Obama has, in their opinion done superbly carrying out the plans well laid out for him by his backers. But the tech oligarchy — the people who run the five most capitalized firms on Wall Street — have a far less egalitarian vision. Our new economic overlords are not typical anti-tax billionaires in the traditional mode; they see government spending as a means of keeping the populist pitchforks away. Handouts, including housing subsidies, could guarantee for the next generation a future not of owned houses, but rented small, modest apartments. Washington flourished, but the people did not share in its wealth. Politicians prospered, but the jobs left and the factories closed. The establishment protected itself, but not the citizens of our country. Their victories have not been your victories. Their triumphs have not been your triumphs. Now, instead of a land of opportunity, California has become increasingly feudal. According to recent census estimates, the state suffers some of the highest levels of in the country. At the same time, the Golden State now suffers the highest level of poverty in the country—23. Like medieval serfs, increasing numbers of Californians are downwardly mobile, and doing worse than their parents: native born Latinos actually have shorter lifespans than their parents, according to one recent. Nor are things expected to get better any time soon. According to a recent Hoover Institution , most Californians expect their incomes to stagnate in the coming six months, a sense widely shared among the young, whites, Latinos, females, and the less educated. Where were the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Reserve, the Office of Thrift Supervision, and the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight as the mortgage bubble blew up in 2008, nearly taking the whole financial system with it and producing the worst economic bust since the Great Depression, which even today has sunk the labor-force participation rate and hiked the suicide rate among working-class men and women to record levels? All its parts still have their old names and appear to be carrying out their old functions. This transformation is not an evolution but a usurpation. Accordingly, he got Congress to create executive-branch administrative agencies, such as the Federal Trade Commission, to do the job. During the Great Depression, President Fran
