Billionaires Are Running America. Ain’t Good!

BY LOUIE OVERSTREET

The pending catastrophe is of our own making. We have become an alphabet of mess-ups. Are you asking yourself, “What is my boy Louie talking about?” Well, here are my answers in letters. 

A dear friend of more than sixty years, Huey Ball, called me to argue that it was not good for America to have people blessed with extreme wealth running things. 

Yes, is the answer, if you are wondering, whenever our friends saw us together, they would ask, “Huey and Louie, where is Dewey?” Be that as it may, his argument caused me to get a copy of “The Trouble with Billionaires,” by Linda McQuaig and Neil Brooks. After reading the book and Dave Darby’s piece, “What’s Wrong with Billionaires?” one could conclude that what billionaires want is absolutely, exactly everything.” 

If my conclusion is correct, then the problem is only going to get worse. In 2024, there were 813 billionaires in America and in 2025 there are 902. All while a staggering 38 million Americans live in poverty. 

Unlike most people blessed with superior aptitude in athletics, language, the performing arts, and the sciences — who are not only able to personally benefit, but are also capable of helping and bringing enjoyment to others — the ability to make vast sums of money is most often associated with greed and power to control or influence. I’m aware of few exceptions. 

The harm comes when they use greed and power to impact public and democratic processes in ways that bring destruction to the economy, jobs, communities, nature, and democracy itself. Billionaires’ power to influence groupthink allows them to blame others, allege that they pay vast amounts in taxes, and claim they worked hard to obtain their wealth — which infers that poor folks don’t want to work hard to get ahead. 

To prove my point, here are two closing thoughts: 

1. The greatest examples of the harm caused by billionaires are Elon Musk and the other 901 American billionaires about to enjoy more tax benefits contained in the Big Beautiful Bill signed on July 4, 2025. 

2. “Poverty exists not because we cannot feed the poor, but because we can’t satisfy the rich.” 

I rest my case!