Are They Waking Up?
I am stunned to find this remark in Time magazine, which I was led to by Atrios (I don't really bother with Time myself):
"In the past decade, nearly every pillar institution in American society — whether it's General Motors, Congress, Wall Street, Major League Baseball, the Catholic Church or the mainstream media — has revealed itself to be corrupt, incompetent or both. And at the root of these failures are the people who run these institutions, the bright and industrious minds who occupy the commanding heights of our meritocratic order. In exchange for their power, status and remuneration, they are supposed to make sure everything operates smoothly. But after a cascade of scandals and catastrophes, that implicit social contract lies in ruins, replaced by mass skepticism, contempt and disillusionment."
I have insisted for years now that the entire history of our country since the sixties has been the story of the failure of the managerial class. The rest of us have continued to do our part, but at some point the rich and powerful decided that they owed nothing to the society that had enabled them to enjoy so much, and embarked on an ever more rapacious course of plunder. In following their degenerate course, they were abetted at every step by a phony economic doctrine manufactured for the sole purpose of justifying their depredations. This doctrine, known as supply side economics, or Reaganomics, was never anything but a dose of economic snake oil, to con the rubes into allowing them to continue their criminal enterprise.
What stuns me is to see something so closely reflecting this view in the mainstream media. Can it be that, at long last, some of the irresponsible people who write our news are at last becoming afraid of the beast that they have let out of its cage?
Probably too much to hope for, but I know for sure that, a couple of years ago, no one would have tried to get something like this published in Time.
"In the past decade, nearly every pillar institution in American society — whether it's General Motors, Congress, Wall Street, Major League Baseball, the Catholic Church or the mainstream media — has revealed itself to be corrupt, incompetent or both. And at the root of these failures are the people who run these institutions, the bright and industrious minds who occupy the commanding heights of our meritocratic order. In exchange for their power, status and remuneration, they are supposed to make sure everything operates smoothly. But after a cascade of scandals and catastrophes, that implicit social contract lies in ruins, replaced by mass skepticism, contempt and disillusionment."
I have insisted for years now that the entire history of our country since the sixties has been the story of the failure of the managerial class. The rest of us have continued to do our part, but at some point the rich and powerful decided that they owed nothing to the society that had enabled them to enjoy so much, and embarked on an ever more rapacious course of plunder. In following their degenerate course, they were abetted at every step by a phony economic doctrine manufactured for the sole purpose of justifying their depredations. This doctrine, known as supply side economics, or Reaganomics, was never anything but a dose of economic snake oil, to con the rubes into allowing them to continue their criminal enterprise.
What stuns me is to see something so closely reflecting this view in the mainstream media. Can it be that, at long last, some of the irresponsible people who write our news are at last becoming afraid of the beast that they have let out of its cage?
Probably too much to hope for, but I know for sure that, a couple of years ago, no one would have tried to get something like this published in Time.
Comments