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Some things I hate |
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The problems we are experiencing today: the disillusionment, the disappointment, the restlessness, the cynicism, have their root in the presidency of Ronald Wilson Reagan. When Ronald Reagan became president in 1980 this country began a period of decline from which it has yet to recover. Ronald Reagan set us against each other. He outlawed the Air Traffic Controller's Union, made it illegal for them to be out on strike. Ronald Reagan removed the protection for the striking worker, the only band-aid the working class ever had on the gushing artery called capitalism. Capitalism is a soul-crushing system. Its byproduct, especially in the USA - the richest country on earth - is poor people. Make no mistake, it is in the interest of the wealthy for there to be poor people. The rich people of this country have seemingly lost whatever conscience they may have one had; there is no one to speak to the "better angels of their nature". There is no one to remind them it is right to do right, that they are morally obligated by virtue of their wealth to not put people out of work just because they can. Call it "noblesse oblige" or whatever the hell you want. But the wealthy should stop looking for the fulcrum point where wages are low enough to make them happy and high enough to keep everyone but themselves from starving. They always go too far. In the past, popular movements have sprung up whose sole purpose was to kill rich people in their sleep, cut their heads while they lay dreaming in silk pajamas. It could happen again. Those of us who've never had anything and maybe never will have become discouraged. We no longer wish for balance, we no longer are able to place blame where it belongs when the corporation decides to downsize, when we are being squeezed for every last cent of our value, when labor is seen as this cash cow that can be worked to death, that can be tossed away when cheaper labor becomes available. The operating principle of the successful businessman these days is "How can I get my labor cost down and simultaneously get more money for my product?". I know about this, I saw that process up close and personal, I worked at a company where 500 people were put out of work for the sake of a few dollars. And a very healthy company was gutted for the sake of a new pool, a new car, a new mink for the mistress. I, for one, am tired of the big grab. How much is enough for these people? And who believes that the money trickles down? Is there anyone, anywhere in this country still naive to think that wealthy people stimulate the economy? Well, I'll tell ya - they don't. They no longer put money back into the community. They no longer create libraries or endowment or museums or art collections. They just make more money and put more people out of work. They move their money offshore. They "shelter" it. They find ways not to circulate it. Despite Ted Turner. People like Pat Buchanan, Bob Grant and Rush Limbaugh sell their pettiness as a virtue. They point fingers at the welfare mothers, the immigrants, those not like themselves. But they never point in the right direction. They want us to blame each other, blame the immigrants, the non-white persons, the government. I have news for Mr. Buchanan and Mr. Grant and Mr. Limbaugh: the enemy is already here. He's been here all along. The enemy o f the working man is the rich man. He's at A.T. & T. getting his shoes shined in his office. He's at Sears & Roebuck taking delivery on a humidor full of Montecristos. He's at a General Motors corporate "encounter" weekend, learning what it means to "manage effectively" and "build bridges" and "work together". He's out on the links, trying to get in nine holes before jetting back to Golden, Colorado for the big Coors strategy meeting, the one about increased saturation in the "inner city", a euphemism on par with "sweep and clear" or "mutual assured destruction"; he's eyeballing a new series of ads wherein black women singers turn crappy John Denver songs (is that phrase redundant) into hymns. He's somewhere right now trying to figure out how to make us work more for less money. He wants your grandma's Social Security money. It's his raison d'etre.. And the government has nothing to do with this man's mind except they've greased the way. They've made the Big Grab as easy as possible by forgetting about us and focusing on the golfers, thinking that the golfers in - in their grand beneficence - are going to take care of us all. Well, it's time to forget the golfers and start thinking about us - the great unwashed - again. It's time to remember that we outnumber the golfers and would like nothing more than to cut their heads off while they sleep. And when we finally awake from our TV induced slumber, we might do just that. To ourselves, we are not much. We probably wish we were better than we are. I know I do. I wish every day that I were a better person, not prone to misgivings, not afraid, able to "go forth and forge the conscience of my race in the smithy of my soul". But the fire is dying in our collective smithy. Our souls have been trampled. We want - we need - to feel connected again, like something matters. Like we matter. I want to tell that if you are out of work or down on your luck and feel you are a hard-working person you must not blame yourself. Don't allow the golfers to pull that trick on you. It would be like choosing death over life. We must say to the golfers: "You're to blame". These are some other things you can do to try and be a better person: Admit you might be wrong about
everything you know. |
