We seem to be under siege like never before, and we are losing

[Faygo Kid]

This 60+ Boomer has seen a lot, but I don't recall anything like the concerted push against the values we here at DU hold dear that we are experiencing now. The Zimmerman verdict is only the tip of the iceberg; North Carolina is in the grip of GOP insanity, Texas has gone completely off the deep end, Wisconsin has Scott Walker, women's health services hang by a thread, the House is trying to end food stamps, climate change is dissed, as are the unemployed, concerted efforts to disenfranchise voters are accelerating, and the Voting Rights Act is no more.

While gay rights seem to be advancing, given the current climate, I fear they will be rolled back. And that has been the only bright spot in an utter debacle of the organized attack against the poor and middle class folks.

I don't see a lot of leadership from the Dems, either, aside from folks like Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. Our president has been out of the loop, and with 3 1/2 years left, he better get some fire in the belly, now.

The Kochs and Rove don't give a rip about social issues, but they will use the rubes to advance their ultimate goal of driving all wealth to an elite few and making the rest of us serfs. We are in a defensive mode, no doubt about it.

Comments welcome, but this is just my observation. I don't despair, but what can we do? Where is the leadership?

[Autumn]

1. Missing, whether by plan or design. Only a small handful of our Democratic

leaders speak up. The rest are silent or complaisant.

[Avalux]

2. I think we need to shift our thinking.

What we're witnessing goes far beyond politic labels. It's about the status quo (both parties involved) - the rich and powerful, fearful of losing their control. The more minorities and the underclass threaten them, the worse it will get.

We need to find a way to bring the divided masses together through some kind of commonality. It might not be realistic, but it's the only way "we the people" will be able to stop what's happening.

When I say "we" - I mean every one of us, at the community level. Fuck our leaders. They have no served us well.

[Faygo Kid]

4. We the People. Has a nice ring to it.

We have done that before, but never faced such incredible power.

The British were tough, but how do we counter the Kochs and J.P. Morgan, which just reported a second-quarter profit up over 31 percent from last year? We need some leaders who will fight for us. Otherwise, we are ruled by a tiny elite.

[Zorra]

8. +1 nt

[PuraVidaDreamin]

25. Form a Community Bill of Rights in your municipality

Learn Through Democracy School.

http://www.celdf.org/democracy-school-video


It could be our last chance.



For a model template in which to pick and choose


http://envisionseattle.org/files/Model-Community-Bill-of-Rights-Template.pdf

[Avalux]

34. Thanks for this...

valuable info we can all put to use.

[earcandle]

40. I agree. We need to empower the unemployed to be self employed and then

stay small and local and only provide labor for each other. Service businesses and farms. Small cottage industries
and our own banks but make the exchange not cash, but labor and goods swapped. A big data base. From babysitters
to lawyers, to dentists to hairdressers, to clothing makers, to fresh farms just trade. Use QuickBooks or excel to track
your own trades, and have a large database for the community to trade. We need to pull out of their economies of means
to deflate them. I can't think of anything else that will do. They are a cancer. They must be deprived of their sugar and
oxygen. We must keep our brains and our respect for each other tightly wired. Brain Rules is a great book to value that
at any age you can remap your brain and fire neurons. Action creates energy.

Or, perhaps Branston's Plan B?

[datasuspect]

91. Dear Satan

can you please inflict the earth with an extinction level event?

thank you and amen.

[Avalux]

92. How about an alien invasion?

That would work too.

[Doc_Technical]

3. I understand your concern Faygo Kid.

It is possible that what is going on is a last gasp
of the privileged former majority of the country
becoming more desperate and frantic in pushing
its agenda, that was in the past taken for granted.

History has shown that the more resistance against
change there is the more upsetting, for everyone, the eventual
change will be.

[Laelth]

13. +1 Given in the hope that you are right. n/t

-Laelth

[atreides1]

22. More likely

A rabid animal backed into a corner...and that usually turns out badly!

[MADem]

28. I think you might be on to something there.

No one was standing in school house doors wielding axe handles until segregation was on the chopping block after all.

This does look like a desperate push to try and retrieve lost ground.

[Th1onein]

75. LOST ground? WHAT lost ground?

We can be stopped at any time, and asked for our ID. We can be piss tested for a job, or just randomly. And, now, they're even doing forced blood tests, if you refuse a breathalyzer.

We've lost our voting rights. We're being spied on. We're losing food stamps, and we're losing unemployment insurance. They're crushing labor unions. We've lost almost all of our manufacturing jobs. We middle class are paying ALL of the taxes.

WHAT LOST GROUND?

[marions ghost]

77. +++

ditto

[MADem]

95. You aren't understanding what I said at all--I am not talking about YOUR lost ground.

I am talking about THEIR lost ground.

If you read my post in the context in which it was provided you would see that. Get out of ATTACK/SCREAMING MODE for a change, and try reading it again. Pay particular attention to the axe handle/school house door part. That should have been a big clue.

