Image via WikipediaThis is the first blog on my TITANIC NATION website. The full title of the book says what it’s all about so it may be helpful to explain how it came to be written.
I have long been fascinated with how and why some economies work, yet some do not. I was influenced initially by my grandmother, the remarkable Vida Lentaigne, who came from a wealthy background – her father was a highly successful textile industrialist – but was greatly concerned at the poverty around her. Then I became interested in my own right because the Ireland I grew up in was an economic disaster. I wondered why this should be so, and when I studied Economics, History and English (at Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland) I devoted particular attention to Economics. Ireland was in a parlous state in the Sixties and I wanted to know why and what could be done about it.
It never occurred to me that an individual couldn’t make a difference. I had seen my grandmother work for the public interest with great success, and saw no reason why I couldn’t do the same thing in my own way. I still don’t. “We The People” is us.
My great grandfather was both a capitalist and a Liberal and saw nothing incongruous in being both. He believed a free enterprise system should drive the economy, but that it was no more than good business to have a contented workforce who could afford to buy the goods he produced. He was therefore a believer in reasonable working conditions, adequate pay, and vacations for his workers – all rights that we now take for granted in developed nations (except in the U.S.). He would be totally amazed to discover that in the U.S., the world ‘Liberal’ is regularly used as a pejorative term, roughly akin to ‘Communist’ because it meant, and it still means, nothing of the sort. Certainly he regarded it is no more than Commonsense Capitalism.
At Trinity, I studied multiple economic systems and focused on trying to find out what worked best. Over four decades later, that still remains my focus.
Many people aren’t interested in how economies work (but can be veritable geniuses in other areas). I lack talent and interest in sports or soap operas, but follow economies with the passion of a sports enthusiast. And that kind of intense focus tends to mean that one learns a great deal over time. Indeed, throw in my Masters from Trinity, and arguably I became an expert.
In the Eighties I become heavily involved in trying to change Ireland’s high tax, high tariff, statist economic system into a low tax, free trade, business friendly economy. In fact I even set up a company so I could study the current approach firsthand. I also lobbied and made speeches though, oddly enough I didn’t write so much in those days. Nothing seemed to change at first. Vested interests were entrenched and strong. But then the views of our rather small group of reformers began to develop traction, and suddenly Ireland took off like an economic rocket. True, it is in trouble right now, but that is because of excess and greed. The core economy remains in vastly better shape.
That Irish experience was further proof to me that, however unlikely it might seem, an individual could make a difference. Though clearly one needed help, I developed a real sense that a relatively small but committed group can have a vast impact – even against the most powerful and entrenched vested interests.
America has been good to me, so in 2001 I emigrated here with my children. As normal I continued my economy watching although this time I had switched my primary focus from Europe to the U.S. Gradually, as I observed and read, I formed the view that there is something really wrong here and that such structural flaws could be traced back to the early Seventies. In brief, it seemed to me that much of what we were being taught was a myth, that “We The People” were certainly no longer in control, that the Middle Class was losing ground, that this truly Great Nation had become a Corporate State run by the Rich and Corporate Special Interests – and the Nation as a whole was in decline.
I had forecast the 2008/9 Great Recession in 2004 (although not scale of the corruption in the Financial Sector) and started TITANIC NATION in 2007. It has been much re-written and updated. Events soon proved my concerns well justified, but I still don’t believe the majority of Americans fully understand the scale of the problems that we face, nor appreciate the true causes; and we are woefully short of solutions.
TITANIC NATION addresses both issues, and is my way of fighting for a country and a people that I feel great affection for; and as a way of saying “Thank you.” But, its primary objective is to stimulate We The People into heading into a new direction.
American decline is not pre-ordained.
Victor O’Reilly MA
Seattle, WA 20010
