In the United States when there are professed to like democracy. In a democracy Public Opinion is going to have some influence on poesy. And then the government carries out actions determined by the population and thats what democracy means. Its important to understand that privileged and powerful sectors have never liked democracy and for very good reasons. Democracy puts power into the hands of the general population and takes it away from them. As kind of the principle of concentration of wealth and power. Concentration of wealth yields concentration of power particularly so as the cost of elections skyrockets which kind of forces the Political Parties into the pockets of major corporations. And this political power. Really translates into legislation that increases the concentration of wealth so fiscal policy like tax policy a deregulation. Rules of Corporate Governance a whole variety of measures political measures designed to increase the concentration of wealth and power which in turn to yield more political power to do the same thing. And thats what weve been seeing. So we have this kind of vicious cycle in progress. You know actually it is so traditional that it was described by adam smith in 776 he read the famous wealth of nations. He says in england the principal architects of policy are the people on the society in his day merchants and manufacturers. And they make sure that their own interests are very well cared for however greed is the impact on the people of england there are others. Now its not a merger of manufacturers its Financial Institutions and multinational corporations the people who adam smith called the masters of mankind and theyre following the vile maxim all for selves and nothing for anyone else. Theyre just going to pursue policies that benefit them and harm everyone else. And in the absence of a general popular reaction thats pretty much what youd expect. Right through American History theres been an ongoing clash between. Pressure for more freedom and democracy coming from below and the efforts that elite control and domination coming from above. Because back to the founding of the country. James madison the main framer who was as much of a believer in democracy is anybody in the world that they nevertheless felt that the United States system should be designed and indeed was his initiative was designed so that power should be in the hands of the wealthy. Because the wealthy are their more responsible set of men and therefore the structure of the formal constitutional system placed most power in the hands of the senate or the senate was not elected in those days it was selected from the wealthy men as madison put it had sympathy for Property Owners in their right. To read the debates at the constitutional convention. Madison the major concern of the society has to be to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority. And hear argument suppose everyone had to vote freely as they will the majority of the poor get together and they would organize to take away the property of the rich and he said that would obviously be unjust so he cant have that so therefore the constitutional system has to be set up to prevent democracy. Which is of some interest that this debate has a hurried tradition goes back to the 1st major book on political systems aristotles politics. Is. Of all of them the best is democracy and it only points out exactly the flaws that manderson pointed out. If absent were a democracy for free men the poor would get together and take away the property the rich. Well the same dilemma they had opposite solutions aristotle proposed what we would nowadays call a welfare state and try to reduce inequality. So the same problem as it solutions one is reduce inequality will have this problem and the other is reduced monikers. If you look at the history of the United States its a constant struggle between these 2 tendencies democratising tendency thats mostly coming from the population pressure from below and you get these constant battle going on periods or gratian periods of progress in 1906 for example were a period of significant democratization. Sectors of the fabulous that were usually passive apis it became organized active story pressing their demands. And they became more and more involved in Decision Making activism and so on. They just changed consciousness and always. Minority rights. We dont want. Womens rights. Or. Concern for the betterment of america is. Seeking to provide a position to creation through did i was criticized as the militant dissent they are serious about lawn on. The vietnamese people grow our own black people and. In turn for other people one day we must ask the question. Of 1000000 poor people in america when you begin. To reason of course the amount the system of distribution of wealth the research. Time these are all symbolizing the fact. That caused great fear. Anticipated the power of a should have but it didnt then to spit the power of the reaction to the civilizing effects of the 60s did not anticipate the strength of the reaction to it. The backlash. Well it finally happened donald trump has been impeached by the house of representatives in complete opposition to what they found. Vision the articles voted on were along party lines it is highly unlikely the senate will vote to remove the president from office so what is the point of this entire exercise. Join me every thursday on the alec simon show and ill