Restoring the Public State

[Time for change]

In a previous post I quoted fellow DUer, 27inCali, on what many people, including me, believe to be perhaps the most fundamental problem that our country faces – the problem that lies at the root of all of our other problems. The main theme of 27in Cali’s post, titled “Someone needs to say it”, is that our country is largely controlled by powerful shadowy figures:

Obama doesn't really have the power to do a lot of the things we wish (and I'm sure he wishes) he could. He had to kiss a lot of rings to even get permission to run for President, let alone be ALLOWED to win…. The President doesn't run this country, international banks and a handful of super-rich families do…. We have to realize that our Democracy is fucked up to the point that the President really can't change the big injustices inherent in the system. The last one that tried got his head blown off in front of his wife in Texas….

Some people call these shadowy powers “The Powers That Be”. Others refer to them as the Military-Industrial Complex, as President Eisenhower did in his farewell address to our nation. Others refer to them as “the deep state” – contrasting them with the public state which the American people elect to represent them.

Peter Dale Scott, in his book, “The Road to 9/11 – Wealth, Empire and the future of America”, summarizes the essence of the problem we face at the beginning of his last chapter:

Will we deal with the problem of terrorism primarily by working to resolve issues that provoke conflict and projecting values that the rest of the world will wish to share? Or will we trust primarily in our own military power and become increasingly a garrison state and empire, conducting more and more of our global strategies in secret and projecting our military and covert strength into further and further corners of the earth?

The cult of secrecy in government, though necessary in some areas, has become counterproductive… It makes it easy for special interests to falsify intelligence input and not be corrected. We saw this recently with Ahmed Chalabi’s disastrous advice on Iraq… This book has argued that secrecy has served America even worse on the policy level. We need to admit that the secret powers of our government helped to create and train this enemy (al Qaeda), whose presence is now invoked to further augment the government’s secret powers. Those secret powers themselves are becoming the major threat to the survival of the open republic.

Some manifestations of shadowy powers

The manifestations of these shadowy powers are everywhere. One of the most obvious and prevalent is that our elected representatives routinely refuse to abide by the wishes of those who elect them to serve their interests. For example, Americans have for decades desired a universal health care plan to ensure that they receive adequate medical care. Yet time after time, powerful interests arise to thwart that goal.

Another manifestation is the unified efforts of our corporate controlled media to control not only the news that Americans hear but what they say and think. As I discussed previously in a post titled “Unmentionable Things in American Politics”, these efforts focus especially on our elected representatives:

There are numerous things that absolutely cannot be mentioned by American politicians because they are …. well, “embarrassing to our country”. Mere mention of these things brings down the wrath of conservative pundits and moderates as well, and even some who consider themselves to be liberal or progressive. The wrath is likely to be so intense that few U.S. politicians dare mention these things because of the risk of being booted out of office – or worse. Three such things are: 1. the stealing of a U.S. presidential election; 2. referring to American military or covert actions as immoral, rather than merely as “misguided”; and, 3. imputing bad intentions, rather than mere incompetence, onto a U.S. president.

Peter Dale Scott discusses several specific examples in his book. One is the Reagan administration’s plans for expanding so-called plans for “Continuity of Government” (COG).

“Continuity of government” is a reassuring title. It would be more honest, however, to call it a “change of government” plan, since according to Alfonso Chardy of the Miami Herald, the plan called for “suspension of the Constitution, turning control of the government over to FEMA, emergency appointment of military commanders to run state and local governments, and declaration of martial law during a national crisis.” The plan also gave the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which had been involved in drafting it, sweeping new powers, including internment.

More ominous are the widespread detention camps, as part of a plan called “Endgame”:

In August (2002)… (Attorney General) Ashcroft disclosed a plan that “would allow him to order the indefinite incarceration of U.S. citizens and summarily strip them of their constitution rights and access to the courts by declaring them enemy combatant”… After widespread protest from legal scholars, the plan for military detention camps was not discussed publicly further. It seems clear, however, that the camps exist and that… the authority already exists for them to be used… On February 6, 2007, homeland security secretary Michael Chertoff announced… more than $400 million to add sixty-seven hundred additional detention beds. Both the contract and the budget allocation were in partial fulfillment of an ambitious ten-year Homeland Security strategic plan, code-named Endgame, authorized in 2003.

