Two Slaveries and the Church

 

Waging the long spiritual fight against communism in Eastern Europe and Greater China left little room for self-reflection, which has now come to the forefront of Catholic consciousness. If the Church had the power to initiate an orderly transition from communism to democracy in Eastern Europe, what power did it have, and did not use, to end human slavery? From today’s lenses, the Catholic Churches’ role in 1800’s slavery appears to be participation and implicit approval. This must be reconciled.

Looking back to the 1890s, in the same papacy of Pope Leo XIII, the Church made a switch from being soft on chattel slavery to being tough on the mental slavery of Marxist communism. By this time, the Church had been stripped of its earthly powers, particularly the papal holdings in Italy (prompting the Leonine Prayers in the Traditional Latin Mass). The world changed greatly at the dawn of the 20^th century. France underwent secularization around 1905. Hereditary monarchy was discredited after WWI. For centuries and millennia, monarchs held a special place in state religions, setting the ‘tone’ for the population, and occasionally practicing intolerance towards religious minorities in their realm. For the Church, there was a real threat that monarchy across Europe would be replaced by communism, as happened in Russia. If monarchy was obsolete, and communism intolerable; then democracy, or transitional autocracy (as in Portugal, Spain or the Republic of China), had to be embraced. Unlike most events in world history, the people would decide, through ballot box or popular uprising, their self-determination.  

 In previous generations, the Church’s worldly concerns as landlord and investor had created a close intertwining of Church and the Spanish and French colonies, where chattel slavery was a common practice.  In theory, slaves in French and Spanish colonies had more rights than slaves in English and Islamic areas. In French practice, mixed-race children were born free; while this was not the case in the American South at large. In practice, life was harsh for all agricultural slaves. Work in the Caribbean sugar plantations was known to be a virtual death sentence. Would the Church have placated itself on false platitudes? Emphasis on pastoral care emerged in the late 1800s, with focus on various groups such as immigrants, Black Americans, and Pacific Islanders. In this context, a focus on human liberation became a natural outcrop of charitable work to feed, educate, and care for the disadvantaged. Leo XIII’s successor, the pauper-born Pope Pius X, would understand that proclamations of human dignity had to be backed by action.

Appalachian Serenade

 

For at least the past decade, New Hampshire has been attracting conservative and libertarian-minded individuals from the Northeast, through the Free State Project and personal initiative. Strong gun rights, no state income tax, and boundless opportunities for rugged outdoor activities provide the incentives. The Granite State’s rural areas vote Democratic, while the more educated and urbanized southern part of New Hampshire, closest to Boston, prefer Republicans. This inversion of modern political trends can also be found in another mountainous state: West Virginia.

Lest anyone forget, West Virginia was a solidly Democratic state until Al Gore and John Kerry were nominated by the Democratic Party in 2000 and 2004. A legacy of coal-field patronage and low-wage labor resulted in a highly-unionized workforce and economically progressive politics. Until Obama’s “War on Coal”, it was unthinkable that West Virginia would make efforts to appease the staunch Republican appendage of the Eastern Panhandle, closest to Washington, DC. It already had competitive advantages in being home to the states’ highest average incomes, federal employment, two interstate highways, and a commuter rail line. But nobody can bring back coal: Virginia’s recent elimination of a coal production tax credit, which was was cut for economically ineffectiveness (the environmental reasons are still too touchy to mention), was but one signal that coal is dead or dying, and that clear minds needed to create a new strategy for economic growth in Appalachia.

West Virginia’s Governor Jim Justice (himself a Democrat turned Republican) passed a Right-to-Work bill, once unthinkable in a strong labor state. More interestingly, he has proposed eliminating the state’s income tax. Just west of Washington Dulles International Airport, the freeway splits. The left turn is for Route 7 /Harry Byrd Highway, into the prosperous horse-and-wine country, which is also growing as suburban bedroom communities. The right turn for Route 9 is the road less travelled. The narrow, meandering road heads into the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia, which lies directly north and parallel to Route 7. Using radically pro-growth policies, and seizing on the current political turmoil and stagnant growth in non-metropolitan Virginia, Governor Jim Justice’s goal is to make his road the more travelled road. The experience of New Hampshire shows this to be a real possibility.

 

 

Easter Greetings

 

We've come a long way since last Easter, when public services in most states, and by many denominations, were cancelled. The churches will be "full" this Easter, and I think it will mostly be okay. (Mine is at 50%, with every other pew empty, so people don't breathe on each others' necks).                      In contrast to last Christmas' gatherings that led to tragic loss of life in January, we now have widespread availability of COVID vaccines among senior citizens, and a lower infection rate overall.

