Arrogant in their power.

Editor,

I just finished reading "The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism," by Edward Baptist. The depth and intractiblity of the Republican - Democrat divide over stuffing the wealth of the USA into fewer and more powerful hands today reminds me of the depth of the division in Congress over the expansion of slavery in the decades running up to the Civil War.

Today's case is different in that corporate financial power using new technology is virtual, unlike slavery which was tied to and depended on ever increasing expanses of enslaved land and enslaved people (and of course today's Democratic and Republican parties have exchanged roles).

But the image of Republicans sitting stone-faced through the President's proposals to distribute the fruits of labor more equitably and limit the ability of rentiers to skim the cream off the American economy, or coughing through quiet passages in the President's speech where he called on them to act in concert with American values of equality and community, looked to my eyes like a roomful of Southern enslavers in the 1840's arrogant in the power of their speculative bubbles and their whipping machine.

Re: "At the State of the Union, a President Outgunned in Congress Is Still Combative" (1/21/2015)