Solutions

Scott discusses the monumental task of replacing the deep state with a public state in the last chapter of his book. Before doing that, he discusses Hitler’s Nazi Germany as an analogy, in which the Nazis and their secret concentration camps were the equivalent of the modern deep state. He says:

I do believe that U.S. citizens should study Germany in the 1930s, to see how a civilized nation, under stress, momentarily lost track of its inherent moral virtues and lapsed into a disastrous course of repression, xenophobia, and ultimately war… They too were vaguely aware that members of another ethnic group were being rounded up and illegally detained, yet they too felt unable to do anything about it.

Scott believes that replacing the deep state with a public state will require an approach between the two extremes of working within our current system and attempting to totally replace it. In doing this, we must strengthen and unite our civil society, which is currently widely divided. There are several issues that we must address:

Recognize growing income disparity as a threat to our public state and address it
Growing income disparity is a major problem not only in the United States, but world-wide and between nations. Kofi Annan, former UN Secretary-General, has noted that the combined wealth of the richest 225 individuals in the world (over $1 trillion) is equal to the combined annual income of the world’s poorest 47% of people. With such tremendous disparity in wealth, is it any wonder that so few people control the lives of so many?

Of course, inequality of wealth is just one manifestation of numerous related failures of social justice. Naomi Klein, in her book, “The Shock Doctrine – The Rise of Disaster Capitalism”, discusses how gross disparities in wealth can lead to disastrous public policy.

Perhaps part of the reason why so many of our elites, both political and corporate, are so sanguine about climate change is that they are confident they will be able to buy their way out of the worst of it. This may also partially explain why so many Bush supporters are Christian end-timers… The Rapture is a parable for what they are building down here – a system that invites destruction and disaster, then swoops in with private helicopters and airlifts them and their friends to divine safety.

It was one of President Roosevelt’s fondest desires to ensure social justice through what he called “The Second Bill of Rights”. In his 1944 State of the Union message he enunciated that principle:

We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. Necessitous men are not free men. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.

In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We’ve accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all – regardless of station, race, or creed. Among these are:

Opportunity
 The right to a useful and remunerative job…
 The right to a good education
 The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies…

Security
 The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment.
 The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health.
 The right of every family to a decent home.
 The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation.

The establishment of social and economic justice strengthens civil society by eradicating some of the major causes of fear, hatred, and conflict.

Oppose preemptive war
War can be a source of tremendous profits for a nation’s elites, and it can be used to keep a nation’s populace in a constant state of fear and insecurity. In so doing, it provides an opportunity for governments to exercise strict control over its citizens and erode their constitutional rights in secrecy. Scott sums up the advantages of war to the deep state:

The need to combat terror is currently being used as justification to increase the dominance of the deep state at home, and to justify ongoing oppressive U.S. occupation of such foreign territories as Afghanistan and Iraq. We need to develop the consciousness that such occupation in the long run is more a cause of terrorism than it is a remedy.

Reform the electoral process
In 2004, George W. Bush was “elected” to a second term largely on the strength of the illegal purging of at least a couple hundred thousand voters in Ohio alone. Another major problem is electronic voting machines that produce unverifiable results, which probably led to many fraudulent elections in the early years of the 21st Century.

Money in politics also corrupts our democracy. Bill Moyers explains the problem in a nutshell in his book, “Moyers on Democracy”:

We have lost the ability to call the most basic transaction by its right name. If a baseball player stepping up to home plate were to lean over and hand the umpire a wad of bills before he called the pitch, we’d call that a bribe. But when a real estate developer buys his way into the White House and gets a favorable government ruling that wouldn’t be available to you or me, what do we call that? A “campaign contribution”.

Let’s call it what it is: a bribe.

