HOW TO BUILD A OLIGARCHY (AND DESTROY DEMOCRACY) FOR DUMMIES
Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Our New Oligarch Overlords
Once upon a time in America, we had this quaint little idea called "democracy"—you know, that adorable notion where regular people got a say in how things worked. One person, one vote. Government of, by, and for the people. All that Norman Rockwell stuff.
Then the billionaires said, "Hold my champagne."
The New Gilded Age: Now With More Yachts
Welcome to 2025, where America's oligarchy isn't a conspiracy theory—it's a business model. And business, my friends, is booming.
According to a recent Washington Post exposé (bless them for dropping the paywall), we're witnessing the systematic dismantling of American democracy by people who have more money than some countries' GDP. These aren't your grandfather's robber barons, though the family resemblance is uncanny. Today's billionaires have upgraded from oil and railroads to algorithms and tax loopholes, and they've got a much better PR team.
The Oligarch's Playbook: A Four-Step Program to Ruin Everything
Our modern plutocrats have perfected a strategy so elegant, so ruthlessly efficient, it deserves its own TED Talk (which, let's be honest, they'd probably fund):
Step 1: DEFUND
Starve public institutions of resources. Cut taxes on the wealthy. Lobby against funding. Watch the system gasp for air.
Step 2: DEGRADE
Point at the struggling system you just defunded and declare, "See? Government doesn't work!" Bonus points for hiring think tanks to produce studies proving your point.
Step 3: DEMONIZE
Blame teachers, public servants, "bureaucrats," and anyone who believes in, you know, public goods. Make them the villains in your libertarian fantasy novel.
Step 4: PRIVATIZE
Swoop in with your "innovative solution" (which looks suspiciously like a profit-extraction scheme). Collect government subsidies. Rinse. Repeat. Buy another yacht.
It's like a recipe, except instead of a delicious cake, you get the collapse of civil society.
Public Education: The Beta Test for Democracy Destruction
If you want to see this playbook in action, look no further than America's public schools, which have become the billionaires' favorite demolition project.
Jeff Yass—Pennsylvania's richest man and a guy who made billions through high-frequency trading (because nothing says "I understand education" like microsecond stock transactions)—has poured hundreds of millions into school voucher programs.
Bill Gates decided Common Core was a good idea, threw money at it, disrupted education nationwide, and then basically said "my bad" years later. The kids who suffered through it? Still waiting for their refund.
The Walton family (yes, the Walmart Waltons) has spent over $1 billion pushing charter schools and vouchers, apparently believing that the same business model that brought you rollback prices and union-busting should also run your kid's school.
Betsy DeVos literally bought herself a Cabinet position (her family donated over $200 million to Republicans) and spent four years trying to funnel public money to private and religious schools. When asked about school accountability, she looked like someone had asked her to explain quantum physics in Swahili.
The results? In study after study, voucher programs have either failed to improve student outcomes or actively made them worse, particularly for low-income students and students of color. But hey, at least someone's making money, right?
Citizens United: The Supreme Court Decision That Ate Democracy
Let's talk about the 2010 Citizens United ruling—the decision that essentially said, "You know what? Corporations are people, money is speech, and democracy is just a suggestion."
The numbers are staggering: In the 2022 midterm elections, the top 20 billionaire donors spent more money than the entire Democratic National Committee. Read that again. Twenty people. More than an entire national party apparatus.
Jeff Yass: $77 million (mostly to Republicans)
George Soros: $170 million (to Democrats)
The Adelson family: Hundreds of millions (to Republicans)
Michael Bloomberg: $250+ million (to Democrats)
It's not even an arms race anymore—it's a nuclear proliferation treaty, except nobody signed it and everyone's launching missiles.
Super PACs and dark money groups now spend billions with virtually no transparency. The "Sixteen Thirty Fund" and similar organizations have become black holes where money goes in and democracy comes out mangled. We literally don't know who's buying our elections because they've made it legal not to tell us.
The Supreme Court: Now Available for Rent
Speaking of institutions under assault, let's discuss the Supreme Court, which has gone from "impartial arbiter of constitutional law" to "billionaire donor appreciation society."
Justice Clarence Thomas has accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars in luxury travel, yacht trips, and real estate deals from billionaire Harlan Crow. When asked about disclosure, Thomas apparently thought "ethics rules" were more like "ethics suggestions."
Justice Samuel Alito has enjoyed similar largesse, including private jet trips and luxury fishing expeditions with billionaire donors who—purely coincidentally, I'm sure—have interests in cases before the Court.
The upcoming Moore v. United States case could potentially exempt billionaires from wealth taxes entirely. The same justices who've been vacationing on billionaire dimes will decide whether those billionaires should pay taxes. What could possibly go wrong?
Rewriting the Constitution, One Ruling at a Time
But the assault on democracy goes deeper than just buying elections and judges. There's a coordinated effort to fundamentally rewrite how America works through Supreme Court decisions:
- Gutting the Voting Rights Act (Shelby County v. Holder)
- Unlimited corporate political spending (Citizens United)
- Weakening unions (Janus v. AFSCME)
- Expanding religious exemptions (multiple cases)
- Limiting federal regulatory power (West Virginia v. EPA and others)
Each decision chips away at the democratic infrastructure built over decades. It's Constitutional revisionism by judicial fiat, funded by people who believe democracy is a market inefficiency.
Media Capture: When Billionaires Buy the Megaphone
Let's not forget media consolidation. When billionaires own the platforms where we get our information, they control the narrative:
- Elon Musk bought Twitter (sorry, "X") and turned it into his personal playground
- Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post
- Rupert Murdoch's empire spans Fox News and countless outlets
- Mark Zuckerberg controls Facebook/Meta, where billions get their "news"
They're not just influencing the conversation—they are the conversation. It's like playing Monopoly when one player already owns Boardwalk, Park Place, and the bank.
