America's not going to wake up, is it? (personal rant)

[lildreamer316]

I really really really don't want to be pessimistic. I swear I am the one who always gets fooled because I believe in people until the bitter end (naive sometimes). But I really think...where is the hue and cry? Where is the outrage? The president just admitted that he broke the rule of the Constitution and......virtually nothing. Christmas commercials. Worship Wal-mart. Watch Joey and the white stupid wife in Harlem. Where oh where is that missing WASPish white college boy? Oprah's Favorite Things. Of course many liberal people write opinions and editorials..but can we trust the NYT since they kept the story from us for a year? Way to gain cred there.
I just
don't think
they are going
to wake up.
I will try to give it some more time; but dammit; I have a 2 year old and I want the best life for him NOW not 20 years from now.
If nothing by the mid-terms; sorry all; I'm outta here to find a place to raise my family in peace. I will fight with you until then; and will continue to fight as much as I can; but I believe that I must draw a line when it comes to putting my family in danger. I see a real possibility of that being a problem. When my baby is in a position to take care of himself; I will rejoin the fray with my whole being. THis is a choice I have to make. I am sure many do not agree; but my family comes first. And nothing can be done without the sheep (in congress too)getting a clue NOW NOW NOW not five months from now. The total black energy coming out of DC just keeps getting bigger and darker.
Fox News just has too much a hold on them. They just don't get it and they won't listen until they are either metaphorically or physically lying on the ground bleeding from a mortal wound. Even then it may be "god's will" (no offense moderate Christians). It will take tanks in the streets and curfews and torture of your next door neighbor and papers and complete poverty and starvation and years of imprisonment and thousands of deaths before they will get it. I want to believe in the American spirit..but I see no glimmer of it in the masses. They are just uncomfortable. Oh; and never mind; they'd rather spend time telling me I'm gong to hell for being non-Christian or a stripper. What a waste of energy.
I see this fork in the road coming and I dread it with every fiber in my being...but it's going to happen and I'd best buck up and prepare. So many things about this country that were great..I hope my son gets to see them rise again. I don't think I will. If the sheep do not wake up NOW the fight will be years...decades in the doing and the toll will be heavy. I wish to shelter my child until he is old enough to hold his own. I cannot do so in what this country is so close to becoming. I also may not be able to teach him the values and ideas that this country is founded on. I cannot take that chance.
I am not running away. I do not want to run away. I also do not want to get caught behind enemy lines with a family to take care of; when I can very well see what is coming and prepare. I have not made the decision yet; but it looms not far ahead...
Pour a little more in that glass; would you? I can't tell if that's half or not.

[Spinzonner]

1. Well, a certain percentage are politically narcoleptic

[lvx35]

2. I am optimistic

the people of america are really quite incredible, actually. Ignore the ideas about them being hopeless, because they are the basis of the elitist republican philosophy. You are exactly right though, they won't get it until it affects them, until they are inconvenienced by it. But then watch out. The american people don't want to be bothered with bullshit, and the first thing Bush does that actually demands something of them other than "sit on the couch and do nothing" will be his downfall. I mean jesus, I have watched all this and I accomplish amazingly little against it with school and work. But there is a line with me, with everybody, that can't be crossed. We are a great people, and that's what the constitution was written around. Sometimes its just tough to get up when you have been relaxing all day! :)

[lildreamer316]

6. But can't they see..

the line has already been crossed? They are living on borrowed everything from the cc companies. When they fall; they will fall hard and fast..and the ones in power are making sure they don't let them fall until AFTER it is too late. Many will not be able to get up..ever.
I promise; I am usually the most optimistic of people. I am genuinely scared for the future..that being even the next few months into the next year.

[lvx35]

11. Well, you've got to keep in mind the structure of things I think.

Were frustrated because we are not seeing people rioting in the streets over this stuff, because the MSM is not showing broad discontent. But its there, its in the poll numbers. a full third think we should impeach, he's hovering around 40% that approve of him at all...so says the MSM. The freepers are getting split, because a lot of mom and pop conservatives really do care about the constituion. His power is not as big as it is projected at all, and we are seeing that more and more. And there is a lot of love in this country...that's what really makes me optimistic. There is a lot of caring and laughing and support amongst people like me and you all over the place. And that's where the energy lies, the real energy for resistance or change, its in the unity and love. I agree that we have some freaky bridges to cross, but actually do have reason for some optimism amidst all this change!!! :)

[lildreamer316]

13. I hope you are right..

I think it is because I am in a red state (although there are alot of us blues here..) and I keep seeing the utterly appaling statements from the Repugs in Congress. It just is getting to me. I take breaks; but the bottom line is that what happens in politics now is going to affect every aspect of my daily life.
I am afraid the monstorus money and power brigade is going to make it a hard hard fight; I don't really doubt that at some point people will rally..it just will be light years from when they really needed to.