Reform the “War on Drugs”
Our so-called “War on Drugs” not only provides a tremendous asset for the deep state from its participation in the international drug trade, but it also is a great way to keep a nation’s citizens under government control.

International statistics from 2006 show that the United States has an incarceration rate of 738 per 100,000 population, the highest rate of incarceration in the world. Approximately 2.3 million persons are incarcerated in the United States as of October 2006, which is a far higher number, by almost a million, than any other nation in the world, accounting for about one quarter of the world’s incarcerated population.

Statistics on racial disparity in prosecuting the “War on Drugs” raise serious issues of social justice. The racial disparity in the United States for imprisonment for drug offenses is well known. Though the Federal Household Survey (See item # 6) indicated that 72% of illicit drug users are white, compared to 15% who are black, blacks constitute a highly disproportionate percent of the population arrested for (37%) or serving time for (42% of those in federal prisons and 58% of those in state prisons) drug violations.

Break up corporate control of the media
Bill Moyers has pointed out that the protection offered us by our First Amendment is based on the assumption of a separation of our government and a free press, which is supposed to protect us from government abuses. When that separation disappears, fascism, whose primary characteristic is the fusion of government with corporatocracy, replaces democracy. Moyers explains:

What would happen, however, if the contending giants of big government and big publishing and broadcasting ever joined hands, ever saw eye to eye in putting the public's need for news second to free-market economics? That's exactly what's happening now under the ideological banner of "deregulation". Giant media conglomerates that our founders could not possibly have envisioned are finding common cause with an imperial state in a betrothal certain to produce not the sons and daughters of liberty but the very kind of bastards that issued from the old arranged marriage of church and state.

Consider the situation. Never has there been an administration (speaking of the Bush administration) so disciplined in secrecy, so precisely in lockstep in keeping information from the people at large and – in defiance of the Constitution – from their representatives in Congress. Never has the powerful media oligopoly ... been so unabashed in reaching like Caesar for still more wealth and power. Never have hand and glove fitted together so comfortably to manipulate free political debate, sow contempt for the idea of government itself, and trivialize the peoples' need to know.

As Peter Dale Scott points out in his book, our corporate news media is less a source of information than it is a tool for thought manipulation.


A final note – on the prospects of unity in U.S. civil society

I’ve said before that when enough Americans recognize how the powers that be attempt to manipulate their beliefs, their manipulation will become much more difficult. This idea is related to Scott’s contention that a strengthened and unified civil society is one of the keys to restoring the public state. That is because one of the major reasons why our society is so divided today is the misinformation that so many Americans receive through their corporate media.

But the widespread use of the Internet is changing the situation. In 2001, when George W. Bush took office, a Pew Research Center poll showed that 74% of Americans received most of their national and international news through television, 45% through newspapers, and only a paltry 13% through the Internet. But by 2008, the Internet had surpassed newspapers as the second most common source of news, and it lost out to television only by 70% to 40%. Scott has this to say about the potential power of the Internet to unify civil society:

With so many Americans getting news from the Web, and from alternate and foreign media sources, it was possible in 2004 to mount a challenge to voting irregularities in the 2004 Presidential election… In the long run… the winning side tends to be the one whose weapon is the truth. Widespread use of the Internet and alternative media has done much to shorten the length of time it takes for political truths to be heard. As long as the alternate sources are there, the widespread recurrence of censorship and lies in the major media must be taken as a sign of the establishment’s weakness, not its strength. It will be important to monitor whether the Internet remains free… I believe that if it does, the American republic will be secure, despite challenges from above. Thus Internet freedom is like a canary in the caverns of our modern mass society…

The Web has created the makings of a multinational civil society and public arena in which there is a shared global interest in matters of justice and injustice in and for all nations, perhaps especially in the United States.

Scott ends his book by commenting on the prospects for unity in our country:

With a triumphalist Bush presidency it is possible that Americans of many differing opinions will be moved to unite in defense of the public realm of the republic, against the unpopular and indefensible overreaching of the deep state. This book is dedicated to the strengthening of that possibility.

