THE 25-YEAR HIDDEN WAR AGAINST THE BILLIONAIRE OLIGARCHY
For some of you, the battle against the billionaire oligarchy began with the orange-hued chaos that was Donald J. Trump. You strapped on your metaphorical armor, sharpened your Twitter swords, and declared yourselves warriors for justice. But for those of us who have been in the trenches for decades, fighting for public education against a cabal of billionaires intent on turning our schools into their personal ATM machines, we’d like to say: “Welcome to the party, pal.” You’re late, but we’ve saved you a seat.
This is not a new war. This is not even a recent war. This is a generational war. For over 25 years, parents, teachers, unions, and activists have been waging a David-versus-Goliath struggle against some of the richest people on Earth who are hell-bent on dismantling public education. And trust me, these billionaires aren’t doing it out of some misguided sense of charity. They’re doing it because they see dollar signs where we see classrooms.
Act I: The Rise of the Billionaire Reformers
Let’s start with the players in this twisted drama. On one side, we have the billionaire oligarchs: Bill Gates, the Koch brothers (rest in peace, I guess?), Laurene Powell Jobs, Michael Bloomberg, Elon Musk, Betsy DeVos, and the Walton family, among others. These folks have more money than most small countries and about as much accountability. They’ve poured their fortunes into “education reform,” which is billionaire-speak for “privatize everything and make a buck while doing it.”
On the other side, we have the scrappy underdogs: teachers’ unions like the National Education Association (NEA) and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), parent groups, bloggers, activists, and organizations like the Network for Public Education and the Badass Teachers Association (yes, that’s their real name, and yes, they’re as awesome as they sound). These are people who believe in public education as a cornerstone of democracy. They believe every child deserves a quality education, not just the ones whose parents can afford private school tuition or who win a lottery spot in a charter school.
Act II: The Four-Step Dance of Destruction
The billionaire oligarchs didn’t just wake up one day and decide to destroy public education on a whim. No, they have a playbook—a slick little four-step strategy that has been devastatingly effective. Let’s break it down:
Step 1: Defund – Starve the Beast
First, they cut funding to public schools. They lobby state legislatures to slash budgets under the guise of “fiscal responsibility.” They divert taxpayer dollars to charter schools and voucher programs. Then they sit back and watch as public schools struggle with overcrowded classrooms, outdated textbooks, and crumbling buildings.
Step 2: Degrade – When Failure Is a Feature, Not a Bug
Once public schools are starved of resources, they inevitably begin to falter. But instead of acknowledging that underfunding might be the problem (because duh), the oligarchs point to these failures as proof that public education is inherently broken. It’s like breaking someone’s legs and then blaming them for not winning a marathon.
Step 3: Demonize – Blame the Little Guy
Next comes the scapegoating. Teachers are painted as lazy union thugs who care more about job security than educating kids. Parents are accused of being apathetic or uninvolved. Students are labeled as undisciplined or unmotivated. This step is crucial because it shifts blame away from the billionaires pulling the strings and onto the people actually trying to make the system work despite impossible odds.
Step 4: Dismantle – Privatization Nation
Finally, they swoop in with their so-called solutions: charter schools, standardized testing, ed-tech products, and AI-driven learning platforms. These solutions conveniently funnel public money into private hands while eroding democratic control over education. And just like that, public education is no longer a public good—it’s a commodity.
Act III: The Heroes We Don’t Deserve (But Desperately Need)
Despite their overwhelming wealth and influence, the billionaires have not gone unchallenged. For every Gates-funded initiative to push Common Core or Zuckerberg-backed ed-tech experiment gone awry, there has been a Diane Ravitch or Randi Weingarten pushing back. These warriors have fought tirelessly to expose the lies behind education reform and to defend public schools from privatization vultures.
Diane Ravitch, once a supporter of charter schools and standardized testing, had an epiphany and became one of the most vocal critics of corporate-driven education reform. Her books and blog posts are required reading for anyone who wants to understand what’s at stake in this fight.
Teachers’ unions have also been on the front lines, organizing strikes and protests to demand better funding for schools and fair treatment for educators. Remember when West Virginia teachers shut down schools across the state in 2018 until lawmakers agreed to their demands? That was nothing short of heroic.
And let’s not forget the parents who show up to school board meetings armed with facts and fury, or the bloggers who spend their evenings dissecting policy proposals and exposing corruption. These are ordinary people doing extraordinary things because they believe in the power of public education to transform lives and strengthen communities.
Act IV: The New Frontiers of Disruption
Just when you think you’ve got a handle on the battlefield, the billionaires pivot to new tactics. In recent years, they’ve shifted their focus from charter schools to ed-tech and artificial intelligence (AI). Laurene Powell Jobs’s Emerson Collective is investing heavily in these areas, as are Gates and Zuckerberg. They promise that technology will revolutionize learning—but at what cost?
Critics argue that these tech-driven solutions prioritize profits over pedagogy. They erode teacher autonomy by turning educators into glorified babysitters for algorithm-driven platforms. They increase surveillance of students and teachers under the guise of “data collection.” And they undermine democratic control by outsourcing educational decisions to tech companies that answer only to their shareholders.
Act V: The Fight Continues
So where do we go from here? How do we fight back against an enemy with seemingly limitless resources? The answer lies in collective action. We need progressive taxation to ensure billionaires pay their fair share. We need strong unions to advocate for workers’ rights and public goods. We need policies that ban predatory privatization schemes and hold corporations accountable for their actions.
But most importantly, we need to change the narrative. Public education is not failing—it’s being sabotaged. Teachers are not villains—they’re heroes doing their best under impossible circumstances. And billionaires are not saviors—they’re opportunists exploiting a system they helped break in the first place.
Epilogue: A Call to Arms (and Bake Sales)
For those of you who are just joining this fight: welcome aboard. We need you now more than ever. Bring your energy, your passion, and yes, your bake sale skills (because God knows we’ll need them). This war isn’t over—not by a long shot—but together, we can turn the tide.
The billionaire oligarchy may have money on their side, but we have something far more powerful: people who care deeply about their communities and believe in the promise of public education. And if history has taught us anything, it’s that even Goliath can be brought down with enough well-aimed stones—or in this case, well-organized strikes and well-argued blog posts.
So let’s get to it. The future of public education—and democracy itself—depends on us.
Big Education Ape: DOGE, BILLIONAIRES, AND THE FOUR-STEP DANCE OF DISMANTLING DEMOCRACY https://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2025/03/doge-billionaires-and-four-step-dance.html
Billionaires Who Aim to “Disrupt” Education May Get a Chance Even If Trump Loses | Truthout https://truthout.org/articles/billionaires-who-aim-to-disrupt-education-may-get-a-chance-even-if-trump-loses/
Billionaires Pave the Way for Trump’s Federal Vouchers in the School Privatization Movement https://coloradotimesrecorder.com/2025/03/billionaires-pave-the-way-for-trumps-federal-vouchers-in-the-school-privatization-movement/68057/
