Cult of Personality

Once upon a time, there was a dim-witted, insecure, egomaniacal despot who completely destroyed his country's economy by promoting ultranationalistic policies that worked against the interests of the misinformed people who lived there. I am, of course, referring to Nicolae Ceauşescu (pronounced "Chow-chess-cue"), the dictator who ruled Romania from 1965 until 1989. For much of this period, Ceauşescu also subscribed to the single-minded belief that the only fake news that anyone could trust was that which his own administration had a hand in producing. He is the propaganda poster-boy for totalitarianism.

"Hey, baby. Are you into brutalist architecture?"

Nicolae "the Dick" Ceauşescu was the third of ten children, born in a small farming village outside of Bucharest in the winter of 1918. His homeland had been ravaged by the marauding armies of the First World War, and throughout his childhood, when he was just a wee dictator tot, the only life he knew was one of extreme poverty. Meanwhile, in nearby Russia, the Bolsheviks had only recently taken over, but Communism had yet to really catch on in the same way in Rumania (or even Roumania, if you prefer), whose borders and spelling were in a state of flux throughout this period.

Ceauşescu himself showed little interest in matters of reading, writing and world geography. After fourth grade, he was all like, "Screw this. I'm out of here... Later, nerds!" I'm paraphrasing, but this exodus unceremoniously marked the end of his formal education. Now free from the drag of elementary school, at the wise age of eleven, he moved in with his sister in Bucharest so that he could finally get a real job at a factory like all of the other kids.

Isn't that how it goes? As soon as one kid gets a dangerous, exploitative job at a factory, pretty soon they all want a taste of that sweet, sweet child labor. His sister also taught him how to repair shoes, which was how he earned a living through most of his teenage years. In his off-time, however, Nicolae was also an aspiring Communist, and when he was eighteen years old, he was arrested for distributing commie propaganda and for getting into physical altercations with police on behalf of striking workers.

Eager to make a name for himself, Ceauşescu endured several stints in prison on a number of related charges. At one particular forced-labor camp, his cellmate was a guy named Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej. Old Georgie-Boy mentored his young pupil in the ways of being a good Communist. He may have even taught him a thing or two about how to read and write. Meanwhile, the guards beat Ceauşescu so severely that it left him with a permanent stutter, which may have contributed to the insecurities that plagued him as a leader. More on that later. In 1944, Nicolae escaped from prison and was given safe haven by the Union of Communist Youth. Distinguishing himself as a real go-getter, armed only with that fourth-grade education and a willingness to throw punches as needed, he served as their secretary for the next year and a half.

In 1947, Ceauşescu married Elena Petrescu, who shared Nicolae's fondness for functional illiteracy, as she too had dropped out after elementary school to find work in the city. The two lovebirds had actually met back in 1939, but due to his frequent visits to prison as a "Communist agitator," this made planning a wedding rather difficult. And what goes with concrete grey, anyway?

However, by 1947, the Communist Party had effectively taken over the Romanian government, and once Ceauşescu no longer feared forced labor and imprisonment, he got married. I'll leave it to you to make your own joke. As a rising star in that country's political scene, party leaders appointed Ceauşescu to be the new Minister of Agriculture, a title that he held until 1950. He was then given the rank of Major General and was appointed Deputy Minister of the Romanian Armed Forces, despite not having any military background whatsoever and looking like the bad guy from the Police Academy movies whenever he stepped into his ill-fitting uniform.

In 1952, his old jail-buddy Gheorghiu-Dej then became the leader of the Communist Party in Romania, which effectively also made him the head of state... because there ain't no party like the Communist Party. Seriously, by this point, due in large part to Romania's shared border with the Soviet Union, communism was kind of the only game in town. Remembering his protégé from prison, Gheorghiu-Dej greased the way for Ceauşescu's own rise to power within the party ranks.

When Gheorghiu-Dej died in 1965, Ceauşescu sidestepped much of the commotion caused by political in-fighting and quietly assumed control of the Romanian Communist Party as a compromise between quarreling factions. Shortly thereafter, he appointed himself to be the nation's first President, and mirroring the politics of the Soviet Union at that time, Ceauşescu promised the people of Romania a friendlier, more modern Communist state. Now with 20% less political imprisonment!

