I've just published a new video entitled "Focus on Neoliberalism."
Smug video commentators are pointing to the crisis in Venezuela and saying "That's what happens with socialism: eventually you run out of other people's money to redistribute."
But those who use that talking point are displaying ignorance about economics, while obscuring the ideology that is actually destroying Venezuela: Neo-Liberalism.
Neoliberalism is causing tremendous suffering to millions of men and women and children in Venezuela, but the problem is even worse than that because neoliberalism is running amok in many other parts of the world, with horrendous results.
The fact that you rarely even hear this word mentioned in the popular media or in social media is a strong indication that those who promote neoliberal policies (and benefit from them financially) would prefer that you don't understand it, or even know that neoliberalism exists. And they deliberately teach outright mis-information and lies in economics textbooks at all levels, so that most people are unaware of how money is actually issued and what policies could actually benefit the wealth of nations and the individual men and women in those nations.
Many of those who promote neoliberalism would actually label the policies that led to the exponential growth of the wealth of the united states in previous decades as "socialism," and they have been actively dismantling those policies since at least the 1980s, and burdening future generations with crushing debt to obtain necessities (such as an education) which their own generations were able to obtain without taking on such debt.
But they'd much rather tell you to focus on "socialism" so that you don't focus on the real problem -- and the real solutions which are possible, and which are not even that difficult to implement.
I would argue that neoliberalism is actually part of a centuries-long (and in fact millennia-long) campaign "against the gods." As I have explained in previous posts such as this one and this one, neoliberalism can actually be characterized as "neo-feudalism." Feudalism is a form of exploitation and oppression and appropriation which surfaced in Europe following the imposition of literalistic Christianity and the suppression of the ancient wisdom given to humanity in the world's myths and sacred stories.
My most-recent book focuses on the Norse myths, the record of which is primarily preserved in two texts from the land of Iceland -- a country which in recent years has been hit very hard by the negative effects of neoliberalism. Not long ago, I wrote a blog post about the story of Thor's visit to Olaf Tryggvason (a story which also comes to us from an Icelandic author, writing about 200 years after the conversion of that country to literalist Christianity), in which the subject of the oppression of the people -- and the fact that the gods always stand ready to help put an end to such oppression -- plays a central role.
I would argue that the issues we see playing out today are actually part of an age-old struggle. Part of that struggle includes the imposition by some of a false mentality of scarcity -- and thus it is perfectly understandable that proponents of that false mentality want to cut men and women off from the awareness of the Invisible Realm, the realm of the gods, which is actually the infinite source of all the blessings and resources we enjoy in this seemingly-material realm of this incarnate life.
We need to wake up and become aware of this reality. The ancient myths which were given to every culture on our globe, at some time in remote antiquity, stand ready to help us reconnect with the wisdom that is the precious inheritance of every man and woman, even to this day and in this modern time.
