” particularly on spending cuts to show that he is willing to compromise while misrecognizing the intents and the tactics of his Republican opponents.  He has been abdicating his role as a defender of the American public against the depredations of the increasingly deranged Tea Party Right by offering unnecessary concessions and cuts in social spending.  His Administration seems also to be firmly in the pocket of Wall Street as is his Republican opposition, even though at this time Wall Streeters are probably most concerned about the debt ceiling being raised by any means necessary.  Either out of entirely naive idealized notions about compromise or sly, corrupt collusion with the off-kilter goals of his adversaries, Obama has continued to strengthen his Republican opponents by not fighting with them.

Pres. Obama, Tea Party Republicans and Deficit Hawks are, Together, Ripping Up the American Tapestry

http://politics2100.wordpress.com/2011/07/24/americantapestry/

Today, the debate in Washington about the debt ceiling and budget deficits has been skewed beyond recognition, endangering the viability of government as an effective instrument of popular will.  The intent to cut federal spending in the face of a crisis of demand in the private economy is currently shared by mainstream political actors of both Parties, even though many distinguished economists and enlightened businesspeople see a severe economic downturn ahead if government spending is cut dramatically.  Those few who have an understanding of macroeconomics have been until now effectively shut out of the discussion.  Fragments of real economic concerns are embedded in largely false narratives about the economy and trotted out for the political and economic benefit of established players or added to a chaotic whirl of words that benefits no one.

Official Washington’s alarm about rising public budget deficits is entirely mistimed from the point of view of the welfare of the American people and the stability of the economy; politicians are striving to appear as the most virtuous budget cutter at a time when households are struggling under past debts and can’t afford to buy new goods and services, shrinking the overall economy.   Government spending is, for the economy as a whole, the only way out at this time, even if at a later date this spending will need to be curbed.  On top of deficit mania, is the use of the threat of not raising the debt ceiling by Republicans to demand even more savage cuts to the economic role of government and to the already fragile social safety net.  These deficit terrorists are trying to realize their quixotic, nostalgic dream of a “limited government” society that will start to look more and more like the world of Mad Max or 19^th Century America with grinding depressions every decade or two, vast social inequality, and violent social unrest.

The debt ceiling crisis in Washington has exposed President Obama as an easily manipulated leader of the party that might have stood against the push to cut public spending and tank the economy, i.e. the Democrats.  Obama has attempted to use the debt ceiling debate, in efforts to appear “serious” and “adult” to poorly informed parts of the electorate, to demand a package of both spending cuts and tax increases.  He has wanted to “go big” particularly on spending cuts to show that he is willing to compromise while misrecognizing the intents and the tactics of his Republican opponents.  He has been abdicating his role as a defender of the American public against the depredations of the increasingly deranged Tea Party Right by offering unnecessary concessions and cuts in social spending.  His Administration seems also to be firmly in the pocket of Wall Street as is his Republican opposition, even though at this time Wall Streeters are probably most concerned about the debt ceiling being raised by any means necessary.  Either out of entirely naive idealized notions about compromise or sly, corrupt collusion with the off-kilter goals of his adversaries, Obama has continued to strengthen his Republican opponents by not fighting with them.

President Obama has Let the Barbarians In…Now We (or He) are Going to Have to Drive Them Out

http://politics2100.wordpress.com/2011/07/01/barbarians/

Before the advent of a world economic system in the last few centuries, agriculture-based civilizations like the Greek, Roman or Chinese empires often faced attacks from confederations of warrior tribes, like the Mongols, the Huns, Vikings etc.  These “barbarians,” who turned from hunter-gatherer or herder ways of life to plundering each other or neighboring agrarian societies, sometimes were integrated into existing agrarian empires or alternatively broke up or destroyed larger civilizations via successive attacks over periods of decades or centuries.  The award-winning 1990 book and subsequent movie “Barbarians at the Gate” re-popularized the term, in this case as a description for ruthless, ego-driven corporate take-over specialists in the 1980’s.