THEY come from a mindset where segregation ruled, where women didn't get equal pay for equal work, where equality wasn't the law of the land. THEY want that "lost ground" --THEIR "lost ground" --back.

Starting to "get it?"

[jwirr]

42. If that is the case they are idiots for alienating women because that includes a large majority of

white women. What they are going to lose is any semblance of the former democracy we once had and in the end they will lose it all with little of their former rights left to them. We are not the only ones losing in this if the OP is correct.

[HiPointDem]

66. last gasp? no, it's the sign that independent sources of resistance to their complete control

have been well-nigh extinguished.

[randome]

5. It's a cliche to say "It's always darkest before the dawn."

But I think that applies. Small comfort for those having to put up with the GOP's insane maneuverings.

I think the tide is turning. It's going to be a rough ride but I do believe we're getting to a point where the GOP will recede in importance. Simple demographics if nothing else tells us the country is changing.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]You should never stop having childhood dreams.[/center][/font][hr]

[Faygo Kid]

10. Well said, but I fear you underestimate them

Yes, demographics are changing, but you underestimate the ruling class push to disenfranchise large swaths of the electorate. If the elections in 2014 go the GOP's way (and Rove won't leave anything to chance, as he did in Ohio in 2012, and was shocked by it), we are finished as a country.

[earcandle]

46. We need to withdraw labor from the weapons industry world wide.

Make a pact world wide to not lift a gun for anyone. To make them obsolete.
If a gun comes, disappear. Send out early warning codes and stop acting like deer in the headlights.
Get a grip. Get smart. Avoid the clash. Don't protest or demonstrate. Just shift tactics to
go local with contact between local groups toward a network that reaches across the planet.

It is way obvious for everyone that we are in the grip of really sick people who are genociders and murderers.
What do they have that we don't? The media, the wealth and the capital. They do not own our labor. If we
figure out how to feed and clothe ourselves locally, we can ditch them globally.

Technology is on our side. We are in the millions, they in the thousands. Stop caring so much about money
and start caring about each other. Fascism can only be thwarted when good people stop disengaging and stop letting
bad people dictate their lives. Start engaging with your fellow men and women. Locally.

This is easy to say. But it is also common sense as well.
When you want to lose something, you forget it exists until its gone.
Convincing those with jobs to shift to self employment is key.

The inability to generalize is a crucial learning impairment.

[pnwest]

12. Turning? I wish I saw/felt that. My

perception of the tide is that it's becoming an ever-stronger wave, pushing and pushing until its become a tsunami of rollbacks of anything fair and just that's been accomplished in the last 70 or so years.

I DO feel a deep despair, a hopelessness and fear that I can't describe. Today, hope and positivity seem futile, and naive to the point of mental retardation.

I WISH I saw the smallest chance of the GOP relegating themselves into irrelevance. I only see an unstoppable bulldozer of greed, corruption, hatred, evil...and greed.

And I see "Idiocracy" and "The Handmaid's Tale" as brilliant, stark, terrifying premonitions of an all-too-certain future.

[calimary]

27. I know how you feel, pnwest. As a woman, I feel as though I'm under seige.

Everything we fought for during the 60s and 70s is being dismantled. All the progress we fought for and instituted - being reacted against with more power and effectiveness than we imagined. We led the proverbial horse to water, at long last, but the horse seemed not to want to drink - and it's kicking us in the head for having the nerve to lead it to water in the first place.

[awoke_in_2003]

60. It's always darkest...

just before it gets pitch black.

[kentuck]

6. well said.

Summarized quite well.

[BlueStreak]

7. Recommending because there really is a whole world of issues besides Zim and Snowden

[marions ghost]

79. "Zim and Snowden" are integrally related to all these

issues we hold as important. I hope you can see that.

And I'm sure you didn't mean to literally equate Zimmerman and Snowden, just the issues they represent.

[BlueStreak]

81. I would welcome a SUBSTANDIVE discussion about how those all relate

There has really been almost no substantive discussion about the trial -- just a bunch of people who are really angry and not thinking very clearly. And most of the discussion about the security state has been of a similar quality -- talking about everything EXCEPT the really important issues.

I can see how the Snowden affair is very related to the biggest threats this nation has ever faced. I don't see anything similar with the Florida trial. It was a bad combination of bad laws, a state that glorifies gun violence, and one crazy dude. While there are some bigger issues behind all that, those are not the things anybody is talking about.

[marions ghost]

83. Both these two events

NSA truth and the FL verdict are shocks on the level of earthquake--to a large segment of the thinking, feeling public. So you have to expect an emotional reaction first. Nevertheless there have been countless well-reasoned arguments here about both issues, so your critique is not valid.

If you REALLY want a substantive discussion, put up your post #81 as a topic. I am sure you would get many rational, insightful, intelligent comments.

Don't just lob critiques from the back row. Own your words. Put your concerns up front.

