Friday, January 14, 2011

if I were a rich man

Somewhere in my upbringing I learned or more likely assimilated a distrust for the very wealthy. Not for the new millionaires or the upper middle class, but for the "old money" the people who have had and expect to have.

People who earned their money the old fashioned was - they inherited it.

These are the robber barons, the landed gentry that came here as second sons and became founding fathers. Some of them had very liberal views of politics and intelligence, some not so much, but they all viewed this new land as an opportunity for more and better than the old country.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vo6BvfaOu5c

Now it could be my working class background showing or it could be the fact that we are living in a time when the gab between wealthy and other is getting obscenely huge - Mount Everest huge. The size of an Ed Reed hit huge. Dolly Parton, you know what, huge.  (yeah voice...) It is disheartening to most "average" (read getting poor) Americans that all their hard work is just digging them deeper into debt.

http://www.alternet.org/story/149531/the_class_war_launched_by_america's_wealthiest_is_getting_more_savage

The republicans and most Americans like to think that if you work hard, pay your taxes and save a little, you too can buy the American Dream. Which, of course, is having a home, a nice future for your kids in a safe neighborhood with a nice car and a golden retriever or maybe a labradoodle.

New flash: this just isn't happening anymore!

What is worse for the republicans and maybe America as a whole is that people are starting to wake up from the illusion. They are beginning to see that isn't just koolaid being served up, but foreclosures, unemployment and repossessions as a lovely dash of arsenic.

Now in the defense of people still sipping the "koolaid"; of course we want to believe this fairytale. It gives us some semblance of control over our lives. If we can't get "ahead" no matter what we do because there isn't really anymore to go around after the top 1% take their 45% of the gross national product, then why should I go to work. Why should I stay on this treadmill? Why should I stay a cog in the machinery that keeps the rich getting richer?

After all I could just marry a wealthy man or win a fortune in a game.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETxmCCsMoD0&ob=av2nl

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