Do I expect to see a moderate spike in cases in three weeks? Certainly, especially with the cold weather on the East Coast this weekend, which will keep families indoors. Am I afraid that public health officials will use the explainable blip to cancel open-air graduation plans tentatively scheduled in May and June? Certainly, but I think now is a good time for optimism. 

  

Curation or Censorship? eBay's Very Public Decline

Recently, eBay crossed the Rubicon by prohibiting the sale of now-collectible Dr. Seuss works, relatively obscure books that are now out of print by the decision of the Seuss estate. With that action, among others, eBay lost its market distinction as an online emporium.

At one time, eBay was a unicorn. The online business achieved a level of trust in which customers feel comfortable carrying out large transactions in gold and silver, electronics and jewelry. The scammers are becoming more sophisticated, though, so security is an area where eBay must focus. In this new cybersecurity paradigm, eBay does not have time for nitpicking the merchandise decisions of its core sellers and buyers; nor can afford the overhead of having staff manually cancelling listings.

The premise of the online marketplace is that customers search for what they want and find it. If they can't find what they want, they will take their business elsewhere. I am sure that eBay lost bibliophiles who look for collectible and out of print works. That was eBay's niche in the book market, and they blew it in one week. Amazon and Barnes and Noble remain top sellers of commodity works like in-print books and textbooks. eBay was not competing effectively in that arena, nor should they try.

eBay is still the preferred marketplace of coin buyers. But if they go on a whim to cancel listing of coins from certain countries or regimes, then the credibility of eBay as an open marketplace diminishes for the numismatic community.

Now, staying above the line of the law was a founding value of eBay. Drug paraphernalia and cockfighting tools are banned. Prohibiting these sales likely helped to bolster the reputation of e-commerce. eBay has also engaged in well-understood social policy, such as not selling Hypodermic needles - though this is part of a lively debate on the risk and benefit of access to clean needles: deterrence and mitigation. Early in the current pandemic, it was advisable to stop marketplace sales of PPE- but small , certified, upstart manufacturers lost sales as they could not communicate with eBay et al. that they needed a wider distribution stream that e-commerce could provide. (NY Times)

User experience has suffered: by 2019 users were “bombarded” with irrelevant advertising. Sellers note that the pages have been overrun by “cheap Chinese merchandise”, and that “eBay can NOT operate as another Amazon”. To top it off, the flailing company is cancelling its longtime eBay bucks program in April.

eBay forgot it’s flea market roots, where buyers move on to the next seller's table, if they find one table to be distasteful. The browser does not quit the market, unless the majority of sellers have gone rogue. Or the owner of the market makes bad strategic decisions. 

Harry Byrd: The Bigot Who Closed the Black-White Wage Gap.

Harry Byrd, a segregationist who ran Virginia's political machine in the mid-20th century, is losing his place near the seat of government in Richmond, VA. A statue erected in 1976, featuring the long-term Senator sizing down the federal budget, is expected to be removed from outdoor display. How did he fall out of grace so quickly?

Too recently, White Supremacists dominated the Deep South. In contrast, segregationists were
"racial moderates" in the South, as they were called in their time. Politicians of the later group were often socially conservative, and fiscally liberal, the "Blue Dog" epitaph today. Public health and education improvements occurred in the mid-20th century by a separate and somewhat equal policy. 

 Atlanta, Memphis, and Washington DC hold America's 3 historically black medical schools. These cities, in general, were forward-looking and not in touch with racial attitudes in their surrounding region. Graduates of Black professional schools built a self-sufficiency in border state Black communities that leaders like Frederick Douglas  and WEB DuBois imagined. 

 

Yet in the heart of the Jim Crow era, many African-Americans worked as peanut, cotton and tobacco sharecroppers under the peonage system in "Black Belt" counties. Predominately Black urban occupations such as movie attendants, domestic servants, and shoe-shiners were exempted from minimum wage laws. (This shortcoming was symbolically closed in recent years). 

Federal directives on equal employment in the defense sector during and after World War Two played a key role in leveling the harsh discrepancy between Black and White income. Senator Harry Byrd of Virginia, a Democrat, maintained cordial  relations with President Eisenhower, the later of whom was able to push civil rights bills through a recalcitrant congress in 1957 and 1960. This relationship made Virginia a powerhouse in infrastructure (Dulles International Airport was build with federal funds), technology,  and the defense industry. In major Virginia cities, college expansions were paired with the opening of a Black college. Hospitals opened or were renovated in underserved communities (Credit to the US Government's Hill-Burton Act of 1946). The racial wage gap compressed further.

Source: Virginia Pilot

With an emerging black middle class came legal action that closed the chapter on Jim Crow. Strength of conviction and legal connections led plaintiffs to sue for equal rights. Cases include Morgan vs. Virginia (1946), desegregating interstate transportation; Boynton vs Virginia (1960), reinforcing the 1946 case; Davis vs Prince Edward County, which became part of Brown vs Board of Education (1954); and Loving vs Virginia (1967) on interracial marriage.

