News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 52

This week we bring you the second part of our annual news roundup of the past year.  Again, don’t be too surprised at the depressing sameness of the news items, as the same things are bound to keep happening until and unless we adopt the Economic Democracy Act, and that is not yet on anyone’s political agenda:

The Framework of Economic Justice: A Limited Economic Role for the State

Today’s blog posting is adapted from the book, Economic Personalism, which you can get free from the CESJ website, or from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Especially today with two centuries of people being brainwashed that all good things come from the State, it is difficult to persuade them that they should have control over their own lives.  This in many cases boils down to access to money and credit . . . not for consumption (there’s never been any problem with that, as the rich and powerful want people to buy what they are selling, unless it would take power away from them), but the means to acquire and possess private property in capital, that is, to be a productive member of society.

Merry Christmas!

 It's all Greek to me!!

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 51

This week we bring you the first part of our annual news roundup of the past year.  Don’t be too surprised at the depressing sameness of the news items, as the same things are bound to keep happening until and unless we adopt the Economic Democracy Act, and that is not yet in the cards:

The Framework of Economic Justice: Widespread Capital Ownership

Today’s blog posting is a selection from the book, Economic Personalism, which you can get free from the CESJ website, or from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

In the previous posting on this subject, we looked at the necessity of reconnecting people to society and concluded that “persons without power must have the means of obtaining power, and those with power must have the means of securing it.”

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XXXVI

Yea, verily, we’re back to the subject matter of the Great Conversation, a story from Herodotus, “The Wisdom of a Fallen King,” Croesus goes down before Cyrus.  Evidently, as a rule, kings still in power either don’t have wisdom or don’t need it. . . .

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 50

One thing becomes increasingly clear as time goes on without the powers-that-be considering the Economic Democracy Act, and that is that without a clear vision of where you are going, any road will take you there . . . and you have a high likelihood of selecting the wrong road:

The Framework of Economic Justice: Reconnecting Persons to Society

Today’s blog posting is a selection from the book, Economic Personalism, which you can get free from the CESJ website, or from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Combining Louis Kelso’s innovation in economics and finance, and with Mortimer Adler the clearly defined principles of economic justice, along with Pius XI’s revolution in social philosophy lays the groundwork for economic personalism. In this way, economic institutions — including the policies and laws governing those institutions — can be structured in a way the respects the dignity of every person. The result is a Just Third Way that transcends the flaws inherent in collectivism that manifests as socialism, and individualism that finds expression in capitalism.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XXXIII

This week’s podcast is about how men and women think different(ly).  It’s not directly related to the Just Third Way, but it’s moderately interesting and relates to what the Just Third Way is for, rather than the specifics of the Just Third Way:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 49

This week we again have more of the same: experts having no real idea of the real-world making decisions about things they know nothing about.  The weird situations they think they’re dealing with could be solved by adopting the Economic Democracy Act, but they don’t seem to consider that.

The Framework of Economic Justice: Social Justice, the Feedback and Corrective Principle

Today’s blog posting is a selection from the book, Economic Personalism, which you can get free from the CESJ website, or from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Today’s posting requires a little explanation.  In general, social justice is the virtue that acts directly on the common good and indirectly on individual good.  The idea that social justice is simply a replacement for individual charity and justice when those two virtues fail to operate or operate effectively is a complete misunderstanding of social justice.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XXXII

“That’s (More Than) Entertainment!”  This week’s Great Conversation is about the ancient Greek poets:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 48

One thing evident from this week’s news items, is that most if not all the experts have no idea what they are talking about.  As usual, however, most of the problems could be ameliorated or eliminated entirely by adopting the Economic Democracy Act:

The Framework of Economic Justice: The Out-Take Principle

Today’s blog posting is a selection from the book, Economic Personalism, which you can get free from the CESJ website, or from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Today we look at distributive justice, the “out-take principle” that governs distributions from a common endeavor.  Distributive justice, in one sense, is an individual virtue built on commutative justice, commutative justice being the most basic form of justice.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XXX

Life in the Clouds . . . of Aristophanes . . . an example of “the New Comedy” . . . of 2,000 years ago:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 47

This week is another episode of “Non Novum Sub Soles.”  All the experts are busily trying to figure out ways the Keynesian system is really working when it really isn’t, and carefully avoiding figuring out ways to adopt the Economic Democracy Act:

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It’s Not an Either/Or Issue

Occasionally, we feel the urge to explain a little about social justice.  This is usually prompted by a comment or question from a faithful reader or two.  This time it was sparked by a comment someone made on FaceBook about how they aren’t interested in helping people one-on-one, but in changing the system that makes it necessary to help people.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XXIX

Why did Socrates refuse to escape and stay, knowing he would be sentenced to death?

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 46

This week the experts are trying to scare people by raising the specter of inflation versus recession . . . forgetting (or ignoring) the fact that there is no correlation between economic growth and inflation, and recession and lowering inflation.  This is evident once we understand the Just Third Way of Economic Personalism and economic reality as applied in the Economic Democracy Act:

The Framework of Economic Justice: The Input Principle

Today’s blog posting is a selection from the book, Economic Personalism, which you can get free from the CESJ website, or from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XXVIII

Is there a difference between apologizing and apologetics?  Specifically, in Plato’s Apologia, why didn’t Socrates apologize for anything . . . as we mean apologizing today?

