Billionaire(ism): It's a mental illness

More and more people, in more and more countries, are giving the middle finger to Capitalism as usual, to "survival of the fittest" economics, to the status quo, to the Institutions, the "experts", the technocrats.

The income gap in this country is growing by a very disturbing logarithm. It's getting worse by the minute. With every new billionaire we have more and more money that is concentrated in the hands of one person. That money will not be circulated throughout the economy the way it would if that billion were dispersed in the hands of 100,000 people. Our government is brokering this astounding redistribution of wealth. The filthy rich are getting filthier at the expense of the rest of us.

No individual, or family can possibly have personal needs (or wildest dreams) that could eat up a billion. That’s an obscene amount of money. It’s about as ridiculous as owning 500 pet dogs, or having size 35 feet, or a stretch limo that is the length of a football field. Yet, so many people choose to keep a billion....and try to make it 2 billion. It's nothing more than an ego trip, a greed trip, a thoughtless trip. We didn't let Ebeneezer Scrooge get away with it...even (he) saw the error in his lack of thinking/feeling. There are a lot of "Tiny Tim's" out there and yet we'd rather design a country that coddles and indulges multi billionaires. If there is one thing our government has demonstrated consistently over the last two decades (at least) it is that it works hardest and most predictably for the interests of the rich and powerful. It’s a cruel joke on the rest of us to ponder the fact that it’s our country’s highest priority to make certain that the richest Americans among us have as little impediment as possible to their becoming exponentially richer.

Yes, the U.S. of A. stacks the deck for the obscenely wealthy. It stacks the deck in favor of those who least need it. It does this, in part, by lowering their tax burden whenever possible and creating a system where the rich and powerful have a grotesquely disproportionate influence on who gets elected. In reality, our policies and laws are sold to the highest bidder. It allows the rich to influence elections of all shapes and sizes. Thus, the system always stays rigged in their favor. Politicians are courting the contributions of the rich so vigorously that they become the employees for the rich and powerful; the spokesman for the rich and powerful. Yes, our “elected” officials work for a handful of rich people and rich corporations. What chance does the average citizen have of being listened to in the face of this high stakes bribery scheme? America now belongs to the filthy rich, and if you think it’s bad now just wait a little while.

There is something extremely disturbing about a country where 3 individuals have more collective wealth than the bottom half of American citizens. Jeff Bezos, Warren Buffet, and Bill Gates have more combined wealth than 160 million Americans. How sustainable is that? How healthy is that for a democracy? Its an income disparity that is so grotesque that it seems like a theme found in a George Orwell novel. And, like global warming, this problem is on a course of destruction while we virtually ignore it. I find it offensive that two of these three men consider themselves to be philanthropists. Their personal wealth is growing as reliably as the polar ice caps are melting and we allow them to anoint themselves as philanthropists. In a country that is 70% Christian can we imagine “Jesus” tolerating a man with 80 billion dollars calling himself a philanthropist. Would a slave owner who set 1% of his slaves free be called an abolitionist?

Imagine if 10% of your fellow men and women and children were starving and you are giving the “thumbs up” as you watch countless crates and boxes of food and beverage being delivered to your giant warehouse; enough food to feed tens of millions, and still leave you with enough food for you and your family for a thousand lifetimes (even if you all indulge yourself). To give that “thumbs up” in that context you have to be totally disconnected from those human beings with whom you share this planet. The indifference to their condition brings incredible consequences. I’m not even sure animals in the wild hoard food from other animals with this much greed and apathy. Yes, even a lion has more compassion for a starving lion.

There should be a level of social responsibility that is expected of everyone in a civilization. If I walk past a man who is drowning without offering assistance it is true that I didn’t drown him (I am free and clear in the eyes of the law) but the indifference to the drowning is an act of breathtaking inhumanity and psychopathy.

Many of these billionaires only have concern (and time) for people with whom they vacation in the Hamptons. Or, maybe their main concern is for their pet cat. In an act of callousness that rivals the Nazis, Karl Lagerfeld left 300 million dollars to his cat after his death. The man designed clothes that only 400 people in the world could afford. I would say that the only part of Karl that had any real, human, transcendent value died long, long ago, if it ever existed at all.

