Western governments claim to be models of democracy, and demonize their geopolitical adversaries as "authoritarian", but empirical evidence shows that the USA and European countries are oligarchies dominated by economic elites and large corporations. Billionaire Donald Trump is the perfect symbol of this, but he's by no means the only one. Ben Norton explains.

VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BONnmHRmp_M

Topics

0:00 Narrative of Western "democracies"

0:26 (CLIP) Joe Biden on "democracy vs autocracy"

0:37 Western governments are oligarchies

1:54 Summary of oligarchic Western leaders

2:54 Scientific research shows USA is an oligarchy

4:29 US public opinion on healthcare

5:20 Money buys 80-90% of seats in US Congress

6:27 Citizens United ruling

7:21 Donald Trump: perfect symbol of US oligarchy

7:57 Robber barons

8:44 One Big Beautiful Bill: class war by the rich

9:49 Billionaires pay lower tax rate than most Americans

10:42 US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent

11:35 Ex US Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin

12:16 Steve Bannon worked for Goldman Sachs

12:58 US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick

13:07 Crypto was taken over by Wall Street

14:08 Trump is the symptom, not the cause

15:07 Biden promised nothing would change

16:07 Barack Obama: funded by Wall Street

17:53 Mitt Romney: servant of Wall Street

18:48 Super PACs

19:32 Bloomberg funded Biden's 2020 race

19:56 Billionaires funded Trump's 2024 race

20:35 Elon Musk donated $288 million for Trump

20:57 (CLIP) Elon Musk bought 2024 US election

21:11 World's richest man buys US politics

21:34 Wall Street wages war on Zohran Mamdani

22:46 Democratic Party sabotaged Bernie Sanders

24:34 UK Labour Party sabotaged Jeremy Corbyn

26:18 British spy agencies sabotaged Jeremy Corbyn

28:15 Symbol of UK oligarchy: Rishi Sunak

31:37 Neoliberal Keir Starmer: Tony Blair reincarnated

32:35 France's President of the rich: Emmanuel Macron

36:04 BlackRock's man in Germany: Friedrich Merz

37:40 Goldman Sachs' man in Italy: Mario Draghi

39:10 Goldman Sachs' man in Canada: Mark Carney

40:22 Summary of oligarchic Western leaders

41:35 Western governments are not democracies

42:45 Outro