While there are still plenty of figurative “barbarians” on Wall Street, barbarian also applies as term to the behavior and goals of the current Republican leadership in Congress and in allied “Tea Party” organizations.  The Republicans have laid siege to government over the last 30 years, developing a culture of “barbarian” disregard for the usefulness of government.  Republicans have created a culture in which plundering government for their own sakes and that of their patrons is “OK”, “natural” and normal-seeming.  They have shown little regard for the activities that maintain the wealth of a society as a whole, including paying taxes to pay for public amenities that benefit the entire society.  While some Republicans are rude in their behavior as one would expect of the barbarians of ancient history, not many act in an overtly loutish manner; there is a shrewd strategic element to the chaos that these political barbarians have been creating which should not be underestimated.

President Obama has through the first two years of his Presidency appeared as though he doesn’t realize that he is dealing with people who are operating by a different set of rules, who represent interests that have ruthless disregard for others.  He has acted as though he is not even in a fight with them, that their cooperation is assumed.  Meanwhile his opponents have treated him both openly and also covertly as an enemy to be defeated.  This has given them an advantage because almost all means of combat are open to them, while he has restricted himself and thereby the leadership of the Democratic Party, to the politest and even quite deferential approaches to them.  In terms of game theory, he has shown them that he will never “defect”, while they can choose to cooperate or defect as they would like.   The Republicans’ approach has increased their power rather than diminished it.  He has conceded the high ground to people who, in terms of governing our current society, have little sense for how not to “grind the face of the poor into the dust” and dismember valuable social institutions for the gain of a few economic warlords.

Today, it has been uncovered that right-wing Christian fundamentalist “therapist” Marcus Bachmann, the husband of Republican Presidential candidate, Michele Bachmann, has called gay people “barbarians” that need to be educated and “cured” of their gay impulses.  While I find this use of the term laughable and inaccurate, I believe my use of the term here actually explains something about our political system and how people think about economic and political spoils.  While I am aware of and am comfortable with its pejorative connotations in my application of the word, I cannot control its misapplication by others.

President Obama has Let the Barbarians In…Now We (or He) are Going to Have to Drive Them Out

http://politics2100.wordpress.com/2011/07/01/barbarians/

Before the advent of a world economic system in the last few centuries, agriculture-based civilizations like the Greek, Roman or Chinese empires often faced attacks from confederations of warrior tribes, like the Mongols, the Huns, Vikings etc.  These “barbarians,” who turned from hunter-gatherer or herder ways of life to plundering each other or neighboring agrarian societies, sometimes were integrated into existing agrarian empires or alternatively broke up or destroyed larger civilizations via successive attacks over periods of decades or centuries.  The award-winning 1990 book and subsequent movie “Barbarians at the Gate” re-popularized the term, in this case as a description for ruthless, ego-driven corporate take-over specialists in the 1980’s.

While there are still plenty of figurative “barbarians” on Wall Street, barbarian also applies as term to the behavior and goals of the current Republican leadership in Congress and in allied “Tea Party” organizations.  The Republicans have laid siege to government over the last 30 years, developing a culture of “barbarian” disregard for the usefulness of government.  Republicans have created a culture in which plundering government for their own sakes and that of their patrons is “OK”, “natural” and normal-seeming.  They have shown little regard for the activities that maintain the wealth of a society as a whole, including paying taxes to pay for public amenities that benefit the entire society.  While some Republicans are rude in their behavior as one would expect of the barbarians of ancient history, not many act in an overtly loutish manner; there is a shrewd strategic element to the chaos that these political barbarians have been creating which should not be underestimated.

President Obama has through the first two years of his Presidency appeared as though he doesn’t realize that he is dealing with people who are operating by a different set of rules, who represent interests that have ruthless disregard for others.  He has acted as though he is not even in a fight with them, that their cooperation is assumed.  Meanwhile his opponents have treated him both openly and also covertly as an enemy to be defeated.  This has given them an advantage because almost all means of combat are open to them, while he has restricted himself and thereby the leadership of the Democratic Party, to the politest and even quite deferential approaches to them.  In terms of game theory, he has shown them that he will never “defect”, while they can choose to cooperate or defect as they would like.   The Republicans’ approach has increased their power rather than diminished it.  He has conceded the high ground to people who, in terms of governing our current society, have little sense for how not to “grind the face of the poor into the dust” and dismember valuable social institutions for the gain of a few economic warlords.

