Democracy Dies For Billionaires

Our corporate media, run by billionaires, are abdicating their duty and fidelity to democracy by proactively bending the knee to Trump and his dictatorial ambitions. The people must resist.

In his now-famous book On Tyranny, historian and expert on authoritarianism Timothy Snyder told Americans that the first rule in combatting tyrants is “Don’t Obey in Advance.”

Corporate media didn’t get around to reading the slim book.

(Photos by Al Drago/Bloomberg; Mark Lenin/AP; Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

In the same week we learned that twice-impeached criminal Donald Trump praised Hitler and was called a fascist by his former chief of staff, retired 4 star general John Kelly, The Washington Post and The L.A. Times have decided to bend both knees. Neither will endorse Kamala Harris.

The Post is owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos who picked former Rupert Murdoch lackey Will Lewis as the new publisher and CEO of the historic outlet that broke the Watergate scandal and published the Pentagon Papers. An endorsement was written, but one of these two, or both, made the call to spike it. We can’t upset a man who promises to be a “dictator for a day” to thwart lucrative government contracts!

Over at the L.A. Times, Patrick Soon-Shiong, the multi-millionaire businessman and investor who bought the paper for $500 million in 2018, decided to spike the editorial endorsement for Kamala Harris. Again, why get in the way of potentially lucrative contracts that Donald Trump could spike if he were to win and assume dictatorial powers, am I right? It’s not like Trump has been proven to be vindictive, craven, cruel, and disloyal. It’s not like he betrayed his own Vice President Mike Pence and threw him to his violent MAGA brownshirts simply for doing his job to certify the election and not participate in Trump’s failed insurrection. Surely, this will bode well for everyone, especially journalists, the economy, and our fractured democracy!

Oh, look! He just said he wants to do mass arrests for his critics.

Speaking of petty billionaires with man boobs, the WSJ had a chilling piece on Elon Musk’s relationship with Putin, whom he has regularly contacted since late 2022. Musk, who regularly elevates and promotes white supremacist content on X, which oh by the way he owns, is the “linchpin of U.S. space efforts” and has security clearance that allows him access to classified information. Allegedly, Putin asked the Apartheid affirmative action billionaire to avoid activating his Starlink service over Taiwan as a favor to China’s leader Xi Jinping. During this election season, Musk has poured millions of his own money to help Donald Trump get elected. He has resumed his “buying votes for Trump” scheme to give away a million dollars to potential voters despite being “warned” by the Department of Justice.

Oh, that’s lovely. A warning. Nice.

One would assume, at the very least, Musk should lose his security clearance or potentially be investigated, but we are cursed with human sloth Attorney General Merrick Garland and our Department of Justice that favors the appearance of neutrality instead of vigorously pursuing justice.

The stakes of this election could not be clearer.

Our corporate media will not save us. Our billionaires will not save us. Our institutions, for the most part, will not save us. It’s up to us, a multi-racial community of the willing to unite and exercise our vote and defeat Trump and MAGA at the ballot box. There are no both sides in this. None of us should cede a single space to fascists and Nazis. Take them on anywhere and everywhere, today, tomorrow, and forever.

If you agree with me, please do support independent voices and outlets. Please consider becoming a paying reader of The Left Hook and subscribing to our Democracy-Ish show I co-host with Danielle Moodie. We unpack all of this in this week’s episode.

I have kept every post free. (No paywalls!) Yes, I might be a terrible capitalist, but what can I say, I’m a sucker for freedom and will take on fascists until the end.

Please join me. Onward.