You've got time on your hands, fire this up. Log in to Netflix and then click on "Dirty Money" and then click on "Slumdog Millionaire." Watch and you'll think the system is rigged against you.
And it is.
The mistake Jared Kushner made was to marry into a famous family and then become part of Trump's inner circle. The truly rich know it's best to keep your name out of the news, publicity delivers trouble. But new money wants acceptance. Or at least new players with old money want acceptance, so they buy and bully their way into the inner sanctum of society and no one busts them, because the story sells advertising for media and those at the tippity-top don't throw shade at each other, it's an unwritten rule of the club, violate it and you're out forever.
So, Jared Kushner runs his father's real estate company. The only thing is it's based on fraud and milking the tenants. Do I think the Kushners are the only real estate barons who do this? OF COURSE NOT! But like I said above, Kushner stepped into the spotlight and this is the result, bad publicity and a hit to the bottom line.
Well, he's leveraging his White House connections to get government loans and...
We can argue about the behavior of this President and his entourage but it doesn't matter, because whatever is said the water is muddied by his acolytes, today there are so many outlets with so many opinions, you yourself can even become a broadcaster, that truth is an elusive concept. Sure, Trump capitalized on it, but think of all the falsehoods people spew all day long from information, oftentimes discredited, they garner online. Like vaccines cause autism. There's absolutely no evidence this is true, the research of the doctor who came out with the initial report has been discredited. But if you send someone to Snopes, they say that site can't be trusted, so here we are...to the point that even his lack of foresight with the coronavirus might not hurt Trump, I think it will, but maybe not.
Because of the elites.
The left wing, the Democrats, have forsaken their core constituency, working men and women. All you've got is highly educated weasels dividing up the pie themselves, who might pay lip service to those below them, but really have contempt for them.
There's this guy in Kushner's apartment complex in Baltimore... He's struggling, being hit with late fees on his rent, but he voted for Trump. He says it's because Trump's a businessman, but...
One do-gooder does a better job of holding Kushner and other real estate barons to account than the entire New York City government, with tons of people in the building department. So, when Republicans say the government is ineffective, here's your evidence. And why should you pay taxes for such an inefficient enterprise? Better to keep that money for yourself, after all, unlike the elites, you need it, it's the difference between having a roof over your head or not.
Of course this guy is voting against his interests, but when you see him attempt to read you remember him from school, assuming you even went to a public school, before all the elites sent their kids to private schools or established charters that left the dumb and bedraggled out.
So if you went to public school, you remember elementary, wherein all the students hung together, wherein you knew everybody, wherein everybody was kind of equal. But, you knew certain people were smarter than others.
And then you get to junior high, now called "middle school," and then high school and they bring in more students and they separate the classes based on intelligence and it's obvious who the losers are. And they're not happy about it. The smart kids run everything, and insult the dumb all the while. These elites are the exact people running the Democratic Party, do you know what these laborers in underpaid jobs say? SCREW YOU!
But it gets even worse. The Republicans have gutted the IRS so even the rich aren't held accountable. The Kushners don't even have certificates of occupancy for their buildings, they break the fire code, but the government never cracks down on them, why fund the government at all? And when the Kushners are finally fined, it's chump change.
The rich Republicans hide. Like Robert Mercer, one of the biggest Republican donors. He was outed for supporting Trump (and spending so much money), and there's now been press about his riches and donations, but the only press we really get about funders is George Soros is the devil. That's right, the Democrats play defense as the Republicans go unscathed. Hand it to the Republicans, they're organized. Forget the Supreme Court, Trump has remade the entire federal court system, populating it with right wing judges, frequently very young, sometimes with no experience.
But this is the weeds when you're working for a living, have mouths to feed, if you've got any free time at all you just want to fire up the flat screen and be entertained, you don't want to delve into the doings of the rich people who control the government.
The truth is almost all of the great fortunes were not made completely legally. Corners were cut, and what's even worse, relationships with the government or lack of government oversight usually let these builders get away with it.
The elite have gotten their way, they've nominated Joe Biden. Joe ain't gonna make them suffer, it'll be business as usual, and Joe can express compassion for the underclass, but will he do anything for them? OF COURSE NOT! The poor will get some token relief and the rich will just keep on raping and pillaging.
Now if this were the sixties and there were only three networks this documentary would have huge consequences. But today, with four networks, a bunch of cable outlets and numerous streaming services nothing gets to the top of everybody's mind...NOTHING! This is how the music industry thinks so small. The Spotify Top 50? The hit parade has less penetration than ever before, as for the other genres people are interested in...it's too much effort to make that money so the major labels abstain, and since there are so many marketing messages newbies can't get their message heard anyway.
But now we're all at home. And the funny thing is we're so weirded-out by the isolation that we're connecting with everybody we know, whether it be by text, e-mail or phone. And we've got free time, which we never had before, too much free time. So, things can get traction that never would before.
Everybody has access to a Netflix account. Take an hour of time and watch this documentary. I don't care if you're Republican or Democrat, this is how the world works, and the more people talk about it the more possibility there is of change.
Which brings me back to Bernie Sanders. The elites decimated him. Sure, the young didn't come out to vote, but why should they when the game is rigged, when the elites gang up to preserve their way of life. And let's not debate Sanders, just the things he stands for. Should everybody have medical insurance? OF COURSE! Do the corporations abuse their power? OF COURSE! Should there be no billionaires? OF COURSE!
But the rich have all the power and they're not letting the poor in on the action. But if we all watch this show and talk about it...
That's another reason why the poor vote for the right. Without hope you cannot sustain, you cannot go on living. So, if you can dream of becoming a billionaire, that resonates, at least there's a target, others make it, why can't you?
You can't. It's like playing the lottery, almost no one wins.
And as all sophisticates know, the lottery is just a tax on the poor. Those who have money don't play it because the odds are too low. But if you've got nothing, playing feeds your hope.
And then the money is supposed to help schools but they siphon funds from the school budget and the end result remains the same.
Sure, we've got to get rid of the Orange Menace.
But we need change.
I'm telling you, I'm losing hope.
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