It's time to come up with a systematic and strategic approach to tearing down the Corporate State which has encroached itself into the daily lives of the citizenry, resulting in predation and social dysfunction at a massive level.
The Corporate State that has supplanted democracy in the U.S., came about after decades of careful planning, strategizing, and colluding by a sociopathic-like class of wealthy individuals, and organizations they set up specifically to move their rapaciously greedy agenda forward.
It can be said that the genesis of this "business activist" movement was what has become to be known as the "Powell Memo."
Historian Kim Phillips-Fein describes how “many who read the memo cited it afterward as inspiration for their political choices.” In fact, Powell’s Memo is widely credited for having helped catalyze a new business activist movement, with numerous conservative family and corporate foundations (e.g. Coors, Olin, Bradley, Scaife, Koch and others) thereafter creating and sustaining powerful new voices to help push the corporate agenda, including the Business Roundtable (1972), the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC - 1973), Heritage Foundation (1973), the Cato Institute (1977), the Manhattan Institute (1978), Citizens for a Sound Economy (1984 - now Americans for Prosperity), Accuracy in Academe (1985), and others.
Because these forces set out to tear down the American democracy in a highly systematic and strategic manner,
operating mainly in the shadows until recently, and because they were able to do so without facing any meaningful resistance from the citizenry, they have been able to target every single building block of democracy in order to advance their agenda.
They took the advice in the
Powell Memo to heart:
Strength lies in organization, in careful long-range planning and implementation, in consistency of action over an indefinite period of years, in the scale of financing available only through joint effort, and in the political power available only through united action and national organizations.
That's how we got to a situation where 1 percent of Americans contribute 68 percent of all election funding, according to
Money Wins Elections. In 2012 there were 435 House of Representatives elections; "candidates that outspent their opponents won 95% of elections.
So basically, because of this "legalized system of political bribery," their forces have been able to commandeer our debased and corrupt political establishment (of both major parties) to do their bidding.
Hence the attack on the public sector (i.e., government and democracy), on unions, on public education, on the environment, on our economic security, on the very core of what America is supposed to stand for.
The treasonous debased politicians take the money (campaign contributions, special favors, access), and the lucrative jobs after they leave office (sometimes increasing their salaries over 1,000 percent), become part of "the club," and sell everybody else down the river. What a grotesque bunch!
Right now, because of the stranglehold these corporatist cartels, and because billionaires-funded propaganda, the political system is pretty much unresponsive to the expectations and demands of the citizenry. This situation leaves many people feeling powerless, frustrated, and angry.
But we should not lose hope. All we need to do is change our mindset, change the paradigm, change our frame of reference--a framing that has been conveniently constructed by these nefarious corporatist forces to keep us operating within their "proprietary" worldview. Break free!
The first thing I suggest people do to start freeing their minds from the false narratives distributed in corporatist propaganda is to stop watching TV, or at least become hyper-aware that the overall effect of the corporate media conglomerate in the U.S. is to manipulate people into acting against their own interests.
But there is a lot more we can do. Actually, people and communities all over the country (and internationally) are doing what needs to be done to change the paradigm, to sidestep the control by the corporate state. We just need to unite and help amplify those efforts.
How do you break free? First you have to understand how they control you. They try to keep you isolated; they encourage you to be selfish and greedy, and discourage you from being selfless and giving, and from uniting with others and acting in concert of the good of our communities. In the system they prefer, people work for subsistence wages, with the bulk of the profits (and productivity gains) being extracted from the working and middle class to go directly into the pockets of the rich.
People are figuring this out, and are taking the necessary steps to break free from this unfair arrangement. More and more people are starting employee-owned/employee-run companies. Another great example is "The Network of Bay Area Worker Cooperatives."
There is also a rapidly spreading "Cohousing Communities" movement. There is also a movement to make "food and agricultural systems more just, accountable, and transparent."
For example, "The Permaculture Institute" promotes an "ecological design system for sustainability in all aspects of human endeavor. It teaches us how build natural homes, grow our own food, restore diminished landscapes and ecosystems, catch rainwater, build communities and much more."
And last, but not least, there is also fast-spreading "Accountability Movement" focused of ending corporate influence peddling government corruption. A good example is the REPEACE movement (for Realize Peace).
National Network of Activists
As I've expressed concerns in the past about what's happening to our country (and the world) as the result of the criminal and rapacious greed by these supranational corporatists cartels, I've neglected to take the time to notice that people are indeed coming together to find solutions, one neighborhood at a time. This to me is very hopeful. I'm truly amazed at how far many of these projects have gotten.
And so I will change a little bit of my "activism" to spreading the good news about these trends, in the belief that as people find out about the, the will see that there is indeed hope; that we can bypass the odious Corporate State. That we could eventually tear it down by defunding it.
Don't get me wrong, I will still be relentlessly advocating for investigations of war crimes by the Bush Administration (or any other), and of the crimes committed by Wall Street cartels. And I will continue "agitating' for the organization of protest rallies, when appropriate.
But I recognize that since the government is on the take, it may take some time before we get a government (or international institutions) willing to do the right thing and investigate the Bush Administration war crimes, and go after Wall Street criminals.
In the meantime, I'll continue putting a lot of energy and attention into promoting these grassroots movements designed to free us from corporate dominance.
With that in mind, I will reach out to people in my email list to start meeting on a regular basis to share information about these trends: jobs/work (employee-owned companies, labor unions); co-housing, housing collectives; sustainable living; food and agriculture (local sustainability).
My vision is to eventually form a tight-night network at a national level capable of sharing information, ideas, and coordinate action nationwide.
I'll use my experience in advertising and marketing (as well as the input from others in the network) to try to reach as many people as possible so they can learn about these trends, and so they can join in this peaceful revolution.
I would also like to invite readers to join the "TrueMarket" group I created here at Daily Kos.
Each blue dot on the map below represents a member of a growing nation-wide network of social justice and anti-corruption activists committed to finding the best way forward. Join us in the effort!
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Ray Pensador |
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For more ideas, please visit the Evergreen Cooperatives website.