I'm Afraid They Are Taking Down The Scenery

[Syrinx]

Frank Zappa, 1977:

The illusion of freedom will continue as long as it's profitable to continue the illusion. At the point where the illusion becomes too expensive to maintain, they will just take down the scenery, they will pull back the curtains, they will move the tables and chairs out of the way, and you will see the brick wall at the back of the theater.

I'm afraid we may be at the point that Zappa foresaw.

Listen to Ralph Nader.

And even if not, how much better is it? The Constitution means nothing.

They have pissed all over it.

Torture by the United States Of America. Let that soak in.

Torture.

In the United States Of Fucking America.

Rampant spying on us... American citizens.

No fourth amendment protections. Those are quaint.

There's no real opposition. Hillary Clinton, the preordained? Give me a break.

The corporations control this country. Isn't that the very definition of Fascism?

We're bankrupt, and our notes are held by those saints that rule China and Saudi Arabia.

We are screwed.

Our fucking speaker of the house, Nancy Pelosi, tells us through her phony smile that "impeachment is off the table." Gutless, soulless sellouts, and worse.

Our country, our way of life, has no prominent defender left.

It is over.

The good guys have faded away, and the opportunists have surrendered.

I guess I'm a "conspiracy theorist." Because, I'm telling you, it has been a conspiracy.

The murders of JFK, MLF, RFK, John Lennon, Paul Wellstone were all connected.

Even the attempted hit on Reagan was part of it too. Because Bush Sr. wanted to be president.

Was it a mere coincedence that Hinckley's father was a long-time business partner of Bush?

Really? Give me a break.

Read about MK-Ultra, and tell me conspiracies don't exist.

And Bush Sr. is the only person I ever heard of that doesn't remember where he was when JFK was shot.

Did you hear the BBC radio piece about Prescott Bush being a part of a plot to organize a private army to overthrow FDR and the American government?

Hello! Does Blackwater ring a bell?

You are living through what the Chinese call "interesting times."

You are witnessing the end of America, in high-definition, real time.

You are seeing the culmination of a conspiracy that has been ongoing for at least eighty years, possibly since the beginning of the republic.

It's crunch time. Is there anyone left to help us?

Anyone but ourselves?

[ixion]

1. the only people who can help us (ourselves) are unable to do so

because it would be...inconvenient.

And because we simply can't tolerate inconvenience in our society or our daily lives, we are deeply, thoroughly and entirely screwed now and for all time.

Of course, there were warning signs. There were the Brits and the Romans before us who fell from the top of the heap for precisely the same reasons. The difference this time is a matter of scale, however the motivations and attitudes of the citizenry are identical.

[Syrinx]

3. "ourselves"

I actually thought of that, and added it, independently, but I was pleased to see it in your reply.

:hi:

[ixion]

6. Anyone but ourselves...that's a big 'but', as the saying goes...

:hi:

I don't think so, personally. I think we're the only ones capable of pulling ourselves out of the hole we're digging.

[seemslikeadream]

2. “Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic.”

War and Globalization
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3117338213439292490&q=Hijacking+Catastrophe&total=29&start=20&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=7


Hijacking Catastrophe:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SltOy_F6ZII&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YlcpXBFOXA&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwZaWh0cJPQ&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8S_vOZqJbE&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GT7ti8LZ6A&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkOtqGNJ8qI&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8C02QHS0D44&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YlcpXBFOXA&mode=related&search
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kBX00TR-aA&mode=related&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jghh00bn_DA&mode=related&search=


“Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic.”


She's present in our country right now, just waiting to make her - to carry out her divine mission



http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/02/27/1454229

CHALMERS JOHNSON: Nemesis was the ancient Greek goddess of revenge, the punisher of hubris and arrogance in human beings. You may recall she is the one that led Narcissus to the pond and showed him his reflection, and he dove in and drowned. I chose the title, because it seems to me that she's present in our country right now, just waiting to make her -- to carry out her divine mission.

