America's Business

[stewstewstewdio.livejournal.com]

Politics is show business for ugly people. - Paul Begala

Mitt Romney and Herman Cain are in the forefront of the Republican nomination race. They both have experience in business with varying degrees of success. Many see this as a driving force for a candidate for the Presidency of the United States. People that subscribe to this believe this will be the panacea that fixes the economy. However the principles that guide government and business put their missions in deep conflict with each other.

Consider:

Description	Government	Business
Reason for existence	To provide protection and services to its citizens	To generate profit for its proprietors, parent companies or shareholders
Mission	General Welfare of the populace	Profitability of the business
Mission Abandonment	None	Business Disolution
Governance	Democracy	Monarchy by ownership or plutocracy by common stock election
Participation	Citizenry	Ownership or Common Stock
Accountability	Citizenry	None or to stockholders only.
National Interest	Citizenry	Parasitic
International Interest	Humanitarian and Defense	Parasitic
International Relationship	Diplomacy and Military	Commerce
Method of Revenue	Taxes and sale of obsolete arms to friendly countries	Sale of goods and services to customers
Capitalization Method	Short and long term Treasury Bonds, Savings Bonds	Venture Capital, Common and Preferred Stock, Corporate Bonds
Expansion of Revenue Base	Promotion of the economy	Product marketing or business acquisition
Expansion of Customer/Citizen base	Domestic Population Growth, Immigration	Competitive Marketing to customers here and abroad

Contrary to what Mitt Romney says, businesses are not people. They are property owned by the same people that own houses, cars, vibrators, garbage cans and other inanimate objects. I have the utmost respect for the United States Supreme Court, although I disagree with Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission in principle only. I understand that organizations, even businesses, have a right to pursue their goals legally in the United States, like people do. The American Dream™ is a quest and not a birthright.

I don’t believe this ruling is going to serve the interest of “We the People”. I fear that this SCOTUS decision will start a corruption shit storm in our very opportunistic American business culture, especially considering the clandestine nature of funding to the 2010 midterm elections by the Republicans.

All this considered, I don’t believe business experience transfers well to government at any level. The interests of the American people are nothing more than an incidental byproduct and annoying obstacle to business. Considering the level of participation and transparency required for government, I don’t think the skills and instincts required would transfer well. Management by edict does not translate into any position of government without populace discontent, dire consequences and/or opposition from critical related functions.

Comments

[verytwistedmind.livejournal.com]

where did you get this chart?

[stewstewstewdio.livejournal.com]

where did you get this chart?

This is a table I put together myself.

[verytwistedmind.livejournal.com]

Do you really think that; National and international Interest/ business = Parasitic is realistic or fair? When a business builds a site, factory, or sells it's goods and services to another country providing jobs, services, goods and opportunity to better ones live, is this a parasitic act?

Government does not create wealth. Businesses do. Could we have the things we do without business?

Parasitic- That which is like a parasite which is defined as a person who receives support, advantage, or the like, from another or others without giving any useful or proper return, as one who lives on the hospitality of others.

Your table loses a lot of creditability by completely dismissing the good business does for everyone. Business is not a parasite. Where would we be without those people who's goals (or as you cleverly said 'reason for existence) wasn't to provide goods and services people want and need and the result being a reward called profit.

The other option would be total central planning by the government and I'm just not a fan of mass graves.

[notmrgarrison.livejournal.com]

"Parasitic"

Derogatory yet highly inaccurate.
You might look up the definition to see what that word means.

[stewstewstewdio.livejournal.com]

You might look up the definition to see what that word means.

I looked it up. Totally accurate and in context. Pertains to something that feeds on a host without regard to the health of the host.

[verytwistedmind.livejournal.com]

http://www.infoplease.com/spot/bhmtuskegee1.html


For forty years between 1932 and 1972, the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) conducted an experiment on 399 black men in the late stages of syphilis. These men, for the most part illiterate sharecroppers from one of the poorest counties in Alabama, were never told what disease they were suffering from or of its seriousness. Informed that they were being treated for “bad blood,” their doctors had no intention of curing them of syphilis at all.

Pertains to something that feeds on a host without regard to the health of the host.

All praise to our benevolent government hallowed by thy name. Who's purpose and mission is and always wil be the General Welfare of the populace and to protect us.

I'd be more inclined to call government a 'parasite' than business. I can always stop buying from a company I disagree with. It's a lot more difficult to find a country who's practices I agree with always/or even just in general.

I like to think of the government more as a necessary evil.

[notmrgarrison.livejournal.com]

A family grows food on their farm, and sells it to the public.
That's parasitical?

A rancher has a large herd of cattle, hires people to help him run the ranch, and sells the beef. Is that parasitical? Providing a product as well as creating jobs for people to work at?