[BlueStreak]

112. I'm not going to start YET ANOTHER thread on Zimmerman.

Thanks just the same. I don't see it being connected to any of the big issues our nation faces and I think discussion of that topic is utterly pointless.

Yes, we are all sad. Yes, we all think Zimmerman got away with something.

There really isn't anything else worth saying on that subject, except that this is the nature of what is still a pretty functional legal system. Sometimes these things happen because the perpetrator gets lucky that strong evidence just wasn't there. A few seconds' difference on the 911 call -- A few steps out the door by one of the witnesses -- somebody else happening to be out in their back yard, and it would have been a guilty verdict. Zimmerman just got lucky. That's it. Nothing else to say. No bigger story, as far as I'm concerned. It wasn't a conspiracy by Koch. It isn't the return of the KKK. It isn't any of that. It was just a dumb schmuck who got lucky and a family that suffered a terrible tragedy as a result.

Can we please move on?

[marions ghost]

114. Sure

--long as it isn't the terrible tragedy that happened to YOUR family, right?

A 'pretty functional legal system"

Here's one effort to illustrate the connection:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023264608

[Triana]

9. That's right. Everyone I talk to says the same

Including the RWNJs who of course gloat about it.

My Mom, 80-something years old, has never seen anything like this. She's absolutely flabbergasted. "Where the hell is God?" she asked.

Well I don't how to answer that. Firstly, I'm not all that religious and secondly even if I was, I'd have no answer.

Our Dem leadership is largely absent and we're left with no organized way to deal with the insidious assault rolling over all that's decent like a steam roller.

I'd not expect any action from "God", but I damn well DO expect some action - and concerted and forceful, organized and consistent action from Dem leadership if indeed they are leaders.

Otherwise, they're just convenient spineless figureheads.

I SO HATE this sewer (US) right now and all it's become. Sorry but I do. I absolutely detest it. So stick that in your metadata crunchers, NSA. And by the way, fuck you, NSA.

[Faygo Kid]

14. Give your Mom a hug for me. Bless her.

She's right. My Mom was an FDR Dem all her life. She would have been 95 this year, and I miss her.

She wasn't political, but she recognized stench when she smelled it. And she would have smelled this.

[SammyWinstonJack]

26. America! Fuck Ya!

This really is a rotten country.


Love It or Leave It


Don't love it and would certainly leave, if I financially could afford too do so.

[CrispyQ]

11. We ARE under siege like never before.

We are at the end of an era & TPTB know that. The 1% don't care if the Christian Taliban gets in charge because they will always be immune, so they don't have an issue funding them. They serve a good purpose.

Even as the Koch's pay for climate change denial reports, they know it's coming. The end of cheap oil is coming. TPTB know we are headed for incredible social unrest & they are making their cushions as big & fat as they can, in an effort to survive the inevitable fall & if that means stealing every thing the rest of us have, they will do it. They want it all. And so they (& that's just about everyone in both parties), distract us with issues like gay marriage & abortion, while stealing our future from us & our kids.

I'm a glass half empty kind of person, could you tell? That said, I humbly realize that I am one of the most fortunate human beings to ever have lived in all of human history. Wow.

[Horse with no Name]

43. because they are passionate and have tried to get a place at the table for decades

they are useful fools for TPTB.

[ellie]

15. You're right

We are under siege.

[Jim__]

16. They can diss climate change all they want. That's one battle they're going to lose. - n/t

[Faygo Kid]

17. Agreed. That and wealth ineqaulity are our two biggest issues.

I really believe that. We have issues of war and peace, agribusiness destroying the environment, and much more.

But ultimately, climate change and the unending transfer of wealth in this nation to the top one-tenth of 1 percent are the issues that will define us.

I'm not hopeful, but old enough that it won't matter to me. Still, I do care about our legacy.

[calimary]

29. Yeah, but the problem with that is - WE ALL stand to lose that one.

Even those of us on the side of reality, science, logic, and facts. Those know-nothings threaten to drag us all down into extinction with them. WE will wind up paying for their willful (and distressingly PROUD) ignorance, closed-mindedness, and pigheadedness.

[Scuba]

18. I endorse every word.

[Faygo Kid]

19. Thanks, and it's time for this discussion

We better figure out where we are right now, because worse times are coming given this onslaught.

[Safetykitten]

20. Correct. We are on a coasting glide to the ground and one person could of made a difference.

But decided not to.

[Greybnk48]

21. A well orchestrated corporate coup d'etat.

I just told my husband my thoughts on this two days ago. They (those behind this) are using the religious crazies as pawns and will crush them when the overthrow of the Govt. is complete.

I will wear a foil hat if need be. But I grew up in the 60's and 70's and I have NEVER seen anything like what's happening here.