For a while, people were indeed granted more freedom to travel, experience other cultures and purchase imported goods, including entertainment products from the West like movies and music. That isn't to say that the Iron Curtain had been replaced by hippie beads exactly, but restrictions on personal liberties were somewhat relaxed with the expressed purpose of improving the standard of living of the people who lived there.

But then in 1971, Ceauşescu took a trip to North Korea... and when two wacky dictators get together, you had better be ready for some hijinks. This whole event is so batshit crazy that you really should just watch the clip. Seriously. And after watching this, I can't help but wonder if Dennis Rodman was expecting a similar reception.

I'm amazed that they even let him past the metal detector.
The guy is practically Robocop.

Nicolae Ceauşescu was so impressed by the whole thing that he must have started wondering why he couldn't expect an insanely choreographed display of Romanian patriotism when he got back home. Where were his giant murals? Where was his mythology? He decided that it was time for a new Romania, and this was probably the only time in modern history that anyone has ever gone to North Korea and then returned home to say, "You know, I wish my country was more like that."

According to historian Peter Gross, Ceauşescu's new directives called for "stronger revolutionary propaganda in all reaches of society, especially in schools and the entertainment and cultural world." The Romanian secret police force, known as the Securitate, helped enforce these policies.

All telecommunications to the outside world as well as many phone calls within the country were monitored. Typewriter ribbons of alleged conspirators against the state were also confiscated. Neighbors became distrustful of neighbors, because nobody knew who was on the payroll as an informant.

Although Romanians were technically allowed to apply for exit visas during this period, this was a process that usually took about four years, during which time their livelihoods could be completely destroyed by the Securitate. This, combined with the knowledge of what would likely happen to family members left behind, served as nearly fail-safe deterrents for defection.

Throughout the 1970s and 80s, Ceauşescu wanted absolute independence from all foreign influences, as he claimed that this was what was best for the Romanian people, and he achieved this by instituting Orwellian policies upon them. According to Gross, "It was not just words such as democracy, progress, justice, socialism, the people, and truth that took on meanings of their own, devoid of reality. The value attached to other words, sentences and whole works took on the kind of unreal or duplicitous meanings that permeated all human relations." 

Nicolae and Elena Ceauşescu, seen here teaching children how to smile.

In real life, however, Ceauşescu showed that he didn't really understand Communism too well after all when he decided to clear out a bunch of apartments where poor people lived so that he could begin construction on an absurdly gargantuan Parliamentary Palace, which ended up being the second biggest administrative building in the world after the Pentagon. From his perspective, it apparently seemed like labor and capital well spent.

Capitol-ism?

At the same time, Ceauşescu also wanted to balance his country's budget and pay all outstanding foreign debts while adopting a strictly isolationist trade policy. These combined factors effectively crushed the Romanian economy in a big bad way. Meanwhile, much of the country's agricultural products, which was their main industry at the time, were being shipped off to the Soviet Union as their own people starved.

Ceauşescu insulated his fragile ego from criticism by building a cult of personality around himself. He wasn't just a hunter, for example, he was the best hunter who ever lived. Never mind that the animals he shot had all been drugged first and that nobody was allowed to shoot anything bigger. There's that insecurity, which seems to be a trademark of dictators.

Come to think of it, he also had small hands... or maybe it
just seemed that way because they were always balled into fists.

Social theorist David Berry notes, "All ideology was effectively filtered through press and television, but it was in the latter that the state managed to create a fantastical image of society. Television was a medium that produced and 'stage-managed' one of the greatest and most grotesque spectacles of theatre and it projected a carnivalesque atmosphere of happiness, gaiety, collective fulfillment and participation in the creation of Ceauşescu's image of the socialist man." 

By 1989, there were thirty-six state-controlled newspapers operating in Romania, as well as nine radio stations and one television channel that broadcast only three hours per day, supposedly because Ceauşescu "did not want to tire the population" by having them stay up late watching television. Because of the theatrical absurdity of the state-controlled media, in the late 1980s, it was estimated that only twenty-two percent of the population watched Romanian TV and only forty-three percent read Romanian newspapers. However, according to Berry, approximately sixty-nine percent of all Romanians listened to the radio, which Ceauşescu had foolishly deemed to be "not as important" as these other forms of media. In actuality, though, in December 1989, Radio Free Europe helped incite a revolution. 

