Monday, October 12, 2015

BARACK OBAMA: The psychopath that nearly built America's first open borders dictatorship - Does this sound like someone we all know?“Poverty of emotional feelings, lack of remorse or shame, superficial charm, pathological lying, egocentricity, a lack of insight, absence of nervousness, an inability to love, impulsive antisocial...

Does this sound like someone we all know? “Poverty of emotional feelings, lack of remorse or shame, superficial charm, pathological lying, egocentricity, a lack of insight, absence of nervousness, an inability to love, impulsive antisocial...



JAY MICHAELS FAILS TO OBSERVE THAT OBAMA'S "SOCIALISM" IS ENTIRELY GEARED TO THE BENEFIT OF HIS CRONY BANKSTERS.


The Mask of Sanity: Psychopath-in-Chief?

Does this sound like someone we all know?
“Poverty of emotional feelings, lack of remorse or shame, superficial charm, pathological lying, egocentricity, a lack of insight, absence of nervousness, an inability to love, impulsive antisocial acts, failure to learn from experience.”
It’s a summary (by Richard Lynn) of the first ten of sixteen behavioral traits of the psychopathic personality from the classic work on the subject, Hervey Cleckley’s The Mask of Sanity.  The book will be seventy-five years old next year. 

It’s given to few individuals to describe a new human type.   Cleckley did it twice.  With Corbett Thigpen, he published Three Faces of Eve in 1957.  The movie version released later that year launched Joanne Woodward’s career and familiarized Americans with what came later to be called dissociative identity disorder. 

Psychopathology, like multiple personalities, had been described before.  It was called “moral insanity,” by the 19th century British physician J. C. Pritchard: “a morbid perversion of the natural feelings.”  But Cleckley was the first to study it systematically and describe it in detail.

Among his patients at a VA hospital, Cleckley, a professor at University of Georgia Medical School, was intrigued by the sometimes charming, glib, superficially intelligent, but utterly unscrupulous individuals he called psychopaths.  None had sought treatment voluntarily.  They’d all been impeached, so to speak, by those they’d lied to.

Of course like all personality disorders, psychopathology is distributed widely, in less virulent forms, across a large population.  Nearly everyone feels depressed occasionally, but only about 7% of Americans are clinically depressed.  However, the distribution of psychopaths or sociopaths (Cleckley in later editions uses the words interchangeably) is not geographically random.  There is undoubtedly a high concentration in Washington, D.C.  But even among Democrats, few display so blatantly so many of the classic features described by the Georgia psychiatrist as the current resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

But there are a couple of ways the President deviates from the classic profile.  Cleckley’s characteristic #15 reads:  “sex life impersonal, trivial, and poorly integrated.”  Obama’s future biographers will reveal whether this is accurate or not. 

Number 16 is “failure to follow any life plan.”  Here the President departs dramatically from the checklist.  He has pursued higher office relentlessly and ruthlessly since he was a teenager.  And his goals have not deviated.  He has sought to “fundamentally transform” America.  This means socialism -- extending government control of the economy in the name of “social justice.”  It means further exploitation and disenfranchisement of European-Americans (aka whites), support of Muslims and persecution of Christians and the subversion of Judeo-Christian values, and, overseas, reducing American power and influence, and promoting the interests of Islam.

Cleckley also observed in psychopaths the “absence of delusions and other signs of irrational thinking.”  Here, too, the President doesn’t conform to the profile.  The basis of his political beliefs is delusional:  the West is evil, exploiting the Third World through colonialism, just as its own workers are exploited by capitalism, and is now irreparably and catastrophically destroying the climate.

But Cleckley, who read widely and gave some thought to social problems, would probably not have been surprised that delusions are now the conventional wisdom of Americans.  He was disturbed by what he called “a rapt predilection of small but influential cults of intellectuals or esthetes for what is generally regarded as perverse, dispirited, or distastefully unintelligible.”   He was thinking specifically of Nobel Prizes awarded to Ezra Pound and AndrĂ© Gide, “who insists that pederasty is the superior and preferable way of life for adolescent boys,” and the accolades given Finnegan’s Wake, “a 628-page collection of erudite gibberish indistinguishable to most people from the familiar word salad produced by hebephrenic patients.”  He was troubled by what he perceived as the growing acceptance of homosexuality on the part of elites, even in the 1950s, and wrote a book on the subject, The Caricature of Love.

