The Implosion of the American Political Consciousness

[StarfarerBill]

By David Michael Green

If you're looking for a decent indicator of the political health of the nation, consider the following excerpt from a Christian Science Monitor article this week: "The decision by the White House Friday to not preempt the season premiere of the psychedelic crash-drama "Lost" for the State of the Union address reveals the surprising power of that much ridiculed stereotype: the American couch potato."

Well, at least no one can accuse us of not having our national priorities in order, eh?

Actually, that's only part of the story - and frankly the more benign part, to boot.

Presidents like to say, in their annual messages to Congress and the country, that "The state of the union is strong". Maybe Obama is bold enough to tell a whopper that big even in 2010. I guess when you've taken an entire country over the cliff lying about "hope" and "change", even a stinker that rude wouldn't be so egregious, relatively speaking.

In fact, the health of this country is tenuous, and that's on a real good day. All the obvious and tangible manifestations are there: massive unemployment, polarized wealth suitable for any banana republic, broken government and political system, environmental catastrophe and more. It's almost as if our goal is to commit national suicide in order to keep a whole next generation of Jared Diamonds employed or something.

These are huge problems, they are nigh on intractable, and they are destructive in the extreme. Indeed, so grim is our situation that the only real hope looking forward is for a resurgence of common sense and mutual sacrifice allowing for at least the possibility of finding the national will to address these crises.

But I'm afraid that's where things really start to get grim.

More:
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/01/10-4

[nightrain]

1. knr. Thanks for posting. I particularly appreciate this paragraph--

"This condition represents an utter failure of the imagination, and therefore the startling ‘success' of the regressive framing effort. This limitation of what is conceivable and the concomitant diminishing of expectations is the greatest triumph of right-wing marketing, and it's Orwellian to its core. What makes it especially startling is that the alternatives in question are so commonsensical and so proximate in real life form, and yet even some progressives in America have been trained to lower their expectations enough to ignore the existence of these ideas and models. What could be more basic than removing gushing profits and massive bureaucratic waste from a country's healthcare system, especially one that is groaning so clangorously under the burdens of runaway costs? What could be easier to figure out than nationalized healthcare, when every other developed country in the world already does it? And yet such ideas were nowhere remotely near consideration throughout these long months of tortuous negotiations over ‘reform' of what actually amounts to the care of corporate health in America. And yet even the most pathetic feints in the direction of real solutions - a public option or the extension of Medicare benefits - were immediately dispatched with, so that the profiteers' victory could be unequivocally complete."

My emphasis added

[IndianaGreen]

2. It is all showbiz: the Obama signing of HCR, presented as real health care reform

is as fictional as the premiere of Lost's final season, and less fun to watch.

[yurbud]

3. the state of the union is SOLD

[2 Much Tribulation]

7. +1

[Demeter]

4. Who Needs the Olympics, When We Have a Contortionist in Office?

[Vidar]

5. +1000

[Tesha]

6. The funny part is that The Firesign Theatre did almost this exact shtick back in 1969...

Where FDR, after Pearl Harbor, quickly announces our unconditional surrender
so that he and his wife can return with every one else to the on-going episode
of "Nick Danger".

And now life imitates art.

Tesha