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Biden Imposes Sanctions On Russian Oligarchs | Zerlina. - YouTube
Channel: MSNBC
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turning now to the impact of the
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multilateral diplomatic response to
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putin's invasion of ukraine president
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biden yesterday announced even stronger
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sanctions this time targeting oligarchs
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and they may have found an audience the
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threat of more sanctions on top of the
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unprecedented ones already in place
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appear to be creating a tension between
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vladimir putin and his cronies those who
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rose to power after the fall of the
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soviet union through privatization of
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public goods and though oligarchs today
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are mainly synonymous with russia
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their influence is not much different
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from that of a billionaire here in the
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united states now i am not suggesting
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the u.s has already become an oligarchy
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but no one can better explain how a
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democracy can easily head down this path
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than my next guest watch this
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oligarchy
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means government of and by a few at the
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top who exercise power for their own
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benefit it comes from the greek word
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oligarchus meaning few to rule or
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command
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even a system that calls itself a
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democracy can become an oligarchy if
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power becomes concentrated in the hands
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of a very few wealthy people and a
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corporate and financial elite
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joining us now is robert reich our
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former u.s labor secretary and author of
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the system who rigged it and how we fix
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it and this week
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when
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president biden announced that he was
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going to
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sanction all of these oligarchs i
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thought of you because i think you know
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the word oligarch
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most people are like what does that mean
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and i want to start off actually with a
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quote from your latest piece in the
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guardian you know that capitalism is
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consistent with democracy only if
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democracy reduces the inequalities
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insecurities joblessness
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and poverty that accompany unbridled
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profit seeking the fact is that
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billionaire wealth in this country has
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surged during the global pandemic
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so
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what does that say about the state of
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our democracy when we have
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these billionaires that are basically
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able to make profit hand over fists
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while the rest of us are sort of left
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with the scraps and how does that
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connect to what we're watching
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overseas in russia and ukraine
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uh well as arlenas there's there's
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absolutely no doubt that america has
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what we might call it oligarchy
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certainly a small number of billionaires
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multi-billionaires
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that have a great deal political
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influence and control now the irony is
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that that is a great threat to american
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democracy obviously and has been as the
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great justice lewis brandeis said during
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the gilded age of the late 19th and
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early 20th century we have a choice in
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this country we can either have great
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wealth in the hands of a few
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or we can have democracy but we can't
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have both
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now the irony though is that in russia
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we are counting on the power of the
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billionaires the oligarchs uh in russia
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to either depose putin or to limit and
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constrain him i mean basically there are
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only two groups of people there in
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russia who have the ability to contain
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putin one of the oligarchs the others
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are the generals putin probably doesn't
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have to worry about the generals because
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he is from the kgb he understands uh the
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the power politics inside the kremlin
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but the oligarchs also have huge power
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there that's why the biden
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administration is targeting them so that
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they will feel pain and they will put
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the some constraints on putin right now
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how does the term oligarch
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apply to
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people we may know their names here in
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the united states like who should we
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apply the term
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oligarch
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ii
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well there are 745
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families in the united states
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that are
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super rich i mean they're beyond they're
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in the hundreds of billions of dollars
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or close to the hundreds billions of
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dollars senate billionaires we haven't
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have actually talked about senate
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billionaires but they're very close to
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senate billionaires i i don't want to
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blame them i i don't you know it's it's
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i think it's wrong to to say that they
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are at fault uh certainly they are not
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bloodthirsty they're not going to do
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anything terrible uh but uh undoubtedly
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the trend has been very disturbing
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because even uh the most recent data we
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have from the election of 2012
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uh the
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richest
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one one hundredth of one percent i'm not
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talking about the one one percent i'm
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not even talking about the richest one
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tenth of one percent i'm talking about
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the richest one percent of one percent
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they supply 40 percent of all
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campaign finance
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in 2012 now that's the latest data we
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have so you can imagine how much more
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the
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let's call it the
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the senate billionaires or the oligarchs
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uh are spending on american politics and
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and that
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big money obviously distorts our
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democracy
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so
