Living In a Kleptocrat Nation

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Living In a Kleptocrat Nation

 

 

By Jim Hightower, Texas Observer

August 21, 2003

 

kleptocrat nation (klep toe krat nay shun), n. 1. a body of people ruled by

thieves. 2. a government characterized by the practice of transferring money and

power from the many to the few. 3. a ruling class of moneyed elites that usurps

liberty, justice, sovereignty, and other democratic rights from the people. 4.

the USA in 2003.

 

 

 

The Kleptocrats have taken over. Look at America's leadership today – not just

political, but corporate, too. Tell me you wouldn't trade the whole mess of them

for one good kindergarten teacher.

 

 

 

Forget George W. for a moment and sneak a peek at practically any big-deal CEO,

congressional heavy, media baron, talk-show yakker, pompadoured TV preacher, or

any the other pushers of America's new ethic of grab-it-and-go greed. In a

crunch, would you want to be tied at the waist to any of them?

 

 

 

Yet, they're in charge! Here we are, living in the wealthiest country in

history, a country of boundless possibilities, a country made up of a people

deeply committed to democratic ideals, a country with the potential for

spectacular human achievement – but we find ourselves ruled (politically,

economically, culturally, and ethically) by a confederacy of Kleptocrats.

 

 

 

When did you first realize or at least begin to suspect that America was lost?

Not physically, of course – we're right here.

 

 

 

Lost its way, is what I mean, having wandered from the brave and true path first

pointed out by Tom Paine, T.J., Jimmy Madison, and several other good thinkers

back around 1776 – a path toward a society focused not on empire, but on

enlightenment and egalitarianism.

 

 

 

We've never reached that glorious place, of course, but the important thing is

that in our two-century sojourn we've been steadily striving to get there...and

making progress. If any one thing really characterizes this big boiling pot of

diversity dubbed " America, " it is that we're a nation of strivers.

Unfortunately, the cultural elites want to minimize this powerful virtue by

reducing it to nothing more than individuals striving for material gain – " Who

Wants to Be A Millionaire? " – " How to Get Rich in the Next Half Hour! " – " You

Might Already Be a Winner. "

 

 

 

Then they wonder why there's such a gaping hole in America, an emptiness that

can't be filled by nonstop shopping, prepaid elections, more bunting, and

reality TV. When the Powers That Be started defining a person's value by the

value of their stock portfolio, they lost America, for that's not who we are.

Don't go calling us names like " Consumer " or " Stakeholder " when who we are is

full-fledged, dyed-in-the-wool, unbridled, rambunctious citizens – indeed, we're

the ultimate sovereigns of this great land. We don't merely strive for material

gain, but also for the spiritual satisfaction of building community and reaping

the deeper richness of the common good.

 

 

 

The idea of belonging to something larger than our own egos and bank accounts,

the idea of caring, sharing, and participating as a public is the big idea of

America itself. As a boy growing up in Denison, I was taught this unifying,

moral concept by hard-working, Depression-era parents who ran a small business

in our town. They knew from experience and from their hearts what America is all

about: " Everybody does better when everybody does better, " is how my old Daddy

used to put it.

 

 

 

The unforgivable transgression of today's leaders is that they have abandoned

this common wisdom of the common good and quit striving for that world of

enlightenment and egalitarianism that the founders envisioned and that so many

throughout our history have struggled to build. Instead, whether from the top

executive suites or from the White House, the people in charge today are

aggressively pushing a soulless ethic that shouts: " Everyone on your own, grab

all you can, and if you've got enough money, secure yourself in a gated

compound. "

 

 

 

Not only are the Kleptocrats stealing our country from us, they're stealing our

democratic ideals-the very idea of America. And it's time to take them back.

 

 

 

How far have the elites moved from us? So far that even the moderates have lost

their way. Take Sherwood Boehlert. He's a Republican Congressman, but despite

that, not a bad guy. Sherwood thinks of himself as " part of the enlightened

middle. "

 

 

 

From central New York, he's been in the House of Representatives for 21 years

now. He says he loves the job, calling it the " ultimate aphrodisiac. " But

Sherwood said something not long ago that made me think that maybe he has been

sniffing the perfumes of high office longer than is good for him:

 

 

 

" It's the people's house, " he gushed about his side of the Capitol, " the one

institution in the whole wide world that's the personification of this great

democracy of ours. "

 

 

 

Think about it: Congress, democracy. Do these two words fit together in your

mind? America is a nation of nurses, office workers, cab drivers, school

teachers, pharmacists, shop keepers, middle managers, truck drivers, shift

workers, librarians, cleaning people, electricians, fruit pickers, struggling

artists – how many of our ilk are sitting next to Sherwood in " the people's

house " ?

