re: #31 Bob Levin

Right. They back both sides because they don’t know who will win, and they want access. And this is because there are many types of power, not simply the power of financing in elections and in politics.

Look, if you raise taxes on these folks, it won’t change their lives one bit. It really doesn’t matter.

I’m just saying that if you want to raise their taxes, you’re not on the side of the little guy, you’re on the side of the government—which tends to work itself into trouble. However, the rhetoric is that you’re on the side of the regular working people. That’s just not true in this case.

I don’t care so much about their taxes. If loopholes were closed, rates would not need to be raised to finance necessary government programs.

But totally apart from taxes, the influence of the rich on government that hurts the middle class and the poor is more likely to come in the form of lobbying. Take the pharmaceutical industry. They assure that we will not see legal marijuana as a matter of federal law. The consequences of this on the majority of citizens can be devastating. Exorbitant drug costs, when a plant one can grow oneself could do. Incarceration rates among the highest in the world. Bloody hell in Mexico and Central America. Unforgivable, IMHO. And that’s just one industry. Next on my list would be the food growers and processors.