The GREED of Big Gubmint

 

Comments

[Mannie Sherberg]

The whole crazy idea, I think, goes back to a guy named Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, the 19th-century granddaddy of anarchism. Proudon was an arch-rival of Marx; like Marx, he had scrambled eggs where most people have brains, like Marx he had a lunatic hatred of Jews (he insisted that they be sent back to "Asia" or exterminated), and like Marx he had a penchant for devising slogans that millions of people -- to this very day -- accept as The Truth. His most famous slogan -- and the one that's caused indescribable damage ever since he coined it -- was "Property is theft" -- which, of course, means exactly what it says: anyone who owns any property has stolen it, by domination and exploitation, from the toiling masses who produced it in the first place. This, obviously, is precisely what every anarchist, every Communist, every Socialist, every OWSer, and -- I believe -- the current president of the United States all believe. They don't just believe that keeping the money you've earned is "greedy" -- they believe it's immoral and should be illegal, since you didn't earn it to begin with; somebody else earned it -- and you expropriated it. Unless you're on welfare or earning minimum wage, the money in your pocket is really somebody else's money; you should therefore be happy to share a large chunk of it with its "rightful owners," and you should be grateful that you're allowed to keep any of it for yourself. All of this sounds farmisht, even meshuggah, but that's because -- as I said -- Proudhon had scrambled eggs in place of a brain. So did Marx, who, on this topic, believed exactly as Proudhon did. Proudhon, however, deserves credit for the slogan.