The older I get the more I fight with the past

[blues90]

I grew up in the 50's . I saw JFK debate Nixon . My parents were for Nixon , who knows why , there was not some great age difference between the two . JFK and Nixon that is .

So growing up with JFK speeches was inspiring and at the time we were in the cold war and duck and cover and the cuban missile crisis . To say the least it was a scary time .

The we lost JFK and MLK and RFK , this is a story many know of .

Then along came the British rock group invasion so this seemed to dull the sense of loss and give us something to take our minds off the madness . Of course MLK and RFK were taken after the British invasion and it was quite distressing .

Then the worst time came along when Carter was bashed and called a peanut farmer , I liked Carter .

But then along came Reagan , the worst of all I can recall at the time and his destruction still lives on .

Then it was Bush Sr , another horror show , one who I never really saw while Reagan was president , does anyone recall Bush Sr , he seemed to work in the back ground and then after Reagan proved to be mentally gone I then knew Bush Sr was the driving force . Who can say to this day where Reagan was gone and Bush Sr took over .

So after all of this madness and horror Bill Clinton came along and all I felt was here is the chance to get Bush out , the bitter war monger Bush . Part of my thinking was Clinton was clsoe to my age , real close and not that this was the main point of my focus , getting Bush out was the main focus .

Well as now we did not pick the candidate , it was clear to me Clinton was a much better choice , who knew that there would be things Clinton did that were against my hopes but over all things were better .

Now after 7 years of Bush jr , a fool who when stole the 2000 elections gave me the feeling of having no president , I thought , man 4 years of another bush freak , how could this happen . No one could see 9/11 coming other than the bush admin , Cheney chose himself as Vice , odd I thought .

Then all hell broke loose with the attack on Iraq and i could not believe so many americans backed this attack , I felt completely out of connection with anyone who supported this attack and there were many .

Now I am to believe there are those who supported this atack that they woke up and see the crimes , I am to believe race does not matter or gender plays no part as if both vanished from america because now we have this as the talking point in this election and now this is played down .

I am confused , who is black of maybe white and there is this Bill Clinton shaddow over Hillary .

I hoped for Kucinich or Edwards , I feel both Hillary and Obama are corporate backed media picks and McCain is hanging somewhere in between either as a was machine man yet he has no right wing repub support .

So we are to choose now and we are once again told pick the Dem , ok fine , we are told we are moving forward and to forget the past yet the past is referenced by the future candidates .

So where the hell are we , I feel we are not much closer to real needed change other than the lowered bar bush will hopefully be gone so people base their hope on what , this is where I am lost . This is where I can't forget the past and remember JFK and even more so RFK where there was a clear vision of a future , now it seems fogged by some new dream and i know a dream is a form of hope , hope and dreams in a modern world of broken down respect and a society of spoil and ruin .

Am I to once again dig into the trick bag and pull out hope and feel this will this time become the answer ? I just can't seem to get there anymore . How about replacing the word hope with truth , perhaps then I could buy into this game .

[Blue_In_AK]

1. I'm not too hopeful either, Blues90

but I will vote for whoever the Democrat candidate is for mainly one purpose -- the Supreme Court. Other than that, I don't think we're going to get too far, but I "hope" I'm wrong.

[Chovexani]

2. Agreed.

The Court is what I care about, so I will hold my nose for whomever has the D next to their name. People tell me I'm way too young to be this cynical, but...:shrug:

[blues90]

3. I know , however it was also Dems who confirmed

The last few supreme court judges . I have to look if Hillary or Obama helped lay down and if so then can either be trusted . Right now my memory fails me .

Another thing is we still have these black box machines and even when Clinton got the youth involved in registering to vote and had all this hype there were not alot who turned out to vote so who knows if this same thing will happen again , to go to primaries is one thing but to vote and if it is counted is another .

I can't help it , I am a pessimist now more than ever before , these things run through my head .

[demnan]

4. This is just about the way I feel too

and Obama is only 3 years younger than I am. But I have a difficult time with his message. I like him, but I can't get fired up. I wasn't fired up about Clinton the first go round either. My choice in 92 was Gore. I feel the same about Hillary as I feel about Obama, as I don't necessarily see the policy wonk as the answer. There is no personal hatred. I see these candidates as both wanting to do good, as both having done things in the past that might not have been the best but they would both be better than Bush. I see them both as very distant to bringing about an improvement to my life. And not far enough to the left for me, but I've learned to live with that. About the same as I felt about Kerry.

When I think I'm tilting one way I end up tilting a bit the other way.

Here is the issue that gets me down every time.

When are we going to stop this war and how and bring the soldiers out of two bad situations? When are we actually going to have a plan regarding Muslim extremism that makes sense? I haven't heard anything from either one of these candidates that makes any sense to me.

[EFerrari]

5. We've been watching public servants be cut from the herd

while the most skilled manipulators get money and press and endorsements.

Truth may be ugly but at least it's real.

[TahitiNut]

6. As just one indication of how far right we've lurched and staggered, ....

... we seem to be fixated on whether some "line in the sand" is the vote to enable or block the unprovoked invasion of Iraq. I regard this as appalling. It's a no-brainer and worthy only of discussion in a Nazi War Council, not in any public forum that purports to be close to democratic or even 'moderate.'

