The Sins of Stability

America’s Flawed Morality

The King of the Hill wants to keep things as they are, regardless of what others think, and it takes a technological or social revolution to change things. The guys on top will do anything to prevent that.

Amazon took on local businesses and won because it adapted to the new marketplace better than anyone else. No, I’m not saying they did so fairly, honestly, morally, or are in any way better than the local small business, but they won. For better or worse.

Netflix destroyed Blockbuster by adapting to the new technologies that the internet brought with it and by having a better business model that wasn’t based on having a near monopoly on the rental business. Get rid of late fees, and reward early returns with a new disc!

Innovation and change on the business front require a certain level of stability. Without a functioning postal service, Netflix wouldn’t exist, and neither would Amazon. They both needed a stable society with a functional social infrastructure that included a robust and well-funded postal system to get started. Investment in oil infrastructure requires political stability, and investment in everything else needs a stable price of petroleum.

This highlights the starkest possible difference between America and Russia. Russia launches wars and occupations to prevent countries from extracting resources so that Russia can maintain its own oil and gas industries as monopolies. America invaded Iraq to increase and…