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 45

Again, this week in the news items we have more of the same, only more so.  We know we sound like a broken record (obscure cultural allusion; “records” used to “break” in a way that would cause them to keep repeating the same phrase or notes over and over), but the only way we see out of the dilemma is to adopt the Economic Democracy Act:

The “Characteristics of Social Justice”

Today’s blog posting is a selection from the book, Economic Personalism, which you can get free from the CESJ website, or from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

As we may have mentioned a few thousand times on this blog, personalist social justice is distinguished from the collectivist and individualist version by not being a substitute for charity or a euphemism for redistribution.  Need-based distribution is individual charity, except in cases of “extreme need” when it falls under distributive justice as an expedient.  Personalist social justice is the virtue concerned with restructuring the social order to make it possible for people to take care of themselves.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XXVII

What is the meaning and purpose of life?  To get more stuff?  Or to become more fully human, that is, virtuous?

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 44

The big news this week is that the Federal Reserve decided not to raise interest rates.  Yay.  Now if they would decide to take effective action by pushing for the Economic Democracy Act, we might get somewhere:

The “Laws of Social Justice”

Today’s blog posting is a selection from the book, Economic Personalism, which you can get free from the CESJ website, or from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Louis Kelso’s and Mortimer Adler’s breakthroughs in moral philosophy (with the principles of economic justice) and in economics and finance (with future savings) were “the missing links” in Catholic social teaching. Combined with Pius XI’s definition of social justice, Kelso’s and Adler’s financial systems concept and principles of economic justice — connecting economic personalism with economic justice — made a truly personalist social order possible as explicit policy for the first time in history.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XXXV

Today we continue the discussion on Herodotus, Episode Thirty-Five of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 43

Again this week we have more of the same only more so.  All the experts continue to flounder about what to do about the economy.  We could make it easy for them if they’d consider the Economic Democracy Act, but as we say in most of the items below, they don’t seem to be considering that:

The Money Question

Today’s blog posting is a selection from the book, Economic Personalism, which you can get free from the CESJ website, or from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

As we saw in the previous postings on this subject from last week and the week before, Hilaire Belloc had a somewhat primitive understanding of money and credit.  Fortunately, Louis Kelso’s understanding of the importance of money and credit was radically different from that of Belloc. This can be traced to Kelso’s deeper understanding of an institution fundamental to the functioning of every form of economy that can possibly be conceived.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XXXIV

For our podcast today we jump to Episode Thirty-Four of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program, which gets back to the Great Books:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 42

It’s strange, isn’t it, that all the powers-that-be all start with the same assumptions and keep coming to radically different solutions to the same problems, and never go with the obvious solution: the Economic Democracy Act:.  That’s why all the news items seem so depressingly the same, week after week:

Solving the Problems

Today’s blog posting is a selection from the book, Economic Personalism, which you can get free from the CESJ website, or from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

In his 1936 Essay on the Restoration of Property, Hilaire Belloc identified five points that had to be addressed if widespread capital ownership was to be restored as a distinguishing characteristic of society. These were,

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XV

Our podcast today is Episode Fifteen of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program.  Today’s topic is more of a general pep talk about getting started on a project like the Great Books than the Great Books, themselves, but it’s part of the series:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 41

One of the things that becomes obvious is that the desire of the gamblers and speculators for low interest rates is so great that they are coming up with anything and everything is being used to justify lowering them . . . which begs the question whether interest rates should be artificially manipulated, or whether we should adopt the Economic Democracy Act:

Why Binary Economics?

Today’s blog posting is a selection from the book, Economic Personalism, which you can get free from the CESJ website, or from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

In all forms of tyranny, the State or community dictates what people must do and how they must do it instead of maintaining the pólis so that people can pursue their own destinies within established parameters as they themselves see fit. When most people lack private property in capital and thus lack power, however, they often have no choice but to comply with the wishes of those who do have property, whether they are a private sector capitalist élite or a socialist bureaucracy.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XIV

Our podcast today is Episode Fourteen of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program.  Today’s topic is about building a good relationship with parents.  It’s not specifically about the Great Books, but what should come out of the Great Books:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 40

The stock market is again plunging, which is sending a panic through the swarm of gamblers and speculators who think they are investing.  We’ve seen it all before, and it would all be moot if we adopted the Economic Democracy Act decades ago, but until then, this is what we get:

Much Ado About Something

The Dow Jones Industrial Average, “the Dow,” plunged yesterday, causing the usual panic among the gamblers and speculators who think investment consists of rolling the dice and hoping to get in on the ground floor of something that will increase in value, so they sell at a huge profit.  Of course, this ignores the true investor who buys something that will generate an adequate return or income regardless of the value of the asset generating the return or income.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XIII

Our podcast today is Episode Thirteen of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program, “Dealing with In-Laws.”  Obviously, we’re not on the Odyssey any more:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 39

It used to be that the experts were consistently wrong, meaning they at least agreed with one another at the same time.  Now they are all disagreeing . . . none of which makes any sense.  Of course, if they wanted to make sense, they would have adopted the Economic Democracy Act decades ago, but until then, this is what we get:

The Nightmare Economy, Keynesian-Style

As Marisa Tomei’s character said in My Cousin Vinnie (still in the running as “Best Lawyer Movie Ever”), it’s a frickin’ nightmare (or words to that effect).  The Keynesians and their clones are desperately trying to come up with explanations and new catch phrases to sweep what they claimed was impossible under the rug.  Again.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XII

Our podcast today is Episode Twelve of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program, “Undercover Odysseus.”  And, yes, we’re still on the Odyssey:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 38

It’s astonishing how much the news items seem to be the same week after week . . . what with the same old people doing the same old things.  Many of these, if not all, could be resolved by adopting the Economic Democracy Act — so it might not matter all that much, except that the degree of the problem is increasing, although not the essence thereof:

“Doing Fine So Far”

There’s a very old and very bad joke about the optimist who fell out of a skyscraper window.  As he passed some of the floors on the way down, people would call out to him, “How’s it going?” and he’d reply, “Doing fine so far!”

