and as long as legalized bribery is disguised as political speech, nothing will really be done to address inequality because the top 1% own many of the politicians.

But that's good! This article below does not address the fact that we dumped the 1% before, proving it's not at all impossible. It just takes being...well, on average a lot less passive and accepting, the entire effort required of the people in that era being GO VOTE, CHECK THE DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE. The difference is that a somewhat higher percentage than usual did just that.

"Remember that study saying America is an oligarchy? 3 rebuttals say it's wrong."

This is such a great quote:

"As long as politics is the shadow cast on society by big business, the attenuation of the shadow will not change the substance."

Dewey, another Vermonter. For a small state we've contributed quite a bit.

Vermonters seem to be especially attuned
to the details of what is going on worldwide, and have very progressive ideals, compared to most other states.

If it wasn't so cold there, I would have moved there decades ago.

Thank you for your recommendation Cali.

John Dewey was a brilliant man and I would hope that more DUers would study his works.

Now we see it was needed to help to keep insurers in line.

Seriously, WHY?

why do fake liberals post here?

if the cap fits..

out of the sand.

I used to like Common Dreams, but then they seemed to be more like Counter-punch - a place that likes to spend a lot of time bashing Democrats.

said recently.

It's real. It's infected both parties. That it's worse in the Republican Party doesn't excuse Democrats who have been complicit.

Carter is dead wrong on this.

It's a bullshit meme made up by "Liberaller than thou" morons on Common Dream

Why would I know more about than you? For a whole host of reasons. One being, I've been exposed to it. As my father, an inventor and manufacturer said as early as the late seventies, the growing gap between rich and poor is the most dangerous thing facing this country. Educated as a historian and anthropologist, his identification of the growing disparity and his prediction that we were approaching becoming an oligarchy, was prescient. He often was.

My father was far from being an idiot and neither is President Carter.

You? Your opinions seem to be rooted in nothing but partisanship- not information.

Your signature is:

That's just bullshit from some "liberaller than thou" assholes.

It's the biggest pile of ignorant bullshit ever spewed on the internet and too many people buy into it.

It;s conspiracy theory woo. Nothing more.

they would by law. We have no one officially not subject to the laws. You may argue there are people who get away with a lot more, but they could always be potentially charged. Calling us an oligarchy is an exaggeration that takes away from whatever point a person is trying to make about income inequality or law not being enforced against the rich, and therefore harms that argument more than helps it.

All of the people in the sign were elected officials not forced on us, but our representatives chosen by the voters.

There is no doubt by anyone who looks objectively that Economic and political power are concentrated within a disproportionality small group.

There is no doubt by anyone who looks objectively that this group uses its political and ecinomic power to perpetuate itself.

this election entirely out of control of would-be oligarchs. They also failed to control in 2008, 2010, 2012, and 2014.

Or do you guys imagine that the return of their personal tax rates to pre-Reagan levels was their doing? Do you imagine that the emergency meeting of over 700 megamillionaires and billionaires held by the Kochs when Obama became president was to celebrate their election victory?

The megawealthy do have undue influence in government, but that's not control and everyone who insists it is while planning to vote on November 8 is being ridiculous.

money is to get out of its way. Of course they've gained wealth. We haven't actually turned them upside down and shaken them down (as I feel we really need to). They have not gained as much as they wanted, though, and they have LOST power.

The latter is not all our doing, by any means. Those irresponsible idiots supporting Trump to spite some vague "the establishment" instead of voting real enemies with real names out of office definitely get a good part of the credit anyway. They rejected several choices who would have served the ultrawealthy very nicely, as would Pence btw. Before them, the clueless tea-partiers who thought they ran the Kochs and not vice versa became a definite wrench in the Koch alliance's' gears, and now more of them have been dumped by the alliance and are losing or choosing to leave office. And so on.

I'm not going to get into it further here because it would involve an alert and considering this new DU, a hide.

And yes, the corporations and very wealthy do have influence to the degree of control in some areas. Witness the TPP, which largely shut out advocacy groups and appointed corporate reps and lobbyists to "advise".

Cali? You're smart enough to know that an oligarchy is government control by a few, by a ruling class. You're also smart enough to know that people won't be proud of, much less fight to protect, what they believe they've already lost. This is a Breitbart argument.

We are NOT an Oligarchy. Not even close!

