Michael Moore: "America Is NOT Broke" 

TRUTHOUT

Published on Truthout (http://www.truth-out.org)

Saturday 05 March 2011

http://www.truth-out.org/michael-moore-america-is-not-broke68265

America is not broke.

Contrary to what those in power would like you to
believe so that you'll give up your pension, cut your
wages, and settle for the life your great-grandparents
had, America is not broke. Not by a long shot. The
country is awash in wealth and cash. It's just that
it's not in your hands. It has been transferred, in the
greatest heist in history, from the workers and
consumers to the banks and the portfolios of the
uber-rich.

Today just 400 Americans have the same wealth as half
of all Americans combined.

Let me say that again. 400 obscenely rich people, most
of whom benefited in some way from the multi-trillion
dollar taxpayer "bailout" of 2008, now have as much
loot, stock and property as the assets of 155 million
Americans combined. If you can't bring yourself to call
that a financial coup d'etat, then you are simply not
being honest about what you know in your heart to be
true.

Watch Video: Michael Moore Speaks in Wisconsin

And I can see why. For us to admit that we have let a
small group of men abscond with and hoard the bulk of
the wealth that runs our economy, would mean that we'd
have to accept the humiliating acknowledgment that we
have indeed surrendered our precious Democracy to the
moneyed elite. Wall Street, the banks and the Fortune
500 now run this Republic -- and, until this past
month, the rest of us have felt completely helpless,
unable to find a way to do anything about it.

I have nothing more than a high school degree. But back
when I was in school, every student had to take one
semester of economics in order to graduate. And here's
what I learned: Money doesn't grow on trees. It grows
when we make things. It grows when we have good jobs
with good wages that we use to buy the things we need
and thus create more jobs. It grows when we provide an
outstanding educational system that then grows a new
generation of inventers, entrepreneurs, artists,
scientists and thinkers who come up with the next great
idea for the planet. And that new idea creates new jobs
and that creates revenue for the state. But if those
who have the most money don't pay their fair share of
taxes, the state can't function. The schools can't
produce the best and the brightest who will go on to
create those jobs. If the wealthy get to keep most of
their money, we have seen what they will do with it:
recklessly gamble it on crazy Wall Street schemes and
crash our economy. The crash they created cost us
millions of jobs. That too caused a reduction in
revenue. And the population ended up suffering because
they reduced their taxes, reduced our jobs and took
wealth out of the system, removing it from circulation.

The nation is not broke, my friends. Wisconsin is not
broke. It's part of the Big Lie. It's one of the three
biggest lies of the decade: America/Wisconsin is broke,
Iraq has WMD, the Packers can't win the Super Bowl
without Brett Favre.

The truth is, there's lots of money to go around. LOTS.
It's just that those in charge have diverted that
wealth into a deep well that sits on their well-guarded
estates. They know they have committed crimes to make
this happen and they know that someday you may want to
see some of that money that used to be yours. So they
have bought and paid for hundreds of politicians across
the country to do their bidding for them. But just in
case that doesn't work, they've got their gated
communities, and the luxury jet is always fully fueled,
the engines running, waiting for that day they hope
never comes. To help prevent that day when the people
demand their country back, the wealthy have done two
very smart things:

1. They control the message. By owning most of the
media they have expertly convinced many Americans of
few means to buy their version of the American Dream
and to vote for their politicians. Their version of the
Dream says that you, too, might be rich some day - this
is America, where anything can happen if you just apply
yourself! They have conveniently provided you with
believable examples to show you how a poor boy can
become a rich man, how the child of a single mother in
Hawaii can become president, how a guy with a high
school education can become a successful filmmaker.
They will play these stories for you over and over
again all day long so that the last thing you will want
to do is upset the apple cart -- because you -- yes,
you, too! -- might be rich/president/an Oscar-winner
some day! The message is clear: keep you head down,
your nose to the grindstone, don't rock the boat and be
sure to vote for the party that protects the rich man
that you might be some day.

