The super-wealthy elite, which is made up of billionaires, and business cartels like ALEC, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Wall Street, Big Oil, Big Pharma, Big Insurance, Big Retail, their propaganda machine, which is made up of the entire mainstream media universe in the U.S., a myriad of think tanks like the AEI, CATO, Heritage, Hoover, and many other, along with the entire Democratic and Republican political establishment make up the American Oligarchy, or Corporatocracy (to be more accurate).
This Oligarchy, in the final analysis, is increasingly fascistic and predatory, spreading a sort of greed-induced ethos across the entire country, which like a cancer, is eating away at our democracy, our freedom, and our natural environment.
Corruption is spreading all over the country, explaining why the new San Francisco Bay Bridge was built following third-world country practices (hence, endangering the public), to why CA Public Utility Commission members on the take cover up massive crimes by Pacific Gas & Electric (remember the big-boom 'as in explosion that killed eight people in San Bruno, CA?), to the ongoing Wall Street-induced fraud in the current real estate bubble, to the stripping of our constitutional rights. It's endemic, and it is fast-spreading.
This thing that I describe above does not need any headlines. It is permanent, entrenched, and it is being consolidated every minute, every day, every week.
That is why American news headlines from the mainstream media are so damaging, in the final analysis. People are being jerked around, manipulated, their emotions being played with, but most importantly, made to be totally impotent to take on the Oligarchy, which is exactly how they like it.
The biggest challenge we face is for a large-enough segment of the population to come to a clear understanding that until the system is prevented from continue working the way it is, nothing will change. We will continue our rapid descend into an dystopian Orwellian world--we are almost there, actually.
I figure this could be done with 2 to 5 percent of the population, and therefore it is doable.
I'm going to cut to the chase and list the steps (I believe) we need to take if we are to restore democracy in this country, in order of importance:
- Protests: Given the current situation, I'll weight the importance of street-level protests at 70 percent. The protests need to be massive (tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands), they have to be disruptive (stop the system from continue to operate), and they have to be relentless, in multiple cities, day after day, week after week. For a recent case study, see Brazil.
- Unity and Solidarity: 20 percent - Anti-corruption social justice activists need to find a way to unite under a common banner (clean government, remove corruption, remove influence-peddling, restore all our constitutional rights, total separation between State and Corporation), and build a cohesive movement that's able to coordinate strategy nationwide.
- Political Involvement: 10 percent - Our entire political system is corrupt to the core, made up of mostly debased, greedy, unprincipled opportunists willing to sell their offices to the highest (corporatist) bidder. This applies to both, the Democratic party establishment, and the Republican party establishment. The Democratic party establishment is the fast-talking, seemingly nonthreatening, snake oil salesman crook to the Republican party establishment outright fascists; or the good-cop bad-cop scam. But they both work for the same people.
You see the problem? There are many, of course. The increasingly brutal system that keeps people intimidated by being threatened with economic insecurity (which doesn't allow people enough time to figure out how the system is fucking them over). Then there is the eerily effective propaganda the entire population is being exposed to 24/7, turning us into obedient drones.
Then there is the stratification of society: How do I get somebody who's comfortable, makes $70k to $95k, lives in a very nice neighborhood, shops at nice stores, etc., to take to the streets? That's the impotence at the top. And how do I get the millions and millions who have fallen through the increasingly porous social safety net into abject poverty, despair, and homelessness, to rise up, when they've lost all hope, all power, and have become invisible? And how do I get to those in the middle, just trying to keep from falling, and thus living in fear?
If collectively, we had a sense of shared destiny, of morality and ethics, of intellectual honesty, perhaps we could form an effective coalition, a real movement to take on this increasingly brutal oligarchy.
But the system works hard at spreading a certain crass and debased ethos; one that promotes selfishness, and greed, and crassness, and rampant consumerism, and ignorance, and fear.
We are being bombarded with this type of messaging, day in and day out, relentlessly.
And thus, unless and until we are able to develop the morality and ethics necessary to deeply feel the injustices committed against others, as if they were being committed against ourselves, we will continue to face the almost impossible challenge to take on the American Oligarchy.
And if that doesn't happen, eventually "they will come after you." But by that time, it will be too late, because you too would have fallen through the cracks, thus losing any leverage or power, or energy to do anything about it.
And until that happens, we will continue being jerked around by the media, by the headlines. And we will continue putting 90 percent of our efforts into a political system that promises only ten percent of the solution.