From the Wall Street bailouts to the recent suggestions from the Republicans that taxpayers pay for the BP oil spill cleanup, it’s pretty clear that the tiny group of privileged ultra-rich people at the top and the politicians they own (which is about 99.9% of all politicians; there may be some county-level bureaucrat they haven’t got to yet) have nothing but contempt for the rest of us. Despite what some right-wing “leaders” and their deluded, unthinking, brainwashed followers might have you believe, there is a class war in this country, but they’ve twisted it backwards: the poor aren’t picking on the rich: the rich are attacking the poor, and they’re winning.

If you had any doubt about this, wonder no more. This week, Congress has again delayed or blocked action on unemployment insurance, COBRA benefits, and have shown no interest in actually trying to come up with solutions to create jobs, or to take steps to stop the continued loss of jobs.

The current “concern” is the deficit. Sure, we have a huge deficit, but while we somehow can’t find money to work on solving our problems at home, we sure seem to have plenty of money for foreign aid (Egypt and Israel are among the largest recipients), plenty of money to fight two wars we’re sure as hell not winning, and plenty of flexibility to provide generous tax breaks to multinational corporations like BP, Goldman Sachs, and Halliburton, and tens of dozens of corporations that shipped our jobs overseas for good.

Unlike previous periods of unemployment, this time many jobs have vanished for good. This is the one time where continued assistance for the unemployed is really needed, and Congress has pulled the rug. People aren’t being “lazy” or unmotivated in taking unemployment, or wanting to continue benefits; for many, these benefits are often the only thing keeping them from being homeless, from suffering malnutrition, from vanishing between the cracks.

To make it even more difficult, now some companies are refusing to even interview unemployed people; instead, they’re only talking to people that are currently employed, or have been out of work for a few months at most. This is appalling, and if this is continued, will devastate our economy even more. These are often the same companies that offer the lowest salaries possible, that supported shipping our jobs overseas, that benefit from generous tax breaks (which they’re NOT using to “create jobs”; they’re using them to pay themselves even more outrageous salaries and perks).

Congress isn’t saying anything about this though, because they don’t really care. Instead, they’re overly concerned with deficits (deficits that were caused in part by two wars, foreign aid to countries that we get nothing beneficial in return from, and tax breaks for the rich and corporations —the exact group of people who don’t really need tax breaks), so instead of trying to use our taxpayer money to invest in America and its people, they’re going to hand out tax breaks instead. It’s not considered “spending”, even though the result is the same, since that ends up being lost revenue. Our government’s priority, from the President on down, is to spend money on bombing and killing other people, on supporting other countries, but nothing for the people they supposedly serve.

When big companies pay nothing in taxes, hide their money overseas without punishment, and hedge fund managers pay slightly more in taxes than the average person, something’s wrong.

Both parties, Democrat and Republican don’t care about us. Big business of all kinds don’t care about us. Rich people manipulating the stock market don’t care about us. They’re shafting us, and they’re winning. If you care at all about yourself, your neighbors, your community, and especially your country, NOW is the time to speak up. Now is the time to contact those sorry excuses for leaders, and tell them we’re fed up. We want our government to invest in all of America, not just the 1% at the top, not just the corporations that own them, not just the foreign countries whose asses we kiss.

If you don’t speak up, you don’t protest, you don’t make some noise, then accept the fact that you’re screwed. Because there is a class war, and the elite, ultra-rich have just about won.

Well, Day 57 and counting: Obama hath spoken. Our Corporatist-in-Chief has once again underperformed. I originally bristled at the comparison to Carter, since I thought Carter was a half-way decent president (If we’d paid attention to half of what Carter was trying to tell us back in the 1970’s, we might not be where we are now), despite a number of flaws. But I think Obama is well on his way to joining Carter in the one-term bracket.

