[Vision2020] More on 'Hollow men'

[Tom Hansen]

Courtesy of Wednesday's (January 11, 2012) Moscow-Pullman Daily News with thanks to Dr. "Ghazi" Ghazanfar.

-----------------------------
More on 'Hollow men'

Posted: Wednesday, January 11, 2012 12:00 am

Inspired by Doug Hughes' letter to the editor ("Hollow men," Daily News, Jan. 4), I am reminded of my own University of Idaho office-door signs.

Here is one from Adam Smith, the father of capitalism. "What is the end of avarice and ambition, of the pursuit of wealth, of power, and pre-eminence?" Answer: "All the grubby scrabbling of wealth and glory has its ultimate justification in the welfare of the common man."


Yet, Smith's self-interest guided "invisible hand" of markets, notwithstanding its virtues, is to ensure the common good. That "hand" meant Providence, and Smith had his reservations.

Among the causes of inequalities, Smith suggests what some call the corporate "visible fist": "The exclusive privileges of corporations are the principal means it makes use for this purpose," and this "privilege necessarily restrains competition" ("Wealth of Nations," 1937; Page 119). And, "people of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public" (Page 128).

Smith discusses debt and distant wars: "By means of borrowing, governments are enabled to raise money sufficient to carry on wars. And people feel scarce any inconvenience from the war, but enjoy the amusement of reading in the newspapers the exploits of their own fleets and armies. They are commonly dissatisfied with the return of peace, which puts an end to their amusement, and to a thousand visionary hopes of conquest and national glory, from a longer continuance of the war" (Page 872).
 
Another sign on my door: "An 'economic man' is one who forgets the death of his father sooner than the loss of his property" (Machiavelli quoted in H.M. Robertson, "Aspects of the Rise of Individualism," 1933, Page 59).
S.M. Ghazanfar
Moscow

-----------------------------

Seeya later, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Spokane, Washington

"If not us, who?
If not now, when?"

- Unknown
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/vision2020/attachments/20120113/c85bf0c4/attachment.html>