Billionaires recently gave us confirmation of much over the last several years. They have little interest in democracy or economic justice. And the one thing they all have in common is that they will do what is necessary to maintain their wealth and power.
It was clear to many that Donald Trump wanted to be president to enrich himself further and may use the presidency to turn his semblance of being a billionaire into being one. But many expected this out of Trump. It has always been clear that he was a selfish, self-centered amoral person among his many other “virtues.”
Starbucks’ former CEO Howard Schultz, however, turned out to be a disappointment. I held this man in very high regards for a very long time. Why? Because he took very good care of his employees. I held him up as the soul of one of the few moral corporations, the epitome of what could be even in an economic model that lends itself to unfettered worth and wealth sucking extraction from the masses.
With his potential run for the presidency of the United States, he has lost all of that goodwill. Many may believe that it is because he is running as an Independent. It is not. It is solely about the policy values he is running on now.
The reality is that, to many, both the Democratic and Republican Party have failed. An Independent Billionaire running on poor and middle-class centric policies beholding to no one could win in these times. One could self-fund beholding to no one.
But that is not how Howard Schultz wants to run. He not only attacked a Democratic Party that is starting to rediscover its values with the likes of Elizabeth Warren, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and other unabashedly Progressive lawmakers in the FDR mold, he attacked the values and policies Americans say they want. He either wants to win or protect his fortune by ensuring new burgeoning Democratic policies on taxing wealth cannot come to pass, read, the reelection of Donald Trump.
When Schultz appeared on Morning Joe recently, he claimed that Medicare for All, tuition-free college (Pay-It-Forward College Education), and a guaranteed job were Progressive ideas we cannot afford. Worse he said that these were policies most Americans did not want. Unfortunately, that is a lie. As I’ve pointed out many times, America is a Progressive country, and it is the Centrists who are out of step with the U.S.
What happened to Howard Schultz? He said he is no longer a Democrat because of their turn to the left. Really? To most Progressives, the Party of FDR has been turning to the Right for the last 40 years. The leftward turn he speaks about is nothing more than the Party righting itself.
When Schultz disparaged Medicare for All as if it was some extreme left idea, he disparaged every industrialized country we are allied with whose citizens are healthier than us on average. When he demeans pay-it-forward tuition, he demeans America insinuating that while countries from Germany to Brazil to Trinidad & Tobago can educate their own, we are impotent and incapable of ensuring extended education for all our citizens.
The country is not a Center-Right or a Center-Left country. It is a Progressive country. The polls are absolute.
Howard Schultz like Michael Bloomberg proved one thing. Their sole purpose for the presidency has little to do with enacting policies to help the poor and middle class. It is all about the status quo. It is about protecting their wealth.
Schultz said he is a self-made billionaire. He pointed out that he is the product of the projects. As such, why would Elizabeth Warren want to tax his wealth?
I will say what many won’t because they are either indoctrinated into the belief that men like Bloomberg and Schultz are deserving of their wealth because they work hard or for fear of being called wealth envious. But here is a fact. No billionaire earned his billions on his own.
In effect, billionaires and many of the wealthy share more in common with parasites based on how their wealth is accumulated. Someone else does the heavy lifting as the wealthy do the collecting of capital.
As billionaires like Schultz continue to campaign on the pretense that they are “self-made,” we must use that opportunity to point out that ALL billionaires, ALL super wealthy people, accumulated capital on the backs of others. We must make their false strength the weakness that it is. There is no self-made billionaire. Those seeking the presidency without policies that make our system more egalitarian are simply there for the sinister reason to prevent change. They are intent on maintaining the status quo, wealthy parasites.