So now what?

[MannyGoldstein]

Please forgive my stream-of-consciousness rambling.

I http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x1793922">posted a poll earlier this evening asking if people are doing better than they were two years ago. I expected to see that most were doing about the same - after all, the overall economy is doing about the same as it was two years ago. Turns out that 84% are not doing the same, and doing worse outnumbers doing better by two-to-one. Not super-scientific, but there are more than 150 responses so the general outcome is likely not so far from reality. That would explain why http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=1766725&mesg_id=1766725">89% of Americans are dissatisfied with the way things are going. I guess the 1% are doing even better, and the 99% are doing even worse. I conceptually knew that, but somehow missed the reality of it.

That's surprising to me, and appalling. As much as I've been a critic of US policies over the past two years, I didn't think it had gotten this bad. And the stories that people tell are heartbreaking.

We are, by-and-large, fucked. There's nobody to save us except ourselves.

So now what?

[Shagbark Hickory]

1. What do you recommend?

[MannyGoldstein]

4. I don't know. It's a big problem and I'm just a little guy.

But I'm sure we need to rely on ourselves.

[Shagbark Hickory]

7. Perhaps if more people would go into industries that exploit poor people & things like foreclosures,

then everyone would be doing fabulous.

[villager]

2. Interesting this was unrecc'd -- though the unrec won't make the conclusion go away

I'm one of those worse off than I was 3 - 4 years ago, by the way...

[MannyGoldstein]

10. I understand that DU3 will allow us to see who unrecs

I suspect the sunshine will be interesting and helpful.

But for now - the unreccers are voracious.

[RKP5637]

18. Wow, that would be interesting. I'm always curious about unrecs. Then it

seems I heard at one time there would be no rec/unrec in DU3.

[MannyGoldstein]

20. Actually, I may have it wrong,

It might be we can see who recs, but no unrecs allowed.

My memory sucks these days!

[NYC_SKP]

3. As you suggest, the poll results are far from reliable and even further from indicative...

...of any causation or application toward future trends.

I don't, from looking around my blighted Forbes worst city (one of worst five), see things worse, they've actually improved.

It looked worse two years ago, and people are getting by pretty well, it seems.

I could have answered the poll either way.

I'm worse off if I look at the value of my home or retirement. But better off in my career and income.

So maybe, had I wanted to make things look bad in answering your poll, I'd have answered "worse".

And vice-versa.

Take heart, we'll be fine if we keep our eye on the prize and put our energy in productive directions.

:thumbsup:

[Harmony Blue]

5. It is obvious that the younger generation

has to circle the wagons for out country. Thank you to the Baby Boomer generation as you have done your best, but time to pass the torch of perseverance of progressive values to the youth.

We can't approach this from a macro level, but from a micro level. Encourage local activism, and support those union workers who go on strike at the local level. Attend town hall meetings for your rep if possible. Help a neighbor out to plant a garden, or help with yard work. Give someone begging for work 50 cents, and shake their hand. Say excuse me when passing someone by in the grocery store. Voluntarily go out and pick up trash on public sidewalks. Visit your old high school and shake the hands of your old teachers.

We can make a difference, but you have to aim for small steps. Remember the Tortoise won the race not the Hare, so this race for the core of our country is a marathon, not a sprint.

[RKP5637]

9. All excellent points/suggestions IMO!!! n/t

[RKP5637]

6. Americans could make a huge difference if they woke up, paid attention and

voted for their best interests, but many won't, and many thought they voted for their best interests in 2008, and then came 2010. My fear is after 2012, they might look like the best of times. I have a really hard time anymore feeling optimistic about much.

[gateley]

11. Many thought they voted for their best interests in 2010, too -

thinking the "other Party" could make it better.

It's kind of sadly encouraging that many who have been affected (hurt) have learned from their mistake, but the majority of people either haven't really "gotten" it, or they continue to think cutting taxes is the answer to getting out of pain. :(

[RKP5637]

15. IMO this is one of the major problems of having only two major political

parties. It's like watching a perpetual domestic argument or tennis match. Three strong parties would break up the Yin and yang. The current environment means parties are constantly at loggerheads. And nothing breaks up the perpetual argument.

