The title of the main essay in the Early April issue of The Privateer (Number 524 - published on April 10) is: Attention - Deficit Disorder(s)!
The Privateer title is a play on words introducing a quite different subject, that of burgeoning global government deficits and the underlying reason for them. But as you probably know, the "real" term "attention deficit disorder" (ADD) has come into vogue over the past quarter century or so and supposedly describes a medical or neurological condition. It was originally "diagnosed" in children, especially in school age children, and has now grown to the stage where it is said to afflict adults too.
Here is a definition of the "condition", taken at random from one of the thousands of sites on the net which deal with the subject.
Attention Deficit Disorder: "ADD/ADHD is a neurological disorder. According to the National Institute of Health, between 3% and 5% of the population in this country are affected by ADD/ADHD. The major symptoms of the disorder are distractibility, forgetfulness, inability to concentrate, poor attention span and impulsiveness.
There are some people who have genuine brain disorders. There are some people who are genuinely and massively affected by allergies (said to be a major contributor to ADD). There are some people who are slow learners because, through no fault of their own, they are of low intelligence. And there certainly are some kids who are royal spoiled brats because they have never encountered any guidance or discipline in their lives.
There are also people who don't like to be patronised. There are some people, even very young people, who do not like to be forced to do something without any reason being given for the action. There are some people who enjoy concentrating on things which interest them and become annoyed if they are distracted. There are some people who are fortunate enough to be quite intelligent or VERY intelligent and can grasp a concept or a group of concepts faster or MUCH faster than most of their fellows. And there are a great many people, especially very young people, who resent and rebel against any type of forced conformity.
All the people in BOTH of the groups described above are routinely "diagnosed" as suffering from ADD. The "cure" is drugs. The results, especially in school-age children, is very well summed up by a description of a typical young "ADD sufferer" named Tim:
"So why have Tim's mother and teachers remained convinced that he's plagued by an inability to pay attention? Tim has learned that he doesn't have to behave, or do anything else that he'd rather not - the lesson of a therapeutic culture that doctors and parents have allowed to run wild. Says Mr. Tucker: 'Kids say to themselves, 'I have this problem, which I really don't believe, but it gets me off the hook...If my temper tantrum is viewed as something I can't help, I'll learn very quickly that I can get away without doing things that I don't want to do, because you think that I have this disease.' We see this all the time."
"In short, ADD kids are learning an early lesson in the mores of 1990s America: Don't take responsibility for your own conduct; instead, declare that you're in the grip of uncontrollable impulses, seek professional help, and start making excuses. Mrs. Griffin may be satisfied with the result - she's happy to shelter her son from all but the most innocuous aspects of life, and she thinks that Tim would be uncontrollable without Ritalin. But it makes an observer wonder: Aren't parents, teachers and doctors shirking responsibility for raising kids by substituting a phony therapeutic approach for old-fashioned discipline?
The operative phrase here, and one that applies to almost ALL avenues of modern life, most certainly including modern economies and markets, is this one: "...substituting a phony therapeutic approach for old-fashioned discipline."
For ADD, the therapeutic approach is the administration of (addictive) drugs such as Ritalin, Adderall, or Clonidine. For modern economies and markets, the equivalent therapeutic approach is the juggling of interest rates, the fabrication of economic "statistics", and the manipulation of markets. In both cases, the "treatment" is said to be beneficial to the "patient". In neither case does the "patient" (mostly young children in the case of ADD) have any say in the matter.
With the compliance of adults, both parents and teachers, the "disciplining" of children is now done using habit forming drugs. With a distressing number of adults, such forms of "discipline" are no longer necessary, the lessons of childhood already having been learned. Nowadays, most people just "go with the flow". Even most of those who don't have long since become inured to "the way it is".
Nowadays, there is increasing unease and resentment against financial markets (which aren't going anywhere in particular) and a growing chorus of protest about market "manipulation". It's pathetic really. The same people who were cheering the Fed on when they were cutting US rates eleven times in 2001 are now getting increasingly offended because the Fed has raised rates seven times since mid 2004. Is one "manipulation" and the other not "manipulation"? Of course not. So what's the difference? The difference is that lowering rates makes things easier for most people (the ones who are borrowers not savers) and raising rates makes it harder for them. Things that make things easier can't be "manipulation", they're "beneficial to the patient". Things that make things harder must be "manipulation", should be avoided at all cost, and if they do raise their ugly heads, must be "cured" immediately if not sooner.
A MARKET, properly defined, is any location where people freely come together to voluntarily trade the fruits of their efforts with one another. When the medium of exchange in such a "market" is not under their control and can be "inflated" or "deflated" at whim by an outside agency (such as a Central Bank or government), there is no market, properly defined. This is what we have today, all under the pretense of making things more "fair and equitable" for everyone.
In "therapeutics", the ancient principle is: "First - do no harm". In any study of proper economics, the first principle is: "First - do not interfere". Sadly, these principles have been more than lost sight of, they have been violated at every turn. In therapeutics, the result is the "discovery" of ADD and the "treatment" of same. In economics, the equivalent of ADD is the Keynes' "animal spirits" attribute of businessmen which his policies were designed to assuage and/or compensate for.
In children, SELF-discipline is learned through example and by exposure to consequences. Having been learned, in adults, it is a necessary ingredient of self-respect. A self-respecting adult does not disrupt the peaceful and voluntary activities of others by demanding universal conformity to his or her whims. Yet that is the practice of those who diagnose ADD at the first hint of rebellion and those who manipulate markets for the "benefit" of the "adult/children" deemed incompetent to make their own decisions.
In the case of both therapeutics and economics, the proper basic principles have been turned on their heads. The most grotesque form of it in "therapeutics" is the drugging of children. In economics, it is the manipulation of markets in general, and Gold in particular. Gold, in its role as money, brings discipline to markets by removing the influence of ANY outside agency to their functioning. That is anathema to the