Better WOULD be a "litmus test" that placed the "line in the sand" as the invasion of Afghanistan, imho. I personally regard that as an appalling decision. Treating 9/11 as a casus belli at all is adopting the fascist framing. The invasion and occupation of Afghanistan was, imho, an unwarranted excess ... when it was far more likely that bin Laden could be brought to some form of justice through extradition. Afghanistan even offered to do so ... if any evidenciary basis at all were presented. The mere fact that we have a regime unwilling to obey even the most cursory requirements of a "justice system" is itself a betrayal of the extent of corruption in our body politic.

We have become a nation of cowards and criminals - fertile for fascist corruption - and I still see no change in direction on the horizon.

[Blue_In_AK]

10. I agree.

This whole thing should have been handled as a policing matter, not an opportunity to make war. The people who attacked on 9/11 were criminals, period. They should have been treated as such. (Even if they were Bush/Cheney, et al., an idea I entertain every now and then.)

[truedelphi]

12. I'd like to recommend your post.

The irony of our invasion of Afghanistan is that as it began, we allowed Bin Laden to escape from Pakistani and American forces.

There is a reason for this. We as a nation "need" to settle into any country where the profits from drugs are superbly high.

We have been in Columbia for a long time. And we will be in the opium capital of the world for a long time as well.

[TahitiNut]

13. Snorting coke and oil througth the Afghan "pipeline" ... it's about green, not red, white, or blue.

The insanity is beyond redemption, I'm afraid. We're "through the looking glass" and "round the bend" if ANYONE thinks any change in the plummet into full-blown fascism is in the offing any time soon.

[John Gauger]

17. As would I n/t

[Donk Yore]

7. Truth may never come, but

one still has to hope. Good luck!

If you want to spend the next 5 years of your life reading about what happened in history (as I will probably do), check this site out:

http://www.brainyhistory.com/

[AndyTiedye]

8. "But This Time Will Be Different"

[blues90]

9. I am begining to wonder if the Dems win and Edwards

Gets a stop as AG for example will he be held back since he is against the very corps who did fund both Hillary and Obama . This is what took Kucinuch down and also Edwards and what allowed Hillary and Obama the spotlight in the TV aired so called debates .

All I heard was some thin promise from the front runners of removing troops from Iraq but no real plans on how this will be done .

I feel no matter who takes the seat Iraq will be an issue for many years to came , bush has made sure of that .

If McCain is in then well Iran will become the next target .

Trouble is all of this war on so many fronts is going on right now yet it's taken the back seat in all news , but britney is out front and running , who the hell cares about this crap . This is what makes the americans appear so insane to the rest of the world and to the sane americans who are still left with a working mind .

I can't even ignore this horror because when I look at the area around me I see the change and the closed independate businessess and people living on the street and I am not far from this .

[truedelphi]

11. The economy on the local level is very bad

The economy of those who worry over the trifling problems that their hedge funds present while out at the golf course is a vastly different economy than the one experienced by middle income Americans.

ALways before, if I faced job difficulties, I could rely on part time work to see me through.

I cannot do that now, as the part time job costs too much. I simply cannot afford to drive somewhere for a mere three or four hours of work and then drive home. Sixty to eighty per cent of what I make would go to the gas station.

I don't hear any economic experts discussing this. But right now, it is a real factor in people being poor.

[blues90]

14. Gas is a huge problem

Also here there are no part time jobs even if you could walk to one . These are all gone , the ones that were here were sub contractor jobs which not only cost you gas but you paid extra insurance and city tax and had no security what so ever .

[AndyTiedye]

15. They Will Give us Britney All the Time Whether We Want It Or Not

Trouble is all of this war on so many fronts is going on right now yet it's taken the back seat in all news , but britney is out front and running , who the hell cares about this crap . This is what makes the americans appear so insane to the rest of the world and to the sane americans who are still left with a working mind

And the Mighty Slime Machine would go on giving us all Britney all the time even if they KNOW nobody gives a damn about her.
Their parent corporations want the war out of the news, so it will STAY out of the news.

[OneBlueSky]

16. being of the same generation, I feel that we "oldies" may have a certain perspective . . .

on things that those in succeeding generations have not yet had time to develop . . . the older I get, the more I realize that the entire notion of democracy in this country is a farce . . . the country is run by the corporatocracy for their own benefit and that of their friends, and all at the expense of the vast majority of Americans . . . despite the illusion of free elections, we really have no say in who is selected to lead, as evidenced by the "elections" of 2000 and 2004 . . . and particularly by the failure of Congress to do anything about those crooked elections, or about the innumerable crimes of the Bush/Cheney administration . . .

since all of them -- Republicans and Democrats alike -- are part of the problem, they will never be part of the solution . . . as long as oil companies and "defense" contractors finance their campaigns, they will not end the war in Iraq . . . as long as healthcare and pharmaceutical dollars keep on coming, we will never see universal healthcare . . . as long as agribusiness bucks underwrite their Congressional junkets, we'll never halt the proliferation of genetically modified crops and never require the testing of all beef cattle for deadly disease . . . and on, and on, and on . . .

I think we understand, possibly better than most, that it won't matter who is "elected" in November . . . nothing of substance will change, and the country will continue to deteriorate economically, politically, socially, and in every other way imaginable . . . as long as corporations keep making obscene profits and using those profits to control the government, we will remain a government of the corporations, by the corporations, and for the corporations . . . and in the end, the results will be disastrous . .

[lonestarnot]

18. Well damn, you're better off than me,

I can't even share how I feel as I am still numb.