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Joe Bageant is the author of a forthcoming book from Random House Crown about working class America, scheduled for Spring 2007 release. A complete archive of his online work, along with the thoughts of many working Americans on the subject of class may be found at www.joebageant.com. Feel free to contact him at: joebageant@joebageant.com.
(3 comments) SHARE Wednesday, August 18, 2010 Understanding America's Class System
You never hear them say it, but neo-conservatives understand that they have a mean streak down inside. They also know if they want to share in the national plunder, they must win hearts and minds. They must look pious and sound right while lying through their teeth and picking our pockets.
(5 comments) SHARE Tuesday, July 6, 2010 Waltzing at the Doomsday Ball: Capitalism is dead, but we still dance with the corpse
As an Anglo European white guy from a very long line of white guys, I want to thank all the brown, black, yellow and red people for a marvelous three-century joy ride. During the past 300 years of the industrial age, as Europeans, and later as Americans, we have managed to consume infinitely more than we ever produced, thanks to colonialism, crooked deals with despotic potentates and good old gunboats and grapeshot.
(1 comments) SHARE Wednesday, February 24, 2010 Round Midnight -- tortillas and the corporate state
Generation after generation of this ascent was bound to lead to what we see now. The ultimate triumph of property and money. A Supreme Court that, without the slightest hesitation, declares that money is speech and, as such, will do most of the talking from here on out.
(2 comments) SHARE Tuesday, January 12, 2010 Taking Tea with the Lizards
The Republican Party will beat the living piss out of anybody for a buck. The Democrats will fly the flag of FDR, even as they pirate the public coffers on behalf of Wall Street. Don't think the American people have not noticed these things. After thirty years of pistol whipping and emptying of their wallets, they've started to figure out there just may be a public robbery underway, with both parties as accomplices.
(7 comments) SHARE Tuesday, August 25, 2009 Don't Need No Trojan Horse -- when Troy is your Home
Almost a year after the Great Giddy Swarming of the Obamians last November, some of the revelers are waking up with one booger of a hangover. And they are asking themselves, “What were we thinking when we had that 10th drink of Democratic Party Kool-Aid?†It was a clear cut case of seduction and date rape. The spike in the drink was of course, hope. Poor pathetic American liberals.
(3 comments) SHARE Monday, August 3, 2009 A Yard Sale in Chernobyl
It's only a system," she said, as we floated through the sprawling supermarket's gleaming commodity lined indoor streets.
"THE HELL IT IS! It's a goddamned air conditioned zombie hell of waste and gluttony," I thought to myself, before the usual vertigo completely enveloped me. Series: Politics (2 Articles, 2866 views)
(1 comments) SHARE Saturday, July 18, 2009 America's White Underclass-- When seeing ain't believing, somebody's blind
"White underclass" is a term I've used often in my writing, and most American readers seem to know what I mean. They've got eyes and live in the same nation I do. But in a sudden burst of journalistic responsibility, I decided that if I am going to throw around the word underclass, then I should offer some clearer, perhaps more scientific definition.
(3 comments) SHARE Wednesday, May 27, 2009 A redneck view of the Obamarama
Obama is humping the pump in an effort to re-inflate an economy that looks more every day like a balloon with a 55 caliber bullet hole in it. He's even tried to get some of the escaped air back by making corporations return a few billion of the trillions in bailout money that disappeared the minute it crossed their paws. "Seems to me," says Fat Larry, "he should'a give the money back to me. It was mine to start with."
(13 comments) SHARE Wednesday, November 19, 2008 The Sucker Bait Called Hope --Making the best of a slow apocalypse
We just concluded an election in which both parties talked about hope, one more so than the other. There is quite a difference between hope and understanding the facts, then holding justified optimism. Hope is magical thinking, a sucker's game. Politicians the world round fully understand this.