[reteachinwi]

109. The end game we are experiencing was well underway by the 60's and 70's.

President Nixon in 1971:

"Miss Dickerson, before we can really get a lift of a driving dream, we have to get rid of some of the nightmares we inherited. One of these nightmares is a war without end. We are ending that war . . . But it takes some time to get rid of the nightmares. You can't be having a driving dream when you are in the midst of a nightmare."

http://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/ST/STchp23.html

[felix_numinous]

23. Without the corporate war machine

and all that money put into reforestation, permaculture, growing food, green mass transit, free education, jobs to maintain infrastructure and housing, health care for all, research and development into how to sustain life in coming climate change....

We are all native, this is our planet. I awoke imagining this alternative track we could have, and still could take, instead if the crazy koo koo paranoid war on terra path that is essentially a disease of perception. A few people on Earth have convinced the rest their violent racist plans cannot be stopped.

The MIC has in its wake not only destroyed ecosystems and cultures overseas but they are at work doing the same here. Billions have been poured into racist hate radio, fear based disinformation and propaganda and entertainment glorifying the militarization and corporatization of the world.

They have created, manipulated and nurtured a fearful, unimaginative, intolerant and unnatural part of the population who have been conditioned to blame their fellow citizens instead of the 1% who have robbed us all BLIND.

I keep wondering what this country and indeed the world, would look like without the war machine?

I cannot help but wonder how many more beautiful and innocent souls would actually be alive and the rest if us safer without it?

[KoKo]

88. Well said. "..a disease of perception."

"We are all native, this is our planet. I awoke imagining this alternative track we could have, and still could take, instead if the crazy koo koo paranoid war on terra path that is essentially a disease of perception. A few people on Earth have convinced the rest their violent racist plans cannot be stopped.


The MIC has in its wake not only destroyed ecosystems and cultures overseas but they are at work doing the same here. Billions have been poured into racist hate radio, fear based disinformation and propaganda and entertainment glorifying the militarization and corporatization of the world."

[certainot]

24. democracy won't work while the left ignores the RW radio monopoly and pretends it's free speech

those are not just some guys with radio shows satisfying market demand any more than corporations are people. does anyone really believe that 95% of the people who listen to talk radio would choose the wit and wisdom of limbaugh and hannity if there were alternatives available?

they are coordinated and fed by our corporate think tanks and used to short circuit the democratic feedback mechanisms a democracy depends on. they hide behind call screeners and are prompted by paid callers. RW radio does the groundwork repetition for everything ALEC and the GOP do.

and it only works so well for them because the left ignores it.

how many protestors is one young republican blowhard with a big microphone worth? OWS lost steam because OWS didn't include radio stations in their protests and those blowhards had weeks to attack the protestors, distort the ideals and motives, and egg on, enable, and excuse the cops and local governments that broke up the protests.

starting 25 years ago when reagan killed the fairness doctrine the corporate/GOP think tanks bought up a bunch of radio stations, many with our publicly funded schools sports logos on them ( https://sites.google.com/site/universitiesforrushlimbaugh/ ), and put carnival barkers on every corner and stump in the country.

they're there all day every day screaming that liberals are liars and thieves and traitors and sluts, creating alternate realities for pro-corporate made-to-order constituencies (see tea party), and the left just walks on by because it hurts their ears to listen to it and they can't read it anywhere. biggest political mistake in history.

there can be no fact-based discussions on a national scale if we give 1200 think tank-coordinated radio stations a free speech free ride.

not on health care, climate change, energy, nukes, abortion, gun control, or trayvon martin and rodney zimmerman.

[KoKo]

38. +1 It's brainwashing propaganda and it works when the alternatives have been

taken away. Yes the death of the "Fairness Doctrine" and the "Telecommunications Act of 1996" under Clinton was the final straw for diversification in Media.

[SHRED]

30. big money = JFK'd

I am convinced that the big money players control at all costs. Play ball with them or else...

[jwirr]

45. That is how I explained what I think is going on - especially with the military issues - to my

grandson.

[DJ13]

31. Where is the leadership?

"leadership" thought back in 2008 that bringing both sides (Libs and Cons) to the table in running the country was a good idea, despite the obvious fact that the voters had just repudiated the conservatives in the national election.

All that did was to breath new life into the already dying conservative movement, giving the Rove's and Koch's on the other side another opportunity to further their agenda.

[polichick]

32. I felt sick when Pres. Obama said that we have to get beyond the issues of the 60s...

He was campaigning then, but he is now being faced with "the issues of the 60s" all over again - I hope he rises to the challenge. I hope we all do.


Edit: typo

[SHRED]

35. He's a corporate DLC

Why would he give a shit about what went down in the '60's?

DLC'ers talk the populist talk and then walk the corporate walk.

[polichick]

37. I know but, as a black man and a guy who was and is close...

to the women in his life, how can he NOT care about what's going on?

[SHRED]

59. you'd think he would that is for sure

[Systematic Chaos]

78. I think he really does care.

I also think he's maybe been shown the Zapruder film a time or three....

