In late January, a band of merry men (and women) organized via Reddit and other Internet forums to stick it to The Man. They began buying shares of failing retail chain GameStop to drive its stock price up.

Their target: Wall Street hedge funds engaged in the tactic of “shorting” GameStop’s stock.

Their main weapon: Robinhood, an app which allows pretty much anyone to buy  stock in small amounts. Its stated mission is to “democratize finance for all.”

You’ve probably read 20 explanations of “shorting” by now, so I’ll keep it simple: To “short” a stock is to bet that its price will go down.

Hedge funds bet heavily against — “shorted” — GameStop. Robinhood’s band of merry men and women bet for GameStop by buying its shares, bringing the price up. The hedge funds lost billions.

Naturally, those hedge funds howled. And Robinhood, instead of siding with its users, sided with the funds. It shut down its users’ ability to buy Gamestop stock, pushing the price back down.

Robinhood’s terms of service specify that it “may, in its discretion, prohibit or restrict the trading of securities.” That clause may or may not sufficiently cover the company’s posterior in a legal sense. But in this  application, it gives lie to the company’s name and supposed mission.

With its attack on its own users, Robinhood is stealing from the poor (or at least the poorER) to give to the rich.

In theory, the stock market is about capitalizing companies that offer goods or services, turn profits, and pay dividends to their shareholders. In reality, many traders (including large institutional traders) treat the stock market like a casino, placing short-term bets, collecting their winnings or losses, and moving on to the next spin of the roulette wheel.

Which is fine, I guess, except that the high rollers, in addition to acting as players, consider themselves “the house.” The house always wins in the long term, but instead of swallowing even this single loss and betting smarter in the future, they leaned on the cashier cage (Robinhood) to stop selling chips to smaller players who were on a winning streak, so as to force those players away from the table.

To its everlasting shame, Robinhood assisted “the house” in its cheat. Above and beyond any legal or regulatory price it pays for its perfidy, it’s also outed its own claims of financial “democratization” as deceptive hype.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

• “Robinhood: Stealing from the Poor to Give to the Rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, OpEdNews, 01/29/21
• “Robinhood stealing from poor, giving to rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Wilson, North Carolina Times, 01/29/21
• “Robinhood stealing from poor, giving to rich,” Spring Hope, North Carolina Enterprise, 01/29/21
• “Robinhood stealing from the poor to give to the rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Elko, Nevada Daily, 01/29/21
• “Robinhood: Stealing from the Poor to Give to the Rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Ventura County, California Citizens Journal, 01/30/21
• “Robinhood: Stealing from the Poor to Give to the Rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, CounterPunch, 02/01/21
• “Robinhood stealing from the poor to give to the rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Wahpeton, North Dakota Daily News, 02/01/21
• “Stealing From the Poor to Give to the Rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Queens, New York Examiner  [web and print], 02/02/21
• “Stealing From the Poor to Give to the Rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp,  Queens, New York Ledger [web and print], 02/02/21
• “Stealing From the Poor to Give to the Rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp,  Brooklyn, New York Downtown Star [web and print], 02/02/21
• “Stealing From the Poor to Give to the Rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp,  Greenpoint, New York Star [web and print], 02/02/21
• “Stealing From the Poor to Give to the Rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp,  Forest Hills / Rego Park, New York Times [web and print], 02/02/21
• “Stealing From the Poor to Give to the Rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp,  New York Leader / Observer [web and print], 02/02/21
• “Stealing From the Poor to Give to the Rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp,  Long Island City / Astoria Journal [web and print], 02/02/21
• “Robinhood no Robinhood,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Orangeburg, South Carolina Times and Democrat, 02/02/21
• “Robinhood: Stealing from the poor to give to the rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Dillon, Montana Tribune, 02/03/21
• “Robinhood: Stealing from the Poor to Give to the Rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Roundup, Montana Record-Tribune & Winnett Times, 02/03/21
• “Robinhood: Stealing from the poor to give to the rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Claremont, New Hampshire Eagle Times, 02/03/21
• “Robinhood: Stealing from the poor to give to the rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Dearborn, Michigan Press & Guide, 02/05/21
• “Robinhood: Stealing from the poor to give to the rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Sterling Heights, Michigan News-Herald, 02/05/21
• “Robinhood: Stealing from the poor to give to the rich,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Millbury, Ohio Press, 02/05/21

Eight days ahead of the 2020 presidential election, Gallup reported that “[a] majority of Americans, 57%, say there is a need for a third, major political party. The poll results aren’t an artifact of Donald Trump’s presidency: “These views have been consistent since 2013.”

Easier said than done, though. Duverger’s Law puts it bluntly: “[T]he simple-majority single-ballot system favours the two-party system.”

With more than 140 years to entrench themselves in that system and fortify their position with ballot and debate access barriers to keep competitors broke and voiceless, the Republicans and Democrats  have little to fear.

Or do they?

Trump himself has quietly leaked word that he intends to remain with (and in control of) the Republican Party rather than launching a “Patriot Party” as many in his committed base, feeling betrayed by GOP cooperation in certifying the election results, had hoped and called for.

Perhaps he’s meditated on the fates of three Progressive Parties created as vehicles for former “major party” contenders (former President Theodore Roosevelt in 1912, Senator Robert La Follette, Sr. in 1924, and former Vice-President Henry Wallace in 1948).

Or maybe he’s just biding his time, waiting to see whether the Republican Party remains in his grip, before pulling the “Patriot Party” trigger if that looks like a plausible path back to power. Things could still get interesting.

Duverger’s Law predicts a two-party system in general, not the dominance or even survival of any particular two parties.

