Señor Peligro and His Fascist Friends
We’ve really slipped into the postmodern-cyberpunk corporate dominated fascist state that reared its head in Blade Runner and other modern works of science fiction. Telecommunications companies secretly giving phone calling lists to the NSA for just about all Americans is the latest in a long list of atrocities being committed at our expense. Also consider the following inexhaustive list:
1. We’re paying $3.00 a gallon for gas, while oil corporations such as Exxon Mobil are posting record quarterly profits in the billions. Home energy costs are through the roof as well, and I’m sure these corporations aren’t hurting either. Is anyone doing a thing to relieve our burden?
2. Credit card companies can charge through the nose in interest rates depending on which state they operate in, they’ve collectively raised the minimum payment we must pay each month in order not to be in default, and they’ve made it tougher for us to file for bankruptcy if these payments overwhelm us. Consider that they passed this bankruptcy legislation through Congress with broad bipartisan support. Also, they’re allowed to inundate us with advertisements by mail, phone, and e-mail, and they can claim us to be in default if we have been delinquent with accounts that rest at other institutions.
3. Media has been continually consolidated into the hands of fewer and fewer corporations. AOL Time Warner, NBC Universal, Viacom, Disney, Newscorp—all huge, multifaceted corporations that have benefited greatly from Bush’s tax cuts. Consider the noncritical coverage of Bush going to war in Iraq, and their lack of real interest in the debacle that has unfolded, and their at best tepid criticism of Bush despite his freefall in the polls and breaking below the 30% approval barrier.
4. Pharmaceutical companies spend billions and billions on advertising each year. There’s medicine out there for every possible condition imaginable, and these companies are doing quite well. Meanwhile, 40 million Americans do not have health insurance. Health insurance costs are going through the roof, as fewer employed people are able to get coverage through their workplaces. A person who is uncovered and gets hit with a catastrophic illness is deeply screwed and will be forced to file for bankruptcy (but, wait, not so fast—see #2 above).
5. Defense contractors such as Lockheed Martin make a killing building airplanes and weapons systems for war. Contractors such as Halliburton, a company that once had the current Vice President of the United States as its CEO and has been revealed as being fraudulent in its billing and accounting, make a killing cleaning up the mess left by the war machines built by the defense contractors. Halliburton has billions of dollars of government money unaccounted for in Iraq and has been found to provide inadequate service to our soldiers as well as overcharging the government for oil. They stay on as government contractors despite this.
Even though Bush and his corporate cronies will praise a free market economy where government imposes few restrictions on corporations and demonize countries such as Venezuela and Bolivia where corporations have largely become state-controlled, corporations have become, paradoxically, an extension of the government. They are supported by the government through hefty contracts and hefty tax breaks and corporate welfare. They do the government’s bidding, whether it’s to report phony news stories or not report news stories at all, and secretly provide phone call lists when the government asks them to, or turn over Internet search records if pressed. They work the government so that laws are passed in their favor and there’s minimal oversight of their activities. To me, corporations and the government seem to be one and the same. Welcome to our fascist future.
Now, I don’t support socialist-leaning countries such as Venezuela and Bolivia. These countries will turn into dictatorships, if they haven’t already, and their citizens will become oppressed. I recognize why they’ve become the way they have though. They’ve been exploited by corporations and American foreign policy for too long, and they’ve grown tired of it.
Will the U.S. eventually head in this direction? The Republicans will have you believe that liberals are doing to this country, even though Republicans have controlled government policy for 25 years and have cemented their control the last five by controlling all branches of government. I mean, we can’t even get a good universal health care system talk going.
The reality is that we’re headed toward the other extreme, and may already be there. Corporations controlling the government instead of the government controlling corporations. Take your pick. Neither is good.
1. We’re paying $3.00 a gallon for gas, while oil corporations such as Exxon Mobil are posting record quarterly profits in the billions. Home energy costs are through the roof as well, and I’m sure these corporations aren’t hurting either. Is anyone doing a thing to relieve our burden?
2. Credit card companies can charge through the nose in interest rates depending on which state they operate in, they’ve collectively raised the minimum payment we must pay each month in order not to be in default, and they’ve made it tougher for us to file for bankruptcy if these payments overwhelm us. Consider that they passed this bankruptcy legislation through Congress with broad bipartisan support. Also, they’re allowed to inundate us with advertisements by mail, phone, and e-mail, and they can claim us to be in default if we have been delinquent with accounts that rest at other institutions.
3. Media has been continually consolidated into the hands of fewer and fewer corporations. AOL Time Warner, NBC Universal, Viacom, Disney, Newscorp—all huge, multifaceted corporations that have benefited greatly from Bush’s tax cuts. Consider the noncritical coverage of Bush going to war in Iraq, and their lack of real interest in the debacle that has unfolded, and their at best tepid criticism of Bush despite his freefall in the polls and breaking below the 30% approval barrier.
4. Pharmaceutical companies spend billions and billions on advertising each year. There’s medicine out there for every possible condition imaginable, and these companies are doing quite well. Meanwhile, 40 million Americans do not have health insurance. Health insurance costs are going through the roof, as fewer employed people are able to get coverage through their workplaces. A person who is uncovered and gets hit with a catastrophic illness is deeply screwed and will be forced to file for bankruptcy (but, wait, not so fast—see #2 above).
5. Defense contractors such as Lockheed Martin make a killing building airplanes and weapons systems for war. Contractors such as Halliburton, a company that once had the current Vice President of the United States as its CEO and has been revealed as being fraudulent in its billing and accounting, make a killing cleaning up the mess left by the war machines built by the defense contractors. Halliburton has billions of dollars of government money unaccounted for in Iraq and has been found to provide inadequate service to our soldiers as well as overcharging the government for oil. They stay on as government contractors despite this.
Even though Bush and his corporate cronies will praise a free market economy where government imposes few restrictions on corporations and demonize countries such as Venezuela and Bolivia where corporations have largely become state-controlled, corporations have become, paradoxically, an extension of the government. They are supported by the government through hefty contracts and hefty tax breaks and corporate welfare. They do the government’s bidding, whether it’s to report phony news stories or not report news stories at all, and secretly provide phone call lists when the government asks them to, or turn over Internet search records if pressed. They work the government so that laws are passed in their favor and there’s minimal oversight of their activities. To me, corporations and the government seem to be one and the same. Welcome to our fascist future.
Now, I don’t support socialist-leaning countries such as Venezuela and Bolivia. These countries will turn into dictatorships, if they haven’t already, and their citizens will become oppressed. I recognize why they’ve become the way they have though. They’ve been exploited by corporations and American foreign policy for too long, and they’ve grown tired of it.
Will the U.S. eventually head in this direction? The Republicans will have you believe that liberals are doing to this country, even though Republicans have controlled government policy for 25 years and have cemented their control the last five by controlling all branches of government. I mean, we can’t even get a good universal health care system talk going.
The reality is that we’re headed toward the other extreme, and may already be there. Corporations controlling the government instead of the government controlling corporations. Take your pick. Neither is good.
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