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Profound Political Disunity Is Now Pitting Rising Elites Against Fading Elites
Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith of OfTwoMinds blog,
The American Power Elite may yet discover that throw the bums out applies to all existing Establishment parties and Elites.
As I have often noted, historian Michael Grant identified profound political disunity in the ruling class as a key cause of the dissolution of the Roman Empire. Grant described this dynamic in his excellent account The Fall of the Roman Empire, a book I have been recommending since 2009.
The chapter titles of the book provide a precis of the other causes Grant identifies:
The Gulfs Between the Classes
The Credibility Gap
The Partnerships That Failed
The Groups That Opted Out
The Undermining of Effort
Today we focus on the rising profound political disunity of the Power Elites of the U.S. As a general observation, the largely theatrical polarization of the two political parties is being replaced by fault lines within each party and American society that no longer respect the ideological lines of Republican and Democrat.
While conventional media pundits have observed the disorder in Republican ranks with more than a little schadenfreude (pleasure derived by someone from another person's misfortune), relatively little attention has been paid to the equivalent fractures in the Democratic Party.
Longtime correspondent Mark G. forwarded an insightful article by Joel Kotkin that explains one of the key fractures: Tech titans want to be masters of all media we survey.
In effect, the Old Left (currently represented by Bernie Sanders) is splintering from the mainstream Imperial Democrats (my term) of Hillary Clinton, while Kotkin's Tech Titans are pursuing a Libertarian-flavored dominance.
Mark G. provides the analytic structure needed to understand why both parties are coming apart at the seams:
What Kotkin describes here is best characterized as a civil war among Democratic Party Elites. This parallels a similar struggle taking place inside the GOP between the 'GOP Establishment' and probably 70% of the GOP's electoral base.
(Excerpt from Kotkin:) "The rising tech oligarchy, having disrupted everything from hotels and taxis to banking, music and travel, is also taking over the content side of the media business. In the process, we might see the future decline of traditional media, including both news and entertainment, and a huge shift in media power away from both Hollywood and New York and toward the Bay Area and Seattle."
(Mark G.:) I think the most important finding from the present political cycle is the evidence of rapidly rising factionalism and infighting among our 0.01%'ers. Their ships are not "all sailing in the same direction," as Don Lucchesi said in Godfather III. Their goals are becoming very divergent indeed to the point of directly opposing each other.
Contrary to received MSM wisdom, this warfare appears to be most pronounced at present inside the Democratic Party. Bernie Sanders is clearly the AFL-CIO's man in a sense, along with the aged New Left. And he's drawing crowds to match. Like Bill, Hillary is the creature of Wall Street, NYC-based Mainstream Media, Hollywood and the Government Educational complex. The Tech Oligarchs really don't have a candidate of their own in the field this cycle.
Meanwhile the "GOP Establishment" is increasingly at open war with its own electoral base. So is the Democratic Party under the aegis of the digital 'Tech Oligarchs.' The older 'Mainframe' Democratic elites were far more attentive to middle class interests in their political coalition. The Tech Oligarchs are displaying a streak of Libertarian "My Way Or The Highway" rawness where it comes to political issues and the interests of nominal coalition partners.
I think The Donald could easily be found possessing support from some surprising quarters when the time comes.
Thank you, Mark, for the analysis.
For further evidence of the fault lines shattering the Democratic Party consider Who Turned My Blue State Red? Why poor areas vote for politicians who want to slash the safety net.
Perhaps we can summarize this as the resentment of the remaining middle class/working class for free-riders who are living as well or better than the heavily burdened workers supporting their guaranteed income.
Game theory has shown that participants will choose to punish cheaters over skimming rewards, until the cheaters are in the majority. At that point, everyone converts to cheating/free-riding and the system collapses.
This rising sense of injustice applies to three classes: the super-wealthy skimmers who buy political influence; protected state workers drawing benefits that are distant memories for 99% of private-sector workers, and the free-riders at the bottom buying groceries with SNAP cards and non-food items with wads of cash earned without the burdens of taxes.
So we have two volatile brews being mixed together: the anger and resentment of what's left of the middle and working classes against those above and below them, and the widening political disunity of the Elites.
