So it’s finally come to pass – America has embarked on the same road down which ancient Rome marched to its ruin: Uncle Sam not only subsidizes bread (by subsidizing wheat production) but now also circuses.
As my friend David Gasten asks in an e-mail, “if the Cirque du Soleil is so popular, then why does it need to be subsidized? They didn’t need to subsidize Michael Jackson’s funeral.” True dat!
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Is David being sarcastic?
http://news-briefs.ew.com/2009/07/09/michael-jackson-memorial-cost-la-14-million/
I would submit that the government providing or subsidizing bread and circuses began long ago and this is only the latest manifestation of it.
You mentioned wheat subsides, but wheat isn’t the only grain that is subsidized nor the only crop, because the word bread implies more than just a slice of Mrs. Baird’s best.
And, certainly the Cirque Del Soeil is not the only entertainment subsidized and promoted to distract the populace.
My own personal opinion is that the American version of the “bread and circuses” of distraction and crowd control began approximately 1948, give or take a year.
I know this is not the best of form, and for this I apologize to the hosts, but this is simply too important to chance not being seen by the maximum of the people: I copied my own post from the Rouges thread:
On the subject of government and its control and/or desire to control, watch this one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWs12ccbOiE
Spread the word, this is really really bad.
Don, I never pictured you as someone who would say “true dat”. Thanks for the laugh.
Your son may very well leave the country to find opportunity as an adult. I think it’s come to that. Sadly.
Don is discovering that unlike Typepad, Wordpress allows his inner Cajun to emerge.
The irony is, as the comments by some people on this forum plainly reveal, the very popularity of something such as Michael Jackson or Britney Spears is, for them, an argument against the market.
The people who support subsidizing such things as Cirque du Soleil have clearly decided that they have better taste and or are more knowledgable than the masses on such issues and know better what people should want.
Marcus,
If I am being redundant to your knowledge and experience then just ignore this; but I believe that we all can agree that most people here realize that it is possible, wise, and desirable to support full fledged free market yet not necessarily like, want, or approve of everything that market brings.
Most of us know that the rose of freedom brings thorns as well.
What’s thorny about it?
Personally, I don’t care for Michael Jackson’s or Britney Spears’ music either. So, I don’t buy their songs.
Apparently I will be paying for Cirque du Soleil though.
What’s thorny?
Well it is my own personal opinion that people like MJ, Spears, Madonna, a high percentage of the rap artists, many so-called comedians of the modern ilk, etc. all use the appeal of moral degeneration, to the young and ignorant, to maximize their profit from their so-called entertainment; and they do so with utter disregard to the long term consequences of those influences.
Free speech and freedom of the press gives us the beauty of the rose in countless moral and profitable uplifting writings and speeches, and at the same time brings the thorns of such as the moral degenerates mentioned above.
I don’t buy or listen to their recordings either but that isn’t the real issue with me. My attention is on my fanatical devotion to freedom and free markets.
Finally my point in responding, to the implication in your first paragraph, in the first place was to ponder on just how many of us here would actively seek to censor Mj or Spears, and prevent them from selling in the market? I don’t see much of that kind of thing talked about here.
Well, when I posted my comment I didn’t have you in mind though you seem to have taken it personally.
Marcus,
Re; People who have decided that they have better taste. There’s that. There’s also that politicians are “meeting people”. I.e., the kind of people who feel important when others have to listen to them. I.e., control freaks.
Crap. We’re doomed.
Bread and circuses. So who will play the part of Nero, Caligula?
Nero has to be Obama. The Broadway date, etc…
The Bob Guccione-produced movie, Caligula could easily be about Clinton.
A $30 million loan for 900 jobs? Seems fishy. Furthermore, I am very skeptical that the jobs will be new–I don’t know how they are calculating those figures, but bringing a circus seems more of a relocating of activity rather than new economic activity.
Section 108 is also supposed to be for “revitalizing” neighborhoods–
“The Section 108 Loan Guarantee Program is a source of financing alotted (sic) for the economic development, housing rehabilitation, public facilities rehab, construction or installation for the benefit of low- to moderate-income persons, or to aid in the prevention of slums.”
Is Hollywood a slum? Or made up of low income folk? I have been there once, and don’t remember it as such. Anybody know details of where this complex is?
Once they subsidize housing there, it will become one.
I have tried to activate your device for shutting off e-mail notification of new comments, to no avail. Having my mail box flooded with the musings of Martin Brock was bad enough, but now Daniel Keuhn, too?
Enough! Cease!
I just got my first email of that type. There’s a link to confirm that I want it. So how do I say that I don’t want it – ever? Does choosing “Do not subscribe” do it? If so, that should be the default.
Also, the choice to not use disqus(?) should be at the top, not the bottom. At the very least, make it easy to click, if not the default condition.
Oh, I see now. Do not subscribe seems to stay default once chosen. A cookie then.
While Michael Jackson’s funeral may not have been “subsidized,” I wonder what the cost to the LA taxpayers was for all the extra police hours, etc. to manage the event?
around $1 million.
Cities and states already subsidize other entertainment – MLB, NFL, NHL, dozens of booze malls that have popped up around the country around such venues – why not CdS?
Here, at least, you are onto something- the ending or curtailment of these other wasteful subsidies rather than their expansion….
Yeah, Jackson’s funeral was subsidized. The city paid over a million for security (police overtime) and several hundred grand in other expenses.
I’m wondering to what extent that can really be considered a subsidy.
When the police put more boots on the streets to cover a protest like, for example, the G20 economic summit protests, are the protesters being subsidized?
Please. Mercy. No more e-mails.
At least the “subsidization” of MJ’s funeral was in the realm of public safety; I assume MJ contributed far, far, far, far, far more than that to the public purse during his tenure in CA.
The subsidy for the Circus is in the realm of “PLEASE COME HERE AND HERE’S MONEY WE DON’T HAVE!”
I have the same feeling here that I had in Iceland when I went to visit and explore the ice caves in the lava flows. I stood there at the entrance to a vast dark empty hole that extended as far as I could see with what light filtered into a short distance.
I feel this attempt at discussion with you is very similar.
HTF could you come to the conclusion or charge me with taking it personally, are you really Daniel Kuehn in disguise?