Oil refinery in coastal Texas | Photo via Wikimedia Commons
Part XXI of the “Back-to-Basics Governance” Series
This columnist respectfully suggests President Biden initiate “fundamental socioeconomic reforms” for 2024 and the four years of an expected second term.
It has also been suggested that President Biden emulate President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and innovate a weekend “fireside chat” by inviting other policy and decision makers (like a Cabinet member, a congressional leader, or a state governor) to join him in discussing the suggested socioeconomic reforms. This way, ordinary folks, especially taxpayers and voters, may be able to learn more about President Biden’s socioeconomic ideas for the next 11 months.
Voters will understand that presidents cannot really do much to control inflation, as even the world’s biggest economy is apparently dependent on crony capitalists and cartels. For instance, the U.S. crude oil and refining industry is like a cartel, following in the footsteps of OPEC. American oil companies follow the OPEC pricing when their cost of extracting and refining local crude oil is less than half (or just a third) of the cartel’s export price per barrel.
However, presidents can initiate concrete steps to achieve fundamental reforms. For example, President Biden requesting the Department of Justice and Attorneys General of interested states to study the filing of price-gouging criminal charges against top executives of the U.S. oil cartel companies. Even the threat of filing such a criminal indictment surely would bring down the immediate reduction of energy prices, which is one of the major reasons for the higher inflation rate.
This column discussed how President Biden could “reinvent” the U.S. economy and turn capitalism into “cooperative economics.” Thus, the American economy and politics can become populist cooperative movements of the people, by the people, and for the people.
Mr. Biden has only to persuade other down-the-ballot slates of his party to sign “Covenants with the People” that will pledge back-to-basics structural changes in federal, state, and local governance.
“However, presidents can initiate concrete steps to achieve fundamental reforms. For example, President Biden requesting the Department of Justice and Attorneys General of interested states to study the filing of price-gouging criminal charges against top executives of the U.S. oil cartel companies.”
Perhaps in a second presidential term, a visionary system of governance can be maximized by reinventing a U.S. Commonwealth of Countries, as explained in this idea: President Biden Can Reinvent an “American-led Commonwealth of Countries.”
Organizing nations that were either colonies like the Philippines or present possessions like Guam, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and even Liberia (founded by formerly enslaved people in North America) is doable. Those invited to join such a commonwealth of countries can expand the economies of the commonwealth countries and the United States.
This column also suggested that they be appropriated as investments in the matter of U.S. military assistance and economic aid (USMAEA).
We also suggested that the Biden Administration study the implementation of the I2D2 proposal of then American Express CEO and Board Chairman James Robinson III. Please read a reprint of his journalist’s discussion on the I2D2 International Debt & Development.
The topic has been discussed and reprinted in several Filipino-American publications. The “I2D2” proposal was discussed in this online publication on January 26, 2021, in this article, A Biden B2B Doctrine for Economic Empowerment (Part IV): The “I2D2” Proposal.
The economic-study group of The White House and its economic advisers can read the articles in this column about the “Biden Back-to-Basics (B2B) Doctrine”, the “B2B Governance,” and the so-called “Mississippi River Initiative” for a start.
If asked, a group of writers from the Philippine Daily Mirror can meet and work with members of the economic study group to fine-tune the various proposals.
