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Trump threatens to upset the apple cart of the political spoils caste system that is protected by politically correct speech codes. Current beneficiaries of the rigged class system will not go down without a fight

Trump versus Class War on the American Theodicy



There has been a national discussion lately about the downward mobility of the Working Class and how the upper class has stacked the deck against them. However, we also need to understand how Trump symbolizes a threat of downward mobility to the Knowledge Class and how he is the antidote to the decimation of the American Theodicy that once maintained cohesion between the social classes.

The Road to Social Mobility is Now Paved with Silicon

Since 1971 there has been a radical change to elite families. Their under- socialized children who used to rebel at working in corpocracies have been raised in the virtual world of the Internet. Elites can work in their virtual worlds in Silicon Valley without ever having to climb the economic ladder that once existed in America or having to go into the military. Gone is the occupational ladder of menial, drudgery, low-paying jobs of working in a fast food eatery, or being a waitress, a furniture mover, or being an apprentice in the construction industry. There no longer is much of a ladder between blue collar and white-collar jobs even if a child of the working class finishes college. Abe Lincoln could no longer make it from "log cabin to Whitehouse" except by affirmative action as personified by our current president. Those who serve in state legislatures and Congress are almost all lawyers who are products of this same bifurcated class system. As described in Angelo Codevilla's book "The Ruling Class: How They Corrupted America and What We Can Do About It" (2010), the social class elites in Silicon Valley and the high echelons of government are out of touch with the "Country Class". Work in Silicon Valley may be depicted as laid-back, with horizontal hierarchies, proverbial "free lunches" and childcare provided by their employer and even working at home and never having to leave the familial cocoon they were raised in. One company in Silicon Valley went as far as advertising an image of sexual looseness of their employees to recruit new workers. Its employees were purportedly known to have sexual trysts with fellow workers in dark stairwells or rooftops while at work. Translated: work is sexually exciting and no longer full of drudgery like the Working Class.

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In 2000 New York Times journalist and comical sociologist David Brooks wrote the definitive book about the New Knowledge Class titled "Bobos in Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There" (bobo is a term meaning the fusions of the two classes of white collar capitalist bourgeois and the countercultural, hedonistic bohemian). An exception are those in the working class who work mainly in government- unionized jobs that are protected by collective bargaining agreements that make their jobs untouchable and pensions "private property". Conversely, the private Working Class is daily exposed to the volatility of markets and the Keynesian manipulations of money supply by the ruling class via the Federal Reserve and US Treasury. They no longer can put their money into a savings account to save up a down payment on a house because interest rates are so anemic (0.25% per year interest while inflation runs 2%). The generational economic cycle where retired people put money into savings banks to supplement social security and in turn that money was loaned out to younger people to buy homes and start businesses no longer works. There are SBA loans through local banks but one has to own a house as collateral for such loans. Homeownership, once a bridge to the middle class, is out of touch for the Working Class. A house is now an economic good provided from one's familial caste to the next generation like in Europe. Contrary to some policy experts, what Trump trumpets is not nostalgia but going back to the kind of economy where the working class could save up for the future, could afford to buy a house on installment payments instead of a rigged subprime loan and where there was an unpoliticized connection between work and success.

Decimation of the American Work Theodicy

Because of this rigged mobility system, there has been a collapse of the theodicy (a religious explanation of success and suffering) that has held America's social classes together. The work and savings ethic described in Max Weber's famous book "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" has been decimated. Mediating institutions of family and churches between the individual and large corporations and government have been hollowed out or co-opted by government nonprofits. Niche occupations have been politicized by overkill licensing regulations. Many elites in the media and academia call those in the Working Class irrational people and don't understand why they cannot live on cheaper imported goods and two part time jobs. But as the Judeo-Christian scriptures declare: "Man doesn't live by bread (or affirmative action or cheap imported goods) alone". Men and women need institutions and productive work that is animated by a spirit that makes life meaningful. Another factor destroying the sacred canopy of military service is the Working Class almost exclusively fights our wars. One of the stated reasons for high suicide rates among soldiers returning from war is lack of a meaningful mission.

The Knowledge Class Panic Over Downward Mobility

We also need to talk about the current social panic by the Knowledge Class of the prospect of downward mobility should Trump get elected. This is what is fueling the social strife, polarization, knock out crimes, race riots, cop killings, and mostly choreographed cop shootings of Black men set up for a fall. If Trump is elected he threatens to upset the apple cart of the political spoils caste system that is protected by politically correct speech codes. The current beneficiaries of the rigged class system will not go down without a fight and without sacrificing martyrs for their cause however. Whether the loss of industrial jobs and stagnant wages or the offset of cheaper goods for the Working Class is actual or perceived is irrelevant. It is the decimation of the American work theodicy that is the issue. Trump offers the only antidote in either political party who has addressed this issue.


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Wayne Lusvardi -- Bio and Archives

Wayne has previously written for The American Thinker, Real Clear Politics (Religion), Calwatchdog.com, MasterResource.com (free market energy website) and Fox & Hounds (California politics). 


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