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, XI

Our podcast today is Episode Eleven of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program, “Odysseus, Go Home!” . . . by which you can probably figure out we’re still on the Odyssey:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 37

Not that it’s much of a surprise, but this week’s news items strongly resemble those of last week!  I know, you’re absolutely flabbergasted.  Fortunately, since the recommended solution is the same this week as last week — viz., adopt the Economic Democracy Act — so it might not matter all that much, except that the degree of the problem is increasing, although not the essence thereof:

How to Gamble with Government Bonds

Small or conservative investors are typically told that government debt is the safest and most conservative type of investment they can have.  Of course, given the current level of political stability in the world, that might not be saying much.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, X

 

And now for something not completely different.  Our podcast today is Episode Ten of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program, “How to Lead a Better Life” and the Odyssey instead of the Iliad!:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 36

 

It’s been yet another week of Federal Reserve follies, with all the experts thinking they’re smarter than what experience and intelligence has long proved to be the case: that Keynesian economics and the Currency Principle simply don’t work, nor can they.  For such gloomy people, they continually rely on the triumph of optimism over experience and think if they just keep doing what hasn’t worked for nearly a century it’s bound to work sometime . . . or they could do the rational thing and adopt the Economic Democracy Act:

De-Dollarization Diplomacy

Economists and their political stooges . . . or maybe that’s politicians and their economic stooges (it’s so hard to keep that straight these days in a Keynesian plutocracy) profess to be terrified and worried and even a trifle concerned about the possibility of the U.S. Dollar losing its place as the primary global reserve currency.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, IX

Our podcast today is Episode Nine of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program, asking the immortal question, “Is the Iliad Worth Reading?”  Obviously, we’re still on the Iliad:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 35

It appears as if China is at the top of the economic news, along with the usual confusion about inflation.  Of course, all this would be moot if some country would just adopt the Economic Democracy Act, but what do you want, a miracle?

An Introduction to Reason and Logic

We’ve repeated this so many times on this blog that most of our readers should have this memorized by now, but we’ll do it again anyway, if only for old times’ sake.  The “first principle of reason” can be stated in two ways, one positive and one negative.  The positive statement of the first principle of reason is called the law or principle of identity.  It can be stated, “That which is true is as true, and is true in the same way, as everything else that is true.”

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, VIII

Our podcast today is Episode Eight of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program, asking “Who are the Gods?”  Obviously, we’re still on the Iliad:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 34

Well, we lost the bet.  We were sure he’d drop off a balcony, fall down some stairs, or shoot his entire family after doing away with himself.  And in other news, all the so-called experts are still jumping up and down about situations that could probably either be ameliorated or solved simply by adopting the Economic Democracy Act:, which is outlined in The Greater Reset which you can get in any quantity for $5 a copy until the end of August, available from TAN Books, an imprint of Saint Benedict Press:

Some Thoughts on Hyperinflation

Over on Medium, we’ve been working on a series of articles on the dangers of reparations and inflation as they related to the rise of Adolf Hitler.  Unfortunately, as is the case with many things about the Just Third Way, people see a word used in an unexpected or unfamiliar way and immediately assume they Know All About It . . . especially when they know little or nothing.  They bring their own baggage to the discussion and nothing on Earth is going to shake them loose from their preconceptions, especially not empirical evidence, or logical consistency.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, VII

Our podcast today is Episode Seven of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program, on a turning point in the Iliad:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 33

The REAL news this week is that you can get The Greater Reset in any quantity for $5 a copy until the end of August, available from TAN Books, an imprint of Saint Benedict Press.  Just sayin’.  The rest of the news is All About Inflation That Isn’t There Except When It Is.  In other words, another spate of reasons for adopting the Economic Democracy Act:

“A Decent Place to Live”

In the United States, people are witnessing cities and states carving out spaces separate from the federal government.  Some cities reaffirm their commitment as sanctuaries and develop policies to direct local officials to defuse irrational and unjust conflicts, but that’s just the beginning.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, VI

Our podcast today is Episode Six of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program, asking the question whether we’re just pawns in the hands of the gods:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 32

The news items this week are anything but new.  Rather than pre-depress you, however, let’s just add to the reasons for adopting the Economic Democracy Act:

“Just, Thriving, and Sustainable Communities”

The objectives of the “Heart of America” project are to eradicate the economic roots of poverty, war, and racism.  This can be done by promoting justice and democratization of ownership for every person through equal access to private property rights in productive capital. In the words of R. Buckminster Fuller, the goal is “[t]o make the world work for 100% of humanity in the shortest possible time, through spontaneous cooperation, without ecological offense or the disadvantage of anyone.”