[KoKo]

89. If it's gotten that bad...then who will speak out?

Surely he had to have known. He worked his way up through the Chicago Machine, served in Senate and was privy to information. Had a huge backer in Penny Pritzger who was, and still is, well connected to the Chicago Machine and is now his Secretary of Commerce. His mother worked for the Ford Foundation.

Surely he knew about JFK.... So...why did he want to become President? If he couldn't achieve the goals he ran on and keep promises he made then why run at all?

[Pryderi]

33. Oligarchy explains it all. n/t

[Blue Idaho]

36. They tell us that Democrats control 2/3 of the national government

Yet the TeaPublican agenda is marching across our nation like a juggernaut. Everywhere I look I see rights bring restricted, freedoms being erased, and a brutal war against the poor, the sick, and the old. Where are the big D democrats willing to put their careers on the line to push back against those who would screw 90% of us just to satisfy their greed and their twisted morality.

We need leaders willing to use the force of the national government to protect people's rights and a justice department willing prosecute those who violate the law.

I am more than willing to put my shoulder against the wheel - but we need real courageous leadership not wimps like Harry Reid and the rest of the "go along to get along" crowd in DC.

[99th_Monkey]

56. This graph of $$$$ in Congress, really helped me see clearly

exactly why Congress seems so impotent and lame, even when the Dems
seem to have a clear opportunity, majority, etc.

[Blue Idaho]

63. Long gone are the days

When even wealthy democrats championed the rights of the poor, the sick, and old.

Greed runs America for the greedy.

[99th_Monkey]

64. Filed under "Sad but True". eom

[ananda]

94. Agree.

There's an uninhibited shadow id at play here in America, and it's coming into the light and showing itself as a very ugly nasty force. It plays to all the hates and phobias in narrow tribalist minds, and its power is something I never would have thought possible until it actually happened.

It makes me think that humanity is headed for extinction sooner rather than later because this kind of force bypasses the heart and the intellect, deriving only from the basest instinct reaching and grabbing for anything and everything it can without concern for consequences.

[marions ghost]

85. that graph really says it all

thanks for posting.

[KoKo]

90. There's no room for honest old lawyers from the Great Depression days

who can "plain speak" and have honor like Sam Erwin during the Watergate days. Even though Erwin had a checkered history on Desegregation...he managed to still have a compass that is lacking in the RW TeaParty and hidden racism of the Republican and Corporate agenda. He was instrumental in bringing down Joe McCarthy and investigating Nixon's crimes. We don't see cross-overs like that anymore.

It's the ambitious who get the funding from Lobbyists for Big Business, Big Ag, Big Wall Street and MIC interests.

"Citizens United" decision by the Superemes was the "cherry on top."

[99th_Monkey]

104. I remember those cross-overs too, as I've lived in Oregon

pretty much my whole life. We even had a Republican Governor McCall in the 60s,
who threw the first-ever "state-sponsored rock concert" called Vortex, in order to
keep the peace in Portland, where the VFW were going to hold a pro-war convention,
that was also attracting the ire of peaceniks & counterculture, and it looked like it
might turn violent. Everything went off smoothly. Everyone was smiling.

We also had US Senator Wayne Morse, a Republican who switched parties to
Dem as part of his very outspoken antiwar tirades on the floor of the Senate;
and US Sen. Mark Hatfield, a very liberal Republican, also very antiwar on Viet
Nam.

[MADem]

96. It's the wrong two thirds, though.

A Democratic Congress--both houses--can, with sufficient numbers, pass laws even if a GOP president doesn't like them, simply by overriding a veto.

We have the executive branch and one chamber. The other chamber, the House, is where laws originate--and the GOP has that.

[99th_Monkey]

101. "We" don't have shit

we have an elaborate DC Punch & Judy Show designed to confuse, delay,
obscure, and mangle the people's business until it's unrecognizable,
all to distract us while we continue to be robbed blind (or "harvested"
if you will) by the 1% greedy assholes who really do believe they are
the "Masters of the Universe".

"They gottcha by the balls" ~George Carlin

[MADem]

107. "We" don't show up in the mid-terms.

"We" don't show up for local elections either, where lousy candidates get small posts, and then bigger ones, and then bigger ones, still, because no one shows up to vote against them and for the "good" candidate.

"We" have the power. If every Democrat brought a full car of Democratic voters to the polls, "we" might see gains.

"They" only have the power that "we" cede to them through inaction.

[Ash_F]

39. weakness is strength

Democrats of the new century.

Thank you for your long term perspective.

[Lifelong Protester]

41. I have the same feelings

I want to believe we are witnessing the 'last gasp' of the current PTB, and hope, that like in the last gilded age, folks WAKE THE HELL UP.
I was on the front lines with the fight for women's equality, a little young but still involved in the whole Civil Rights fight of the 60s, and I am hoping that young people today are involved.

Informally, and maybe it is just the posts I tend to read, but it seems like a lot of DU is made up of boomers, like myself. I am not saying we are not involved, but we need all sorts of people, of all ages, races, creeds, you name it, involved.

