Financial, Economic and Social Mood Update (May 1, 2026)
My most recent monthly blogs have tackled the all-important issues of global wealth and income inequality and how to address this problem by taking on the top level of estate planning (offshore trusts and holding companies which allow multinational corporations to legally avoid taxation) and by monetizing the asset base of planet earth which will address the issues of not only unequal wealth and income distribution but of environmental degradation (also called “climate change” and/or “global warming”).
These issues affect everyone and even all forms of life (not merely human life) on this planet. In order for these issues to be addressed effectively, this must be done on a global scale. As we saw during the long Depression era in the 1920s to 1940s, authoritarianism and extremism left unchecked (or checked too late) affects the entire world in the worst way. A similar specter of extremism has raised its head in our time but we appear to be addressing this issue earlier than our forefathers did: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/3b8zpcHfnv8.
The primary focus of this month’s blog is the history of representative government on earth. As we shall see, even so-called “democratic” forms of government have historically limited enfranchisement (the “voter franchise”) to this day. Extremist political groups on the far-right wing seek to limit voter franchise because they realize that in any test of the entire population they are demographically doomed to be nothing more than a tiny minority. The demographic situation on the entire planet earth today is not unlike how things were when (white) minority political rule came to an end in southern Africa in particular in Zimbabwe-Rhodesia in 1980, in Namibia in 1990 and in the Republic of South Africa in 1994.
The most developed form of a supra-national state today is the European Union which does have a popularly elected parliament – lower house of the legislative branch of government located in Strasbourg in the Alsace. The rest of the world has similar organizations / entities by geographic region but none of these bodies are as advanced as the EU. Recent news about the EU: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9lCArg48rg.
The form of global government we have is the United Nations (since it was launched in San Francisco in 1945 at the end of World War Two) and this was a continuation of the League of Nations which emerged after the end of World War One (1914-1918). The UN has merely one legislative branch which is more similar to an upper house of parliament or even a legislative body of ambassadors where every nation state or country has one representative appointed by its own national government.
The idea for the League of Nations (1920-1946) was born out of the Concert of Europe (1814-1914) which emerged after the end of the Napoleonic Wars (1789-1815 which eventually became not just European but global in nature). Almost the entire planet was under European colonial or imperialist influence and the nation-states of Europe met in a legislative body located in Frankfurt (the “Reichstag” of that time), Germany known as the Germanic Confederation (1815-1866). The reason for this was clear: most European countries were constitutional monarchies and their heads of state were “nobles” or “blue bloods.” All of these noble families were (and are) ultimately of German ancestry due to the fact that they all emerged from the end of the old Roman Empire in A.D. 476. All of the modern nation-states of Europe and even North Africa are descended from these proto-states formed from former Romans and the then Indo-Germanic (Indo-European and Barbarian) tribes who migrated all over Europe and North Africa. For example, modern Iberia (Spain and Portugal) were founded by the Visigoth Germanic tribe (western Goths). Modern Italy was settled by the Ostrogoth Germanic tribe (eastern Goths). The Goths originally lived along the Baltic coast near West Prussia. Modern day France was founded by the Frankish Germanic tribe (Franconia is a region in modern day Bavaria in southern Germany). Modern day England was founded by the Angles, Saxons and Jutes – all Germanic tribes. Saxony covers much of historical northwestern and south central Germany. The Jutes came from the Jutland peninsula in modern day Denmark and Schleswig in northern Germany.
The Germanic Confederation (1815-1866) was itself a descendant of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation (800-1806) which was dissolved due to Napoleonic conquest and aggression. The old German “Reichstag” was much like the “Reichstag” of the Germanic Confederation and of the UN today – it was basically a stand-alone upper house of parliament where each state had its own ambassador. For instance, the modern day descendant of the former British Empire (the Commonwealth of Nations) is ruled by the British Royal Family – the House of Windsor. “Windsor” is an artificial name adopted during World War One due to anti-German sentiment at the time. Their real surname is “Saxe-Coburg-Gotha” which is a small duchy located in the modern day German state of Thuringia.
