Democratic capitalism.

Editor,

The "democratic capitalism" and "free markets" of which George Bush speaks are government-rigged autocracies that provide license to corporations, which are dictatorships, and international gamblers known as "investors" to plunder each and every economy in the world. Workers have no rights, and citizens have no say with respect to how business will be conducted in these "democratic markets." The environment is trampled underfoot, and the profits that result are distributed ever higher up the "democratic" food chain.

French chateaux are a snapshot of the "democratic capitalism" and "free markets" to which George Bush aspires. Before the French Revolution each of these, including the miles of land surrounding it, were owned by one man who employed dozens of servants at low wages, lavished his riches on himself, and lived among a sea of peasants who were lucky if they owned a pair of shoes.

George Bush can say that the predatory, unregulated capitalism he promotes is "democratic" because words don't mean anything to him -- the word torture, for example. And he can label rigged global corporate trade "free", but the whole world, including those whom "democratic capitalism" makes rich, know that this is the most ambitiously predatory project since the invasion of the Americas by murdering European Christians in the 15th and 16th centuries.

re: "Bush to Host World Economic Summit" (10/19/2008)