If you can hold huge national demonstrations for a week,

[Warren Stupidity]

of a scale that constitutes a general strike,
and if the army will not shoot at the demonstrators,
a government, perhaps any government, will collapse.

Why not here?

[Dawgs]

1. Are you crazy?

It's cold outside. :evilgrin:

[Warren Stupidity]

2. weather permitting

[SoCalDem]

24. and people would miss American Idol

:rofl:

[movonne]

3. because our country has been deliberately dividing us...

[ThomCat]

12. Corporations in our country have been deliberately dividing us.

• Distract us with useless media trivialities, celebrity culture, and nonsense. If people are so obsessed with what is on tv, or in the movies, or the latest craze online to pay attention to serious issues in politics then they won't get involved.
  
  
• Convince us that our nation is essentially wonderful, the best, despite it's problems so there is no need for any action. American Exceptionalism has its purposes.
  
  
• Constantly condemn and ridicule even the slightest hint of activism, and the people who might engage in it as radical, kooky, loonie, and make peaceful activists into criminals in people's minds so that people won't want to engage in activism of any kind.
  
  
• Create an entire culture of anti-intellectualism, convincing people that they aren't smart enough to understand politics. Being smart is a bad thing. Understanding serious issues is sign thinking too much. But only enforce that anti-intellectual culture downward upon the masses, rather than upward upon the elite.
  
  This explains why so many people swear they aren't smart enough to bother voting or paying attention to politics, but they can take apart an engine blindfolded, recite the entire American League's history in detail with commentary going back decades, and talk like a war historian because of reading they do in their spare time. People are smart, but are convinced that they aren't only when it comes to politics.
  
  
• Consolidate the media in a few corporate hands that can be very reliably counted upon to edit any news and commentary in order to deliver calming and controlling messages. People will hear only what the elite need them hear. Nothing will make it into the news, or into the media that is ever likely to incite people, inflame people, or even confirm the need to incite or inflame people. Self censorship in the media will be the rigid norm, and any information needed by activists will become increasingly unavailable as media consolidates into fewer, larger, corporate hands.
  

"If they can get you to ask the wrong questions, they don't need to worry about the answers."

[leftstreet]

17. +1

:thumbsup:

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. People are not hungry enough.

[brooklynite]

5. Unrec'd

You're recommending that our Government collapse? A Government that, last time I checked was primarily run by Republicans? Because presumably its as dictatorial as Egypt?

[spanone]

6. if we ever have to live under a dictator, perhaps it will happen.

[hedgehog]

7. Huge national demonstrations are a last resort for when

government fails to recognize the will of the people and/or is manipulated by special interests.

In the case of the US, I don't think we need a government collapse, but it would be nice to see some demonstrations on specific issues. For example, what if right now there were demonstrations demanding a federal bailout of state and local budgets hit by the recession? If banks are too big to fail, why not the government entities that provide basic services?

Alternatively, why not demonstrations demanding a billionaires tax?

[Motown_Johnny]

8. because the people will start to run out of food

We are far to dependent on our drive thru windows and 24 hour markets to be able to sustain a general strike for a week.


You would end up with food riots.

[Newest Reality]

9. Our "dictatorship" is far too subtle and covert

and a lot of money and science has gone into making it that way. However, the decay and dissolution that result from the methodical manipulation and manufactured consent will erode the facade that keeps the simulated state of the union intact.

As long as the television, radio, beer, Prozac and other licit and illicit drugs keep flowing, we won't have to concern ourselves too much with any kind of drastic move towards change that benefits anyone but the entrenched, deadbeat rich and their holdings.

America likes to watch!

[Earth_First]

10. Because people are afraid to lose what little they still have...

They need to be reminded about everything we've already LOST!

There is a propaganda machine (M$M) violently whirring along reminding the citizenry that even though you haven't lost it ALL; they are waiting in the wings to take the rest of it away in the snap of a finger in order to quell insurrection against the Corportacracy.

Make no mistakes about it, it is; and always has been US v.s. THEM and it's CLASS WARFARE!

We're getting our asses handed to us one day at a time, year in and year out.

Before long, they will have it all anyways...

