Class Warfare Nothing New in America: Jim Hightower

Monday, March 16, 2009
Federal troops attack Bonus Marchers, July 28, 1932

One of the ways that Republicans have been attacking President Obama’s budget is by saying that it represents “class warfare.” Republican columnist David Brooks wrote that, according to Obama, “no new burdens will fall on 95 percent of the American people” and that “All the costs will be borne by the rich and all benefits redistributed downward.” Columnist Jim Hightower points out that the United States actually has a long history of class warfare, including such incidents as Shay’s Rebellion against foreclosures and debtors’ prisons (1786-1787), the Homestead Strike (1892), Coxey’s Army of unemployed workers (1894), and the Bonus Army of veterans (1932). Hightower implies that the real class warfare has been waged for the last 30 years by the rich against everyone else, and that Republicans only complain when wealth is distributed from the bottom up instead of from the top down.

 
Fighting Back in America’s 30-Year Class War (by Jim Hightower, Creators Syndicate)
A Moderate Manifesto (by David Brooks, New York Times)

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