August 6, 2025 • 18 mins
LISTEN and SUBSCRIBE on:
Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/watchdog-on-wall-street-with-chris-markowski/id570687608
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2PtgPvJvqc2gkpGIkNMR5i
WATCH and SUBSCRIBE on:
https://www.youtube.com/@WatchdogOnWallstreet/featured
In this episode of Watchdog on Wall Street, Chris takes a step back from the headlines and asks the deeper question: What good is policy if the country has lost its soul? As our social fabric unravels—families broken, trust in institutions shattered, morality privatized—we face a crisis no tax cut or stimulus check can fix.
Here’s what you’ll hear:
Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/watchdog-on-wall-street-with-chris-markowski/id570687608
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2PtgPvJvqc2gkpGIkNMR5i
WATCH and SUBSCRIBE on:
https://www.youtube.com/@WatchdogOnWallstreet/featured
In this episode of Watchdog on Wall Street, Chris takes a step back from the headlines and asks the deeper question: What good is policy if the country has lost its soul? As our social fabric unravels—families broken, trust in institutions shattered, morality privatized—we face a crisis no tax cut or stimulus check can fix.
Here’s what you’ll hear:
- Why both Republicans and Democrats have abandoned small-government principles
- How Trumpism has morphed into a “misarchist” movement—hostile to government, yet eager to wield its power
- The collapse of community: from neighborhoods to churches to shared values
- Why the real fight isn’t about big vs. small government, but about restoring order
- And how we must reclaim virtue, obligation, and belonging—before it's too late
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Watchdog on Wall Street podcast explaining the news coming
out of the complex worlds of finance, economics, and politics
and the impact it we'll have on everyday Americans. Author,
investment banker, consumer advocate, analyst and trader Chris Markowski.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
Social Order, Trump and Priority Job number one. You know,
it's easy nowadays, especially the way social media works. It
constantly being inundated with human beings behaving badly. You'll see
some video at an airport or on an airplane, or
(00:37):
in some restaurant or whatever it may be. Somebody acting
in a horrible, horrible fashion gets caught on camera and
it gets posted on the internet. An easy thing to do,
easy thing to do is to obviously make fun, repost,
make some sort of snide comment. And I probably I've
(00:58):
been guilty of doing that in my life, and I
try not to do that. Try not to do that.
I constantly reminded podcast I listened to every single day
done by Father Mike Schmidt's Bible in the year, and
he always talks about that you know, we have forgotten
(01:18):
and this is from mother Teresa. We are forgotten that
we all belong to one another. And I wanted to
I want to share with you the columns New York
Times column David Brooks talking about where we're at and
some of the points that he makes here. Now, David
Brooks is a guy that, again I don't agree with
(01:40):
all the time. He is one of the conservative guys
over at the New York Times, but he does he
makes some unbelievable points here in the article, and he
talks about the main political argument of the twentieth century
was basically how big should government be? The left, the
(02:03):
donkeys basically tried to use government to we want to
reduce any quality, we want to offer safety nets. And
again I have been highly critical of their ideas and
what they wanted to do, because to me, they were counterproductive.
(02:24):
We talked about Cato Institute studies and the various different
social pathologies that go along with handouts and giveaways if
there's no strings attached, and they keep going on forever
and ever and ever. And I don't want to rehash
that right now, but anyway, on the right, people tried
to reduce taxes and regulations to boost growth and the
(02:44):
social dynamic allowing our economy to grow. It's a belief
system that I hold it's over I mean let's be
honest with each other. I mentioned this lately. Some of
the things that Donald Trump is proposing are some again,
(03:08):
something that Elizabeth Warren would propose, something that ayok would propose,
something that Bernie Sanders would propose. Donald Trump is a
big government guy. He's a big government populist. There's no
(03:29):
more small government conservatism anymore. He's gotten me. He's got
Congress going in lockstep outside of you know, like I said,
Rand Paul's Thomas Massey's of the world again, he's using
(03:49):
the power of big government tariffs, basically wants to read
jigger trade flows, doing the same thing. God, it's the
same thing that Joe Biden did, okay, using industrial policy
to pick winners and losers, using government power. He wants
(04:10):
to get involved colleges and universities. Makes a point too that,
you know, the Trump Defense Department just spent four hundred
million dollars to become the largest shareholder of a private
rare earth elements company, the US Steel Deal. Ronald Reagan
said in his first inaugural address. In the present crisis,
(04:36):
government is not the solution to our problem. Government is
the problem. Man, I remember Reagan, But man, I feel old.