All those Democratic Party stalwarts whose power base is being disrupted by digital forces beyond their control are not happy campers. Unfortunately for them, history can't be turned back.
As for the Republicans, the party's long reliance on social polarization for its support is wearing thin, as thin as the wallets and purses of traditional Republican audiences.
What's upending the existing political Elites is this: there's no free lunch. As the phantom free lunch of the past seven years is shattered by economic realities, the parties' fiefdoms are discovering there isn't enough money for all fiefdoms to expand as they have for 60 years.
As a result, each fiefdom is forced to battle other Elites for increasingly scarce financial and political oxygen.
The American Power Elite may yet discover that throw the bums out applies to all existing Establishment parties and Elites.
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Good, shit on all of them.
How the Ashkenazi Jewish elite Conquered the West => http://wp.me/p4OZ4v-2mp
Seattle??!!??
Now I'm scared...
One thing the author overlooked was younger white liberals and even older with little brains still intact waking up to reality. They are realizing the true nature of the Marxism of the New Left and are repulsed by it. It has nothing to do with helping anyone. It all has to do with power grabs. Hopefully, the current fudgepacker in chief will be the last.
I am all for diluted propaganda instead of the high grade we get force fed.
My anger is palpable, my distrust is at an all time high, and I am pretty resentful.
Someone I haven't seen lately here on Zero Hedge had the perfect moniker "Feral Serf".
I'm at that point...call me "Rabid Serf".
I plan to keep infection spreading.
Don't cha just hate being outsmarted by a bunch of Jews? What the world needs is a Master Race that can defeat them.
Perhaps a war could be arranged. The Master Race vs The Chosen People. It might get real good ratings on Pay Per View.
What you have to watch out for is secret perverters like Milton Friedman who have a plan to corrupt our precious bodily fluids. They do it with carbonated drinks. Only by limiting the amount of that stuff people drink can progress be made. Mayor Bloomberg had the right idea.
At least two zionazi stoodges did not like you exposing their masters dirty laundry.
Out with the old crazy psychopaths, in with the new crazy psychopaths.
Everything old is new again.
Again, when there is mass protest in front of the WH from HuffPo-CNBC viewers and idiot college kids so deep in debt and loss of blood from listening to them and their leftwing tenured professor vampires, somebody wake me up.
Until then...#BlackLiesMatter...bitchez.
Let it burn.
We are in the 1850's. What comes next is civil war.
Look up the death rate (percentage, not total) of the Civil War.
American's are fucking mean when they put their mind behind the idea of forcing some other asshole to submit.
That is why it is imperative it be bred out of us via unlawful immigration (or any other input). It is why I like GUNS.
The US population hasn't been truly behind a war for a very, very long time. God help the poor bastard who is on the wrong side of that trade when it comes back around.
Regards,
Cooter
There is no longer the "American people" that you remember, thanks in no small part to immigration. The new majority, unless trends are reversed, will be Central American. It's not just the number of people who enter - it's also the disparate birthrates of those who do. We've essentially been inviting the world to outpopulate us here.
There never has been an "American people". That's just a master race/chosen people myth. The only thing that bound the original colonies together was a hearty loathing of the English. Even then that was done by confiscation of royalists' estates in the colonies, compelling them to flee the new country. Since then it has been nothing but wave after wave of immigrants. To call immigrants "invaders" as some clueless fools without a concept of histoy do, is deceitful. To want to shut the doors as many wish, is to deny that they, too, came from immigrant stock. Latinos are here because today's Americans, white and black, are too bone lazy to get out and work. Rather than ballyhoo some mythical "American people", perhaps it would be well to appaud anyone who doesn't mind working for a living, such as Latino immigrants.
I'm sick of listening to self-pitying, resentful whiners compain that someone else has taken their jobs. If you'd done the job competently, you'd still have the job. If corporations hadn't offshored your jobs, you'd still have them. If evil Clinton hadn't pushed the North American Free Trade Agreement, Mexicans and Central Americans would still have work in their own countries and wouldn't be here.
