by Charles Hugh Smith
Of Two Minds
Every individual and entity seeking to maximize their private gain by prostituting themselves to the government is, well, prostituting themselves to the government.
The free-money PPP “loan” obtained by a prostitute frequented by Hunter Biden offers a vividly teachable insight into American capitalism: you don’t maximize your private gains by offering a product or service that’s faster, better, cheaper, you maximize your private gains by securing a government-gimme. Hunter’s Hooker Scored $20,000 PPP Loan As Joe Biden Entered White House.
The cornucopia of government-gimmes is vast. There are “loans” which are forgiven, i.e. free money such as the PPP “loans;” government subsidies and tax breaks designed to serve the interests of a single enterprise or cartel; low-interest loans unavailable to tax donkeys; sweetheart contracts where the private cartel/monopoly can overbill the government without consequence; toothless anti-trust agencies allow monopolies to scoop up dozens or even hundreds of potential competitors, and skims/scams funded by government largess: Medicare / Medicaid fraud, the student-loan racket, and so on, in an endless profusion of ways to maximize private gains via investing capital in capitol, i.e. bribing politicians and bureaucrats to use the government’s vast powers to enrich the few at the expense of the many.