 

 

 

The great majority of Americans make less than $50,000 a year; half of us make

under $32,000. How many members of Congress come from such modest backgrounds?

Today's Congress is made up of business executives, lawyers, and former

political operatives (which Boehlert was). The Public Interest Research Group

reports that nearly half of the people newly elected to Congress last year are

millionaires. This is the personification of democracy?

 

 

 

Not only do the members tend to descend into Congress from the economic heights,

but they also spend practically all of their substantive and social time with

others from the heights. Congress' real constituency is no longer you and me,

but the people who " matter. " These are your top-floor corporate executives and

the moneyed elites who have full-time lobbyists and who make the

$1,000-and-higher campaign donations (only 0.12 percent of Americans are in this

class) that grease the wheels of congressional incumbency. They are the

privileged few who know members by their first names, who get every one of their

phone calls returned – and who get their agenda adopted.

 

 

 

Perhaps this gaping economic chasm between those on the inside and all the rest

of us on the outside explains why our strumpets of state never get around to

dealing with little matters like assuring health care for all families, passing

living-wage legislation, and making sure everyone gets a decent retirement.

Members of the congressional club feel no urgency because, hey, it's not them –

they have no personal anxiety about such matters because (one) they're well off

and (two) they're covered on all this by us taxpayers. Yes, even the

multimillionaires in Congress get:

 

 

 

 

Full platinum-level health coverage for themselves and their families,

including choosing their own docs, seeing the specialists they need, dental

care, and cosmetic surgery for their pets. (Just kidding about that last one-but

don't put it past them!)

 

 

 

 

 

 

A rosy retirement, with pensions that can rise higher than the pay they got

while in office. Just the starting pensions are sweet: Phil Gramm, who finally

did something for the people of Texas by leaving the Senate last year, starts

out drawing retirement pay of $78,534 a year. He'll be paid more for doing

nothing than 80-plus percent of us Americans are paid for working full time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Regular cost-of-living pay raises. While Congress has not seen fit to

increase the minimum wage (still $5.15 an hour) since 1996, the members did give

themselves four $5,000 pay raises during the past five years. This $20,000

" adjustment " in each of their own annual pay packets is $8,000 more than the

gross pay that a full-time minimum-wage worker would get if Congress ever gets

around to the one-dollar wage hike they've been " talking " about for years.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Excellent job security. Did you know that a member of Congress is four times

more likely to die in office than to lose an election? This is not only because

of the special-interest money they're stuffed with, but also because the GOP and

Democrats conspire to divide the turf in each state, gerrymandering districts to

assure that 96 percent of them are " safe " for the incumbents. There's not much

democracy in a rigged system that now allows only about 20 of the 435 House

seats to be competitive in each election cycle.

 

 

 

 

 

A couple of years ago, Japanese police discovered more than 400 pieces of

women's underwear in the home of Sadao Ushimura, a fellow who was a prominent

official in Japan's finance ministry at the time. Mr. Ushimura proclaimed total

innocence of any possible scandal or perversion, explaining: " I picked up all

lingerie on the streets by pure chance. "

 

 

 

We still have our underwear in America, but we've been stripped of a garment far

more delicate and precious: our democracy. On this sprawling continent with its

cacophony of voices, we've been able to hold it all together through the years

because of our people's instinctive and tenacious belief in the sanctity of

democratic principles.

 

 

 

But something has gone terribly wrong. The essence of democracy – our power to

control decisions that affect us – has steadily and quietly been pilfered by

corporate Kleptocrats. They have gathered up our democratic powers piece by

piece, hoarding them in the privacy of their own fiefdoms. These elites (fully

abetted by the governmental elites they have bought) now effectively control the

decisions that affect We The People – everything from public-spending priorities

to environmental degradation, from wages to war, from what's on the " news " to

who gets elected.