If there is evidence that the latter generation of segregationists delivered for minority citizens, it is found in voter turnout. The same Southern Democrats who defended segregation often gained support of Black voters towards the end of the 20th century. Governor George Wallace and Senator Al Gore, Sr, are two examples.

Virginia Pilot Link: https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pilotonline.com%2Fnews%2Fvp-nw-racial-income-gap-virginia-20200915-b5t4cl7p6fa7hkdtufpwrnj34e-story.html&psig=AOvVaw1LnHGSMJxgd3yiDhRFqXd8&ust=1612839349840000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CAMQjB1qFwoTCMisp_ek2e4CFQAAAAAdAAAAABAD

Ride the New Current: Electric Vehicle Charging Stations

 When you type “Virginia Electric Ch...” into a search engine, results for the Electric Chair come up. Electric Charging Stations, the wave of the future, are an afterthought. As far as the adaptation of green transportation solutions go, this is a sad state of affairs, but an opportunity.

DC Fast chargers (DCFC) operate on 450 volt power, which is provided to every commercial and industrial property. There is no fuel leak hazard or noxious fumes. There is no logistics chain- no fuel laden hazmat trucks. The downside is that these fast chargers cost $50000 each, currently. This is one-tenth the cost of a new petrol station, but a price that prevents rapid proliferation.

Drive Electric Virginia has set a goal of making charging stations available to 95% of residents, within 30 miles of their home. This is a barebones system. A short term goal should be saturation in suburban and urban areas, and a charging station at every freeway interchange.

Multiple car and charging station manufacturers are condensing on a standard type of charging outlet, and electric car manufacturers, even Tesla, are providing adapters to their early-adopting car owners. Say goodbye to proprietary standards in the next 5 years or so.

EVgo Triples Fast Charging Network Through The Drive Electric Virginia Program - EVgo

The Educated Working Class

Despite the vocal assertions of mainstream media, student loan debt is not killing millennials as a whole- 2/3 do not have loans as they have paid them off, acquired scholarships or grants (such as the GI Bill for veterans), or did not attend college. Furthermore, the average balance for those with outstanding loans is a reasonable $8000. (The conservative National Review provided these stats). But there are 6% with over $100,000 in loans, and likely a larger group with high five-figure debt: we could say a solid demographic quintile have large outstanding student loans.

Among this group, many face growing balances as a result of low monthly payments and a high interest rate. Many students were taken in for surprise: there is no counseling requirement for undergrad loans. This was the cost of following your dreams into struggling fields like journalism. Existentially, it calls into question the role of higher education: to pursue a passion, or seek return on investment? Historically, attending college was a ROI proposition, with exceptions for the wealthy elite and certain upwardly-striving debutantes. Then if everyone sought the ROI method, society would suffer as a whole. Compensation for teachers, social workers and public advocates did not rise to reflect the cost of increased professionalization in these fields. Low compensation is endemic to career fields with origins in “women’s work” and advocacy.

While the college graduate still out earns the non-college grad, the wealth gap has closed. At age 35, the skilled tradesman has a higher net worth than the loan-taking college graduate
An economic realignment of the tech and COVID eras has occurred. White collar unionization at workplaces such as Google is emerging. This reflects the precarious nature of employment: contract workers without a sufficient war chest  (cash reserve) to mitigate the risks of self employment or small business entrepreneurship.
A decline in entry-level positions makes it more difficult for new graduates to deploy learned skills in a meaningful way. Such self-employment is a principal part of the skilled trades. In the trades, the “get a good job” mantra could bring a middle class income, but creating your own job was the ultimate goal. White-collar professionals must now reckon with the change.

Politically, what can be done? Portable health insurance ( through the Affordable Care Act) is a key enabler. Universal Basic Income would assist in lieu of unemployment benefits
I advocate for student debt relief through interest rate reduction, rather than cancellation of principal. This is the fairest approach considering that a majority of students do make compromises to manage the cost of education, such as attending community college as a commuter student, or pursuing part-time studying while working. 

The college grad is in a different cultural milieu than the traditional working class, but its economic standing is not too far. It is a force to reckon with, electing progressive candidates. The hippie generation recovered its economic standing during the 1980s-2000 bull market; some college educated millennials from the comfortable middle class may not.

There exists dichotomies in political theory: working class vs rich, highly educated vs not; as well as labor vs management.
Senator Marco Rubio, a Republican, has called for a multiethnic working class party. Most likely speaking of  Economically secure part of the working class, holding rare or marketable skills, who is in control of their work life.