Democracy vs. Dollarocracy

Can the United States rightly call itself a democracy? As long as Paul Ryan and "Fix the Debt" types are able to push extreme austerity measures, Nation writer John Nichols says, we're looking more like a "dollarocracy," where "the ideas that rise to the top are those that are best-financed." In a democracy, Nichols explains, people have a right to say "No" to bad ideas—but in a dollaracracy, all they get is bad ideas.



IMO, dollarocracy is just another term for corporatocracy. While I agree with most of what Mr. Nichols is saying, I hope the American people see beyond what he says in this video. Of course, he's right that the focus of any debt-relief should be on corporate crime and corporate welfare reform.

But social welfare (Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid) reform should never have been considered as part of the debt problem. Our national debt is a problem derived from corporate bailouts, corporate welfare, corporate crime, and spending on the military-industrial complex.

That's where all of any cuts should be directed to reduce the debt. Can't you see it?

Social welfare cuts are just a scheme introduced by the criminals who call themselves Republicans on behalf of the 1%, in a sinister plan to convince gullible American citizens to pay for their crimes. They shouldn't even be part of the conversation about balancing the budget, let alone a bargaining chip for compromise by the Democrats.

Don't be foolish enough to buy into the GOP bullshit and become one of their enablers.

Uprising | A Documentary

Produced by an Academy Award-winning team including the Executive Producer of Taxi to the Dark Side and the Editor of Inside Job, Uprising tells the inside story of the Egyptian revolution from the perspective of its principal leaders and organizers, including four Nobel Peace Prize nominees.

Their success in forcing the downfall of a brutal dictatorship has changed the face of the Middle East and provided hope for millions of oppressed people across the world. Above all, it is a story of profound hope, of courage rewarded, of a people who beat back a police state and threw off the shackles of decades of degradation and oppression.

According to Daniel Gold of the N.Y. Times - Uprising is a concise commemoration of a new society’s birth pains. Playing at the Phoenix Film Festival in early April, here's the trailer -


Source: Uprising Film

The Lottery Of Birth | A Documentary

So, you think you're free. And your values, beliefs and choice of film are all down to you, right? You might even go so far as to assert that you are your own person.

The Lottery of Birth is a documentary that's going to make you think about those freedoms again. Drawing on the best minds in philosophy, history, physics and economics, it employs decades of evidence to deftly interrogate who we are.


Soon after we're born, we discover the virtue of doing what we're told - it's the only way to get along in society. But this film brings into devastating clarity what happens when we switch off and obey: the defense of 'just following orders' sounds as hollow now in the mouths of bankers and tabloid journalists as it has at any other point in history.

In a world rocked by scandals across our banks, media and government, what we really need is a hero or two - and this documentary delivers heroes in spades. Physicist Vandana Shiva, journalist George Monbiot and the late, great historian Howard Zinn all dazzle with their ability to see things differently and their invectives against apathy.

Whether you're into ethics, economics or simply being a better person than you were born to be, you can't afford to miss this film. Now playing at the Sun Valley Film Festival, here's the trailer -


Source: Creating Freedom

The Trickle-Up Process

I think we all know by now that the economic theory known as the "Trickle-Down Effect" is complete and utter bullshit, causes economic inequality, and could also be described as "corporate welfare".

So, wouldn't it benefit our society as a whole to take away that taxpayer-funded corporate welfare from the criminals and put it to good use towards testing the value of the "Trickle-Up Effect"?

Wealth Inequality in America

Infographics on the distribution of wealth in America, highlighting both the inequality and the difference between our perception of inequality and the actual numbers. The reality is not what we think it is.