I Think We've Lost

[MannyGoldstein]

Just came to me today.

Used to be such a great country, but I think the jig's up.

[FSogol]

1. BS. n/t

[Naked_Ape]

37. +1

[rwheeler31]

2. I don't think so. Change is hard keep moving.

[MannyGoldstein]

3. Nah. It Starts By Trying.

Nobody who's anybody seems to be trying anymore.

[Cali_Democrat]

106. Well...

If that's the case then anybody who's nobody should try to do something about it.

[Zhade]

50. Has to be change before it can keep moving.

NT!

[ShortnFiery]

4. If you're not ultra-wealthy and/or an executive or CEO of a corporation, then I agree.

The middle class of this nation have LOST and will soon be just more of "the peasant class" that will include all but the upper 5%.

America is owned by the multi-national corporations. Lock, stock and barrel.

[MercutioATC]

30. Solution: Become a CEO.

No, not everybody can do it, but there are plenty of people who can.

I work in a building of about 600 people. Probably 8%-10% have their own businesses on the side...everything from photography businesses to writing technical manuals to a liquor brand. Over the last decade or so, the markets have become increasingly friendly to entrepreneurship.

It doesn't take a truckload of money or great connections (though those DO help). All that's required is an idea and a lot of persistence...and almost ANYBODY can become a CEO.

[ShortnFiery]

107. ...

:wtf:

[MercutioATC]

111. What part of my post did you not understand?

:shrug:

[FatDave]

112. Selling keychains on ebay is not the same as being CEO of a multinational corporation.

I say this as the CEO of a small software development company.

[MercutioATC]

121. Granted, but it gives you a much greater level of control of your destiny.

And with so much talent currently unemployed, it's a great time for entrepreneurship.

No, you'll probably never be a "king"...but neither will you be a serf.

[leftstreet]

5. We were never in the game

[gateley]

7. Agree. It's always belonged to them, but they used to throw us a few more bones. nt

[tblue]

18. Just enough to keep us thinking we matter.

I was mad at Obama & our members of Congress for not righting the ship. But now I think it's beyond even their control. How naive I have been all these years. I didn't realize how much the fix was in until the Dems won control and I realized there was not even an effort, not even a mention of systemic change.

[gateley]

35. What opened my eyes was learning about how the Fed was formed -- then

learning of the tentacles of the Bush family and the others who had gone before them.

It's bigger than Dems or Reps. They're being manipulated, too.

[roamer65]

39. "The Creature from Jekyll Island" - The Federal Reserve

Good name for it from the author of a book on the Fed. The author is annoyingly right-wing libertarian, but the history he has compiled on the Fed is amazing.

[gateley]

69. Yeah -- but in this case I'm not considering the

source :7. I think he's got it nailed. Other things I've heard and read seem to substantiate what he says.

[LuckyLib]

120. +1

[hughee99]

11. Playboy?

Really, does playboy really belong up there with banks, insurance companies, media, telecommunications, electronics (I noticed both Windows and Internet explorer logos are up there), fast food, soda, tobacco and sneaker companies.

Did American really sell out to Playboy?

[leftstreet]

15. Were the workers able to claim the value of their labor?

The Playboy Mansion, where Hugh Hefner lives with his girlfriends,
has had $14.3 million in renovations. Newscom photo

[hughee99]

26. What does this have to do with them "owning" America?

As far as the workers owning the product of the their labor, in what industry does this happen? It's the publishing business, how is Playboy any different from High Times, Cat Fancy, or Fangoria?

[Hissyspit]

99. .

oops delete

[Nite Owl]

12. We never were but now they are

very bold and blatant about it. That's why there isn't much we can do right now. Maybe someday if the masses catch on, if a real leader emerges.