Present a fricking argument, MoRo, not angry nothings.

There is no small group of people with control of our government.

To claim there is can be taken as nothing mroe than conspiracy theory woo. It's Illuminati/Bildeberger bullshit.

A majoritarian democracy we ain't. Enjoy:

https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/files/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_theories_of_american_politics.doc.pdf

More than 126 million individuals cast a vote in the 2012 elections.

In 2014 during the lowest percentage turnout in modern history, more than 100 million individuals cast a vote.

Millions upon millions of people participating in government does NOT an oligarchy make!

First there is the dollar vote, whereby those with more dollars "elect" suitable candidates, followed by the democratic vote, whereby the rest of us get to choose from there picks. It's not perfect, sometimes we hear from a renegade candidate like a Perot or a Sanders despite elite desire to suppress them, but nevertheless elite interests generally prevail. The Princeton study - which my guess is you didn't even open - provides empirical evidence of the resulting less-than-democratic outcomes.

Last edited Sat Aug 20, 2016, 07:53 PM - Edit history (1)

Municipal, statewide, federal, all in fifty states.

Thousands upon thousands of elected officials govern this nation from city councils, to county commissions, school boards, state legislatures, governors, to the federal halls of government we all know.

Thousands upon thousands of people do not an oligarchy make.

Is it your contention that, therefore, there cannot possibly be oligarchic rule there either?

To suggest that the mess of our Congress, not to mention the state legislatures, city councils, and county commissions nationwide, equates a small group in control is so laughable as to be dismissed as horseshit on its face.

Seriously, you need to read something other than extreme leftwing bullshit websites if you honestly are going to buy into that fake "liberaler than thou" horseshit spread by idiots who cannot even own up to the actual definition of the term "oligarchy".

Yes? Until you do - an essay with over a 100 citations to scholarly articles - then how can we have a discussion about the facts? The essay does not conclude we are an oligarchy (at least as I recall it does not), but it also makes very clear we are no longer a functioning majoritarian democracy. Instead, it is the interests of a very limited socioeconomic class that is protected and advanced.

By way of example, note that the majority of public at large supports gun control that would require background checks even between private sellers. Has the legislature met our wishes? No. Why not?

The majority of citizenry would like to see "Medicare for all". Do we have it yet? Why not?

Could it have something to do with money in politics (that "dollar vote" I mention earlier)? Me (to illustrate), state senator, need contributions of $ in order to keep my job. Those with more $ are my lifeline to continuance of my career. Without $ I am not easily heard. My opponent that does accept $ from special monied interests blast the airwaves that I am the worst thing since Stalin but without the campaign $ I cannot get my refutation widely heard. I lose.

That's how it works. Not conspiratorially. Not intentional. But the net result of our institutions as they are setup today.

But I love how the right wing Machivellian Republicans play the game. Abortion is such a hot button issue with an important (for them) constituency. But when they had the Presidency, the Senate, the House, the Supreme Court, and most of the mainstream press, did they act to remedy the situation? No. Why not? It was and is a tool for them to continue in power. And it did not contravene the interests of the monied elites. Instead, the latter enjoyed 2 tax cuts that in 10 years cost our Treasury more than the shortfall expected in Social Security over the next 75 years. The low information voters are being played, and they are being played by the politicians allowed to be in office by powerful interests. Because, generally, true alternative candidates are not on the ballot.

If you have a better explanation for the empirically supported conclusions of the Princeton study, let's hear it.

The ignored the definition of Oligarchy.

That makes it completely and utterly a stinking pile of shit.

The essay concludes we have economic-elite domination and biased pluralism. Since you are so keen on definitions, can you tell us here what that means?

You never did answer my direct question earlier. Is that because you have no answer and need to run from it? And you run from it because you can't support your claims except with bombastic claims, peppered with curse words, that "it ain't so"? You can do better than that.

Understand this: Because we have these crises in democracy, there is no reason to throw in the towel. You, I, and everyone else here really need to defend what we believe in away from here (or one does not belong here). My belief is we should, as we just did, fight out our ideological principles in the primaries. If we lose (as I did), our next responsibility is to rally around our collective choice (who is infinitely better than the alternative). I also believe that 'all politics are local' and reconstruction begins in the fight for school boards, alderman, governors, and state legislatures. My bet is we don't disagree on these points. But if you believe we are a problem free, fully functioning democracy, we simply disagree. A nice aspect of being a Democrat is we can disagree yet fight shoulder to shoulder in those things we do agree on.

