Eso’s Chronicles 149

Banks Rob Governments of ‘Efficiency’… (8)
© Eso A.B.

Not a Paper Poppy

…’symbolic efficiency’ that is. One of the main reasons why government politicians praise ‘democracy’ is the consequence of their loss of believability and trust. Praising ‘democracy’ excuses one for being stupid and yet knowing it works among bullies of roughly equal strength.

As I began to write this blog, I was thinking of Haisenberg’s ‘uncertainty principle’ http://www.aip.org/history/heisenberg/p08.htm and that it involves what is known as‘quantum jumps’, the latter, in lay language, being something like a jump or a slide off the top of a tomato into a pool of tomato juice. The tricky thing is whether—while I am falling or sliding through the air—the tomato will turn into tomato juice deep enough for me to dive into and swim.

I was soon diverted from such thoughts by an economic force majeure propelling a tsunamis wave across the ocean from the shores of Cyprus. The message embedded in the pulse was a negative one, and kept repeating itself over and over: “’The Symbolic efficiency of governments’ is basta, dead for good!”

In the past, I have described ‘symbolic efficiency’ as ‘charisma’, which is a term from (hot) mythology rather than the ‘cool’ language from scientism (Žizek). In this case, however, for certain political reasons the preferences of cool and emotionless scientism win out. Besides, the words do not cease to be synonyms.

Be that as it may, financial tsunamis are waves straight out of ‘quantum mechanics’, a miraculous transformation of abstract physics into ‘symbolic efficiency’  under the control of Western banks at the expense of government credibility, making the latter uncertain and subordinate entities.

The collapse of the ‘symbolic efficiency’ or ‘charisma’ of governments was caused—interestingly!—by the demands made by the secularized populations of one of Europe’s most workaholic and disciplined countries—Germany.

The German people and Germany have an interesting history that began with life in the wood and a mountainous landscape combined. While the wood harbored the ordinary German ‘folk’, the castle provided a focus for their fantasy (most of the fairy-tales of Brothers Grimm serve as an example). In the East, the great expanse of Tartary (now mostly Russia) was wooded flatland, and the focus of the people was by way of fairy-tales on a far away king or tsar. If I lived in Novgorod and wanted to visit the king’s castle at Tsargrad or Byzantium, I could either try walk or paddle a boat there, or have my shack in the wood grow a chicken leg and make a hop there with every dream. By contrast, in Germany the king, the princes and princesses, were relatively close by: a sack of peas or beans with a hole in it sufficed to mark the path to the Schloss and back.

The proximity of the German ‘folk’ to their leaders made for an efficient relationship. The ‘folk’, wise about the best hiding places (the swamp) offered by the wood, expected their kings to lead by example. They understood that leadership by example is inseparable from leadership by courage and self-sacrifice. If the example was not forthcoming, it was realized by staging a successful rebellion. Thus, the Germans people and their leaders had an enduring tradition of a symbiotic and mutually advantageous relationship.

Unfortunately, the coming of so-called ‘modern times’ destroyed the cultural space of an empire with many small kingdoms. The bonds established by the charisma of ‘symbolic efficiency’ were weakened when ‘they’ and ‘we’ went their separate ways.

Nevertheless, the ‘they’ of German leadership maintained their charismatic ties with the ‘folk’ by successfully replacing the self-sacrifice of their woe-tans [physicians http://www.14words.net/2012/04/who-is-wotan.html, known among the Baltic tribes as ‘vaide-loshi’ (vaide=wound, moan), healers by sympathetic magic] with the practice of war. It is possible that this was achieved with the help of the Vikings, who replaced self-sacrifice with especially gory sacrifices of their prisoners. One favorite method was known as the ‘spread eagle’, which entailed slicing open the victim’s breast cage, then spreading it open to expose the inner organs. The peasants or pajans long remembered this by thus spreading the owls that made nests in their barns by nailing them by their wings to the barn doors as a warning to passers by. Since the owl was also a very ancient symbol of wisdom, its cruel death warned that no stranger should think themselves ‘clever’ enough to plot harm.

In other words, the tradition of self-sacrifice as essential to the mechanics of maintaining a community was replaced by provocations that led to war. Self-sacrifice was forced upon people by their leadership through a ‘timely’ engineered conflict. The deaths caused by the war served to cement all who suffered from it into a close knit community. Though a lie and a deliberate misconstruing of God (the big Other) as an Act of Love, death of innocent loved ones brought by ‘demons’ made the symbols of the community sacred and efficient nevertheless.

The death of old and sacred traditions did not happen in the bat of an eye of a get-rich-quick Prince. In fact, it took many centuries. Though the most extreme example is taking place only now, indeed, just last week, a radical weakening of government charisma as a necessary and an ‘efficient symbol’ was brought about by Germany. One may argue that the failure of Stalin to self-sacrifice himself after his bloody rule was the direct cause for the failure of the Soviet Union to survive. It is no different with Hitler’s Germany. Though Hitler is said to have shot himself, there is no proof that he actually did so. [General Rommel took a cyanide pill with two generals as witnesses, and was dead in five seconds.] Not surprisingly, the governments of ‘democratic’ rulers who believe that it is their ‘human right’ not to die often manifest uncertainty about the ability of the nations they lead to endure.

In our own days, the Germans, the ‘folk’ have clearly voted in favor of their banks and Money as replacements of their big Other. One is tempted to compare the last (and weak) Soviet leader Gorbachev with the German leader Merkel http://www3.pictures.zimbio.com/gi/Angela+Merkel+Opening+Gorbachev+Exhibition+fPcZEZjdASGl.jpg. Though Merkel may last, it will only be because Merkel supports and maintains the German people’s Money as an ‘efficient symbol’. After the trauma (catastrophic inflation) forced upon Germans after WW1 by the violence of the Great Powers, and the resolution of that trauma through Nazism, Nazism has not gone away, but portrays itself as naïve and blitzes Cypriots instead of Jews.

The dead-end of governments that have become ‘deficient symbols’ has backed our 'globalized' society into something of a void. Just a few days ago, the leaders of the European Union, most of them unelected and obliged for their power to heredity or wallets of oligarchs, gathered over the body of Cyprus and cried “Victory!” The cry came as the banks of the West (their princely swords turned into Law that writes laws for thieving Snakes, i.e. government and its undying bureaucracy) imposed on the people of the tiny island of Cyprus a ‘penalty’ for being alive http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/21/us-cyprus-parliament-idUSBRE92G03I20130321 and wishing to live according to the example set by the life-style of Germany. As the link shows, the European Central Bank (ECB) is ready by an act of legalized blackmail to starve the Cyprians, one and all. Of course, hunan rights will be observed, and no one’s rib cage will be turned into bloody wings http://www.newbedford.k12.ma.us/srhigh/oliveira/Pict0615.jpg .