Unable to challenge power

At the end of May I wrote a big post on Power. I find there is one more section to add to it. I had written that Power is maintained through laws, by oppressing those who don't recognize that the powerful are supposed to be in charge, and by enlisting others to support their oppression. I see that I missed one key part.

A Power will make sure others are unable to challenge their power.

An example of this is the tax laws in Alabama that are designed to make sure the schools for black students are underfunded. Black children who aren't educated grow up to adults who are able to take only the menial jobs and are no challenge to the corporate tycoons.

Newsweek has an article about another aspect of this Power preservation. The article by Anna Bernasek, discusses the ways we are underfunding our public schools nationwide and the consequences that has for us as a society.

The article mentions the support the elderly get from government ($27K per person from all levels of gov't and 41% of the federal budget (including Social Security and Medicare). In contrast each child gets $12K and most of that comes from state and local budgets in the form of education. The federal budget has only 10% for children. Fortunately, the article spends very little time on the argument that if the elderly weren't so greedy the kids would be just fine. The proper solution, not mentioned much, is that the rich aren't being taxed enough.

Some of the support kids need and don't get: Nutrition assistance, health care, a place to live, education. And education is the biggest one.

Some claim that if we don't deal with the federal deficit our children will inherit a mess. But if we skimp on our children's education they won't be able to deal with the mess.

In one of my protests over the last month one of the leaders remarked that Wayne State University in Detroit used to get 75% of its budget from the state of Michigan. Now it gets 25%. It has become a private school. Many student in Detroit can't afford it. This article and others are full of cuts to all levels of education and the soaring debts students now carry.

This is why I am putting underfunded education under a discussion as a way to prevent challenges to Power:

Back in the 1960s and 1970s [California's] residents mightily benefited from low-cost college education. Without huge student debts, students were free to experiment with new ideas and start their own businesses. The rise of Silicon Valley as a place of innovation, creativity, and risk taking, coincided with two generations of students going to college in California for next to nothing. That might have been tougher to pull off had they been saddled with a $100,000 or so in student debt.

Another aspect of this is companies no longer train their workers. They assume the worker is already trained -- on the workers dime. Without that training employees can't get into the higher-paying jobs.

So a student either can't afford to go to college or has so much debt the emphasis must be on fitting into the current power structure to pay off the debt rather than doing something radical and innovative that might challenge the power structure.

Social Security and other services are designed so that current workers support retirees. The young support the old. Yet, the young are provided fewer resources to enable them to do that.

I've gone back to the original post on Power and updated it.

On to another aspect of Power: The Demos Policyshop highlights a study that showed as inequality increases, trust in strangers declines.

This decline in social trust begins a downward spiral. Bo Rothstein and Eric Uslaner note in a fabulous paper for World Politics, "The best policy response to growing inequality is to enact universalistic social welfare programs. However, the social strains stemming from increased inequality make it almost impossible to enact such policies."

A lack of trust means the rich see the poor as takers and the poor see the rich as selfish. A study found that "upper class individuals were, more likely to break driving laws, take goods from others, lie in a negotiation, cheat and endorse unethical behavior." Which belies their claim that money equals morality.

My dad sent me a link to a video of Cenk Uygur posted on Upworthy. Does money influence politics? Sheesh, what a question! Of course, it does. That's why rich give money to campaigns. But do you know to what degree? The video reported on at a study that compared how closely the last five Congresses listened to their various constituents, how thoroughly they did what the rich, middle class, and poor asked them to do. The rich always had their requests filled. The poor -- never. The middle class? Only when Democrats controlled both chambers of Congress. And only enough to get the middle class to shut up.

I have mentioned several times, though maybe not on this blog, that while it is obvious the GOP is my enemy, trying to institute policies I profoundly disagree with, I am not convinced the Democrats are my friends. Another part of this video provided more evidence they are not. One finding was that the Democrats -- not Republicans -- most closely did what the rich wanted. The rich are able to play the two parties as Good Cop -- Bad Cop. Those GOP people are really out there. They won't do anything for you. So vote for the Dems because they will (even though it is just a few crumbs while they give us everything we want).

I don't do Halloween, especially the part about handing out candy to kids. I did, however, wore by Charlie Brown shirt to the college on Tuesday (Halloween party) and to the Ruth Ellis Center on Wednesday. "So you're Charlie Brown!" "No, I stole his shirt." A couple women offered to hold footballs for me.

So I look for something else to do during the time the kids go door-to-door. This year I ended up at the Purple Rose Theatre in Chelsea to see the play Vast Difference. That's a pun on the vas deferens and (as a reviewer said) if you want to know more Wikipedia can help. It was a comedy about manhood. The small crowd did quite a bit of laughing.

I mention all that here because my first choice for the evening was to see the documentary Inequality for All by Robert Reich. Alas, the last showing at the one movie theater showing it was at 1:30 yesterday afternoon. I did hear about the movie when it was released, especially the interview in which Reich said that the rich would be richer if they invested in the middle class, which would in turn buy more of whatever product made them rich. So why scrimp on that investment? Reich couldn't explain that one.

But I can. The 1% isn't after money, though huge piles of it is mighty nice. No, the rich want power and all that money enables them to get power.