"Do people or profits come first in our society?"
 

In the last twenty-five years, we've witnessed an undeclared war against the middle class.
The so-called conservatives waging this war are only interested in conserving
-- and steadily increasing-- their own wealth and power. Thom Hartmann shows how,
under the guise of "freeing" the market, the neocons have systematically dismantled
 the programs set up by Republicans and Democrats to protect the middle class
and have installed policies that favor the superrich and corporations.
 
From BuzzFlash

 Thom Hartmann is probably the most productive person we know.

He's an accomplished author, Air America syndicated radio host, journalist, specialist in childhood psychological disorders, voracious reader, and just about the most knowledgeable person we have come across while publishing BuzzFlash.

Somehow, he even manages to squeeze in a monthly book review for the Buzz, Thom Hartmann's "Independent Thinker Book of the Month."

And he has three children and a wife, who works with him.

So, how does he keep finding the time to author terrific books, with fascinating insights?

We don't know, but we're sure thankful that Thom is drinking his V-8 Juice, because "Screwed: The Undeclared War Against the Middle Class" is another impassioned, enlightened look at American society, this time focusing on the shrinking middle class.

While the radical GOP extremists have been diverting the attention of America's middle class with demagogic, divisive emotional "values" issues, the Republican Party has been picking their pockets, reducing their opportunities, and dismantling their support systems.

As the book illustrates, the rich are getting richer, the poor are getting poorer, and the middle class is getting screwed.

Hartmann always grounds his contemporary analysis in the context of the origins of our nation, our Constitution, and revolutionary history.

Do people or profits come first in our society?

Are we a nation that is interested in advancing the public good and interest of the many? Or are we an oligarchy, in which the many must sacrifice their futures for the benefit of a privileged few?

The latter sounds a lot like a monarchy, doesn't it?

And wasn't the American Revolution a result of the rule of an unjust, tyrannical monarchy?

From the Publisher:
"The American middle class is on its deathbed. Ordinary folks who put in a solid day's work can no longer afford to buy a house, send their kids to college, or even get sick. If you're not a CEO, you're probably screwed.
 
America wasn't meant to be like this. Air America Radio host Thom Hartmann shows that our Founding Fathers worked hard to ensure that a small group of wealthy people would never dominate this country-- they'd had enough of aristocracy. They put policies in place to ensure a thriving middle class. When the middle class took a hit, beginning in the post-Civil War Gilded Age and culminating in the Great Depression, democracy-loving leaders like Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, and Dwight Eisenhower revitalized it through initiatives like antitrust regulations, fair labor laws, the minimum wage, Social Security, and Medicare.
 
So what happened? In the last twenty-five years, we've witnessed an undeclared war against the middle class. The so-called conservatives waging this war are only interested in conserving--and steadily increasing--their own wealth and power. Hartmann shows how, under the guise of "freeing" the market, they've systematically dismantled the programs set up by Republicans and Democrats to protect the middle class and have installed policies that favor the superrich and corporations.
 
But it's not too late to return to the America our Founders envisioned. Hartmann outlines a series of commonsense proposals that will ensure that our public institutions are not turned into private fiefdoms and that people's basic needs--education, health care, a living wage--are met in a way that allows the middle class to expand, not shrink.
 
America will be stronger with a growing, prospering middle class-- rule by the rich will only make it weaker. Democracy requires a fair playing field, and it will survive only if We the People stand up, speak out, and reclaim our democratic birthright."
 

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"When a long train of abuses and usurpations [...] evinces a design
to reduce them [the people] under absolute despotism,
it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government."
- Thomas Jefferson, US Declaration of Independence