[FarLeftFist]

20. Pizza Hut? WTF!?

[arcadian]

23. Yum! Brands

[xiamiam]

74. right..a few different logos are necessary but the idea is spot on..nt

[xiamiam]

72. powerful and disturbing image..nt

[avaistheone1]

108. True. How single-payer was handled is a testimonial to that.

I keep coming to the conclusion we don't matter to our elected officials except for our votes and our money. Once they have them, they turn their backs to us.

[KittyWampus]

6. speak for yourself. You are consistently negative. Too bad you feel compelled to try

and get others to wallow in it.

[MannyGoldstein]

9. I Suck

The terrifying part is that I'm virtually always right.

[tblue]

22. No you don't.

Ach! Go do something that makes you happy. Really, step away from the computer and go watch a comedy or phone a friend. :hug:

[MannyGoldstein]

27. Thanks. I Think I'll Head To Bed.

Long day. Big epiphany.

[greenbird]

76. . . . "I'm virtually always right"?

Wow. First human ever in the history of the world! Congratulations!

[dionysus]

83. ROFL... nice megolomania...

[martymar64]

87. I agree about the lost part. I think that we're fixing to go the way of the Soviet Union

To me, Obama is the equivalent of Gorbachev, happening to be on watch when the whole thing falls apart.

http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dtxqwqr_20dc52sm

[arcadian]

24. Kitty Wampus is a wet blanket

[Subdivisions]

29. Well, how about you rebut the OP's assertion by pumping us full of

sunshine and daisies and show us your skittles-shittin' unicorns?

I mean, really! If you know something that we (because I agree with the OP) don't, please do tell.

[xiamiam]

75. skittles- shittin unicorns...thats funny...nt

[Jackpine Radical]

124. What, a unicorn ate Skittles?

Migod, that's awful!!1!

[Lorien]

8. Um, yep:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4218309

[natrat]

10. you have to be pretty stupid not to draw that conclusion

if they ruin the dollar, as they have been doing, standard of living could decline further. Knowing that we are drifting from a quasi democracy to something else is not so easy on the mind

[Gregorian]

13. The dingbats and sad sad idiots have been with us since we came here.

We almost didn't get independence because of these dunce-like creatures.

[EmeraldCityGrl]

14. Sorry, I'm not buying into the defeatist mindset.

Granted we are not a great country at this time. Maybe we need to deconstruct before we can rebuild. Learn from what we have lost and reinvent ourselves
How many European countries resemble the nations they were a couple hundred years ago?

[Mind_your_head]

16. I'm typically an optimist....even a 'Pollyanna' at times

but, there's not much healthy/functioning 'good' to hang onto (play the glad-game with) these days.

It is with deep regret that I am in agreement with you Manny.

[Mind_your_head]

17. dupe - self deleted (I hate when that happens- double postings *sigh*)

[Goldstein1984]

19. We're in bad shape, and I think it may get worse

but I have grandchildren and can't afford to give up.

I predict that we're heading for a moment when people wake up to what is happening and the need to stop it, and when that happens people of democratic ideals will do what they have done in the past--threaten to destroy the foundation upon which the power of the few rests.

My concern, again because I have grandchildren, it that it won't happen in time for the revolt to be peaceful.

Just in case, my wife and I are visiting a friend in Thailand next winter to do some scouting for another place to live. 3/4 of my ancestry has been in the U.S. for less than 100 years. My wife is Inuit--a circumpolar people. We're waiting until next winter because I want to learn a fair amount of the Thai language before I go.

Chin up. One way or another, I doubt it's the end of history.

[tblue]

25. You rock!

:hug:

[Goldstein1984]

33. Hey tblue!

You and I seem to hang out together in the darker corners of DU.

[villager]

21. When the inevitable dissolution comes, due to eco-spasms, etc.

Perhaps some of the smaller countries emerging from the implosion can be actual democracies.

Then again, we're bound to have some regional theocracies in there, too...

[rhett o rick]

28. We are down, but havent lost. We need to fight harder. We need a strategy and an organization.

We need our own propaganda machine. We need a backup network in case the internet "goes down". We have money collectively.