With a few notable exceptions, Jack Cashill’s Deconstruction Obama, Stanley Kurtz’s Radical-in-Chief, Dinesh d’Souza’s The Roots of Obama’s Rage, Steve Sailer’s America’s Half-Blood Prince, biographies of the President have flown to the remainder table at warp speed -- deservedly.  One day, when candid, thorough, dispassionate studies of our first post-racial President are written, we’ll have a better idea of the psychopathology this cold-blooded seducer of a nation.  Before they sit down with their notes, Obama’s future biographers might want to take a look at The Mask of Sanity.

Does this sound like someone we all know?
“Poverty of emotional feelings, lack of remorse or shame, superficial charm, pathological lying, egocentricity, a lack of insight, absence of nervousness, an inability to love, impulsive antisocial acts, failure to learn from experience.”
It’s a summary (by Richard Lynn) of the first ten of sixteen behavioral traits of the psychopathic personality from the classic work on the subject, Hervey Cleckley’s The Mask of Sanity.  The book will be seventy-five years old next year. 

It’s given to few individuals to describe a new human type.   Cleckley did it twice.  With Corbett Thigpen, he published Three Faces of Eve in 1957.  The movie version released later that year launched Joanne Woodward’s career and familiarized Americans with what came later to be called dissociative identity disorder. 

Psychopathology, like multiple personalities, had been described before.  It was called “moral insanity,” by the 19th century British physician J. C. Pritchard: “a morbid perversion of the natural feelings.”  But Cleckley was the first to study it systematically and describe it in detail.

Among his patients at a VA hospital, Cleckley, a professor at University of Georgia Medical School, was intrigued by the sometimes charming, glib, superficially intelligent, but utterly unscrupulous individuals he called psychopaths.  None had sought treatment voluntarily.  They’d all been impeached, so to speak, by those they’d lied to.

Of course like all personality disorders, psychopathology is distributed widely, in less virulent forms, across a large population.  Nearly everyone feels depressed occasionally, but only about 7% of Americans are clinically depressed.  However, the distribution of psychopaths or sociopaths (Cleckley in later editions uses the words interchangeably) is not geographically random.  There is undoubtedly a high concentration in Washington, D.C.  But even among Democrats, few display so blatantly so many of the classic features described by the Georgia psychiatrist as the current resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.


But there are a couple of ways the President deviates from the classic profile.  Cleckley’s characteristic #15 reads:  “sex life impersonal, trivial, and poorly integrated.”  Obama’s future biographers will reveal whether this is accurate or not. 

Number 16 is “failure to follow any life plan.”  Here the President departs dramatically from the checklist.  He has pursued higher office relentlessly and ruthlessly since he was a teenager.  And his goals have not deviated.  He has sought to “fundamentally transform” America.  This means socialism -- extending government control of the economy in the name of “social justice.”  It means further exploitation and disenfranchisement of European-Americans (aka whites), support of Muslims and persecution of Christians and the subversion of Judeo-Christian values, and, overseas, reducing American power and influence, and promoting the interests of Islam.

Cleckley also observed in psychopaths the “absence of delusions and other signs of irrational thinking.”  Here, too, the President doesn’t conform to the profile.  The basis of his political beliefs is delusional:  the West is evil, exploiting the Third World through colonialism, just as its own workers are exploited by capitalism, and is now irreparably and catastrophically destroying the climate.

But Cleckley, who read widely and gave some thought to social problems, would probably not have been surprised that delusions are now the conventional wisdom of Americans.  He was disturbed by what he called “a rapt predilection of small but influential cults of intellectuals or esthetes for what is generally regarded as perverse, dispirited, or distastefully unintelligible.”   He was thinking specifically of Nobel Prizes awarded to Ezra Pound and AndrĂ© Gide, “who insists that pederasty is the superior and preferable way of life for adolescent boys,” and the accolades given Finnegan’s Wake, “a 628-page collection of erudite gibberish indistinguishable to most people from the familiar word salad produced by hebephrenic patients.”  He was troubled by what he perceived as the growing acceptance of homosexuality on the part of elites, even in the 1950s, and wrote a book on the subject, The Caricature of Love.