Today, it has been uncovered that right-wing Christian fundamentalist “therapist” Marcus Bachmann, the husband of Republican Presidential candidate, Michele Bachmann, has called gay people “barbarians” that need to be educated and “cured” of their gay impulses.  While I find this use of the term laughable and inaccurate, I believe my use of the term here actually explains something about our political system and how people think about economic and political spoils.  While I am aware of and am comfortable with its pejorative connotations in my application of the word, I cannot control its misapplication by others.

resident Obama’s Persistent Strategic Error: Mistaking Inside-the-Beltway Reality for “Real” Reality

http://politics2100.wordpress.com/2011/06/26/politicalreality/

Progressives and others who are concerned about the content of discussion in Washington are now divided on a critical issue:  to what degree should one hold responsible President Obama for errors or failures in the last two years, as well as the strengthening of Republicans after Democrats’ decisive electoral defeats of the GOP in 2006 and 2008?  These divisions depend on how different supporters and former supporters of Obama would answer a number of relevant questions:

1. What would you like to see happen in Washington and in politics more generally?
2. What do you believe is the current and potential power of the American Presidency?  How important is the “bully pulpit” and the President’s influence on popular opinion?
3. How important is “supporting your team” (in the upcoming election) as opposed to holding out for principled policy?
4. Is Obama at heart a progressive or more of a center-right corporatist or neo-liberal (right-wing on economics, left of center on social issues)?   Or is he simply a careerist without strong ideological commitments?
5. Will Obama always concede to his opponents rather than fight?
6. Do major crises in the real world require leaders to overcome their personal inclinations?

Those who tend to have very ambitious hopes for President Obama or feel that the dire situation of the world calls for dramatic and decisive action, are much more inclined to criticize him.  Also those who feel that the Presidential “bully pulpit” is a critical piece of political weaponry feel that he has been a major disappointmentwhile those who feel that the Presidency has limited powers are more appreciative of his performance.  There are some who fear that it will weaken the President if progressives criticize him, pointing out that Republicans band together much better than Democrats.  Others feel that they must continue to point out his shortcomings, in the hope that he changes his policy or his strategy.

My perspective is that Obama and other Democrats need to be held accountable to what I’m calling “real” reality, the economic reality of Main Street, as well as the real physical reality of the earth’s degradation by our own species as home for…our own species.  Obama, as would any President, has had the potential to mobilize the grassroots in favor of his agenda or an agenda that is more favorable to the interests of “Main Street”, but that he has not done so, disempowering himself and the Presidency at a time of justified popular anger.  I believe that severe real world crises force leaders to confront their own personal preferences and limitations; America in 2008 required a new FDR or a President of similar ambition and nerve.  I care about Obama’s “heart of hearts” commitments and personality only insofar as they impact the American people.

I have been trying to locate a way to describe as simply as possible the common thread among Obama’s political mistakes while avoiding making a statement that is a condemnation of his character, his fundamental political principles, or attributes to him a permanent trait that bars improvement in his performance as President.  Given these assumptions that there is no fundamental flaw, I have come up with a formulation that makes sense of many of his major political mistakes so far.

Supply-Side Economics and the Return of “Economic Royalism”

http://politics2100.wordpress.com/2011/06/18/economicroyalism/

The political label “economic royalist” has lived on in current memory via recordings and reading of the speeches of Franklin Delano Roosevelt from the 1930’s.  FDR, drawing on a populist tradition within the Democratic Party, used the label to portray the financial interests and Republicans who opposed the New Deal agenda during the 1930’s as essentially traitors to the intent of the US Constitution and the American dream.  In his speech to the 1936 Democratic National Convention, FDR drew a contrast between the economic powers that opposed him and ordinary small businessmen:

For out of this modern civilization economic royalists carved new dynasties. New kingdoms were built upon concentration of control over material things. Through new uses of corporations, banks and securities, new machinery of industry and agriculture, of labor and capital – all undreamed of by the Fathers – the whole structure of modern life was impressed into this royal service.

