As C.E.O.'s Rob the Treasury and Senators Scam Taxes, Where Does Frank Rich See a "Tsunami of Populist Rage?"

Frank Rich bases his respectable New York Times Editorial Slumdogs Unite in the premise that there is a "tsunami of populist rage coursing through America." He argues that this is why Obama had to apologize for Tom Daschle's failure to pay taxes. Were Tom Daschle a Kathy Kelly saintlike tax resister, I'd give him street cred and demand that he join the cabinet. But the fact of the matter is, much like the top 1% of Americans controlling more than 20% of the wealth, Daschel is a fat cat creep.

Frank Rich claims that this populist tsunami is "bigger than any C.E.O.'s bonus." Yeah right. If populist rage swept the United States, the banks would be in flames, the C.E.O.s would be hanging from street lamps, and democracy would prevail. In the words of Lewis Lapham in his Harpers Essay, By The Rivers of Babylon:

The looting of the U.S. Treasury is never an easy trick, but to carry off more than $1 trillion in broad day-light while the members of Congress stand around applauding the exist strategy as one certain to guarantee the health and happiness of the American people is a wonder of entrepreneurial enterprise that surely deserves some sort of tip of the hat.

If our country were swept with Rich's "populist rage," we'd tip our hat by tearing down the capitalists and creating a true democracy with actual equal opportunity for all.