Why Elites Won't Change The World And Why Democracy Will

[ancianita]

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

1. One things for damn sure... Bernie will change the world.

He's the one we've been waiting for...


Bernie & Elizabeth 2020!!!
Welcome to the revolution!!

[ancianita]

2. Changes we need won't be done by just "the one we've been waiting for." I love Bernie, but you're

kinda talking past the point of the OP.

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

6. Fair point! But, in my defense, I believe Bernie has sparked a revolution, the effect of which

will be felt for generations to come. It's the "wildfire," created by that spark, of generations of Democratic socialist supporters who will make the true impact, no doubt... not the corporate elites, like the Mark Zuckerbergs and Jeff Bezos's of the world, who think they have all the answers and want to rule over the masses like feudal overlords.

No, it is true and honest democracy that will win out in the end and, perhaps, historians will trace back the paradigm shift in political thinking to Bernie's revolutionary ideas that brought Democratic socialism back into vogue and vanquished the "neo-feudalism" being imposed by these corporate elite "overlords", once and for all.


Bernie & Elizabeth 2020!!!
Welcome to the revolution!!!

[ancianita]

8. Totally agree, which is why I supported him in the last primary. This time, though, climate change

runs my decision.

Climate change action should guide our politics, not the other way around, simply because if a candidate doesn't really put it first, it will get lost in the morass of hackery that compromises action.

Which is why this time, I support Jay, who's got the most revolutionary outlook for this country. He rightly thinks that if we don't stop ours and the world's carbon output, no amount of political revolution will really matter.

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

10. I agree, Jay is prolly the best on the issue of climate change.

Bernie & Elizabeth 2020!!!
Welcome to the revolution!!!

[ancianita]

12. If we need to regain standing internationally, climate change will re-connect us to the world. Jay

has the only record of accomplishments -- he's also the only governor in the candidate pool -- that, with further input, can be scaled up to national levels.

He knows what current things we do and what new structural stuff we can do to drop our carbon footprint to EU levels. Which would be a big step forward as a model for other nations like China.

He's got a door that we can go through to regain our standing as an equal with other nations. The global solutions to save this species from killing off itself and other life are formed with constructive, connected action.

It won't be zero sum. Elites here and elsewhere stand by waiting to help us solve the problems they know they've caused for humankind. But they will move on without us if we keep coming up with MarketWorld tactics rather than institutional solutions that we all, and not just they, OWN.

[FreepFryer]

9. That's an interesting argument. It's wrong - but it's interesting how u cling to "great man" theory.

Whether Bezos, sanders, trump or otherwise, it’s a continuing belief in the “great man” on which your argument falsely relies.

Democracy is the will of the demos, not the leader.

Until the hero worship you perpetuate is abandoned in favor of the popular will, you’re just moving the same pieces around your ostensibly “revolutionary” new playing field and calling it progress.

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

11. Nope... clinging to the great revolution that Bernie started.

Great politicians come and go... the movement Bernie started will last for generations!!


Bernie & Elizabeth 2020!!!
Welcome to the revolution!!!

[FreepFryer]

13. yup. Clinging, indeed. (n/t)

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

14. Proudly too!

Bernie & Elizabeth 2020!!!
Welcome to the revolution!!!

[FreepFryer]

16. "Proudly clinging" is like "fearfully standing" - so, yeah.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

3. I saw the similarities to Feudalism long ago.

I think it might be a common human phenomenon (that I personally dislike).

A few people with power (lords) realize they can't maintain their authority without allies (vassals). The vassals are overly-compensated for their loyalty to the lord rather than the majority.

Modern-day lords are the corporate owners and their vassals are business managers, paid more than they deserve for the so-called "stress" of telling workers what to do.

The lords and vassals are the "deciders", as George Dumbya Bush would say.

What blows my mind is that people in those positions often convince themselves that they are more important than the people doing the actual work.

I've been a manager, and it EMBARRASSED me to have people kissing my butt while they experienced the real hardships and they performed the actual work.

The fact that I previously did "real work" in my youth made no difference. Did I somehow EARN the right to avoid actual labor because I "paid my dues" in my youth? NO! It's still unfair to overpay a "decider" over someone doing something REAL!

[ancianita]

4. I always thought of that feudal stuff as a right wing "road to serfdom" thing, but it's very real.

Hating labor is real. But labor creates the value that so-called "owners" want to take credit for and profit from. Definitely feudal.

When you say, "It's still unfair to overpay a "decider" over someone doing something REAL!" I'm reminded of exactly why schools are poorly funded, and how the pay is the inverse of how it should be -- the highest paid should be those directly teaching, and the farther from kids "the system's" people are, the less they should get paid. The teacher is the #2 cause of student achievement.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

5. Teachers are very important!

Particularly embarrassing to me was when the "subordinates" knew more than me about a particular process, yet they still were deferential to my decisions because I had the "authority" over them.