There was no place among this royalty for our many thousands of small-businessmen and merchants who sought to make a worthy use of the American system of initiative and profit. They were no more free than the worker or the farmer. Even honest and progressive-minded men of wealth, aware of their obligation to their generation, could never know just where they fitted into this dynastic scheme of things. (complete speech here)

Echoing the language of the American War of Independence 160 years before, Roosevelt implicitly drew an equivalency between New Deal Democrats and American Patriots fighting for independence against the royalist sympathizers, also known as Tories, who sided with the British crown.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1936 in front of Madison Square Garden in New York. Unlike any politician since, Roosevelt was able in no uncertain terms to condemn financial and economic malfeasance while holding out a role for legitimate businesses and businesspeople.

At first glance, the use of the concept or label “economic royalist” today would seem to be a throwback to a time when people knew enough about American history to know what a “royalist” was.  Alternatively, it might sound like an old political debate overheard, with “economic royalist” the equivalent of “scoundrel,” a generic and perhaps outdated derogatory term.  Yet I believe that there is something in the label that goes beyond either nostalgia or finding the most effective way via a put-down to win political sympathy.  We have been experiencing over the last 30 years, a return to “economic royalism” which has led to the intensification of the commitments of its adherents rather than weakened it.

In the last few months, having listened to a number of the speeches and interviews from the extreme Right Republicans, such as Paul Ryan, John Boehner, and Scott Walker that now dominate the Republican Party, it occurred to me that the policy framework that they propose as well as the economic model behind it, consists of treating the wealthy and corporations as economic royalty, with the privileges of kings and queens.  Government should “make way for” the private sector, the “job creators”, and it appears as though these political representatives are happy to function as the courtiers who stand aside for the passage of a class of “higher ups” who will do as they please.  On a human level, there is also something sad and obsequious about the overawed treatment of the wealthy that does not, as it turns out, correspond to their real virtues and talents, or for that matter, the real virtues and talents of any human being.

The Choice: Social Solidarity (and Deficit Spending) or Social Fragmentation

http://politics2100.wordpress.com/2011/05/15/socialsolidarity/

We, and in particular our government officials, are facing a stark choice in the weeks, months and years to come:  either continue investing in a shared American civilization or engage in a ill-thought-out campaign to withdraw our support from such a common society-wide enterprise with a likely catastrophic outcome.  Over the border to the North and across the Atlantic, a muted version of this conflict is being played out though with a somewhat less stark choice between civilization and chaos.  This is not simply an abstract ethical or spiritual crossroads but one that involves dollars and cents.  There is however a connection between the inner moral and cognitive side of this monumental choice and material investments in infrastructure, capital goods. and service provision.

The immediate occasion for this choice are political and cultural conflicts surrounding public and private debt and how we evaluate and handle our current and future debts.  There are threats by Republicans in Congressnot to vote for to raise the debt ceiling of the government, with potential for catastrophic effects for the world economy, while drastic cuts in government programs are demanded.  Republican leaders in Congress have endorsed “the Ryan Plan” that would gut social programs while extending tax cuts for the rich, all in the name of fiscal austerity.  Rep. Ryan’s plan would hardly cut public debt because of its extremely generous tax cuts for the wealthy.

The trend in the last two years is for those on the political Right to make government debt and spending the scapegoat for all that ails the economy and society more generally.  This conveniently distracts the public from the most obvious causes of our current economic woes including the role of large political donors to Republicans and Democrats (primarily the financial industry) in bringing down the economy in 2007-2008.  The current campaign for fiscal austerity is part of the Right’s longer-standing political program to gut social welfare programs, always citing “government spending” as the phantom that haunts our economy and society more generally.   Bond markets, the ultimate “judges” of the solvency of governments, however are showing no diminished appetite for US government debt, even as a crisis in public debt is being declared by these “Very Serious People” among the Republicans, Democrats and in the media.

