The Hidden History of American Oligar..., Thom Hartmann
The Hidden History of American Oligar..., Thom Hartmann
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The Hidden History of American Oligarchy
Reclaiming Our Democracy from the Ruling Class

Author: Thom Hartmann

Narrator: Sean Pratt

Unabridged: 4 hr 31 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Ascent Audio

Published: 02/01/2021


Synopsis

Thom Hartmann, the most popular progressive radio host in America and a New York Times bestselling author, looks at the history of the battle against oligarchy in America-and how we can win the latest round.

The history of America (and of all democracies) catalogues the dynamic tension between democracy and oligarchy. Oligarchy usually has the power and the resources, and for this reason democracy has had limited success historically. The most important "stabilizer" that a democracy can build into its own system is one that prevents an oligarchy from taking over-which was an original purpose of the Constitution.

Thom Hartmann traces the history of the struggle between oligarchy and democracy, from America's founding revolt against British aristocracy to the United States' war with the feudal Confederacy to President Franklin Roosevelt's struggle against "economic royalists," who wanted to block the New Deal. In each of those cases the oligarchs lost the battle. But with increasing right-wing control of the media, unlimited campaign contributions, and a conservative takeover of the judicial system, we're at a crisis point as real and critical as those we hit in 1776, 1861, and 1932. Thankfully, Hartmann lays out practical measures we can take to break up media monopolies, limit the influence of money in politics, and return control of America to We the People.

About Thom Hartmann

Thom Hartmann is the four-time Project Censored Award-winning, New York Times bestselling author of twenty-five books currently in print in over a dozen languages on five continents. Hartmann is also an internationally known speaker on culture and communications, an author, and an innovator in the fields of psychiatry, ecology, and economics.

The cofounder (with his wife, Louise) and former Executive Director of The New England Salem Children's Village (1978) and The Hunter School (1997), he has led national innovations in the areas of residential treatment for abused children and private/public education for learning-disabled children.

He has helped set up hospitals, famine relief programs, schools, and refugee centers in India, Uganda, Australia, Colombia, Russia, and the United States through the German-based Salem International program. Formerly rostered with the State of Vermont as a psychotherapist, founder of The Michigan Healing Arts Center, and licensed as an NLP Trainer by Richard Bandler (who wrote the foreword to one of Thom's books), he was the originator of the revolutionary "Hunter/Farmer Hypothesis" to understand the psychiatric condition known as Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD).

A guest faculty member at Goddard College in Vermont, he also synthesized the "Younger/Older Culture model" for describing the underpinnings-and possible solutions-to the world's ecological and socio-political crises, suggesting that many of our problems are grounded in cultural "stories" which go back thousands of years.

Leonardo DiCaprio was inspired by Thom's book The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight to make the movie "The 11th Hour" (in which Thom appears), and a series of environmental videos narrated by Hartmann and DiCaprio, available at Green World Rising.

Talkers Magazine named Thom Hartmann as the most important progressive talk show host in America for the past decade, and for three of the past five years the #1 most important progressive host, in their "Heavy Hundred" ranking. His radio show is syndicated on for-profit radio stations nationwide by WYD Media, on non-profit and community stations nationwide by Pacifica, across the entire North American continent on SiriusXM Satellite radio, on cable systems nationwide by Cable Radio Network (CRN) and Free Speech TV, on its own YouTube channel, via subscription podcasts, worldwide through the US American Forces Network, and through the Thom Hartmann App in the App Store. The radio show is also simulcast as TV in realtime into nearly 60 million US and Canadian homes by the Free Speech TV Network on Dish Network, DirectTV, and cable TV systems nationwide.

As an entrepreneur, he's founded several successful businesses which still are operating, and lived and worked with his wife, Louise, and their three (now adult) children on several continents.

He was born and grew up in Michigan, and retains strong ties to the Midwest, although he and Louise have lived in New Hampshire, Vermont, Georgia, Germany, Washington DC, and Oregon.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Zeb on December 24, 2020

So what we have here is the truth, free of the rhetoric of the Far Right and the Trumpkins. The biggest thing that the Right has created under Trump is the idea that the "Liberals" are BAD people and want to take away everyone's rights. So while Trump rails against the Dems wanting to take away thei......more

Goodreads review by S on August 27, 2021

MUST READ.......more

Goodreads review by Seajay on September 29, 2024

Everyone who can read should read this. We're at a tipping point in the US when, if we're not vigilant, we will succumb to tyranny, the kind that now exists in Russia, Hungary, and Venezuela, and once existed in Nazi Germany. Do almost half of this country's citizens want that? If not, they need to......more

Goodreads review by Helen on July 18, 2022

This book examines American history from the perspective that it has been shaped by a constant struggle against an oligarchic ruling class, which is always trying to increase its money and power at the expense of the working class, but which also recurrently experiences defeats, especially at key tu......more

Goodreads review by Kim on January 18, 2022

4.5 stars! This is a book I think every American should read. For those with little interest, I would recommend that at the very least you read just the last two sections - Part 5 and Part 6. We are in very real danger of losing our democracy, but most of us are just too busy living our lives to not......more