Prince George and the Return of the Sheriff of Nottingham

[WorseBeforeBetter]

Started reading this Hal Crowther piece at lunch, thought I'd share.

http://www.indyweek.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A38235

"People are working harder, earning less, and the rich are raking it in. Where's Robin Hood when we need him?"

"...current reports from the Census Bureau and the Labor Department show that median real wages have fallen behind inflation and the highest 1 percent of salaries account for 11 percent of all wages, nearly twice their share 30 years ago. The buying power of the minimum wage is at its lowest point in 50 years; the average CEO salary, 24 times the average worker's compensation in 1965, is now 262 times greater (511 in the obscenely flush oil industry)--an abhorrent trend that began in the 1990s and continues to accelerate."

"America's economic food chain in 2006 bears a close resemblance to the 1906 model, with outrageous new wealth at the top and overworked, underpaid helots at the bottom. A major difference is the health of the middle class, still vast and vigorous in Teddy Roosevelt's day, depleted and endangered in our own."

"The same day Senate Democrats derailed Frist's tax scheme, a Senate subcommittee reported that wealthy Americans hide at least a trillion dollars in offshore tax havens, mainly in the Caribbean, depriving the IRS of at least $40 billion a year."

"The current immigration controversy, another battle in the war on the poor, is primarily about keeping hungry Mexicans out of the United States. It seems to me that what we need is more Mexicans--we need millions more, if these Mexicans are people with the backbone to stand up for their rights and protest the rule of the rich. In return, maybe we could send Mexico a few million clueless, spineless "values" voters, the ones who always re-elect the same nasty jackals who rob them blind."