The modern institution of the presidency is the primary political evil Americans face, and the cause of nearly all our woes. It squanders the national wealth and starts unjust wars against foreign peoples that have never done us any harm. It wrecks our families, tramples on our rights, invades our communities, and spies on our bank accounts. It skews the culture toward decadence and trash. It tells lie after lie. Teachers used to tell school kids that anyone can be president. This is like saying anyone can go to Hell. It’s not an inspiration; it’s a threat.

Listen to the Audio Mises Wire version of this article.

Listen to the Audio Mises Wire version of this article.

In late January and early February, protestors took to the streets of lower Manhattan to “re-occupy Wall Street.” Protestors were there to draw attention to the efforts by Wall Street elites to use their political influence with Congress and the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) to crush the traders—many of whom had rallied around certain groups within Reddit—who had embarrassed hedge funders and cost them billions through the now infamous GameStop short squeeze.

Raghuram Rajan has written a surprising book. Now teaching finance at the University of Chicago, he is an international bureaucrat in good standing, and not a minor one at that; he was chief economist of the International Monetary Fund. Yet far from calling for an increase in “global governance,” as one might expect from someone with his background, he wants to strengthen the local, “proximate,” community.