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, V

Our podcast today is Episode Five of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program, on the subject of the Great Books not being quite as easy to read as you might have thought:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 31

 

The big economic news this week is the Federal Reserve raising interest rates and many of the experts rushing to say why it’s such a bad idea.  Other experts, no doubt seeing the writing on the wall, are starting to declare that a recession is inevitable or necessary.  None of them are saying that it’s possible to get off the whole boom-and-bust treadmill completely by adopting the Economic Democracy Act:

A City Divided, Part II

In the previousposting on this subject, we noted that despite whatever efforts had been made, St. Louis, Missouri is a city divided along economic, cultural, and racial lines, and it’s not accidental.  “There are two reasons St. Louis looks the way it does today,” noted Michael Allen, director of the Preservation Research Office. “There’s been this perpetual, successive fight of whites and middle-class people from the core of the city, and the same relationships tended to reconstitute themselves across a wide swath of geography.”

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, IV

Our podcast today is Episode Four of “the Great Conversation” on the Great Books Program:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 30

 

Again, most of the news items this week are about inflation, deflation, and other monetary myths.  By insisting that money must exist prior to economic activity, the so-called experts bind people into a losing paradigm and ensure that everyone, even ultimately the presumed winners, loses.  Of course, adopting the Economic Democracy Act could straighten people out on that, so maybe it’s time to get busy with it:

A City Divided, Part I

Why did Eugene Gordon choose St. Louis for the Heart of America Project?  Apart from being a resident, it can be argued — as Gene does — that no place needs it more.  In St. Louis, segregation, whether geographic, cultural, or economic, is normal. The typical descendant of American slaves lives in a neighborhood that is 45 percent black, 35 percent white, 15 percent Hispanic and 4 percent Asian.

JTW Podcast: Return to the Great Conversation

Today we continue the series of podcasts on “the Great Books,” this one on the disappearing liberal education.  Of course, we know that simply reading them or, worse, just knowing about them, isn’t going to do a “gosh darned” thing.  You have to understand them and think about them . . . which is the hard part . . . net to putting them into action to become virtuous, which is the whole point of it:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 29

Not surprisingly, most of the news items this week are about inflation, deflation, and other monetary myths.  By insisting that money must exist prior to economic activity, the so-called experts bind people into a losing paradigm and ensure that everyone, even ultimately the presumed winners, loses.  Of course, adopting the Economic Democracy Act could straighten people out on that, so maybe it’s time to get busy with it:

A Breakthrough for Democracy

On Friday, July 1, 2022, the Republican Governor of Missouri, Michael Parson signed a bill that is designed ultimately to reduce poverty, racism, and a host of other problems in an area encompassing some of the most economically disadvantaged neighborhoods in St. Louis.  The initial phase is to form a commission funded by the state of Missouri to study the problem and develop recommendations for implementing what Eugene Gordon of the Descendants of American Slaves for Economic and Social Justice calls “the Heart of America Project.”

JTW Podcast: The Front Line with Joe and Joe

Today we have an episode of The Front Line with Joe and Joe on the subject of  “Economic Personalism,” which is the principles of natural law applied to the economic common good with the human person the central focus of economic and all other activity:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 28

Perhaps the more cynical among our readers would say that it’s right on schedule, but the world does seem to be falling apart at an increasing rate.  What is also increasing is the obviousness of the fact that the Economic Democracy Act may be about the only game in town that has any hope of solving the mounting problems:

A New Look at Reparations

There has been more talk in the Unites States of reparations for slavery recently.  Ironically, this is at a time when the foundations of the economy and therefore of the tax base are rapidly eroding for everyone except the rich and those who have political power — usually the same people, as has often been the case throughout history.

JTW Podcast: The Great Conversation, Episode 2

Today we present Episode Two of the Great Conversation based on the Great Books of the Western World as promoted by Mortimer Adler and Robert Maynard Hutchins::

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 27

Right now the world is quite properly focused on what is happening in Ukraine at the present time and not worrying about the future rebuilding of the country (with the Economic Democracy Act, of course), but there are other things going on, of which we present a few here:

The Great American Chocolate Philanthropist

It is impossible to say anything about chocolate and America without mentioning the Hershey Company of Hershey, Pennsylvania.  Milton Snavely Hershey founded the Lancaster Caramel Company in 1883, having failed at three previous attempts to establish confectionaries in different cities across the country.  Although successful in caramel production, he became fascinated with chocolate after seeing modern chocolate making machinery at the Chicago Exposition in 1893.

JTW Podcast: What Happened to Education?

What happened to education?  According to Robert Maynard Hutchins, it was getting away from a liberal education — liberal in the true sense, not in today’s political sense — as embodied in the “Great Books” of the western world.  If you’re satisfied or dissatisfied with the way the world is, chances are you will be angered or annoyed by this short video — especially if you’re not talking or associating with “those people” . . . you know who we mean:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 26

As the world remains obsessed with the same old thing, it becomes obvious that something new like the Economic Democracy Act has might be just what is needed instead of the “Great Reset.”  Speaking of the Great Reset, today is the final day of the sale on our book on the GREATER Reset — The Greater Reset: Restoring Personal Sovereignty Under Natural Law.  After that you can read this week’s news items:

Separation of Church and State

It’s often astonishing how much words and phrases can change meaning or have a different meaning depending on the time and place.  “Money,” for example, used to mean a means of carrying out economic transactions, the consideration in a contract, or “all things transferred in commerce,” to quote Black’s law dictionary.

JTW Podcast: What Happened to the Great Books?

Today we have a short, but interesting video on what happened to the “great books” and why they seem to have disappeared from everyone’s education . . . and why no one today seems to learn how to think . . .