Truth dollars? That sounds legit.

In the westernmost city of Timisoara, Romanians heard news reports on Hungarian radio, which was broadcast from just across the border, that Reverend Laszlo Tokes of the Reformed Church had been evicted from his place of worship for speaking out against the Romanian authorities in his sermons. This brought several hundred people to his church to support him in protest. By December 15, that number had grown to over a thousand, and the conflict between them and the Securitate quickly turned violent. Over the next two days, what began as a revolt marked the beginning of an all-out revolution. Meanwhile, the Romanian media remained silent about the events that were taking place in Timisoara, just as news anchors had not informed the Romanian people of the student uprising at Tiananmen Square or the events that had taken place in several of the other recently fallen Communist states in the region. 

By December 18, Timisoara's main post office was closed indefinitely and all links to the outside world were severed. Two days later, almost immediately after Ceauşescu had returned from a state visit to Iran (because it's always fun to trade tips on how to run an oppressive regime), he went on national television to condemn the uprising, hypocritically referring to the demonstrators as "fascists." On the afternoon of December 21, he ordered the citizens of Bucharest to leave their homes and places of work to attend a televised rally at the Palace Square as a show of support for the Communist government. 

Before a crowd of several hundred thousand, after a few minutes, Ceauşescu's speech could no longer be heard over the shouting of the angry mob. The television feed was soon interrupted, but protestors then assumed control of the cameras and resumed the broadcast so that the Romanian people could see the conflict that was unfolding on the streets of Bucharest. Their despotic ruler of twenty-four years, as well as Elena, the idiot intellectual – who some say was even more despised than he – were forced to evacuate the scene by helicopter.  

Later that day, television and radio "journalists," still under state control, announced that Minister of Defense General Vasile Milea had committed suicide, even though it was widely suspected that Ceauşescu had had him executed for not following orders. This provided the catalyst for the Romanian army to unite with the protestors in bringing down the national government. 

On December 22, as Nicolae and Elena Ceauşescu attempted to escape from the city, protestors – now with the support of the army – took over Channel 1 in Bucharest and made the public acutely aware of the events that were transpiring within their borders. Petre Popescu, one of Romania's most-watched television news anchors, went on the air and announced that, "For 25 years we [at Romanian television] have lied." He then promised that, "From now on we will tell the truth," and "Whoever wishes can come to us and speak freely." 

For the next couple of weeks, people lined up outside the studio for the opportunity to speak out against the government that had wronged them for all those years. Meanwhile, the Ceauşescus were captured and held in custody until their two-hour trial in a kangaroo court on December 25, immediately after which they were executed. On December 27, footage of their execution was broadcast on Romanian television, although some skeptics remain convinced that their execution at the hands of the firing squad was likely faked, furthering suspicions that the Ceauşescus were actually victims of a coup that had been carried out under the cover of widespread revolution. 

Either way, in a matter of less than a week, Romanian television had gone from heavily censored, pro-state propaganda to the gruesome televised execution of their two most hated public figures. I'd call that a pretty big change. 

Once a revolution has taken place in the minds of the people, not even the will of a brutal, manipulative dictator can prevent it from manifesting in reality. 

The Not-So-Great Gatsby

Most of us know Walgreens as the place where grandparents like to do their Christmas shopping, but did you know that they were once in direct competition with Al Capone?

Back in 1920 (two years before F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote what many critics would later refer to as "the Great American novel" -- much later, in fact, as the book wasn't really widely read until GIs were given paperback copies during WWII), Congress passed the Volstead Act. Although the name evokes images of goat sacrifices, pentagrams, and the summoning of the Dark Lord Volstead, it was actually something far worse. The Volstead Act prohibited the “manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors" throughout the United States, thereby marking the beginning of Prohibition.

Of course, as long as there have been laws, there have been loopholes. 

"That sure was a good idea to put that empty barrel down there."

Throughout this period, doctors could count on a steady supply of patients by being liberal with their prescription pads. They would commonly write prescriptions for booze, treating ailments ranging from tuberculosis to chronic depression to general boredom to... yes, alcoholism, and drugstores at this time made bank filling them.

