Study Shows USA is an Oligarchy, not Democratic

[JimBowie1958]

An oligarchy is a system where power is effectively wielded by a small number of individuals defined by their status called oligarchs. Members of the oligarchy are the rich, the well connected and the politically powerful, as well as particularly well placed individuals in institutions like banking and finance or the military.

For their study, Gilens and Page compiled data from roughly 1,800 different policy initiatives in the years between 1981 and 2002. They then compared those policy changes with the expressed opinion of the United State public. Comparing the preferences of the average American at the 50th percentile of income to what those Americans at the 90th percentile preferred, as well as the opinions of major lobbying or business groups, the researchers found out that the government followed the directives set forth by the latter two much more often.

It's beyond alarming. As Gilens and Page write, "the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy." In other words, their statistics say your opinion literally does not matter.

The corporations have divided the working class against itself using neomarxist fascism on the left and social issues to the right to wedge the working class apart and distract us from the looting we are subjected to such as 'Quantitative Easing' and the steady shift of taxation from three individual dollars to every two corporate tax dollars, to it now being 6 to 1 heavy individual taxes paying almost all the governments costs instead of corporations. The law says that corporations are people so why don't they pay taxes at rates like the real people?

We have been hoodwinked and robbed and we keep on letting trolls and liars mislead us and bamboozle us to get robbed even more.

 

[Asclepias]

An oligarchy is a system where power is effectively wielded by a small number of individuals defined by their status called oligarchs. Members of the oligarchy are the rich, the well connected and the politically powerful, as well as particularly well placed individuals in institutions like banking and finance or the military.

For their study, Gilens and Page compiled data from roughly 1,800 different policy initiatives in the years between 1981 and 2002. They then compared those policy changes with the expressed opinion of the United State public. Comparing the preferences of the average American at the 50th percentile of income to what those Americans at the 90th percentile preferred, as well as the opinions of major lobbying or business groups, the researchers found out that the government followed the directives set forth by the latter two much more often.



It's beyond alarming. As Gilens and Page write, "the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy." In other words, their statistics say your opinion literally does not matter.

The corporations have divided the working class against itself using neomarxist fascism on the left and social issues to the right to wedge the working class apart and distract us from the looting we are subjected to such as 'Quantitative Easing' and the steady shift of taxation from three individual dollars to every two corporate tax dollars, to it now being 6 to 1 heavy individual taxes paying almost all the governments costs instead of corporations. The law says that corporations are people so why don't they pay taxes at rates like the real people?

We have been hoodwinked and robbed and we keep on letting trolls and liars mislead us and bamboozle us to get robbed even more.

You just now figured this out?

Its always been like that. The only difference is that anyone can rise up and become part of the few.

 

[TheOldSchool]

Every country's an oligarchy

 

[Pennywise]

We have never been a democracy, but were a Republic until about 100 years ago. As the government grew, they began to pick winners and losers. The corruption is pernicious and pervasive.

 

[Sallow]

An oligarchy is a system where power is effectively wielded by a small number of individuals defined by their status called oligarchs. Members of the oligarchy are the rich, the well connected and the politically powerful, as well as particularly well placed individuals in institutions like banking and finance or the military.

For their study, Gilens and Page compiled data from roughly 1,800 different policy initiatives in the years between 1981 and 2002. They then compared those policy changes with the expressed opinion of the United State public. Comparing the preferences of the average American at the 50th percentile of income to what those Americans at the 90th percentile preferred, as well as the opinions of major lobbying or business groups, the researchers found out that the government followed the directives set forth by the latter two much more often.

It's beyond alarming. As Gilens and Page write, "the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy." In other words, their statistics say your opinion literally does not matter.

The corporations have divided the working class against itself using neomarxist fascism on the left and social issues to the right to wedge the working class apart and distract us from the looting we are subjected to such as 'Quantitative Easing' and the steady shift of taxation from three individual dollars to every two corporate tax dollars, to it now being 6 to 1 heavy individual taxes paying almost all the governments costs instead of corporations. The law says that corporations are people so why don't they pay taxes at rates like the real people?

We have been hoodwinked and robbed and we keep on letting trolls and liars mislead us and bamboozle us to get robbed even more.

The study pointed that out where, exactly?

And what we have now? Is what you folks wanted.

Corporations are people.

Money is speech.

Enjoy.

 

[Sallow]

Every country's an oligarchy

Sorta.

 

[JimBowie1958]

Every country's an oligarchy

Bullshit.

