The Long, Dark Shadows of Plutocracy

The truth of big money’s influence on politics

Harry Reid declares war on the Kochs

Are the 99% whiners?

Big paper defends Perkins 1% persecution

'The Gilded Age' Statistics Corporations Don't Want Workers, or Anyone, to See | Common Dreams

'The Gilded Age' Statistics Corporations Don't Want Workers, or Anyone, to See | Common Dreams
"If there's one thing about what many are calling the "The New Gilded Age," it's that well-known corporations—not to mention less well-known, but extremely powerful ones—will fight extremely hard to keep secret just how lopsided the economic disparities have become in recent decades between low-paid workers in the society and the executive and ruling class that have reaped the words of a globalized, top-heavy economy."

Koch Brothers: Vulture Capitalists

Conservatives: The New Taliban

Conservatives: The New Taliban
"And don't for a minute think that it's really all about religion. Religion is just used to manipulate the useful idiots. It's really about money, power, and control. And that can only be held by thugs like the Taliban when the people are kept poor and stupid.

Here in America, there's a new Taliban rising. They fetishize guns, just like the Afghan Taliban. They fear women and education. They want to keep the people stupid and in chains.

They're the plutocrats and the billionaires who rose to power on the heels of Reagan's trickle-down economics. And now, what's trickling down to us is their stupidity."

Paul Ryan, a.k.a. Scrooge, Needs Both a Reality and a Humanity Check | Alternet

Paul Ryan, a.k.a. Scrooge, Needs Both a Reality and a Humanity Check | Alternet
"Someone needs to tell Paul Ryan that his party -- and the economic platform of austerity and plutocracy he crafted for it -- lost a national election last year."

Wealth Inequality in America

Pete Peterson's Puppet Populists | Common Dreams

Pete Peterson's Puppet Populists | Common Dreams
"Fix the Debt is the most hypocritical corporate PR campaign in decades, an ambitious attempt to convince the country that another cataclysmic economic crisis is around the corner and that urgent action is needed. Its strategy is pure astroturf: assemble power players in business and government under an activist banner, then take the message outside the Beltway and give it the appearance of grassroots activism by manufacturing an emergency to infuse a sense of imminent crisis."

CEOs Calling For Entitlement Reform

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Exposed! How the Billionaires Class Is Destroying Democracy

Exposed! How the Billionaires Class Is Destroying Democracy
"If we are concerned about the future of our American democratic republic, the way to preserve it isn't to protect it from greedy Social Security recipients by pushing the retirement age back to 70. It's to get money out of government, thus neutering the political power of the Billionaire Class. And that means reversing two core doctrines that the US Supreme Court has created out of thin air (at the request of big business and billionaires): that corporations are people, and that money is speech.

The best way to do that is through a constitutional amendment that says corporations are not people, and money is property and not speech."

The Parable of the Frogs » Counterpunch: Tells the Facts, Names the Names

The Parable of the Frogs » Counterpunch: Tells the Facts, Names the Names
"What does it take to produce large-scale social change?  Most historians, if you catch them in an honest moment, will admit that the popular levers of social change, such as education or legislation, are bogus; they don’t really amount to very much.  What does make a difference–and then only potentially–is massive systemic breakdown, such as occurred in the United States in the fall of 2008.  It was the greatest market crash since 1929, leading to widespread unemployment (something like 18% of the population, in real–as opposed to official–statistics*) and the loss of billions of dollars in retirement savings.  In fact, the crash  wiped out $11.1 trillion in household wealth, and this is not counting the several trillion lost in stock market investments.  It had been many decades since the middle class found itself in soup kitchens, and yet there they were.  In the face of all this, however, very little seems to have changed.  Americans are still committed to the dream of unlimited abundance as a “reasonable” goal, when in reality it is (and always has been) the dream of an addict."

Whole Foods - Now Serving Food & Fascism

The CEO of Whole Foods recently attacked Obamacare - calling it a prime example of facism. Well - he's a little wrong about that.

No, Actually, This Is What a Fascist Looks Like

No, Actually, This Is What a Fascist Looks Like
"But, whether Mackey meant to or not, it’s about time someone injected the word fascism back into our political debate. Especially now that corporations wield more power today than they have in America since the Robber Baron Era."