Daily Inspiration Quote by Ralph Steadman

Steadman’s genius has always been to make the grotesque feel truthful, and this line reads like one of his ink-splattered caricatures turned into prose: blunt, accusatory, and intentionally impolite. “Governments are not running the show anymore” isn’t a policy claim so much as a stage direction. Power has moved backstage, away from institutions that at least pretend to be accountable, toward operators who treat society like a leveraged buyout.

The phrase “running the show” matters. It frames politics as performance: officials as visible actors, rules as set dressing, elections as a lighting cue. Then Steadman yanks the curtain and points at who he believes is holding the strings. “Scumbag Entrepreneurs” is a deliberately crude coinage that fuses two modern myths: the entrepreneur as heroic innovator and the scumbag as unapologetic predator. He’s not critiquing business in the abstract; he’s attacking a specific cultural sanctification of disruption, where breaking things is reframed as progress and collateral damage becomes a rounding error.

The subtext is less “capitalism bad” than “accountability has been privatized.” “Harsh and ruthless agenda” suggests an ideology without ballots: speed over deliberation, extraction over stewardship, monopoly over competition. Coming from a cartoonist associated with gonzo-era skepticism and anti-authoritarian bite, the line lands as a warning about a post-democratic mood: when civic life feels managed by venture logic, politics becomes customer service and citizens become data points. It’s meant to sting because, in Steadman’s view, sting is the only remaining proof you’re still alive to it.