Oligarchs and Their Republicans: The Quiet Coup's Troubling Vapors

Oligarchs Everywhere

The long, tedious road to 2014.

Of course, there aren't really oligarchs everywhere -- there are simply too few of them.  That is part of the essential nature of oligarchs.

The dictionary defines oligarchy as "rule by wealth."  In a representative democracy it means that the "constituency" of normal, representational interests is replaced by the direct interests of oligarchs.  Although few, they become the "constituency" served by the "representative" Congress.

On one side there are American oligarchs and corporatists with feverish ambitions to own the remaining 20% of the total national wealth they don't already control.  On the other are the hundred of millions of middle and lower class Americans -- the remnant of what was called the "middle class" before this final assault began.

There is now a clear picture of the future American economic model inhabiting the dreams of these oligarchs -- one quite removed from the somewhat whimsical traditional American model.  In it, economic austerity for most and economic privileged opportunism for the few will be the order of the day, and the traditional expectations for a "life in the United States" will become -- permanently -- a thing of the past.

The scheme of the US oligarchs was to creep up on a largely disinterested population.  Years ago, a spokesman for the Moral Majority, an oligarch front group, mapped out the organization's strategy [actually, the thinly veiled strategy of the oligarch class] which would ultimately maneuver the country away from its traditional cultural posture to where it is now.  The names of the groups, the think tanks, the political action committees have changed through the decades, but the core tactics have unfolded like clock work.

That advice was to quietly elect reactionary "conservatives" into as many places in government as possible, beginning with innocuous positions such as school boards, city councils, country commissioners, utility commissions and even dog catchers.  This move was designed to gradually create a cadre of loyal, accessible, corruptible and "ideologically pure" office holders -- all dependent on the continued financial backing from the oligarch class -- operatives who would then, in turn, be available as candidates for constantly more important positions.

It was precisely from this abundantly financed birthing crib that the creatures -- such as ALEC -- perpetrating our modern political atrocities emerged.  The mischief didn't stop there.  During the Bush autocracy a civil service "four lane highway" ran directly from thinly veiled "think tank colleges" such as Regent University School of Law into low level positions in the Depart of Justice.

Likewise, positions as Federal Regulators for everything from banking, brokerage houses, environmental watch dogs and dozens of other areas were patiently saturated with useless, strangely obedient new employees.  The incompetent, ineffective, corrupt pockets of government employees which had previously been exceptions to the rule became a deeply embedded, disgusting norm. 

The Planetary Campaign's Plan for the US

It was SUPPOSED to herald a new US monarchy...

When viewed as a picture of day-to-day events, the grand scheme has consistently appeared as no more than a series of "coincidental set backs," easily perceived as temporary at the time.  For Americans interested in even watching, the corporate grip on the politics of representation grew at a deceptively slow yet steady pace -- a constantly "calming" one.

The American electorate had been very carefully placed with the frog in the cooking pot.  The increasingly hot water could be very comfortably dismissed until it became so hot that ignoring it was impossible but, by that point, exiting this particular "frog pot" had also gradually become almost impossible.

At least, exiting gracefully had become almost impossible.

Now, with the water boiling all around the remnant of the democracy, the portent of that "graceful exit" now becomes, most likely, more like "the dance of the Furies."  Any retreat from the current situation to anything more similar to, say, the United States of the Eisenhower era in terms of a workably egalitarian distribution of wealth and power has probably become a tale of blood and sacrifice.

Merely controlling the Congress was conducted initially as an unusually genteel interim step.  The really rapacious moves which come next will make the legislative corruption pale in comparison.  The "new American nobility" firmly controls around 80% of the entire wealth of the nation.  While they've scratched and clawed their way to this precarious pinnacle with rather subdued mechanisms of corruption, when they find the remaining ascent to total oligarchy blocked only by a desperately confused, chaotic, suffering population of suddenly reluctant "serfs," their real nature will emerge.

Enemies Foreign and Domestic

Americans had always taken the Constitutional admonition concerning "enemies foreign or domestic" seriously, but all along they had insisted that the "domestic enemies" would behave in the mold of "foreign enemies," that is, as hordes of heavily armed foreigners suddenly streaming into down town Los Angeles from troop ships docked in the harbor.

Well, these particular "domestic enemies" knew better than to take the "troop ships in the harbor" approach. Their think tank strategists -- perhaps correctly -- promised them that the troop ships wouldn't be necessary.  Clearly, control of the Congress could be accomplished far more cheaply.

Additionally, although historically the oligarchs have consistently shown an almost genetic, tactical "short sightedness," they were sternly admonished at the start to be extraordinarily patient in this campaign.  The strategy was to be a slow and steady affair stretching over decades before finally yielding the "the frog in the boiling pot."

That is to say, "cooked frog" was to be the main dish served at their "victory over America" celebration feast.

Just relax. [http://incrementalist.com/]

Big Trouble in Little Hooterville

Even oligarchs shudder when the best laid plans falter

Take heart.

MeanMesa has noticed some of the foundation stones for this scheme beginning to crack.  After wasting hundreds of millions while financing the Romney Campaign, the oligarchs had high hopes for more tactical anti-democracy  "progress" during the 2014 mid term election.  Yet, we may be seeing the first signs of this "conspiracy of wealth" starting the almost inevitable phase of "eating its own."

Keep an eye on this blog.  MeanMesa will be taking a closer look at the evidence of structural failure.