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 25

Again, this week’s news items are about what you’d expect in a world in which the Economic Democracy Act has not yet been adopted.  Of course, you can read all about it by taking advantage of the $5 per copy sale on for The Greater Reset: Restoring Personal Sovereignty Under Natural Law.  Or you can read this week’s news items:

Focus on Africa

Every week, it seems, brings another atrocity story out of Africa.  For people outside Africa, it’s a news item, but for those in Africa, it’s a daily occurrence.  Rather than sit around and say how terrible it is before going on to the next horror the news media delight in bringing to us, it may be time to do something about it.

JTW Podcast: Robert M. Hutchins: The Great Conversation

“The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush.  It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.” — Robert M. Hutchins.

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 24

This week’s news items are about what you’d expect in a world in which the Economic Democracy Act has not yet been adopted.  Of course, you can read all about it by taking advantage of the $5 per copy sale on for The Greater Reset: Restoring Personal Sovereignty Under Natural Law.  Or you can read this week’s news items:

The Housing Crisis

According to a recent news story, three-quarters of “middle class” (whatever that means) Americans can no longer afford to buy a house.  This appears to be one step closer to one individual’s vision of Klaus Schwab’s and the World Economic Forum’s “Great Reset” in which, as one enthusiast put it, “You will own nothing and be happy.”  The American dream used to be owning your own farm or business.  Then it became getting a good job and owning a house.  Now it's degenerating into getting a universal basic income and finding a place in a government housing project.

JTW Podcast: Robert Maynard Hutchins on Education

Today we have a real treat in store for you: a damning indictment of the American university system, it’s decay from a center of independent thought into a “folk institution.”  It’s a good argument for Justice University:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 23

Not much good is happening, unless you include the $5 per copy sale on for The Greater Reset: Restoring Personal Sovereignty Under Natural Law.  The debt ceiling crisis has been “solved” by kicking the can down the road a piece (and we’re running out of pavement), Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has entered a new phase with Russia’s premature (from a military standpoint) and criminally insane (from a war crimes and humanitarian standpoint) destruction of the Kakhovka dam . . . in other words, business as usual.  The solution to many of these problems can be found in the Economic Democracy Act, but no one seems to be considering that:

The Truth About Inflation and Employment

If you want to pass an economics test these days or become well-known in politics, you will accept without question the Keynesian doctrine that there is a necessary tradeoff between inflation and employment.  If, however, you want a sound economy that operates for everyone instead of only a financial or political elite, then you will jettison the idea immediately.

JTW Podcast: The General Code of Human Behavior

 

Mortimer Adler defined natural law as the general code of human behavior and, because man is a rational creature, discernible by reason . . . although (as he also pointed out) not necessarily discerned, as human beings have free will and can act contrary to reason.

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 22

 

Most of the economic news this week has to do with the debt ceiling debacle, but there are other knavishly imbecilic events as well.  (That’s our current catch phrase, by the way, so expect to see it a lot.)  Naturally, a lot of these problems and others could be solved or at least ameliorated with the Economic Democracy Act, but that might actually work, so they run away from it as fast as they can:

Not Owning Up: Why Dining Out is Dying Out

A recent New York Times story related the horrors of dining out in today’s society.  Bemoaning the high cost of food and the low level of service, the article went to great lengths to assert it’s point that it’s personal service and warmth that make the difference in whether people enjoy their dining experience.  Lack of experienced wait staff, the pandemic, and a few other factors were cited as contributing to the problem.  The high cost was virtually ignored, although the cited $200 for a simple dinner and drinks comes to more than four times this writer’s monthly food budget (food only, by the way. none of the other things you might get in a grocery store).

JTW Podcast: George Mason (Again)

Okay, today’s podcast is very poorly edited, and you really should fast forward to minute 7 or so or you will fall asleep.  Otherwise, an interesting series of presentations on George Mason of Gunston Hall, even if they don’t appreciate his full significance and his importance for the Economic Democracy Act:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 21

Naturally, everyone expects the current debt crisis to pass and then everything will be fine until the next time and the politicians want to keep spending money that doesn’t belong to them and creating an impossible burden for future taxpayers . . . meaning us next year.  They keep kicking the can down the road, but the can keeps getting bigger and bigger, and the road keeps getting shorter and shorter.  What’s the answer instead of the Band-Aid?  Adopt the Economic Democracy Act:

A Short Lesson in Bookkeeping

A proposal that has been making the rounds again is that the United States can somehow solve its debt problem by issuing trillion-dollar coins struck in platinum and use them to pay down the debt.  While the proposal sounds marginally plausible if said quickly enough while moving walnut shells or thimbles around on a tabletop with a pea hidden in the crook of the presenter’s little finger — where we get the term “thimblerig” for a con man or other variety of sleight-of-hand artist — it falls apart of its own dead weight once the proposal is examined in the light of common sense and a little elementary bookkeeping.

JTW Podcast: George Mason of Gunston Hall

On June 12, 1776, the Virginia Convention adopted a Declaration of Rights.  This video gives some good information on Mason but leaves out a lot that you will find in Rutland’s biography and Rager’s analysis of the influence of Cardinal Bellarmine on Mason as well as Locke and Sidney.  This is the core of the Economic Democracy Act:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 20

 

Not too much different to report in this week’s news items . . . but then the powers-that-be keep making the same mistakes over and over.  Everyone seems to be frantic about raising the debt ceiling, but no one is saying anything about doing something effective to eliminate the need for a ceiling in the first place, or why we need government debt.  Maybe all that’s needed is a new approach to money and credit, such as can be found in the Economic Democracy Act, but that might be getting a little crazy for the powers-that-be that don’t want a solution, but a continuation of the status quo:

What is “Inflation”?

