Of all the people Trump has given us, there's only one who I actually enjoy. Legitimately, not out of some twisted joke or ironically or anything like that. It's been a while since I spoke of the Mooch, but I've actually been listening to some of his shows, and they're very good. If I was a Republican, I would probably be him.
One of the things he likes to talk about is how our political system has somehow switched around the voting process. Traditionally, the voters are supposed to select the politicians. With gerrymandering, the politicians are picking the voters, and that is fucking insanity. Pure goddam insanity. How have we let things get so bass-ackwards in this country?
But I'd like to go a little farther than the Mooch on this, because the current market is also bass-ackwards. It was still OK(-ish) when I was a kid, so this is a fairly new development. It may explain why our corporate overlords have so much more money than we do. Their sole purpose these days is to transfer value from our pocket to theirs, and the less they give us in return, the better. The ridiculous thing is, they've somehow gotten it so that even if we buy their products, we don't *own* them. We have to use their products the way they were intended to be used, and if we don't, then we're in violation of the deal we made when purchasing it. Depending on the degree of that violation, it's even possible that we've committed a felony.
I'll give you an example. When I bought my printer, I was under the impression that I could use that printer as I saw fit. If I ran out of ink, and the manufacturer's cartridges are too expensive, I should be able to use another company's ink in that printer. But no, if you try to do that, your printer will reject it. You are legally required to purchase their ink to go with your printer. Cory Doctorow is fond of pointing out that HP ink is more expensive, by volume, than a Kentucky Derby winner's sperm.
To me, that is bass-ackwards. The consumer is supposed to dictate terms to the market. Instead, we find ourselves in Bizarro World where the corporations dictate terms to the market. No wonder the economy is fucking broken. Maybe we should fix that?
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