Scott’s book was published in 2007. Well, it appears that the Bush presidency did not yet result in a united civil society. In fact, the election of a new US President may have indirectly resulted in further division of our country, as various political leaders have used the occasion to stir up racial prejudices and hatreds. It will be a great test of the American character to see to what extent we can resist that tendency in the long run.

[Nikki Stone1]

1. K & R

:kick:

[Atman]

2. Wow.

What's wow-ier is that so much of it is stuff many DUers, me among 'em, have been posting here for years. Literally years. The cave dwellers and underground cons blasted me and people like me for being hysterical liberal whiners when we warned of the impending economic collapse, or the precariousness of the dollar. But hey -- read the headlines today. Moreover, I posted many times about the fake unemployment numbers, concocted by the Bush administration simply by using a different index, one that considered the long-term unemployed or the newly under-employed "off the books." The same way way we told them that Bush's "off the books" war was not sustainable and would eventually wreak havoc on our economy.

Oh, no...we liberals were just crazy moonbats. But when I look back through my posts on DU over the years, it's pretty amazing how often me and many other DUers warned of what has come to pass. We weren't necessarily scholars or experts in our fields -- though many were -- but we had common sense, curiosity and the skepticism to question tbe bullshit before our eyes, presented by the corporate sponsors who profit most from our dumbed-down nation.

Wow, again. Just fucking wow.

.

[Time for change]

15. I like what H2O Man recently had to say about liberals and progressives

I don't recall the exact words, but the central concept was that they care about social justice.

Intimately related to that, IMO, is the capacity to question what we hear from the guardians of the status quo. Without that capacity I doubt that there will ever be much social justice.

[waiting for hope]

3. Brilliant - and thank you.

K&R

[Dystopian]

4. THIS

is what we need here. This is truth.

Recommended with heartfelt thanks..appreciation and respect.


peace~

[Time for change]

42. You're quite welcome

:hi:

[diane in sf]

5. Recommend, enthusiastically.

[abq e streeter]

6. as always, interesting, informative and worth the time to take to read

[scentopine]

7. Brilliant as always! Wish everyone would stop and read this...

another great thought provoking essay.

[ddeclue]

8. Ridiculously long.

[Raster]

10. Really? Perhaps you'd prefer the Reader's Digest abridged version?

[pundaint]

13. But there is a point there.

How do we make this understood in a nation containing a sizable population that could imagine a President Palin?

[Raster]

29. No one that could imagine a President Palin would be reading anything posted by

Time For Change on this website. Or even reading anything above a fourth-grade comprehension.

[Octafish]

16. Are you joking, my Friend?

I know you know it can take a lot of words to make a point:

From G. Gordon Liddy to I. Lewis Libby - Secrecy is the enemy of democracy

In addressing complex issues, length may be needed to make it possible for people to read the entire post in the future, when should the powers-that-be cut off free-exchange of information.

[Ikonoklast]

26. "I'm not gonna read all that, it's too long and difficult to understand."

[Ignis]

32. Yes, your response was ridiculously long.

tl;dr

[earth mom]

33. Don't look now but your laziness and ignorance is showing.

The problem with people like you is that you think that you are "informed" via the 1 minute sound bites made to you by the lying talking heads on t.v. who have a vested interest in you NOT knowing the truth they are hiding.

Educate yourself-because NO ONE will do it for you.

Knowledge is power.

[Greyhound]

52. This is like the fifth thread I've come across today that you simply piss on

with no facts, no thought, no argument, nothing. Are you sure you're in the right place?

[Merchant Marine]

9. Revolution

springs from three sources- soapbox, ballet box and cartridge box. Which one are we at now?

[Raster]

11. Well-written, insightful, timely and valid! Well done, yet again, my friend.

Well done!:kick:Recommended!
Free your mind. The rest will follow.

[loudsue]

12. Kickass post if I've ever seen one on DU.

As usual, Time for change, you're the best. K & R

[conscious evolution]

14. Highly recommended

More and more people are beginning to see thru the charade because of writers like these.