’Way back in the Stone Age, someone once asked a politician or a judge . . . or it could have been the person ahead of them in line at the supermarket . . . to define pornography.  The answer was something along the lines of the individual couldn’t define it, but he knew it when he saw it.

JTW Podcast: Banking on Cheese

 

C.K. Chesterton once said something-or-other about people should be writing poems or singing songs about cheese (or something like that).  We’re far more mundane than the Apostle of Common Sense . . . but no less interested in cheese.  That’s why today’s podcast is a video we located about the cheese banks of Parma.

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 19

We’re a little top-heavy with financial items this week, but it was either that or go on at great length about how Zelenskyy deceived the Russians by lying about the start of the Ukrainian counter-offensive.  Evidently, it’s alright for Putin to declare he isn’t going to invade another sovereign country, but not fair for the leader of that country to say that they have not yet begun to fight.  Gotcha.  Of course, that has a little to do with adopting the Economic Democracy Act, but not much:

Its Name Is Legion

Whatever you call it, it is quite possibly the biggest problem in the world today.  No, that’s not to denigrate or belittle poverty, racism, war, climate change or any of the other ills that plague humanity.  It is, however, to denigrate most of the attempted solutions to poverty, racism, war, climate change, and many of the other ills that plague humanity.  These have been increasing geometrically in magnitude, largely as a direct result of the modern world’s abandonment of common sense, that is, truth and reason.

JTW Podcast: Msgr. Knox on Chesterton

Today we have a rare radio program of Msgr. Ronald Knox, first broadcast by the BBC in 1941.  Interestingly, Knox was the teacher of Fulton Sheen, known as “the American Chesterton.”  He was also the author of Enthusiasm, and is cited (along with Chesterton and Sheen) in our book, The Greater Reset, which gives a broader view of “what’s wrong with the world” and also gives a viable solution — the Economic Democracy Act:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 18

 

Shades of 1907 all over again, but with a vengeance.  The “Bankers Panic” of 1907 was caused by a commercial bank using its assets to speculate on Wall Street and another, bigger bank shutting off clearinghouse privileges to deny access to additional reserves to avert a panic.  The bigger bank — J.P. Morgan — then used its financial power to take over the smaller bank and save the day . . . and increase demands for a central bank that would put a stop to such things and put the reserve currency on an asset-backed basis instead of being backed by government debt (which had been an aggravating factor in the Panic of 1893 and the subsequent Great Depression of 1893-1898).  Sound familiar?  Then maybe it’s time to restore a sound financial system by adopting the Economic Democracy Act:

Bridgeport Conference on the EDA

Today we have a brief report on the Bridgeport, Connecticut EDA (Economic Democracy Act) conference held this past weekend.  Despite the weather, there was a good-sized crowd, maybe seventy-five or so, and an undetermined number who watched livestream.  Some dignitaries or their representatives were unable to come, probably due to insufficient notice, but some of the scheduled dignitaries couldn’t be there, either, due to various unavoidable factors.

JTW Podcast: What We Need

This video was premiered at a conference in Bridgeport, Connecticut on the Economic Democracy Act.  Give it a view and give your feedback if the spirit moves you.

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 17

 

We know there is a depressing sameness about the weekly news items . . . but there’s also a depressing sameness about the refusal to adopt the Economic Democracy Act:

What’s Wrong with the World

Once upon a time G.K. Chesterton published a book he titled What’s Wrong with the World.  While the book was intended to oppose socialism and a bit of capitalism, it has been taken by many people as promoting the very thing it was primarily intended to counter: Fabian socialism.

JTW Podcast: Economic Independence

Today we have Dawn K. Brohawn and Michael D. Greaney on The Frontline with Joe and Joe talking about “Economic Independence.”  Of course, the best way is to adopt the Economic Democracy Act . . . so why aren’t the powers-that-be doing it?

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 16

Mostly what’s going on in the Global Justice Movement is preparing for the April 29, 2023, conference in Bridgeport, CT, on the Economic Democracy Act.  As the webpage lets you know, the event is free and will be livestreamed, so be there or be . . . not there.  Not that we’re letting up on other efforts to get the Economic Democracy Act adopted:

Let’s Talk About Consumption Taxes

Especially this time of year it’s common to hear proposals about how to eliminate the Internal Revenue Service and institute a simpler, kinder way of taxing people . . . like a flat tax, or a consumption tax.  Now Representative Buddy Carter has come up with a new twist: a flat rate consumption tax.  As he says,

JTW Podcast: What is Ownership

 

Getting past the rather bizarre and kind of gross story about the severed foot, it helps illustrate the difference between the right to be an owner, and the rights of ownership.  This video is pretty good about the rights OF ownership, but really weak on the right to be an owner in the first place.  This can lead to massive confusion and causes some people to think that because the rights OF ownership are almost infinitely flexible, the right to be an owner is equally so.

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 15

Now that Easter is over and the pinch of high egg prices has somewhat ameliorated and people are fed up (literally) with chocolate bunnies, it’s time to get back to the real world of Keynesian economics . . . just kidding.  Keynesian economics is more of a fantasy than the Easter Bunny, for Easter comes with or without chocolate eggs or bunnies, but a Keynesian economy can’t even exist without the Great Defunct Economist’s fantasies, as he himself admitted.  We have to lie to ourselves until the lie becomes reality, as Keynes declared in 1931.  He gave it a century to work, and the situation is worse than before.  Time is running out, and the only hope is to adopt the Economic Democracy Act:

Helicopter Money

 

A recent book about money — and that coincidentally costs a lot of it — is John Cochrane’s The Fiscal Theory of the Price Level, which came out in January of this year from Princeton University Press after being revised.  It seems that new data keep flowing in that require the basic theory to be tweaked continuously or it will drift too far from plausibility and some typos seem to have sneaked into the original version.

