Monthly Review December 2005 Charles McCollester - Pittsburgh—The Glory and the Gutting

This is just a snip of the larger article.

Monthly Review December 2005 Charles McCollester - Pittsburgh—The Glory and the Gutting In the birthplace of American unionism, the collapse of steel has been followed by the collapse of government.

Cavalier disregard for democratic process and majority rule, the imposition of unelected authorities, and the blocking of popular participation by arrogant elites who define “freedom” as the power to rule in their own interest without restraint or restriction, these are characteristics of our age. Anti-democratic, selected-not-elected models are being developed in the heartland as well as abroad. Little noticed among the impositions of governing authorities in Iraq and Haiti and the assault on popularly elected leadership in Venezuela is the dismantling and usurpation of public authority and accountability in Pittsburgh. The banana republic comes to the rust belt.

The steel rust-belt area from Youngstown, Ohio to Johnstown, Pennsylvania, centered in Pittsburgh and strewn with once mighty but now financially broken towns like Aliquippa, Braddock, Newcastle, Steubenville, Sharon, McKees Rocks, and Duquesne, is sinking into spiritual and financial bankruptcy.