If this last paragraph inflames you, well it just shows your true colors.

You do not have comparable knowledge, insight, and judgement. An entirely different logical fallacy.

Trump changing 48% of AA kids are unemployed to 46%. IMO for both of you pushing his dishonest racial and your "democracy is lost" grievances respectively on vulnerable malcontents is inimical not just to the Democratic Party but to racial progress on his part and to democracy itself on yours.

I'm pushing NOTHING pro-Trump. You damn well know that.

bye bye. welcome to my short but growing ignore list. You simply hear what you want to hear and are too rah rah team blue to be able to discuss factual matters with.

changing your position to Trump's similar behavior. I never said that you were pro- Trump. But then you knew that, Cali.

Straw man argument: Attacking a point that no one made.

and apologize for the misunderstanding. It seems a shame to pump up rancor for no reason.

Cali has a lot to say that is worthwhile. I re-read her post, and then yours and must say I'm perplexed at your harsh words.

That said, I wish we could stay on topic. A big problem on DU is when there is petty bickering over nada.

This post is about Oligarchy and the fact that it needs to change to something that includes the 99% in forming policies that affect us all.

I am specifically refuting the statement that it exists in America at all. People outside DU don't have to conform to DU's rules. But here promoting insidious conspiracy theories that could undermine confidence in the Democratic Party is not okay.

Criticism of the party and the republic it serves positively, honestly and responsibly is constructive. Deliberately negative, dishonest and irresponsible misrepresentations are not.

Claiming that our nation is run by an oligarchy, meaning our party and electoral system are merely parts of a phony facade under their direction is very much not okay.

Oligarchy
1. A form of government in which all power is vested in a few persons or in a dominant class or clique; government by the few.
2. A state or organization so ruled.
3. The persons or class so ruling.

Concentration of wealth isn't good.

No one needs a billion dollars. We do need to get back to policies that flatten income and wealth distributions. Weather you wish to call the obscenely wealthy "oligarchs' is really not important, is it? They acquire too much wealth and power because we let them.

We need to focus on policies.

You basically run for president your entire life. You rise up the ranks of the party and kiss the right asses and hopefully those people are in the right place to elevate you.

In other words, you can't run for President until you "pay your dues and take your lumps."

The problem though is this eventually becomes a very corrupt process. And it's very undemocratic because it begins to resemble a line of succession. When that happens....when you can predict who the candidates will be 8, 12, 16 years out....that's when you cease to become a democracy. You are now not much different than a monarchy.

This is what George Washington feared and thought would destroy the country. He despised political parties. He believed what will happen is you would would end up with a small group of party elites at the top who will pick the candidates and set the platform. Then, everyone else below them feels compelled to support what the elites have decided. He believed this destroys individual thought and was undemocratic.

Washington has a good point. But it's less of a problem in countries where you have lots of parties. If your country has 6 parties, you could probably relate to a few of them. And coalitions have to be formed in order for a government to function. Therefore it kind of provides a check and balance system within itself.
However, when you have very few choices, that's when the problems really begin. And especially when you get down to one-party rule....you no longer have a democracy at all. That's when things start turning into what you had with the Nazis in Germany and the Soviet communists in Russia. There is no check and balance at all. It is complete control of the state through one party's elitist rule. And I think that the danger we are now facing in America as the GOP continues to fade.

Remember the old saying....
"Absolute power corrupts absolutely."
The American government was designed by our founders to have checks and balances. It was designed to avoid corruption, abuse of power, and maintain power to the people. When one party has so much dominance that that check and balance no longer works because one party controls every element of the state.....then the American experiment is officially over. And this country will eventually end up in the dustbin of failed empires throughout history.

Do you want the entire American government controlled by only a few unelected people at the top of a political party? I don't. Not even if they were Democrats. That's too much power in the hands of too few.

indies and repulicans. Why are people still picking this bullshgit he was just as popular Meir Dnes when HRC won almost 2::1.

elites who made it to the presidency. There are very few. Kennedy, both Bushes off the top of my head. Who else? A few who came from what could be considered upper class homes, if not exactly in the Bushes' circle. But certainly not Nixon, Johnson, Carter, Reagan, Clinton, Obama. Some had very modest backgrounds.