With a few notable exceptions, Jack Cashill’s Deconstruction Obama, Stanley Kurtz’s Radical-in-Chief, Dinesh d’Souza’s The Roots of Obama’s Rage, Steve Sailer’s America’s Half-Blood Prince, biographies of the President have flown to the remainder table at warp speed -- deservedly.  One day, when candid, thorough, dispassionate studies of our first post-racial President are written, we’ll have a better idea of the psychopathology this cold-blooded seducer of a nation.  Before they sit down with their notes, Obama’s future biographers might want to take a look at The Mask of Sanity.


Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/10/the_mask_of_sanity_psychopathinchief.html#ixzz3oNC958pl
Follow us: @AmericanThinker on Twitter | AmericanThinker on Facebook

OBAMA-CLINTONomics - SOARING POVERTY IN AMERICA Wealth of America’s super-rich grows to $2.34 trillion



TO KEEP WAGES DEPRESSED AND BUILD THEIR LA RAZA "The Race" MEXICAN ILLEGAL PARTY BASE, THE DEMOCRAT PARTY HAS RUTHLESSLY ASSAULTED THE AMERICAN WORKER, OUR LAWS ON HIRING ILLEGALS AND OUR BORDERS TO KEEP WAGES DEPRESSED.



"The U.S. now ranks at, or near, the top of developed countries for income inequality. Job creation has lagged far behind population growth. Automation has erased some jobs, but corrupt, inept government leadership is responsible for the deplorable job- deficit-low wage situation." 

"The federal government encourages the massive illegal and legal immigration that plays a huge role in job scarcity and income suppression for American workers. To paraphrase Milton Friedman, a viable economy cannot exist with open borders and unrestricted immigration. An oversupply of workers willing to work for less pay, the outsourcing of jobs, and visa-immigrant hiring allow companies to replace American workers with immigrants for reduced labor and benefit costs."



Income inequality has risen during the last several decades to heights last seen in the 1920s. Most of the income growth has gone to a small fraction of the population, the ultra-rich elites, while real wages for the bottom 90 percent ...

The Causes of Income

Inequality

 
Income inequality has risen during the last several decades to heights last seen in the 1920s. Most of the income growth has gone to a small fraction of the population, the ultra-rich elites, while real wages for the bottom 90 percent has been stagnant since the 1980s. The U.S. now ranks at, or near, the top of developed countries for income inequality. Job creation has lagged far behind population growth. Automation has erased some jobs, but corrupt, inept government leadership is responsible for the deplorable job- deficit-low wage situation.    

Trade agreements are one cause of job and wage reduction. Over the last twenty years, we’ve amassed $10 trillion in trade deficits and exported 12 million manufacturing jobs, forcing workers to move into lower-wage service jobs. Government brags about the free trade agreements, CAFTA, NAFTA, KORUS, and TPP. But the “free” applies only to the foreign trading partners, which manipulate their currencies, pay sweatshop workers low wages, manufacture under environmentally-toxic conditions, and restrict U.S. imports. We hand over our technology, good-paying jobs, product labeling, and safety guarantees -- all to enrich multinational corporations and foreign industry. Industrial research and development have been decimated as companies move overseas or outsource jobs, leaving the nation a future of little technological innovation. The U.S. is left with hollowed-out industries and service jobs. 

The federal government encourages the massive illegal and legal immigration that plays a huge role in job scarcity and income suppression for American workers. To paraphrase Milton Friedman, a viable economy cannot exist with open borders and unrestricted immigration. An oversupply of workers willing to work for less pay, the outsourcing of jobs, and visa-immigrant hiring allow companies to replace American workers with immigrants for reduced labor and benefit costs. A well-known example is that of Disney IT workers who were forced to train their cheaper immigrant replacements. It is no coincidence that the rise in immigration has occurred simultaneously with the rise of the welfare state. People unemployed, or in low-wage and part-time jobs, rely on government subsidies. The result is larger national debt, more corporate wealth, and declining wages.

ObamaCare influences, and will influence to greater degrees, the lowering of incomes for Americans as healthcare costs rise. Higher premiums and deductions for health insurance are being shifted to employees, reducing benefits and wages. Medical care costs already have risen much faster than wages, leaving many struggling to pay for necessities. Ever-higher deductions mean that people can’t afford to use the insurance they are forced to buy because they can’t even pay the deductions.        