I was popular as a manager because I praised the people "under me" for their superior knowledge (at times), and I often deferred to their judgement, but I eventually quit that position because I despised my fellow managers who relished their authority. We'd even watch "instructional" videos that focused on authority, and the importance of it to supposedly maintain order.

It was not like the scientific community at all, where everyone is questioned and critiqued.

In the "business" system that I was supposed to accept, a person like Einstein should be unquestioned about his views of Quantum Physics simply because he was a genius in regard to the macro-world and gravity.

We are ALL fallible and can learn from others, and there's no ultimate authority of ANYTHING!

EDIT: I'm not surprised at all that most scientists are not Republican, and that so many Republicans are anti-science in recent times. Authority and supposed "order" mean more than TRUTH to them.

It's more like a social caste system of the likes of India.

[ancianita]

7. A caste system. That's what Anand calls what it seems like in the U.S.

True, we're all fallible.

By distraction and stress, we're trained away from thinking clearly.

Too many people confuse being IN authority (behavior trainers) with being AN authority (knowers).

Teachers are an authority, which is why more innate respect goes to them than to admins.

Republicans who rely on being in authority, and their followers, think they can buy those who are an authority like a commodity. Their disrespect of those who are an authority comes from their thinking they "own" them because they pay them. They and their followers revert to what we see as "authoritarian" behavior and rigid behavior rules -- ruling/following. Free will is negotiable, not respected.

An authority respects free will and thought, and seldom fears challenge, critique or equality.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

19. Very well said!

[erpowers]

15. Howard Schultz Comes To Mind When Thinking About the Contents of this Video

Howard Schultz seems to be a guy who claims to want things to get better, but does not want to have to give up anything for things to get better.

[appalachiablue]

17. Elites have been involved in philanthropy and funding the arts,

education, medical research and more for a quite some time in order to receive (tax) benefits or improve their image. In the late 19th-20th c. and beyond it was the Carnegie public libraries, JP Morgan Library, the Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Fnd, the families of Dupont, Milken, Sackler and many others funding universities, cultural institutions, museums, medical centers and working on public health policy and science programs like the evil eugenics/pseudo science movement. Before these elites and 'robber barons' of the industrial era, there were patron monarchs, kings, princes and dukes.

Many earlier donors were involved in 'shaping society' for some 'improvement' even if not to the level of today's billionaires of the Second Gilded Age. And who actually believed pronouncements by corporate heads like Mark Z. and others years ago to be solely motivated by 'good for humanity,' without some self interest? I mean really--. And I agree wholeheartedly with the role of democracy in organizing our society, not extreme wealth.

Facebook Facing Criminal Probe Over Data Sharing, Truthdig, March 14, 2019
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/facebook-facing-criminal-probe-over-data-sharing/

[ancianita]

18. Thanks for your effort post. It's good to consider the merits of philanthropy. Two things

from Giridharadas' work opened my eyes on understanding how the billionaire class and philanthropists came to think.

One thing they still believe is from what Carnegie wrote (not sure if he was in the Gilded Age):

1. If you want progress, which wealth building IS, you have to let rich people make their money however then can, even if it widens inequality -- like the concentration of business, industrial and commercial enterprises, in the hands of the few -- and that management methods aren't to be questioned. That the capitalist "system" is off limits for discussion.

Carnegie justifies extreme taking by laying out a doctrine of extreme giving. Unlike many rich people then and now, Carnegie derided the two most common ways to give away wealth -- giving to descendants and giving after death.

Carnegie thought a punitive estate tax would encourage philanthropy. Actively giving one's own wealth away was the only approach Carnegie supported, because wealth belonged to the community.

Today's billionaires don't believe, as he did, that keeping was hoarding, and that hoarding was thus akin to thieving the public.

Carnegie said money you don't need and that the public could employ isn't really your money. That inequality was a transitional phase between taking and giving; it's a necessity for progress, but soon reversible. That way, wealth can be made a much more potent force than if it had been distributed in the small sums of wages.

He believed that in the taking phase, for the non-wealthy to resist any callous injustice -- low labor pay, low level housing-- is to be rejected. He believed there's no choice for business capitalists but to operate in the most aggressive way, lest they go out of business.

All that is excused by later philanthropy; that such giving would keep the underdogs out of the top dogs' hair, a belief that today's philanthropists do admit.

Which means that, even today, the rich believe that they know better what to do with money than their wage employees and their families.

Carnegie, like today's billionaires, believed that generosity is a substitute for and means of avoiding the need of a more just and equitable system -- like higher tax funded schools, better housing, etc. He understood his taking/giving phases were a fairer distribution of power. Philanthropy was "better than taxes."


2. The other thing true for both then and now -- the rich don't allow anyone to expect them to make any sacrifices to level the playing field of capitalist competition.

Giridharadas proves in all kinds of ways just how philanthropy, as it is practiced today, helps widen the income inequality gap.