This is how Walgreens expanded from 20 stores in 1920 to 525 in 1930: they were one of the few places that openly sold alcohol to their customers during Prohibition.

Unlike Capone, what they were doing was perfectly legal -- similar to medical marijuana dispensaries of today, except these drugstores were protected by federal instead of state law. As author Daniel Okrent points out, this is also how Jay Gatsby made his fortune: the old sport owned a lot of drugstores. 

So if you ever wondered what made the Great Gatsby so darn great, the answer is medicinal hooch.  

For many doctors at the time, it was also a matter of principle, as they didn’t like being told how to do their jobs by politicians and bureaucrats. If they wanted to prescribe bottles of whiskey to patients with "hysteria," that was their prerogative. Besides, the medicinal properties of alcohol had been widely accepted for centuries. It was not only an effective pain killer, but it was also an antibacterial agent that almost certainly saved millions of lives before people even knew what bacteria were. Plus it has been making people seem more attractive for millennia, and nine out of ten doctors agree that it tends to make parties a lot more fun. 

Incidentally, during Prohibition, the typically prescribed dosage of liquor for children was 1/2-2 tsp every three hours. 

According to the bottle, it can be used for
"Summer Complaints of Children,"
and "For Adults, Double the Dose."

Sleep well, kids.

Monopoly Money

Contrary to popular belief, monopolies are not illegal in the United States. In fact, the federal government only gets involved when it can be proven that a monopolistic corporation has engaged in price fixing or similar noncompetitive practices, which doesn't happen very often. When it does, the Federal Trade Commission and the Supreme Court essentially get to decide which are the "good" monopolies and which are the "bad" monopolies.

And we both know which kind this is. 
Not once has a game ever ended without someone saying "Fuck this."

Groucho Marx once said that history repeats itself, first as a tragedy, then as a farce. Actually, wait... now that I think about it, that was Karl, sometimes referred to as the "least funny of the Marx Brothers." Commonly portrayed as the number one arch-enemy of American values, Marx waxed philosophical in envisioning this thing he called "communism" as a sort of economic democracy that would be administered by the state. It was all theory, of course. He never saw it come into fruition within his lifetime (nor, do I suspect, would he want to take credit for the perverse ways in which his ideas have historically been implemented), but the basic concept was to create a government designed to protect the people's interests, particularly when it came to the exploitation of their labor.

In Das Kapital (1867/1883/1894), Marx criticized what he saw to be the insatiable greed that fuels capitalism, arguing that the principle of constant expansion is inherently flawed. In order for shareholders' profits to continually increase, that revenue has to come from somewhere. According to Marx, it comes from artificially inflating a commodity's exchange value relative to its use value (charging more for less), increasing worker productivity or simply paying employees less -- at least relative to inflated commodity prices. More often than not, it's all of the above. In other words, that executive's bonus came from you, the employee and consumer. To Marx, money is an abstract commodity that draws its value from the backs of the proletariat (the people who actually do the labor), but which is then accumulated by the capitalists who own the means of production.

He also believed that eventually these companies get too big for the public good, and only a strong central government could intervene on the people's behalf. As a man who spent most of his life in abject poverty, Marx simply saw communism as being the next logical step of human civilization after the collapse of capitalism, which he believed was inevitable because of the unsustainable wealth inequality that it fostered. To him, an ideal system of government represented the coming together of the citizenry in order to protect their common interests from the greedy capitalists, who he saw as being something akin to the feudal lords of yesteryear. Here in the US, people seemed to think so, too, as the term "robber baron" was applied to these men of extraordinary means.

In real life, we all know that rich white guys rarely go to prison.

History has proven that in practice, many of the same fundamental flaws exist in both of the "Big C" economic systems... specifically the potential for corruption by those who are granted more privilege or authority than others. That is, even if we had a perfectly equitable system of commodity and labor exchange, or a form of government that was clearly better than the sum of its parts, we still have imperfect human beings to make terrible decisions on everyone else's behalf.

Although Marx was writing about conditions that he saw in London and elsewhere in Europe, similar circumstances existed in the US at that time. Wealth inequality was at record levels, and so steps were taken by the United States government to break up some of these monopolies. Not all of them, mind you, just the "bad" ones.