Youth of America, are you in?


And we need a leader we can rally around. I had hoped it was the President, but I think he has been bogged down with all kinds of crap that has been intentionally fomented TO bog him down.

We need a general rising. A real rising.

And I am from WI, wondering why people keep voting against their own self interest. I am sure it is because they are 'told' to fear the 'other', fear helping anyone, protect what you have! What a load of crap, designed to keep us at each others' throats while the wealthy rig the system and steal us blind.

Sorry, this is sort of a disjointed rant, but I keep thinking, "Jeez, not this crap again!". When will we learn?

[felix_numinous]

68. Why do people keep voting against

their own interests? Besides propaganda and dumbing down of schools-- I suspect the hackable Diebold machines!!! I will NEVER completely trust close elections, especially when Rs win.

Until we get rid of these machines, how can we trust results? And now that voting rights got reversed, the AA voters will be purged next election.

Great response!

[marions ghost]

86. +++

The voting issues are basic.

[konnie]

44. I Despair

I am completely disgusted. This 60+ boomer is sick to her stomach at the complete devolution of her once beloved country. Every institution and value we were so proud of has been shredded. If I had the money I would pack up and leave. From the money coupe of the government to the court system to the race war's return I am brokenhearted. And I see no hope for the future. None.

We are in the exact place that the Roman Empire found itself in at the end. Maggots eating
the rotting flesh of empire. All of the hopes and dreams of a better civilization, a more just society, crushed under the weight of an evil oligarchy.

There are no leaders, no platform, no solutions to fix this mess. I will not live long enough to witness a return to civility, much less anything even resembling peace. The history books, if the planet lasts long enough for historians to reflect, will pronounce this time period as the beginning of the end of the American Experiment. I see only savagery ahead. America will become like India with it's caste system - South Africa and its townships. Divided and violent. The boundary lines reinforced by fences, bright and horrific.

It is so sad to remember a time when hope shined so brightly with leaders and dreamers who fought so hard to change hearts and minds. But they were murdered. It is painful to read MLK, or listen to the speeches of Bobby Kennedy now. Yes I despair, for myself, my grandchildren, and my fellow countrymen.

[live love laugh]

97. I despair too. I have watched for over a decade now--since Bush was selected

Things are not getting better. There is no "voice" for the average American. The media is locked up and free speech/the fairness doctrine et al, are history. I actively avoid listening to the news but because I am staying with relatives temporarily and not at home, I am listening to the news because somebody else does. I was appalled to hear the other day that a new law will deny teens 17 and under abortions if they don't notify their parents. Then in passing, I heard another abortion law will decrease the window of time when abortions can be performed. Not only that, we have continuing job exportation; a virtual wild wild west for corporations who maintain off-shore bank accounts and don't pay taxes and it's never exposed or even questioned. Most maddening to me is the pure absence of reason and thought in society. There is no exchange of critical ideas and information--just propoganda and slanted/ommitted/shield information that is thrown out and which most people pick up and regurgitate as fact when nothing could be further from the truth. I have stopped coming to DU very much and backed off from political activity because I don't see things getting any better.

This is not my America. I grew up with a different kind of media; with public schools where teachers cared and which I revered. I never thought we could/would stoop so low--and so fast. I definitely didn't think this could happen in my own lifetime. I once held out hope/fantasies of some strong leader stepping up, exposing the truth and rallying people back to their senses. I don't see that happening either.

Basically, we. are. screwn (intentionally bad spelling).

[marions ghost]

98. "Fences, bright and horrific"

--you put that so well. Welcome to DU.

That is what they are building in every sense--walls and barricades. The rich vs middle class/poor, white vs non-white, men vs women, preferred religion vs not preferred, urban vs rural, gay vs straight, boomers vs younger generations, gun promoters vs gun regulators. And lately, defenders of NSA spying vs. defenders of individual privacy. You name it, wherever they can divide, they WILL divide. We should NOT buy into these divisions.

Yes it is a downward spiral for this country--and it's crucial to see it, name it and face it. You have articulated our present situation with truth and honesty IMO. Your projection is likely, without a full-on effort to stop it, thwart it, change course. I totally agree with that.

No we cannot beat them at their own game. They hold the controlling hand in that rigged game.
But do we really have to be their pawns? What strengths do we have?

We have good minds--the best--on our side. People with great wisdom and intelligence. We have sheer numbers on our side. We have right action, justice and honesty on our side. We have non-violent strategies and new ways & means. We have new media. We have solidarity with other similar oppressive regimes around the world (and this is a regime--it is NOT what America really stands for, certainly). We have Nature on our side in the sense that nature's voice is ever more insistent, and WILL be heard.

We have heart & they have none. They are heartless and ruthless, greedy and selfish. They will lie, cheat, and steal. We do not. These are strengths, not weaknesses.