Another contributor to job deficiency and wage stagnation is the increased regulation and taxation of small businesses instituted by Obama’s executive orders, EPA overreach, and ObamaCare. Small businesses traditionally have created two-thirds of new jobs annually. The bright spot in the economy, small businesses have created 78.7 percent of new jobs since the recession. Today, faced with these government anti-business policies, small businesses are closing their doors at a faster rate than new businesses are opening. The small businesses that remain open often don’t expand because of Obamacare and government regulations.

Income inequality is greatly impacted by the Federal Reserve’s policies of money-printing and zero interest rates, which have led to the funding of the financial and corporate markets while ignoring the needs of smaller businesses. The money supply and cheap lending has gone to the government, large corporations, and Wall Street, leaving the rest of the economy to sputter along with little capital and fewer jobs. The Fed’s policies of crony capitalism favor big business and big banks over that of smaller entities and are responsible for the increasing number of big business deals such as Walgreen's purchase of Rite Aid.


DEATH OF THE AMERICAN MIDDLE-CLASS

This government-driven, crony-capitalist economy defined by job scarcity and wage stagnation is the reason college graduates are burdened by $1.3 trillion debt, living with parents, can’t afford to marry or buy homes, and working as waitresses and bartenders. Job scarcity and low wages are the reasons we’re becoming a nation of renters rather than homeowners. They are the reasons that 51 percent of workers earn less than $30,000 a year. They are the reasons for the demise of the middle class and the burgeoning welfare rolls, the modern-day equivalent of slavery.    

Income inequality and its devastating consequences are seldom mentioned on the nightly news. The media and bogus government statistics paint rosy pictures about economic recovery, and government masks the bad economy with welfare so that we don’t see Great Depression bread lines. But the only recovery has been in the Federal Reserve’s inflated stock market, not in the main street economy, where 94 million working-age adults are unemployed and 47 million are on some welfare program. The “Made in America” displays weekly touted by ABC news are the few exceptions, rather than the rule, in an American economy of boarded-up stores and factories.    
The political implications of income inequality are most evident in the increasing rise and entrenchment of career politicians, supported by big donor funding and media favoritism. The integrity of the electoral process is endangered as election propaganda, funded by big money and hyped by corporate media bias, become more prominent in spreading lies, distortions, and innuendos to the voting public. Unrestricted campaign funding has given the moneyed elites first access to elected officials. At the same time, private-sector unions, small businesses, and citizens find their influence dwindling or irrelevant. This crony capitalism, resembling dictatorships and communist oligarchies, seriously threatens our democracy because money, power, and media control are consolidated in the hands of a few at the top. Voter apathy prevails, as voters feel increasingly powerless to change the course of events. 

The United States, a once great economic powerhouse and the largest creditor nation, has become the largest debtor nation, and is fast becoming a banana republic. Past and present elected authorities and public officials have stripped bare our industries, put the nation under a mountain of debt, and turned the U.S. into a welfare depository. Government leaders have intentionally failed to protect our borders, jobs, and freedoms. These public “servants” and the wealthy elites have garnered riches for themselves, and purposely impoverished citizens and future generations. The greatest threats to our economy and national security are not foreign countries or terrorists; they are the enemies inside, corrupt government leaders and the money masters they serve. 
 
Income inequality has risen during the last several decades to heights last seen in the 1920s. Most of the income growth has gone to a small fraction of the population, the ultra-rich elites, while real wages for the bottom 90 percent has been stagnant since the 1980s. The U.S. now ranks at, or near, the top of developed countries for income inequality. Job creation has lagged far behind population growth. Automation has erased some jobs, but corrupt, inept government leadership is responsible for the deplorable job- deficit-low wage situation.    

