How bad does it have to get?

[dixiegrrrrl]

At the fall of Rome only two thousand people owned all the land between the Rhine and Euphrates rivers.
http://wemeantwell.com/blog/whats-next/


In 1900.s England, 1% of the wealthiest people owned 60% of the country.

The Perfect Summer: England 1911, Just Before the Storm
Juliet Nicolson

[cantbeserious]

1. Until The Beer, Bread And NASCAR Are Gone - Americans Are The Perfect Sheeple

eom

[unblock]

2. for the romans, it was bread and circuses

for us, what, mcdonald's and american idol?

[cantbeserious]

3. Updated OP With NASCAR As Surrogate For Circuses

eom

[jmowreader]

11. Change NASCAR to sports

We have NASCAR and baseball in the summer, football in the fall and basketball to keep them happy until Speedweeks.

[Whisp]

14. and mega sports and general squelching of curiosity and questioning status quo.

not looking good at all despite the many good people fighting this. It seems it's a natural occurance over history and we are not able to do much about it. History repeats, and peats and peats.

*sigh.

[WCGreen]

37. And all the city fathers give into the black mail of a moved

sports franchise to funnel more money to the wealthiest people at the expense of providing the basic needs of the poorest people in the country...

[ChisolmTrailDem]

21. Why did you pick NASCAR?

Why is NASCAR such a problem for some people - some Progressives? Does any one of you who disparages NASCAR have any idea the number of people that entertainment venue employs or the economics it generates?

When was the last time you heard of a NASCAR personality embroiled in some scandal? In football the names Plaxico Burress, Michael Vick, and Hollywood Henderson jump immediately to mind. Indeed, I decided to look up NASCAR criminals and on this page there is only one NASCAR mention while there are numerous listed for other sports.

There are exactly two national-scale NASCAR races each week for a total of about 70 races per season versus hundreds of football, basketball, hockey, and baseball games each season. Yet you decided to pick on NASCAR as your "circuses".

Why?

[cantbeserious]

23. Very Popular With Low Information Voters

eom

[ChisolmTrailDem]

24. Bullpuckey.

NASCAR is no more popular with low-info voters than is football, baseball, basketball, or hockey. You are broad-brushing NASCAR fans.

Thanks for the non-answer answer.

[cantbeserious]

25. A NASCAR Fan - Well Enjoy The Sport

eom

[ChisolmTrailDem]

27. You say that as if I'm somehow a lesser person because I am a NASCAR fan.

Also, your "Well Enjoy The Sport" comment can be also read as an insult since some people, like you, have some sort of problem with NASCAR being called a "sport".

What is your problem with answering my explicit question as to why you decided that NASCAR was the best example of "circuses". And why the smugness and insults?

[cantbeserious]

28. If NASCAR Is Your Sport - Then Enjoy It

eom

[Wednesdays]

29. WHAT THE Hell are you picking on Beer for!?

I like beer! All my friends like beer, too! Why are you picking on us? Can't a person enjoy beer once in a while without being made fun of or thought of as some low class nobody??

Oh, and I like circuses too. Got a problem with that, buddy?


OFFS.

[Squinch]

30. I hate circuses. All those clowns.

[unblock]

4. sadly, much worse.

for the most part, what's going on now is that the bulk of us are stagnating while the rich keep all of the economic gains for themselves.

unfair and frustrating as that is, mere stagnation is not a sufficient driving force for compelling social/political change. things have to be getting markedly WORSE for people before they'll really object. stagnation merely brings about grumbling.

and while the unemployment rate is "high", i think it would really take something well in excess of 15% to really bring about change.

[dixiegrrrrl]

6. Apparently most of Europe is uprising this week.

Bulgaria:
SOFIA, Feb 20 (Reuters) – Bulgaria’s government resigned on Wednesday after violent nationwide protests against high power prices, joining a long list of European administrations felled by austerity during Europe’s debt crisis.
http://uprisingradio.org/home/2013/02/20/huffpost-bulgaria-government-resigns-after-nationwide-protests-over-high-electricity-prices/

Portugal:
Mass protests in Portugal over austerity cuts
Demonstrators hold marches in 20 cities denouncing government cutbacks aimed at pulling nation out of recession.
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/europe/2013/03/201332175729879141.html

Spain:
Spaniards angered by budget cuts and corruption scandals have assembled in cities across the country in a "citizens' tide" of protests.
Thousands converged in central Madrid on Saturday in a din of drums and whistles, in one of scores of demonstrations called by a grouping of civil movements.
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/europe/2013/02/2013223163651607351.html