 

 

 

This has not taken place by " pure chance, " but through deliberate filching, and

the filching now has reached the level of wholesale looting. The elites have

pulled off a slow-motion coup, radically wrenching America's power balance from

a people's democracy to Kleptocrat Nation.

 

 

 

This would be terribly depressing except for one thing, which is that one basic

has definitely not changed in our land: The people (you rascals!) still have

that instinctive and tenacious belief in our historic democratic principles. The

antidote to kleptocracy is the age-old medicine of democratic struggle,

agitation, and organization, and all across our country, the rebellion is on!

 

 

 

As happened in the rebellion of 1776, as happened in the populist revolt against

the robber barons of the 19th century, and as is already happening in community

after community today, America's historic democratic yearnings will not be long

suppressed. Despite our present leadership (with their autocratic, plutocratic,

and imperialistic ambitions), this is a nation of irrepressible democrats, and

their spirit will out.

 

 

 

Come on, America! Don't let BushCo, the Wobblycrats, and the Kleptocrats steal

our country and trivialize We The People as being nothing more substantial than

passive consumers who can even be made to cower in duct-taped " safe rooms "

whenever the governing authorities shout " Code Orange! " out their windows.

America wasn't built by conformists, but by mutineers; we're a big brawling,

boisterous, bucking people, and now is our time!

 

 

 

Our democracy is being dismantled right in front of our eyes, not by crazed

foreign terrorists, but by our own ruling elites. America desperately needs you

and me to stand as full citizens, asserting the bold and proud radicalism of

America's democratic ideals.

 

 

 

Consider these words:

 

 

 

It is not that we see democracy through the haze of optimism. We know that

democracy is a jewel that must be polished constantly to maintain its luster. To

prevent it from being damaged or stolen, democracy must be guarded with

unremitting vigilance.

 

 

 

That's not Patrick Henry or Abe Lincoln, but Aung San Suu Kyi, the courageous

and inspirational fighter for democracy in Burma. Her life literally is on the

line every day, for she's the leader of the popular opposition to the ruthless

military dictatorship that usurped this beautiful country's democracy in a

bloody coup. In 1990, her National League for Democracy won 82 percent of the

vote in a democratic election, but the military and the economic elites stepped

in and invalidated the people's choice, and they have ruled through iron-fisted

repression, murder, and armed force ever since.

 

 

 

You think democracy asks a lot of us – too many meetings, too much risk of

getting your name on Ashcroft's database, too much confrontation with authority?

Try walking a few miles in her shoes. Burma's military thugs would love to kill

her, but for now they know that they could not withstand the popular explosion

that would follow such a murder, for she's the symbol of the people's suppressed

democratic yearnings. Instead, they held her under house arrest for seven and a

half years, and though she was officially released last year, she is hounded,

harassed, monitored, and followed everywhere she goes in an effort to intimidate

her and Burma's other democracy activists. They wish she would leave, but she

wouldn't even go to Stockholm to accept the Nobel Peace Prize she won in 1991

because she feared she would not be allowed to reenter her country.

 

 

 

Maybe you're thinking: " Well, Hightower, sure, if a dictatorship was imposed

here in the US of A, then, by golly, you can bet your boots that I'd stand up! "

 

 

 

A military coup is not the only way to slip the plush rug of America's democracy

from beneath your motionless feet. A few tugs here and a couple of hard yanks

there... and it's gone. And they've been tugging and yanking furiously of late,

taking scores of actions that would cause Paul Revere to mount up again,

including: Ashcroft's ruling that the FBI can secretly infiltrate and spy on

political and church meetings without a warrant; the federal judge's ruling that

New Yorkers could be denied their constitutional right to march in protest of

Bush's war plans, instead, relegating them to a 10,000-person " rally pen " where

they " could be adequately policed " ; Ashcroft's PATRIOT Act II, which would

provide advance immunity for federal agents who conduct illegal surveillance at

the behest of top executive branch officials (a provision that would have

protected Nixon's illegal wiretappers).

