Reply #102: But the rich are captives of their primate natures as much as we all are.

[tom_paine]

I am reminded of the experiment in the 80s with the monkeys and the cocaine. If I recall correctly, monkeys in cages had two buttons, one for cocaine and one for food (water was supplied them).

Most of the monkeys eventually died because they could not stop pushing the cocaine button and it's attendant "pleasures" long enough to get some food. It didn't happen overnight, but eventually the monkeys grew weaker, starved and died.

Pleasure. Be it sexual or any other kind, drives us in our quest. For monsters like Bush and Cheney, their pleasure is power, control, domination, and bloodlust. For their authoritarian followers, pleasure comes from unquestioning obedience to Fuhrer and the superiority over target groups conferred by Fuhrer and Party. Plus, the pleasure of not having to think, just follow.

For the rich, the reinstitution of aristiocratic privilege and a renunciation of the ideas that "all (people) are created equal" must be immensely pleasurable. Almost everyone gets pleasure from feeling superior to others in some way (another sad truth about the human condition...witness daytime talk shows and COPS), so just imagine the pleasure of our Elites at not only feeling superior to the ignorant peasantry, but the reinforcement of that belief by SOCIETY as aristocratic privilege returns in all aspects of life.

That doesn't even address the "cocaine rush" that must come with the fattening wallets as the rest of society is drained into their pockets as we return to a pre-1776 state of affairs.

So, we might present a "business case" to the rich, but they are crazed with the cocaine rush of being Gods among Peasants (who wouldn't be? ...we think we would, but I wonder...absolute power corrupts absolutely) and the orgy of dollars pouring into their bank accounts as the Middle Class, worth trillions, is liquidated?

Could one present a rational case to a cocaine addict in the midst and throes of such a peaking high? Could one expect people who are just now beginning to feel that immense and powerful rush that the accepted inequality charaterstic of all Totalitarian States, not just our nascent BushPutinist variety, is bad for business and ultimately themselves?