[midnight]

17. I know that this one word has so many implications but it is equality that is missing.

[SammyWinstonJack]

18. K&R

[kentuck]

19. Makes one feel hopeless...

and helpless. :-(

[Time for change]

21. It is quite a challenge

But I certainly didn't mean to make it sound hopeless -- nor did Scott.

Of course, with almost 7 billion people in the world, the influence of any single one of us is quite limited. But when enough of us make our limited individual contributions, good things can begin to happen. Anyhow, that's the way that I look at it :)

[kentuck]

20. kick one time

.

[Jackpine Radical]

22. I regret that I have but one Rec to give for this thread.

True wit is nature to advantage dress'd--
What oft was thought, but ne'er so well-expresst.



It's nice to have these occasional reassurances that either I'm not totally nuts in my view of reality, or at least that my delusional system is somewhat widely shared.

Actually, I cannot express how grateful I am to you for your deeply researched and well-thought-out work. Surely you have the material for more than one book among your political writings.

[Time for change]

28. Thank you -- That's one of the great things about DU --

We get the opportunity to share our delusional views of reality with those who really appreciate them ;)

But in a more serious vein, I feel the same way as you do about this. Outside of DU, even most of the liberal people I know think I'm kind of crazy when I try to talk about these things with them. But I keep on trying.

And at least it's very nice that my wife and two adult children share my views on this.

[Jackpine Radical]

38. On 9/11, I came back from being out of town for the day, and when I got home

I found that my wife had the identical theory: MIHOP. Within a day or so I had dredged up some of the connections between the Bush & Bin Laden families, which merely served to confirm notions f which we were already morally certain.

[Time for change]

41. My son was (and is) a DUer on 9/11, and I wasn't

He was stranded about a block from the Pentagon when the Metro was shut down. I tried to go into DC to pick him up, but police blocked my access -- wouldn't let me cross the river.

My son got home later that evening, as the Metro was started back up again. He talked to me about MIHOP/LIHOP that night and seriously aroused my suspicions, though I wasn't convinced. I read a few more books on the subject, and after reading David Ray Griffin's book I was pretty much convinced.

[jotsy]

23. If I may be so bold as to add a couple of interesting peripheral tidbits...

For anyone more interested about details on the "continuity of government" passage of this remarkable and informative OP -(tyvm)- try googling executive order 51, per the dark and dreary Bushco days. I found it a few years back, 10 to 12 heart breaking pages of how oppression is not simply justified but welcome and necessary.

Another progressive outlet, probably Think Progress or Common Dreams, before the election last year tried to make it a more publicly known fact that more than three quarters of us already live in what FEMA considered to be "constitution free zones", employing the legal notion that anyone within a certain distance of a body of water boarding the U.S. doesn't have any such right. A clause originally placed by revolutionary era Americans and meant to address the right to search pirates in more open ocean waters near us, but interpreted much differently by Chertoff as he saw that border inland as well and catching a huge chunk of the general population with it.

As for the military industrial complex, well it has sprouted new limbs in a corporate controlled media and a purchased political system making its ability to move with such coordinated unity four times as dangerous to this democratic republic.

The people have nothing more to lose or gain from continuing to participate in a system that refuses to govern its public in a self willed direction. We will not obtain a better sense of viability until fairness and integrity are considered as virtues that outweigh the bottom line value of vice.

[Time for change]

40. I like your conclusion

"We will not obtain a better sense of viability until fairness and integrity are considered as virtues that outweigh the bottom line value of vice."

That statement has much in common with Peter Dale Scott noting our need to recognize income disparity as the one of the greatest threats to our public state.

[pberq]

24. Kick and recommended

Recently I saw a video of an old Bill Moyers show about Iran-Contra. There is footage from the hearings where Senators are talking about the Iran-Contra episode as an example of a secret government, with it's own army, airforce, treasury, etc.

As we know, that secret government has continued to this day. The only difference is they have become much better at covering their tracks, so we haven't had anything like the Iran-Contra hearings since.