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understanding how uh you know this works
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over in russia is actually helpful to
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understand the threats to our own
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democracy here i mean essentially what
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you're saying is that these uber rich
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people and we're not just talking about
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like rich people we're talking about the
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uber rich
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they basically use their wealth and
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influence to make a government and
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that will pass laws that benefit them um
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at the expense of everyone else i mean
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how how is that a threat to the
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democratic system as we know it i mean
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how bad is the threat
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that's a huge threat uh and i mean if
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you just look at the increase in
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billionaires wealth the 745 billionaire
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families i'm talking about uh they
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increased their wealth during the
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pandemic just the last two years
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by 70
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that was you know that comes down to 2.1
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trillion dollars not billion 2.1
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trillion dollars for 745 families well
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you do the math i mean
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they have the capacity because of that
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wealth to inundate american politics
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not only in terms of campaign
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contributions but also in terms of
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shaping public opinion for example now
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are they doing that to some extent they
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are are people aware of that i think a
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lot of americans feel that the game is
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rigged i mean donald trump in 2016 we
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heard him over and over again a campaign
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on the fact that the game is rigged uh
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and and i think that a lot of the anger
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we find in america today
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is really
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fundamentally because people feel that
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they're powerless
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that they can't they're they're working
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as hard as ever harder than ever they're
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not getting ahead while the people at
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the top are doing better and better and
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better and wielding their power to
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affect changes in the rules of the game
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that affect them that help them but hurt
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everybody else uh and i mean you can see
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it all around you look what's happened
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to labor unions i mean labor has you
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know it used to be used to be more than
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a third of all americans in the private
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sector
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workers belong to a labor union they had
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a lot of power they they they were able
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to exert that power to raise wages today
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six percent
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six percent of workers in the private
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sector are unionized because there has
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been so much union busting and the laws
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have actually
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changed over the last 30 years to allow
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corporations to do that kind of union
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busting well that's just one example
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look at monopolization uh you know
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zerlina all across america
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you find a big big companies are
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monopolizing in ways that the anti-trust
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laws of this country never used to allow
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well why is that has that changed
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because you have huge power
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both from corporations and from these
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let's call them what they are oligarchs
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in terms of how to prevent the
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continuing slide talk towards autocracy
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i think malcolm nance in his book called
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you know america becoming a part of the
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axis of autocracies uh in putin's vision
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um how do we prevent it from getting
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worse i mean what can the people do
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frankly to limit the over outsized power
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of these billionaires and
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let's just call them oligarchs i don't
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know why we use two different terms
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we're talking about russian billionaires
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versus american ones but
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how do we prevent these oligarchs here
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from having outsized influence and
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dismantling the democracy
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and our slide towards authoritarianism a
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la russia
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uh well we came uh you know during the
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2020 election both elizabeth warren and
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bernie sanders both proposed wealth
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taxes that is taxes on the ultra
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billionaires the oligarchs
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that would not only pay for a lot of
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things we need to do in this country
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but also reduce that power uh that comes
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with great wealth uh we could do that i
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mean uh
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essentially those ideas uh
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have died uh why have they died partly
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because of the power of the oligarchs
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you know see they're as early as where
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we get into the uh the kind of vicious
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cycle uh the more power and more wealth
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you see at the top the more difficult it
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is to come up with any kind of taxes or
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any kind of reforms even campaign
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finance reform uh that will prevent that
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wealth from having the power that
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generates even more wealth but we have
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to do it uh we can't give up uh i mean
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we can see
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the dangers uh in autocracy we can see
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see the dangers abroad if there's
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anything we are learning from what's
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happening in russia but what we see
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around the world is that we democracy is
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precious we have to hold on to it uh it
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is our most precious legacy we've got to
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do whatever we can to make sure that it
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is sustained
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democracy is precious
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that's a really good point and on robert
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reich thank you so much for being here
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and helping us understand these
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connections it's so important in moments
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like this to
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draw those connections so thank you
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again
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thank you
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hi i'm zerlina maxwell thanks for
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checking out our channel on youtube you
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can see more from zerlina by clicking
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