The good old USA fought a Civil War. Abe Lincoln said it was to make sure that government of the people, by the people and for the people should not perish from this earth. That government model he fought over is called democracy. Old Abe had a stake in and a passion for democracy.
But, me, and people like me, not so much.
No, we have a different model in mind. It is an exciting business model. And our model has been in operation and proven a winner for us in far more places for a far longer time than this crazy idea of democracy defended by the likes of Abe Lincoln.
We have a better idea: “TIMocracy.” That comes from the Greeks. Literally, it means rule of the wealthy, by the wealthy and for the wealthy.
We are close, so close to this dream of a fully functioning timocracy. And, ironically, many thanks for this progress has to be given, to a fellow named Tim. I’m talking about Tim Geithner. Tim has been working away for our ideals through three successive Presidents: Bill, W, and now Barack.
Tim Geithner was at Treasury under Bill Clinton when deregulation removed all the barriers to risky lending … and lucrative bonuses (*cock head, smile*) and what made it all so much more appetizing was having our risky loans backed by a taxpayer guarantee.
Tim was at the New York Federal Reserve under W—a golden age while the risks got bigger and the liabilities grew higher and, man, were we rolling in dough!. We needed a regulator who would look the other way and Old Tim was there to look the other way with his eyes closed. Good times. Good times.
Tim was still there when it all blew up, the system fell apart and we all went from spectacularly wealthy to merely fabulously so. That should not happen to people like us.
We wanted our money back and the people living in our timocracy had to give it to us.
Tim made sure that the Congress agreed to borrow enormous sums of money on the credit card of the people. And Congress agreed with Tim that the people would pay the carrying charges on the debt for as long as it takes to pay it off. Very reasonable of them, I must say.
And Tim was right there to make sure there was no delay in taking the people’s money and putting it in our pockets as quick as possible without any disclosure or scrutiny!
But, most importantly, Tim became Secretary of the Treasury under Barack at the moment when we needed someone to stop meaningful reform of risky banking, end any discussion of criminal prosecutions, and get “constructive” with the regulations to keep our bailouts flowing at the same time we collected our latest round of bonuses. Timmy, my main man! You made it happen, dog!
Your democracy is over, Abe. Who needs to invite the poor, the middle class or the merely well-to-do to the table?
The time has come for Tim’s “timocracy.”
Timocracy—such a delicious flavor to that word. It makes my mouth actually water.
Why shouldn’t we enjoy the whole buffet made possible by taxpayer bailouts? What else were the people going to do with the money? Buy groceries?