The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 was designed to allow private parties to bring suit against a company that they believe to be a bad monopoly. The burden of proof therefore rested on the prosecution to prove how their clients were financially wronged by this company as a direct result of its monopolistic practices. If a lawsuit was deemed viable, it was then filed by the US Attorney General to appear before the Supreme Court.

Go ahead and congratulate yourself if you
knew that this wasn't the Supreme Court.

One of the first such cases was raised against Standard Oil, owned by John D. Rockefeller, who was a major proponent of social darwinism. Adjusted for inflation, he is the richest person who has ever lived... because he controlled the oil market at a time when America was rapidly industrializing. Back in 1890, the Standard Oil Trust accounted for 88% of all oil production in the US. Two years later, they were determined to be in violation of Sherman Antitrust Act. It then took another 19 years before the mega-corporation was finally split into Amoco, Texaco, Exxon and Chevron, all of which were still controlled by Rockefeller and his heirs. So you tell me who won.

I'll give you a hint: they're wearing fancy hats.

In 1893, the Supreme Court decided that labor unions could also constitute a monopoly that warranted government investigation and dissolution if deemed to be in violation of antitrust statutes. In the United States v. Workingmen's Amalgamated Council of New Orleans, the final score was corporations one, labor unions zero. That was over a hundred years ago. Corporations have long since taken the pennant.

In 1895, the US Attorney General filed an antitrust suit against the American Sugar Refining Company, which controlled a whopping 98% of the domestic market at that time. However, this was determined to be a "good" monopoly because they weren't doing anything that was expressly illegal. Besides, it wasn't like Americans could ever get too much sugar!

In 1911, the executive branch engaged in a similarly futile attempt to break up US Steel. This was a corporate conglomeration created a decade earlier by JP Morgan (the actual guy that Uncle Moneybags from Monopoly is based on) and another insanely rich dude named Elbert H. Gary. US Steel controlled 67% of steel production in this country at a time when steel was in record demand, all thanks to the booming auto industry and the looming world war. Despite that US Steel had essentially bought up all of its competition, the Supreme Court ultimately decided that they should be allowed to continue on with business as usual, consumer be damned.

Theodore Roosevelt, who was President from 1901-1909, built a reputation in Washington as a "trust buster." In many ways, Roosevelt was the personification of how this nation saw itself. He was a rugged badass who once finished a speech even after being shot by an attempted assassin. No shit. "Teddy" Roosevelt also had a face that was made for national monuments and turn-of-the-century political cartoons. That said, despite his well-honed reputation as a card-carrying progressive, Roosevelt was really more "pro-regulation" than he was "anti-monopoly."

...unlike most people who have ever played the board game, who are resolutely on the side of anti-monopoly.

"Carry a big stick and hire a decent illustrator."

Roosevelt did launch the antitrust suit against the Northern Securities Railroad Company, which was owned by perennial supervillain JP Morgan and which ultimately dissolved in 1904 as a result of the Attorney General's investigation. This is essentially why Roosevelt is a national hero: he proved that an elected representative of the American people still held more power than the wealthiest of its citizens. At a time when it seemed like the robber barons had won, he showed America and the world that democracy wasn't dead yet.

In 1914, Congress passed the Clayton Antitrust Act in an attempt to clarify what exactly constituted a bad monopoly, because many of these cartels were just becoming legitimate corporations, finding legal loopholes that allowed them to circumvent the antitrust laws. The Clayton Act tried to close some of those loopholes. It basically said that if these companies were determined to be limiting fair competition or charging more for their goods or services as a direct result of their monopolistic practices, then this was bad. Otherwise, bigger could only be better. Right?

Hollywood sure thought so. By 1929, the "Big Five" studios (MGM, Paramount, Warner Brothers, Universal and RKO) accounted for about 90% of the film industry, controlling every aspect of their movies from production to distribution to exhibition. The "studio system" produced motion pictures in much the same way that Detroit was producing cars and it thrived throughout this period, which is why this is commonly referred to as the "Golden Age" of Hollywood.

In 1948, this all came to an end with the United States v. Paramount Pictures, where the Supreme Court determined that the system as it existed did in fact constitute a monopoly. The studios could either sell off their production, distribution or exhibition facilities. They chose to divest themselves of their theaters. Since it was at the end of the economic food chain, the studios could still charge independent theater owners exorbitant fees to rent their film prints. In fact, this is basically why popcorn usually costs more than your movie ticket. Theaters make most of their money from concessions.

