But "no one" cares because oligarchy is becoming "normalized" in the U.S. The super-wealthy have no reason to conspire in these matters - at least when they do conspire they have no need to do it in secret - because for the last 25 years or so we have lived in a de facto oligarchy that is slowly becoming a de jure oligarchy. Sure they conspire, they get together and plan what they want for the future and then they announce it to the New York Times. They even announce their bribes - what senators and congressmen they have bought and sold. They have bought and sold whole state legislatures to get the laws they want past. The credit card companies wrote the laws that essentially abolished usury and then they wrote the new bankruptcy laws, then they simply past the law along to the senators and congressmen that they have in their pockects and the law was past. As J.B. Bullworth would have said, "Obscenity! That's the real obscenity." In the United States this obscenity is called politics. Bribery is about as open here as it was in the last 100 years of the Roman Republic.
Another example of this kind commonwealth of obscenity, open "conspiracy if you will, is the abolishment of the "Rule Against Perpetuities" in some states.
For a long time, in fact since the birth of capitalist property forms - it was considered a sine qua non of various kinds of property law that wealth could not be granted through wills and trusts in perpetuity. Thus a single super rich person could not establish a trust or write a will to pass property on for dozens of generations. This was the meaning of the famous "Rule Against Perpetuities" (RAP), the bane of all first year law students:
"No future interest is valid unless it can be shown that it will necessarily vest, if at all, no later than 21 years after some life in being at the creation of the interest."
What has not been noticed is that a number of state legislatures, legislatures that have essentially been bought by billionaires, have been engaged in a race to the bottom, a race similar to what created Delaware corporations law. The race is to abolish the RAP for the benefit of the super rich, and only for their benefit. Thus now days if you establish a trust in Alaska it can last for generation upon generation, potentially freezing property and wealth in one family for hundreds of years. There has been nothing like this in Anglo-American property law since the age of feudal property forms.
All of this was done out in the open, much like the establishment of corporations law, by legal bribery, open "conspiracy", but no secret. So who besides trust and estates attorneys, knows about this?
Jerry Monaco
On 4/26/06, Michael Pollak <mpollak at panix.com> wrote:
>
>
> [Heads up via Sam Smith's Undernews. The full report is at:
> http://www.citizen.org/documents/EstateTaxFinal.pdf]
>
> 18 HYPER-RICH FAMILIES BEHIND ESTATE TAX REPEAL
>
> The multimillion-dollar lobbying effort to repeal the federal estate tax
> has
> been aggressively led by 18 super-wealthy families, according to a report
> by
> Public Citizen and United for a Fair Economy. The report reveals how 18
> families worth a total of $185.5 billion have financed and coordinated a
> 10-year effort to repeal the estate tax, a move that would collectively
> net
> them a windfall of $71.6 billion.
>
> The report profiles the families and their businesses, which include the
> families behind Wal-Mart, Gallo wine, Campbell's soup, and Mars Inc.,
> maker
> of M&Ms. Collectively, the list includes the first- and third-largest
> privately held companies in the United States, the richest family in
> Alabama
> and the world's largest retailer.
>
> These families have sought to keep their activities anonymous by using
> associations to represent them and by forming a massive coalition of
> business and trade associations dedicated to pushing for estate tax
> repeal.
> The report details the groups they have hidden behind -- the trade
> associations they have used, the lobbyists they have hired, and the
> anti-estate tax political action committees, 527s and organizations to
> which
> they have donated heavily.
>
> In a massive public relations campaign, the families have also misled the
> country by giving the mistaken impression that the estate tax affects most
> Americans. In particular, they have used small businesses and family farms
> as poster children for repeal, saying that the estate tax destroys both of
> these groups. But less than one-third of one percent of all estates will
> owe any estate taxes in 2006.
>
> "This report exposes one of the biggest con jobs in recent history," said
> Joan Claybrook, president of Public Citizen. "This long-running, secretive
> campaign funded by some of the country's wealthiest families has relied on
> deception to bamboozle the public not only about who must pay the estate
> tax, but about how repealing it will affect the country."
>
> These super-rich families have relied on their fortunes, the resources of
> their companies and their business connections to marshal a massive
> anti-estate tax jufernaut that has reported nearly a half-billion dollars
> in
> lobbying expenditures ($490.3) since 1998.
>
> The stakes of the campaign are high. If the families' repeal bid
> succeeds,
> they stand to gain $71.6 billion -- and it will cost the U.S. Treasury
> about
> a trillion dollars in the first decade.
>
> Full Report at: http://www.citizen.org/documents/EstateTaxFinal.pdf
>
> ___________________________________
> http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
>
-- Jerry Monaco's Philosophy, Politics, Culture Weblog is Shandean Postscripts to Politics, Philosophy, and Culture http://monacojerry.livejournal.com/
His fiction, poetry, weblog is Hopeful Monsters: Fiction, Poetry, Memories http://www.livejournal.com/users/jerrymonaco/
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