The real trajectory of public debt and government spending shows that public debt has risen for a host of reasons that are not cited by the critics of spending.  US public debt has gone up because of defense spending initiated in large part by Republican Administrations, and in particular the last Bush Administration. The last few months of the Bush and Obama Administrations have increased deficit spending as a means to compensate for the effects of the financial crash of 2008 which was caused by a huge credit and debt bubble in the private sector.  Our public spending overall is on an upward trajectory because of the incredibly expensive profit-driven medical system that has been built in the United States, as well as increases in medical spending overall due to technological innovation and an aging population.  Making public debt the scapegoat at this moment in time is a deeply irresponsible political move that distracts from a whole host of real factors that both require spending now and also inflate spending now and most importantly in the future.

Deficit spending, and the concomitant public debt it incurs in bond obligations, is a critical tool of the US government, used by almost every Presidential Administration in recent memory, to respond to some perceived or real social or economic need, often when other financial means, such as sufficient tax revenue or private sector initiative or capability, are lacking.   The mania for tax cuts on the Right since the Reagan administration, has forced the federal government to use more deficit spending and to incur more debt, as the government attempts to address both perceived and real needs that no other agency will address.  It then seems to be a very profound irony then that the proponents of fiscal austerity are often exactly those that advocate lowering taxes and government revenue!

Rep. Ryan and the Radical Republican Right are, like Termites, Eating Away at American Civilization

http://politics2100.wordpress.com/2011/05/03/termiteinfestation/

I am not someone who ordinarily compares my fellow human being to insect pests.  However, in using this, for me, extreme metaphor, I want to counteract a trend in the media and among the Democrats, of dignifying the extreme Republican right-wing and their ideas with respectful attention and even praise.  I realize that there are right wing crazies on Fox News who have used far worse labels with far more abandon; with this insect metaphor I may be inviting comparison with these people for whom I have almost nothing but contempt.  I can say in my “defense” that I am stopping short of calling them termites, saying that they are “like” termites; there is hope for them that they could repent of their termite-like ways.

Eaten away from inside...this is not the America we want to live in.

Now to the gist:  Why are Rep. Ryan and the majority of the Republican caucus on Capitol Hill (as well as many Republican state lawmakers such as Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin) “like termites”?   The “termite” label is not simply a put-down but a fairly accurate condensation of what is going on currently in American politics and also, alarmingly, elsewhere.  The Republican “termite” ideology has also inspired “termite-like” actions in Democrats who have seen in this destructive behavior a virtue that is wrong-headed from both an ethical and an economic perspective.

The American economic and social system that during the 20^th Century produced great wealth and success for the nation as a whole and for American individuals was built by a combination of private initiative and government efforts.  It was built, in some respects like a building is built, though it is an enormous, complex and unfinished building that is always in the process of being built or renovated.  Some of the goods and services necessary for that building to continue to be constructed or to even remain standing are supplied by the government.  Other goods and services are provided by a combination of the efforts of private and non-profit actors.  The latter could be called “the market” plus the voluntary sector.

While both parties unfortunately too slavishly serve the interests of their biggest political donors, in particular large corporate interests and the wealthy, there is a still a critical difference between the two parties:  the Republicans are operating within the fiction that much of the work that government has done and does, especially for the domestic economy, is unnecessary.  By contrast, the Democrats attempt to be defenders of the notion that government delivers critical services that keep the “building” of American civilization standing, albeit, for the most part, including the President, they are very weak defenders of this idea.  Lately Democrats have fallen under the sway of Republican ideology that government is optional and a hindrance to the further development of American civilization.

Under current Republican ideology and the intimidating influence it has had on Democrats, government projects like the Hoover Dam are almost inconceivable.

The Republican Right, since Ronald Reagan’s triumph in 1980 has campaigned vigorously to undermine the positive role of government in building and maintaining American society, even as they have sought in private to maintain the benefits of government for their political patrons and some key constituencies.   Decrying government in general, they exempt farmers and farm subsidies, military contractors and, defense spending, and the actual bailing out of their political patrons while decrying the idea of “bailouts”.  While both political parties show some breath-taking duplicity in their political behavior, especially as regards the interests of large donors, the Republicans are almost breathtakingly consistent in the falsity of their politics, which sound populist yet benefit almost exclusively the most privileged.