JTW Podcast: How to Win n Argument

Here is a podcast about how to win an argument by getting “buy-in” from others, giving the example of how Misterrogers saved PBS.  It doesn’t have much to do directly with the Economic Democracy Act . . . except maybe how to convince people how to go about getting it:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 14

 

Christians celebrate this as “Holy Week,” but it also applies to everyone else if you’re talking about the economy and the world situation as “Wholly Weak.”  Of course, if people wanted to turn things around, they could start demanding the Economic Democracy Act, and it’s still not too late:

Human Rights v. Property Rights

Some time ago we took part in a conference during which a participant made the statement that he was for human rights, not property rights.  This, while it garnered a large measure of applause, didn’t make any sense.  It was a little like saying he was all for meals but was against eating.  The startling fact that surprises so many people, especially today, is that property is a human right; only human beings are natural persons, and therefore only human beings have rights.

JTW Podcast: Harpoon Brewery ESOP

And now for something completely different . . . not.  In this short video produced by the ESOP Association — which is not a “stock OPTION group,” but a “stock OWNERSHIP group,” something completely different — the narrator mentions “the Silver Tsunami,” a wave of retiring business owners who are potential clients for ESOP providers.  Of course, there are ESOPs and ESOPs, and even the ESOP itself is a stepping stone on the way to the Economic Democracy Act, but that doesn’t mean that it’s not a keystone as well:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 13

 

Everyone seems to be agreeing that we are headed into a recession (Keynesian newspeak for depression), but nobody seems to know what to do about it except keep repeating the same things that got us into this mess in the first place.  No one is considering something different, like the Economic Democracy Act:

America’s Kryptonite

Saturday, March 25, 2023, saw an astonishingly stupid article appeared in the Washington Post.  “The Dollar is Our Superpower, and Russia and China are Threatening It.” by Fareed Zakaria (p. A18), while no doubt well-intentioned, reinforced some very bad, even extraordinarily dangerous ideas about money.  These have not only the potential to destroy every economy in the world, including that of the United States, they have gone a long way toward doing it.

JTW Podcast: Louis Kelso at the ESOP Association Conference

This is not the talk that we heard, which was a few years later, but is interesting and in a sense prophetic, as it was given on May 10, 1984, a month after the founding of CESJ on April 7, 1984.  Kelso’s vision was far beyond the ESOP, and he viewed the ESOP as just a necessary first step.  It has gotten the idea of widespread worker ownership into the culture.  What we’re working on and aiming toward now is capital ownership for everyone, as proposed in the Economic Democracy Act:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 12

Everyone is still trying to figure out what to do about the war in Ukraine and the bank failures (as well as everything else), but it should be increasingly obvious that one thing that could be done to everyone’s advantage is to adopt the Economic Democracy Act:

Analysis of the Panic of 1907

In the previous posting on this subject, we closed by noting that the financier J. Pierpont Morgan saved the country from the “Panic of 1907” . . . which he had caused in the first place.  Observant readers of this blog will not be slow to realize that a similar thing has happened with the recent bank failures.  The federal government has been quick to assure the public that it will guarantee that the rich people who had money in the bank will be rescued from wanting to have their cake and eat it, too . . . and coincidentally take more control over the financial system.

JTW Podcast: Just Third Way Home Economics

Usually when we talk about economics, what we really mean is political economy, the science of production, distribution, and consumption of marketable goods and services.  Most authorities divide political economy into macro- and microeconomics, a distinction that does not exist in binary economics, at least not as generally understood.  In Economic Personalism, microeconomics refers to the individual and family, while macroeconomics refers to everything else.

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 11

If you happen to be at least 150 years old, you will recall the Panic of 1907, a.k.a., “the Bankers’ Panic,” and not be surprised at the current spate of bank failures.  If you don’t happen to have reached the century and a half mark, you will, of course, be stunned and amazed, as well as baffled, that such a thing could happen on the eve of the Utopia that Keynes promised if we would just lie to ourselves for a century.  Of course, if we adopted the Economic Democracy Act, we wouldn’t have to lie at all, and could probably avoid problems like these:

The Panic of 1907

The recent bank failures have once again raised questions not only about the safety of the financial system, but its role in the economy.  What goes on in the world’s financial centers seems to have no connection to people’s daily lives and the need to secure food, clothing, shelter, and the other essentials of life.  What happens on Wall Street, stays on Wall Street . . . except when it seeps out to the real economy and destroys lives.

JTW Podcast: Natural Law Theory

Today we feature a short piece on Thomas Aquinas and natural law theory.  Although we might not agree with everything that the presenter says or how it’s said, Thomist (Aristotelian) natural law theory is the foundation of the Just Third Way of Economic Personalism as applied in the Economic Democracy Act:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 10

As usual, reports and predictions of economic disaster are coming as fast as glowing reports of economic health and growth.  What’s the real story?  Paradoxically, both reports and predictions could very easily be true . . . depending on who you are.  Like “the Great Reset” of Klause Schwab and the World Economic Forum which has capitalism for the rich and socialism for the poor, today’s economic growth benefits the rich, while the recession/depression affects the non-rich.  Of course, the Economic Democracy Act would benefit everyone, but no one seems to think of that.