But this, you know, seems much much older than that
if you actually think about it. We have an administration
that's all about the power of the executive branch of government,
(05:02):
relentless federal action, executive branch action. And let's be honest,
he's not the first. I mean, he took a look
at George W. Bush and what he steam rolled through
with the war on terror and the use of military force.
(05:23):
We don't declare wars anymore. The Patriots ACKs spying on people,
I mean, and again you have all the trained seals,
all the trained seals and monkeys at Fox News and
all the other so called they call themselves Conservative sides.
Trained seals out there, yay, yay, spy on Americans, yay. Yeah,
(05:44):
it doesn't matter who's in charge, that's their job. They
just cheer it on. Brooks asked the question, how did
the Republicans move so far so fast? Well, twentieth century
argument over the role of government happened at a time
and when people basically thought America was working. When society
seems stable, the individual is seen as the primary political reality.
(06:08):
How can we support individuals so they can rise and
prosper tax cut? Here, whose social program there, But today
most people think America is broken. According to recent surveys,
public trust and institutions is near historic lows. Two thirds
of Americans agree with the statement society is broken two thirds.
(06:38):
And if I was asked a question, I'd say, yeah, yeah,
it's broken. And if I was asked why I thought
it was broken, well, I could say, you know, I know,
I grew up in the you know, the seventies and eighties.
This ain't it is just not it and miriad different things,
(07:03):
you know, allowing crime to run rampant, Black lives matters, riots,
this riot, that riot not in forced. I mean, it
just you know, doesn't translate. It's like bizarro world for
people like myself. Between nineteen eighty three and two thousand
and seven, the share of Americans who were satisfied with quote,
(07:26):
the way things are going in the United States hit
peaks of about seventy percent and was often above fifty percent.
Now again up to two thousand and seven. What happened
in two thousand and eight, Yeah, we had the we
had great recession financial crisis. What happened there? Yeah, we
(07:54):
got sold down the river by the powers that be
that bailed out all of the financial institutions. We saw
what transpired here, and nobody was held accountable. That is
a massive that's a massive gut punch, massive gut punch
to the country. We saw it in real time. It
(08:19):
affected the entire country. We all saw what happened. Bailout, bailout, handout,
check being written, didn't matter, didn't matter whether it was
a Democrat, matter it was Obama, didn't matter was George
w But they all did the same thing. Just throwing
that out there, Okay. From two thousand and seven to
(08:41):
twenty twenty two, the number of Americans who were satisfied
with the way things were going was frequently down to
twenty five percent. What does that say about social order
here in this country? And Brooks makes a point, that's
(09:05):
that's the difference. Just he made all the difference here. Rights.
The French mystic Simone Whale once wrote that order is
the first need of all. She emphasized that the social
order is built on our obligations to one another. Again,
like I said, Mother Teresa, the understanding that we all
need to we all belong to one another, the texture
(09:30):
of our trustworthy relationships. Humans need to grow up in
a secure container, which they can craft their lives. The
social order consists of a stable family, a safe and
coherent neighborhood, a vibrant congregational and civic life, a reliable
body of laws, a set of shared values that neighbors
(09:51):
can use to help build healthy communities, and a conviction
that there exists moral truth. Yeah, how often do I
talk about this here? Can't live in a free society
unless people have values, morals, ethics. It just doesn't work.
(10:12):
How is that neighborhood, that community of yours that has
got bought up by Blackstone, black Rock, some private equity company.
Nobody can afford to live there any more. You got
commercials on TV for reverse mortgages because senior citizens can't
afford to live in the houses that they've paid for
(10:35):
that they own outright, because the property taxes have gone up.
