How America's Business Elite Became Their Own Marxist Caricature

"There is a moment in every authoritarian takeover when the business elite must choose between principle and profit, between defending the system that made their wealth possible and accommodating the forces destroying that system. That moment has arrived for America’s capitalist class, and they are failing the test so spectacularly that they’re validating every Marxist critique of capitalism ever written...

When economic policies driven by personal loyalty rather than market logic begin producing the inevitable catastrophes—supply chain collapses, currency instability, institutional breakdown — the fury will focus not just on the regime but on those who enabled it through their cowardly calculation that accommodation was smarter than resistance.

Every Marxist critique of capitalism as inherently corrupt, inevitably authoritarian, and ultimately concerned only with profit maximization over human welfare is being validated in real-time by capitalists themselves. The theory that business interests will always choose fascism over democracy when their privileges are threatened is being proven correct by the very people who spent decades arguing it was unfair caricature.

They are demonstrating that when forced to choose between democratic principles and oligarchic access, between constitutional governance and regime favor, between defending the system that made their wealth possible and protecting the wealth itself — they will choose wealth every single time. They are confirming that capitalism has no loyalty except to capital, no principle except profit, no commitment except to whatever arrangement allows continued accumulation.

The golden plaques and fabricated investment figures will become iconic images in socialist propaganda for generations: capitalism revealing its true nature when tested, business leaders prostrating themselves before power, competitive markets dissolving into tribute economies. No amount of future lectures about entrepreneurial virtue will overcome the visual record of American business elite on their knees before a fascist regime.

When this regime falls—through electoral defeat, economic collapse, or internal contradictions—the business leaders who enabled it will discover that their “pragmatic” calculations were profound strategic errors. Their accommodation will be remembered not as wise adaptation but as moral cowardice that enabled systematic destruction of everything they claimed to value.

The political coalitions that historically defended market systems—educated professionals, constitutional conservatives, principled libertarians — have been systematically alienated by business leaders’ craven accommodation. The intellectual frameworks that justified competitive capitalism—innovation, merit, freedom, individual responsibility — have been discredited by capitalists’ own behavior under pressure.

What remains will be a population that has watched business leaders choose collaboration with authoritarianism over defense of democratic principles, watched them prioritize access over integrity, watched them demonstrate that all their rhetoric about freedom and competition was performance art covering crude calculations about power and profit.

The socialists won’t need to convince anyone that capitalism inevitably serves authoritarianism — the capitalists will have provided all the evidence anyone could need. The torches and pitchforks won’t be socialist organizing tools but democratic responses to documented collaboration with forces that destroyed democratic governance.

The most bitter irony is that they had every opportunity to be heroes. Business leaders who stood up to Trump, who defended constitutional principles despite economic costs, who chose democratic integrity over oligarchic access—they would have emerged from this crisis with enormous moral authority and political capital.

Instead, they chose the path that maximizes short-term comfort while ensuring long-term destruction. They preserved their wealth while discrediting the system that made wealth accumulation legitimate. They maintained their access while eliminating the institutions that made access meaningful.

They wanted to be remembered as pragmatic realists who navigated difficult circumstances with sophisticated calculation. They will be remembered as the useful idiots who handed socialists the perfect argument for why capitalism cannot coexist with democracy, why business interests inevitably choose authoritarianism when their privileges are threatened, why competitive markets inevitably become tribute economies when tested by authoritarian pressure.

Two plus two equals four. There are twenty-four hours in a day. And American business leaders are systematically destroying capitalism while claiming to defend it, validating every socialist critique through their own behavior, and ensuring that whatever emerges from this crisis will be far more hostile to market systems than anything they could have faced by choosing resistance over accommodation.

They thought they were being smart. They were being the cartoon villains in someone else’s revolution, writing their own obituaries in gold ink on tribute plaques presented to a fascist regime.

When the reckoning comes — and it is coming — they will have no one to blame but themselves for choosing temporary comfort over permanent legitimacy, immediate access over lasting authority, collaboration over courage.

The free market they claim to defend required defending. They chose collaboration instead.
And they will reap exactly what they have sown."


https://www.techdirt.com/2025/09/30/how-americas-business-elite-became-their-own-marxist-caricature/

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