We need to stop voting for the lesser of the evils. We need boycotts and civil disobedience. We need to get busy.

[Subdivisions]

40. Taking all that into account...yes,

the jig is indeed up.

What you are describing is a revolution. Not. gonna. happen! Americans are too fat, lazy, medicated, stupid, or scared. Case in point, rich robber barrons are ciphoning off the wealth of the middle-class and dumping off their bad debt on the paychecks of every single taxpayer in this country. Americans: "Yawn." Coporations are controlling our government like some bad prison planet sci-fi movie. Americans: "Yawn." Rights and privacy are take from us every day while we've simultaneously being transformed from citizens with certain unalienable rights to fat-ass, lazy, brain-dead, over-medicated, and frivously-entertained consumer slaves hanging on every movement of a three-number credit score. Americans: "Yawn."

I could go on. But, I digress...

[sendero]

122. You're assessment..

... matches mine. However, I'm not sure that there isn't some pain level at which Americans WILL say "enough already" and take action.

People who are well fed may be complacent, but hungry people are less so, and given the conditions we face, hunger is not that impossible.

[TBF]

93. We need boycotts and civil disobedience

Bingo - and that's just for starters.

[rhett o rick]

109. First we need an organization and strategy. nt

[happy_liberal]

31. who is doing anything?

Where are our progressive groups that were happy to take $$ when Bush was in office?

The only one organizing anything is Cindy Sheehan with the march in March.

[happy_liberal]

34. this is depressing to me

I post this story
Boeing Reaps Stimulus Millions to Clean Up Site It Was Fined for Polluting
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x7442757

Boeing pays a 471,000 fine then get 15.9 million in stimulus money to clean up their own mess....and hardly anyone cares. If they get away with ripping off the country this way, and people on DU don't even care....everyone just accepts this now?

[jotsy]

32. A way of life lost, yes perhaps.

Life in and of itself though and the quality of it is on us. How we handle the hard times we anticipate on the horizon.

The 'jig' as you say that is up, isn't the failure of the concept of us, but rather usurpers of a public will that have been exposed to the extent that the undeniably of it has left a fractional but informed public stunned. We are as a people, not responsible for liars and cheats, just leaving them not only in our midst, but at the helm our once great nation.

We the people are charged with forming the order of a more perfect union.

It has taken the PTB generations to get us to this lethargic intellectual state. It will only take one to set right what has gone awry. Hope can never be far from the heart of resurrecting the spirit of a self governing society, keep that at all costs.

[roamer65]

36. The emperor has no clothes.

All of the lies and deceit are now becoming obvious. Turns out we're not much different than any other empire from the past.

[Naked_Ape]

42. What a whiner

who said it would be easy? Who said you could change the whole world at once? Right now we are at the edge of giving back the little ground we have made, and you want to quit??

It will take A Generation of Democratic rule to get the country going back in the right direction. We need to raise a whole new crop of candidates to replace the aging Democratic majority, if there still is a majority. If that's too difficult for you to think about keep it to your whiny ass self.

[Zhade]

56. With Democrats like these? You can't be THAT naive.

NT!

[Betty Karlson]

61. Newsflash:

you don't have another generation.

The Middle East hates your guts
Europe is fervently trying not to need you anymore - and once the Dollar goes into prolonged inflation, guess what happens.
China won't keep you infused with credit for another 25 years
East Asia is orientating on Australia and vice versa.
Africa still needs you, but that only because its leaders still believe AIDS is a Western myth.

Oh, and the Polar Bears will all drown in less than a decade.

You want to make a change? Do it now.
You want your children to make a change? That's the very definition of procratination.

[donheld]

38. It does look pretty bleak.

Without good campaign finance reform, and putting big business in their place, we are as good as lost.

