The Myth of the American Dream
Where's the outrage?

By Alex Walker, BuzzFlash Contributor

JOHN STEINBECK, author of "The Grapes of Wrath," would have loved the current mess in his beloved Northern California.

April 4th -- The New York Times tells the world volunteers must raise $500,000 or all libraries in Steinbeck's home town, Salinas, California, will close.

April 5th - The next day -- The San Jose Mercury News reports that right up the road from Salinas, Yahoo CEO, Terry Semel, cashed out $231 million in stock options.

Nobody was outraged. There was not so much as a single indignant letter-to-editor.

Then, by golly, it happened again.

April 11th -- Mercury News reports "record profits" for Silicon Valley Companies, including 10 companies hoarding $73 billion in cash.

April 12th - The next day -- Mercury News reports the tech sector laid off another 59,537 workers in the first quarter of 2005. John Chambers, Cisco Systems CEO, has "vowed not to hire until revenue per employee reached $700,000 again." We learned on March 14th that this John "tough guy" Chambers cashed out stock options worth $14.9 million. [snip]

I am a progressive working man. I also happen to be an African-American who strongly believes in labor rights, civil rights and women's rights. My political frustration is almost more than I can bear. Many people reading this will probably think I'm lying or at least exaggerating.

If I were not living here I probably wouldn't believe it.

200,000 lost jobs?
$2 trillion in lost wealth?
Short pay?
Unsafe working conditions?
Schools and libraries closing?
Record profits + more layoffs?
People who do have jobs putting in 100 hours a week?

One doofus corporate bureaucrat pockets a quarter billion bucks in one year?

Where's the outrage? Buried underneath people's rampant materialism and selfish desire to have the "American Dream"--what the Cisco and Yahoo CEOs have. As Nestor says, America's Most Dangerous Founding Fable "was designed to eradicate any semblent of solidarity from those stupid enough to buy it. The dream is to be rich – the more the better – and in pursuit of that dream living in a society free of affordable health care, decent education, etc. . . . somehow seems a small price to pay to almost all Americans."

There is no outrage--on either the domestic issues discussed by Alex Walker or global issues like the Iraq war--because the American people are uneducated, willfully ignorant and held hostage by a corporate-owned government and hypocritical, reactionary religious leaders who exploit their ignorance. There is no outrage because Americans, despite all evidence to the contrary, believe in their own international superiority. There is no outrage because the corporate owned media perpetuates this ignorance with outright lies, unimportant news-lite that distracts from real issues, mind-numbing entertainment and advertisements that encourage Americans' addiction to consumption. (While the Internet has provided people like myself with a diverse, easily accessible outlet for political frustration, it remains to be seen whether the efforts of bloggers can effectively counteract the corporate media--not to mention the corporate voting machines--and let us not forget that the Bush administration is cautiously trying to suppress dissent on the 'Net.)

As long as people continue to believe in the Myth of the American Dream and seek to attain its false promise, there will be no outrage in America.
- posted by TJ @ 11:43 AM