Eat the rich

I've talked a bit recently about being, I guess supportive is the right word, of the government, federal in particular, and of showing some optimism that the system we live in isn't entirely broken. At least, that is the impression I get from rereading my posts. This impression is mistaken.

I also see a lot of anger directed at the power structures of our country, if you wanted to, you could make the argument that I am not the USAs biggest fan, my distaste for the power structures more or less equates to a dislike of the country in general, and you would not be entirely wrong.

But you would be wrong there too, I love this country, which is why the system being broken is so upsetting to me, I am under no illusions that the USA has ever quite been the paragon of ideals it claims to be, but I do believe the ideals it was founded on are worthy, and that the Constitution and Bill of Rights are documents that, as the basis of a government, hold up very well to this day, with the exception of course of the 2nd Amendment.

The power structures that run the country, at every level, from local to federal governments, and I include corporate interests here, are broken, perhaps irreparably, I know I just finished writing about how the government still accomplishes good things on occasion, but I look at it like this one broken oven we have at my work, its door handle falls off and you can't read the temperature settings, but if you are really good at finagling it, you can still get it to cook your pretzels, however if you don't have the skills and knowledge to use it properly, it'll burn the shit out of your stuff. I trust I don't need to explain the metaphor?
I will anyway, a little bit.

The wealthy in this country know all the tricks of using the oven, but even if you know all its quirks a broken tool still screws up occasionally, which is the only reason we haven't reverted to literal serfdom yet, although there are those who are totally for it. The money in the power structure is too pernicious and influential, I am not talking about buying elections, that is the most visible, yet as we have been seeing, least reliable way to influence policy, I speak of lobbyists and the incestuous relationship between elected representatives and the industries that fund them. The fact is, these groups don't care about the problems of society, they don't care about poverty, sexism, racism, homophobia, or any other social issue except as a means to divert attention from the moneymaking and power brokering operations that they do care about.

The system is broken because those with the greatest influence on it wish it to be, it has been breaking for a century or more, when financial institutions ruin our economy because the all consuming focus on short term profits means company presidents cannot make sustainable decisions, because if they do they will be removed by their boards in favor of someone who doesn't, it happened when banks decided the perception of success was more important than the homes and savings of the people who choose to bank with them, a well as the actual health of the US and world economy.

These private organizations do not think of people as anything more than, at best, a resource, and at worst, an obstacle, and more and more, they view governments that way as well, they believe they rule the world, and because of the money in all levels of government, they kind of do. The only reason they don't do more with their power is because they don't want to, they have the vast majority of wealth and influence already, and that is steadily increasing every day, they know they can get away with anything up to and including ruining the world economy, because they already have!

I've said before how I don't really view the rich as the same as you or me, they do not live in our world, they live in a world of unimaginable privilege, they operate at levels we can barely comprehend, their wealth is a tool so powerful that, like the atom bomb, it hardly even has to be used to be influential, just  the knowledge that it is there means, in a lot of ways, the world arranges itself to their desires without them having to lift a finger.

They rarely have to interact with the public, and when they do it is clearly noticeable, Mitt Romney was one of them, we viewed him as kind of a robot built to look like a politician, but that isn't actually accurate, the problem he had was that he had no frame of reference for the problems the majority of the country deals with daily, he has never had to deal with them and never learned how, among his own kind he was regarded as very personable and I am sure he was, he knows those people and is comfortable there, but out amongst the porrs he was like a wolf trying to make friends with sheep, it wasn't working and most of us were scared he would eat us.

Today we have a vast number of Presidential candidates that have similar problems, some, like Hillary Clinton and to some extent Donald Trump, can convincingly act like they can connect with the average person, but most of the rest of the field have the same problem as Mitt Romney, unless they are simply insane like Ben Carson anyway.
They live with power and wealth, they live with people whose only goal is accumulating more of both, they were raised that way and see it as how the world is supposed to work, and these people control the world, they leak out once in a while to run for president, but behind the scenes are hundreds of Romneys doing the manipulating and enforcing their demands on the power structure.

They must go, medieval era monarchies had a similar division of power and insulation of the powerful from the powerless, and for the most part, they are gone now. It is intolerable that so much power rests in the hands of so few in this day and age.

Short of a bloody revolution that puts all the 1%  up against the wall, there is little realistically that can be done about it, we have to hope for incremental change and that in the years between positive change, those who oppose it are unable to do much damage to the cause, my fantasy, ironically, is more power to the government, nationalize the banks, without their lobby and with the federal government in a  position to make and enforce responsible finance rules, there maybe a chance to head off the next economic catastrophe and prevent a possible revolution that might even occur in our lifetimes.
I suppose that might not actually be a bad thing depending on your particular politics, but Accelerationism is for assholes who use phrases like "Necessary sacrifice" and make quotes about  the needs of the many, screw them.