Trade agreements are one cause of job and wage reduction. Over the last twenty years, we’ve amassed $10 trillion in trade deficits and exported 12 million manufacturing jobs, forcing workers to move into lower-wage service jobs. Government brags about the free trade agreements, CAFTA, NAFTA, KORUS, and TPP. But the “free” applies only to the foreign trading partners, which manipulate their currencies, pay sweatshop workers low wages, manufacture under environmentally-toxic conditions, and restrict U.S. imports. We hand over our technology, good-paying jobs, product labeling, and safety guarantees -- all to enrich multinational corporations and foreign industry. Industrial research and development have been decimated as companies move overseas or outsource jobs, leaving the nation a future of little technological innovation. The U.S. is left with hollowed-out industries and service jobs. 
The federal government encourages the massive illegal and legal immigration that plays a huge role in job scarcity and income suppression for American workers. To paraphrase Milton Friedman, a viable economy cannot exist with open borders and unrestricted immigration. An oversupply of workers willing to work for less pay, the outsourcing of jobs, and visa-immigrant hiring allow companies to replace American workers with immigrants for reduced labor and benefit costs. A well-known example is that of Disney IT workers who were forced to train their cheaper immigrant replacements. It is no coincidence that the rise in immigration has occurred simultaneously with the rise of the welfare state. People unemployed, or in low-wage and part-time jobs, rely on government subsidies. The result is larger national debt, more corporate wealth, and declining wages.

ObamaCare influences, and will influence to greater degrees, the lowering of incomes for Americans as healthcare costs rise. Higher premiums and deductions for health insurance are being shifted to employees, reducing benefits and wages. Medical care costs already have risen much faster than wages, leaving many struggling to pay for necessities. Ever-higher deductions mean that people can’t afford to use the insurance they are forced to buy because they can’t even pay the deductions.        

Another contributor to job deficiency and wage stagnation is the increased regulation and taxation of small businesses instituted by Obama’s executive orders, EPA overreach, and ObamaCare. Small businesses traditionally have created two-thirds of new jobs annually. The bright spot in the economy, small businesses have created 78.7 percent of new jobs since the recession. Today, faced with these government anti-business policies, small businesses are closing their doors at a faster rate than new businesses are opening. The small businesses that remain open often don’t expand because of Obamacare and government regulations.

Income inequality is greatly impacted by the Federal Reserve’s policies of money-printing and zero interest rates, which have led to the funding of the financial and corporate markets while ignoring the needs of smaller businesses. The money supply and cheap lending has gone to the government, large corporations, and Wall Street, leaving the rest of the economy to sputter along with little capital and fewer jobs. The Fed’s policies of crony capitalism favor big business and big banks over that of smaller entities and are responsible for the increasing number of big business deals such as Walgreen's purchase of Rite Aid.

This government-driven, crony-capitalist economy defined by job scarcity and wage stagnation is the reason college graduates are burdened by $1.3 trillion debt, living with parents, can’t afford to marry or buy homes, and working as waitresses and bartenders. Job scarcity and low wages are the reasons we’re becoming a nation of renters rather than homeowners. They are the reasons that 51 percent of workers earn less than $30,000 a year. They are the reasons for the demise of the middle class and the burgeoning welfare rolls, the modern-day equivalent of slavery.    

Income inequality and its devastating consequences are seldom mentioned on the nightly news. The media and bogus government statistics paint rosy pictures about economic recovery, and government masks the bad economy with welfare so that we don’t see Great Depression bread lines. But the only recovery has been in the Federal Reserve’s inflated stock market, not in the main street economy, where 94 million working-age adults are unemployed and 47 million are on some welfare program. The “Made in America” displays weekly touted by ABC news are the few exceptions, rather than the rule, in an American economy of boarded-up stores and factories.    
The political implications of income inequality are most evident in the increasing rise and entrenchment of career politicians, supported by big donor funding and media favoritism. The integrity of the electoral process is endangered as election propaganda, funded by big money and hyped by corporate media bias, become more prominent in spreading lies, distortions, and innuendos to the voting public. Unrestricted campaign funding has given the moneyed elites first access to elected officials. At the same time, private-sector unions, small businesses, and citizens find their influence dwindling or irrelevant. This crony capitalism, resembling dictatorships and communist oligarchies, seriously threatens our democracy because money, power, and media control are consolidated in the hands of a few at the top. Voter apathy prevails, as voters feel increasingly powerless to change the course of events. 

