The Chris Moeller Archives

The times that try rich men's souls

This is not an easy time in history to be rich. Sure corporate profits are at an all-time high. The tax rates are regressive and at generational lows for the top brackets, with the corporate tax nearly non-existent. Oversight of Wall Street operations is a dusty museum piece, and taxpayers subsidize all of their investment risk. They own our government lock, stock, and barrel, and hold majority stakes in several other governments as well... But they feel unloved.

As Glenn Greenwald tells us, the rich are tired of being blamed for running our economy cold into the ground. They spy socialists under every cushion. A president that gives them every piece of legislation they lobby for wrapped in ribbon and bows has, according to billionaire Charles Koch, "done more damage to the free enterprise system and long-term prosperity than any president we've ever had."

But Maine governor Paul LePage is striking back on behalf of the wealthy and powerful. He's delivering a blow for equal respect for the rich. At his state's office building for the Department of Labor, he has seen to it that a public mural that honors working people in the Pine Tree State be taken down. He saw the mural for what it was-- "one-sided." "Were the bosses in the mural?" he wants to know. LePage is also ordering that the building's rooms be renamed. The rooms are named for Cesar Chavez and other historic labor figures from Maine or otherwise. Where are the names of the bosses and the employers? Just widen your peripheral a little there, governor. I bet you'll find them engraved on monuments nearby, on the street signs, the bridges, and all the buildings.

posted by CM @ 8:24 PM