BFT3K

A few things to think about...

There are over 7 billion people on the planet, and most of them would be happy to work for pennies.

Most corporations that used to be considered "American" are now classified as "multi-nationals".

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Here is one of millions of true stories you can hear all over America. This is a very abbreviated tale, but it is just an example...

A friend of mine used to sell car seats. He is located in the US, his sewers were located in the US, his suppliers were located in the US, etc.

He made some decent money, and rented a space with 8 full-time employees.

Over time, everything became more expensive, and more competitive, so he started buying supplies from overseas to save a buck. Pretty soon, so did his competition.

The profit margins per/seat were squeezed, so he embraced the internet, added e-commerce, downgraded to a smaller space, and reduced his staff to just 2 full-time employees.

Over time, the internet, which was originally his saving grace, turned on him. Within no time, his replacement seats were being sold on eBay, through China, for less than his cost!

At that point he had to let his final 2 employees go, he moved into the basement of his own house, and now he is looking for a job, while in his early 60's.

He is not a lazy "taker" - he is one of millions of "victims" of the new unregulated corporate world.

Some people are smart/lucky enough to weather this storm, and some are not so fortunate.

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Now let's cut to reality....

Almost none of our elected officials give a shit about the people or their country any more. Big money interests have trumped the interests of the people.

There are no more checks and balances for the largest multinationals. They can do whatever the fuck they want now, and no one can stop them.

They piss in your water, pollute your food, kill your unions, eliminate pensions, etc.

Leaders on both sides PRETEND to give a shit, but the writing's on the wall now, and the politicians are grabbing what they can before the ship goes down.

The mainstream media, which is now owned by only 5 or 6 corporations, have done a superb job of hiding the realities of corporate injustices, and redirecting the anger to people-vs-other people, to deflect the guilt.

Rather than come up with real solutions to make the world better, we have people in congress, who want to eliminate the minimum wage completely. In other words, rather than build up the lower and middle classes, they don't even want to bother.

The corporate interests tell them they can hire people for $1 p/hour somewhere else, so if the US wants to compete, our "elected officials" are told they should remove all regulations from American business, and reduce the worker's pay to that of 3rd world countries, so there is an even playing field.

As long as corporations can offshore everything, hire workers from anywhere, never pay the price for pollution, etc., they win, and we all lose. It is a race to the bottom.

This is not necessarily a D vs R issue. Even as we speak, Obama is ramming through a new trade Pacific Trade agreement, that will only exasperate this imbalance.

As an example, Walmart buys tons of shit from China. Small businesses in towns where there are Walmarts can not compete with this behemoth, so they go out of business. Then the people in town have to line up for shit Walmart wages, since there are no other places to work, and the cycle continues.

Shit wages are too low for American made products, so you need to buy from shit stores like Walmart, so Walmart says, "look, we only sell crap from China because our customers need low priced items" and around and around we go.

The big money sees what's going down, so they invest in corporate-run prison systems, as they know that's where a good number of people will wind up.

They've also polluted the military with private contractors, so now war and weapons are just another cash cow.

Things can be fixed, but only if the slave people rise up against their captors.