By the subtitle, I really do mean it. This is not just hype to sell books -- “The Last Days of the American Republic.” I’m here concerned with a very real, concrete problem in political analysis, namely that the political system of the United States today, history tells us, is one of the most unstable combinations there is -- that is, domestic democracy and foreign empire -- that the choices are stark. A nation can be one or the other, a democracy or an imperialist, but it can't be both. If it sticks to imperialism, it will, like the old Roman Republic, on which so much of our system was modeled, like the old Roman Republic, it will lose its democracy to a domestic dictatorship.

I’ve spent some time in the book talking about an alternative, namely that of the British Empire after World War II, in which it made the decision, not perfectly executed by any manner of means, but nonetheless made the decision to give up its empire in order to keep its democracy. It became apparent to the British quite late in the game that they could keep the jewel in their crown, India, only at the expense of administrative massacres, of which they had carried them out often in India. In the wake of the war against Nazism, which had just ended, it became, I think, obvious to the British that in order to retain their empire, they would have to become a tyranny, and they, therefore, I believe, properly chose, admirably chose to give up their empire.

As I say, they didn't do it perfectly. There were tremendous atavistic fallbacks in the 1950s in the Anglo, French, Israeli attack on Egypt; in the repression of the Kikuyu -- savage repression, really -- in Kenya; and then, of course, the most obvious and weird atavism of them all, Tony Blair and his enthusiasm for renewed British imperialism in Iraq. But nonetheless, it seems to me that the history of Britain is clear that it gave up its empire in order to remain a democracy. I believe this is something we should be discussing very hard in the United States.

[Syrinx]

4. seems more like a nightmare...

Thanks for your input!

:hi:

[BridgeTheGap]

5. "Those who see conspiracies behind everything

are just as narrow minded as those who see no conspiracy at all." unknown

It has always been this way. Torture is not new to America. Ask anyone ever beaten with a rubber hose or fists by local police. Ask native Americans. Ask African Americans.
Make no mistake - this justifies NOTHING. It's just that what we are seeing now did not evolve out of a vacuum. It's the natural result of how things have been done in this country SINCE THE BEGINNING.
Is there a choice? Absolutely.
Get active - educate ourselves - encourage others to participate - don't give in to cynicism and despair - write a letter to the editor - write/call your Congress critters and any other elected official. Just don't take it lying down!

[Syrinx]

7. Torture is defintely new to America!

Torture has never been official American policy. Until now.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

9. Not true.

We tortured many people in Vietnam. It most certainly was officially sanctioned policy, and that's just one recent example.

[Syrinx]

8. "Those who refuse to see conspiracies when they are evident..."

Are just stupid. (Me.)

[petgoat]

11. The jury in a civil lawsuit about the assassination of MLK

concluded that "governmental agencies were parties".


In 1999, Coretta Scott King, King's widow, along with the rest of King's family, won a wrongful death civil trial against Loyd Jowers and "other unknown co-conspirators". Jowers claimed to have received $100,000 to arrange King's assassination. The jury of six whites and six blacks found Jowers guilty and that "governmental agencies were parties" to the assassination plot.<35> William F. Pepper represented the King family in the trial.<36><37><38>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_King,_Jr.

Re: conspiracies, I've heard attributed to Michael Parenti the observation that
it's absurd to think that people who spend their lives accumulate political and
economic power do not meet together from time to time to coordinate their efforts
in matters of mutual interest.

[Exultant Democracy]

10. I've thought that we have been living in"interesting times" for a while.

[earth mom]

12. You nailed it. I have hope left that Gore may save us-other than that, Zip.

:cry:

[tom_paine]

13. "The avalanche has begun. It is too late for the pebbles to vote."

--Ambassador Kosh "Babylon 5"

[fenriswolf]

14. yeah when push comes to shove

when the sh*t hits the fan we are I'm not going to be helping "us" im going to be helping myself. Helping people and giving people a hand up are things that we are able to do in a civil society, when the end run hits trust me america will be a third world country, without gas, without water, without electricity at your beck and call, what markets are left you will be lucky to buy anything that "is" availble. I will be looking out for me and mine, if I have any generosity to spare it will be spared but i doubt it, i will have enough problems trying to survive. Oil and our dependance on it and our refusal to change has doomed our nation.