[glitch]

25. It's painful watching media from when we had both government and media, isn't it? K & R tfc nt

[noiretextatique]

27. a wealth of information...thank you

and not as depressing as all the DUers who would support a health bill with the Stupid amendment. i never thought i'd be as disillusioned as i am now.

[phasma ex machina]

30. Too many secrets. nt

[GillesDeleuze]

31. Hardt and Negri are using the term "Commonwealth"

To reference to potential juridical structure of an assertive, organizing multitude.

[earth mom]

34. I am so glad that there are still people on DU like you who speak the truth.

Thank You! :applause:

[me b zola]

35. K&R

[Tashca]

36. Many good points.

I think you are right about the internet. It is vital that the information is not controlled. I anticipate more attempts to control it in the future.

FDR's second bill of rights....I believe this to be a foundation to build on for a true civil society for the future.

This point by Peter Dale Scott; "In the long run… the winning side tends to be the one whose weapon is the truth." This is a point that gives me optimism....I really believe this.

recommend!!

[BREMPRO]

37. EXCELLENT post ! Full of thoughtful nuance and insightful understanding!

the obstacles to change pointed out in this post and Scott's book are the reason Obama is pursuing a strategy of incremental change rather than radical change- working within the system to the limits of his power. When more people realize this, stop criticizing Obama and the Dem's for making compromises, not mopping fast enough, and stop treating democracy as a spectator sport, maybe we can be more united and begin to accomplish the reforms necessary to reduce the corporate/elite dominance of our lives.


DUers UNITE!!! well, maybe that's a bit too optimistic... :spank:

[tbyg52]

39. I always print your posts, read them, and pass them around. Thanks. nt

[Time for change]

44. Thank you for letting me know

That's great to know.

[Uncle Joe]

43. Outstanding post as usual.

:thumbsup:

I believe what you said about the Internet's; ability to save our democratic republic, is precisely the reason it's being attacked now, whether it be the issue of Internet Neutrality or information monopolist Murdoch's muddling with you-tube and the like.


On edit, too late to recommend, I'm sorry for missing the chance to recommend this one.

Thanks for the thread.

Peace to you,Time for change.:hi:

[Time for change]

45. Thank you Uncle Joe

Yes, I think that the Internet is perhaps the most hope inspiring tool we have.

:hi:

[DemReadingDU]

46. I would be devastated if we couldn't gave access to the Internet

It's like your own personal library. A whole world of information at your fingertips. I learn so much in cyberspace. And thank you for another excellent post, very thorough, and well written.

[sabrina 1]

47. Too late to rec, but definitely would if I could ~

Thank you for an excellent post, well worth reading all of it.

Regarding the last paragraph, it's true that since Obama's election it seems that racism is more prevalent than it was before. I think that happened when Bush et al roused up the public about the 'Muslim Threat' and the Crusade to make Americans safe. Until then, those with racist views kept them mostly to themselves. But the 'terror' war allowed them to surface and vent their hatred, by using 'Muslim/Terrorists as a justification of their use of racial epithets 'raghead', 'camel jockey' 'sand nigger' etc. They would not have dared to be so openly racist before 9/11.

But in spite of that, Obama was elected by a majority of the people. Imo, I think that means the tide of racism has turned. But it's true his election had brought out the closet racists, louder than ever. Still, maybe that's a good thing. Before we couldn't tell what progress had been made. Now we know that over 60% of the population have evolved into no longer seeing race as an issue.

What we are seeing re racism is now a small, though very loud minority. The election of Obama was like baiting them. The election was kind of like a glass filled with liquid, but clouded with scum. After letting it sit for a while, the scum rises to the top and it's only about one fifth of the entire glass.

The scum is now visible where before it wasn't. 'The Scum Also Rises' might be a good title for a book on this period of US history and the emergence from their caves of the last of the racists. I think in another 20 years or so, the liquid will be a lot less cloudy.

:kick: for a great post ~

[Overseas]

48. Recommended. Thanks for another great post.

I look for your posts. You say so many of the things I've been thinking so well.