be speaking to us from the world of politics sports business im showbusiness ill see you then. Is your media a reflection of reality. In a world transformed. What will make you feel safe. Isolation full community. Are you going the right way or are you being led so. Direct. What is true what is faith. In the world corrupted you need to descend. To join us in the depths. Aura made in the shallows. Exists is a sticker from the water bottle phone in the stomach of a fish the brand is part of the Cocacola Company which sells millions of bottles of soda every day the idea was that lets tell consumers there are the bad ones there the litter bugs are throwing us away industry should be blamed for all this waste the company has long promised to reuse the plastic. In maine that seems cool sets. Stay on your phones at a special projects funded he tells it to. On the new vest that is the end of a footy team fun now the mountains of waste only grow higher. You know worlds big partners new things a lot and conspiracy its time to wake up to dig deeper to hit the stories that Mainstream Media refuses to tell more than ever we need to be smarter we need to stop slamming the door on the bath and shouting past each other its time for Critical Thinking its time to fight for the middle for the truth the time is now for watching closely watching the hawks. Legs. There has been an enormous concentrated coordinated business offensive beginning in the seventys to try to beat back the gallant tarion efforts that went right through the nixon years and you see it in many respects and over on the right you see it in things like the famous pell memorandum. Sent to the chamber of commerce Major Business lobby but Later Supreme CourtJustice Powell warning them that business is losing control over the society. And something has to be done to counter these forces course it puts it in terms of the defense defending ourselves against outside power. If you look at it its a call for business to use its control over resources to carry out a major offensive to beat back this democratizing wave. Over on the liberal side something exactly similar the 1st. Major report of the trial Lateral Commission is concerned that this. Called the crisis of democracy. TriLateral Commission is liberal internationalists in their flavors indicated by the fact that they pretty much staff the carter administration. And they were also called the democratizing tendencies of the sixtys and so we have to react to that. They were concerned that there was an excess of democracy developing. Previously. Passive and obedient parts of the population are sometimes called the special interests who are beginning to organize and try to enter the political arena and they said that imposes too much pressure on the state cant deal with all these pressures so therefore they have to return to a city and become the politicised. And they were particularly concerned with what was happening to young people young people get into free and independent. In the way they put it theres a failure on the part of the schools the universities churches the institutions responsible for the indoctrination of the young there for it is not mine. If you look at their study theres one interest they never mention private business and that makes sense theyre not special interest theyre the National Interest kind of by definition so theyre ok theyre allowed to you know flub is by Campaign Staff the executive make decisions thats fine but its the rest the special interests the general population who have to be subdued. When thats the specter its the kind of ideological level of the backlash but the major backlash which was in peril of this was just redesigning the economy. Since the 1970 is theres been a concerted effort on the part of the masters of mankind the owners of the society to shift the economy in 2 crucial respects one to increase the role of Financial Institutions banks investment firms and so on insurance companies. But a 2007 break before the latest crash they had literally 40 percent of corporate profits. Far beyond anything in the past. Back in the 1950 s. And as for many years before the United States economy was based largely on production. In the United States as the great Manufacturing Center of the world. Financial institutions used to be a relatively small part of the economy and their task was to distribute unused assets like a bank savings to productive activity buying our way to. Money. On the back of the reserve bank. To be high to providing an. Outing money. To the community by making. Money for a manufacturer. Getting high. To unmarked car money on and why people are always needing more and i havent been. Thats a contribution to the economy. Regulatory system was established banks were regulated the commercial investment banks were separated cut back or risk investment practices that could harm private people. There had been remember no financial crashes during the period of regulation by the 1970 s. That changed. The story getting that huge increase in the flows of speculative capital just astronomically increased an enormous changes in the Financial Sector from traditional banks to risky investments. Complex Financial Instruments money manipulations and so on increasingly the business of the country isnt production at least not here. The primary business here is business. You can even see it in the choice of directors so a director of a Major American Corporation