The Voting Rights Demolition Derby
While we're cataloging democratic destruction, let's not skip over the coordinated assault on voting itself:
- Voter ID laws that disproportionately affect poor and minority voters
- Purging voter rolls
- Closing polling places in specific neighborhoods
- Limiting early voting and mail-in ballots
- Gerrymandering so extreme it would make Elbridge Gerry himself blush
And who's funding much of this? Our friendly neighborhood billionaires and their dark money groups, naturally.
The Absurdist Theater of Billionaire Hubris
The sheer audacity of billionaire behavior has reached performance art levels:
- Elon Musk challenging Mark Zuckerberg to a cage fight (which, sadly, never happened)
- Musk being appointed to "streamline government" despite running companies known for chaos and labor violations
- Elizabeth Holmes convincing billionaires that she'd revolutionized blood testing (she hadn't)
- Jeffrey Epstein cultivating relationships with billionaires and power brokers (the less said, the better)
- Donald Trump claiming billionaire status while allegedly evading taxes and facing multiple fraud investigations
These aren't serious people solving serious problems. They're playing real-life SimCity with our actual lives, and they keep hitting the "disaster" button.
The China Comparison: At Least Someone's in Charge
Here's where it gets weird: In China's "socialism with Chinese characteristics," billionaires exist but serve at the pleasure of the Communist Party. Step out of line, and you might find yourself disappeared for a few months for "re-education."
Jack Ma criticized Chinese regulators and vanished from public view. The government torpedoed Ant Financial's IPO. Billionaires donate to "common prosperity" funds—not out of generosity, but because the alternative is worse.
It's authoritarian and problematic, but at least there's someone who can say "no" to billionaires. In America, we've apparently decided that's government overreach.
So What Do We Do? A Modest Proposal (That Won't Involve Eating Anyone)
The good news: We're not helpless. The better news: We actually know what works.
Campaign Finance Reform
- Pass the DISCLOSE Act: Make dark money visible
- Public financing of elections: Small-donor matching programs (6-to-1 matching for donations under $200)
- Close Super PAC loopholes: Ban coordination between campaigns and "independent" groups
- Constitutional amendment: Overturn Citizens United and establish that money ≠ speech
Supreme Court Ethics
- Mandatory disclosure of gifts and travel
- Strict recusal rules when donors have interests before the Court
- Term limits (18-year staggered terms)
- Enforceable ethics code with actual consequences
Tax Justice
- Wealth taxes on extreme fortunes
- Close carried interest and other loopholes
- Minimum billionaire tax (Biden proposed 25% on unrealized gains for those worth $100M+)
- Strengthen IRS enforcement for high-wealth individuals
Defend Public Education
- Full funding for public schools
- End or heavily regulate voucher programs that drain public resources
- Teacher-led reforms, not billionaire-led experiments
- Transparency requirements for all education funding
Antitrust Enforcement
- Break up tech monopolies (Google, Meta, Amazon)
- Strengthen FTC and DOJ antitrust divisions
- Prevent anti-competitive mergers
- Regulate platform power
Protect Voting Rights
- Restore the Voting Rights Act
- Automatic voter registration
- End gerrymandering through independent commissions
- Make Election Day a national holiday
The Resistance Is Real (And Often Hilarious)
The beautiful thing? People are fighting back with creativity, humor, and determination:
- Teachers' unions are organizing against privatization
- Diane Ravitch and education advocates are exposing billionaire reform failures
- Grassroots organizations are defending public institutions
- Investigative journalists are following the money
- Regular people are running for school boards, city councils, and state legislatures
Social media is full of people mocking billionaire absurdity. Memes about Musk's Twitter chaos. Jokes about Zuckerberg's metaverse obsession. TikToks explaining oligarchy to Gen Z. Humor is a weapon, and we're well-armed.
The Bottom Line
American democracy is under assault by people who have more money than most of us can conceptualize. They're rewriting the Constitution through captured courts, buying elections through unlimited spending, destroying public education through privatization schemes, controlling media narratives, and suppressing votes—all while paying lower tax rates than their secretaries.
It's not a conspiracy. It's not hidden. The Washington Post literally wrote about it (and dropped the paywall so everyone could read it). How billionaires took over American politics https://wapo.st/3MrZgoo
We're living through the making of an American oligarchy in real-time. The question is: What are we going to do about it?
Because here's the thing about oligarchies: They only work if the rest of us let them. Democracy isn't a spectator sport. It's a participation requirement.
So participate. Vote. Organize. Donate to candidates who support reform. Join your local school board meeting. Support public institutions. Call out billionaire BS when you see it. Make noise. Be ungovernable.
The billionaires are counting on us being too tired, too distracted, too cynical to fight back.
Let's prove them wrong.
"We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both." —Louis Brandeis, Supreme Court Justice (1916-1939)
Turns out, he was right. And we're running out of time to choose.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go check if my public library is still publicly owned or if Jeff Bezos bought it while I was writing this.
For more information on defending democracy and public education, support organizations like the Network for Public Education, Common Cause, Public Citizen, and your local teachers' union. They're doing the actual work while billionaires are doing... whatever it is billionaires do on their third yacht.
How billionaires took over American politics https://wapo.st/3MrZgoo
Billionaires Are Undermining Public Education in America https://janresseger.wordpress.com/2025/12/11/billionaires-are-undermining-public-education-in-america/ via @janresseger
Jeff Yass, the Billionaire Who Funds Vouchers | Diane Ravitch's blog https://dianeravitch.net/2025/12/11/jeff-yass-the-billiionaire-who-funds-vouchers/