Unless your name is Hiawatha or Sitting Bull, FACE IT, you are an immigrant yourself. Get over it.
"If you'd done the job competently, you'd still have the job"
Bulllshit. If your employers can get a HB1 to do the job a lot cheaper they'll get rid of you, even if you are competent.
And you're one of those Proposition Nation people? Look, those of European origins made America what it is. When those people's descendants get replaced by a black/Latino/Muslim swarm the country will become like Brazil, violent and impoverished.
Agreed.
Under the right conditions, highly motivated patriotic Americans could unleash a firestorm of lead and brass the world has never seen.
No. The Civil War---Sherman's March in particular---was the reaction of a northern elite to being told by their debt-slaves to go suck the devil's cock in hell.
And today the elites have atomic bombs. You think Lincoln (may he burn in hell) wouldn't have nuked Atlanta to preserve his miserable Union? You think Hillary wouldn't nuke Little Rock to teach the good old boys a lesson?
The US Army has never been a clear, present and existential danger to anyone but the American people themselves.
The Sheeple are waking up....and reading ZH.
The idea that we must continue to choose one or the other is completely insane......
molon labe
Yer all over the place...
The New like the Old still have NO Allegiances. So Carry on Regardless.
I think Tulsi and the republican who supported her are a sign of a sea change.
Questioning the CIA to wolf blister. Effected millions of viewers. The lucid question is now officially out there.
(Knowing full well that different factions were now doing damage control etc)
I watched that interview on YT and can't see anything partiuclary controversial. Was it edited out?
Considering she is drafting a bill that is against the CIA. The fact that those facts and perspective have never been expressed by wolf(duel passport) blister in his many news casts, ya the interview was important.
This is an excellent essay! Thank you!
yes it is. I love it.
when fewer than 100 people own 90% of the wold's wealth the 10% owned by the serfs is not worth gowing after. the main game will be number one going after the rest. R & D wont matter
Oligarchies always fall to a Tyrant + The Middle Class. Standard historical pattern.
The oligarchy gets too full of itself and tries to turn everyone into peasants by removing their rights as serfs, and the middle class finds a leader to restore the balance. This is why the US Oligarchy has been killing presidents and trying to quash anyone who looks like they are rising to lead.
Well Carter operation cyclone and Regan tear down that wall PNAC crowd are the DNC/RNC/CFR finances mayhem through drug dealing and controlling police, government, taxi (including air taxi's), education, debt mafia of miss information....
THIS LAWLESSNESS HAS BROUGHT THIS HOME TO ROOST.
“The Salvador Option”: US-NATO Sponsored Death Squads Integrate “Opposition Forces”
USSA USSA USSA USSA USSA USSA
"Sweet Caroline" "Sweet Caroline" "Sweet Caroline"
READING LIST
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Edward Gibbon
Tragedy and Hope QUIGLEY
INFORMATION REVOLUTION IS THE ONLY ANSWER.
FIRST RULE OF THE FIGHT CLUB
At this rate, we are going to be climbing wrist-thick kudzu vines in the near future!
There is a huge growing hole in the ozone layer of capitalism over the US. Now it's eroding into the upper classes. Payback for all that crony capitalism is a bitch.
viz the title: I wish. THis is just the same old infighting over who gets to put their fork in the cooked goose, and who has to settle for table scraps from the master's table. As someone above said: Everything old is new again.
The impact of the end of growth is beginning to settle in on the political parties. The never ending growth of government has long since reached its limits. The system continues only because we have the luxury of magical money that can be conjured out of thin air. The tax base has not been sufficient to fund government for the last 100 years. That is why the progressives pushed for the creation of the Federal Reserve. It allowed the funding of projects and wars that could never have been supported by tax payers.
The ever increasing complexity of government, its services and public dependency has run up against a wall of debt. That coupled with a declining resource base have evaporated any hope of a self-sustaining economic system. We all know how this ends. The money dies.
With the death of money, the system collapses. Both parties have been holding the levers of power for well over a hundred years. The fault will be placed at their feet. There will be no shortage of scape goats, bankers, blacks, Mexicans and Jews will all be painted as the authors of the collapse. There will be no shortage of messiahs that will rise up each selling their own brand hopimum.
