I was informed of numerous things about capitalism this week. I said on X that I support nationalizing SpaceX because Musk is running his own private foreign policy with Starlink, and that this is my entire justification. What returned was a catechism. Capitalism accounted for his success. Capitalism guarantees the United States’ ongoing prosperity. Private property rights are essentially sacrosanct, and “asset seizure in one persons concept of ‘the national interest’ is a fundamentally communist concept.” Starlink is basically “a commercial network with a TOS agreement, just like any digital service you subscribe to.” The company is simply too big to nationalize anyway, so I ought to stop yelling. One man inquired if I’d like to seize the means of production, and added a smirk so I’d know he was the amusing one.
Starlink is a technological accomplishment, and I have always said as much. It functions approximately two-thirds of all active satellites in orbit, more than all other operators combined, and in one quarter last year it accounted for 97% of satellite internet speed tests worldwide. Ukraine runs its drones on it. This is what critical infrastructure entails. It is the thing individuals cannot do without, and the moment they cannot do without it, the person who owns it holds their lives in his hands whether he requested that responsibility or not. [...]
One person asked if I would also like to nationalize Microsoft, since the Pentagon operates on its software. As of this writing, Microsoft seems not to be pursuing an independent foreign policy in the conduct of a foreign war. The test was not about size or success or whether I liked the CEO. It is whether a private owner has taken something the public cannot do without and made it an instrument of his own will. The concept is much older than any of us. When the Supreme Court allowed Illinois to regulate Chicago’s grain elevators in 1877, it stated that property used in a manner affecting “the community at large” becomes “clothed with a public interest.” Generations of Americans grasped this without needing it explained. It took a generation brought up on Ayn Rand and a podcast microphone to forget this.
I find it hard to be only angry at the men in my replies, because some of what I feel is pity. They talk about capitalism the way earlier Americans spoke of liberty, as the thing the country is for. However, capitalism is a system where the owners of capital retain their profits and invest them in additional capital, which can be beneficial and has never been a justification to exist. You won’t find it in the Declaration of Independence or the Preamble, which speak of justice, the common welfare and the blessings of liberty. These individuals have taken a mechanism and constructed a church around it, and the deity of the church is a man who has informed them that most people “unthinkingly believe whatever their political tribe tells them to believe. Like an NPC in a video game.” They are defending, without pay and with genuine emotion, his right to determine which Ukrainians get to defend [...]
Regarding the law, it is not complex. The Fifth Amendment allows private property to be “taken for public use“ with just compensation. Madison drafted it in 1789, decades before Marx was born, so the communism charge says more about the reading habits of the man making it than about the idea. It would require an act of Congress, a reasonable price paid to shareholders and courts to resolve the disputes. Due process, the thing that these men claim to cherish, is the whole mechanism. And when they warn that Republicans will win again someday and be in control of it, they have stumbled upon the point. Power held by an elected government shifts when the public alters its mind. Power held by Musk is transferred when Musk dies, and not prior.
I wrote back to one of them that once people’s lives depend on a thing, the person who built it does not get to say it is theirs to do with as they want. You exist within a society. When your decisions result in people being killed, the rest of us have a right to intervene. This is the argument. They respond to a different question, the one regarding envy, because envy is the sole motive they can envision for wanting something to be shared.
What they refer to as the end of America is the end of an exemption. For twenty years they have been informed that their talent positioned them above the usual obligations, that the producers are natural rulers and the rest of us are freeloaders waiting to take what they built. They have confused the indulgence of a country with its foundation. The country was founded on the opposite idea, that no man’s private power is beyond the reach of the public’s claim on him.
I wrote back to one of them that once people’s lives depend on a thing, the person who built it does not get to say it is theirs to do with as they want. You exist within a society. When your decisions result in people being killed, the rest of us have a right to intervene. This is the argument. They respond to a different question, the one regarding envy, because envy is the sole motive they can envision for wanting something to be shared.
What they refer to as the end of America is the end of an exemption. For twenty years they have been informed that their talent positioned them above the usual obligations, that the producers are natural rulers and the rest of us are freeloaders waiting to take what they built. They have confused the indulgence of a country with its foundation. The country was founded on the opposite idea, that no man’s private power is beyond the reach of the public’s claim on him.
by Mike Brock, Notes From the Circus | Read more:
Images: uncredited
[ed. An excellent example of why democratic socialism (or democratic capitalism) is a viable alternative to unfettered corporate capitalism. When critical infrastructure is held hostage to the whims of a private individual or any corporation, that's no longer democracy. See also: It’s Time to Take Starlink Away from Elon Musk (Krugman).]*****
Some may object as follows: Musk owns Starlink. Doesn’t he have the right to do what he wants with a business he owns?No.
Yes, America has a market economy. And to make this economy work, we need to respect property rights. But we are, first and foremost, a democracy. And in a democracy, the rights of private property don’t and never have included the right to act against the nation’s interest — where democratically elected representatives of the people, not business owners, should decide what is in the nation’s interest. Capitalism is not an excuse for treason.
Let’s look at a hypothetical case. Taiwan’s air force flies F16s made by Lockheed Martin. Imagine that for some reason — perhaps as part of a business deal with China — Lockheed Martin suddenly moved to degrade Taiwan’s military capability by cutting off access to spare parts, upgrades, munitions, computer networks and more. Would anyone consider such action acceptable, a legitimate exercise of property rights? Surely not. There would be immediate demands that Lockheed Martin reverse its actions — and if it refused, the federal government would step in to temporarily take control of the company.
This has actually happened in the past.
U.S. mobilization during World War II relied overwhelmingly on private contractors. But these contractors weren’t free to do as they pleased. Among other things, the federal government was anxious to avoid labor conflict that might impede the war effort. So the National War Labor Board negotiated mandatory settlements between management and workers.
Some businessmen didn’t want to go along. In particular, Sewell Avery, the chairman of Montgomery Ward, simply refused to comply with the terms of collective bargaining agreements that had been hammered out with the United Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union.
At the time, Montgomery Ward was both a major retailer and a major manufacturer, whose production of tractors, auto parts and more were important parts of the war effort. But Avery placed a higher priority on resisting unionization than on defeating the Nazis.
So in April 1944 FDR ordered the Army National Guard to seize Montgomery Ward’s main plant in Chicago. National Guard troops literally had to carry Avery out of his office:
It’s important to realize that none of these actions were attempts to impose long-term government control of the economy. There was never an intent to permanently nationalize Montgomery Ward. But the principle was clear: private individuals do not have the right to undermine national security. And if temporary nationalization is the only way to stop them from doing so, so be it.
So, back to Elon Musk: In modern warfare, where communication and real-time information are as important as rockets and artillery, Starlink is as central to national security as Lockheed Martin. Decisions about which countries have full access to Starlink’s capacity are as much a matter of foreign policy and national security as decisions about which countries will be allowed to buy and operate U.S. high-tech weapons.
Such decisions cannot, must not, be left up to private individuals. This would be true even if these individuals were patriots who supported democracy and American values. They definitely shouldn’t be left in the hands of this guy.