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2. They have created a poison pill that they know you
will never want to take. It is their version of
mutually assured destruction. And when they threatened
to release this weapon of mass economic annihilation in
September of 2008, we blinked. As the economy and the
stock market went into a tailspin, and the banks were
caught conducting a worldwide Ponzi scheme, Wall Street
issued this threat: Either hand over trillions of
dollars from the American taxpayers or we will crash
this economy straight into the ground. Fork it over or
it's Goodbye savings accounts. Goodbye pensions.
Goodbye United States Treasury. Goodbye jobs and homes
and future. It was friggin' awesome and it scared the
shit out of everyone. "Here! Take our money! We don't
care. We'll even print more for you! Just take it! But,
please, leave our lives alone, PLEASE!"

The executives in the board rooms and hedge funds could
not contain their laughter, their glee, and within
three months they were writing each other huge bonus
checks and marveling at how perfectly they had played a
nation full of suckers. Millions lost their jobs
anyway, and millions lost their homes. But there was no
revolt (see #1).

Until now. On Wisconsin! Never has a Michigander been
more happy to share a big, great lake with you! You
have aroused the sleeping giant know as the working
people of the United States of America. Right now the
earth is shaking and the ground is shifting under the
feet of those who are in charge. Your message has
inspired people in all 50 states and that message is:
WE HAVE HAD IT! We reject anyone tells us America is
broke and broken. It's just the opposite! We are rich
with talent and ideas and hard work and, yes, love.
Love and compassion toward those who have, through no
fault of their own, ended up as the least among us. But
they still crave what we all crave: Our country back!
Our democracy back! Our good name back! The United
States of America. NOT the Corporate States of America.
The United States of America!

So how do we get this? Well, we do it with a little bit
of Egypt here, a little bit of Madison there. And let
us pause for a moment and remember that it was a poor
man with a fruit stand in Tunisia who gave his life so
that the world might focus its attention on how a
government run by billionaires for billionaires is an
affront to freedom and morality and humanity.

Thank you, Wisconsin. You have made people realize this
was our last best chance to grab the final thread of
what was left of who we are as Americans. For three
weeks you have stood in the cold, slept on the floor,
skipped out of town to Illinois -- whatever it took,
you have done it, and one thing is for certain: Madison
is only the beginning. The smug rich have overplayed
their hand. They couldn't have just been content with
the money they raided from the treasury. They couldn't
be satiated by simply removing millions of jobs and
shipping them overseas to exploit the poor elsewhere.
No, they had to have more - something more than all the
riches in the world. They had to have our soul. They
had to strip us of our dignity. They had to shut us up
and shut us down so that we could not even sit at a
table with them and bargain about simple things like
classroom size or bulletproof vests for everyone on the
police force or letting a pilot just get a few extra
hours sleep so he or she can do their job -- their
$19,000 a year job. That's how much some rookie pilots
on commuter airlines make, maybe even the rookie pilots
flying people here to Madison. But he's stopped trying
to get better pay. All he asks is that he doesn't have
to sleep in his car between shifts at O'Hare airport.
That's how despicably low we have sunk. The wealthy
couldn't be content with just paying this man $19,000 a
year. They wanted to take away his sleep. They wanted
to demean and dehumanize him. After all, he's just
another slob.

And that, my friends, is Corporate America's fatal
mistake. But trying to destroy us they have given birth
to a movement -- a movement that is becoming a massive,
nonviolent revolt across the country. We all knew there
had to be a breaking point some day, and that point is
upon us. Many people in the media don't understand
this. They say they were caught off guard about Egypt,
never saw it coming. Now they act surprised and
flummoxed about why so many hundreds of thousands have
come to Madison over the last three weeks during brutal
winter weather. "Why are they all standing out there in
the cold? I mean there was that election in November
and that was supposed to be that!

"There's something happening here, and you don't know
what it is, do you ...?"

America ain't broke! The only thing that's broke is the
moral compass of the rulers. And we aim to fix that
compass and steer the ship ourselves from now on. Never
forget, as long as that Constitution of ours still
stands, it's one person, one vote, and it's the thing
the rich hate most about America -- because even though
they seem to hold all the money and all the cards, they
begrudgingly know this one unshakeable basic fact:
There are more of us than there are of them!

Madison, do not retreat. We are with you. We will win
together. 

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