Iceland is one example of a country where the people control the political system, and they thrive as a result.

Wish I could talk my wife into moving there with me and I'd go.

 

[JimBowie1958]

We have never been a democracy, but were a Republic until about 100 years ago. As the government grew, they began to pick winners and losers. The corruption is pernicious and pervasive.

Didn't say we were a democracy. I said we are no longer democratic; big diff.

 

[TheOldSchool]

Every country's an oligarchy

Bullshit.

Iceland is one example of a country where the people control the political system, and they thrive as a result.

Wish I could talk my wife into moving there with me and I'd go.

Some of the smaller nations are not oligarchies.

 

[JimBowie1958]

An oligarchy is a system where power is effectively wielded by a small number of individuals defined by their status called oligarchs. Members of the oligarchy are the rich, the well connected and the politically powerful, as well as particularly well placed individuals in institutions like banking and finance or the military.

For their study, Gilens and Page compiled data from roughly 1,800 different policy initiatives in the years between 1981 and 2002. They then compared those policy changes with the expressed opinion of the United State public. Comparing the preferences of the average American at the 50th percentile of income to what those Americans at the 90th percentile preferred, as well as the opinions of major lobbying or business groups, the researchers found out that the government followed the directives set forth by the latter two much more often.

It's beyond alarming. As Gilens and Page write, "the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy." In other words, their statistics say your opinion literally does not matter.

The corporations have divided the working class against itself using neomarxist fascism on the left and social issues to the right to wedge the working class apart and distract us from the looting we are subjected to such as 'Quantitative Easing' and the steady shift of taxation from three individual dollars to every two corporate tax dollars, to it now being 6 to 1 heavy individual taxes paying almost all the governments costs instead of corporations. The law says that corporations are people so why don't they pay taxes at rates like the real people?

We have been hoodwinked and robbed and we keep on letting trolls and liars mislead us and bamboozle us to get robbed even more.

The study pointed that out where, exactly?

And what we have now? Is what you folks wanted.

Corporations are people.

Money is speech.

Enjoy.

https://www.princeton.edu/~mgilens/...ens and Page 2014-Testing Theories 3-7-14.pdf

Biased Pluralism. Olson’s argument points toward an important variant line of thinking within the pluralist tradition: theories of “biased” pluralism, which posit struggles among an unrepresentative universe of interest groups – characterized by E.E. Schattschneider as a heavenly chorus with an “upper-class accent,” and more recently dubbed by Kay Lehman Schlozman, Sidney Verba, and Henry Brady an “unheavenly chorus.” Theories of biased pluralism generally argue that both the thrust of interest group conflict and the public policies that result tend to tilt toward the wishes of corporations and business and professional associations.17
Schattschneider suggested that policy outcomes vary with the “scope of conflict”: for
example, that business-oriented interest groups tend to prevail over ordinary citizens when the scope is narrow and visibility is low. Grant McConnell added the idea that the actual “constituencies” of policy implementers can consist of powerful groups. George Stigler (articulating what some economists have scorned as “Chicago Marxism&#8221 analyzed the politics of regulation in terms of biased pluralism: the capture of regulators by the regulated. Charles Lindblom outlined a number of ways – including the “privileged position” of business – in which business firms and their associations influence public policy. Thomas Ferguson has posited an “investment theory” of politics in which “major investors” – especially representatives of particular industrial sectors – fund political parties in order to get policies that suit their economic interests. Fred Block’s “neo-Polanyian” analysis emphasizes groups. Jacob Hacker’s and Paul Pierson’s analysis of “winner-take-all-politics,” which emphasizes the power of the finance industry, can be seen as a recent contribution to the literature of biased pluralism.18
Marxist and neo-Marxist theories of the capitalist state hold that economic classes – and
particularly the bourgeoisie, the owners of the means of production -- dominate policy making and cause the state to serve their material interests. As the Communist Manifesto put it, “The bourgeoisie has...conquered for itself, in the modern representative State, exclusive political sway. The executive of the modern State is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie.”19 We cannot precisely test the predictions of such theories, because we lack good measures of policy preferences by economic class. (In Marxist theory, neither income nor wealth accurately signals class position.) We can note, however, that certain “instrumentalist” Marxist theories, including the important version put forth by Ralph Miliband, make predictions resembling those of theories of Biased Pluralism: that interest groups and corporations representing “large scale business” tend to prevail.20

And you can shove the 'you folks' up your stinking nasty ass, bitch.