Inspired by Libertarianism, Republicans and the Tea Party Choose Short-Sighted Greed Over Long-Term Self-Interest

http://politics2100.wordpress.com/2010/10/17/greed/

In this blog, I have been defining the 30 year experiment of the New Right as being largely libertarian with regard to its political appeals, theory of how society works, and attitudes toward government and taxation.  To be fair, I have pointed out that the Republicans’ agenda includes two other potentially conflicting influences, social conservatism and support for an interventionist national security state.  I have chosen libertarianism as the dominant trend of the three in part because it is the most all-inclusive and influential in the area of economic policy and politics.  In this post, I will argue that Republican-libertarian/Tea Party politics and policy are based on short-sighted greed, which is a moral accusation that is extremely obvious yet has not been spoken of as such in the public sphere.

It is surprising that after a monumental economic slump caused in part by Republican pro-greed policy, that the same group committed to short-sighted greed may make substantial electoral gains in November against President Obama and the Democrats.   The Democrats are relatively speaking more committed to our long-term self-interest as a nation, though have made some deeply problematic policy suggestions and political strategy.  They have proposed and passed laws which are cumbersome and sometimes wrong-headed (I’m thinking about the health care bill).  The Democrats have stumbled badly in communicating their intents and commitment to a sustainable American prosperity.  However the Democrats are not so exclusively beholden to irrationality and short-sighted greed as the Republicans who are standing for office or campaigning for re-election.

The substantial imperfections of the Democrats pale in comparison to the callous disregard for the welfare of the American people of the Republican Party, some of whom are now campaigning to return America to the 18^th or 19^th Centuries.  Recently some “Tea Party” candidates have been campaigning against public education.   For their mistakes, the Democrats deserve to have their feet held to the fire but, even more, the Republicans do not deserve to be rewarded for their insanity and sheer stupidity.  Thus electing Democrats and challenging them in 2012 primaries would send the right message (even challenging the President in a primary makes sense) rather than switching over to the Party that brought us to ruin and doesn’t care.  Though the timidity and cluelessness of some Democrats is maddening, they are not as blind and morally bankrupt as their Republican opponents, in a vast majority of cases.

“Augustinian” Theology and the Republican/Libertarian Denial of Society

http://politics2100.wordpress.com/2010/10/12/theology/


n the foregoing posts, I chronicle how libertarian ideology has led the Republican Party astray, misleading the American public about the real problems and solutions for our common challenges.  The resurgence of libertarian ideology started during the late 1970’s and the 1980’s when the post-WWII consensus about how advanced industrial societies should be governed came under question after the Vietnam War, the 1970’s energy crisis, and bouts of inflation.  One of the more important Transatlantic figures in the resurgent right was British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, whose electoral victory in 1979 showed the way for Ronald Reagan’s electoral win in 1980.  As a conservative MP of a new school, Thatcher was a student of the founder of neo-liberalism, Friedrich von Hayek, who attempted to create an economics based almost exclusively upon the action of individuals in the marketplace.  Thatcher’s 1987 statement “that there is no such thing as society..only individuals and families” is an almost programmatic expression of Hayek’s beliefs and economic prescriptions.
While Thatcher apparently tried to back away from this statement in her memoirs, the absurdity of it has not been fully exposed and explored, given that at the time it was uttered, neoliberalism was in the ascendant and has continued to have an inordinate influence over political discourse in all parts of the political spectrum.   Blindness to or denial of society runs throughout the libertarian/neoliberal philosophy; economic policy prescriptions from most political groupings to this day are marked by the avoidance of viewing society as a system or whole.  Though President Obama is nominally from a political tradition that believes in government as an integrative force in society, his utterances in his first years in office have tended to support or be only mildly critical of this ongoing denial of how society and the economy function as a system; he has instituted policies that support social systems in a manner that is, to the say the least, subtle and seems half-hearted.  He and the Democrats are now harvesting the consequences of their neglect of these issues.