This is good for society. He talks about a book
written in nineteen seventy four, The Roots of American Order,
written by Russell Kirk, and Kirk showed over the century,
certain values, practices, and institutions emerge gradually, forming the basis
(10:59):
of a mayor American social order. Kirk wrote that the
importance of the social order was best appreciated by imagining
its opposite. A disordered existence is a confused and miserable existence.
If a society falls into general disorder, many of its
members will cease to exist at all. And if the
members of a society are disordered in spirit, the outward
(11:21):
order of the commonwealth cannot endure. This is where many
of us whee where we're at. My wrong in that assense?
Was Brooks wrong? And that assessment Families broken apart, families
(11:42):
that are not formed, many areas of the country, that
neighborhood life decaying, while a lot of empty churches. That's again,
that pendulum is starting to swing and God willing that continues.
Just you know, drugs, drugs. I mean, for years, I'm
(12:06):
banging the drum here on this show, nobody really paying attention.
You know, eighty thousand people died this year. One hundred
thousand people died this year. Over one hundred thousand people
died this year. And I was like, my God. When
I was in the nineteen eighties, cocaine was the thing,
and crack and the crack epidemic, and you know, the
highest death totals that they had during that whole period
(12:27):
was around ten thousand. Yep, we don't do anything. We
watched videos online, the videos online of these areas in
Philadelphia with people on trank or whatever it is. They're
hunched over, they can't move. How is this okay? Anyway?
(12:51):
Downtown's becoming vacant, a national elite growing socially and morally detached.
We have privatized morality, so that is no longer shared values. Nope.
And again got a lot of this through the university
system as well. The educated class increasingly far far left
(13:15):
a man of they're so far left, there's so nonsensical.
They feel like they're from another planet. Am I wrong there?
The idea is that they push now when the social
order is healthy, nobody notices when it's in a rubble.
It's all anybody can think about once the social order
(13:38):
was shredded. Small government conservatism, I guess, doesn't make sense anymore. Right,
if you know society is not doing well, you know,
why would you want a small government to do nothing?
If you think society is in moral and civic chaos?
Why would you think this or that tax cut, or
(14:01):
this or that government program is going to make a difference.
People who feel that society is fundamentally rigged, unfair, and chaotic,
turn too populous. Populism is an ethos that cuts across
the categories of the big government small government debates. Populace
(14:24):
can be very conservative on social issues and isolationists and
nativists on immigration issues, but very very progressive when it
comes to redistributing wealth. Sound familiar, Sound familiar? Anyway, he
(14:48):
talks about Trump in this sense. This word's called miss arcist.
Miss arcist. It was a new word for me too.
Miss Arcist is as a leader who is hostile to
government and the people who run it, but is willing
to use state power to enforce order and traditional morals.
Miss Arcis often see a public office as their personal
(15:11):
property which they can use. However, they want to take
down their enemies. And again Trump concentrates state power so
he can go after the managerial class. Again. People believe
and not necessarily wrong, that you know, this class has
betrayed America, destroyed a lot of the social order, and
(15:34):
they played a part. Again. Too many administrators, bloat, civil servants,
go on and on and on again, this modern ruling class. Again,
you can go too far, too far. But Trump's supporters
feel that this is what's going to restore order. Brooks says,
(15:58):
a central argument of the twenty first centuries no longer
over the size of government. The central argument of this
century is over who can best strengthen the social order.
Republicans right now they've got the people that they think
can do that. I quite frankly don't like what they're doing.
(16:19):
I don't think it's the way to go. Democrats, they
don't have anybody. They really don't. Since the progressive era,
Democrats have seen society through a government policy lens that
is often oblivious to the pre political social fabric that
holds or does not hold society together from the bottom.
(16:39):
Democrats have often been technocratic, relying excessively on social science
policy wonkery. They are prone to the kind of thinking
that does not see the news, the minutia of common life,
the stuff that cannot be quantified. They are the party
of the elite, managerial class, and it's hard for these
types to really understand and the overall disgusted, rage and
(17:03):
alienation that envelop the less privilege as they watch this
social order fall apart. Some good points made by Brooks,
I just I don't feel that he's a point again,
these are points that I've been talking about for some time.