We need to prevent that NOW before we progress further down their rabbit hole into oblivion!

[cali]

13. what little they have? look, there's a large and growing number of people

here who are poor, but there are still a shitload more who are buying all those iphones and gadgets and going to Disney World. Until people can't afford all this stuff, they won't be out in the streets.

[cottonseed]

11. Get back to me when the US isn't ranked as the #1 fattest country.

[nadinbrzezinski]

15. FYI for the record we are number two.

our neighbors to the south are number one, this year...

We have been taking turns over the last five.

[L. Coyote]

14. Reasons too numerous to list.

:rofl: Albeit, the tea partiers are still futily trying to get a few hundred people to show up in the same spot at the same time. :rofl:

[FrenchieCat]

16. Are you advocating the overthrow of the current government?

What would you replace it with, and why do you think you'd get to decide?

We had elections, and last I checked, the Black Guy won!

If you wanted to overthrow a government, why wait till now?
Why not have done it when Bush was in office?

[NNN0LHI]

22. Those are five valid questions that deserve an answer

[Uzybone]

25. don't expect any answers

internet revolutionaries never have them

[Warren Stupidity]

31. Sorry, the commute home sucked.

I don't view this as a revolution, I view it as a restoration, and an evolution. A restoration of power back to the people and an evolution of the structure of our government to deal with the fundamental distortion that the plutocracy that arose out of the post WWII perpetual state of emergency has caused. I am a reformist, not a revolutionist, but reform is going to have to start with widespread and prolonged mass demonstrations.

[Warren Stupidity]

30. yes of course I am

I would replace it with a democratic republic of and by and for the people.
I have advocated for the peaceful overthrow of the corrupt plutocracy for the last 30 years.

[TheKentuckian]

34. "The Black Guy" is the public relations man for the corporate government that is never

up for election.

It should be replaced by Representative democracy as dictated by the US Constitution.

Under the Bush pResidency it could be hoped that the electoral process would remedy the subversion of our government but unfortunately "The Black Guy" works for the same corporations and wealthy that Bush did.

[Bonhomme Richard]

18. There's too much good stuff on TV like the view and...

cops and american idol.
Maybe rerun season.

[jaxx]

19. You want our government to collapse?

I am appalled.

Jeez read the rules.

[Warren Stupidity]

32. yes I want the plutocracy out

and quite frankly, fuck the rules.

[jaxx]

35. Socialism isn't going to happen here.

Quite frankly, the level of 'concern' is outrageous.

[bluethruandthru]

20. We might miss American Idol...duh! n/t

[JuniperLea]

21. It's not near bad enough here yet...

To get people out from in front of American Idol and such mind rot.

Some will say it's bad enough, or as bad as Egypt. But by virtue of their posting such things on a message board in the free InterTubes, they prove their own assertions to be patently false.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

23. Because the American people can vote their leaders out.

The level of disatisfaction needed to make it worth protesting to unseat a government that you can remove democratically in a couple of years anyhow is much, much higher than the level you need to make it worth protesting to unseat a government that could hang around for decades otherwise.

Plus, for obvious reasons, really unpopular people seldom get to power in the first place in democracies.

[Warren Stupidity]

33. not really

[Donald Ian Rankin]

36. Yes, really!

Elections happen, they're not just a myth...

Also, while they're not perfect, they're considerably more representative of the will of the people than mass protests can ever be.

[BrklynLiberal]

26. APATHY COMPLACENCY IGNORANCE ...Sad, isn't it?

People would rather sit on their couches watching Dancing with the Stars or Survivor ...

Do the words "Bread and Circus" ring any bells?

[Kaleva]

27. We are too busy at the moment trying to take down the unrec feature. It's a matter of priorities.

[Better Believe It]

28. Well it could happen here if and when the objective economic and political conditions exist.

But, that obviously is not the case.

And under those conditions the United States could either go to the left with some form of democratic socialist government and economy or to the extreme right with some form of fascism.

But, we are a long ways from that.

Certainly years.

[blindpig]

29. By and bye...

The contradictions of Capitalism pile up on each other, it's bound to happen.

For the rest of the world it would be a great mercy if we got on program, their part would be so much easier.