[happy_liberal]

46. unfortunately we are going the wrong direction on that as well

Supreme Court to Remove Restrictions on Corporate Donations
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x7428698

[donheld]

55. I hear you. i don't know what to say.

[Scurrilous]

41. "That's it man, game over man, game over!"

:thumbsdown:

[proteus_lives]

43. You're wrong.

Simple as that.

[MannyGoldstein]

44. I Hope So

But I wouldn't bet against me.

[proteus_lives]

45. I would.

Everything I got.

[HughMoran]

48. double-down on that

all in

[Naked_Ape]

51. Good, and double good...

You can do something today. Teabaggers are invading Mass. Raised a million bux against Coakley just today, polls are way too close for comfort. Go here and do what you can:
http://www.marthacoakley.com/
It's too early to quit!

[HughMoran]

67. My parents and GF will put Coakley over the top

They aren't going to win.

[Subdivisions]

52. Based on what? n/t

[proteus_lives]

53. History.

Tech and cultural trends.

And the old gut feeling.

[Subdivisions]

57. Umm...

History? You mean like the 1930s history?

I'm glad you're optimistic. I am too.

[proteus_lives]

58. 1930s?

Ha. Not even close.

Crack history book, it will be enlightening.

[Subdivisions]

63. Please explain. n/t

[proteus_lives]

70. To put it simply, it's not as bad.

On the the economic front, politics, war and social change.

It's a difficult time and there are many challenges ahead but in comparison to the Great Depression, the conflicts of the time and the far more radical politics, it's like our situation is the PG-13 version of that adult film.

[natrat]

79. fdr came along during the depression-you can make damn sure they wont let that happen again

[dionysus]

89. it's a cyclical downturn in the economy. it may get worse before it gets better, but it will get

better.

breathless hyperbole that we're a third world nation in abject poverty makes people look foolish.

[HughMoran]

47. Really?

I've never heard you express this sort of feeling here before.

:rofl:

[MannyGoldstein]

49. I'm Flattered By Your Stalking

I guess I must be pretty important to you.

That's cool.

[Subdivisions]

54. I'm glad he's ignoring me. I made the mistake of...wait for it...

"having a nasty attitude".

[Forkboy]

102. He puts people on ignore and then reads their posts anyways.

He's told me he's put me on ignore twice but he's responded to me more than once since. He puts people on ignore and then reads DU in "printer friendly" mode so the ignoreds show up.

[glitch]

103. OT I wish the printer-friendly view didn't print the ignoreds.

Back on topic: you only lose when you give up.

[Forkboy]

104. I go through stages where I feel like giving up sometimes.

But I don't really know what else to do with myself anyways. There are times when I think dropping out would certainly help me, but it won't help anyone else.

Besides, it's the only game in town. :)

[HughMoran]

68. Don't flatter yourself

I guess when someone expresses an opinion in one of your posts you call it "stalking" - and you think that's insulting to me?

:rofl:

You -> :crazy:

[Birthmark]

59. I think you're right.

The specifics of how we further deteriorate should be fascinating. I intend to watch from afar.

[berni_mccoy]

60. What is the point of this thread? Oh yeah, disruption. Thanks for playing.

[Subdivisions]

64. Pot...

...kettle.

I mean, just look at your sig image to see my point.

[berni_mccoy]

71. Rrriiigghhhttt

You don't even know what it means.

[dionysus]

85. that bernie, he's such a disruptor, by staying positive, supporting dems... what an evil bastid...

:eyes:

[pecwae]

77. LOLZ!!

[Juche]

62. We have to keep fighting though

The wealthy and influential have always tried to become more and more wealthy and influential by having as many locks on the levers of power as possible (the military, politics, religion, the media) while also destroying whatever competitors they had (unions, independent media, organized grassroots). In the US they are fairly good at it. The military fights for corporate profit. The parties are largely bought and sold by wealthy individuals and corporations. The corporate media has few/no true progressive agenda (since progressive agenda is by nature anti-corporate). Religion has been co-opted as a tool to make the socially conservative working class vote against their economic interests.

