This oligarchy has maintained its control by a number of different methods, the concept of "divide and conquer" being one of the most important in its arsenal. Throughout history, the divisions of race, religion, national borders, and class have all been cleverly used to keep the many from rightly viewing the few as the enemy.
In the past, there have been times where the façade has shown cracks and there have been individuals who have shown their perception of the obstacle of division and subsequently made strides to overcome it. Those individuals did their best but were promptly silenced or murdered for their efforts. The murders of JFK, RFK, MLK, and others are all testaments to this idea. Particularly with Martin Luther King Jr., the danger to the oligarchy was not so much his fight for civil rights for black Americans, his opposition to the Vietnam war, and his concerns for labor that posed a threat to the oligarchy individually, it was his ability to unify those varied interests - blacks and black civil rights activists, white war protesters, and blue collar workers - that represented the greatest threat.
Comment: People are getting fed up with austerity measures that have nothing to do with helping the country but sucking resources from the people.