We also have our own idealistic history on our side--we know without question that we must actively reject & resist these walls they are trying so hard to build--these immoral, artificial walls to protect their corruption and greed. The Boomers can still put some major cracks in those walls, and the younger generations are certainly up with that. The young are not complicit with the whole divide & conquer, grab all you can, "I got mine" mentality--many of them see and recognize that as twisted and doomed. Occupy, if nothing else, has proven that the young get it and understand the nature of the assaults. So IMO it's not yet time for proceeding down the very same road as the Roman Empire, even though we are on the brink of that. I understand the despair and feel it often. But did you think our adversaries would give up easily?--that they would not use every means possible to overcome the gains of the 60's-70's? We have to fight with all we've got, on every front, non-violently. We have to respond to their assaults. Do what we can, no matter how small. This is just part 2 of that story. Another battle on the beach. The arc is long.

The Berlin wall fell. These stupid, tragic, unsustainable walls CAN fall.

Just my two cents, NNTR.

[AZ Progressive]

47. We are in times of war, a war against American progress

[marions ghost]

87. A cold civil war

---

[Comrade Grumpy]

48. It's telling that when you name two national Democrats showing progressive leadership...

...that only one of them is a Democrat. Bernie Sanders is a socialist independent.

Maybe we need a party that represents our interests.

[TransitJohn]

49. K&R, good post.

Sure would be nice if the Party leadership cared about these things.

[99th_Monkey]

50. "Where is the leadership?" <--hiding out in a Russian airport.

and on trial for "sedition" and "treason". sadly.

[kentuck]

51. Damn!

Now that you mention it...

[ProSense]

53. I think

"Where is the leadership?" <--hiding out in a Russian airport.

...this is more likely the case: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023253582#post3

I fully expect the right and some on the left to frame the RW assualt on this country as Obama's fault.

Zimmerman acquitted: Obama's fault.

[99th_Monkey]

61. I would like to think this is true

"It is possible that what is going on is a last gasp
of the privileged former majority of the country
becoming more desperate and frantic in pushing
its agenda, that was in the past taken for granted.

History has shown that the more resistance against
change there is the more upsetting, for everyone, the eventual
change will be."

however, excuse me if I remain more than a little skeptical,
given our recent experience with Occupy, et. al.

[Enthusiast]

73. Yeah, Obama's great. We've heard it all before.

What about his promotion of the TPP? What is your excuse for that? Trade deals are good when President Obama is promoting them?

The best way we can make progress is to first and foremost admit that President Obama is the problem and try to work around him. He is not progressive. He is corporatist all the way. Criticism of Obama might actually spur him to do something we want instead of what we don't.

Don't bother with your links, I won't read them. If you have something to say, say it.

[great white snark]

80. Please. Leaking, running away and hiding in a stall in no way describes leadership.

Your idea of a leader could never govern.

[arthritisR_US]

52. Your observations are dead on and the lack of

leadership leaves me disheartened and dumbfounded

[firenewt]

54. Yes. we are losing and I have given up. I'm 60 and on a full medical disability. My 26yo daughter

has Chrohn's disease and no insurance. She tries to work, but her health is bad. My 22yo son has a blood disorder and no insurance. He has lost 60 lbs in the last 18 months and is too weak to work - he is trying to stay in college. I had a nice little trust fund, but the trust company lost approx $500,000 thru neglect and mismanagement. I don't have control of the trust so I can't do anything about it. I raised my kids as a single dad - can't get any help from their mother.
I am not looking for sympathy, just stating what I'm dealing with. And, to add insult to injury, we live in Indiana. Not the most progressive state in the union.
And just for fun, my teeth are rotting due to all the meds I'm on with no dental insurance. Looks like I've got meth mouth.
I try to remain positive, to maintain some hope for the future, but it's damn impossible to do so.
This is why I've given up.

[Faygo Kid]

58. My daughter is 36, and she is disabled.

Brilliant, yet has led an underachieving life. She and her husband live in Florida, which of course under Rick Scott wants to cut everything for the disabled. I do what I can, but I'm not a young go-getter anymore. What has happened to my country? Why do I pay tax dollars for agri-business and wars, and they want to end food stamps for the children that are born?

[Skittles]

72. you wouldn't be here if you had completely given up, firenewt

you and your children are decent people - hang in there and stick with DU - there is always someone here, always - we have to keep trying

[cantbeserious]

55. + Infinity

eom

[Iliyah]

57. And you are correct.

One power we have "We the People" is to get out and vote for our common interest not against it.

We need work within and vote for people who will work for the people's interest. Hopefully we won't be caught in that trap of neither is any good and allow that no good party to waltz in. If that occurs again y'think the injustice that is happening now is bad, it will get even worst.

[AZ Progressive]

62. TPTB are masters at propaganda and "divide and conquer"

They can tear apart the American people easily by dividing them and have them fight each other. One thing America pioneered is propaganda, and its the main weapon of TPTB.