But the fact that they own this place doesn't mean we have to take it lying down forever. We can (and will) get discouraged, and it'll take decades just to make minor changes. But changes can be made.

[Bobbie Jo]

65. Aww, but hey...look on the bright side.

Glenn Beck agrees with you. :thumbsup:

[Egnever]

66. You been singing that tune for years now.

It must comfort you or something.

[Echo In Light]

73. The death blow came decades ago, but took a brainwashed public a while to catch on

[varelse]

118. Yes, it did

Reading history only makes that more obvious to me.

We're also facing something unprecedented in history: global deterioration of the ecosystems that sustain life. There are no chapters in history that could prepare us for this development. Nor would "becoming a CEO" help in any way. By the time the majority of humans understand what is happening, it will be far too late to change the course, and there will be no escape: the rich will die with the poor.

[blindpig]

78. We've never been in the game

if by 'we' you mean the majority of he populace. We have been gamed from the gitgo. This realization is not an end but a beginning.

[natrat]

80. i think we lost when they killed wellstone and took congress with coleman

[coyote]

81. We are finished....

They are just gutting what´s left of the country and taking whatever cash they can get and leaving the country. Whatever is left will be nationalized by the goverment and the citzens will pick up the tab. There will be change alright....very painful change.

The super rich are already in the process of moving their money out of the country. China has stopped buying our debt....and the FED is monetizing the rest of it (printing paper). The only way out of this mess is too default and reset the system....think it can't happen here?....Argentina did, Russia did. Why can't it happen here?

There was already talk on wall st how this administration is floating the idea of people moving their 401k into annuities in order to buy US treasuries (last great money grab...your retirement). I am sure within year it will be mandated that people buy treasuries as part of their retirement plans.

The gig is up....I give it another 1-2 years max before it all comes crumbling down. And when it does, we´ll get our change. What change? I don't know....dictatorship, war, progressive goverment...anybody's guess.

[Caretha]

91. I agree with you Coyote

That's kind of what I see. One more point that I've been thinking about lately & how the Health Care Insurance Reform Bill fits into this. Everyway that I've calculated it by going to the Senate Bill or House Bill calculation sites, I'll not be able to afford either, and I can't be alone. There must be millions who won't be able to help subsidize the Insurance companies. I think that's when the Fit will hit the Shan".

[spanone]

82. move?

[dionysus]

84. must suck to be you.

:shrug:

[dionysus]

86. meanwhile, tens of millions of people have, homes, can afford to eat, and to them the world

isn't ending...

melodrama much? we have PLENTY of problems, and there are a lot of suffering people, but nothing that can't be fixed or improved.

i guess to you hyperbolic pessimism is the american way.

[natrat]

88. the idea is to look ahead-obviously people are ok right now

[dionysus]

90. i'm not saying there aren't serious problems that need to be dealt with. but abject pessimism isn't

going to help us!

[TBF]

98. "People are ok right now"

I guess that would be the rich people. Not the unemployed, the ones who have lost their homes, those living in tents (if they're lucky), the perpetually under-employed, those in pain without medical insurance, those going bankrupt from medical bills, the list goes on and on ...

The "people are ok right now" must refer to the politicians and their brilliant underlings. Y'all need to get out beyond the beltway now and again.

[Starbucks Anarchist]

105. Half of GD is ten minutes away from pulling a Sylvia Plath.

I wonder how they get out of bed every day.

[DelPotro]

92. America was great? When was that?

What gets to me is people thinking America was once a great country with a moral compass? When was that? I must have missed that part of history. From the massacres of Indians, to slavery, to Hiroshima, Vietnam, to its policies in Latin America, to its support for the creation of the terrorist state of Israel, to supporting the Shah of Iran, to supporting Saddam with intelligence and chemical weapons against the Iranian people, to these modern day Middle East debacles, America has by far the worst track record. They just have a very powerful propaganda machine to show they are the land of the free.