back in the fiftys and sixtys was very likely to be an engineer as somebody who graduated from a place like mit maybe Industrial Management more recently the directorship in the top managerial positions or people who came out of Business Schools learned financial trickery of various kinds and so on. By the 1970 s. Say General Electric can make more profit playing games with money than you could buy producing in the United States. You have to remember that General Electric is substantially a Financial Institution today it makes half its profits just by moving money around in a complicated ways and its very unclear that theyre doing anything that sort of value to the economy. So thats one phenomena lets go financial ization of the economy. Going along with that is the oil sure into production. The trade system was reconstructed with a very explicit design of putting working people in competition with one another all over the world. And what its led to is a reduction in the share of income on the part of working people. Its been stickily striking in the United States but happening worldwide it means that an American Workers in competition with super exploited worker in china. Meanwhile highly paid professionals are protected theyre not placed in competition with the rest of the world far from it and of course a capitalist free to move a workers are free to move labor cant move but capital can well again going back to the classics like adam smith as he pointed out free circulation of labor is the foundation of any free trade system but workers are pretty much stuck the wealthy in the privileged are protected so you get obvious consequences and theyre recognized in fact praised. Policy is designed to increase in security. Alan greenspan and when he testified to conquers he explained his success in running the economy as based on what he called greater worker insecurity. A typical restraint. Compensation increases has been evident for a few years but as i outlined in some detail in testimony last month i believe our job insecurity has played the dominant role workers and secured are going to be under control. Theyre not going to ask for say decent wages were a decent working condition or the opportunity to Free Association meaning unionized. Now for the masters of mankind thats fine they may show their profits but for the population its devastating. For these 2 processes financial ization im sure are part of what led to the vicious cycle of concentration of wealth concentration of power. In the troubled 19 seventies a group of killers rampage through parts of Northern Ireland that was coordinated loyalist attacks on the catholic population tens of thousands were forced to flee their homes and what was striking to put these attacks was that the are you see the Police Actually took part in the attacks so instead of preventing it they were active participants in the burning of coal streets in belfast at the time more than a 100 innocent civilians were. As the review can seniors and we found out more i was surprised about the extent and of the currents which the pollution was involved in some of those places they kill as would later be named into the now getting i think it went to the very very top i think it is. The water where all the tastes and you on and give the go ahead. Live. Live live. Live. Live. Live live. Live. Live live. Live live. Live. Live. Live. Oh. Please. Live. So. Clear. And very well welcome to you youre watching us inside. Larger see below do goulard of. Muslims drew more than i was introduced to imprison by the regime love my life. Take a stick grab some Media Attention and its a shooting in a 16 year olds to 16 birthday parties. So i think the police just a lot of pressure chill close the case. For you. Just dont like those. You know so far the stronger than the sure dont want peace be with us thats all of the issues because i was standing right next to. Me for is the sun you got to keep in mind the ones you 1617 years old so. You could lose. Just one to 2 spears a true. Blue food. For more than just. Going to go to know the truth. Understanding of shell is that its a money loser from day one but it doesnt matter in the u. S. Because all the creditors to lend money into the shell industry are constantly being bailed out by the central bank that prints money thats why they do it for the fees its great for the banks but its not an energy play it is not a business its a sinkhole but here as you point out in argentina so they cant just print their way out of a losing situation and the economy is already a bit fragile you dont want to add another loser into the mix like shale drilling voided completely. Join me every thursday on the alex simon short and ill be speaking to get us to the world of politics sports business im show business ill see you then. I. I. I i. Mustnt officials reveal the identity of the gunman who killed 2 and injured 5 in a shooting near the federal Security Service building in central moscow weve spoken to the father of the attack. Lately he became very secretive and also got some kind of strange beast an accent he used to tell me that he liked shooting and even wanting to get the skills right become amongst the old school. For more than 3 years of deadlock a new mystery junctions u. K. Parliament finally backs Prime MinisterBoris Johnsons brags that with. Last minute attempt to disrupt russian gas supplies to europe the u. S. Senate is born a Swiss Company that