down with inequality, not capitalism

a lot of people - intentionally or not - are misreading what occupy wall street protestors are railing against. for the majority of them, for people like myself, it's not about evil corporations that have to be brought down. it's about a more realistic sharing of the profits made by those corporations, a system similar used to that in some other nations, where the head of a company can't make more than a certain percentage of entry level employees. the protests, as i've heard them described, are less about abolishing corporation than making them more humane.

it's interesting that the supreme court ruled that corporations have the legal standing of personhood, when a more inherently bloodless, bottom line over life line entity you're rarely going to find.

my view of mega large financial institutions is forever colored by a comment made by rey cooper at a sultry autumn "snacks by the tracks": after hearing someone mention something her bank had done for free, rey quipped - "banks don't do anything for free." there's always something they're getting out of whatever they do.

and that's not evil - that's business. but when 1% of the population of a country controls most of the wealth, then that is sick.

it's not corporations, per se, that most of the people i've heard gripe are trying to rein in - it's the mega corporations, the "too big to fail" institutions whose executives have grown comfortable living lives beyond consequences.

we've gone from being a nation where everyone was equal under the law to one where if you're high enough, wealthy enough, important enough, you can get away with the most blatant disregard of our laws because pursuing justice comes at too high a price, too much discomfort.

it's the inequality of seeing an entire strata of financial nab bobs who brought down our economy get away with it, scot free.

it's the inequality of seeing leaders lie & do things against our own principles, and get away with it because "the nation needs to move on."

it's the inequality of a mega wealthy businessman extolling occupy wall street protestors to return home leave, get a job, get a life because he doesn't grasp that the protest is over the cold reality that the home is lost, the jobs are overseas, and their lives short-changed by economic policies favoring corporate "persons" rather than actual people.

capitalism has done a lot of good over the years, but robber barons are a perversion of its potential, "opinion-making elites"acting outside the law ~ assured by the powerful that they're entitled to a life without consequences ~ are a travesty of our principles, a government that dances to their tune rather than looking out for the welfare of all its citizens is a mockery.