The Whigs, split over the issue of slavery, fell on hard times and were displaced by the Republicans in the 1850s. While it’s unlikely that a notional “Patriot Party” could replace the Republicans as a major party, such a Trump-centric effort might enjoy just enough support to take the GOP down with it, creating an opening for something new.

One side effect of the long Democrat/Republican “duopoly” is a sleepy centrism. If political ideology is a 360 degree circle, the “major” parties cover perhaps five degrees in the comfy “center-right” arc of that circle.  As third party (and proto-Trumpian) presidential hopeful George Wallace noted in the 1960s, there’s “not a dime’s worth of difference” between the two in substance, despite their “polarized” presentations.

Could the (third-largest) Libertarian Party or (fourth-largest) Green Party surge into the vacuum left by a Republican fade? Decades of failure to make much headway say Americans aren’t ready for that degree of change.

But if change is coming whether Americans are ready for it or not, both parties have advantages. They already hold a few elected positions (on city councils and in state legislatures, even one Libertarian congressman for a year). They’re veterans at navigating difficult ballot access barriers. They’re tanned, rested and ready.

As the news guys like to say, “developing.”

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

• “The Next Major Party Won’t be a Trump Production,” by Thomas L. Knapp, OpEdNews, 01/27/21
• “The next major party won’t be a Trump production,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Elko, Nevada Daily, 01/28/21
• “Why the Next Major Party Won’t be a Trump Production,” by Thomas L. Knapp, CounterPunch, 01/29/21
• “The Next Major Party Won’t be a Trump Production,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Ventura County, California Citizens Journal, 02/06/21
• “The next major party won’t be a Trump production,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Sterling Heights, Michigan News-Herald, 02/09/21
• “The next major party won’t be a Trump production,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Dearborn, Michigan Press & Guide, 02/09/21

“[T]o restore the soul and to secure the future of America,” President Joe Biden said in his inaugural speech, “requires more than words. It requires that most elusive of things in a democracy: Unity. … This is our historic moment of crisis and challenge, and unity is the path forward.”

The bad news:  Where politics is concerned, “unity” is a pipe dream.

The good news: Where human flourishing is concerned, the ersatz “unity” demanded by politicians like Joe Biden is neither necessary nor desirable.

There’s nothing wrong with unity as such. Unity is desirable when it’s voluntary, unanimous and based on shared values and interests. Otherwise, people should just do their own things.

Nor is politics as we know it about unity as such. It’s about ruling, and about making sure those who disagree with the rulers don’t GET to do their own things. That produces unity of a sort, among those who support the rulers. It also produces polarization between those who do and those who don’t.

Carl von Clausewitz’s aphorism, “war is the continuation of politics by other means,” is equally applicable in reverse.  Politics does not bring an end to Hobbes’s “war of all against all.” It merely recruits the fighters into competing armies, waving different flags and wearing different uniforms.

Such polarization might be ugly, but not as ugly as prospective political unity. Such unity would look like George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four: A society united under the rule of a single party dedicated to stamping out not only dissent but the very possibility and concept of dissent. Thankfully, that’s never happened (even with millions dead or dying behind barbed wire, the Third Reich’s “unity” was contested by its Hans and Sophie Scholls).

Polarization is not the opposite of unity. The two are simply complementary sides of one coin. One both produces and requires the other. To transcend one, we must transcend both. And we can, by trading them in for another coin, the two sides of which are freedom and peace.

How do we get there? Through deescalation and decentralization.

To the extent that politics is war, and it is, the more things government controls, the more things we have to fight about. And the more things there are to fight about, the more we’re going to fight. Every new thing to fight about produces new internally unified, mutually polarized factions.

If we want freedom and peace, we have to reduce the power of government (anarchists and voluntaryists would eliminate that power entirely). If we have less to fight about, we’ll fight less.

In addition to reducing the power of government as a whole, spreading that power out through devolution, secession, even panarchism (“competing governments” in overlapping geographies) would allow voluntarily “unified” groups to live their way without demanding that others do likewise. Less to fight about. Less fighting. The first two have been done many times. The third is worth a try.

What’s not worth continued trying is coerced “unity” under Joe Biden or anyone else.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

• • “Political ‘Unity’ is Neither Necessary Nor Desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, OpEdNews, 01/24/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Orange County, California Register, 01/25/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, San Gabriel Valley, California Tribune, 01/25/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Riverside, California Press-Enterprise, 01/25/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, San Bernardino, California Sun, 01/25/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Los Angeles, California Daily News, 01/25/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Long Beach, California Press-Telegram, 01/25/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Redondo Beach, California Daily Breeze, 01/25/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Redlands, California Daily Facts, 01/25/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Inland Valley, California Daily Bulletin, 01/25/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Pasadena, California Star-News, 01/25/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Whittier, California Daily News, 01/25/21
  • “Political ‘Unity’ is Neither Necessary Nor Desirable,”  by Thomas L. Knapp, CounterPunch, 01/26/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Richmond, North Carolina Observer, 01/26/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Hopkinsville, Kentucky New Era, 01/27/21
  • “Political ‘Unity’ is Neither Necessary Nor Desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Madill, Oklahoma Record, 01/27/21
  • “Political ‘Unity’ is Neither Necessary Nor Desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Roundup, Montana Record – Tribune & Winnett Times, 01/27/21
  • “‘Unity’ is unnecessary,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Richmond, Virginia Legacy [web and print], 01/27/21
  • “Political ‘Unity’ is Neither Necessary Nor Desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Ventura County, California Citizens Journal, 01/28/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Coos Bay, Oregon World, 01/29/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Lake Havasu City, Arizona News-Herald, 01/29/21
  • “Political ‘unity’ is neither necessary nor desirable,” by Thomas L. Knapp, Kingsport, Tennessee Times News, 02/01/21