too rich?

[Cato]

We've busted up our unions and shipped our manufacturing jobs overseas.

I hear this bit of bullshit all the time. I concede that there are about 8 million fewer manufacturing jobs since about 1980, but our manufacturing output has doubled in the same time. In 1800, over 90% of the U.S. population lived on farms and was engaged in agriculture. Today this figure is less than 2%. Your superficial 'manufacturing job outsourcing' logic would conclude that nobody in the U.S. has anything to eat. I'm counting on the absurdity of this conclusion catching your attention.

What's left? We have corporate raiders who invade long standing American businesses like Brachs or Hostess, chop them up, embezzle their employee pensions and run the company out of business. How's that good for the American economy again?

Brach's and Hostess are simply very poor examples for your corporate raider theory.

Here's the history on Brach's:
http://americanurbex.com/wordpress/?p=779

From the article:

Artificially inflated domestic sugar costs and strict import quotas put in place by the US Department of Agriculture made operating costs in Chicago difficult for Brach’s. (These policies have essentially crippled candy production throughout the United States.) High labor costs also exacerbated the situation to the point where the owners decided to shutter the aging plant.

Brach's has seen several ownership changes, but was never the victim of corporate raiding.

Your use of Hostess is even more bizarre given how recent and well publicized its demise was. Again, no corporate raiding involved.