But instead of, say, a family farm, it's a big agricultural corporation. They provide food, and create jobs, that's parasitical? Or by your definition, that's feeding off the host?

[404.livejournal.com]

Most businesses don't do well when the country they are operating in has gone down the tubes. It's in their best interests to see that their country thrives, if only for their own self interest.

[jerseycajun.livejournal.com]

I can rig a chart just as accurate, vilifying government and raising the market as the virtuous entity. (In reality I don't apply virtue and vice to institutions, and I'll argue with other libertarians who tend to do the same) That I could do this at all indicates that applying analogy like this isn't really aimed at accuracy but reinforcing personal perspective.

There is a long track record...

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

... of businesses being incorporated with a supposed mission for public service which turn around a bilk consumers, defraud investors, and cause foreign policy headaches that other people have to clean up.

There is a long track record...

[notmrgarrison.livejournal.com]

of people committing rape and murder, so I guess they're all bad too.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

The problem to me with CUNT v. FEC is more that it legalizes what's already there than that it was a break with anything.

[stewstewstewdio.livejournal.com]

The problem to me with CUNT v. FEC is more that it legalizes what's already there than that it was a break with anything.

Nice acronym. And totally appropriate, I might add. LOL

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Well, the original name of the organization was Citizens United Not Timid. The Right Wing's developed an art form out of "unintentional" vulgarity just like the "Tea Bag the Dems" slogan. Someone should give the people who come up with those slogans and ideas some one on one with Sigmund Freud and have done with it.

666 plan

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Cain's plan will ditch Social Security and Medicare, create a huge windfall for the richest Americans, and increase taxes for the working poor, and middle class. And every set of economists that have looked at it has said it will not raise the required revenues.

Cain also claims he's got special insights because, well he was a business leader. But when you ask him why he missed the housing bubble issue with his great foresight and business sense, "I made a mistake." What would he do to prevent that from happening in the future? "I'll have good advisers."

What a lame answer.

Re: 666 plan

[jerseycajun.livejournal.com]

What would he do to prevent that from happening in the future? "I'll have good advisers."

It is a lame answer, but its one we tend to blindly accept when searching for a candidate to nominate. We want to believe that the right candidate with the right advisers will possess all necessary wisdom to solve the problems we've somehow come to expect them to solve, often beyond reason.

We agree!!!!

[geezer-also.livejournal.com]

Of course I admit I felt that way 3 years ago when Joe Biden was picked to be VP nominee because of his foreign policy experience ;)

Mixing business and government...

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

It was Dwight Eisenhower who warned us about the military-industrial complex. If only Republicans today were willing to recruit such talented people.

When people with business interests get into government, we see pissing contests over who gets the pipeline concession in Afghanistan.

BTW, your table is more idealistic than realistic.

Re: Mixing business and government...

[stewstewstewdio.livejournal.com]

BTW, your table is more idealistic than realistic.

It has become pretty popular to call things idealistic when they don't mesh perfectly with a person's own agenda. Putting concepts into reality is rarely as pretty or well packaged as we'd like them to be.

I would bet that the ideals in the government side of the table are guiding principles on both sides of the aisle. Their methods are what are in question. This is what has kept this community going for years.

These guys are trying to keep their jobs, like everyone else, by doing the best they can. We will continue to speculate what can be done better.

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

I think CEOs are the most ironically named positions we have in the modern world. What does a CEO do? Well, it decides to sell product in places where they aren't currently selling. The CEO decides to buy a company. The CEO does nothing of any particular brilliance but spend 20 percent its time negotiating compensation, 20 percent of its time flying around, 20 percent of its time ratifying automatic processes and decisions, 20 percent of its time testifying, 20 percent of its time figuring out who to blame, 20 percent of its time taking the blame, and 20 percent of its time taking the credit. It all works out in the end.

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

Other brilliant decisions the CEO may have to make: firing some people when they're not selling enough. Deciding on the color of the wood paneling.

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

Well anyone who conflates government with business probably holds a paranoid view of government and uses confirmation bias to denounce any and all government activity, no matter how much it benefits them.

Government is designed as a selfless and sacrificial entity. A small portion of the money that goes into it is used to pay the salaries of those who work for it. The rest is funneled back to the people in the form of programs too big for the people to organize themselves. Social programs are akin to huge coops, although people's say and participation in them have to be changed legislatively.

To conflate that with business is downright nefarious.

[notmrgarrison.livejournal.com]

The rest is funneled back to the people in the form of programs too big for the people to organize themselves.

You left out spring meadows and puppies.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

Mitt Romney and Herman Cain are in the forefront of the Republican nomination race.

You're funny.

[stewstewstewdio.livejournal.com]

You're funny.

Who do you think the front runners are?  Ron Paul and/or Rick Perry?  Now that's hilarious.

(http://pics.livejournal.com/stewstewstewdio/pic/0005txd2/)