The real truth is that the resources necessary to return us to the imagined past opulence do not exist.
Gasoline is the life blood of our economic system. Its consumption is a good indicator of the state of the world economy. A recent report put out by the EIA reveals that consumption in many countries is already in decline.
http://peakoilbarrel.com/a-surprising-look-at-oil-consumption/
That decline is reflected in the economic stress faced by most western nations.
"Gasoline is the life blood of our economic system. Its consumption is a good indicator of the state of the world economy. A recent report put out by the EIA reveals that consumption in many countries is already in decline."
errgg.. Another cloudwalker who never studied Eco 101.
Q: What happens when a good becomes more expensive?
A: Short term: people try to use less of it. Longer term: people adjust their lifestyles to use less or switch to alternate goods.
This is EXACTLY what we see happening with gas. Price hits $4/gal? People reduce driving (A), and/or start buying electric cars (B) or hybrids (A/B) or just more fuel-efficient cars (A/B), and/or move closer to work (B) or change jobs (B), etc. etc.
More astute readers will see that the B changes take longer to take effect, but once changed, they are often permanent (at the least, take a long time to change back). The 'cash-for-clunkers' program, whatever its faults, has caused a permanent reduction in US gas consumption by removing cars getting less than 10 mpg and replacing them with cars getting 30+ mpg. Electrics and hybrids are still in their early stages, but in five more years, I expect them to make up a considerable amount of urban vehicles. How much will they save?
Remember that ICE engines still use gas even when sitting at stoplights, while electrics are only using enough power to run the radio and gauges (maybe A/C). A good average is .5 l/hour for warmed up cars, not using A/C. 10 cars lined up, two lanes each way, at a stop light for 1 minute = 40 min * .5l/hour = .333 litres per min. But when the light changes, the same conditions hold true for the other way, so it's more or less constant. So for each hour of busy use, that light causes 20 litres of gas (about 5 US gal) to be wasted. Using Toronto as an example, there are 2300 stop lights, but most are not that busy. Let's just use the 300 on the major streets. There are two busy hours in the morning (7-9 am) and 2 in the afternoon (4-6 pm). 300 x 4 hours * 5 gal/hr = 6,000 gallons per day. But there are 250 working days/yr = 1.25 million gal/year. And that's just at the major lights in one NA city during rush hour. I'm sure the full-day numbers from Manhattan or LA would be staggering. And that's just the stop lights, not the time spent crawling along expressways at 1-2 mph, etc, where gas engines are very inefficient and electrics are very efficient. The net result of the change to hybrids/electrics will be a huge and permanent drop in demand for oil.
This will happen, as people change to electrics, and guess what? It won't cause any change in our lifestyle, nor will it add 'economic stress'. The economy, through the individual decisions of millions of drivers, will adjust to higher gas prices, just as Eco 101 suggests. And we will enjoy harder to quantify, but valuable, knock-on effects, such as less air pollution in cities (fewer people with emphyzema (sp?), bronchitis, etc.), less noise, etc.
Whatever happens, whoever gains, whoever loses, the Chosenites will bob to the surface.
Sick and Tired.
Of all this bullshit.
Great campaign slogan.
We are sick and tired of being sick and tired.
Behead all of them.
Arise sans culottes.
As the phantom free lunch "of the past seven years" DELDELDELDELDELDEL "since the founding of the Federal Reserve in 1913 and female suffrage in 1919" is shattered by economic realities.
FIFY.
Having spent a fair amount of time with elitists, one can see a certain duality. They are grossly insecure, regardless of position and wealth, but delude themselves into believing that they are indispensible and everything would fall apart without them. They think "If only they could have a little more control over the environment around them ..."
This is a volatile combination.
Message to elitists: Your fear is well founded. The world does not need you and everything you do to try to exert more control and prove that you are indispensible is harming everything around you. Release the fear. Release the ego. Join the human race. You will be accepted if you do and can understand that it is not "beneath" you.
It is quite possible that this world was created to save you, not to suffer under you.
