Seriously, give them time. Can't do everything at once. First the books and education, then the internet and airwaves.

@rainmanjr They won't ban those things. They alredy found a use for it. Its all pretty much redacted and carefully selected bits of info available along with enough propaganda to make any megachurch preacher envious! The system is designed that way so they can keep the power and money and we are too busy fighting eachother to pay attention to what they are doing.

@Ceaselessmind There's some truth in that, yes. Especially the last sentence but not so much the first, imo. Once they have the full power they will then shut down communication ability. It will be done with the people's resigned approval, by that time, but it will happen. On the bright side, that's how revolts are created.

@Ceaselessmind And what ARE they (super-rich oligarchs) doing? Fending off demands for socialism and wealth redistribution. That's the only way people like Trump make any sense.
Their ideological cover is "supply-side economics" and Ayn Rand-style Objectivism. Religiously it's Prosperity Christianity.
As you say, it's all a smokescreen. I have the distinct feeling, when the time is right, they will withdraw whatever props they have in place, and the 'system" will collapse entirely, leaving nothing but a despoiled planet with wreckage and ruins laying about. Will their pawns admit THEN they were gullible fools?
No.
They'll blame us, the ones who believed facts and made rational decisions.

@Storm1752 while I agree with a nearly all that you wrote, I am a bit less cynical in the outcome. The biggest step has been the awakening of the labor force. Refusing to work for these slave wages and conditions. I commend those who have decided to unionize and come together to force change to come from big businesses. Those who simply quit did not have the same effect and did more harm for themselves than help. By banning literatures and other critical thinking sources of media the wealthy and powerful hope to remove the critical thinking aspect from the equation. I have bad news for them however, they are too late. Most of the folks I know are already wise to this. That is precisely why new outlets like 1440 and Democracy at Work are flourishing. The word has gotten out and the decay of western capitalism is in its final stages.

As far as political ideologies go, things are beginning to change for us as well. The days of gerrymandering is approaching the end and rank choice voting is becoming evermore popular. It is a bit more difficult to rig the election when more people are represented on the ballot and people can choose by rank who they feel will be better for the job. These change things more aptly at the local level which resonates out to the state level and eventually the federal level.

More and more women are taking offices across the country in local municipal elections and in state governmental jobs. I am excited about this in particular because with a few exceptions most of these women had to bust ass to get where they are and are more eager to make changes to the existing patriarchal system that has been stagnant and corrupted for far too long. Not all, but most, women are great at unifying people in a common cause and they tend to be better organized than the men that occupy the same job/space. I can think of no better place than a womens restroom in a public building. More often than not they are cleaner and less vandalized than mens restrooms. Its because they are not as immature usually and they take care of the space rather than trash it or urinate on the floors.

Alas only time will tell if we are all screwed by the seat of our pants to a doomed rollercoaster in a horror movie or if we allow, as a species, reason and logic to become our guiding principles.