Extreme Wealth Corrodes Democracy

The United States was, for a short time, a democracy, if only of white male property owners--much like early Athens. Counterrevolution began with the Constitutional Convention.

Democratic forces were predominant in other eras in the US, but they didn't last. There was the Democracy of Andrew Jackson and brash new western men. There was the early radical Republicanism of the Civil War. There was the Progressive era: the overweening power of the trusts was busted, at least temporarily. There was the New Deal, extending through the Great Society, in which government made it its business to extend equality and its benefits.

But each democratic era has been followed by a period of reaction and hardening elite rule. However, up until now, America has always had an upwardly mobile society: the son of the worker, farmer, or clerk becoming the new rich. And always before, the elite made way for them, even if they hated "upstarts" and "new money."

Today, class mobility in America is lower than in class-bound Britain; American society is becoming rigid and stratified--though no one will admit they are anything but "middle class." The difference between the new financial wealthy and everyone else has never been greater; CEO's are paid 100's or 1000+ times more than their workers, a greater margin of difference than other developed nations. Inequality increased even more rapidly after the so-called Great Recession and subsequent "recovery" under Obama's leadership. More than 90% of the gains since 2009 have gone into the pockets of the extremely wealthy, while unemployment hovers around an official 7.8% and is nearly twice that when counting workers who have given up looking for work.

The intransigence of conservative Republicans is not surprising, nor the timidity of Democrats: they both reflect the changing balance of power in the US. Unions have declined to single digits of the private sector workforce, and Republicans have sharpened their knives to eliminate the power of public sector unions, as well.

Meanwhile, state legislatures and Congress promote austerity, and cut programs benefiting the less affluent, while attempting to lower taxes and eliminate regulations that irritate the resurgent wealthy.

Why not? Politicians easily accumulate wealth from their connections. Anyone in government, even idealistic Obama staff, can legally line his/her nest by cooperating with the moneyed, our Roman Senators. None live in ghettos, or working-class neighborhoods. None see or hear the people who are hurt by the wealthy bias in media and politics.

And the media, largely owned by our Roman Senators, naturally reflects their bias; so even the poor tend to accept the agenda of the wealthy, insisting that austerity is necessary and even Social Security benefits must be cut.

This isn't just the swing of the pendulum; this smells like "takeover" by the very wealthy, like the Roman Senators' monopoly of power in Fifth Century Rome--before its fall.