Most of my adult life I’ve called myself a “social anarchist”. Make no mistake: I am (and always have been) fully aware that I am a white, privileged, male American. Nonetheless, my early studies of politics led me to believe that:

  1. Bureaucracies don’t work. The larger, they are, the less effective they are.
  2. Individual freedom is more important than collective welfare.
  3. Any system created by humans will be corrupted by humans.

My conclusion was: don’t bother.

The United States was founded by a bunch of anarchists. Actually, it was founded by a bunch of privileged, wealthy, white, land-owning anarchists. Often, they were the cast-off nonconformists of European privileged society that placed pedigree above merit. Every system has its flaws …

Now I’m 36 years old. I spent most of 2009 traveling this beautiful wide world. And, unfortunately, I have seen the status quo that is hidden from view for most first-world privileged folk. It’s washing up on the shores of Koh Lipeh in Thailand in the form of Coca Cola bottles. Today, it’s washing up on the shores of the Gulf Coast in the form of crude oil.

I’m an engineer by training. Engineers like to think about problems of optimization. Human systems are just that: our attempt to optimize for certain variables. Unfettered capitalism is one such system. It tries to simplify everything by creating a system around the notion of “currency” — a universal unit of measurement from which and into which any resource can be “converted”. We’re optimizing to maximize the amount of currency in the world. Guess what: it’s working. However, that’s not the right variable against which to optimize! We should be optimizing for happiness, not wealth. My wealthiest friends are the least happy people I know. Past the point of “freedom to spend your time as you wish”, wealth inevitably makes people unhappy.

Like all such systems, pure capitalism is too simple. It looks great on paper. However, it doesn’t look great on the shores of small Pacific Islands — it doesn’t look great on the shores of Louisiana right now, either. The system itself is imperfect.

Does this mean I’m casting off my “social anarchistic” tendencies and becoming a Democrat? Hardly. Actually, I could never align myself with either Democrats or Republicans, since they are both too moderate for me. Politics is not linear. There is more than one axis. I am neither “left” nor “right”. In terms of social / moral politics, I believe the government should “butt out” (yes, gays should be able to marry, all psychoactive substances should be legalized, etc.). In terms of fiscal policy, however, my recent observations have made it very clear to me that regulation of huge corporate beasts is not only necessary, but imperative.

I find it quite depressing that so many of the world’s brightest people, many of whom are my friends (and / or family), fail to see that governments are no longer the enemy of “the people”. Well, maybe they are. But they’re no longer the most powerful enemy. Huge, multinational corporations now rule the world. And until we reign them in, everyone will suffer, including libertarians, startup entrepreneurs, and day laborers.

Unfortunately, I am not a political scholar. I am a businessman, an inventor, a technologist, and an entrepreneur. I don’t offer any solutions in this blog post. I’m just ranting, as usual. For this (and all of my other shortcomings), I apologize.

If you’re in California, though, I will offer this: don’t forget to vote today!