Not your father's middle-age crisis...

[CoffeeCat]

Remember when having a middle-aged crisis meant buying a Corvette and hearkening back
to younger days--while wondering if the second half of your life will be as fulfilling
as the first half?

I'm 46 an in the throes of middle-age. However, my middle-age crisis is centered around what
will happen to me in the future, in this country. My husband and I have worked hard and
we've saved, plus we have 401ks. We're doing ok. But is there EVER enough money on which
to retire when our healthcare system is so horrendous, Medicare is on the chopping block and
Republicans are out to dismantle Social Security?

Today, you'd have to be a multi-millionaire to have absolutely no worries, going into retirement age.

Today's middle-age crisis is about realizing that you become expendable in this country if
you are not a millionaire or if you aren't absolutely perfect and working like a hamster on
a wheel for the corporations owned by the millionaires.

I'm exercising like a crazy person--doing plyometrics and kickboxing--not because I want the
body I had when I was 25. I'm kicking ass because I realize that I must keep myself healthy and in tip-top
shape to avoid needing our failed healthcare system; and also because I'll probably have to
work until I'm 80, to survive!

The lower 95 percent can no longer afford a mid-life crisis in which you look back and wallow
in what was. Today, the "crisis" in mid-life is about looking forward and hoping you
can survive the dismantling of the safety net that has been in place for generations.

[MichiganVote]

1. As soon as we can stop policing the world thru war and globally overindulging the ME we CAN make it

[bluethruandthru]

2. I'm right there with you!

I just wish the idiot class of americans who blindly cheer on the republicans would see what they're doing to this country.
Average Joe-Republican is so concerned that some "illegal immigrant" might be getting some benefit from Social Security or Medicare that they're just fine with getting rid of both!
Their fear of someone else getting more than they get stops them from seeing past their own noses.
These under-informed voters seem to have no ability imagine what their own future will be like when the time comes for their own retirement.

I used to pity these idiots...but now I'm starting to hate them.

[CoffeeCat]

4. It amazes me how aggressively...

...these tea partiers will argue against their own self interests.

They do it so passionately--all because Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh give them
the talking points and they repeat those memes.

I don't think they even realize the real-world implications of what they're doing and saying.

Glenn Beck told his followers that poor people who got loans from Fannie/Freddie were to blame
for the housing crisis; therefore LESS banking regulation was needed. Can you believe that? The
tea partiers were screaming for LESS REGULATION--after the housing market collapsed in this country due
to rampant deregulation and out-of-control greed via Big Banking and Wall Street.

How do the Republican get these people to do their bidding like that? It's like mind control.

It's astounding!

[bluethruandthru]

6. They are masters at tapping into the fear, greed and ignorance

of a good many Americans. The R's have been working and studying how to do this for decades and they've been gradually putting the pieces in place to accomplish everything they want...and they've been patient.
For example, they worked hard to deregulate the telecommunications industry years ago to relax the ownership caps on radio stations, television stations and newspapers. This allowed a handful of major corporations to own and control our media. That media has slowly but surely integrated republican memes into our collective consciousness. Things like: Welfare queen, liberal media, tax and spend liberals, union thugs, etc. They've created dirty words out of liberal
", entitlement, socialist, social program (social anything!). They've also "slanted" history. For example, how many people still believe that Al Gore said he invented the internet, that Reagan ended the cold war, that John Kerry doesn't deserve his purple hearts?

You have to give the R's credit. They know what they want (to get rid of government that does anything to help people and to empower corporations) and they're going to get it.

[RKP5637]

10. The "Stupid" in this country is so great, it's shot off the "Stupid" scale. n/t

[flamingdem]

3. I want to have the option to become a very overweight, snacking couch potato

but cannot with the cost of health care, insurance makes me take care of my health!
That's the silver lining I suppose.

[RKP5637]

5. What needs to be done is to kick the sorry asses out of office known as politicians today. Many are

not qualified to hold office. They severely lack the skill sets required. Americans settle for less and less and that is pure bullshit. We have incompetents running the country, that's the root cause of the problems. People are elected into office as bullslingers and curb appeal, not because they are qualified.

[CoffeeCat]

7. The vast majority of elected officials...

...are corrupt as hell and beholden to their corporate contributers/overlords.

There can be no democracy as long as this perverted version of our government is
allowed to continue.

Elected officials who serve the corporations--at the expense of the very people who
these politicians represent--is a mockery.

[Kat45]

8. Agreed. I'm 56, and for the first time I'm terrified about my future.

I haven't had a steady job in over two years and don't see any hope of getting one (my advanced degree is of no interest to anybody). My savings is dwindling from being un- or underemployed for so long. I'm not married so there's no second income in the household. I have no idea how I will have enough income, and I don't even want to think about health care.

[RKP5637]

9. At the rate these creeps we elect as politicians today are going, we will look and

be a third world country in a decade. I wish Americans would wake the hell up and boot their sorry asses out of office.