Spitting Out Words

The political power of America's richest has never been greater, and the level of their responsibility and collective burden has never been less. Meanwhile, for ordinary Americans, the remaining remnants of their financial security and middle class comforts rapidly erodes. It's true that the U.S. Government has little regard for the free market: they intervene constantly in the free market on behalf of the nation's wealthiest and most powerful business interests; it's crony capitalism, corporatism: government run by corporations (or, as Dick Durbin said of the Congress in which he serves: "the banks own the place").

For billionaires to see themselves as the True Victims, to complain that the President and the Government are waging some sort of war against them in the name of radical egalitarianism, is so removed from reality -- universes away -- that's it's hard to put into words.
~ from "Billionaire self-pity and the Koch Brothers" by Glenn Greenwald ~

Unlike Greenwald -- who I greatly admire -- I can think of several words to describe these folks.

The most prominent word is unmitigated greed! Whatever they command is NEVER enough. If they can commandeer $20 billion, they will bitch and moan that it's not $40 billion. If they hoodwink their way to $200 billion, they will be fit to be tied that it's not $500 billion!

Another word I can think of is selfish. They don't seem to care how any of their machinations impacts anyone else. Their local community, region or country could go to hell in a hand basket and that's a-ok as long as they get exactly what they want and then some.

A third word I think applies here is unconscionable. Most of them make no apologies whatsoever for being greedy and selfish. They think both are as natural as breathing air.

The last word I will offer in this post is sad. It is sad that there are individuals in this world who lack any semblance of a social conscience. It is even sadder that these are the people who, by and large, run the world.