[Blue_In_AK]

I totally agree with this.

Maybe even four or five parties. Basically that's what we have now, anyway, what with the tea party and the progressives being less than satisfied with their Republican and Democratic party leadership. It's not fair that people have to compromise their beliefs so much in order to find a party they can vote for.

At the very least, there needs to be a left, a center and a right. Barack Obama could run as a Centrist and we on the left could have our own candidate. What few remaining sane Republicans there are can join the Centrist Party and not feel bad about it since they don't have to claim the term "Democrat." The Tea Party can be who they are. A three-way race would be fun and interesting. More choice is good.

[AndyTiedye]

27. The People ARE Awake. But When They Woke Up, they Turned on the Tee Vee

and the Tee Vee always tells them that Democrats and liberals are Satan and that they should always vote Republican.

[kentuck]

8. Everybody knows it was bad and it is bad still...

They want a fighter. They want someone to lay down the truth like a nine-pound hammer. Call out the sinners. People are waiting.

[BzaDem]

12. I think "Fucked" is more of a relative term that depends on one's expectations.

To a right-wing Ayn-rander nutcase, we were always fucked, since the government will always to continue to have programs like Food stamps to prevent starvation. But to that nutcase, he will always be fucked, and there's nothing he can do about it.

In our case, if we go into this thinking that there is always a way to get what we want, we are always going to be disappointed. This is true for many reasons. Two of the most significant are the structural limitations on our government that are not present with most governments (I talked about them http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=439&topic_id=1780326">here). Another is that particularly in our system, politicans will often go after what they perceive to be the median voter, which is often going to be far from what we want. (For example, people in this country oppose Keynesian spending programs to increase jobs by a margin of something like 5-1, and these polling numbers are almost identical to what they were under FDR.)

In any case, thats why I think thinking with binary "fucked vs. non-fucked" terms leaves out important information. Of course in many ways we are "fucked." But that doesn't mean there isn't anything that can be done. The critique of Obama is that he is not liberal enough. But Obama and the Democrats currently in Congress won't be the last Democratic politicans we have, and we will continue to have chances to convince the rest of our party and the rest of our country to move leftward. The real danger is the Republican plan not simply to enact right-wing policy, but to ensure that such policy is the only option (regardless of how progressive future governments are). This is exactly what the oligarchs did for the first 37 years of the last century, when progressive laws were struck down left and right.

[MannyGoldstein]

13. Forget Obama. At what point are we *absolutely* fucked rather than

*relatively* fucked?

[BzaDem]

17. I would say we are absolutely fucked when we are legally prevented from ever improving the condition

of the Country (even if we have the most progressive officeholders imaginable).

There are some actions politicans take that last a year, some that last a few, and some that last a generation or more. For example, the replacement of Thurgood Marshall by Clarance Thomas has affected our laws in ways most can't even imagine. His authority could very well last 40 years, and if he waits to retire under someone like-minded, that switch could affect us for 80 years. That one replacement (among many, many effects) had the effect of multiplying Corporate power 10-fold in elections, which just makes the problem that much worse. Multi-generational actions like that should be looked at in a different light than the short-term ebb and flow of our politics.

[RKP5637]

19. SCOTUS is too powerful and can be too easily manipulated by TPTB. Our

system needs some tweaks here and there, but I have no idea how that's going to come about. I also think there should be more turnover on SCOTUS. It's ridiculous having life appointments IMO. And, there is no guarantee we are getting the best of the minds, but we are stuck with them for a long time.

[BeFree]

14. Reality is...

With the environment changing for the worse, with the economic bubble burst, and because the light at the end of the tunnel is looking more and more like a hellbound train, is it kinda cool to think that just laying out on the tracks is the best of all possible paths?

In reality, there are not many humans, if any, who actually are better off or will ever be better off.

Our better days may be behind us.

Then of course there is always tomorrow. And wasn't it MLKing who said: "Even were the world to end tomorrow, I'd still plant a tree today"? I'd feel better if he'd lived to be a real old man.....

[RKP5637]

21. Yeah, we could sure use some of MLK's wisdom these days!!! We have a pattern

in this country when someone good comes along they get killed.

