The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It

Perhaps more than anyone else, former Secretary of Labor and Obama advisor, Robert Reich is perfectly qualified to diagnose and explain why 50% plus of the country has had no choice but to turn to so-called radical candidates like Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump.

Robert Reich is almost uniquely positioned to describe what has happened and why. Most importantly in The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix, he lays out why 40 to 50% of the country is not racist in xenophobic, they are simply trying to get ahead and accomplish what they were told would be possible through hard work and playing fair.

The System crystalizes how in the current two-party dynamic we have one group as the party for millionaires and billionaires and a second option for the professional class and free handouts to minorities. In an amazing turn of events the US has no one currently pushing for the rights and well-being of our largest group of people, the lower to middle income working class.

We have well over 40% of America being not only ignored but demonized as racist bigots for no other reason than they are looking for support. A neam majority of American’s have been beat down and are looking to anything and anyone that can make them feel slightly less bad about themselves, even if that means blaming others. In short, the demonization of Trump voters as racist xenophobes has done far more to tear this country apart than Trump himself could ever do.

This book explains the Trump voter perfectly. They are people that have felt left behind, neglected and pushed aside by the society that brought them up. The society that promised them the American dream meant that the only limit to their success was their own willingness to work hard and play by the rules.

Being fed the LIE of work hard and get ahead your entire life can only be stomached for so long before people start looking for any other option, any other explanation for what’s gone wrong.

This is not to say anything positive about Donald Trump in any way. At best, Donald Trump was a smoke screen for the oligarchy who got everything they wanted with Trump’s four years. All this goes to show is that Trump was able to use the right kind of rhetoric to convince the working class that he would be the people’s champion, however false it may have been in the end, it worked. Trump did far more to help his own oligarchical, born rich class, than even the Democrats would have but the one thing he did do was understand the pain and need of his constituents, something even Democratic socialists like AOC continue to fail at.

Until the Democrats are able to return to their roots as the party of the working class demigod dogs like Trump will continue to surface at regular intervals to take advantage of the pain and the feelings of being left behind of the majority of the United States

As much as the oligarchy and Democratic party want the world to believe that the support for Trump was racist and xenophobic based, the truth is it was an anti-establishment movement hijacked by a rich kid sociopath. What people have a hard time understanding is that Bernie and Trump supporters are cut from the same cloth, they are anti-establishment movement that was looked down upon, ridiculed and abolished before it had a chance.

At the end of 2020 we are now back to square one where we have a disenfranchised angry 40% of the population who have been demonized for nothing more than believing the lies they were told about working hard to get ahead and the American dream. As with covid, the second wave may very well be worse than the first and it’s no one’s fault but our own.