 

 

 

These underminings of our basic civil liberties and imposition of

anti-democratic police power are in addition to other maneuvers that are

steadily strangling our people's democracy:

 

 

 

The Supreme Court's 1976 ruling that campaign money is " speech " effectively

negates the value of your vote and electoral participation, while giving a

handful of corporations and wealthy interests far more " speech " than the rest of

us, and also puts the possibility of holding public office beyond the reach of

ordinary Americans. Nothing has been so destructive of our nation's promise of

democratic representation as has this totally un-American decree, which neither

political party challenges.

 

 

 

The unheralded provisions of NAFTA, the WTO, the forthcoming FTAA, and other

arcane trade schemes allow global corporations to wield veto power over your

local, state, and national laws, usurping our people's right to self-government,

a theft of power that has been pulled off without the people knowing it, much

less agreeing to it.

 

 

 

With a massive infusion of campaign donations, a half-dozen conglomerates have

gotten Congress and the FCC to rush through a radical rewriting of the rules so

that they now control our public airwaves, making a mockery of our " Freedom of

the Press " and restricting the mass-media debate to corporate-approved topics

and viewpoints.

 

 

 

Don't expect these political, corporate, media, and other money powers to alert

you to the fact that big chunks of your democracy, right here in the US of A,

already have been seriously damaged or stolen; and they're certainly not going

to rally us to the essential cause of repairing and retaking our democracy.

That's up to us.

 

 

 

Of course, BushCo is hoping we're idiots, and to help keep our minds from

wandering to what's going on with democracy here in The Homeland, they have us

riveted on color-coded threats from afar, warning sternly that millions of the

world's people hate us – indeed, as George so eloquently put it, " They hate our

freedoms. "

 

 

 

What they hate is that our government, corporations, and military storm around

the world in betrayal of every democratic value that the American people hold

dear. Bush poses grandly as the noble spear carrier for democracy, yet he is

(like his predecessors) a willing accomplice of brutal dictators and global

corporate powers that oppress the world's people, impoverish them, and plunder

their resources. Through his perpetual war agenda, his oil buddies, the World

Bank, the arms dealers, his defiance of environmental and human rights treaties,

and dozens of other actions, George W. (and our Congress) is an enthusiastic

supporter of global-scale theft and thuggery.

 

 

 

Perhaps it doesn't cross his mind that the people who are being run over can

clearly see America's economic, governmental, and military might behind the

thievery and thuggery. Aung San Suu Kyi damned sure saw it. When the generals

threw out Burma's elected government and installed themselves in power, the

United States did nothing in support of democracy. Worse, our government turned

its back as Unocal, Texaco, and Halliburton cut deals with the new junta (which

had given itself the Orwellian moniker of SLORC, the State Law and Order

Restoration Council) to develop gas fields there and build the billion-dollar

Yadana pipeline across the country. The pipeline partnership stole land from

farmers, displaced entire villages, uprooted sections of rain forests, and

conscripted locals who were forced at gunpoint to help construct the pipeline.

Unocal is still in partnership with these dictators, who daily hound and harass

Suu Kyi.

 

 

 

Such upstanding American corporations as Disney, Eddie Bauer, Levi Strauss, Liz

Claiborne, Macy's, and PepsiCo also made business deals with the devils of

Burma, though grassroots boycotts and political pressure back here in the United

States and elsewhere finally forced them to withdraw (www.freeburma.org).

 

 

 

It is this investment by our oil giants and other corporations that has given

the generals the wherewithal to build and maintain a police state that boasts of

300,000 armed forces deployed to stifle democracy and keep the dictatorship in

power. This is the face of America that much of the world sees, the face of

executives from Unocal, Halliburton, Disney, and others, standing side by side

with the SLORCs of the world.

 

 

 

Yet, Suu Kyi does not hate you and me. She knows the difference between us and

our corrupt leadership. She is sacrificing her comfort, happiness, and quite

possibly her life to try to extend to her country the very values that you and I

cherish. She and oppressed people throughout the world love freedom, and they

look to the American people as a beacon of the democracy that they seek.

 

 

 

The irony is that she is more aware of what we're at serious risk of losing here

than most Americans are.

 

 

 

Author and columnist Jim Hightower is a former Texas Observer editor. This

article is excerpted from his new book, " Thieves in High Places: They've Stolen

Our Country and It's Time To Take It Back " (Viking Press, September 2003) and is

reprinted with permission from Viking Press.

 

 

 

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