Warren Buffet: my class is winning the class warfare

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LINK:
http://www.alternet.org/workplace/144388/america_without_a_middle_class_--_i
t%27s_not_far_away_as_you_might_think/?comments=view&cID=1382255#c1382255

Everything is going according to plan
Posted by: CaliJim on Dec 5, 2009 8:32 AM
In the mid 90's I had a customer who was writing a paper at the University
of California. The title of the paper was "The Latin-Americanization of the
United States".
The premise of the paper was that the rich and corporate interests were
aligned in an effort to eliminate the middle class in our country, while
greatly increasing the incomes and wealth of the tiny "elite" percentage of
the population. The result would mirror the Latin American model of a tiny
minority that owned or controlled the vast majority of everything, a tiny
middle class struggling to hang on, and a large and rapidly increasing
"underclass" of poor who would literally have to do whatever they could to
survive. Literally, a return to the Feudal system of lords and serfs.
I read his paper and we had many discussions regarding it...and I have to
admit that I thought it was a bit extreme in it's predictions at the time.
Now, of course, it's clear that he was a prophet - and that things have
proceeded exactly as he predicted they would. Wages have been systematically
held down, benefits have been reduced and/or eliminated, jobs have been
systematically shipped overseas (often with tax benefits to the corporation
for every job that was eliminated in the US), taxes for the rich and
corporations have been vastly reduced and funding for education, health care
and other essential services are no longer adequate to do what needs to be
done. The rich get richer and richer, while the corporations get more and
more powerful and arrogant.
I've already advised both of our kids to move to New Zealand or Australia if
they can...where minimum wage is $12-13 an hour and they get free health
care - which is exactly how it should be here.
Ironically, a fairly large percentage of the population has been conned into
going out in force and supporting the very policies that are harming
them...by distortions, manipulations and outright lies regarding unions,
increasing wages, raising taxes on the rich and corporations, health care
reform and restrictions on the powers and rights of corporations. These have
been sold by highly paid spokespersons like Limbaugh, Beck and others, who
get their funding from the same rich and corporate interests who are
benefiting.
Unfortunately, nothing has been done to rein in the financial abuses by the
banks, insurance companies and other multinational corporations - even after
the wholesale collapse of our economy.
I'd love to be able to end with some uplifting and encouraging comment...but
the best I can do is to repeat the quote by Warren Buffett “There’s class
warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war,
and we’re winning.”
Unfortunately, nothing has been done to rein in the financial abuses by the
banks, insurance companies and other multinational corporations - even after
the wholesale collapse of our economy.
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