Duff McKagan’s column runs every Thursday on Reverb. He writes about what music is circulating through his space every Monday.”The whole labor of the world lies at their mercy–and like fierce wolves they rend and destroy, like ravening vultures they devour and tear! The whole power of mankind belongs to them, forever and beyond recall–do what it can and strive as it will, humanity lives for them and dies for them. They own not only the labor of society, they have bought the governments, and everywhere they use their raped and stolen power to entrench themselves in their privileges, to dig wider and deeper the channels through which the river of profits flows to them.” –The Jungle, Upton SinclairLast weekend, for the first time, I finally watched Michael Moore’s latest film Capitalism: A Love Story. Now to be fair, I watched this film on a plane that started its descent just as the film was getting to the poignant end–when we the people had finally spoken and elected Obama, therefore finally clamping down on the banking industry and all its villains and bad guys. Chuckle.I’m sorry I’m so skeptical. It’s just that in my view, and from what I’ve discovered avidly reading financial papers and textbooks, political office, lobbyists, Wall Street, and the banking industry are so interwoven and above reproach that unless Obama throws out Geithner and stages some sort of grand socialist /co-op work program on a national scale, we are just doomed to repeat the mistakes that led to our current crises. That is, if and when we get out of our current mess.I read somewhere that as of late, banks were being called “casinos” because of the way they are gambling with people’s money, but that would be unfair to casinos. Las Vegas must at least (by law) keep a specified amount IN RESERVE to cover their ass. The banking industry does not have the same regulation . . . you read me right.Obama is not a dumb guy, and I hope he is right now studying flubs from the past to hopefully learn a thing or two about getting us all out of this crisis with the least amount of pain. I hope.What has been happening to the global financial markets over the last 30 years or so is an almost conceited blindness to the failures of the past because of boom-time lust. What has happened recently in this credit crisis is not a product of failure. It is a product of success.I believe Winston Churchill stated back in the late ’40s that “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.” When General Eisenhower became president after the war, he instated a 90 percent tax against the richest of the rich here in the U.S.A. It paid for the war and built our interstate highway system, dams, and other massive infrastructure. In the 1950s, America was never so prosperous. Eisenhower was never questioned, because by God he won the fucking war! A 90 percent tax sounds a lot like what they do in Sweden and other “soft” socialist countries. [SO, IS THIS SOMETHING YOU’RE SUGGESTING WE SHOULD DO?]Michael Moore points to a pretty poignant grand overview with his movie, though: The capitalist propaganda machine was cranked into high gear, selling it as being as American as apple pie. Maybe Obama can start cranking out propaganda that exhorts social programs and shared revenue. Are we ready to listen?