Via Libertarianism, Republicans Try to “Off” the Superego

http://politics2100.wordpress.com/2010/10/06/superego/

Freud’s concept of the superego is helpful in understanding what is at stake in the upcoming midterm election and more generally in the American political economy (and in political conflicts in other countries).  Republicans under the influence of libertarianism are attempting to get rid of or weaken our society’s “superego”, our collective conscience, which is often expressed in government laws and regulations.  Democrats are more or less, though often weakly and ambivalently, aligned with and supporting the notion that society needs an “auxiliary external superego” realized in part through government action.  The choice in November is between those who are in some way in touch with moral and social reality and those who are via their professed ideology out of touch with the reality of actually “doing the right thing”..

Egos, Ids, and Superegos

Freud proposed in his later work a theory that has been called the “structural model” of the individual psyche, which is still current in common parlance as a way to describe mental experience and dynamics.  Freud located animalistic drives in the “id” ( das Es = German for “the It”),  Among these drives Freud’s theoretical and clinical focus was on sex and aggression, which were the impulses most troublesome to his neurotic patients; a more inclusive approach than Freud’s would include other drives like thirst, hunger and thermo-regulation.  In any case, the id is supposed to operate according to the pleasure principle, the notion that gratification must be instantaneous, either via the supply of real satisfactions or imaginary ones, as in fantasy.  The “ego” (das Ich = the “I”) contains most of the central executive functions of the personality, including calculative rationality, and abides by the “reality principle”, which understands the difference between wish and the fulfillment of wish, the dream and the external world outside.  The ego endeavors to organize life and the environment so as to fulfill the wishes of the id in a realistic manner.  Our popular use of the word “ego” for “exaggerated self-regard” is not part of the way the term is used by Freud and subsequent psychoanalysts; more recent psychoanalysts have formulate theories that specifically address these narcissistic issues.

The superego (das Ueberich = the “over-I”) is thought to be the internalized mandates of society and significant others in the early life of a child (parents, etc.), the should’s and shouldn’ts of life.  The superego is supposed to enforce taboos and inspire guilt as well as present a picture of the ideal self, alternating rewarding and punishing the ego and id for conformance to ideals or violations of prohibitions.  Someone who is a psychopath or sociopath is supposed to have a weak or non-existent superego; they act to satisfy their own impulses without regard to what society mandates.  While the “superego” sounds like the executive function of the personality it is dependent upon the ego to obey its mandates and work towards its ideals.

While Freud and Freudians after him thought that a complete set of this psychological “furniture” was installed in early life inside individuals, this model of the psyche overlooks the contribution of the environment to actual behavior.  For instance people are much more likely to abide by laws or “do the right thing” if they know that they will be observed or they have continual modeling of good behavior by people they identify with (giving to charity if others give to charity, etc.).  Thus a social environment functions as an “external superego” (most obviously policemen, peer groups, courts, group bylaws and codes of conduct) to supplement the internal superego; psychoanalysts since Freud unfortunately have talked as though such an external help for the superego is the exception rather than the rule.

About Me-michael hoexter

http://www.zimbio.com/Marketing/articles/6y-8YRzp_DT/About+Me+michael+hoexter

My name is Michael Hoexter and I work in the marketing of energy efficient products and services and renewable energy in California.   I’m a LEED-AP, have a background in psychology (Ph.D. from Michigan), software development and sales. My Green Thoughts blog and site, is a place to read about and discuss issues related to clean energy policy, the marketing and selling of greener products and services as well as the technical issues that impact the market.  My commitment is to connect our language and actions to the scientific, technical, and economic realities of saving the climate that has been so good to us, while rebuilding our economy.

Due to the urgency of the climate crisis, I have been focusing mostly on a concept called the “electron economy” which I have renamed the “renewable electron economy”. The long series of posts that I have written on the renewable electron economy have started to yield a picture of what a clean energy economy might look like in the not too distant future.

I have seen both sides of environmental issues having been involved in conventional auto sales as well as in green activism. I bring a perspective to green markets that sees both the reasons why people don’t do “the right thing” as well as why they do. I will be blogging more about these issues in the months to come.

Post your ideas about these subjects on my blog or send me an email at michael dot terraverde AT gmail dot com!