"We" stole half of Mexico by armed force -- the nice parts with rich deposits of gold and silver (and, as it turned out, oil -- though "we" didn't actually recognize that at the time.)

"We" made sure that "our" influence over Latin America was such that wealth would be steadily transferred from their countries to ours. "We" sent the Marines to Nicaragua, Haiti, & Guatemala often enough to insure that life in those countries would be a permanent living hell for most of the inhabitants. "We" imposed military dictatorships in almost every Central & South American country, stunting the aspirations of their people, & imposing conditions from which some of those countries will never recover. (So if some of the people want to escape from the living conditions in those countries, "we" had very much to do with creating those conditions.)

Interestingly, "we" started doing all this at the same time that "we" were exterminating the indigenous people here, AND using black slaves from Africa. What a loveable, righteous people "we" are, here in the "Land of the Free"!!

"We" came here somewhere in the early 1600s. "We" found this Promised Land, rich beyond imagination with fresh water and fertile earth and abundant game and timber for the felling. And to "our" further delight, it was largely uninhabited--if "we" didn't count the Red Ones.

"We" didn't see too many of them at first; they avoided our noise and the smoke from our fires, which were always too big. But soon enough, "we" were here in such numbers that they couldn't go around us anymore.

"We" were shocked--SHOCKED, I tell ya--that there were Savages in "our" Promised Land! So "we" set about exterminating them. "We" killed them whenever "we" saw them, "we" drove them from their land and their homes, "we" slaughtered their food supply and left the buffalo bodies to rot in the sun by the hundreds of acres. "We" gave them blankets full of smallpox, murdered their children and raped their women before "we" murdered them as well. "We" rounded them up into concentration camps and ate their food while they starved. "We" made them cut their hair, wear britches and beat them to death if they wouldn't speak "our" language.

"We" stole a whole fucking continent from them and paid them in Genocide.

Forget the nostalgia, it's just a fanciful lie that the United States was ever great.

[TBF]

95. Excellent post, I agree completely.

nt

[CBR]

97. +1... another thread idealizing the past. nt

[Dhalgren]

100. I wish we could "rec" individual posts! Your response is dead-on!

The only negative to this cesspool of a empire going extinct is the misery and death that will accompany it. And since "misery and death" are this countries gift to the world, I guess even that doesn't matter much...

[Cal Carpenter]

101. I'm glad you answered that

You did a much better job than I would have.

:thumbsup:

[DutchLiberal]

119. Great first post.

No sarcasm. Really, what a way to come in! Welcome!

[freddie mertz]

94. We have definitely lost the battle we thought we had won in 2008.

And I guess that means it is time for a new strategy.

I wish I had a better idea of what to do.

[WI_DEM]

96. Good Grief!

Will if it just came to you then it must be true. We're finished.

[Odin2005]

110. So that's it? You are giving up?

Shame on you. Get off your ass and DO SOMETHING!

[Geek_Girl]

113. I'm not sure that we've ever been a great country

But I do think, if we can wrestle our government out of the grip of Corporate America, this will become a great country. What is needed is stiff penalties for companies to offshore jobs and a strong labor movement.

[Martin Eden]

114. Un-Recommended

I rarely use the function, but a simplistic all-encompassing subject title with essentially nothing to back it up does not merit the Greatest Page.

That and it represents a capitulation that I in no way endorse.

[laughingliberal]

115. Rec nt

[hfojvt]

116. the jig is up!!

I say that probably a dozen times a day. :rofl:

[S_E_Fudd]

117. I agree..it is irretrievably broken...

Our COnstitution is no longer up to the task...

[IndianaGreen]

123. We lost the Republic in December 2000

We lost our freedoms with PATRIOT.

We just found out that our political institutions are a sham and a fraud whose only mission is to defend the interests of the rich and powerful against the people.

The next thing we will experience will be the ever present Ministry of Love.