The United States, a once great economic powerhouse and the largest creditor nation, has become the largest debtor nation, and is fast becoming a banana republic. Past and present elected authorities and public officials have stripped bare our industries, put the nation under a mountain of debt, and turned the U.S. into a welfare depository. Government leaders have intentionally failed to protect our borders, jobs, and freedoms. These public “servants” and the wealthy elites have garnered riches for themselves, and purposely impoverished citizens and future generations. The greatest threats to our economy and national security are not foreign countries or terrorists; they are the enemies inside, corrupt government leaders and the money masters they serve. 


Read more:

http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/11/the_causes_of_income_inequality.html#ixzz3qSBDYQVs

Follow us: @AmericanThinker on Twitter | AmericanThinker on Facebook



Obamacare open enrollment: A widening health care disaster for workers

Obamacare open enrollment: A

widening health care disaster for

workers

3 November 2015
“All of Obama’s policies have been geared

toward increasing social inequality. … The

claim that the health care overhaul is an

oasis of progress in this desert of social

reaction is simply a lie”—





"Amazon became a byword this year for savage treatment of 

employees. Bezos joins several others in the top 15 notorious 

for low-wage exploitation, including four heirs to the Wal-

Mart retail empire, James, Alice, Christy and Samuel Robson 

Walton, and Phil Knight, chairman of Nike Inc., whose $24.4 

billion fortune is extracted from his international network of 

sports apparel-producing sweatshops."


OBAMA-CLINTONomics is a simple device - Serve the super rich and pass the cost of their looting and Wall Street crimes on to the backs of the last of the American middle-class!


"Of course, the wealth of the financial elite cannot come from nowhere. Ultimately, the continual infusion of asset bubbles is the form taken by a massive transfer of wealth, from the working class to the banks, investors and super-rich. The corollary to rise of the stock market is the endless demands, all over the world, for austerity, cuts in wages, attacks on health care and pensions."


“As a result, the share of wealth held by the richest 0.1 percent of the population grew from 17 percent in 2007 to 22 percent in 2012, while the wealth of the 400 richest families in the US has doubled since 2008.”

OBAMA-CLINTONomics and the final death of the American middle-class

"Obama expanded the Wall Street bailout, handing trillions of dollars to the criminals who wrecked the economy. He then utilized the financial meltdown to restructure the auto industry on the basis of brutal pay cuts, setting a precedent for the transformation of the US into a low-wage economy."

"In the midst of the deepest slump since the Great Depression, the administration starved state and city governments of resources, leading to the destruction of hundreds of thousands of education and public-sector jobs and the gutting of workers’ pensions. Obama’s Affordable Care Act set in motion the dismantling of employer-paid health insurance and massive cuts in the Medicare insurance system for the elderly."


SEN. BERNIE SANDERS

“Calling income and wealth inequality the "great moral issue of our time," Sanders laid out a sweeping, almost unimaginably expensive program to transfer wealth from the richest Americans to the poor and middle class. A $1 trillion public works program to create "13 million good-paying jobs." A $15-an-hour federal minimum wage. "Pay equity" for women. Paid sick leave and vacation for everyone. Higher taxes on the wealthy. Free tuition at all public colleges and universities. A Medicare-for-all single-payer health care system. Expanded Social Security benefits. Universal pre-K.” WASHINGTON EXAMINER

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS ON HILLARY’S SERVITUDE TO OBAMA’S CRIMINAL CRONY BANKSTERS… their looting continues unabated.




"I think that the business model of Wall Street is fraud," said Sanders. "I think these guys drove us into the worst economic downturn in the modern history of America and I think they're at it again. I believe that when you have so few banks with so much power you have to ... break them up. That is not Hillary Clinton's position."



Wealth of America’s super-rich grows to $2.34 trillion

Wealth of America’s super-rich grows to $2.34 trillion

By Nick Barrickman 
3 October 2015
The wealth of the 400 richest Americans 
continues to soar, according to the results of 
the new Forbes 400 list, published annually 
by the business magazine of the same name. 
At $2.34 trillion, the total net worth for the multi-billionaires on the list set new records, displacing last year’s all-time high of $2.29 trillion.



OBAMA-CLINTONomics: MELTDOWN!


Did their crony banksters ultimately destroy the global economy?





Richest one percent controls 

nearly half of global wealth

 

In 2009, the total net worth of the Forbes 400 was $1.27 trillion. Today, nearly six years into the so-called economic “recovery” fostered by the Obama administration, the wealthiest Americans have nearly doubled their hoard. The total wealth of the richest 400 Americans managed to reach new heights even while financial markets have been roiled by tumultuous swings.

