40 billionaires pledge to give away half of wealth

[Zor]

Um, I don't see a whole lot of poor people in this painting
Snip
if the underclass in colonial America were wearing silk waistcoats and pristine knee-britches what were the upper classes wearing? Solid gold suits of armor?

The War of Independence was fought by a lot of poor guys, but it was started by a lot of rich guys.

To be fair, only the upper stratas of society generally got much education besides maybe some basic literacy back then and Thomas Jefferson did advocate for education to be made more readilly available to the lower classes. Then again, their were sections of the US that took half a century to abandon property requirements for infranchisement.

Zor

[eion]

Shadow's point however (if I am understanding it correctly) was that a financially disenfranchised underclass were the primary actors in the American Independence Movement.

Politically disenfranchised the founders may well have been, but almost universally they were men of means.

Who else would have the time to sit in the stifling summer heat of Philadelphia and debate?

[Patrick Degan]

The French Revolution might be closer to an example of the sort Shadow Dragon is reaching for, as many of its initial events were driven by spontaneous uprisings of the peasantry.

[CaptainChewbacca]

I have to say, I'm a little disappointed. Forty billionaires come together to make a plan and nobody even MENTIONS building some sort of doomsday weapon or orchestrating a power grab?!

We're NEVER going to have super-heroes until some supervillains start causing trouble.

[Temujin]

I think companies like BP and Massey Energy are doing just fine on the supervillain front.