Merely climbing or clawing one's way to the top of a structure does not make one a member of the "elites." Ask any non-elite ex-president. They're not nobodies, but nevertheless the doors to homes of the true elites, our top power families, are not guaranteed open to just anyone who was once president for a few years. These days there's apparently a strong market for them as trophy speakers paid with what amounts to chump change, but who knows how long that market will hold up?

Even a really horrible one like George W. Bush was only able to be so horrible because his party controlled all of congress.

Of course, Congressional elections have their own ways to be rigged. Just witness the way Hillary was installed as Senator of New York.

Although when I mentioned that on another blog, somebody pointed out that the voters rejected Caroline Kennedy.

Except when I read that story it seems to me that many party bigshots like Cuomo rejected Caroline first, and then it turned out she was not polished enough as a speaker.

That people are willing to vote against their own financial well being over social issues they believe are important is not an indication of an oligarchy because 100 million people still participate in election after election.

More than 100 million voters participating in government is absolute undeniable proof we are not an oligarchy!

your evidence just doesn't hold up with any dedicated denialist

This is called motivated reasoning, which leads people to confirm what they already believe. To some extent, we all do it. It's why we're here. That goes for politics too.

I didn't see a statement in the article that supports the supposition that you make. Perhaps it is what it is. A very well written article that supports what Dewey says about corporations controlling government, and what to expect from such an arrangement.

Nothing more.

And that's why your posts deserve no consideration. You present nothing to consider.

This shit has been spewed for decades and it all amounts to the same conspiracy theory woo spewed by Neo-Nazis (the government is controlled by the JEWS!) to the wingnut John Birch Society nuttery of the Bildebergers or Illuminati controlling the government.

The fact of the matter is, there is not now nor has there ever been a tiny group of people with total control of the government and attempting to claim that nonsense is the biggest pile of conspiracy theory BULLSHIT going.

There is no difference in this article and all the rest of the "ooh this small group of people are REALLY controlling the government" conspiracy theory nutjobs!

and corporate entities have and exercise within our political system. It's certainly not unprecedented, but there was more balance from the early 1930s until the Reagan era.

You have no idea what you're raging about. I don't know how much reading you do on these subjects, but from your rantish ways, it appears to be lacking a bit.

Same bullshit as the Neo-Nazis and Birchers. Conspiracy theory WOO! You are simply inserting a different set of bogeymen into your conspiracy theory.

I've heard it discussed. It's not new, but it's a lot more dominant now.

It sure isn't woo. And my dad knew a fuck of a lot more about it than you ever will. As does President Carter.

And if there's one thing my very successful father wasn't, it was woo.

The Neo-Nazis all claim to have seen their CT Woo in action, as have the Birchers.

It's bullshit woo, There is no small group of people controlling our government.

It no longer is a theory at all.

You reminded me of those misguided enraged pundits on Fox News that define anyone that points out honest faults with the country as hating it, instead of wanting to establish those faults because you love your country and want to make it better.

It is all conspiracy theory woo.

More than 100 million people participate in our government and by definition, that means we CANNOT be an oligarchy.

So is Russia also not an oligarchy? Putin gets a nice majority each election.

You really don't get it. If the choice is between two candidates that both enable a small class of citizens to define most of their economic policies, it doesn't matter how many voters have handed them the means in which to do so.

Jeez, get off it. Learn the language and discuss issues properly, but go spouting CT nonsense like "The US is an Oligarchy" will only get you laughed at.

...by the willfully ignorant.

I'm fine with that, believe me.

and as we have seen, they can oppose each other and do. They are not conspiring together. That poster is silly. As if Obama and Hillary are conspiring with Bush to run things.

There is little tolerance anymore for any article that speaks this kind of truth to power, if that power includes our new third way candidate.

Nonetheless it's important to continue to keep people aware. Thank you.

And for many, it's just a big game with rah rah team blue.

It's important that a Republican NOT win the White House, but equally important not to forget the bigger and ongoing battle no matter who wins.

And that is certainly not what I wish to see. That false equivalence bullshit is exactly the crap Trump has been spewing on the campaign trail and it turns my stomach.

Pretending there is no difference between Dems and the GOP is a vicious lie and helps gets people like Trump elected, people who want to repeal the ACA and deny women reproductive rights. This is no "rah rah game." This is a matter of life and death. Posting shit like this OP only helps the GOP.