[lvx35]

16. I don't know man, I really think Bush is in a precarious spot.

The thing is that there are two realities...The actual one, and the one people are feed. But for Bush to REALLY make a move, he actually has to take things out of the shadows, because there is only so much disguise you can put on a 900 pound gorilla. So that's where he's at, trying to figure out how to make a move in the non-clandestine realm, and that's where he fails miserably. Yet he wants to be this historical figure, this abe lincoln, but can't figure out how to put his actions into the realm of the real, the known. This is his tough spot I believe.

[Marleyb]

28. "conservatives really do care about the constitution"

many of these people have just been fooled, their trust has been abused, and as they wake up they are even more appalled about what Bush has done than we are.

I think this needs to be repeated...

"there is a lot of love in this country...And that's where the energy lies, the real energy for resistance or change, its in the unity and love."

The Bush Administration's whole game plan has been divide and conquer. They have created all sorts of stupid reasons to separate us. WE can fight back by reaching out to conservatives on the matters that unite, the foundation of our country, and refuse to ever discuss the stupid crap Rove and others try to use to divide.

[lvx35]

29. exactly!

That cuts the heart of it. You have ask WHY they are having to create absurdities like "the war on X-mas", and the reason is that there are no way they can get mom and pop conservatives behind things like torture. They are having to create issues. well said, well said.

[still_one]

3. they will eventually , but not until we go through a lot more pain

many of the democrats in congress are NOT doing their job, and so it will be up to the people to get new leadership.

A lot more Americans and Iraqiis will die, a lot more Americans will aquire an unsustainable debt load, and the time will come when they realize that their jobs and technology are being sent overseas, they do NOT have enough for retirement, healthcare, and cannot afford to send their kids to college, only then will change occur

[drduffy]

4. Pretty much agree with you....

I share your view. Some are waking up but nearly enough, not nearly quickly enough.... and the catastrophes of peak oil and global climate change are breathing down our necks. The fascists are pushing. The neocons and corporatists are manipulating, controlling, destroying. I have wracked my brain about how to best survive all of this with my son (he's 12). I don't have the capital to simply leave. I have that sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. And what's worse is that even among those who should know better, most are simply clueless. Like that wacko fundie radio woman..... la, la, la, la, la......... I can't hear you......

got any good ideas on where to go that the fascists won't control

[lildreamer316]

7. Trying to formulate

some basic ideas; to educate myself...I will share any good info I come across. Again; I don't want to go to that extreme, but the possibility is becoming a little too real for comfort.
Venezuela?
Europe?
Brazil?
Peru?
even southern Mexico isn't looking too bad...

[vi5]

5. I'm with you in the pessimism department....

There are 40% of the people who are never, ever, under any circumstances going to admit that they were wrong about Bush and they are so adamant that I think they would likely take up arms simply to defend him (note, defend HIM, not defend America). There are another 20% who are so completely apathetic that nothing is going to get them off their couches or to read a newspaper other than the sports section.

Unfortunataly that adds up to a majority.

[OneBlueSky]

8. might as well hang around and fight the bastards, because . . .

there's no place on the planet that won't be impacted in a major (and negative) way by BushCo . . .

[mwb970]

20. It's amazing how Bush has damaged our nation, our world and our planet.

Has any other human ever been so universally disliked around the world? The vast majority of people are unknown to all but one or two hundred other people. This guy is known of by BILLIONS of people, most of whom hate him. Maybe his Bubble, which keeps him from knowing this, is necessary to keep him from going insane or something.

I'm trying to picture how I would feel knowing that a billion people despised me. Not good.

[JCMach1]

9. Not that it's an option for you, but becoming an expat

largely for economic reasons has given me cognitive distance from the mess back home. It has allowed to live a life outside of JUST politics and I am so thankful for that.

I don't know if I will ever go back.

Vote, scream, shouts, and even protest ...

But, what used to be home seems a very bad place indeed from where I am standing.

[Nomen Tuum]

10. Millions wait for the Rapture

They don't care about anything happening on Earth because they really believe Jesus is going to rapture them next week.

This country is doomed.

[EFerrari]

12. It's not so much that Americans want to be in a coma.

It seems more like the fact that their every day lives are so difficult that they hope the damn goverment will do their job because most families already have hands full. :(

We will get this done and it will be very hard work. The alternative is not an option.

:hug:

[lildreamer316]

14. You are an inspiration..

and I hope that you don't think I am being too cowardly..I just really want to protect my son. I realize that fighting for this country is providing him with a good example of my beliefs in action and that I am fighting for his right to live free; but if I have to raise him otherwise I do not think that will be beneficial.
I promise to give it more time and to fight while I am here. But the decision still looms as a ever more distinct possibility.

[lildreamer316]

15. dupe

[Armstead]

23. You summed it up perfectly

[izzie]

17. I guess the point you miss is that some people want this

Seems un-am. to me and I am sure to you but these people love Bush and voted him in so reason tells me they want what he is pushing.:shrug: :shrug: :shrug:

[rooboy]

18. I don't drink very often and I don't smoke.

But I keep a carton of cigarettes and a big bottle of rum handy in preparation for that day. I don't know what kind of day it will be, but I've been telling my wife that some really, really bad things are going to start happening before too long. And when one of those bad things comes to my street, they're gonna find me with a smoke in my mouth and a rum & coke in my glass.

