Welcome To The Pseudo Science Of Your World, Your Pocket Book, Your Mind

Freedom? Ok. Let’s define it. (Long pause. Think. Continue pause.)

Money?

Travel?

Beauty & Fashion (as per Melania Trump’s RNC speech)?

In my quest to misunderstand this worst-world we must all live in, I periodically read a book or three about economics. Most of these books usually carry a bit of narration with them and leave out all the academic bullshit. That’s the only way I can get through them. This newest endeavour, though, is a bit different. For one, it doesn’t have much narration in it. It’s also a bit overly academic. I mean, it has X-Y charts and graphs that depict whatever it is the author tried to say using words–which, I guess, makes the imagery redundant. Or? Nomatter. There is something in this book that has saved it from ending up stuffed in the back of one of my bookshelves with a sad-face post-it note on its cover. Two-thirds of this book is a dictionary. And a pretty interesting dictionary at that. The rest of it is made up of various articles and essays by the author–most of which lost me because they were, well, too academic.

So me let me try that again. What the hell is freedom?

Answer: I have no fucking clue what freedom is.

From the day I was born to this very moment, other than spitting on a street and telling a teacher once how stupid s/he was, I have no idear what freedom is. And keep in mind, I was born and raised in #americant–you know, that city-on-hill where dreams come true and liberty reigns for all–i.e. as long as you have the money to pay for it. By the time I got to “F” in this pseudo-dictionary-book about the debacle that is today’s Economics, I was hoping that the author would define the word freedom for me. But he didn’t. Instead, Michael Hudson defines “free trade”, “free market” and “free lunch”. He also defines things like earned and unearned income. Then there’s his definition of productive vs. unproductive labor. Etc, etc. Of course he also defines Junk Economics, hence the title.

Michael Hudson goes through the whole economic alphabet and defines lots of other words by telling you what you think they mean–because of how you’ve heard or read about them, on, say, faux news or CNN or whatever it is you use to get informed about how fucked up the world is. And then he tells you what these words actually mean. In other words, according to what I got out of this book, Economics, per the author, is a pseudo-science. Ka-ching, baby!

Which brings me to my own little conclusion after reading this book:

Astrology ——-> Astronomy
Alchemy ———> Chemistry
Economics ——-> ????

The subtitle of this book is “A Guide to Reality in an Age of Deception”. Now, dear worst-reader, what could an #americant economics professor mean by that subtitle? Indeed. The thread that permeates this entire book is the simple fact that Americans are being fed pseudo-science when it comes to economics, just like mankind was fed Astrology as it tried to figure out why certain heads go bald, rain didn’t fall when it should or how come I work and don’t get nothing for it? I suppose some would call the words we hear about economics today Orwellian, which Hudson refers to at times. But others, present worst-writing company included, would call it: land of the free to be stupid. So I guess that’s what freedom means. Or?

One of the roots of all the problems of the world today is none other than the misuse of words. Hence, newspeak, doublespeak, Orwell, etc., should be at the top of anyone’s mind when s/he thinks finding answers is out there. Either that or it’s time to move on. Which brings me to one final question. As noted above, if the pseudo-science of Astrology lead to the science of Astronomy, where will/can the pseudo-science of Economics lead?

But I digress.

Rant on.

-T