All you billionaires out there (even the self defined “philanthropists” among you)......Just tell me how you can stay a billionaire? You have to be incredibly thoughtless, heartless, greedy, and totally lacking in empathy if you have a billion dollars for more than the time it takes you to give enough of it away so that you no longer have a billion dollars; yes, so that you have no more than 999 million dollars. Is that asking too much, David Geffen, Jeff Bezos, Michael Bloomberg, Donald Trump, Dr. Dre?, the Koch brothers, Shel Adelman, Steve Wynn, and yes, even you Oprah. I'll put it in the simplest (and most sarcastic) terms possible. Would you rather make life much easier for hard working families who need some help or would you rather buy your 3rd yacht, your 7th Sessna, your 5th tennis court, 8th vacation home, your 3rd wife, your 4th remote island? Would you be willing to live in a mansion that is 10% smaller in order to eliminate the intense levels of human grief and despair of others? No, that concept has no chance of being understood or accepted. A snowball has a better chance surviving in hell. I don’t know where the line of sanity should be drawn. For the sake of this discussion I drew it at 1 billion. One BILLION!

I don’t know of ANY billionaires who have given ANY measurable amount of their wealth away. Not Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, etc.. I know this because those men (who make tens of millions of dollars each day) still have in excess of 70 or 80 billion worth of personal wealth. Tomorrow it will be 100 billion, a few weeks later, 150, and so on. It always works out that way somehow. Losing their respective status among the elite rich would be worse than quadriplegia. They want to be uber rich and take credit for being uber philanthropic. Maybe we should give them handicapped parking permits, too. I’m sure they think they deserve them.

Bill Gates recently gave 1 billion to fight the Corona virus. Does he need to save all the rest of his billions for a rainy day? Is he worried that he is being too loose with his money and before he knows it he will be down to 75 billion? Does he need to save the rest to repave his 18 tennis courts? Good, innocent, hard working people and families are suffering NOW. Its long past time to start thinking that that extra 10 billion you have under the mattress could be saving lives (and dreams).

The Flint water system with its lead infected water lines is (still) not repaired. Innocent children in those poor communities have experienced irreversible brain damage simply by trusting and drinking the civic water supply. (That’s another horrid American story). The estimated cost to fix this entire problem and restore non toxic water is $240 million. Why aren’t multi billionaires tripping over themselves to give a microscopic percentage of their wealth to keep kids from being poisoned? These are kids whose lives are already severely challenged. It’s a privilege to be able to help so many people without getting your hands dirty or compromising your lifestyle in the slightest. It would take a phone call, that’s all. With the slightest amount of quid pro quo skills you could probably get them to change the name of the town from Flint to your name. We know how much that excites you. How about Geffen, Michigan, or Bezos, Michigan. What kind of a citizen with this colossal wealth wouldn’t see this as an opportunity if not a responsibility? If there is a Jesus (70% of Americans say there is) and he came back to earth in 2020 he would never stop shaming these personifications of greed and heartlessness. It might actually be the first time that Jesus threw punches.

It’s obviously asking for too much to ask any of these kingpins to live on a paltry 1 billion dollars. If you can’t live on 1 billion then find another planet where you can indulge yourself beyond a human scale.

I applaud the entrepreneurial spirit and genius/cunning (mixed with greed and ruthlessness in most cases) required to earn a billion. Many of those billionaires were not "American" in the way they earned their billions. They love to exploit capitalism but they aren’t even willing to play by those capricious “rules”. They are less “American” and more like thugs and gangsters. Bill Gates had many lawsuits over violating anti trust laws, most notably “United States vs. Microsoft in 2001”. Microsoft lost that case.

Howard Schulz of Starbucks was notorious for trying to make sure that no other coffee businesses could even exist. Competition doesn’t suit these people. In that way they are carbon copies of how Donald Trump makes his money. Bullying, intimidation, breaking laws, etc.; You know, the same ruthlessness we used to exterminate the Native Americans and to enslave blacks for 250 years. We do it without blinking an eye. Yes, you billionaires have a mental illness. Its a variation of the type of mental illness that motivated Adolf Hitler. It’s a (take over the world and leave dead bodies in your wake) kind of game. It’s a form of imperialism. It’s All American. Think about it

In 2008, Starbucks settled an antitrust lawsuit in Seattle that charged it with passing out samples of its drinks in front of rival coffee shops and strong-arming landlords into not leasing space to competitors. Yes, the king of the 8 dollar cup of coffee wants to rig the deck. Don’t play poker with any of these guys.

