A class-B
movie actor occupied the Oval Office. Unlike most politicians in 1984, he knew
how to follow a teleprompter. For the want of a better description, the mosaic
of the times appeared healthy. Terms like global
economy and globalization began
cropping up in conversation. We bantered those terms as if we comprehend what
their meaning, but few among us grasp the long-term significance.
If you are required
to earning a living—as opposed to being idly rich or gainfully
self-actualized—what global corporations do affects you—the spectator.
Think of the
globe as one horrendously huge three-dimensional chessboard with nine Kings
scattered about. Each King represents one of the eight industrialized nations, plus China. These Kingdoms collectively control
more than 60% of the world economy and 100% if you live within their
jurisdictions.
Unlike a
conventional chessboard, each industrialized Kingdom is not pared with a matching
Queen, as there is but one. We will refer this Queen as the International Monetary Fund (or IMF). The Queen works with all the various Kingdoms. All the
other pieces and pawns on the board closely monitor where the IMF positions
herself on economic issues.
The other major
pieces (Rooks, Bishops and Knights) represent trade, capital, resources
and investments. To avoid being outmaneuvered
by the Queen, those pieces form alliances of convenience. While individually they
do not have the power held by the Queen, a strong alliance among the lessor
pieces can influence the Queen’s maneuverability.
As for the pawns, those are multinational companies
striving to move forward. The more trade, capital, resources and investments
they control, the more influence they have on how the game progresses. Their
goal is to promote themselves into a major piece—thereby becoming too large to
fail—and some cases even too
large to prosecute.
Once a multinational industry amasses enough assets,
they qualify to run the Kingdom’s pieces-parts.
From this position, they influence legislation, write self-serving laws, decides
who gets elected, and how the the kingdom is administrated. Not even a duly
elected official can override that amount of power, money and influence.
Before
participating in this convoluted game of chess, the corporation has to control large
amounts of trade, capital, resources and investments. The slightest hint that the
participant might upset other pieces on the board, and the others will neutralize
the situation.
This accounts
for why you observe very few mavericks holding public office. While there are
occasionally exceptions, for the most part, the real players stay out of the
limelight. Should those under their control attract too much attention, the pieces
can be discretely replaced.
Mitt Romney
desperately desired to be the front man for multinational corporate interests.
Unlike Ronald Reagan who could stay on scripted message, Romney could not. His
habitual verbal missteps brought too much attention on himself, which eventually
did him in.
In the end, the
global community got want it wanted—a non-interfering government tied up in administrative
gridlock. The average Joe Spectator’s economy may be stumbles along, but corporate
profits and their subsidies soar. A comprehensive jobs bill might improve things
at the bottom, however, it is not on the global agenda. If it were, things would
be otherwise.