Tonight (28 January), thousands of Egyptians are marching through Cairo demanding an end to the thirty-year rule of President Hosni Mubarak. A state of emergency has been declared along with a curfew. Government forces are battling protesters in the streets. People are getting injured. At least thirteen have already been killed. By the time you see tomorrow's news, these figures will have increased..
Mubarak has asked his own government to resign to quell the unrest. Unless he steps down, however, there will be no fundamental change in Egyptian society for the betterment of the people. Aside from corruption, Egyptians are rioting for another significant reason. Many live in want. Many have are trapped in socially immobile lives. Why? The cronies connected to the government own nearly everything. Egypt is not a democracy. It is an autocratic oligarchy - a quasi-dictatorship that serves the interests of a small, ultra-wealthy elite. Commenting on the recent revolts in Tunisia, Jordan, Yemen and now Egypt, Emile Hokayem of the Institute of Strategic Studies concluded, 'They're all protesting about growing inequalities. They're all protesting against growing nepotism. The top of the pyramid was getting richer and richer.' Now, what does this have to do with America? Unfortunately, the answer is both 'everything' and 'nothing'.
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Similar to Egypt, the United States is a nation of massive inequality, poverty, despair and collusion between the elites. If you think this is just 'radical rhetoric', consider the following data compiled by G. William Donhoff, a professor of sociology at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
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The richest 1% of the American population owns nearly 35% of all the wealth.
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The richest 20% of the American population owns nearly 85% of all the wealth.
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The 'bottom' 80% of the American population owns 15% of all the wealth.
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It has long been accepted that few can enter politics - let alone succeed - without selling his or her soul to soft money in order to raise enough cash to get elected over an opponent who will to go to the same unscrupulous end. Even Barack Obama reneged on his call for the public financing of elections when he realized his chances to win the White House were lessened without an equal or greater amount of money to that of the Republicans.
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Meanwhile, drug companies are still making obscene profits - as is the entire medical industry - while more than forty million Americans live without any health insurance and an equal number are underinsured. The jobless rate is 15-35% everywhere in the nation if the underemployed (those with part-time jobs or full-time jobs with meager wages) are counted. Three years of recent college graduates cannot get attain a job with a living wage and get started with their lives.
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Once again, the question: what kind of country affords its people far more access to guns than a full-time job with benefits?
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The answer is clear. Not a democracy - an oligarchy. The rich are richer in America today than ever before. Yet so many suffer. Throngs of homeless men and women sleep on frozen streets near the Capitol building night after night - and in every city and town in the United States. Has America no shame?
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While rioting and violence is not the answer to effect change, something has to be done now. The first thing is to direct our political discourse to these problems and hold a national dialogue on the disintegrating middle class.
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It is not radical to expose the truth of the massive inequality of wealth in America. It is radical to deny it - and even more radical to perpetuate it with our silence and inaction.
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The time is now, or the next cyclical depression might indeed be the end of the 'last, best hope of earth.'
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For an excellent article on the extent of American wealth inequality by Timothy Noah of Slate, click onto the following link: http://www.slate.com/id/2266025/entry/2266026
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Photo: The notorious tenement district of New York City circa 1900.
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J Roquen