I'm sorry, I don't think this type of strong armed
(17:28):
can people call for it. They call I mean, they
call for it. It's biblical, you know, Amanda the King. Yeah,
people call for it for these types of things that
I don't think it's necessary. I don't. We do not
need a command and control economy. There's going to be blowback.
(17:50):
The pendulum will swing back in the opposite direction if
you allow it to do so. Even even the left
is starting to recognize this. Outside of their fringe, even
they understand the direction is not working anymore. Again, Issue
(18:16):
number one. Yeah, yeah, we've got to understand that we
all belong to one another and restore that social fabric
Priority Job one. It ain't going to be easy. Watchdog
on Wall Street dot Com
The Watchdog on Wall Street podcast explaining the news coming
out of the complex worlds of finance, economics, and politics
and the impact it we'll have on everyday Americans. Author,
investment banker, consumer advocate, analyst and trader Chris Markowski.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
Social Order, Trump and Priority Job number one. You know,
it's easy nowadays, especially the way social media works. It
constantly being inundated with human beings behaving badly. You'll see
some video at an airport or on an airplane, or
(00:37):
in some restaurant or whatever it may be. Somebody acting
in a horrible, horrible fashion gets caught on camera and
it gets posted on the internet. An easy thing to do,
easy thing to do is to obviously make fun, repost,
make some sort of snide comment. And I probably I've
(00:58):
been guilty of doing that in my life, and I
try not to do that. Try not to do that.
I constantly reminded podcast I listened to every single day
done by Father Mike Schmidt's Bible in the year, and
he always talks about that you know, we have forgotten
(01:18):
and this is from mother Teresa. We are forgotten that
we all belong to one another. And I wanted to
I want to share with you the columns New York
Times column David Brooks talking about where we're at and
some of the points that he makes here. Now, David
Brooks is a guy that, again I don't agree with
(01:40):
all the time. He is one of the conservative guys
over at the New York Times, but he does he
makes some unbelievable points here in the article, and he
talks about the main political argument of the twentieth century
was basically how big should government be? The left, the
(02:03):
donkeys basically tried to use government to we want to
reduce any quality, we want to offer safety nets. And
again I have been highly critical of their ideas and
what they wanted to do, because to me, they were counterproductive.
(02:24):
We talked about Cato Institute studies and the various different
social pathologies that go along with handouts and giveaways if
there's no strings attached, and they keep going on forever
and ever and ever. And I don't want to rehash
that right now, but anyway, on the right, people tried
to reduce taxes and regulations to boost growth and the
(02:44):
social dynamic allowing our economy to grow. It's a belief
system that I hold it's over I mean let's be
honest with each other. I mentioned this lately. Some of
the things that Donald Trump is proposing are some again,
(03:08):
something that Elizabeth Warren would propose, something that ayok would propose,
something that Bernie Sanders would propose. Donald Trump is a
big government guy. He's a big government populist. There's no
(03:29):
more small government conservatism anymore. He's gotten me. He's got
Congress going in lockstep outside of you know, like I said,
Rand Paul's Thomas Massey's of the world again, he's using
(03:49):
the power of big government tariffs, basically wants to read
jigger trade flows, doing the same thing. God, it's the
same thing that Joe Biden did, okay, using industrial policy
to pick winners and losers, using government power. He wants
(04:10):
to get involved colleges and universities. Makes a point too that,
you know, the Trump Defense Department just spent four hundred
million dollars to become the largest shareholder of a private
rare earth elements company, the US Steel Deal. Ronald Reagan
said in his first inaugural address. In the present crisis,
(04:36):
government is not the solution to our problem. Government is
the problem. Man, I remember Reagan, But man, I feel old.
But this, you know, seems much much older than that
if you actually think about it. We have an administration
that's all about the power of the executive branch of government,
(05:02):
relentless federal action, executive branch action. And let's be honest,
he's not the first. I mean, he took a look
at George W. Bush and what he steam rolled through
with the war on terror and the use of military force.
