Who's afraid of the oligarchs?

It's the ruling class we should fear.

Just before leaving office, President Joe Biden, in his farewell address, warned that “an oligarchy is taking shape in America.” He should know; some of them just pushed him out of his own party, but apparently those weren't the oligarchs he was talking about.

Bernie Sanders too, warned after the 2024 election, “We are moving rapidly into an oligarchic form of society.” But Sanders has been saying this for a long time. And he wasn't warning us. He said they were already here! As far back as 1989, he declared the United States was now “controlled” by “an economic oligarchy,” and he was talking about both parties.¹

In 1989, Bernie Sanders declared the United States “controlled” by “an economic oligarchy,” and he was talking about both parties.

So why are we supposed to suddenly be shocked and horrified about Elon Musk and the other billionaires that Trump is surrounded by? Musk is described by pundits, not just as the richest, but now he's the most powerful man on earth. I might trust the media with measuring wealth, but they don’t seem to know much about power. If Musk, Bezos, and Zuckerberg were all so powerful, why are they all lining up to kiss Trump's ass?

To quote the now disgraced but not discredited Frank Underwood in House of Cards “Money is the McMansion…that starts falling apart after 10 years. Power is the old stone building that stands for centuries.

Puckerup! If Musk, Bezos, and Zuckerberg were all so powerful, why are they all lining up to kiss Trump's ass?

Don't get me wrong, billionaires are bad and they are dangerous. They are a menace to society, and they are wreaking havoc across the earth. But so are the millionaires (perhaps with less drama) that were in the Biden and Obama administrations, and, even more destructive, are the billionaire and many more millionaire donors that today dominate and continue to corrupt the establishment wing of both political parties.

And there aren't that many oligarchs in the Trump cabinet anyway. ABC News says its “an unprecedented 13 billionaires,”² but by my count, there is one, maybe two full billionaires and two almost or barely billionaires (Musk, who is not in the cabinet, is another story³). Most of the other very wealthy people are getting ambassadorships, which—as disgusting as it is—is par for the course in all modern administrations—just look at the New Jersey governor, a millionaire bundler for the Democrats with no diplomatic experience, appointed ambassador to Germany by Obama. I’m not sure what makes a billionaire worse than a multi-millionaire.

Billionaires versus millionaires

Frankly, I'm far less worried about one-time billionaire Steve Witkoff, who bulldozed Netanyahu into brokering a ceasefire in Gaza, than I am about the lunatic non-billionaire Mike Huckabee (now a millionaire from his Fox News infomercials), who Trump appointed ambassador to Israel and whose daughter (the Arkansas governor) is backed by the multi-billionaire Walton family that spends hundreds of millions to privatize public education in her state.

I am worried about what Linda McMahon, the spouse of a billionaire, is going to do to the Department of Education (just as I worried about the damage billionaire Betsy DeVos, would do). But Obama picked a pro-charter school employee of a hedge fund, Arne Duncan, to run his education department. Duncan, now rich himself, is deeply involved with the Emerson Collective⁴, a rats-nest of billionaire Democratic donors (Including Bill Gates, Mike Bloomberg, Eric Schmidt, and Steve Jobs's widow Laurene Powell Jobs, who leads the group) who want to “disrupt” public education with more charter schools and other for-profit privatization schemes.

I am worried about what damage billionaire former governor Doug Burgum might do to our already degraded environment as Secretary of the Interior. But I’m more worried about Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the bootlicker of two pro-war and fanatically pro-Israel billionaires⁵ who have been bankrolling him for over a decade.

The mortals, the gods, and the giants

So far, Trump seems able to dominate, or at least control, his billionaires in a way I've not seen Democrats stand up to their donors. Part of the reason may be that the oligarchs don't like each other—some hate each other. Many have conflicting business interests, but some are just so naive, childish, selfish, and egotistical that they are easy to manipulate. Some, Trump has just sidelined or ignored. Heard anything from Charles Koch lately? He's about as irrelevant as his dead brother David. At almost 90 years old, he’s waiting out the Trump years with the other Trump-hating right-wing billionaires at the Cato Institute.

Heard anything from Charles Koch lately? He's about as irrelevant as his dead brother David. At almost 90 years old, he’s waiting out the Trump years with the other Trump-hating right-wing billionaires at the Cato Institute.

So, while these billionaires are dangerous, they are also chaotic and often at war with themselves. Trump has not unified them; he has divided them (he has emasculated and humiliated some of them). They are more like the dysfunctional family of gods on Mount Olympus—decadent, greedy, menacing, and threatening but shambolic.

The Battle between the Gods and the Giants, 1608, Joachim Antonisz Wtewael. The oligarchs are more like the dysfunctional family of gods on Mount Olympus—decadent, greedy, menacing, and threatening but shambolic.

The rupture of the ruling class