As in: you concede to pay $8.50 for about 20¢ worth of popcorn.

Of course, now just about all of those independent movie theaters have been bought up by giant chains. American Multi-Cinema, for example, better known as AMC, is now the biggest theater franchise in the country and the world with nearly a thousand movie theaters and over ten thousand screens in the US and Europe. They're also owned by a Chinese company... but that's a different article altogether.

You may also be thinking, "Hey, aren't there still just a handful of movie studios that make almost everything that plays at the cineplexes? And haven't ancillary markets like television and home video more than made up for any lost revenue from not owning theater chains?" If so, give yourself a pat on the back for being so darn smart.

Today, there are six corporations that own most of American media: Time-Warner, GE, Disney, News Corp, CBS and Viacom.

This is Jeff Bewkes, the CEO of Time Warner:

...properties of which include Warner Brothers Pictures, HBO, Cinemax, CNN, Time, TBN and TNT.





Here's Jeffrey R. Immelt, CEO of GE:

...which controls Universal Pictures, NBC, USA, E! and the Weather Channel, etc.






And this is Robert A. Iger, current CEO of Disney:

...which, in addition to the Disney studios and theme parks, owns Marvel Studios, Pixar, Miramax, ABC, ESPN, A&E and Lifetime, among other media properties.






Of course, we can't forget Rupert Murdoch, CEO of News Corp:

...who oversees operations of 20th Century Fox, Fox, Fox News, FX, HarperCollins, Barron's and the New York Post. From what I can tell, he was also the inspiration for Emperor Palpatine in Return of the Jedi.





Here's Leslie Moonves, CEO of CBS:

...which, in addition to your grandparents' favorite television channel, also owns Showtime and the publisher Simon & Schuster.






And then there's Robert M. Bakish, who only recently replaced Sumner Redstone as the CEO of Viacom:

...which owns Paramount Pictures, MTV, VH1, Comedy Central, etc.






Ok, now what do they all have in common?




1. They have never been in my kitchen.

2. They all look like the antagonist from a Rodney Dangerfield movie.

3. Each of these guys has more money than you and I could even begin to comprehend.

4. Something about their gender and complexion, and maybe the socioeconomic class that they were born into. I can't quite put my finger on it...

I know what it is now. They all look like models from a catalog that sells yacht shoes.

These six obscenely wealthy white men wield influence over a vast majority of mainstream American media. This is where most of our public discourse occurs, so consider that these men ultimately control much of the national conversation. This seems like the kind of a situation that would constitute a "bad" monopoly. Then again, I don't write the laws. Lobbyists do.

Here's another one. Did you know that there are ten companies that produce just about every manufactured commodity that you buy at the supermarket? Look at the label. Unless it is the store brand (which, even then, is most likely manufactured at the same plants, just with different packaging), there is a very good chance that it was produced and distributed by either Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, General Mills, Kellogg's, Mars, Unilever, Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble, Nestlé or Kraft/Mondelez International.

You can go ahead and check. I'll wait.

Again, these are all apparently "good" monopolies. Your house is probably full of products from these ten companies. But doesn't it seem at all troublesome to think that once again, there are ten CEOs who ultimately control so much of what we ingest and consume? Also, doesn't it seem strange to think that Fancy Feast cat food and Gerber baby food are made by the same company? Or that both Taco Bell and Cap'n Crunch are owned by Pepsi?

I'll do one more. There are currently four banks in the United States that control over seven trillion dollars in assets. That is nearly half of our GDP. Bank of America holds about $2.2 trillion, Citigroup has approximately $1.7 trillion, Wells Fargo has about $1.9 trillion, and JP Morgan/Chase is responsible for an astounding $2.4 trillion dollars. Yes, even long after he is dead, JP Morgan lives on in the name of one of the richest banks in the world.

To put these astronomical figures into perspective, if you laid two trillion one dollar bills end-to-end, it would reach further than the distance from the earth to the sun and then back again. Seriously. I'm no communist, but that seems like a pretty obscene accumulation of capital.

Beware of the robber barons. The American trust is broken.