I watched two interesting documentaries yesterday; the first was a documentary about the new ultra right wing political group, the Tea Party which is gathering a following in the US. The second a documentary about the uber wealthy, the one percent in the US that owns everything. Although different they were essentially the same, they were about greedy, selfish people that think they deserve more than everyone else for whatever deluded reason they see fit to think about. The Tea Party doc was on the BBC by Andrew Neil, a former US political correspondent; was particularly scary, seeing the falseness and apparent neo-Nazi ideology that festers like an open wound in America. I understand where they are coming from; they have lost much and feel they want to go back to what they call a more free society without ‘big government’. But they are deluded into thinking the cause of this disaster is what they call, the tyranny of the Democrats. They are so blinded to selfishness, they do not realise, the reason they are in the mess they find themselves, is because of the very people like themselves, the Republicans, and the insanity of eight years of Dopey Dubya. American politics is incredibly confusing; it seems that if any loony can raise enough capital they can get what they want. It shows that in America any crazed idea if popular will happen. If it was suddenly popular to bring back slavery, or gladiators fighting to the death in Stadia, you feel some loony would try to lobby for its inclusion. I know this is an extreme example but when you hear some of the things that get thought about in the US, is it really that extreme.
The doc showed contrived interviews between the silly Sarah Palin, and Glen Beck, which baffles me how anyone could be so duped into believing the nonsense they spout. Glen feels Sarah Palin is the woman to change America, and she believes it because she raised an army veteran, how the hell is that a reason to be president of the most powerful country in the world; to say my heart was racing at the terrifying thought if that ever came true. When are people going to wake up and realise that greedy selfishness, and looking after number one and only thinking of yourself, and what you have, is divisive. It is the ultimate doom, it doesn’t help you, it hinders you, look back at history, every greedy selfish me, me, me, society eventually falls. I am not sure if people in the US can see the doc, if you can watch it, because these Tea Party extremists look like a cross between the early Nazi party and the Political side of the Klu Klux Klan.
To add there is a brilliant rant by Matt Damon, on YouTube, it is brilliant and sums up Sarah Palin to a tee. here is the link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6urw_PWHYk
And here is a one from John Cleese http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMyNk8J1c8g&feature=related
And Bill Maher http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2OUJ8ZUTiI&feature=related
This last one is silly Sarah herself http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntEE9Zy-qQQ&feature=related
The One Percent doc was by Jamie Johnson, son and heir to the Johnson & Johnson fortune, his family are billionaires, but he wrestles with the inequality of having so much, when so many have nothing. Jamie because of his standing and status speaks to many of the wealthiest people in the world or their children. Maybe giving their children so much privilege and a decent education has allowed them to see how dreadful the world is for so many people. To hear some of these billionaires talk you would think they were the saviours of the world, and that they in some way deserve all this power and privilege. Imagine if every billionaire or everyone with over 100 million dollars gave one percent of his wealth to the people of their countries, an equal share just to help people. How much money would that be? How much would you get? How much would it change the lives of millions of people? If you take the personal wealth of the top three, that total is approximately $150 Billion, yes it is incredible to think, and one percent is $1.5 Billion. Now that is only the top three, now I am sure they will argue they give millions of dollars every year already, and they do but that still doesn’t take away the fact that they make far more, and the way the world works means they get more and more whilst everyone else gets less. If I remember rightly America was supposed to end the classes make everyone equal in God’s eyes, and give everyone a chance to make it big. Today’s society reminds me a similar system of the past, when wealthy land barons owned everything and serfs did their hard work for next to nothing, the time of old medieval England. The weird thing is if you compare the two docs, realistically the Tea Party should be totally against the wealthy one percent, but they are not, they don’t mind them. They don’t mind them having more money than many countries. What I find amazing is they are pissed off at the people at the other end. The ones with nothing, they say are sponging off them, taking their hard earned money. It’s an incredible oxymoron, and quite bizarre, I find it incredibly confusing, bewildering to the point of incredulity. The division in America will affect the whole world, and if we are not careful, nearly 150 years after the last American Civil War there may be another one looming.
No comments:
Post a Comment