Bill Moyers: "plutocracy and democracy don't mix"

BILL MOYERS: You've no doubt figured out my bias by now. I've hardly kept it a secret. In this regard, I take my cue from the late Edward R. Murrow, the Moses of broadcast news.

Ed Murrow told his generation of journalists bias is okay as long as you don't try to hide it. So here, one more time, is mine: plutocracy and democracy don't mix. Plutocracy, the rule of the rich, political power controlled by the wealthy.

Plutocracy is not an American word but it's become an American phenomenon. Back in the fall of 2005, the Wall Street giant Citigroup even coined a variation on it, plutonomy, an economic system where the privileged few make sure the rich get richer with government on their side. By the next spring, Citigroup decided the time had come to publicly "bang the drum on plutonomy."

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"...the top 10%, particularly the top 1% of the US-- the plutonomists in our parlance-- have benefited disproportionately from the recent productivity surge in the US... from globalization and the productivity boom, at the relative expense of labor."

"...(and they) are likely to get even wealthier in the coming years. (Because) the dynamics of plutonomy are still intact."

more:
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/04302010/transcript5.html

on this thread about Moyers.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x8251635

Moyers nails it again.
I will miss his voice.
The last of a dying breed....a TRUTH Teller.


"If we don't fight hard enough for the things we stand for,
at some point we have to recognize that we don't really stand for them."
--- Paul Wellstone

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