(05:23):
We don't declare wars anymore. The Patriots ACKs spying on people,
I mean, and again you have all the trained seals,
all the trained seals and monkeys at Fox News and
all the other so called they call themselves Conservative sides.
Trained seals out there, yay, yay, spy on Americans, yay. Yeah,
(05:44):
it doesn't matter who's in charge, that's their job. They
just cheer it on. Brooks asked the question, how did
the Republicans move so far so fast? Well, twentieth century
argument over the role of government happened at a time
and when people basically thought America was working. When society
seems stable, the individual is seen as the primary political reality.
(06:08):
How can we support individuals so they can rise and
prosper tax cut? Here, whose social program there, But today
most people think America is broken. According to recent surveys,
public trust and institutions is near historic lows. Two thirds
of Americans agree with the statement society is broken two thirds.
(06:38):
And if I was asked a question, I'd say, yeah, yeah,
it's broken. And if I was asked why I thought
it was broken, well, I could say, you know, I know,
I grew up in the you know, the seventies and eighties.
This ain't it is just not it and miriad different things,
(07:03):
you know, allowing crime to run rampant, Black lives matters, riots,
this riot, that riot not in forced. I mean, it
just you know, doesn't translate. It's like bizarro world for
people like myself. Between nineteen eighty three and two thousand
and seven, the share of Americans who were satisfied with quote,
(07:26):
the way things are going in the United States hit
peaks of about seventy percent and was often above fifty percent.
Now again up to two thousand and seven. What happened
in two thousand and eight, Yeah, we had the we
had great recession financial crisis. What happened there? Yeah, we
(07:54):
got sold down the river by the powers that be
that bailed out all of the financial institutions. We saw
what transpired here, and nobody was held accountable. That is
a massive that's a massive gut punch, massive gut punch
to the country. We saw it in real time. It
(08:19):
affected the entire country. We all saw what happened. Bailout, bailout, handout,
check being written, didn't matter, didn't matter whether it was
a Democrat, matter it was Obama, didn't matter was George
w But they all did the same thing. Just throwing
that out there, Okay. From two thousand and seven to
(08:41):
twenty twenty two, the number of Americans who were satisfied
with the way things were going was frequently down to
twenty five percent. What does that say about social order
here in this country? And Brooks makes a point, that's
(09:05):
that's the difference. Just he made all the difference here. Rights.
The French mystic Simone Whale once wrote that order is
the first need of all. She emphasized that the social
order is built on our obligations to one another. Again,
like I said, Mother Teresa, the understanding that we all
need to we all belong to one another, the texture
(09:30):
of our trustworthy relationships. Humans need to grow up in
a secure container, which they can craft their lives. The
social order consists of a stable family, a safe and
coherent neighborhood, a vibrant congregational and civic life, a reliable
body of laws, a set of shared values that neighbors
(09:51):
can use to help build healthy communities, and a conviction
that there exists moral truth. Yeah, how often do I
talk about this here? Can't live in a free society
unless people have values, morals, ethics. It just doesn't work.
(10:12):
How is that neighborhood, that community of yours that has
got bought up by Blackstone, black Rock, some private equity company.
Nobody can afford to live there any more. You got
commercials on TV for reverse mortgages because senior citizens can't
afford to live in the houses that they've paid for
(10:35):
that they own outright, because the property taxes have gone up.
This is good for society. He talks about a book
written in nineteen seventy four, The Roots of American Order,
written by Russell Kirk, and Kirk showed over the century,
certain values, practices, and institutions emerge gradually, forming the basis
(10:59):
of a mayor American social order. Kirk wrote that the
importance of the social order was best appreciated by imagining
its opposite. A disordered existence is a confused and miserable existence.
If a society falls into general disorder, many of its
members will cease to exist at all. And if the
members of a society are disordered in spirit, the outward
(11:21):
order of the commonwealth cannot endure. This is where many
of us whee where we're at. My wrong in that assense?
Was Brooks wrong? And that assessment Families broken apart, families
(11:42):
that are not formed, many areas of the country, that
neighborhood life decaying, while a lot of empty churches. That's again,
that pendulum is starting to swing and God willing that continues.
