We recently mentioned that Lawrence Lessig was playing down his advocacy of free culture, in order to focus his next ten years on understanding the causes of the corruption of (and not just ‘in’) the political process.

An author who has preceded him is Ravi Batra in his new book: The New Golden Age: The Coming Revolution against Political Corruption and Economic Chaos.. Batra sees corruption, and the philosophy of trickle down economics, which makes the rich richer and the poor poorer, as the key to understanding the current systemic crisis. He predicts a short period of chaos and political revolt, in the next ten years or so, but followed by an age of transparency and renewed but equitable social and economic growth. His predictions have credibility as the author has predicted the fall of communism, and the Iranian revolution.

It also makes sense on an intuitive level. The systemic crisis we are facing, such as global warming, can simply not be solved at the present level of interest-based politics.

Excerpt 1: The revolt against the corruption of the political process

“I know of three noneconomists, including Democrats and a Republican, who have written books that challenge the brutally exploitative orthodoxy. Michael Dorgan is a U.S. senator from North Dakota. His book is Take This Job and Ship It. Michael Blomquist is a real-estate businessman, whose book is entitled The Housing Bubble: An American Dream or Nightmare. Jim Cunningham is a Chemistry PhD, and former vice president of Advanced Micro Devices. His book is called Hollowing Out: America’s Flight from Manufacturing into a Perilous World of Economic Fantasy. All these books have self-explanatory titles and make much more sense than what some Nobel laureate economists contend–namely, that no one is ever fired, or that people simply choose to be unemployed.18 The point is that the public frustration with the status quo is rising, so much so that even noneconomists are beginning to question it and have gone to the extent of writing books about it.

Then there is Dick Alexander, the CEO of Global Shop, who has penned a manifesto entitled Democrats: An America for All the People (Returning America to Greatness). He is extremely worried about America’s bleeding manufacturing industries, and is doing his utmost to bring my plan for an export exchange rate to the attention of key lawmakers. He has been a great inspiration to the present work, as he writes, “We believe that America, at its best, is a kind and caring nation, which wants to promote and promulgate its highest moral standards and values.”19 This is the kind of message that “we the people” need to hear and adopt in our voting behavior.

Other popular book titles that reflect the public rage are The Buying of the President, The Buying of the Congress and How Much Are You Making on the War Daddy? A Quick and Dirty Guide to War Profiteering in the Bush Administration, among others. As Frank Rich of the New York Times notes, “Americans are angry. The government has failed to alleviate gas prices, the economic anxieties of globalization or turmoil in Iraq. Two-thirds of Americans believe the country is on the wrong track.”20 But this is just the beginning. By the end of the decade, there will be a lot of unrest, fury and chaos in society, and revolutionary change will appear as the only viable solution to restore sanity to the economy.”

Excerpt 2: From Acquisitor’s Democracy to Intellectual Democracy and Warrior’s Democracy

“Essential features of a democracy are elected officials; the basic freedoms of speech, media, assembly, location and religion; equality before the law, and a right to have a job affording the minimum necessities. Since of the four classes, only three take turns to rule, there can be three types of democracies: an acquisitor’s democracy, an intellectual’s democracy and a warrior’s democracy. What is familiar to us is the acquisitors’ democracy, where money is indispensable to the electoral process. Here elected members of legislative assemblies and the executive branch are either affluent themselves or are supported by the wealthy. Without the backing of wealth, few even dare to contest elections.

The state machinery in an acquisitors’ democracy operates to further the interests of the rich; as a result the latter grow richer and richer over time at the expense of other classes. Such is the form of government prevailing today in the West, India, Japan and much of Latin America.

Intellectual’s Democracy

For a democracy to exist, it is not necessary that wealth play an important role in politics. People can get elected without the backing of money, as has been occurring recently in the formerly Marxist dictatorships of eastern Europe. Elections in Poland and the Czech Republic require little backing of the moneyed class. The Russian president and parliamentarians also need little support from the wealthy to get themselves elected. Of course, Russia does not have a democracy yet, but it will soon, in about a generation.

A government in which a majority of the elected come from the class of intellectuals, where basic freedoms are respected and where money plays little role in the electoral process may be called an intellectual’s democracy. In an acquisitor’s democracy, top positions in government usually go to businessmen, bankers, merchants and landed magnates; but in an intellectual’s democracy, poets, writers, lawyers, physicians, priests, professors, scientists, economists, and the like hold the reins of government and the administration.

The British parliamentary system soon after 1689 was close to an intellectual’s democracy since the wealthy had no say in elections, and the legislative assembly was under the thumb of the Prime Minister.

Warrior’s Democracy

An elected government in which money plays an insignificant role can also be a warrior’s democracy. A republic, where the topmost positions of the president (or prime minister) and cabinet officers go to the class of warriors, where human rights and freedoms are honored and where wealth is secondary in the electoral process, may be called a warrior’s democracy. As explained in Chapters 4 and 5, the warrior mentality belongs to soldiers, policemen, firefighters, professional athletes and skilled blue-collar workers. Even in a warrior’s democracy the majority of legislators may spring from the class of intellectuals, because the latter are mentally equipped to formulate laws and usually do so in all eras; but the executive branch of the state is mostly in the hands of people with martial qualities.

It is interesting to note that the first president of the United States, George Washington, was an accomplished warrior, and did not need the backing of the opulent to be elected. Similarly, when General Dwight Eisenhower became the president in 1952, money had little sway in his election. All this shows that warriors can get elected in the West without any help from the wealthy, while human rights are still respected. What democracy needs are a constitution, a free press and an educated public conscious of its rights as well as duties. The mentality of the ruling class need not matter in this regard.

The coming revolution will catapult the United States into a warrior’s democracy. This is because the opponents of the prevailing acquisitive regime will have to display extreme courage and valor, qualities that belong only to warriors. Nobody surrenders power on a silver platter. The acquisitors and their cronies will fight tooth and nail before surrendering to the revolution, but their defeat is preordained by the law of social cycle. My calculations indicate that the laws of nature now favor the warriors; these laws will disrupt the status quo, unite the people and goad them into a ballot-box revolt, until the acquisitive regime is deposed.

The entire upheaval could last from 2009 to 2116, but if “we the people” strive hard, it could end sooner. Greatness springs from the abyss of human spirit. It is for us to turn the near-term adversity into lasting bliss. We will have to persevere in order to open a new chapter in the ever-flowing spring of civilization. Our success is assured, because history is about to repeat itself: After the downfall of the American business empire will come a global golden age.

When the ruling elite become brutal, corrupt and exploitative, then natural laws act to bring an end to their rule and put a new class in power in accordance with the social cycle. The acquisitors’ orgy of greed grinds society down to such lows that a golden age must follow. The law of social cycle, the law of supply and demand, the law of reverse justice, and so on, are all laws related to human nature. Such laws interact to bring about societal change in a rhythmic pattern.

In all civilizations, the golden age usually flourished in the warrior eras. In Egypt, India, Japan, China, the West and the Caliphate, the golden era appeared when men and women of martial qualities held the reins. Today, China is in the ascending phase of the age of warriors, and see how fast its economy is growing and its middle class emerging. Compared to where the nation was prior to the communist revolution of 1949, China may be said to be in the early stage of a golden era.

Note that a golden era, according to historians, does not signify a perfect society; it only means a rapid and previously unfathomable advance in many areas of a polity, including the economy, art, music, sports, literature, and so on.”