The “Reichstag” of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation (800-1806) met at times in the German cities of Augsburg, Speyer and Regensburg. The “Reichstag” of the Germanic Confederation (1815-1866) met in the German city of Frankfurt on the river Main. The “Reichstag” of modern day Germany has existed in the German city of Berlin since 1871. The Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation is the political ancestor of modern day Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Italy, San Marino, the Vatican, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Andorra, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Hungary, Poland and Romania. When one includes every nation-state represented in the older versions of the German “Reichstag” this expands to modern day Spain, Portugal, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, Iceland, Denmark, Greenland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Serbia, Kosovo, Albania, Malta, North Macedonia, Bulgaria, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and beyond. Prior to World War One in 1914 almost the entire planet was ruled either by Europe or by colonialist and imperialist powers who imitated the Europeans in the USA and Japan.
In 1900 up to 35 percent of the human population on earth was white, European and/or Caucasian. That figure is now down to 8 percent. From 1797 to 1897 (the peak of European demography in South Africa), modern day South Africa was up to 29 percent white. Now that figure is down to just 7 percent. Right wing claims that majority rule by the ANC (African National Congress) in South Africa is extreme are simply not true. At the end of white minority rule in South Africa in 1994 whites owned 87 percent of the land – today this figure still stands at 72 percent. This is merely normal evolution of ownership – not state sponsored socialism.
Representative government in the English-speaking world traces its original roots to the “Charter of Liberties” in 1100 and to the document known as the Magna Carta in 1215. The first “election” in England took place in 1264 and the first political parties in England were established in 1658 with seats being awarded by party in 1661. One must keep in mind that the percentage of the entire English population represented here was below one percent. The only “enfranchised” individuals were Caucasian male members of the nobility above a certain age who owned a certain amount of property on which they thus paid a property tax.
This “Westminster” parliamentary system was eventually exported to places such as the American Colonies (which became the USA), Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Even with the growth of “democracy” the percentage of the population who chose the actual national and state (provincial) political leaders has remained low. In the USA it exceeded one percent of the entire population for the first time in 1804, two percent in 1808, six percent in 1828, 7 percent in 1840, 9 percent in 1868 (after the American Civil War which “ended” slavery which continued to exist in de facto form for up to 100 more years in the former old Confederacy), 15 percent in 1920 (after the female vote became law in much of North America and Europe), 17 percent in 1928, 18 percent in 1932, 21 percent in 1936 (think about the legal empowerment of trade labor unions), 22 percent in 1964 (think about the civil rights laws due to the likes of JFK, RFK, MLK and Lyndon Johnson), 23 percent in 1984 and 24 percent in 2020 (Biden/ Harris).
The Electoral College gives the USA an indirect way of electing a President and it has also given more enduring political stability compared to continental Europe which follows the format of the French Revolution of 1789. One problem which needs correction is that there have been US national elections where the popular vote loser has won more electoral votes due to a system designed to protect the rights of smaller population states going back to the present US Constitution in place since 1788. If current “gerrymander” trends in the USA continue (where one party seeks to disenfranchise everyone who does not vote for them) then the entire American system may have to be replaced with continental European style “proportional representation.” An informative video by Heather Cox Richardson: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=So8G_E-a6ws.
If the United Nations were expanded with a much larger (and popularly elected) lower house of parliament the issues of the inequality of wealth and income, environment degradation and keeping world peace could be addressed more effectively than they are today. The number of registered voters in the world today is in excess of 4.9 BILLION. Laws vary by jurisdiction (by country) as they do in the USA by state and locality. Some jurisdictions have no legal vote (such as Saudi Arabia, Niger and Somalia), some countries have as many registered voters as they do inhabitants (such as Syria) and some countries have more registered voters than they do inhabitants (such as Ukraine likely due to the Ukrainian diaspora since 2022). Note that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is still an absolute monarchy, which is very rare.
An informative video forecasting a possible global famine due to the war of aggression against Iran started by Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/ywU3SECzBh4.
