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welcome to the David Pakman show it is Tuesday Louis is back with us we will
hear all about his big wedding extravaganza and the big speech that he
gave people are just up in arms the National Speakers Bureau actually
is having Louis maybe a be the keynote speaker they were so impressed with the
wedding speech that Lewis cable here about all that later
i wanna talk about a new study which if we interpret it
on colloquially if we interpreted
in layman's terms confirms that the United States is not a democracy but
rather an oligarchy this is a really
entrance interesting study from this is going to appear in the journal
perspectives on politics
in the fall and it finds essentially it doesn't use these terms
I'm using these terms that the US is not a democracy but instead
and oligarchy and what are these terms what are these terms mean a democracy
would be a system of government
by the whole population or all the eligible members
a vase state typically through elected representatives in other words
the will love the people the will of the people is reflected
in the system that a in the system of government in the laws an oligarchy
is when a small group of people have control of the country organization or
institution
I've long argued that we have essentially an oligarchy plutocracy in
this country
where those with money those with resources have disproportionately more
power
and the laws judicial and political systems
reflected their desires and priorities
far more than the average person and what does the
study say it says despite the seemingly strong empirical support
in previous studies for theories have majoritarian democracy
our analyses suggest that majorities of the american public
actually have little influence over the policies are our government adopts
Americans do enjoy many features central to democratic governance
such as regular elections I freedom of speech and association and a widespread
if still contested franchise but and then they go on to say
it is not true and that america's claims to being a democratic society are
seriously threatened
threatened by the findings in this first-ever comprehensive scientific
study which shows that the desires
above the median voter there's the average voter
are disproportionately under reflected in the laws that are passed but
the preferences of the elite the preferences
%uh the rich are far more likely to eventually become law to eventually
become policy to put it short
we have a system where the elites and the rich
get their way so much more than the average person
this is not shocking Louis but it is interesting that it has been
scientifically analyzed
and numbers have been put to this right I I think it's
funny that people just assume that their elected officials are somehow
representing the well
up the people that elected them when we know that's not really the case I mean
you could just take at that the corporate tax cuts and breaks to giving
is big companies and I don't think anybody would agree with that
with that stuff so that's not true though is there has been this what the
Tea Party years and others who are somehow convinced
that it makes sense to support policies that help rich people in big
corporations and not then
because someday they might benefit from that stuff for because its ostensible
freedom
I don't know I just think it's their spokespeople saying that a you
you get into the the crowded had better be different story but of course you
don't have these rich people actually representing the country
right their influence is just overwhelming
to put it another way the findings in this study say that the opinion
average citizens on a particular issuer policy
are mostly uncorrelated with the probability that the policy will be
adopted or that their view will represent
the eventual laws that are passed however the opinions if the economic
elites
have a much stronger mathematical correlation
with the eventual laws that are passed this is so important
if we are to have change in this country and when it comes to inequality when it
comes to the plutocratic state of affairs
we aren't going to necessarily have change if people understand this dynamic
that exists
but if people are aware of this we almost definitely won't have changed
because
why would anyone try to change a system that they think is completely fair so I
think this is really important study
very important study and it's interesting if you ask a conspiracy
theorist and who's in control because you don't tell you with an oligarchy to
you
but your program it just might be the ideal domain ID
builder purchase something maybe not oil execs right now would be a different
a the details would certainly be different I think