Bombardment by the billionaires
Why Biden and the Democrats should declare war on these class warriors
The richest person in America tweeted last week that Democrats have “become the party of division & hate, so I can no longer support them and will vote Republican.”
Hello? Democrats are the party of division and hate? What planet has Elon been living on?
Meanwhile, the second-richest person in America (Jeff Bezos) tweeted that the Democrats’ proposed tax hikes on the rich will not tame inflation and their proposed spending would worsen it (he’s wrong, and I’ll explain why in another post).
In addition to last week’s billionaire tweetstorm, it was reported that Oracle’s Larry Ellison (#7 on Forbes’ list of richest Americans) in November 2020 joined Sean Hannity, Lindsay Graham, and Trump’s attorney to discuss strategies for contesting the presidential election results.
Oh, and Ellison has dumped some $25 million into a Super PAC supporting South Carolina Republican senator Tim Scott, a Trump endorsee.
As I noted last week, another billionaire, Peter Thiel, has donated at least as much to Trump-endorsed Republicans in senate primaries.
Not to mention Trump-diehards Charles Koch (#16 on the Forbes list), Rupert Murdoch (#31), and Carl Icahn (#43).
This is the same crew, not incidentally, that’s been fighting unions and flooding Congress and statehouses with cash to support Trump election deniers, prevent tax hikes on themselves, and kill off Biden’s and the Democrats’ agenda (more on this in a moment).
This billionaire bombardment gives Biden and the Democrats an opportunity to tell America whose side they’re on and whose side they’re not on — in effect, to declare class war on the class warriors.
Will they take it?
Not in over a century has so much of the nation’s wealth been concentrated at the very top — in the richest one-tenth of one percent of the richest one-tenth of one percent. Not in seventy years have corporations been as flush with cash, notwithstanding the stock market’s recent selloff. Not since the 1890s have CEOs raked in as much pay relative to average workers. Not since the creation of the income tax have the super-rich paid as low a rate as they do now relative to tax rate paid by most other Americans.
Isn’t it time for Biden and the Democrats to tell this to America?
Wealth isn’t a zero-sum game in which more at the top necessarily means less below, but wealth is tied to power — and power is a zero-sum game.
Many of America’s wealthiest and most powerful are now gathering for their annual gabfest in Davos, Switzerland, just as the annual get-together of America’s right (CPAC) is coming to a close in Budapest, Hungary. The two conferences are beginning to converge. Although the CEOs and hedge fund managers at Davos profess to worry about America’s record inequality and tout “corporate social responsibility,” their own corporate political action committees are doing everything possible to squelch tax increases on them, and to prevent additional spending on health care, child care, and other needs of average working people.
Meanwhile, not even the Republicans’ billionaire backers can disguise the total absence of a Republican agenda to help average working people.
The reason Democrats haven’t been able to get their agenda through the Senate and raise taxes on billionaires or on big corporations to pay for it — or even repeal the Trump tax cuts that went mostly to the top — is because Democrats have only 48 senate votes (all fifty Senate Republicans are against these measures, and the other two senate Democrats are major beneficiaries of campaign donations from corporations and the rich).
Isn’t it time for Biden and the Democrats tell this to the American people, and offer them a clear choice in the upcoming midterms and beyond?
Billionaires are mounting a class war. Republican lawmakers are mounting a culture war to deflect attention from it.
On October 31, 1936, in New York’s Madison Square Garden, Franklin D. Roosevelt, facing a bruising re-election bid, defined the stakes much as they are today. He explained that America was in a struggle against “business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering” and that a wealthy elite “had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs.”
He continued: “We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob.”
Then FDR said, in words similar to what Joe Biden and Democrats should be using against the billionaires and bigots who are now arrayed against them:
Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me — and I welcome their hatred.
Isn’t it time Biden and the Democrats came out clearly against the billionaires abusing their wealth and power by suppressing the wages of average working people and flooding our democracy with their money? And against the culture warriors who are covering up for them? Isn’t it time for Biden and the Democrats to explain why they haven’t been able to get their agenda through Congress?
Biden and the Democrats should tell Americans which side they are on — and ask America to choose sides.
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PS: ICYMI, here’s a clip from my appearance on “The Simpsons” last night, where I had a chance to explain the reasons for America’s staggering inequality in 8 seconds. (I probably got more across to more people in those 8 seconds than in all the books I’ve written and all the classes I’ve taught, combined.)
Mr. Reich, do you think one of the reasons the Democrats aren't more vocal about the overt corruption and antics of the Republicans and the billionaires is because they too are taking a lot of money from corporations and special interests? It seems to me that Bernie Sanders is the only one standing up to the Democratic National Party about not accepting PAC money. I truly believe that all of our politicians (except maybe a two or three) are in some CEO's pocket. Can average joe's really compete with the billionaire's money? It all seems so broken to me.
Imagine, if you dare..
That a candidate running for the highest office in the land, let’s say Former President Ronald Reagan or Former President Barack Obama, said these words about an American Soldier who was captured and tortured by the enemy.
“I like people who weren’t captured…”
You can bet the Republican Party, at least the Republican Party back then, would still be peeing on Reagan’s Grave and still talking bad about Obama worse than normal. Neither candidate would have stood a chance in hell of becoming the President of the United States and would have been despised by every American, if not every citizen of all the worlds’ democracies. Yet candidate Trump only got a slap on the wrist.
An important difference for our time: If a Democratic candidate had said this, let’s say Biden, the Republican Party would have taken it and ran with it forever or at least up until the present day and maybe beyond. This would be their rallying cry for the entire Biden Presidency! They would bring it up EVERY SINGLE CHANCE they got to speak on virtually any topic, related or not.
So why doesn’t the Democratic Party do the same?!
Why..? Because losing elections is what Democrats often do well. The main reason why Biden won was ONLY because many Americans, that normally don’t vote, got out and voted because they saw the threat of our country becoming a Fascists’ State.
We better get our act together quickly and start adapting the techniques used by the leaders of the Republican Party, which at its core is fear driven…for as long as I can remember anyway. And yes, I, and most Americans, FEAR the U.S. will become a fascists’ country if Trump, or someone that kisses up to him, becomes President.
And please, stop referring to the left as ‘liberals.’ Yes there are some, on both extremes of every party, who would love to have as much as possible without any hard work or long hours. HOWEVER, the overwhelming majority of people who are not in their late teens/early twenties, and people living in the real world, of Democrats, Independents and Republicans, understand you have to get out there and work hard to get what you need and want. (Yes, I understand the super wealthy control most of the board and get MUCH more in return than the effort they put in – difference topic altogether) “We” are the Progressive Party, not the Liberal Party! Say this instead all the time and put the word ‘Liberal’ to bed once and for all. Why continue to shoot yourself in the foot.
This is not rocket science so why do we treat it as such. Most Americans (the hard-working middle and working classes) can’t, or won’t, take the time to do deep analysis. The Leaders in the Republican Party, and of course their Think Tanks, get this and know how to use it to their advantage. (their so virtuous) Sadly, the Democratic Party does not get this. DUH..