Welcome to the Oligarchy

By Rob C.

Art by Pat Bagley

TL;DR

This isn’t politics as usual. We’re caught between two versions of tyranny: the corporatists who want stability for profit, and the oligarchs who want chaos for dominance. The companies that own our platforms are gatekeepers, the billionaires are writing policy from boardrooms, and democracy is the price we may have to pay.

The term “oligarchy” might make us uncomfortable because deep down we believe in merit, fairness, and freedom. But Author and Speaker Chris Hedges has described exactly what we’re living through: a war within capitalism between the corporatists, who crave orderly markets and technocratic governance, and the oligarchs, who want to burn the state down, dismantle public institutions, and turn everything into a tollgate they control. YouTube+1

✊ Subscribe, share, and remember — democracy only works if we fight for it.

The corporatists are your traditional big-business players: they build factories, maintain supply chains, invest for decades. They need the system to hold together so their money can make sense. The oligarchs? They don’t make anything tangible. They are the gatekeepers: private-equity barons, tech monopolists, rent-seekers who profit when governments fail and public goods vanish. They are the new feudal lords in $5000 suits.

Look at Facebook, Twitter (yes, still), Amazon — they don’t create much apart from platforms and data silos. They charge access, harvest attention, erect toll booths around everyday life. Now apply that model to our courts, our utilities, our laws. Services become subscriptions; rights become “premium features”; voting becomes something you’re “allowed,” not something you have a right to.

The oligarchic model is simple: dismantle public infrastructure — schools, healthcare, regulations — call it “reducing government,” then step in and monetize the pillars you destroyed. The safety net becomes a fee. The common good becomes a private equity opportunity. The rule of law becomes selective.

Hedges warns that this isn’t an accidental shift. The 2024 election, he says, was a clash between these two ruling factions of capital: the corporatists vs. the oligarchs. YouTube+1 On the ground, this means you’re not being ruled by elites who build; you’re being ruled by elites who extract.

We can feel it in our towns: the neighborhood school begins charging “private tuition”; the water system is sold to a private firm; the post office becomes a logistics subsidiary of Amazon; public services decay while government-contractor revenue soars. When you don’t control the public sphere, you control it by owning the lawmakers. The oligarchs win not by production, but by ownership of access.

And what role does democracy play in all this? It’s the last defense — the firewall, the voice of the people. But when people vote, the results can still be ignored. When people organize, the rules can be rewritten. When people speak, public squares become marketplaces. The oligarchs would rather citizens stay out of the way.

If democracy survives, it’s because ordinary people keep showing up. If it fails, it will be because the gatekeepers convinced you that you didn’t matter.

America is on the Brink.

Robert Cain, author of “Democracy for Sale: How Corporate Greed Is Corrupting Democracy and Endangering the Planet”

Subscribe now

Further Reading & References

• Hedges, Chris. The Chris Hedges Report podcast. See episodes “2024 Election Was the Oligarchic Elite vs. Corporate Elite” YouTube and “How Republicans, Democrats, and the Media Have Weakened US Democracy” economicsandbeyond.podbean.com.

• Hedges, Chris. Death of the Liberal Class. 2010. Wikipedia

• Cain, Robert. Democracy for Sale: How Corporate Greed Is Corrupting Democracy and Endangering the Planet.

• Oreskes, Naomi & Conway, Erik. The Big Myth: How American Business Taught Us to Loathe Government and Love the Free Market.

• Hedges, Chris. Interview featured on TheRealNews Network. The Real News Network