Is Western Civilization a Handicap?

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To my dismay, I have increasingly chanced upon not only Americans finding fault with the conventional American way of life, but with Western civilization et al. as being to blame for any of the challenges we face as a nation.  There is nothing wrong with western thinking. We have not been doing a hell of a lot of western thinking. Western thought brought us the likes of Peter Abelard, Augustine, Boccaccio, Byron, Caravaggio, Cicero, Dante, Dostoevsky, Galileo, Hobbes, Gericault, Homer, Luther, Machiavelli, Masaccio, Michelangelo, Hayek, Petrarch, Habermas, Raphael, Locke, Rembrandt, Adam Smith, Rousseau, Sophocles, Stendhal, Vermeer, Virgil, and Nozick to name but a miniscule fraction of the brilliant minds produced, nurtured, and influenced by Western culture. Along with the myriad of unnamed original thinkers who produced, nurtured, and influenced Western civilization. The strength of the Western thought is its relative accessibility, when compared to the far more rigid, autocratic, and often esoteric philosophy of the East.

Had we simply applied the time honored Western school of thought, rather than a forensic review, of facts leading up to the current economic malaise in which we find ourselves firmly ensconced, we would find that …  

1. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with a housing market that is booming for more than a decade without an apparent natural demographic driving it. 
2. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with interest rates remaining in the low single digits while the economy is booming. 
3. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with people who have never qualified for even the most lenient of mortgages are suddenly homeowners in upscale neighborhoods. 
4. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with cooks, gas station attendants, and homemakers who are suddenly movers and shakers in the residential "flip" market. 
5. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with government insured deposits (FDIC) financing "Low Doc" or "No Doc" mortgages to nearly anyone with the ability to sign their names on a dotted line. 
6. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with real estate novices buying homes in lucrative neighborhoods for $500,000.00 and selling the same home a few months later for a $50,000 profit. 
7. Western thought would have told us that something is wrongwith a family being able to refinance their new home twice in the first couple of years of ownership and being able to pull out substantial amounts of cash each time. 
8. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with and nation having a blazing hot economy while; 

a) expelling its manufacturing base into foreign exile, 
b) producing an annual crop of increasingly uneducated citizens, 
c) drowning in public debt mainly due to unprofitable transfer payment schemes, 
d) stripping the economy of capital to grow an expanding multitude of redundant, inefficient, ineffective, and often counterproductive bureaucracies staffed with highly compensated individuals of mediocre acumen. 
e) steadily decimating its entrepreneurial spirit in the private sector by regulation, licensing, taxation, and employment liability. 
 
Western thought would have told us all these things, but as I stated earlier, "We have not been doing a hell of a lot of western thinking." Instead, we have been PROGRESSIVELY (Hint-Hint) adopting ideologies, principles, and tenants foreign to us in the west. In stark contrast to those in the East who have been doing the exact opposite and growing fabulously wealthy using historically western ideologies, principles, and tenants. Western thought is unique in that it is inherently non-elitist.  Wisdom is recognized, documented, and transmitted regardless of the social standing, rank, or pedigree of the individual from which it emanates. 
  
The ongoing and deteriorating state of crisis we in the west are experiencing is not a failure of Capitalism; it is solely due to our failure to be the Rational, Resourceful, Inventive, Adaptable, Intellectual, Optimistic, Innovative, Capitalists that we are…thanks to our unrivalled Western school of thought.

Our Wasted Wealth

 

In the past few years the Obama administration along with a large cadre within the Federal government have  shoveled nearly Three Trillion Dollars (That is $3,000,000,000,000.00) down a rat hole under the guise of “Fiscal Stimulus” without ever stopping to check their Totem.   While the Keynesian sycophants justify this wanton disregard for current and future generations of Americans by claiming that everything would have been much worse without the effort without a scintilla of proof to back up their claim, I say the economic impact is easy for those who can do the math. Follow along with me…

Number of US Taxpayers:	144,000,0001
Average age of US Taxpayer:	34 Years2
Retirement Age:	68 Years3
Average Years to Retirement:	34 Years
Total “Stimulus” Spending:	$3,270,000,000,000.004
Spending Per Taxpayer:	$22,708.335
Average Equity Investment Return:	12%6
Wasted Wealth of Average Taxpayer:	$1,328,925.94

Now with that being said, I understand that there are those who will find some minute bone to pick with my projected rate of returns, or point out that I did not account for taxes or inflation, and these are valid claims which I am not only willing to discuss, but in the interest of full disclosure, I'm pointing them out myself. However these are at best marginal issues when you consider the big picture:

1. I did not add the interest payments which over the same 34 year period will raise the total cost of the already staggering 3.27 Trillion borrowed today to a devastating total of 9 Trillion Dollars.
2. I did not estimate the degraded economic conditions that every American will suffer throughout their lives due to the addition to our already commerce crushing national debt.

 

 

 

References, Citations, and Sources

1. Internal Revenue Service
2. Ibid.
3. Estimated Minimum Social Security retirement age in 2045
4. Heritage Foundation
5. Smartstockmarket.com
6. Assumes a modest monthly investment of $50.00 per month by the retiree

That Bah Humbug Spirit?

 

This holiday season seems a little different, doesn’t it? A little less jubilant, perhaps? Maybe a bit more stoic than it has been in previous years. Many of us have had to scale back on the festivities, cut short our travel, and especially reign in the spending when compared to holidays of just a few years ago. For the most part, even among those considered to be “poor”, Americans are not very good at not doing at least fairly well. We have come to expect it as a birthright, our due prosperity to be very merry at this time of the year.  While there is much that we have lost over the last few years, this is no time for self pity or despondence that leads to resignation. We have been beat down, but we are far from beat.

We have a purpose to remember who we are and those who gave liberty, security, comfort, and life to hand us the prosperity of yesterday. Most important among them was a man who did not have in this life the luxury to fix His mistakes because He lived and died for the mistakes of others. He gave His life so that each of us could live, and live with passion and purpose. Put aside your financial concerns for the moment. Accept that you may never again earn what you once did. However you can make a point to make His Life, His Agony, His Fear, His Sacrifice worth it …earn this.  The dividends are certain, the growth potential limitless, and no one can take this investment from you as the only legal tender acceptable for this account was paid in His blood… earn it.