Israel and other cities
Protests In Gaza And 40 European Cities Demand End To International Trade With Israeli Agribusiness
http://www.imemc.org/article/65025

Ireland
Tens of thousands of people march in six cities around Ireland to protest against austerity measures, days after the government struck a vital deal on its bank debt.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/world/europe/8284690/Irish-mass-in-austerity-protest

Slovenia Joins Euro Zone Anti-Austerity Protests
http://www.policymic.com/articles/25332/slovenia-joins-euro-zone-anti-austerity-protests

[kairos12]

5. In Paris in the summer of 1789 it took the price of...

bread to rise 3 times in the slums of Paris before they marched on the Bastille. With no inflation, I don't see a popular outcry. This is one of the reasons why the rich fear inflation so widely.

[dixiegrrrrl]

7. In my readings of post 1790 history

it is clear that governments and courts all over Europe were VERY concerned by the French revolution.

As they are today about protests...
and spring is almost here.

[kairos12]

8. You are right

The monarchies in Europe learned to fear the National Razor invented in France as they could be next. The Revolution in France influenced the English to moderate their monarchy and work, at least in appearance, for the public good. Noblesse Oblige. Here the One Percenters have no concept of duty--public service, military, etc. They want everyone to have a J.O.B.--Just Over Broke.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

9. Rome and Great Britain became dependent on their colonies and had to defend them.

In order to sustain themselves, they had to "protect" the colonies from outside forces and rebellion.

Catch-22. In order to survive as empires economically they had to depend on the colonies. Defending them ended up making the empires collapse economically.

We can no longer afford to defend our client states and we can't afford to do without them.

It's just a matter of time.

[stevenleser]

31. What client states? What countries can we not afford to do without?

The one country we cannot do without is China. And China seems perfectly capable of defending itself and doesn't want our help in doing so. And they are going to continue selling us the cheap goods we cannot seem to do without because it is in their best interest to do so, and I don't think you can call China a 'client state'.

Here is a list of the US' top ten trading partners. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_trading_partners_of_the_United_States None of them are client states, first is Canada, second is China, then Mexico, Japan, Germany and the UK.

What on earth are you talking about here? It seems your ideology is overwhelming all else including facts.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

34. Well, that's a relief.

Obviously, we can do without Japan, South Korea, Australia, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Dubai, Qatar, Poland, The UK, Germany, Pakistan, India, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, etc, and we only have troops, supply them with military aid, and will let them to get them by on their own if they are attacked or "subverted"....Just like we've let other non-client states go during and since the (not so) Cold War.

And, we can close all of our military bases around the world, shut down CIA operations and the embassies they operate out of, because we don't need to protect our non-client states.

Because we can do without them.

Right?

[stevenleser]

35. What are you even talking about? nt

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

36. The OP. What are you talking about?

[talkingmime]

10. I thought the 1% already owned damn near everything.

At least in one sense or another. We have a oligarchy now.

[stevenleser]

33. I think they are at about 40% of wealth in the country now which is already way too high.

Wikipedia says the top 10% possess 80% of all financial assets while the bottom 90% hold only 20% of all financial wealth.

I think it will take another two to three Republican Presidents before things get better. It will take that many before the rest of the American people who don't get it yet realize that the Republican economic model of supply side economics and trickle down do not work.

Once that happens, people realize that the only models that do work are those on the left, like traditional Liberalism, and Keynesian demand side economics.

[talkingmime]

38. I'm pretty sure you're correct about the 1% owning 40% but think about the side issue...

If you just consider the top 10%, that means the 1% own half of that 80% of assets!

[stevenleser]

39. Absolutely. And you can take it further. There is a similar relation between the top 1/10th of 1%

and the rest of the 1%.

It has totally messed the economy up. The other side of that that most people do not realize is, if the top 10% own 80% of the wealth, the bottom 90% could go on a permanent general strike and it would not affect 80% of the commerce (by $ not by number of transactions) of the country. That limits the impact of the strike. The top 10% would only start to feel it if the utilities started failing or the transportation system failed to the extent that cars could not get around. I try to point that out when some people suggest a strike but it doesnt usually go over well.

That also necessarily means that your average stores in your average towns around the country where there are not concentrations of top 1% and top 10% might as well close up shop because there is no one there with any wealth to buy goods. That is what happens when the middle class has wealth stripped away.