Just you know, drugs, drugs. I mean, for years, I'm
(12:06):
banging the drum here on this show, nobody really paying attention.
You know, eighty thousand people died this year. One hundred
thousand people died this year. Over one hundred thousand people
died this year. And I was like, my God. When
I was in the nineteen eighties, cocaine was the thing,
and crack and the crack epidemic, and you know, the
highest death totals that they had during that whole period
(12:27):
was around ten thousand. Yep, we don't do anything. We
watched videos online, the videos online of these areas in
Philadelphia with people on trank or whatever it is. They're
hunched over, they can't move. How is this okay? Anyway?
(12:51):
Downtown's becoming vacant, a national elite growing socially and morally detached.
We have privatized morality, so that is no longer shared values. Nope.
And again got a lot of this through the university
system as well. The educated class increasingly far far left
(13:15):
a man of they're so far left, there's so nonsensical.
They feel like they're from another planet. Am I wrong there?
The idea is that they push now when the social
order is healthy, nobody notices when it's in a rubble.
It's all anybody can think about once the social order
(13:38):
was shredded. Small government conservatism, I guess, doesn't make sense anymore. Right,
if you know society is not doing well, you know,
why would you want a small government to do nothing?
If you think society is in moral and civic chaos?
Why would you think this or that tax cut, or
(14:01):
this or that government program is going to make a difference.
People who feel that society is fundamentally rigged, unfair, and chaotic,
turn too populous. Populism is an ethos that cuts across
the categories of the big government small government debates. Populace
(14:24):
can be very conservative on social issues and isolationists and
nativists on immigration issues, but very very progressive when it
comes to redistributing wealth. Sound familiar, Sound familiar? Anyway, he
(14:48):
talks about Trump in this sense. This word's called miss arcist.
Miss arcist. It was a new word for me too.
Miss Arcist is as a leader who is hostile to
government and the people who run it, but is willing
to use state power to enforce order and traditional morals.
Miss Arcis often see a public office as their personal
(15:11):
property which they can use. However, they want to take
down their enemies. And again Trump concentrates state power so
he can go after the managerial class. Again. People believe
and not necessarily wrong, that you know, this class has
betrayed America, destroyed a lot of the social order, and
(15:34):
they played a part. Again. Too many administrators, bloat, civil servants,
go on and on and on again, this modern ruling class. Again,
you can go too far, too far. But Trump's supporters
feel that this is what's going to restore order. Brooks says,
(15:58):
a central argument of the twenty first centuries no longer
over the size of government. The central argument of this
century is over who can best strengthen the social order.
Republicans right now they've got the people that they think
can do that. I quite frankly don't like what they're doing.
(16:19):
I don't think it's the way to go. Democrats, they
don't have anybody. They really don't. Since the progressive era,
Democrats have seen society through a government policy lens that
is often oblivious to the pre political social fabric that
holds or does not hold society together from the bottom.
(16:39):
Democrats have often been technocratic, relying excessively on social science
policy wonkery. They are prone to the kind of thinking
that does not see the news, the minutia of common life,
the stuff that cannot be quantified. They are the party
of the elite, managerial class, and it's hard for these
types to really understand and the overall disgusted, rage and
(17:03):
alienation that envelop the less privilege as they watch this
social order fall apart. Some good points made by Brooks,
I just I don't feel that he's a point again,
these are points that I've been talking about for some time.
I'm sorry, I don't think this type of strong armed
(17:28):
can people call for it. They call I mean, they
call for it. It's biblical, you know, Amanda the King. Yeah,
people call for it for these types of things that
I don't think it's necessary. I don't. We do not
need a command and control economy. There's going to be blowback.
(17:50):
The pendulum will swing back in the opposite direction if
you allow it to do so. Even even the left
is starting to recognize this. Outside of their fringe, even
they understand the direction is not working anymore. Again, Issue
(18:16):
number one. Yeah, yeah, we've got to understand that we
all belong to one another and restore that social fabric
Priority Job one. It ain't going to be easy. Watchdog
on Wall Street dot Com
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