Network Part I: Mad As Hell

I don’t have to tell you things are bad, everybody knows things are bad. The idea that this country is dedicated to the freedom and flourishing of every individual in it is finished. I don’t mean that the United States is finished as a world power. The United States is the richest, the most powerful, the most advanced country in the world. It’s our dedication to the concept of liberty that’s finished. It’s the single solitary human being that’s finished.

This country has become a machine. Where once there were checks and balances, now you see the powers that be working in tandem to screw the people. Regulators who were supposed to ensure the people’s safety are working only to ensure that big corporations are safe from competition. Lobbyists write bills and hand them over to legislators along with big checks, and our legislators cash the checks and sponsor the bills, never having read them. Our political system has been bought out from under us lock, stock, and barrel.

When did it happen and who’s to blame? Blame natural selection. When an idea is profitable it doesn’t take long for others to emulate it, and regulatory capture is one of the most profitable ideas that’s ever come along. It’s common knowledge that power corrupts, so it should come as no surprise that those we have given power have been thoroughly corrupted by it.

Who stands to gain the most from the labyrinthine network that constitutes our current system? Follow the money. If big business owns our regulators, who owns big business? Rich people, right? Wrong. If you look at the list of major stockholders for any large company, you’ll find that wealthy individuals are a drop in the bucket compared with large financial institutions. Big banking controls every industry in this country, if not the world. When you look at a list of lobbying dollars spent by each industry, banks are always at the top of the list, but that’s not half as frightening as when you realize that they own all of the other industries on the list too. If you were ever curious about who benefits most from our oppressive regime of government/corporate collusion, you need look no further than your friendly neighborhood investment banker.

Is it a conspiracy? No. There is no dark secret room where a shadowy cabal of investment bankers plot world domination. It is what John Perkins called a culture of corporatocracy, the commonly held belief that dishonesty, exploitation, and shortsightedness are acceptable tradeoffs for immediate payoffs and instant gratification. Bilderberg and Bohemian Grove are merely elaborate conventions at which the decadent elites can network. It would be much easier if we were struggling against a cult or a conspiracy, it could be rooted out and abolished, but an authoritarian culture is much more insidious.

We know things are bad, worse than bad. They’re crazy. We know that our air is unfit to breathe and our food is unfit to eat. We stare at our newfeeds and read headlines about the police killing unarmed men and raiding the homes of peaceful people as if that’s the way it’s supposed to be. You know that all of your internet traffic is being surveilled, but you think ‘Please, just let me have my Facebook and my Tinder and my Twitter and I won’t say anything. Just leave me alone.’ Well I’m not going to leave you alone. I want you to get mad!

I don’t want you to write your Congressman, because frankly unless you send a large campaign donation he’s not going to care what you have to say. In next week’s conclusion to this article I’ll tell you what you can do to help stop the corporatocracy, end the wars, and liberate yourself from tyranny, but first you’ve got to get mad! You’ve got to say ‘I’m a human being, god damn it! My life has value!’ You’re going to need to be pissed off if we’re going to alter or abolish our government. You’re going to need to be mad as hell if you’re not going to take it anymore.