One thing that has to be won thus is the war of words.

[Faygo Kid]

65. Correct, and I wish we were winning this one.

We should be, but aren't.

[Egalitarian Thug]

67. And just how do you propose to do that?

Don't know where you live, but almost every place I've lived we only get to vote for corporate candidate 'D' or corporate candidate 'R', knowing full well that neither of them is going to do shit for the "small people" that vote with mere ballots.

You want to know how obscene it is? My Senator Heller, republican POS, has a far better position on helping students deal with unreasonable debt than my Senator Reid, Democratic POS, and Heller actually responds to calls and emails from us.

My House representative, Titus, has her head so far up her corporate master's rectum that nobody's seen her for months.

[Doctor_J]

69. Platitudes like this are counterproductive

at present neither national party IS any good.

[Doctor_J]

70. we might have passed the point where we can resist

Republicanism is a cancer. 20 years ago it was stage I and could have been treated with minimal invasiveness. Now it is stage IV and any treatment will have to be radical and dangerous and might not work anyway. The question is whether we want to go all out, or to accept our fate and go peacefully.

[marions ghost]

99. "Accept our fate"

NO way....that would not be going peacefully, more like "dragged kicking & screaming."

"All out" to me means unified and relentless resistance, not violence. I don't think that's even been seriously tried on a large enough scale yet. People are still in shock & anger as to the necessity of it. We need to get out of the "this can't be happening here" denial.

[Skittles]

71. it's almost as if we never won the presidential elections

Last edited Mon Jul 15, 2013, 03:30 PM - Edit history (1)

[Enthusiast]

74. Noticed that too, did ya?

[KoKo]

93. Three and a half more years...

[Doctor_J]

105. 2009_2010 should have opened everyone s eyes

Best congressional profile we're going to have for a long time. Results were almost nothing.

[BarbaRosa]

76. I see this as America's longest running war.

The one Reagan started; America vs America, and America is losing.

[CanonRay]

82. I was having similar thoughts at 4am this morning

It seems that advances we made when I was a teenager and young adult (voting rights, birth control and abortion rights) are being rolled back as I hit my dotage. I never, never thought I'd live to see what is going on now. The Trayvon Martin verdict hit me like a mule kick between the eyes. It's very depressing.

[treestar]

84. not feeling it

We can try for a Democratic Congress in 2014 and make some more progress. The wars are over or winding down. The ACA is starting to take effect. There are more state legislatures that are reasonable and not Tea Party than there are Tea Party legislatures. The economy is getting better. The problems of today are not a special crisis. It was far worse during the Bush Administration. Quit observing and get out there and do something.

[marions ghost]

100. "The problems of today are not a special crisis"

maybe not for you, but for many they are.

[SomethingFishy]

108. No empathy?

No possible way for it to be true because you aren't "feeling it"?

I haven't seen a raise in 8 years, not even a cost of living raise, I was told, "you are a great asset but, there is just no money". 3 weeks after I was told there is "no money" the guy I work for bought a second private jet and had a 2 million dollar pond dug on his land. See I am FEELING it. I'm feeling like there is something wrong here. Really, really, wrong.

There's no money. Same thing the government keeps telling me. There is no money. Well there is no money for Social Security or health care but there is 46 billion dollars to build a fence and put armed guards on the border when immigration from Mexico is at a zero sum. There is no money for gym or art classes or for teachers but there is money to arm Al Quaeda rebels in Syria.

There is no money for the poor the elderly or the sick, but there is money for a massive new multi billion dollar data center in Utah.

There is no money for low interest college loans or food stamps but plenty for subsidizing corporate farming.

It's gotten to the point where we are so used to getting screwed that people don't even "feel it" anymore.

[reteachinwi]

110. Don't leave out the $85 billion the Fed prints every month

to make the banks "profitable"

[valerief]

102. None of it could be done without Jeebus. nt

[Deep13]

103. The seige is over, we lost.

After 80 years, fascism has final won.

[polichick]

106. "but what can we do?"

I think about this every day - there must be something but I sure don't think it's about either of these parties anymore.

Maybe it will become clear one of these days - sure hope so.

k&r

[reteachinwi]

111. "but what can we do?"

duck, for now.

[npk]

113. That pretty much sums it up for me

Unfortunately no matter how well intended a person may be, and I am mostly speaking of our elected Dem's in congress, but also President Obama, MONEY and the elite power structure trump everything once the election ends and the person takes their post. Maybe a couple of men and women in congress don't abide this, but they are ignored. Just look what happened to Dennis Kucinich and Alan Grayson. When they said no to these powerful lobbyist, they were immediately labeled as cooks and weirdos by the press and even many of their fellow Dems. It's basically fall in line or we will find someone to replace you. That is not a system of government that can rule by the will of the people, it basically becomes a political corporation. DC has become an industry onto itself and their main goal is to seize power, maintain that power, and enrich themselves; by whatever means necessary.