My main beef with Obama centers around civil liberties (surprised?) and his continuing validation of Smirk’s policies (again, primarily the destruction and erosion of the Bill of Rights), but most, if not all, Americans care about our nation’s geographical health, whether they like to admit or not (especially if it’s in THEIR backyard!), and everyone is naturally biased about the nation’s economic health, and Obama is doing squat about both. Tonight Obama did what he’s becoming famous for: Yelling a lot, posturing, then doing absolutely nothing, because like 99% of the politicians in D.C.,  he’s bought and paid for. If you’re looking to “kick ass,” President Corporatist, start with your own, okay? Pretty speeches mean nothing anymore.

There’s enough blame to go around. Shall we?

Louisiana politicians have always been famously corrupt, but they used to be pretty smart too (see: Huey Long). Now they’re just corrupt AND plain dumb. Example #1: Bobby Jindal. Jindal, in 2006, sponsored/supported the Deep Ocean Energy Resources Act, in an attempt to lift the moratorium on offshore drilling (this is a condensed and abbreviated explanation, I know). In the immediate aftermath, Bobby Jindal righteously protested the oil spill we have now, then wanted to build a barrier wall  (which won’t work, and is a waste of time and resources). Crowd-pleasing, perhaps, but not a well-thought out strategy. NOW Jindal’s pleading for off-shore oil drilling to begin again!

“Diaper Dave” Vitter (funny how righteously everyone condemns John Ensign for adultery and encourages him to resign, but the then (and still)-married Vitter gets a pass for frequenting prostitutes and indulging in his diaper fetish) is also continuing to support off-shore drilling. He may be pleasing some of Louisiana, but I’m not sure everyone may continue to agree with him once this all unfolds. Mary Landrieu doesn’t get off here either, since she also supports continued off-shore drilling. Oh, I know—many people in Louisiana support drilling, because it’s their livelihood and all they’ve ever known. I understand that—a great-uncle worked in the oil industry for years (including Zapata Oil- my distant connection to Smirk and his clan), so I know what it means to the employees. But if they took a long, hard look at Alaska post-Valdez, they might just realize they’re getting screwed from all ends. When that happens, I wouldn’t want to be a politician in Louisiana, Democrat or Republican.

BP… where do I start with B[latant] P[ollution]? Blatant Pollution is the most irresponsible corporation I’ve seen in a while—they might have had a relatively good reputation pre-spill, but they obviously flunked Business Ethics and didn’t pay attention in Public Relations class. It was pretty obvious before, but now they’ve apparently hired Blackwater and Goldman Sachs. Gee, great strategy: If you’re a hated company, hire companies more reviled than yours.

They also didn’t responsibly drill oil before this catastrophe, and now: They’re hiding the truth about how much oil is being spilled, they’re allowing hundreds (at minimum, there’ll be more) of animals to die, they’re ignoring health concerns in Louisiana residents and spill clean-up workers, and most of all (what they’re REALLY pissing me off with, other than ruining some of the most beautiful coastline I’ve ever seen), they’re bringing in private guards and manipulating the Coast Guard to control access to the beaches.

The Corporate Media may do a half-assed job much of the time, but we Americans deserve to know what’s happening to our country, to our shorelines, to the animals that are in our waters, bays, and bayous, and most of all, to the people who’s lives are being destroyed. America theoretically belongs to the people, but right now it is effectively owned by a corporate entity. Some information is dribbling out, sure, including pictures, but this gangsterism on the part of corporations has to stop.

There’s more I could say about BP, the government (especially Minerals Management Service), and our ineffective president (oh, wait… on him, I probably will say more later), but others (mostly online bloggers and news outlets) have done a good job. Just do a search, spend a few hours, and you’ll be as appalled and angry as I am.

I’m not sure what will happen; so far BP is trying to fix the problem (or so they claim), but no one’s really doing anything, and in the meantime, BP is (so far!) going scot-free, because they OWN our Congress, they OWN our President. If you like what’s happening, keep supporting the status quo, because right now, multinational corporations own our asses, and as long as their ass is covered by our cowardly politicians, America doesn’t belong to Americans, and  justice will never be served.