[talkingmime]

41. That's exactly the point I was trying to make. You could be AT the top 2-10% level and...

would still be in the bottom 90% of the top 10%.

[SheilaT]

12. The truth of the matter is that this country

is a couple of decades past its peak. I cannot begin to comment on any other country, but this is what it feels like to be living in the beginning years of the collapse of a great empire.

If we were to severely cut military costs, we'd simply decline as a military power, but could stay very strong in other ways. Unfortunately, the people that make these decisions cannot see beyond the need to fight every other country on the planet.

We have the money and the resources to do a lot, including something about the environment. But our "leaders" priorities are elsewhere, and so here we are.

[Arugula Latte]

15. The people making the decisions know that the actual wars are beside the point.

It is all about enriching Halliburton, Aegis, G.E., Exxon, Raytheon, IBM, McDonnell Douglas, and so on. So several hundred thousand innocents have died to enrich U.S. corporations. Who cares? Certainly not the PTB.

[SheilaT]

26. I am not sure it's really a matter of the people making

decisions wanting to enrich various companies. Yes, those companies are enriched, and many of them are well-represented in government, but to me it's more essential than that. It is, in my opinion, a set of completely mis-placed priorities, which seems to start and end with the notion that this country is above all the most powerful military presence in the world. Nothing else matters. Not jobs at home, not education, not health care, not clean water, not housing for everyone. I could go on and on, but it comes back to nothing matters but the powerful military presence.

Even the soldiers who fight those wars don't matter, because they have been sent off ill-equipped (and for all I know ill-trained), poorly supplied, and so on. They are just bodies to be out there. Cannon fodder is what we used to call soldiers like that. As an aside, I've read that in WWI Russia sent off soldiers without guns. They were expected to wait until the soldier next to them was killed, then take that gun.

The world is changing. Our power as a nation is diminishing. It's not very obvious yet, because we still spend more than the entire rest of the world combined on our military, but the damage is being done.

[stevenleser]

40. I don't think that is true. There is still immense wealth and capacity here. It's just that the

wealth is distributed in a way that makes this country not as great. If the middle 15%-85% owned 50% of the wealth, even 40% of the wealth, this country's economy would take off like a rocket ship. The wealthy would still do quite well, because all of that purchasing would eventually go to companies that the wealthy own anyway, but the country would be better off by a longshot.

[SheilaT]

43. Certainly, the strongest economic growth that we

had in this country was when the marginal tax rates were at their highest. And that was exactly when the working and middle class did the best in this country.

I wonder if there isn't a connection between these two things, the inequality and the overboard military spending that I'm missing.

[steve2470]

13. kick and rec for discussion nt

[Cleita]

16. This is worse, because we have foreign investors coming in, buying up

everything at bargain prices, and basically owning our country.

[Rex]

17. When the bread and circus no longer keeps the serfs sedated.

THAT will be the point of no return.

[DeSwiss]

18. K&R

“Man is the only creature that consumes without producing. He does not give milk, he does not lay eggs, he is too weak to pull the plough, he cannot run fast enough to catch rabbits. Yet he is lord of all the animals. He sets them to work, he gives back to them the bare minimum that will prevent them from starving, and the rest he keeps for himself.” ~George Orwell

[snagglepuss]

19. .

[dotymed]

20. I wonder and worry for the next generations (being born now)

about how they may have to survive in a post apocalyptic world, one that could have been averted if not for greed. I fear we proles have finally reached the point of action. Even though I have longed for this time for many years, I was hoping for peaceful measures to rectify ever increasing inequalities in our country.
Admittedly, I was hoping for an election of another FDR (Bernie Sanders) or a peaceful citizens coalition.
i fear that time has passed and our future looks bleak. Yes, Spring is almost here and people have reached their levels of toleration. I would be very surprised to see another two years pass without a revolt unless there are major improvements..

[dixiegrrrrl]

22. "spring is coming"

[cbrer]

32. Collapse will follow our debt avalanche

And the wealthy will claim to own America. And we'll have to win it back...again.

Many will die.

We can only hope that the police and military will refuse to fire on their own families.

[stevenleser]

42. I dont think so. I dont think debt is what will trigger the tipping point.

We're now cutting government spending and drawing down the second of the two wars, that is going to cut down on the debt immensely.

I think working class people are going to get sick of having no disposable income and businesses throughout middle America are going to close up because places where there are not adequate concentrations of top 10 percenters or top 1 percenters are not going to have enough disposable income to keep any businesses going. I think those things are going to be the tipping point.