Capitalists Wage War on Americans, and the World

After winning the Cold War against communism in the early eighties, the rich capitalists within America and Europe have gone on to wage war directly against the very citizens who helped build it’s first great economic playground: America.

Capitalism is an economic system based on private ownership of capital and relies chiefly on citizen’s desire for profit and material gain for it’s fuel. The idea is if citizens are given the freedom to compete economically on a level playing field, their desire for pleasure, safety and material gain will fuel a market in which everyone can create their own destiny as they wish. But this is strictly the idealist’s definition of capitalism.

The truth is that man’s inequalities ranging from differences in intelligence, health, safety, access to education and starting capital make for a playing field that is anything but level. The poor living in public housing with few jobs in the surrounding area, lack of a decent education and a neighborhood filled with drugs and violence have very little chance to compete at all, let alone on a level playing field.

On August 20, 2005, the United States Census held a press conference to release the Housing and Household Economic Statistics for the Census of 2004. Among the many statistics released was the disturbing fact that 37 million Americans live in poverty. That is 12.7% of the total population and 1.1 million more people were classified as living in poverty than the previous year.

Perhaps more telling was the fact that the total income received by the highest earning 20% of the population of households increased, while the total income received by those in the remaining 80% declined. Indeed the concentration of wealth in the hands of the rich is at some of the highest levels ever recorded in the history of man; therefore, the inequality of the participants competing for capital is also peaking.

“As of 2004, the top fifth of households held 50.1% of all income, tied with 2001 for the highest share on record,” says the Economic Policy Institute. That is higher than plutocratic Rome and higher than Europe under feudalism. The playing field is anything but level.

Consider the following: while drivers were paying upwards of three and four dollars per gallon of gas in the wake of hurricanes Katrina and Rita, energy companies’ earnings have been estimated to have jumped nearly 73 percent during the third quarter of 2005. A huge increase in profits, but gains that will not come urgently, for Exxon Mobil’s net income during the second quarter of 2005 was 7.6 billion dollars. (The CEO of Exxon, Lee Raymond, alone was paid a salary of 7.5 million dollars in 2004, with 43.6 million dollars in stock options exercised during the same period.)

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the Exxon mobile example needs to be contrasted with a couple examples of ordinary citizens who, by no fault or lack of energy of their own, have very little money to heat their house or pay their transportation costs to get to a job that pays little more than minimum wage.

More shocking data from the Economic Policy Institute could be inserted:

“real income of the typical household has fallen five years in a row, despite the fact that the last three of those years 02, 03, 04 have been years of economic expansion.”
“over the same five years, the workforce has also become productive, as output per hour is up 15% from 2000 to 2004.” (yet all of these productivity gains have failed to reach the typical household in terms of increase income)

the fact is that Americans are working harder and longer for less pay every year while the corporations they work for are making record profits. The government’s tax and economic policies have consistently shown that the rich continue to grow richer, leaving little hope for the 13% of Americans already in poverty and a middle class that strains to stay above water year by year.

Progress is merely perceived because of the new technology available and the constant propaganda by the government and their media mouthpieces.

Also, available to be inserted in the middle section is the effects of capitalism on the world market. I have seen first hand what “free trade” is really about in Thailand. With a 7-eleven on every street corner in Bangkok, coke, Pepsi, Exxon, burger king, kfc, caterpillar, visa/MasterCard, etc… there is no way any Thai business can compete with these multi-nationals. And if the Thai government doesn’t let them come to setup shop here, then the disastrous economic sanctions would be imposed, the Thai prime minister would be assassinated or a coup would be setup by the CIA to install a more ‘democratic’ government, complete with secret police, torturous prisons for dissidents, etc.

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The idea of capitalism has already failed, but the ordinary overworked American has neither the time, nor the energy to see the situation clearly. He is lost in a sea of daily propaganda, stress, entertainment, escape and endless desire fed to him daily on every possible media he could come into contact with. The ordinary man or woman cannot see that capitalism could never work because in order to work, it requires the rich to have empathy and concern for the poor.

The consolidation of capital into the hands of a few cannot continue forever without literally breaking the backs and the minds of the labor force. Recent anxiety and depression statistics reveal that the millions of Americans are already precariously close to their breaking point on any given day. For the over-worked and over-stressed individual, there’s always a prescription: fifteen million Americans went to their family doctors to be treated for depression in 2004, 90% left the office with a prescription for an anti-depressant.

In order for capitalism to work, the playing field needs to be truly level, and that means the rich must give the poor and honest chance to compete. That includes proper education, healthcare, a safe environment and economic policies that support new businesses. But these hallmarks of American ‘freedom’ are increasingly becoming seen not as a right to every citizen, but as a privilege for those who can pay for them.

History has shown time and time again, that the poor over-worked, over-taxed and underpaid citizen will not be taken advantage of forever. However, in this modern age the rich have more power and more technology to control and continue waging war against average citizens than ever before in the history of man.

Media ownership has been consolidated in such a way that a handful of multi-national conglomerates can beam the status quo to billions of people in every form of media possible. Not since Hitler’s Third Reich has a nation’s population been so complacent while their government wages war not only other nations, but on the social welfare of the nation in general.

Without a doubt, the rich will continue to subdue the general population via the media and advertising, the threat of terror or (increasingly) terror itself. Once subdued, as most of America has been for the last thirty years, the rich owners of capital will continue to squeeze every last penny out of every citizen they can. Not because they are evil, not because they want to hurt anyone, but simply because their desire knows no limits and the Wall Street Journal contains no sob stories.

Capitalism and the rich corporate owners of capital will continue to wage war upon the common citizen, other nations and the Earth’s resources until the plight of the poor’s suffering becomes stronger than the capital being used to control and manipulate them. Until then, the silent war will continue unabated and unrealized by most Americans who ironically fuel it through their ignorance and blind participation.

The rich capital owners will never have enough and it is only when the average citizen starts demanding more, that there can ever be an end to the stranglehold capitalism has set upon this world.