America is an oligarchy

New Report Proves What We Already Knew – The U.S. Economy Sucks

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I’m surprised it took this long, but it’s finally become mainstream thinking to acknowledge that the official unemployment rate is little more than nonsensical propaganda. As the emergence of massive populist movements on both the “right” and the “left” have demonstrated, something ain’t right in the U.S. economy, and everyday people get it.

Bloomberg reports:

Democrats typically cite the current unemployment rate of 4.9 percent as evidence of significant economic improvement since the last recession, but a report this week from the left-leaning Center for Economic and Policy Research says otherwise.

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Middle Class Destitution – A Devastating Tale From America’s Heartland

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He had made the drive enough times to already suspect what he might find. Stride Rite had left Huntington for Mexico at the tail end of the recession; Breyers Ice Cream had closed its doors after 100 years. In the weeks after each factory closing in his part of Indiana, Lewandowski had listened to politicians make promises about jobs — high-tech jobs, right-to-work jobs, clean-energy jobs — but instead Indiana had lost 60,000 middle-class jobs in the past decade and replaced them with a surge of low-paying work in health care, hospitality and fast food. Wages of male high school graduates had dropped 19 percent in the past two decades, and the wealth divide between the middle class and the upper class had quadrupled.

“These jobs aren’t the solution so much as they’re part of the problem,” Lewandowski said, and now the result of so much churn was becoming evident all across Indiana and lately in Huntington, too. Fast-food consumption was beginning to tick up. Poverty was up. Foreclosures were up. Meth usage up. Heroin up. Death rate up. In Dan Quayle’s Middle America, one of the biggest news stories of the year had been the case of a mother who had let her three-week-old child suck heroin off her finger.

“Despair is our business, and business is booming,” Lewandowski said…

“This is how it feels to be sold out by your country.”

“It’s pure greed.”

“They wanted to add another 6 feet to their yachts.”

“We’re becoming like a third-world country. We’re going to have nothing left but fast food.”

“Fast food and hedge funds. That’s where we’re going.”

– From the Washington Post article: From Belief to Outrage: The Decline of the Middle Class Reaches the Next American Town

I write a lot about the middle class. It’s been one of the core themes here at Liberty Blitzkrieg since inception, yet my posts tend to be filled with statistics and sarcasm, and often lack the crucial element of heart. In order to truly connect with the public and shift their sentiments from apathy to action, it’s imperative to create a deep emotional connection. I admittedly have not done a great job in this regard. Fortunately for all of us, Eli Saslow of the Washington Post has done just that.

I read a lot of articles, and I can’t remember anything that hit me as hard as what he published this past weekend. It tells the tale of the spirit-crushing decimation of the American middle class through the lens of eternal optimist, Chris Setser. Chris is a man who always went above and beyond in order to provide a good life for himself and his family. Working the graveyard shift at an Indiana United Technologies plant so that he could be home when his kids came home from school, Mr. Setser lived his entire life living by the mantra: “Things have a way of working in the end.” Until they didn’t.

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Welcome to the Recovery – 1 Out of 7 Americans (45.5 Million) Remain on Food Stamps

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The following article from the New York Times is shameful in many ways. While the paper is forced to cover the undeniable fact that real wages for the lowest income Americans have plunged during the so-called “economic recovery” over the past six years, it fails to actually pin blame on the undemocratic, oligarch institution most responsible for this humanitarian crisis: The Federal Reserve.

Of course, I and many others have been saying this for years, but now more than half a decade into what is supposed to be a recovery, people are finally being forced to admit what this really is —  large scale theft.

In fact, Ben Bernanke and his crew of upward wealth distributing academics have pulled off the greatest wealth heist in American history. In its wake we have been left with a hollowed out, asset striped Banana Republic. Thanks for playin’ Main Street. Or more accurately, thanks for being played.

– From the post: The Oligarch Recovery – Study Shows Real Wages Have Plunged for Low Income Workers During the “Recovery”

More than six years into Dear Leader’s glorious economic recovery, 45.5 million Americans, or one in seven, remain on food stamps.

I’d say that’s a problem, but I don’t want to be accused of “peddling economic fiction.”