Now, it's infecting us as well. I'm not sure why that is.

We'll see if it stands...

Once you realize that, you'll start understanding where we really are.

It might be more accurate to at least include these folks (sorry that the picture of these people won't completely load. If you go to the link below you can see more of them:



This article does a great job explaining who is really in control:

http://yournewswire.com/secret-elites-why-forbes-rich-list-excludes-worlds-richest-families/

Which also explains why their pictures are generally not the ones that you see.
Thank you, I am posting here so I can find this again later.

A few more from that site:

http://yournewswire.com/school-girl-found-wondering-streets-after-escaping-illuminati-ritual/

http://yournewswire.com/george-soros-paid-al-gore-millions-to-lie-about-global-warming/

http://yournewswire.com/big-pharma-was-invented-by-the-rockefellers/

[IMG][/IMG]
[IMG][/IMG]

Bush v. Gore, 2000! Bill Maher addressed this during his last show before vacation just a couple of weeks ago. "Pet issues" MUST take a backseat. He's even taken his mission to legalize pot off the table for right now. Its hard for me to be this polite but I don't want to be sent to the cornfield by DU administrators....

simplistic thing they remembered from their childhood.... the old saying "Money talks, bullshit walks."

And so maybe too they have come to believe that any attempt to accomplish a goal while having plenty of material resources will succeed, while trying to accomplish that same goal through mere rhetoric will ultimately fail.

Oh... what would our great orators of days gone by think about this mess?

Still!

to give us an economic royalty. And they dont want to change a thing. The Dems have to play along or die in this system.

You are still fighting the primary. It is time to stop doing that.

Article.

And when people rise up and try to change something, their own party attacks them viciously and does everything possible to put them back in their places.

Thanks Aikido. Its important we keep our voices out there

You must be thinking of someone else. Cater never talked about the "two-party tyranny", or said that "the Democratic Party has all too often contributed to the crises they blame Republicans for creating". Nor can you find him claiming " the campaign of Hillary Clinton has embodied such subservience to the corporate class".

Jimmy Carter is a Democrat himself.

and whoopsie...lol

the theme that nuclear power was the way to go after TMI?

The article is an attack on the Democrats and Republicans (and the author continues that theme in his other pieces on Common Dreams). It puts Obama, Pelosi and Hillary Clinton in the photo the thread starter chose as an OP illustration. The article attacks Obama ("Barack Obama settled in the camp of those Dewey so often lambasted&quot , talks about 'the fecklessness of the "two-party tyranny"', says 'Democrats pay fealty to progressive movements, but rarely present more than "tepid reforms," amounting to a mere "attenuation of the shadow"', and says ' the campaign of Hillary Clinton has embodied such subservience to the corporate class'.

The Carter interview was about the Citizens United decision. He said Democratic and Republican incumbents see the money as useful, and incumbents are best place to benefit from it, so that they are unlikely to work to get rid of it. But Clinton has pledged to fight to overturn Citizens United. Carter supports Hillary.

So, no, Carter wouldn't have written anything like the OP. He's a Democrat. He supports Hillary. The OP article was written by someone fundamentally opposed to the Democrats, and especially Hillary.

"I can't think of one." Obviously the work required to overturn the oligarchy goes far beyond a narrow focus on Citizens United. That decision did not create the oligarchy but rather forwarded it.

Carter is a Democrat, but not a blind one. I'm happy Clinton supports overturning Citizens. It is a place to start. It is not the finish line.

It would have been more effective and more useful to post it after the election.

who were created to defend the aristocracy long ago, deny it.

Unsurprisingly many of them even deny the proof in this particular pudding -- inequality https://www.google.com/search?q=is+socio-economic+inequality+as+bad+as+ever+in+the+US&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

The next thing we know that kind will be insisting that their overlords haven't energetically and successfully taken advantage of that "money is speech" doctrine to perpetuate their dominion and control over us serfs

This is the kind of swill pushed by that idiot Jill Stein, who is a right wing tool. Pushing this kind of shit has no place on DU.

release her tax returns?

Gee, I wonder what she is hiding

I hadn't heard she'd joined the "none of your business" club of political con artists. Figures.

the 1040 was only for 2015, no other years.