Natural disasters expose the realty of social life. The United States is characterized by levels of social inequality that are without precedent. Three billionaires own as much wealth as the bottom half of the population. Last week, Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon, increased his wealth to over $100 billion -- three times the amount of aid approved by the US Congress for hurricane relief last month.
For the past four decades, the ruling elite, under Democrats and Republicans alike, has engaged in a single-minded policy of wealth redistribution, channeling resources from social programs and infrastructure to the balance sheets of corporations and the bank accounts of the rich. The consequences are innumerable, from the opioid crisis ravaging much of the country, to declining life expectancy, poverty-level wages and soaring debt for the majority of the population.
The main domestic priority of the ruling class is to pass a massive tax cut for the corporations and the wealthy, currently being fast-tracked through Congress. While the Republicans are spearheading this looting operation, they do so with the complicity of the entire political establishment.
The conditions in Houston exemplify the social reality that the Democrats and the media are attempting to bury by polluting public consciousness with the campaign over allegations of sexual harassment and the neo-McCarthyite hysteria over claims that Russia is "sowing divisions" within the United States. They hope to suppress opposition through a regime of Internet censorship.
Facts, however, are stubborn things. The devastation wrought by Harvey will have its impact in other ways, feeding into a growing mood of anger and opposition that has revolutionary implications.
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