 

[peach174]

We were never Democratic.
We were a Republic, with 3 separate branches of powers and had States rights. Our Constitution limits the powers of our Federal government.
It's Progressives who have messed up our political ideology and has turned it into a huge mess.
Progressives has turned our form of government into the exact opposite of what the founders wanted.

 

[JimBowie1958]

We were never Democratic.
We were a Republic, with 3 separate branches of powers and had States rights. Our Constitution limits the powers of our Federal government.
It's Progressives who have messed up our political ideology and has turned it into a huge mess.
Progressives has turned our form of government into the exact opposite of what the founders wanted.

Didn't say we were a democracy, just said that we are no longer democratic, which is another thing entirely.

We are no longer a democratic republic but we are an oligarchic republic.

 

[peach174]

We were never Democratic.
We were a Republic, with 3 separate branches of powers and had States rights. Our Constitution limits the powers of our Federal government.
It's Progressives who have messed up our political ideology and has turned it into a huge mess.
Progressives has turned our form of government into the exact opposite of what the founders wanted.

Didn't say we were a democracy, just said that we are no longer democratic, which is another thing entirely.

We are no longer a democratic republic but we are an oligarchic republic.

We were a Republic no Democratic republic.

The Founding Fathers universally rejected democracy and hoped that posterity would never turn the United States into one. The word they used was Republic, which is not synonymous with Democracy. The word Democracy is not in the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, the Constitution, or the Bill of Rights. Even the Pledge of Allegiance says the Republic for which it stands.

Benjamin Franklin defined democracy as a two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.

So why did they reject Democracy? Because it is inherently flawed with the share of the wealth philosophy, which only works as long as there is someone else's money to share. Those receiving are quite pleased with getting something for nothing. But those forced to give are denied the right to spend the benefits of their own labor in their own self-interest, which creates jobs no matter how the money is spent. They also lose a portion of their incentive to produce.

We were a Republic that had individualism first and society 2nd.
Progressives has turned it into Society first and individualism 2nd.
The Progressives has turned us into a Social Democracy.

Democracies always end up as Oligarchies.

 

[guno]

Every country's an oligarchy

Bullshit.

Iceland is one example of a country where the people control the political system, and they thrive as a result.

Wish I could talk my wife into moving there with me and I'd go.

Ummmmm Iceland is a democratic Socialist County

Top Economists: Iceland Did It Right ? And Everyone Else Is Doing It Wrong | Zero Hedge

Iceland; Socialism works! | ACA The Underground

Iceland's socialist economy grows 4.7 percent after the 99% takes on the 1%

 

[Asclepias]

Seeing as the country was founded for and by wealthy, white, male, landowners I would have to say it was an oligarchy from the start. What is unique is that now with some modifications to the constitution, anyone can belong to the class that reaps the benefits.

 

[guno]

Every country's an oligarchy

Bullshit.

Iceland is one example of a country where the people control the political system, and they thrive as a result.

Wish I could talk my wife into moving there with me and I'd go.

Ummmmm Iceland is a democratic Socialist County

Top Economists: Iceland Did It Right ? And Everyone Else Is Doing It Wrong | Zero Hedge

Iceland; Socialism works! | ACA The Underground

Iceland's socialist economy grows 4.7 percent after the 99% takes on the 1%

Iceland is doing all the things the right wing capitalist disapprove of.

They nationalized their banks, repudiated the banksters debt, allowed their currency to massively devalue and increased welfare programs to help the average Icelander.

If they continue to prosper it will be a huge bitch slap to all those who want to wipe out government in hopes of instituting some kind of "free market" nirvana.

 

[Asclepias]

Every country's an oligarchy

Bullshit.

Iceland is one example of a country where the people control the political system, and they thrive as a result.

Wish I could talk my wife into moving there with me and I'd go.

Ummmmm Iceland is a democratic Socialist County

Top Economists: Iceland Did It Right ? And Everyone Else Is Doing It Wrong | Zero Hedge

Iceland; Socialism works! | ACA The Underground

Iceland's socialist economy grows 4.7 percent after the 99% takes on the 1%

This will be kept quiet or there will be a media blitz on every negative thing that occurs in Iceland.

 

[peach174]

Seeing as the country was founded for and by wealthy, white, male, landowners I would have to say it was an oligarchy from the start. What is unique is that now with some modifications to the constitution, anyone can belong to the class that reaps the benefits.

That is not true.

