Is America now a post-democracy society?

[Dr.Phool]

I got my new copy of Free Inquiry magazine in the mail, and it had an excellent article by Paul Kurtz.

It details all of the changes in our gov't since Reagan. the forces that are aligned against us, and the possibility, if any to stop them.
http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/fi/kurtz_25_1.htm

Read 'em, and get scared.

[DenverDem]

1. Given the sham of "elections", we are WAY POST democracy.

Sad times.

[tabasco]

2. No responsible press. No accountability.

Democracy is dead.

[man4allcats]

3. If it isn't, at this rate it soon will be.

I just received received this from a friend. If you thought the initial version of the Patriot Act was draconian, check out what Patriot Act 2 has in store for us:

News Gathering Is Illegal Under New Patriot Act ll By Alex Jones InfoWars.com 11-20-4

SECTION 102 of the new Patriot Act ll states clearly that any information gathering, regardless of whether or not those activities are illegal, can be considered to be clandestine intelligence activities for a foreign power. This makes news gathering illegal.


A Brief Analysis of the Domestic Security Enhancement Act 2003
- Also Known as USA Patriot Act II

Congressman Ron Paul (R-Tex) told the Washington Times that no member of Congress was allowed to read the first Patriot Act that was passed by the House on October 27, 2001. The first Patriot Act was universally decried by civil libertarians and Constitutional scholars from across the political spectrum. William Safire, while writing for the New York Times, described the first Patriot Act's powers by saying that President Bush was "seizing dictatorial control." On February 7, 2003 the Center for Public Integrity, a non-partisan public interest think-tank in DC, revealed the full text of the Domestic Security Enhancement Act of 2003. The classified document had been leaked to them by an unnamed source inside the Federal government. The document consisted of a 33 page section by section analysis of the accompanying 87 page bill. read the rest about this unAmerican legislation at < http://www.rense.com/general59/newsgatheringisillegal.htm >.

You can also download a PDF version of Patriot Act 2 (aka the Domestic Security Enhancement Act Of 2003) from links at < http://www.infowars.com/police_state.html > though it seems the servers are quite slow. In any event, even the overview given at < http://www.rense.com/general59/newsgatheringisillegal.htm > makes for interesting though unsettling reading.

[izzie]

4. I have heard the RW people say that we should let Bush do ----

as he thinks best. Could be the only ones that think like that are the ones that call c-span but I do not think that. It maybe that they will be like that until some one tells them how their church will think as it always gets back to that with these groups.

[Cat Atomic]

5. If you asked me, it's been a dog and pony show for a long time.

But they even dispensed with dogs and ponies in 2000.

Still, I'd like to think we're going through an un-democratic phase, rather than something so final as "post-democracy". Eventually, things will get so bad that people wake up and demand changes. Maybe we'll get a renewed democracy and another New Deal. Maybe we'll get red armbands and a death camps. Who knows.

[Vidar]

6. Rule by corporate robber barons.

Started big time with the president from GE-Reagan, but Eisenhower warned us of the military-industrial complex in the fifties. The dems are by far the lesser of the two evils, but largely the same corporations hold the purse strings of both sides.

[deutsey]

7. Yep...we're entering the Gilded Age, part 2

I think after more than a century of progress in slowly and painfully expanding the democratic process here in America, we're right back where we started in the 1880s.

[Junkdrawer]

8. Until we RESTORE Democracy, this is what we can expect...

I'm in the Victoria Collier camp of BBV:

http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/102503C.shtml

Computerized vote fraud has been going on for a loooong time. And the result? Think selective breeding: Given a modest amount of time, a breeder can turn a wolf into a chihuahua.