The Forbes report notes that in 2015, “It was 
harder than ever to join the 400. The price of 
entry this year was $1.7 billion, the highest

it’s been in the 33 years that Forbes has

racked American wealth.” Forbes makes note

that the wealth threshold was so high this year that 145 billionaires failed to make the list.
While a majority of billionaires have prospered, their wealth underwritten by the massive government bailouts of financial institutions and near-zero interest rates from the Federal Reserve, a significant fraction of the wealthy elite have lost ground in the turbulent stock markets of recent months.
The ratio of winners and losers among the billionaires was ten to one last year, but this year was much closer to 50-50. Forbes noted that the top three position-holders on the list, Microsoft’s Bill Gates, Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffett and Oracle’s Larry Ellison, each saw a drop in their total net worth of at least 5 percent in the last year. This did nothing to threaten the position of Gates, number one at $76 billion, or Buffett, number two at $62 billion, but Ellison’s third-place position, with $47.5 billion, left him “only” $500 million ahead of the fourth-place multi-billionaire, Jeff Bezos of Amazon.com.
The majority of those on the Forbes list were associated with some form of financial speculation, or with computer software and the Internet. According to the industry breakdown supplied by Forbes, its 400 include 126 engaged in investment, real estate and finance, 81 from computer technology and media, 36 from food and beverage, 32 from retail and fashion (including five members of the Walton family, owners of Wal-Mart), 31 from oil & gas, 20 from health care, 19 from miscellaneous services (including six members of the Pritzker family, owners of Hyatt Hotels), and 19 from sports and gaming.
This left only 35 listed as making their fortunes in manufacturing, automotive, construction, and logistics. The largest manufacturing fortune is the $7.4 billion of Harold Kohler, whose company makes toilets and other plumbing fixtures. Perhaps that is symbolic, given the state of manufacturing in the United States, once the world leader in industry, but no longer.
The growth of financial parasitism has underwritten the wealth of many on the Forbes 400. In 1982, the first Forbes 400 list saw figures directly involved in finance making up only 4.4 percent of the total wealth on the list. As of today, this group now makes up more than 21 percent of billionaires on the list.
Former Microsoft chairman Bill Gates, who has held the number one spot on the Forbes 400 for 22 years, has less than 13 percent of his fortune in stock in the company he founded. According toForbes, the majority of Gates’ wealth is bound up in Cascade, the software mogul’s investment firm, which specializes in “investing in stocks, bonds, private equity and real estate.”
Besides the well-known super-rich of Silicon Valley like Google’s Larry Page and Sergey Brin (with $33.3 billion and $32.6 billion, respectively) and Mark Zuckerberg, founder of the social media web site Facebook, the seventh wealthiest man in America with $40.3 billion in total assets, there are numerous other newly minted Internet billionaires, including the owners and co-owners of Uber, Airbnb, WhatsApp, LinkedIn, Twitter, SnapChat, GoPro and GoDaddy.com.
Jeffrey Bezos, owner of the online retailer Amazon, saw the largest gain in wealth for the year, making $16 billion in 2015, placing his total net worth at $47 billion and catapulting him to fourth place. Nearly half of Bezos’ gains came within a single day last July, when his company announced gains in the second quarter, leading to a speculative frenzy which bid up stock values for Amazon by over 18 percent.
Amazon became a byword this year for savage treatment of 

employees. Bezos joins several others in the top 15 notorious 

for low-wage exploitation, including four heirs to the Wal-

Mart retail empire, James, Alice, Christy and Samuel Robson

Walton, and Phil Knight, chairman of Nike Inc., whose $24.4 

billion fortune is extracted from his international network of 

sports apparel-producing sweatshops.
While safeguarding the ill-gotten wealth of the Forbes billionaires remains an ironclad principle of both the Republican and Democratic parties, working people throughout the US continue to suffer the brunt of attacks on their living standards. A US Census report released earlier this month shows that 14.8 percent of the US population lives in poverty; a figure that is unchanged from a year earlier. The Census findings show that 6.6 percent of the population lives in “deep poverty,” or less than half of the already unrealistically low official poverty line in the US.