The sociopathic 1 percent: The driving force at the heart of the Tea Party

[DonViejo]

In their warped view of society, only the individual exists -- with no social relations, shared history and culture

PAUL ROSENBERG



“The sociological imagination Mills calls for is a sociological vision, a way of looking at the world that can see links between the apparently private problems of the individual and important social issues.” – Oxford University Press

“I always said that if I wasn’t studying psychopaths in prison, I’d do it at the stock exchange.” – Robert Hare, creator of the Hare Psychopathy Checklist and its variants, the most widely used diagnostic tools for psychopathic personalities.

In 1998 the International Sociological Association listed radical sociologist C. Wright Mills’ book “The Sociological Imagination” as the second most important sociological book of the 20th century. As is only natural with such an influential work, there are differing interpretations of what’s meant by sociological imagination, but all involve some relationship between individuals and society. Lately, however, we’ve been exposed to a completely opposite sort of imagination, one that sees only individuals in isolation, and seems incapable of grasping even the most basic of social facts connecting them with each other. Call it “the sociopathic imagination,” because sociopaths are defined by their lack of empathy, conscience or any form of intuitive social awareness.

We’ve seen this most strikingly in a recent wave of attention to some bizarre thinking of the 1 percent. It was sparked by billionaire investor Tom Perkins, with his letter to the editor of The Wall Street Journal, in which he compared public criticism of the “one percent” to Nazi attacks on the Jews, and suggested we were on the road to another Kristallnacht, which was reinforced by the remarks of others, such as billionaire real estate investor Sam Zell, who supported him.

As Paul Krugman correctly noted, “Mr. Perkins isn’t that much of an outlier” among the 1 percent. Krugman scored them for their “paranoia” and “megalomania,” both of which are obviously present to some degree, but it was one of their own who zeroed in much closer to the mark. Venture capitalist Nick Hanauer — who has advocated a $15 minimum wage and for raising taxes on people like him “to reward the true job creators,” ordinary middle-class consumers — rightly called them sociopaths when he recently appeared on “All In with Chris Hayes.”

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http://www.salon.com/2014/03/08/the_sociopathic_1_percent_the_driving_force_at_the_heart_of_the_tea_party/

[Laelth]

1. Nick Hanauer sounds like a smart guy. k&r

Here's what he says:

The fundamental law of capitalism is that if workers have no money, businesses have no customers. That’s why the extreme, and widening, wealth gap in our economy presents not just a moral challenge, but an economic one, too. In a capitalist system, rising inequality creates a death spiral of falling demand that ultimately takes everyone down.

Low-wage jobs are fast replacing middle-class ones in the U.S. economy. Sixty percent of the jobs lost in the last recession were middle-income, while 59 percent of the new positions during the past two years of recovery were in low-wage industries that continue to expand such as retail, food services, cleaning and health-care support. By 2020, 48 percent of jobs will be in those service sectors.

Policy makers debate incremental changes for arresting this vicious cycle. But perhaps the most powerful and elegant antidote is sitting right before us: a spike in the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour. True, that sounds like a lot. When President Barack Obama called in February for an increase to $9 an hour from $7.25, he was accused of being a dangerous redistributionist. Yet consider this: If the minimum wage had simply tracked U.S. productivity gains since 1968, it would be $21.72 an hour — three times what it is now.

http://politicsinminnesota.com/2013/06/nick-hanauer-the-capitalists-case-for-a-15-minimum-wage/#ixzz2vOi3scWK

Spot on, if you ask me.

-Laelth

[BeyondGeography]

2. It's the whiners-take-all society