Hitting the Nail

TWO RECENTLY PUBLISHED BOOKS are an indication of things to come in the world of academic scholarship, book writing, and publishing, if we are fortunate. they are: Community Empowerment in the Age of Corporate Greed" by Edward Lorenz, and "Its OK to be Angry at Capitalism", by Senator Bernie Sanders. Both books begin with the same premise; that the United States, politically culturally, economically, and just about every other way, is a country owned and controlled by teh wealthy corporate elite, a corporate elite which owns and controls the American political and economic system,and thus structures both politics and economics so as to best benefit the wealthy corporate elite one percent, and may the devil take everyone else, the ninety nine percent. Actually, arguably, the breakdown is twenty percent versus eighty percent, but either way, its extremely unequal. Corporations, if left unchecked, can do tremendoud damage to the environment, then leave the mess for local communities to clean up. Its happened often in the U.S.. In recent years, however, thers has been an increasing tendency for community organizers to lead efforts to hold the big, powerful corporations accountable, and those efforts have met with some success. The ultimate, inevitable question is, quite simply: do we wish to live in a country in which we the people govern ourselves through civic institutions and democratically elected governments, or to cede esssential control of American society to the Fortune Five Hundred? Its a very real choice, one which we the people face now and in the future. The American economy is what is called a "mixed economy", with strong elements of both capitalism and socialism. Senator Sanders is fond of pointing out that a teny percentaage of the American people possess a huge percentage of the wealth in the country, something like one percent owning forty percent. The three wealthiest multi-billlionaire Americans are together wealthier than the poorest one half of the American people, amazingly. The mere fact that the wealthise country in human history has a huge percentage of its own people living in poverty is the main justification for the title of the Senator's book. Sanders points out that the purpose of the medical insurance indistry in the United States is to make as much money as possible for the wealthiest few industry owners, investors, and managers, whereas in an ideal system, a good, efficient, and moral system, the purpose would be to proivde the best possible medical care for the greatest number of people at the lowest possible price, correct?