What is a “Bank”?

Banking for most people is a little like pornography.  There is something not quite right about it, but a lot of people seem to like it and can’t seem to function without it, and they can’t define it, but they know it when they see it.

JTW Podcast: Fulton Sheen at UCLA

What, Notre Dame wasn’t good enough?  Just kidding, although we’d like to see something truly revolutionary come out of Academia instead of the increasing emphasis on “job training” at a time when AI is replacing even top professionals, leaving very little to do for the rest of us.  The obvious solution is the Economic Democracy Act, but nobody is or was discussing it, which leaves it up to the will bes:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 09

 

Recently we saw a video in which a retired British major general kept insisting that we must appease Putin and allow him to keep Crimea and everything else he had managed to grab.  He was then honest enough to admit that if Putin were appeased in this fashion, it would probably be necessary to fight him or his successor again in five or ten years, but that was the price that had to be paid for peace.  Over a year ago people were saying Putin could not be stopped from taking all of Ukraine and so must be allowed to have it, now they are saying Russia will never surrender Crimea and must be allowed to have it.  Apparently, nothing succeeds best for a tyrant than people afraid to stand up to him.

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 09

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 09

What is the “Banking Principle”?

Frequently, we have made the statement that, where the so-called mainstream schools of economics (the Keynesian, Monetarist/Chicago, and the Austrian) are based on the “Currency Principle” and belong to the “Currency School,” the binary economic of Louis Kelso is based on the “Banking Principle” and belongs to the “Banking School.”  What does this mean?

JTW Podcast: Fulton Sheen on Firing Line

 

This week we're putting the late Fulton Sheen on the firing line . . . or was that Fulton Sheen on Firing Line?  In either case, you're bound to see something interesting, although not, perhap, as interesting (or at least as immediate) as the Economic Democracy Act:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 08

Today is the first anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, or (as some are putting it) Day 366 of Russia’s 10 day “special military operation.”  Given that no sane person believes claim of saving the world from gay Nazis through war crimes and atrocities, it seems reasonable to expect that the effort would have collapsed months ago.  Instead, Russia continues to push . . . well, if not forward, at least along, losing sometimes more soldiers in a week than it did in Afghanistan in ten year.  Of course, the rest of the world, locked into the economic insanity of Keynesian economics and accumulating more debt in nominal terms than the entire world did in a century before Keynesian economics came along, has nothing to brag about, as can be seen by the refusal to adopt the Economic Democracy Act, but, like Putin, people still insist on implementing failed programs that never worked in the first place:

Was Henry George a Socialist?

In a recent email, someone stated, “Henry George was definitely NOT a Socialist.  Quite the contrary.  He wanted to untax labour and capital, treat land rents as the source of public revenue and restore the mediaeval system of financing the Crown through land rents.”

JTW Podcast: Fusion Power and Kilowatt Hour

We are not nuclear scientists, but we recognize the importance of power to any civilization, especially a technologically advanced one.  We also recognize the importance of a stable measure of value for a currency for any civilization, especially (again) a technologically advanced one.

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 07

Again this week we see a large number of problems that could be solved by adopting the Economic Democracy Act, but people still insist on implementing failed programs that never worked in the first place:

Some Thoughts on Credit

. . . social credit, that is, the brainchild of Major C.H. Douglas.  Recently we received a question asking whether we were familiar with “the Douglas Scheme,” as the Anglican Christian apologist C.S. Lewis rather pejoratively termed it.  Yes, we are familiar with Major Douglas and his social credit plan, which has nothing to do with what the Chinese have termed “social credit,’ although both rely on intrusive government control.

JTW Podcast: Embodiment of the Human Person

Continuing the series of videos on personalism, today we have Dr. John F. Crosby on “Understanding the Embodiment of the Human Person.”  He puts it in terms of Christianity, but being based on natural law, applies across the board.  In this video he talks about what Dr. Ralph McInerny of Notre Dame called “fideism,” the opposite but equal error of materialism.  Both are forms of “modernism” that separates faith and reason.

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 06

As usual, we have nothing spectacularly new to report, although the special segment on Hulu airing tonight might be of great interest.  Otherwise, the list of news items is tophevy with stories about people and situations that would e much better off with the Economic Democracy Act, but we may get there eventually:

A Keynesian Contradiction

The first principle of reason is that nothing can both “be” and “not be” at the same time under the same conditions.  This law or principle of (non) contradiction simply means that something cannot both exist and not exist at the same time, e.g., nothing can be a little bit dead.  Something is either dead or alive; Schrödinger’s cat is only half dead and half alive because there’s a fifty percent chance it’s either one, which is known for certain when the box is opened.

JTW Podcast: Intro to Thomistic Personalism

This week we follow up on last week’s podcast that featured the personalism of John Paul II, with a video of the Thomistic personalism . . . of John Paul II.  Okay, so we’re in a rut, or at least we’re not finding enough videos or other shows on the rest of the Just Third Way.  Again, there is nothing in the video about economic personalism as applied in the Economic Democracy Act, but you can’t have everything:

News from the Network, Vol. 16, No. 05

It is very tempting to give the blogging equivalent of “Nothing to see here, move along,” when reporting on various events that advance the Just Third Way (rare) or actively inhibit or prevent the Just Third Way (far too common).  Sadly, too many people seem to be convinced that if we just continue to do what isn’t working and has never worked instead of adopting the Economic Democracy Act, things will be fine: