One of the main ideas in Political Catsup with Economy Fries, the book I wrote that you can buy on Amazon.com, is that politics and economics are different activities. On the one hand, politics works according to rules of governance like those set out by the U.S. Constitution. These rules are based on moral principles connected with people’s happiness. On the other hand, our economy works according to beneficial mutually agreed upon exchanges betweeen groups. Groups find out what to produce based on profit and loss where profits allow the producer to know that more of something is needed and losses say that less of something is needed. Profit and loss or buying and selling isn’t about morality, though a business is supposed to be held to a reasonable standard of not harming those it is supposed to be supplying.

The reason that government is not a corporation is because governments are ethical and they aren’t supposed to be motivated by profit or loss but instead according to moral standards. The United States government is supposed to operate according to rules set out by the U.S. Constitution and the Congress and President are supposed to be elected by voters. Government’s purpose is to act on behalf of the electorate, addressing harms and following policies to maximize opportunity and reduce harms. Harming the nation or the people isn’t allowed.

In a recent interview, Elon Musk, claimed that the U.S. government is a big corporation that is allowed to use force. And he was quick to point out that he isn’t allowed to use force, so the U.S. government is more powerful than he is when he is acting in any of his companies. But although some people from a real politic perspective would applaud Musk’s comment, Musk is wrong. I suppose that the U.S. govenment has been acting in a politically corrupt way in that the 2020 election result was faked. Musk may view the U.S. government as being like a corporation precisely because it is so corrupt. The level of self-dealing money-making and corruption running rampant in Washington includes malfeasance by government officials in high positions of authority. Numerous examples present themselves from Fauci, to Biden, to the MIC the NIH and the CDC.

Corrupt people act without ethics and now also in our government without legitimacy. Eventually, it will be seen that they are illegitimate government actors. They also aren’t corporations because self-dealing under the rubric of government officialdom isn’t legal, isn’t protected by law. Corporations are protected by law but also responsible to legal requirements.

Corrupt people in government aren’t part of government in that they don’t act within an arc of ethical considerations. Instead these corrupt people guilty of malfeasance are temporarily in power for a short time as criminals with a shortened career that will be over. No one will be sad when they are finished except we will all be sad about the tragic messes that they leave behind. As individuals, corrupt government actors won’t be seen as sucessful in either government or economics and they will even fail as criminals.

To have a stable government, politics and economics need to work well together without either one trying to do the other’s job. Politicians and corporations are supposed to have totally different goals and means of carrying out their jobs. A stable commonwealth is possible only under 3 basic conditions: a stable and solvent banking system, an army that is war-ready but conducts mostly no warfare, and law that is published and applies equally to everyone. For more information about this topic, buy a copy of Political Catsup with Economy Fries, available at Amazon.com.