"The Corporation" Reaction Essay

The movie "The Corporation" made me realize a few things about capitalism. It seems that when it comes to a capitalist economy, you're either for it or against it, there is no gray area. Therefore, if you are not a capitalist, that makes you a communist. If there's one thing most people agree that Americans should hate, it's communism, but why? Is it the fact that the people have no say in the government? Could it be that without any form of competition in the marketplace, the system is bound to collapse? Those would be some good guesses, because in America, everyone is free to reach the top, so long as they work hard and never give up. Just look at our new President, Barack Obama.

President Obama started with humble beginnings, his father was a Kenyan exchange student and his mother came from a working class family in Kansas. HIs father abandoned him at the age of two and only saw him once before first losing his legs in one car accident and his life in the second. Obama had a very difficult childhood, his mother re-married and moved to Indonesia, though her new husband was an alcoholic and abusive. I learned these facts from Obama's book, Dreams From My Father, and I've come to realize how much I actually have in common with our commander in chief. My father also abandoned me at a young age. Although I had a relatively stable childhood, my mother became involved with an abusive alcoholic after divorcing my step-father after twelve years of marriage. Like Obama I have had humble beginnings, yet I am now at a point in my life where my future has never looked brighter. Perhaps this is because my troubled past is for the most part behind me, but I believe it is also because of the opportunity that I have been afforded by governmental policies that have allowed me to live comfortably while I work for my education. Obama has stated that student loans and grants made it possible for him to get a good education, which ultimately has led to him becoming the first African-American president in the history of the United States. That's no easy feat, and if I'm going to have any hope of rivaling his achievements I'm going to have to do a lot more than become President, after all I am a white male, it can't be that hard, despite the fact that I've inhaled on several occasions.

What I'm trying to explain here is that we don't live in a country with perfect equality, and we probably never will, but we can level the playing field. The truth is we don't have a true capitalist economy, we have a oligarchy, a rich minority who control virtually everything from the military to the media. You might be surprised to know that this is the exact same system in place in China, a communist country. We have been communists ever since 1913 when we went off the gold standard and created the Federal Reserve. Our money is based on faith in the government instead of a tangible currency. We receive vouchers for working in the large communes of office buildings and other businesses. Granted, we have a little more freedom, but with our dwindling resources, we don't have much time left to celebrate that fact. Soon enough we may be rounded up into work camps without pay so that The Corporation can make a profit. When you look at it that way, you realize the US and China are the best of friends, at least their governments are, because they have the same goal, the enslavement of the human race. I just pray that Obama is who he claims to be, that the system hasn't corrupted him like the others. He is the only hope we have, we are in the 11th hour, if he fails, we are all going down with him. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Rush Limbaugh.