The effort, launched in the wake of the Brown v Board decision in 1954 (as so brilliantly documented by Nancy MacLean in her new book Democracy in Chains), to take over the institutions of American governance has been largely successful. And to solidify their gains, some among the very, very wealthy are aggressively supporting Republican efforts to gerrymander and vote-suppress the Democratic Party into oblivion.
In Crash, I pointed out how each of our nation's major reboots (each leading to a huge progressive leap forward) happened after an economic crisis. The economic crisis of 1772 (which led to the Tea Act, and then the American Revolution), the Great Crash of 1856-'57 (which even wiped out Abraham Lincoln and led to the Civil War), and what was then referred to as the Republican Great Depression of the 1930s (which led to World War II) all led to major changes in America.
Will it take another Great Crash to bring about a reformation of our government? Or have our oligarchs so deeply embedded themselves and their shills into our institutions of government that it's no longer possible for us to pull back from our headlong rush into neo-feudalism/neo-fascism?
The answer to both questions will probably become evident in the next three years.
But if America is to truly become the land of the free and the home of the brave, a place where any person can make it, a land clean and protected from corporate predation, it's going to take a massive mobilization of people who currently aren't even bothering to vote or run for office.
The Republican Party's behavior today eerily parallels the day in 1936 when Roosevelt said, "In vain they seek to hide behind the flag and the Constitution. In their blindness they forget what the flag and the Constitution stand for."
In 1932, the pain from GOP policies was so great that Americans turned out in huge numbers for FDR. Disgust with the Republican embrace of America's robber barons was so thorough that, outside of 1947-'48, Republicans didn't hold majority control of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1933 to 1995.
Today, even the phrases "robber barons" or "economic royalists" are likely to produce a "Huh?" response, particularly among those who watch oligarch billionaire Rupert Murdoch's Fox News or listen to right-wing hate radio.
Americans are in crisis. From opiates to student loan debt to underemployment, oligarchs representing monopolistic Big Pharma, Big Banks, and Big Retail/Fast Food are devastating us. Our courts are largely taken over by shills loyal to billionaire wealth and corporate power, as have the majority of our state governments. And our land and food supplies are poisoned daily by frakkers, polluters, and agricultural chemical companies.
And our ascendant political party, the GOP, is working as hard as it can to transfer trillions more dollars of wealth from working people to its patrons in the top 1%.
As Eldridge Cleaver said, "There is no more neutrality in the world. You either have to be part of the solution, or you're going to be part of the problem."
It's truer today than ever before. And it's not like we weren't warned.
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