From Bloomberg:

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The Oligarch Tax Bracket – How the Tax Rate for the Wealthiest 400 Americans Plunged from 27% to 17%

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I never liked the saying: “We are the 99%.” While admittedly catchy and effective as a slogan, I think it is ultimately divisive and counterproductive. The reason I say this is because the statement itself alienates much needed allies for no good reason.

In a country with a population of 320 million, the 1% represents 3.2 million people, which is a pretty big number. While the 1% certainly have far superior material lives compared to the 99%, that doesn’t mean a particularly large percentage of them are thieves, cronies or oligarchs. In fact, it behooves people interested in transitioning to another paradigm to court as many of them as possible to the cause. It is very useful to have well meaning people with resources and connections on your side. To blithely assume there aren’t plenty of potential allies from a pool of 3.2 million is committing strategic suicide.

– From the post: Charting the American Oligarchy – How 0.01% of the Population Contributes 42% of All Campaign Cash

Much of my focus throughout 2015 was on the pernicious influence of the 0.01%, i.e., the American oligarchy. Indeed, nothing would please oligarchs more than to define a struggle as the 99% vs. the 1% in order to shift attention away from the real root of the problem, themselves.

As I’ve mentioned time and time again, 99% of the 1% doesn’t bribe politicians, write tax laws, or influence U.S. foreign policy. To discover the real players, the people who drive American domestic and foreign policy, as well as make all of the important decisions, you only need to focus on a hand full of people.

Today, the New York Times published an important article that proves the point. Here are the key paragraphs in the entire lengthy article:

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Congress Introduces Legislation to Ensure Corporate Criminals Remain Above the Law

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House Republicans on Monday unveiled legislation that would decriminalize a broad swath of corporate malfeasance, a move that injects white-collar crime issues into the thus-far bipartisan agenda on criminal justice reform. 

The House bill would eliminate a host of white-collar crimes where the damaging acts are merely reckless, negligent or grossly negligent. If enacted, it would make it more difficult for federal authorities to pursue executive wrongdoing, from financial fraud to environmental pollution.

Department of Justice spokesman Peter Carr blasted the legislation in a statement provided to HuffPost, saying it “would create confusion and needless litigation, and significantly weaken, often unintentionally, countless federal statutes,” including “those that play an important role in protecting the public welfare … protecting consumers from unsafe food and medicine.”

– From the Huffington Post article: House Bill Would Make It Harder To Prosecute White-Collar Crime

A key key theme here at Liberty Blitzkrieg from inception is that there are two tiers of justice in America. One for the rich and powerful, another for the poor and voiceless. It’s even worse than that though, since not only are certain segments of the population above the law, they are actually rewarded for a lack of ethics and criminality.

There is no more perfect example of this than the banker bailouts, in which the one sector of the economy that created and nurtured the financial collapse was rewarded with trillions of dollars in taxpayer backstops and bailouts. This same finance sector has seen a disproportionate amount of all income gains since the “recovery” started, precisely because the bailout itself was designed to help it as opposed to the middle class.

Of course, it’s not just Wall Street. The elite’s minions must also be taken care of. As such, police are allowed to SWAT raid, shoot to kill and rob average Americans via civil asset forfeiture with impunity. In fact, we just learned that police civil asset forfeitures exceeded all burglaries in 2014. So you are actually more likely to be robbed by a government criminal, versus a street thug in today’s America.

As reported by Armstrong Economics:

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“The Populist Upsurge is Real” – A Liberal College Professor Finds Common Ground with the Tea Party

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People are going to be pissed off no matter who wins this election and that is a very important social dynamic I believe is vastly under appreciated by the majority of mainstream pundits and analysts out there.  This is also very distinct from the environment that prevailed in 2008.  Four years ago, the financial markets were crashing and the economic future of America was circling the toilet bowl, yet a majority of Americans embraced the potential of a young, inexperienced biracial politician from Illinois who was saying all of the right things.  Despite the gigantic disappointment he has proven to be as President, there is no denying that he had all of the Democrats and most Independents under his spell on this day four years ago.

