Its not about smarts, its about greed. Oh sure, everybody wants money, and power, its how we guarantee our comfort and security. In that respect we're no different than anybody else, and we are no more or less likely than anyone else to abuse that obsession.

But money (which is synonymous with power), when pursued responsibly and honorably, is only a means to an end. It is only of value if it can be applied to secure and maintain our happiness. In America, we have turned it into a game. It is how we keep score, the way we define happiness, it is our means of self-actualization, our way of declaring our status, our self-worth. Its how we rank ourselves as human beings against our fellows. We have inflated the value of wealth so much that we are willing to sacrifice everything else for it, our families, our self-respect, our health, our country, our environment. And we have learned to hold those who don't feel that way with contempt, as weak, as cowards, as fools. Or as our own President and leading political party smugly declares, as losers.

We have come to substitute the ability to accumulate wealth for the capacity to contribute to our community. This fallacy has even invaded our language; "He may be a great engineer (or artist, or athlete, or craftsman) but he sure can't run a business." We live in a tribe where any successful executive is held to be of more value than even the most skilled and conscientious worker. And of course, "business" is not necessarily an enterprise which creates value for the community.

We honor the real estate mogul who sells golf courses, luxury trinkets and posh hotels more than we do our teachers or our scientists or our poets. He runs our country "like a business". Well, they got that right, didn't they?

We supposedly honor the entrepreneur, but most commercial activity today is carried out by soulless collectives who are much more interested in profit than product.

Good men understand this and weep silently in frustration and sorrow. Evil men discover it immediately as our weakest link, and use it to undermine us. America wasn't robbed. It sold itself out.


"The last capitalist will hang from a rope sold in his store."
-Attributed to both K. Marx and V. Lenin.