Your post about our inadequate pain management was very moving too. For me, it pointed out the cruelty in our society-- preferring puritanical posturing to guide our policies while leaving so many in pain. That posturing reminds me of the flashy hyping about welfare fraud by the corporate media during the Reagan and Clinton regimes. Because of 5-10% fraud, the 90% who truly needed that assistance had to suffer. Cruel absolutism when it suits corporate interests-- there's a bit of fraud in social programs, so we'd better cut them all. But comparatively minimal coverage in the corporate media of major fraud by military contractors.

The sad thing about this post is that the power of the corporate media monopolies is so strong. I am very glad it wasn't strong enough to overcome the landslide in favor of Change that elected President Obama. But I wonder what the actual numbers were and whether Republicans abandoned most of their vote manipulation in favor of a strategy to crush one more Democratic administration with economic turmoil, perpetuation of wasteful wars, stirring up of more intense right wing hatred, and encouraging more libertarian resentment against compassion. Wonder if the powers that be are planning to revive their vote manipulation techniques again in 2010, after sowing the corporate media with stories about "widespread, genuine grass roots opposition"-- not covering the real story about how professionals have manipulated the desperation of our fellow uninsured, foreclosed fellow citizens, but pretending those storms were about "fear of reform." We've seen Republican Party support decline significantly after the ugly rhetoric of its hard right faction, but then that extremist wing has been allowed to call itself "conservative" when it should be labeled "hard right." And meanwhile, we don't have any Hard Left speakers on the corporate media, so they've been able to label the compassionate call for national health insurance and freedom from the terror of bankrupting medical emergencies as "extreme left." Compassionate health care has been made into a left wing idea on the major corporate media, when it is has been a bottom line of civil society in most other countries. Even when the majority of the American people believe it should be a human right and not an elite privilege. The corporate media discussions pretend that the millions dieing early is just some technical detail. They pretend that "the people aren't ready" for freedom from medical terror.

There is too much still remaining to say in reply to your thoughtful post.

Why so many of our legislators are prepared to continue pouring billions into the two wars that reduce our national security, without any grandstanding voting and filibuster threats for the pundits to discuss. I was glad our president pushed the warmongers to provide exit strategies from the Graveyard of Empires. I admired the ambassador's urgent cables discouraging escalation of the counter-productive war there.

Our whole approach to warfare needs to change for the Green Century. Let us hope we can keep our internet free and uphold Net Neutrality so we can have those discussions.

But it is discouraging when a basic item like low cost government subsidized health care is considered debatable. Even when we can count the stacks of campaign contributions a.k.a. bribery driving our legislators' votes.

[zeemike]

49. To late to rec this post but kick it I will.

And as usual a well thought out and relevant post.

But I suggest that we talk about fundamental change that will be necessary if we are to rescue this country from it's disastrous course that we are on.
And while things like election reform would be helpful it will not and cannot fundamentally change a system like we have because the fundamentals are not there.

And so I suggest that the fundamental change we need is based on the theory that people are poor because they have no land.
And so If I could wave my magic wand and change things what I would do is give every family a piece of land...not a house in the city but farm land, and i would declare that it was given to them forever, and should they sell it it could only be bought for 50 years and then would return to the owner.
Yes this is a radical idea that flies in the face of what we call capitalism, and to make it worse it is based on something that is offensive to many on the liberal side....the Ten Commandments.
For this was the economic system of the nation of Israel as created by Moses and an atheist or none believer could never accept such a system just because of that fact and not based on it's real merits.
And oddly enough the most against it would be the religious people themselves, because they have morphed religion into a cult revolving around money making.

And so the merits of this system cannot be purposed or even considered even though it could fundamentally chang our country and the world for the better....and in fact I have just wasted band width on this.

[wolfgangmo]

50. Do NOT get on a small plane

Ever.

You are 6 times as likely to die from small plane failure as a democrat/progressive than a republican/corporate flunky.

Stay off the small planes

[Greyhound]

51. , but too late to rec. n/t