A few of the 1787 delegates were wealthy, but many of the country's top wealth-holders were Loyalists who went to Britain. Most of the others had financial resources that ranged from good to excellent, but there are other founders who were less than wealthy. On the whole they were less wealthy than the Loyalists.

 

[guno]

Bullshit.

Iceland is one example of a country where the people control the political system, and they thrive as a result.

Wish I could talk my wife into moving there with me and I'd go.

Ummmmm Iceland is a democratic Socialist County

Top Economists: Iceland Did It Right ? And Everyone Else Is Doing It Wrong | Zero Hedge

Iceland; Socialism works! | ACA The Underground

Iceland's socialist economy grows 4.7 percent after the 99% takes on the 1%

Iceland is doing all the things the right wing capitalist disapprove of.

They nationalized their banks, repudiated the banksters debt, allowed their currency to massively devalue and increased welfare programs to help the average Icelander.

If they continue to prosper it will be a huge bitch slap to all those who want to wipe out government in hopes of instituting some kind of "free market" nirvana.

Instead of allowing the criminals responsible for bank fraud to run free as the years passed by, Iceland thought it might be wise to actually indict bankers who committed serious financial crimes that contributed to the collapse. By paying off loans for consumers, forgiving homeowner debt (up to 110% of the property value), and throwing the offenders in prison, Iceland was able to bounce back. Now, its economy is “recovered” and is growing faster than both the US and European economies.


When Iceland’s President Olafur Ragnar Grimmson was asked whether or not other countries – Europe in particular – would succeed with Iceland’s “let the banks fail” policy, he stated the following:

“Why are the banks considered to be the holy churches of the modern economy? Why are private banks not like airlines and telecommunication companies and allowed to go bankrupt if they have been run in an irresponsible way? The theory that you have to bail out banks is a theory that you allow bankers enjoy for their own profit, their success, and then let ordinary people bear their failure through taxes and austerity. 
People in enlightened democracies are not going to accept that in the long run.”

Grimmson’s “famous” reply to the controversial question, “What is the reason for Iceland’s recovery?” is most remarkable.

“We were wise enough not to follow the traditional prevailing orthodoxies of the Western financial world in the last 30 years. We introduced currency controls, we let the banks fail, we provided support for the poor, and we didn’t introduce austerity measures like you’re seeing in Europe.”
Iceland's Stabilized Economy Is A Surprising Success Story - Forbes

 

[guno]

Bullshit.

Iceland is one example of a country where the people control the political system, and they thrive as a result.

Wish I could talk my wife into moving there with me and I'd go.

Ummmmm Iceland is a democratic Socialist County

Top Economists: Iceland Did It Right ? And Everyone Else Is Doing It Wrong | Zero Hedge

Iceland; Socialism works! | ACA The Underground

Iceland's socialist economy grows 4.7 percent after the 99% takes on the 1%

Iceland is doing all the things the right wing capitalist disapprove of.

They nationalized their banks, repudiated the banksters debt, allowed their currency to massively devalue and increased welfare programs to help the average Icelander.

If they continue to prosper it will be a huge bitch slap to all those who want to wipe out government in hopes of instituting some kind of "free market" nirvana.

Instead of allowing the criminals responsible for bank fraud to run free as the years passed by, Iceland thought it might be wise to actually indict bankers who committed serious financial crimes that contributed to the collapse. By paying off loans for consumers, forgiving homeowner debt (up to 110% of the property value), and throwing the offenders in prison, Iceland was able to bounce back. Now, its economy is “recovered” and is growing faster than both the US and European economies.


When Iceland’s President Olafur Ragnar Grimmson was asked whether or not other countries – Europe in particular – would succeed with Iceland’s “let the banks fail” policy, he stated the following:

“Why are the banks considered to be the holy churches of the modern economy? Why are private banks not like airlines and telecommunication companies and allowed to go bankrupt if they have been run in an irresponsible way? The theory that you have to bail out banks is a theory that you allow bankers enjoy for their own profit, their success, and then let ordinary people bear their failure through taxes and austerity. 
People in enlightened democracies are not going to accept that in the long run.”

Grimmson’s “famous” reply to the controversial question, “What is the reason for Iceland’s recovery?” is most remarkable.

“We were wise enough not to follow the traditional prevailing orthodoxies of the Western financial world in the last 30 years. We introduced currency controls, we let the banks fail, we provided support for the poor, and we didn’t introduce austerity measures like you’re seeing in Europe.”
Iceland's Stabilized Economy Is A Surprising Success Story - Forbes