[BeFree]

23. Wouldn't that have been something?

To have MLK still fighting for us.

I bet he would have raised holy hell about the voting machines, for one thing.

[RKP5637]

24. Yep, MLK would have added a very powerful voice. I loved to hear him talk, he was

very inspiring to listen to, a truly great American.

[tblue]

28. About everything!

But he would have been vilified and called a commie. The difference is he wouldn't care.

[phasma ex machina]

16. I'm strengthening my real world community ties. It's a lot of fun.

[OhioChick]

22. Your polls, as well as others don't surprise me...

I see/hear on a daily basis how bad life is for most. Joblessness, foreclosures, stagnant wages, food and gas prices continuously rising, etc.

This came out recently:

Report: At least 1 in 4 families couldn't afford food in the last year(OH)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=4957896

If 1 out of every 4 families can't even afford food, things are BAD. This is only a report from one state, people shouldn't be fooled to think that it's not going to soon be THEIR state.

Yes, we're fucked and I have no answers.

As long as this is acceptable, life for most will only worsen over time:

Keeping the number of U.S. jobs a mystery

----Pfizer, the world's biggest drug company, hasn't reported the breakdown of its workforce between the United States and overseas since 2000.

----Procter & Gamble
Tide is a brand of Procter & Gamble, the world's largest consumer products company. You won’t find P&G’s U.S. head count in its filings, either. When initially asked for the number, company spokesman Paul Fox said: “We do not track nor report U.S.-specific jobs numbers vs. jobs overseas.” After it was pointed out that P&G’s chief executive, Bob McDonald, had cited such figures in an op-ed piece, Fox acknowledged that company did track that data. The number of U.S. employees is 35,000 out of 127,000 total, or 28 percent.

----IBM
IBM stopped disclosing its U.S. head count in 2009. Dave Finegold, dean of the Rutgers School of Management and Labor Relations, estimates that 2009 marked the first time the company had more employees in India than the United States. IBM chief executive Sam Palmisano has also met a number of times with the president for discussions on the economy.


----Hewlett-Packard
A Best Buy employee walks by a Hewlett-Packard computer at a store in San Francisco. HP is among the multinational companies that do not disclose the breakdown of their job numbers.

----Apple
Apple chief executive Steve Jobs holds up the new MacBook Air at the MacWorld Conference in 2008 in San Francisco. Apple also does not reveal how many of its employees are based in the United States. Apple and Pfizer are part of a coalition of companies pushing for Congress to give them a tax break on money they have parked overseas, saying that any money brought back to this country would spur hiring.

----AT&T
A customer enters an AT&T store in Santa Monica, Calif. The phone and digital giant does not include its employee breakdown in its Securities and Exchange Commission filings.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/keeping-the-number-of-us-jobs-a-mystery/2011/08/08/gIQAFBA8UJ_gallery.html#photo=1

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=439&topic_id=1793112

[lonestarnot]

25. +55, Big I's little You's

[Joe Fields]

26. So now what?

How do I word this, without sounding like I want to see people suffer? My words will be misconstrued no matter what, but...you said, so now what? Nothing. That's what. Not enough of us have suffered to the extent of taking direct action. As I said in a post a couple of days ago, we haven't nearly reached rock bottom, which, I believe will be what it takes for the groundswell of action that will need to take place. I don't like to see anyone suffer, and I am one of the ones being trampled, but I would rather see the profound suffering happen soon, instead of deaths by a thousand cuts.

What I would wish for is for all democrats to throw their support behind Bernie Sanders and convince him to primary against Obama, but it ain't gonna happen.

[Lorien]

30. OK, then we push for a massive write in campaign. We aren't powerless

but the powers that be want us to believe that we can only do as we're told.

[Lorien]

29. The problem is that we keep waiting for someone "in charge" to do something

we've been conditioned to take orders from authority figures, and so we wait for those orders. The ones that are coming will only make our situation worse. Look, it's OUR country too; we can vote for whoever we damn well please. It's up to us to get that basic message out: It's our Country too, and we can choose who we vote for. We don't need an endorsement by an official party for that. We HAVE the power to organize, we just need to get up off our collective asses to do it.