Not A Broken Government, But A Stolen Government

The U.S. Government is broken? Pleaaase.

It works perfectly fine for the special interests, who don't have any trouble in getting Congress and the Senate to pass any law that benefits them at the expense of the country. Any multinational corporation that can muster an army of lobbyists and lawyers can basically achieve what they want, given how corrupt and self-serving professional politicians are in the nation's capital. Also, the Israeli lobby AIPAC seems to have no problem with how business is done. Neither does the Pentagon.

And, of course, there are the Wall St. investment banks. Its practically their government, the American people just pay for it. And that's not an exaggeration. That's a fact. We've learned from Rolling Stones' Matt Taibbi's latest reporting on the ongoing Wall St. robbery that 2,000 banking lobbyists marched into Washington D.C. this year to steamroll the financial reform bill and kill any piece of legislation that blocked their way in any way. In his article "Wall Street's War" Taibbi writes:

The financial-services industry has reportedly flooded the Capitol with more than 2,000 paid lobbyists; even veteran members are stunned by the intensity of the blitz. "They're trying everything," says Sen. Sherrod Brown, a Democrat from Ohio. Wall Street's army is especially imposing given that the main (really, the only) progressive coalition working the other side of the aisle, Americans for Financial Reform, has been in existence less than a year – and has just 60 unpaid "volunteer" lobbyists working the Senate halls.

After reading Taibbi’s article, you get the impression that Wall St. executed an infantry invasion of Washington, and successfully seized it.

While it’s true that the Hill has been Wall St. territory for many years, they have never before been so brazen about their political victories. As a result of their recent campaign against financial reform, you can clearly see their flag hangs the highest on top of the political rubble that gathered around the capital after the financial earthquake of 2008. And its being waved proudly. But, perhaps, too proudly. The Wall St. mafia are taking Scarface’s motto "The World Is Yours" a little too literally. Unlike the real mafia, they can’t make big deals behind the scenes and get away with it. And they can cloak their dirty work in flowery language and free-market rhetoric only for so long without being found out.

As Taibbi says, the war is not over. Americans will not go down to the Wall St. raiders without a fight. It is highly likely that calls to pull back the drapes on the Federal Reserve, and Wall St, could turn into calls that the entire house of cards be burned down.

A couple of months ago, Time magazine and CNN teamed-up to do a series called "Broken Government." They examined just how broken the Washington political system has become. You can view CNN's coverage on their site. Richard Stengel, the managing editor of Time, wrote:

As part of our discussion of the problems in Washington, we are working with our partner CNN on its timely weeklong series of programming called Broken Government. Its notion is that Republicans, Democrats and independents can agree on one thing: government isn't working. CNN will look at both the frustrating problems and at the possible innovative solutions, and we will partner with it in that effort.

The problem with CNN and Time's analysis that the "government isn't working" is that they stop short. Who isn't the government working for? Society is not one big group. Not everybody looks to the government to protect the same interests. Certain individuals who work for Wall St. banks want the government to protect their asses. Corporations want the government to serve their industry at all costs. The flip side of the question is who is the government actually working for? It has to be working for somebody, and it's obviously not the people. It must be this guy and his friends.

In that same article, Taibbi wrote, "When it comes to protecting the world's wealthiest banks from public scrutiny, it turns out, Democrats and Republicans have no trouble achieving bipartisanship."

It's public knowledge that the corporate media doesn't dare to raise such questions, nor is it in its interest to do so. To even hint at a class war in America on television is considered political heresy. But heresy or not, reality is reality. And that elitist and multinational interests are protected time and again to the detriment of the people, and the country, is a reality that must be addressed. The consequences of not facing that reality with honesty and courage are only beginning to dawn on the nation. It won't be long before America officially reaches third-world status, a fact that won't go down easy on most Americans, who may say to hell with politicians, and rise up to retake Washington D.C. from Wall Street's financial conquerors.