Crazy Money

By Judith Gayle | Political Waves

Some things stretch credulity so far that they’re in danger of snapping the delusional rubber band that too often serves as the American brain stem. How many believe, for instance, that a semi-conscious Michael Jackson, zonked to the gills on a cocktail of pharmaceuticals and wafting in propofol-induced twilight sleep, waited for his doctor to leave the room and then gave himself another, and fatal, dose? Doesn’t it take an almost mystical suspension of disbelief to consider a man so comatose capable of helping himself to another vial of moon-juice and a one-way ticket to the Big Tree House in the Sky? And shouldn’t we ponder, for even a moment, the accused Dr. Conrad Murray’s plea of innocence? But when a man receives a salary of $150,000 a month, is it terribly cynical to think he wasn’t hired to pass out Tylenol?

OK, here’s another. How many believe that Charlie Sheen, sardonic second-generation actor and drug-addled bad boy, deserved forty million bucks for last season’s body of work? Despite not finishing the requisite episodes of his popular sitcom, Two Men and a Boy, Charlie received more money than any other actor on television for, apparently, portraying himself. What does this say about the American television viewer? How did a semi-sadistic, blow-snorting, wife-beating, hooker-dependent, drug-induced sociopath become one of America’s beloved role models? Ahhhh, but his personal life captured the angst and anger of this period, some will argue: Charlie is “edgy.” Piffle! Charlie is perpetually tweaked and in complete defiance of the expectations of those who love and depend on him, except for an audience completely mesmerized with his fall from grace. If and when Charlie seriously decides to address his dependency issues, his amends list will travel with him into his next incarnation.

I find nothing exotic or intriguing about Charlie Sheen putting a good portion of his salary up his nose to accommodate his gargantuan habit, or Michael Jackson’s attempt to medicate his way out of rotten childhood memories, oblivious to the unspeakable trauma he caused his own children. In fact, I think similar American stories can be found, a dime a dozen, in any local prison of your choice. Without lucky breaks, family connections and fat check books, Charlie could be living in a cardboard box under an overpass somewhere and Mike’s preoccupation with children might have earned him a hellish life, and/or early death, in lock-up.

I suppose if we push back the simplistic appeal of celebrity worship and the darker pleasures of watching someone else’s life implode, we might say that both of these people took themselves to extremes on the waves of the outrageous money each commanded. That is worth a closer look, especially when old folks are doing without meds, dispossessed families are taking up residence in their vehicles, and millions of American children are living in poverty and squalor. The amounts of money paid to these people for their talent is more than excessive.  The demons that seized these artists were not caused by money, but were certainly compounded by it.

If money is power, some have too much of it. Sometimes crazy money is too much of a good thing. Like using a bullhorn in a crowd, following the money amplifies the picture of what is being corrupted and allows us to zero in on cause rather than symptom. We can follow crazy money to Wall Street, where they will (quietly and carefully) celebrate banner profits this year and pay individual bonuses into the multi-millions, while the rest of the country suffers from want, and the fear of it. Something is terribly wrong with our value system, don’t you think? Children go to bed hungry while CEOs laugh all the way to the Caymans? We aren’t talking about mere profit anymore; we’re talking about spoils stolen by rogue capitalism consuming an unsuspecting host. We’re talking about the spoils of a class war against the American public.

This week the Republicans filibustered Obama’s jobs bill. No jobs for America, then, unless the EPA is gutted and corporate taxes are lowered and the beloved market is given full reign to create jobs (in some country other than our own). Rick Perry has suggested a jobs program that will begin with Drill Baby Drill and proceed from there. Radical, you say? Robert Reich reports that David Frum, moderate conservative and ex-speech writer for George W. Bush, quit representing the right on public radio because he wasn’t radical enough. Said Frum, “Under the pressure of the current crisis — intoxicated by anti-Obama feelings and incited by talk radio and Fox — Republicans have staked out an extreme position on the role of government.” There is no longer any pretense that the Republican party is working for the public good. They have radicalized as the Corporate party, much as the Dems have become an extension of moderate Establishment politics. Both are configured to run on big money, one more than the other.

To me, this battle for more-more-more money isn’t just ill-advised, it ain’t “all that.” Food, air, love? Necessary. Money? Not so much, at least not by the barrel full. Clearly, all the money in the world couldn’t protect Jackson or Sheen from trying to destroy themselves. These two celebs and scads of other movers and shakers seem never to pony up as heavy a price for their foibles as, say, the average struggling, largely resourceless Joe or Jane. Money and privilege provide a cushion against paying heavy penalties for bad behavior.

An echo from the Gilded Age, such class distinction was true over a century ago, kept a low profile for several egalitarian decades, and has now made a fashionable comeback among those who think they have the ear of big money and favor of big power. Too powerful for game-playing, the one tenth of one percent who own the world would surely agree that wealth provides an unfair advantage, does very little to inhibit egocentric and selfish behavior, and in fact seems to encourage it. But that’s hardly news.

What might be news, if we decided we REALLY wanted to know why these things happen rather than just bask in juicy yellow journalism and align with one side of the argument or the other, would be the findings of a thorough examination of our own self-hatred and contempt. We have various names for that thing we don’t understand, can’t come to terms with and refuse to acknowledge. Sometimes we call it dysfunctionality, attribute it to our upbringing and early childhood issues. Some of us know it as a response to guilt, a defense against being found to be less than we assert ourselves to be, and secretly fear we are. Those who can calm their fears about it call it nihilism, a kind of despondent death wish that devils each of us. They point to shared mythology that includes the fiery pit of Hell for evildoers and courts the kind of activities that would hasten Armageddon’s last stand for humanity. That dark energy runs the world today. That is the monster we’re pitted against. We’ve met the enemy and he is us.

This is not simply an American problem, of course; issues of what we like to call self-esteem are global. The self-destructive behaviors we’re seeing seem almost epic, here in 2011. Perhaps that’s exactly what they are: an epic healing crisis that will either burn away the raging fever of our selfish preoccupation or kill the host for good. Maybe the Tea Party spilled out a vast infection of hatred and anger, of fear and phobia and non-sense about the future that sensitized the rest of the nation to the invading emotional duress. Perhaps Occupy Wall Street is the resulting inoculation, the prophylactic force that opens these wounds to drain them away, that demands that they expose themselves to examination and analysis. Perhaps the only thing that can mend such a dark, self-destructive vision of the future is an equal and opposite vision, full of inspiration and hope, deliberately empathetic and compassionate.

Yes, there are any number of things that stretch credulity in this nation, and we keep learning more about them, day by day. For me, the most incredible possibility is that money would trump love or that the bright hope of a nation would fall to the Kochs or the Dows or the BPs of the world. As perceptions shift, we’re waking up to the tactics used to control us and discovering that they aren’t so frightening as we long thought. We need to hold thoughts about money lightly, not strangle ourselves with them or hold others hostage to them. There is plenty; affirm your share and give the rest to those who need it most.

According to the Christian book, it’s not money that’s the root of all evil, it’s the love of it, yet there are so many other things more worthy of our love and attention, aren’t there? It feels to me as if the inevitable has already started, and now we just need to get out of our own way. There are still moments when it seems very dark out in the pubic square but now we hear voices speaking for truth and honor and liberty, voices long awaited and anticipated that bring fresh air and light along with them. And when darkness meets light, guess which one disappears.