I wonder what a national nervous breakdown would look like.

[Raven]

We have the Homeland Security tsar talking about his tummy. We have the President talking about victory in Iraq. We have Senators refusing to give American kids a rest between tours in Iraq. We have memory failure on a massive scale in this Administration. We have an entire generation heading into their senior years without adequate health care, without adequate funds for retirement. We have a younger generation that is looking at a planet that is burning itself up at an alarming rate. We have families who have to decide between food and gas.

Yup, it's Chernoff talking about his gut that is sending me over the edge...how about you?

[proud2BlibKansan]

1. Two kids in their 20s who don't have health insurance

That's my number one.

Then there's the war, the failure to impeach the bastards who started it, and No Child Left Behind.

There's more, but those are my biggies.

[Mandate My Ass]

2. Unemployed and uninsured for the past few months

It gives me more time to read DU. Yes, I have a "gut feeling" of my own that these monsters are up to something no good. My nerves are fried crisp.

[Demeter]

3. 1967

That was a national nervous breakdown.

[Davis_X_Machina]

10. More like '68...

MLK, RFK, Chicago...

[Demeter]

14. It Started In '67 With the Riots Detroit, Newark, etc.

[H2O Man]

19. I agree

that it started in 1967. The events of that year were overshadowed, of course, by the deaths of MLK and RFK, and the democratic convention. But the country experienced the hell it did in '68 because of events in '67.

[annabanana]

20. I was in the ghettos of New Haven that summer.

That was the first time tear gas had been used on American protesters... That's what sparked the riots in "The Hill".

[frogcycle]

4. like this

The Kent State shootings, also known as the May 4 massacre or Kent State massacre, occurred at Kent State University in the city of Kent, Ohio, and involved the shooting of students by members of the Ohio National Guard on Monday, May 4, 1970. Four students were killed and nine others wounded, one of whom suffered permanent paralysis.<1>

Some of the students who were shot were protesting the American invasion of Cambodia which President Richard Nixon announced in a television address on April 30. However, other students who were shot were merely walking nearby or observing the protest at a distance. <2><3>

There was a significant national response to the shootings: hundreds of universities, colleges, high schools, and even middle schools closed throughout the United States due to a student strike of eight million students, and the event further divided the country along political lines.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings

[Raven]

5. Why is it that we need carnage in this country to finally do the right thing? n/t

[frogcycle]

11. don't know that that is so

you asked what a collective nervous breakdown would look like
in my opinion this was exactly that - the Nat Guard troops were pushed over the edge and snapped - the chain of command was telling them who-knows-what w/respect to all the "hippy college students" being a threat to the national security
the lies, deceit, divisiveness, etc. had driven the national psyche to the breaking point.

That is as close as I can imagine what you posed in your question.

one of the groups you mention, all of which are being pushed to the edge, will "go postal"

it remains to be seen whether it is contained, or explodes after that -

[porphyrian]

6. Haven't we been having one since 2001?

The people I see NOT acting crazy are few and far between.

[Tesha]

21. Absolutely!

The correct response to 9/11 would have been to briefly
mourn the <3,000 lost and then get back to normal business.
(After all, next month, 3,000 more would be dead in road
accidents. And 3,000 more in the month after that...)

Instead, the entire country had a simultaneous panic
attack and entered some sort of fugue state where the
general populace couldn't do *ANYTHING* while the gangsters
in power completely sacked our democracy.

I can hardly imagine it could have worked out better
for Al Qaeda if the Bushies had planned it with them.

Tesha

[The_Commonist]

7. Our national nervous breakdown...

...is due to greed and corruption and corporatism run amok. We simply have to stop buying all the cheap plastic crap that nobody needs, and send a message to the greedmongers and privatizers that we are done with them trying to steal our planet from us!

The cheap plastic crap is just a symptom, though, not the cause. The corporatists do everything they can to cause tension among the populace, and we anesthetize in response. If we had sane leaders and sane policies, we could fix whatever problems we face, and the world would once again look to us as the beacon of freedom that we once were perceived to be. Unfortunately, (for us, not the greedmongers) there's more money to be made from tension than from rationality.