Fast forward to 2012 and the county isn’t “divided” as mainstream media talking heads like to say.  The country is pissed off.  Genuine and legitimate frustration permeates the land from sea to shining sea and rightly so.

– From my 2012 pre-election article: The Seventy Percent

Robert Reich is Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley. I know of the man mainly from his frequent appearances on CNBC when I used to watch the channel (I’m proud to say I haven’t tuned in, even for five minutes, for several years now). He was always held up as the token “liberal,” who was more than eager to spar with CNBC’s endless parade of crony capitalist heroes and “socialism for the rich” supporting statists. During my post Wall Street years, I have from time to time come across his musings, but none have struck me like the insightful post he published three days ago.

The post is titled, What I Learned on My Red State Book Tour, and it’s an extremely important that all Americans read it. Here are a few excepts:

I’ve just returned from three weeks in “red” America.

It was ostensibly a book tour but I wanted to talk with conservative Republicans and Tea Partiers.

I intended to put into practice what I tell my students – that the best way to learn is to talk with people who disagree you. I wanted to learn from red America, and hoped they’d also learn a bit from me (and perhaps also buy my book).

But something odd happened. It turned out that many of the conservative Republicans and Tea Partiers I met agreed with much of what I had to say, and I agreed with them.

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Retirement Assets of 100 CEOs Equals Combined Retirement Assets of 41% of American Families

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The following speaks for itself.

From Fortune:

The retirement assets of 100 Fortune 500 CEOs are worth more than the entire nest eggs of 41% of American families, a new study shows.

That means the 100 largest CEO retirement accounts—which totaled $4.9 billion last year—would equal the total saved by 50 million U.S. families, according to a report that was jointly published by the Institute for Policy Studies and the Center for Effective Government.

Now here’s the truly egregious part of all this…

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New Gallup Poll – 75% of Americans See Widespread Government Corruption

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The chart below from Gallup, is the sort of thing you’d expect to see in a Banana Republic. Which makes perfect sense, because America is a Banana Republic.

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Here are some additional observations from Gallup:

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Three in four Americans (75%) last year perceived corruption as widespread in the country’s government. This figure is up from two in three in 2007 (67%) and 2009 (66%).

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In New York City, Workers with Full Time Jobs Are Living in Homeless Shelters

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Puleo added he has “never seen” the homeless situation this bad.

Dilcy Benn, president of the union’s Local 1505, said more than 100 of the 1,000 parks workers she represents are living in shelters and at least another four, including Torres, are living on the streets on Staten Island and The Bronx. 

– From the Market Watch article: Hundreds of Full-Time New York City Workers are Homeless

One of the main data points that pundits and politicians who claim there is an “economy recovery” point to is jobs created. Please tell me, what good is a job if it can’t earn you a roof over your head?

Welcome to the Oligarch Recovery.

From Market Watch:

Angelo Torres punches in to work at 5 a.m. each weekday and spends the next eight hours cleaning up debris on Staten Island’s Midland Beach.

It’s a grueling job, says the veteran Parks Department maintenance worker, but also a welcome escape from the uncertainty of living on the streets as one of the city’s more than 300 full-time workers who are homeless.

“I cry every night thinking this isn’t really happening, but it is,” Torres, 45, told The Post.

Torres earns $33,662 a year but says it’s not enough to find four walls and a roof to call his own in a city where, according to StreetEasy, the median rent is $2,690 a month.

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Video of the Day – Three Former U.S. Treasury Secretaries and a Facebook Executive Laugh About Income Inequality

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If there was ever a “let them eat cake” moment in modern American history, this is it.

Earlier this year, at 2015’s Milken Institute Global Conference, Facebook Chief Operating Officer, Sheryl Sandberg, was moderating a panel with three former U.S. Treasury Secretaries. The topic of income inequality was raised, and they all burst out laughing. The biggest uproar came from the man who orchestrated the 2008 banker bailouts, former Goldman Sachs CEO, Hank Paulson, as Sandberg enthusiastically claps her hands like a privileged, primped out Panem aristocrat. To the right of Hank is Clinton puppeteer Robert Rubin, and all the way to the left, Timmy Geithner.

You have to see it, to believe it:

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