To paraphrase Milton Mayer (who chronicled the German public's manipulation by the Nazis), we live in a society that has become used to being 'governed by surprise' - each little outrage worse than the last, but not bad enough to cause an uproar. Until one day we wake up and find all the forms there - the churches, the schools, the streets - but the substance of them is gone, and all that is left is emptiness.

[Crazy Dave]

19. I'M SERIOUSLY PESSIMISTIC!

Because too many Democratic voters just keep giving a bunch of pussy-assed, democratic incumbents a free pass all the time instead of holding them accountable for either going along with the administration or are just too damned afraid to speak against it. With the exception of Dean, Murtha and Feingold who do what's right instead of what a FOX news poll says they should do, the rest are only worried about getting re-elected and claiming they need to keep being re-elected over and over to protect us from the neocons, but in fact they just keep allowing and seem more than willing to let the right wing just take the entire nation and it's freedoms, to let people die with no health care, to starve the people with no decent paying jobs, and to keep making deals with them, just so long as they get to keep their limos and assigned parking spaces in Washington, D.C.

Maybe they also don't want to get their phones tapped, screw the rest of us though.

Is this an inaccurate statement? If so, please explain.

:mad: IMPEACH & PROSECUTE! :mad:

[Jed Dilligan]

21. black america has lived with this every day for centuries:

"tanks in the streets and curfews and torture of your next door neighbor and papers and complete poverty and starvation and years of imprisonment and thousands of deaths"

and black america still hasn't risen up.

[Crazy Dave]

22. You are 110% correct Jed

When you know that you will automatically get someones vote you just take it for granted and think, "since they'll always vote for my side anyways...why waste any money or time on them?". I can point out poor black communities now that were poor and impoverished 30 years ago. Nothing ever gets done except promises and finger pointing. If we keep letting our career, 20 year plus incumbent leaders run things the poor and working class will never get any relief. How about in '08 voting in someone like Edwards who isn't a Washington insider, who has had a real job in the last 20 years and worked for what he has versus the country club, silver spoon fed, blue bloods who say they care about the little man but always side with the big man.

It's enough to make you :puke:

[Jed Dilligan]

24. Oppressed people need leaders--real leaders

Bad conditions alone, obviously, don't make for revolution. I like Edwards' politics, but I would've liked him to make a better showing in the debates. I think maybe he has yet to come into his own as an orator.

[Crazy Dave]

26. He did great when he was on his own....

but after the Kerry handlers got ahold of him he turned into a different candidate and had to make apologetic excuses for his previously strong opposition against invading Iraq. To his credit he did rip into Cheney pretty good in my opinion.

[MadHound]

25. Don't dispair and give it time

I don't know if you remember Watergate or not, but virtually every single one of Nixon's illegal actions was greeted by the sound of deafening silence. People are still rolling this around in their head, getting a grip on it, exploring the ramifications. Remember, the vast majority of people in this country aren't as politically savvy, or as politically plugged in. Most spent this weekend in a last minute flurry of Christmas shopping and getting ready for the holidays. Quite a large number probably haven't even heard of what is going on until this morning when listened to the morning news and got ready for work. It takes time for things like this to sink in.

But given time I believe that people will start waking up on this one. It is already starting to be the buzz around my small city, people both outrage, and people wanting to know what is going on and when informed, then they are becoming outraged. The patrons of the coffee shop I patronize are aghast because it is hitting people they know personally, since the owner is from Jordon and phones there quite frequently, and one of the people who works there is an Iraq war vet and contacts Iraqi friends he made on a frequent basis. Thus people have the whole mess personalized, know folks who this effects personally, and they're getting pissed.

It took two years from the Watergate break-in to the resignation of Nixon. Public opinion took at least a year to go from apathetic to outraged. These things take time for people to wrap their head around, give it to them.

[newportdadde]

27. Kids give you an different perspective don't they?

My son will turn two next month. I've found it has spurred me into doing more research on politics then ever before, not for myself but for him. Even his grandfather is more active although not on the PC this guy knows just about every damn thing that goes on via papers etc, pretty cool.

For a variety of reasons I'm not very optomistic. I really believe I will tell my son someday of the 90s and it will blow him away. I mean *gasp* rising wages!


Things that concern me:

I fear that we will be attacked here again at some point do to our foreign policy and diverted resources and that this will be a major attack that kills thousands sparking a draft etc that could ensare my son.

Economically we have a lot of problems, I liken it to a house with a fresh coat of paint resting on a cracking foundation. Our standard of living is lowering to meet with India and China as theirs rise.

Oil, its going to get nasty. I see gas prices that make Katrina levels look cheap.


I still have hope though it may take 25 years but we do tend to self correct fairly well is this country if given the time.

[sproutster]

30. Blah you wanna wake up call...

For some reason we were discussing what political parties we were. One guy I really like is a Republican who is PISSED at the neo-cons and advised me to move to Sweden since it will be the last attacked when the Oil War really gets going. It wasn't off the cuff either - He is really really worried about the Christian Right having their armogeddon.