It's simple really. They're trying to kill as many of us off as possible, because they want the planet to themselves. Knowing that would cause anyone, or any society to face a nervous breakdown...

[Demeter]

15. Hope they like doing their own housecleaning, etc.

picking produce in stoop labor, etc, etc.

[stellanoir]

8. Welp prior to 9/11 they had. . .what 5 or 6 "so called" intelligence agencies that

weren't communicating with one another. So then they start yet another big bloated agency called "Homeland Security" that can't find frigging New Orleans on a map to deliver bottled water to. Still can't figure the subtle difference between "National Security" and "Homeland Security."

Then they out a patriotic covert operative who's tracking WMD's, destroy her agency and all their international contacts, and seemingly basically got away with treason.

So all Chertoff has to go on is his gut given our acute lack of translators.

No matter.

Here's a potential cure. . .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yA1t-nyA0v4

www.firethegrid.com

[Robbien]

9. We also have a country total unprotected from natural disasters

It use to be hours or a day or so before electricity is restored from a storm. Now it is weeks or months. Last winter storms left some areas in the NE states went without power for weeks with nary a word being said about it in the media.

I haven't heard much about the country helping out in all the various states who have been flooded out, nor in the states who have been suffering from droughts or fires.

Just another burning log to put on that national breakdown fire we've got going.

[warren pease]

12. Over the edge, and through the looking glass...

I have no illusions about what these thieving megalomaniacs are capable of. After they suffered through Clinton for eight years, I just can't imagine that, having retaken the white house (sort of) they'll be willing to just pack up and go. There's way too much left on the planet to steal, and they seem to take a certain delight in causing various atrocities. So why stop just because there's this damn 22nd amendment? The law is for suckers and for people who don't have the power to either ignore it or make their own.

Those two presidential directives Bush signed a couple of months ago -- NATIONAL SECURITY PRESIDENTIAL DIRECTIVE/NSPD 51 and HOMELAND SECURITY PRESIDENTIAL DIRECTIVE/HSPD-20 (sorry for the u/c; I was too lazy to type all that in so I just stole if from a news release on the white house web site)-- Anyway, that's the framework and the justification and, when combined with the patriot act and military commissions act, they've got all they need to lock this country down like a bank vault.

Would they do it? Is the pope German?


wp

[blues90]

13. I feel much the same way .

I can't imagine after all these criminals have done that they are just going to walk away and give up all the power they have gotten .

There are all sorts of things we have tried to stop them and so far they seem to get right around it . There is always a few missing in action doing something to further their destruction of this country .

With most of the money and power in a few corporate hands and the media their mouth piece most people are really unaware of the danger we face .

With 300 million in the US I really wonder how many pay attention while those who do are constantly on edge hoping this will end before it's to damn late if it is not already .

[DemReadingDU]

16. Most people don't pay attention

They just go with the flow. Until something traumatically affects them, then they wake up.

I'm still waiting for that major event that wakes up everyone to the greed and corruption of these criminals who have hijacked our country.

We who read DU and other forums and blogs, know what's going on with this administration, but most people don't take time to read them as they get most news from TV.

and we know the real news is Paris Hilton :sarcasm:

[Zywiec]

18. I think you're right

It's summer and the weather is nice. Who is sitting in front of the TV watching the news?

Most people are drinking a beer and having a BBQ.

[tom_paine]

17. The beginning and middle stages would look like the last 6.5 years

What will the later stages and endgame look like? I cannot guess the exact details sufice to say it will be crazier than all of those things you mentioned, more absurd and more hurtful to those few of us (altho that number seems to be increasing lately) living in the Reality-Based Community.

[Odin2005]

22. "What will the later stages and endgame look like?"

Mutiny in the army, oil price spikes, investor panic, stock market crash...

[shadowknows69]

23. Lots of fires in the streets