The American oligarchs see the rest of America, you and me, as superfluous! Superfluous in this instance means unnecessary or needless. Honorable and dignified work that is essential to America’s survival is undervalued by the upper classes who see those who perform essential work as undeserving of a comfortable life. They seem to believe that essential workers are not worth $15/an hour. They seem to despise civil servants as they are seen as failures who couldn’t make it in business. The attitudes of the rich towards hard working Americans is despicable. They see themselves as all deserving and the rest of us as leeches when we, in fact, are the backbone of America. America can’t survive without us!
The enemy of America and democracy is not minorities, the poor or immigrants, it is the greedy, unregulated, law-skirting wealthy class. Some ignore and even reject decency and compassion, and internalize a willingness to engage in legally and ethically questionable actions in order to grab more money. They have used their wealth and power to change government policies and legislation to favor themselves with lower taxes, deregulation, reduced workers’ rights and reduced social services like healthcare and education. The result of all this is immense income inequality that has half of America struggling to earn a decent living that, in turn, is causing great discontent which is leading some or even many to extremism!
Four decades of government policies and legislation favoring corporations and the wealthy at the expense of working Americans fueled the anger that led to the January 6, 2021 insurrection. Sadly, the anger is misplaced and the insurrectionists blame minorities and immigrants rather than the rich and powerful and keep voting for the status quo that keeps them down. You are not superfluous and stop voting for those who see you as superfluous!
The current right/left division in America is heartbreaking. This sense of brokenness hit me really hard while I was watching the opening ceremonies of the Tokyo Olympics. The Olympics represent peace, harmony and goodwill in the world, a feeling I’m not getting from the U.S. right now. When I saw the U.S. Olympic team enter waving their American flags, I cried as flashbacks from January 6th entered my mind. The anger displayed, and the disrespect and violence directed toward our sacred seat of democracy and the police officers charged with protecting it pushed aside all feelings of American pride that I would usually feel during the opening ceremonies when I would see our team enter! We must heal our brokenness and stop the real source of our division, those who see us as superfluous!
reilly m gray 