'Will Economic Inequality Lead to Terrorism? A Chilling Moment on NPR' (Bruce Judson)

[swag]

http://itcouldhappenhere.com/blog/a-chilling-moment-on-npr-terrorism-and-inequality/

. . .

CALLER: I think you should be listening to this guy, Judson. I’m an unemployed nuclear engineer. I’ve worked on 13 nuclear power plants. Making a dirty bomb is not a big deal. I’m not going to go out and tell everybody now to do it, but I’m just saying things like that can happen. And it sounds like you’re just being dismissive of all his ideas and what he’s saying. Because there’s a lot of anger out here, and there are a lot of people who feel that the American Dream is slipping away from them, they don’t have a chance. And the only entrepreneurial opportunity for them is to sell drugs and to be an outlaw. It’s happening.

TOM ASHBROOK: I hear you, Don. We’ve got Bruce on for an hour. So, I can’t say we’re not listening to him. But let me ask you, you’ve got a lot of expertise in your field, nuclear engineering. But does that mean you’re unhappy if you’re unemployed? Do you really feel like the country’s ready to revolt?

CALLER: I’m not an expert in revolution, and I don’t really know how they happen. All I know is I’m 60 years old. There’s not a lot of people who want to hire a nuclear engineer who’s 60 years old. And there are a lot of people out there like me who are out there who, you know, once you have so much gray hair, you’re out of here. And there’s just a lot of people that are just not happy with the way that the country’s going right now.

And I don’t know…where it’s going to take it, or what’s going to be its spark, or what’s going to be the event. But people feel like there’s just no way to climb out of the hole. Like there’s just nothing that’s going to get them out. This attitude, that I’ve seen, over 60 years, I’ve never seen anything like it. It scares me.

TOM ASHBROOK: Up against it. And with an education, a particular education. Don, thank you for your call.

. . . more

[amborin]

1. sounds like that Michael Douglas movie, a decade or so back....

the super disgruntled engineer, who wound up on the freeway, i forget the title

academics have pondered this question....do rising levels of economic inequality lead to revolutions or domestic terrorism, etc?....they generally concluded, no, based on lots of historical evidence and case studies

[Angry Dragon]

2. French Revolutioon

What caused that??

[starroute]

16. Economic problems from getting involved in the American Revolution

It was a good thing for us but a really bad thing for France. There were also some crop failures and resulting famines along the way. And the French court was corrupt as hell, and the French middle class was losing the ground they'd gained over the previous 50 years.

All the usual.

[Angry Dragon]

17. Gee.

Wars that we should not have been involved in??
Government debt??
Social unrest??
Church involved??

Gee, does not sound too much different than what we have now.....

[swag]

3. Oh yeah, "Falling Down." Terrible movie.

Anyway, thanks for posting. Academics (and you don't cite any) have pondered lots of questions. And have often been wrong.

How many of the three or four academics who predicted the financial meltdown were just winners of a coin-flipping contest?

[MannyGoldstein]

5. American Nazi Party And KKK got huge in the last depressiom

This won't end in a sweet and calm way.

[girl gone mad]

7. Can you cite any of these studies.

I would think in the face of limited economic opportunities, endemic corruption which is actively encouraged by government policies, an incredibly unfair playing field tilted toward entrenched institutions and well-connected elites, and massive corporate communism that the large wealth disparity we are witnessing will be a big problem.

[rhett o rick]

12. Yes, a big problem. But there isnt a whole hell of a lot we can do. Many countries around the world

already face this situation. I dont think any have come up with a solution.

[MUAD_DIB]

9. Falling down.

[Double T]

11. "Falling Down"

One of my all time favorites. Revolutions don't always need to be violent; they can start in a voting booth getting rid of ALL INCUMBENTS!.

[tblue37]

15. _Falling Down_.

[willing dwarf]

4. I found myself musing on the same point this evening

I didn't hear this show, but I found myself thinking that with so many unemployed people from the middle, seeing the american dream slip away...there's could be trouble from the law and order people if they feel cut off, Sort of scary to have my vague thought confirmed here.

[bridgit]

6. ^

:kick:

[bertman]

8. This is why we are rapidly becoming a police state with the police equipped like an infantry

unit. This is why an active American Army Brigade has been designated for domestic security for the U.S. This is why we are seeing more and more instances where our police are working with the military on tactical exercises in our towns and cities. This is why our police look like Robocop.

The Powers That Be have foreseen the backlash and they think they are prepared for it. They have even conveniently imported millions of low-wage, non-citizen workers to take the place of the millions of Americans who will be incarcerated or worse when the excrement hits the wind-delivery system.

God bless Amerka.

[dysfunctional press]

10. eventually, yes.

and the plutocracy is gearing up for the inevitable.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

13. The plutocracy pushes the workers.

The plutocracy pushes the workers, keeps wages down and unemployment high. They do this as far as possible until the unemployed revolt. If there was more income equality, the society would be more stable, but the powers that be do not care. They just want profits.

The nuclear engineer is right; there are millions of educated baby boomers who know highly technical fields who indeed could pull off terrorism. The baby boomers have been thrown away on the trash heap after getting excellent educations (I'm one of those).

[amborin]

14. how many people shop at wallmart? drive a japanese car? buy clothes made in china?

[willing dwarf]

19. Amen to that

gleeful acquisition of more stuff while sawing off the limb they are standing on.

Globalization has fundamentally changed the nature of capitalist economy. If there was a world -government set up to equalize results of disasters -- natural and man-made-- and to rebalance the distribution globally, then we might see a liveable version of capitalism.

But really, it the economic burden was shared globally, the poor me perspective of American middle would be overwhelmed by the real poverty and difficulties of people living in lots of other places round the globe.

I'm not saying that the hardship felt and the reactionary response of disappearing middle America isn't potential hazard. But it pales by comparison with the potential anger of disenfranchised peoples outside the US --hence Al Quaida etc, trying to get a point across.

[loudsue]

18. Baby boomers didn't just get excellent educations, we worked our asses off to build

the most successful, productive economy the world has ever seen. Now: no insurance, no jobs, 401K's and IRA's are worthless.

It ain't pretty.