F.L.O.T.U.S Rising 7+

📕 Industrialist Richard Roberts has spent his career conquering the worlds of business and media. He has played both sides of the US political machine to his benefit for decades, making donations and purchasing influence whichever way the political wind was blowing.As King Richard prepares to pass the empire he has built down to his adult children; it is brought to his attention by his family the corruption an inequality of the world his generation is handing down to the next.He sees his nation for the first time through the eyes of the less privileged; the ever-shrinking middle class. Roberts listens as the people he meets tell him in their own words about closed factories and shuttered businesses in their towns. He hears how their children are caught up in a bloated, poorly run educational system that leaves them unprepared for the workforce of the future. They speak of their college-age children saddled with huge student loan debt and working after college part-time jobs with no benefits, and limited future opportunities.The 2012 election cycle is for Roberts a life-changing epiphany. Both political parties seem to ignore the voters' struggles during the rocky, jobless recovery period following the Great Recession. Roberts observes firsthand as both parties continue to do business as usual, jockeying for power and influence in a city completely corrupted by lobbyist dollars.Exasperated by what he witnesses, he finally asks the question no one seems to be willing to ask, ...