Howie didn't just want you to buy (his) coffee; he wanted to make sure you couldn't buy anyone else's. That is not competition, that is an attempt at monopoly. Monopolies are as un-American as the KGB, but many in blind pursuit are more than willing to utilize totalitarian tactics to obtain wealth, American values be damned. The perfunctory American flag lapel pin is the ultimate insult. Many billionaires (present, past and future) are more than happy to use sharp elbows and much more to gain an unfair advantage. When the piñata breaks they want to get ALL the candy. How do you build a civilization around that mentality. It resembles the Mafia more than you might think.

Trump is a great example of a billionaire in this country. We can only imagine how he attains wealth. We know that he likes to peddle in fake universities and he likes to not pay many of the people he employs. He likes to intimidate and threaten and con and bribe. Jeff Bezos is another example. He pays his employees extremely low wages and he is currently in a frenzy over trying to replace as many of them as he can by automating the whole Amazon business model. David Geffen is another story of how a person obtained a billion dollars. It is not a warm and fuzzy story. I would guess that most billionaires would be willing to put people in body bags who stood in their way of getting that billion.

Go ahead, make your billion....but do you really need to hold onto all that wealth? How does a barista at Starbuck’s survive on $9.50/hr. before tips. Howard Schultz will tell you it’s not his problem.

If you are so pitiful a citizen of the world that you are holding onto a billion dollars when you have the rarefied ability (and privilege) to improve the lives of millions and eliminate human suffering on a colossal level, then you should be banished to an island somewhere, the way lepers were generations ago. We would prefer your gene pool not be mixed with those of us who care about our neighbors. Yes, you should be cast off on an island somewhere with the other billionaires...you are unfit to sit at our table. To get off the island you should have to take courses in empathy, compassion, and thoughtfulness. We demand a bare minimum of it to walk among us. We will get along just fine without your online shopping network, or your media conglomerate, your Frappuccino’s, or your graphically attractive smartphones. Giant hotels in Vegas? We have way more of those commodities than we ever needed or asked for. We don’t need faster internet, we need compassion and empathy and altruism. We will accept no substitutes. I’d much rather see 200,000 mom and pop coffee shops that are run and owned by proud local business owners than 200,000 “one size fits all” big box coffee colossus clones where one fat cat controls every store with homogenous repetitiveness. Its like bringing a T Rex to a dog park and wondering who will be left standing. Where has all the America gone?

The hottest place in hell will always have a few empty bunks available for a billionaire.

For what it's worth I've never been more dismayed and discouraged over the greed and selfishness and corruption and heartlessness that abounds in this country. We aren't "great", don't fool yourself... A great country doesn't sit idly while tens of millions of families are living in poverty. It doesn't referee a game where the interests of the rich and powerful few take precedence over the powerless and impoverished masses. It doesn’t allow its richest citizens to skip out on paying taxes and to shield their money in offshore bank accounts. These people want the benefits of exploiting America but none of the responsibilities. Give me a drug dealer any day over these pseudo Americans.

Denmark, Sweden, Finland...those countries care about their citizens..they care about all of them, they care about educating them, they care about family leave, and vacations, and health care. They won’t accept that a family can lose their house if someone living in it gets a serious illness. They care even about the ever elusive emotion of happiness. Imagine a country that truly cares about everyone's happiness. This country of ours largely cares about lowering taxes....There is a political party that is galvanized by that one issue.

Those Scandinavian countries don't even get any Sunshine. It's overcast and rainy most of the time. They don't have palm trees, or the richest agricultural conditions on Earth...they don't have Kim Kardashian or the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. They don't have Lebron James. They have every reason to be depressed...but they're not. By virtually all measurable indices these countries rank higher than America in annual objective rankings. Yes, even in happiness (without the benefit of sunshine). Check it out...check out poverty in those countries (you'll need a magnifying glass), on the other hand, the United States has the second highest poverty rate for kids 18 and under among the 35 developed countries (23% of 18 and under kids in America live in poverty). Check out the brilliance of their education systems (Finland ranks #1 in the world), the United States ranks 18th. Tell me....when did 34th and 18th (out of 35) make you “great”? In the world I grew up in that would make you pitiful, pathetic. Hint: It’s going to get much worse. Count on it.

In this age of digitalization and automation there is a shelf life to a country that lives by the mantra “every man for himself”. The French Revolution was born from just such an indifference to the common man. If we allow a few T Rex to roam freely among normal humans then our survival as a country is on the clock.

Yes, imagine a country that truly cares about everyone's happiness.

We aren't living in one of them.

My opinions.

Food for Thought....