"free-riders at the bottom buying groceries with SNAP cards and non-food items with wads of cash earned without the burdens of taxes"
Right. The "wads of cash" one can earn without the burden of taxes is under $10,150 for an individual ($845 a month). Pretty hard to find a place to rent for that much these days, let alone buy food and other necessities. Even so, if you are making $10,150 a year, you may escape Federal Income Tax, but you will have to pay employment taxes and state and local taxes. Typical libertarian crock of shit.
As for the SNAP benefit, its only available to an individual making less than $1276 a month (and only if they have few assets), and the average amount recieved is $125. Wads of cash, indeed. Also, what exactly are the "non-food items" that this dolt thinks people on SNAP can buy?
"SNAP benefits can be used to purchase all food products, not including: beer, wine, liquor, cigarettes, or tobacco; any nonfood items; vitamins and medicines; foods that will be eaten in the store; or hot foods."
"more than half of SNAP recipients are children or the elderly. For the remaining working-age individuals, many of them are currently employed. At least forty percent of all SNAP beneficiaries live in a household with earnings. In fact, the majority of SNAP households do not receive cash welfare benefits (around 10% receive cash welfare), with increasing numbers of SNAP beneficiaries obtaining their primary source of income from employment."
http://www.snaptohealth.org/snap/snap-frequently-asked-questions/
What rock do you live under? Since when do the people using SNAP cards tell the gubmint about the cash they get for watching other people's kids, or slinging rocks, or a couple of days of cash labour on Wed and Thur so they can buy enough beer and dope for the weekend?
Part of the reason, I'm sure, Western gubmint wants to outlaw anonymous cash.
You make a lot of assumptions about people using SNAP cards. Nobody I know who uses one fits your description. More than half of the recipients are children or elderly. The only people I know who are taking advantage of the program include a poor college student who works part time while going to school to keep the student loans manageable and a family where layoffs and underemployment has made getting by more difficult.
Well how come these SNAP and EBT recipients seem to wear the latest gear and always seem to be snapping with the latest Apple offering?
So, how many SNAP and EBT recipients do you know? For the two types of EBT cards, there are more than 45,000,000 SNAP (food stamp) recipients and less than 2 million TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) recipients in the US. How many of them do you know personally, seeing that you seem to be making a statement about their characteristics?
http://www.cbpp.org/research/family-income-support/chart-book-tanf-at-19
At some point, the rising Elite will have to realize that most of them will have no place waiting for them if the Old Money have their way. New Elites are disruptors, they help concentrate wealth for Old Money to scoop up, and they serve useful functions (like Google's role in the evolving Security State). A newly-minted tech billionaire with $2 or even $10 billion probably feels on top of the world, but if he's paying attention, and especially if he gets invited someplace like Bilderburg, he'll know that he's a small fish (the Rockefellers' wealth is estimated at $11 trillion; the Rothschilds nearly ten times that), entirely expendible, and that the "new order" being planned will destroy his wealth and status. Rising Elites are useful idiots to the Old Money, who will eventually discard them.
If rising Elites figure that out, they will be powerful tools for bringing down the NWO. Compartmentalized though they may be, eventually one of them who gets high enough will spill his secrets- come forward with incriminating inside information, etc. One of the oligarchy's vulnerabilities is that it has to co-opt new leaders and innovators, either harnessing them or neutralizing them by bringing them (to some limited extent) into the fold.... by sharing a few secrets in exchange for some minor glory and wealth, etc. At some point when the collapsing economy threatens rising Elites' wealth (computer aps and streaming music services being luxury items), the endgame will be apparent and most rising Elites won't cooperate further.
Although success against the NWO will only happen if the broad base of the societal pyramid acts, many of those dynamic innovators and leaders in the rising Elite will be key players. The Nurenburg-type trials we have for the oligarchs when this is all over will largely be presided over by rising Elites who fought to preserve their wealth and status. Hopefully Old Money's paranoia about exactly this is hampering their ability to embrace and cooperate with rising Elites who they still need at this stage in the game.
Of course once the dust is settled, there will be the question of how to keep the "New Boss" from being "same as the Old Boss". I only hope I'm around to have the luxury of worrying about that!