Thanks for the “headsup” WOTS—I missed Mr. ENGLISH post my first time through the thread—-Great comment.

Thanks Lloyd English, for an excellent post. I would add that Raihim Salem (sp?)
the self-styled conservative intellectual, recently acknowledged what you rightly
call conspiracies, referring to them as the “accretion of interests”. Later, in that
same interview, he called corporations money-making “congeries”.

This is a tacit admission, from an influential conservative thinker, that such cabals
exists. So, what’s in a name, Shakespeare? Can’t say for sure, but in this case
one’ll get you 500k in a 401k, and the other’ll get you 1 to 5 in a 5 by 5.

All that most of us have access to is ordinary people—in our neighborhood, at our workplace, at church or in the grocery line.  They are the ones we have to reach out to for any organization.  Talking to each other online or expecting other people “higher up” to start organizing “the people” is a pipedream that just lets us off the hook of doing the hard work of getting started.

There are posts here that are adequate to help get greenhorns to step up—people who have never done organizing before.  Some good detailed suggestions appear in comments on other articles, yoo. 

I’m glad to see it getting started.  It’s going to be much more helpful than blame and rehashed analysis.  TD might find some other articles that would be encouraging—and encouragement is what we need.  Encouragement and the ability to reach out to friends, neighbors, acquaintances—not forgetting young people (who were conspicuously absent from the midterms, and no wonder!

Along the way, should we consider as a possible focus issue getting rid of the Citizens United Supreme Court ruling which is patently criminal if the Constitution is to have any meaning at all in 2012.

Redhorse,

You got me wrong, bad boy. I couldn’t care less about your flippancy and no apologies were necessary.

What I seem to hear in you is a willingess to go deep, and frankly, I liked that.

Now, I don’t know you, true. But given your moniker, I imagine you’re speaking from indigenous roots that, as it were, also go deep.

I don’t care about your being a red man or a white man or a yellow man. Those are mere details. I care mostly about the fire in the belly and the heart.

Finally, if you’ve read my posts, you know that we’re not really anything that that different.

I will concede that you are probably more committed to the need for political organization. I mostly want to get through the 2012 election cycle without giving the nuclear football to someone even crazier than Bush and Cheney. That said, I think that the other changes in store for us will make most political solutions moot. That’s largely a matter of detail, however, and it really isn’t of over-riding importance.

I guess what I had intended to say was that I liked some of your postings both for their trenchancy and the intimations, at a spiritual level, that I thought I discerned.

Given the fact that I have all but flayed some other people here, it isn’t such a bad compliment to get.

Sorry if it may have embarrassed you.

MDGR: I read most all posts here. I hold no grudge against either you or RICO S. No one is all right or all wrong. You’re takin’ me (and we all take ourselves) way to seriously. Again: Sorry for being flip. My bad!!

Redhorse,

I imagine that a lot of people here would be inclined to dismiss what you say out-of-hand.

I don’t. We may disagree on details, but you cut to the case very nicely.

And as far as the details go, who knows, I myself may be speaking out-of-hand.

I would not propose we get a room.

I would suggest that we talk to each other out loud.

LAFAYETTE: The man whose name you choose to represent your posts was one of the greatest “individualist” the world ever produced. It is true that the American collective psyche is damaged and confused but why discount the importance of individuals committed to moral social action and the actual meaning and purpose a human life experiences and the benefits the collective society enjoys because of it. That’s what LaFayettes entire life was about. One can nit pic (as politically correct/revisionist do) LaFayettes or our founding fathers lives to discount and twist the reality of their contributions and paint any picture desired. Let me remind you (and others hiding in intellectual pretension): We all stand on feet of clay.

      My suggested outline for personal action doesn’t promise victory or glorious destiny but guarantees direct confrontation with the forces of doom, fascism and social disintegration of which so many here whine and openly abhor. There is no question that the individal who joins hands with others to confront these forces will experience struggle, conflict and change but because of the effort, so will the forces confronted. There is a continued lament of leadership here (check the posts on any Hedges piece) but without grassroots organization there aren’t even any followers.

      There is a new dance in America. It’s called the Sugar Titty Snivel. All together now!!

Having recently seen the movie featuring Borat, I
have concluded that Borat is the ‘real’ and all
people he encountered and events he witnessed on his
odyssey across America are the not ‘real.’ 

Much like the artists who reflected on the atrocities
of WWI, the entire event making no sense, an
absurdity defying reason, the art world launched the
‘dada’ movement, a movement in which the artist
depicts the not ‘real’ as, in fact, the ‘real.’ 
(Labeling their works/movement ‘dada,’ German for
hobbyhorse, was a stroke of genius.)

comments on patriot10101 post-

‘fair traded’ products are a big deal here. not only coffee but bananas, fruit juices, teas and other items. all of the major food stores carry them and they sell very well. in fact, biologically produced food, locally grown is a hot item and has been for many years. a number of years ago 2 food chains (Aldi and Lidl both out of DE) set up shop offering ‘cheaper’ foodstuffs. They both fell on their collectives butts because the folks would not buy their stuff. Now, in order to stay in business they have changed their product lineup to include locally grown product and fair trade items. Oh yes these 2 food giants also paid substandard wages, minimal insurance etc. That has/is changing because it was not socially acceptable. People just did not shop these stores. Monsanto is a dirty word. (grassroots politics??)

Water, a stealth investment if there ever was one.(just look at who has been buying up the private suppliers). Here the water is clean, no chlorine, no chemicals. To measure water purity they use fish, trout to be specific. Fish, as one would imagine, are very sensitive to water purity. One can still swim, fish etc without running into someones turds. One doesn’t have to worry about a jet of natural gas coming out of the water tap because a gas exploration company is using hi explosives to fracture the geology (ala New Mexico)

Energy, alternative energy, is an uphill battle against the nuclear industry. as everywhere. (see DE demos this past weekend). However, there is an alternative. Each year we sign a purchase agreement with the local power company that stipulates how much solar/wind/water energy we wish to purchase. This portion is more expensive than the ‘normal’ energy by maybe 30%. However each year the price difference has fallen as technology improves and the subscriber base increases. (grassroots??)

Slave labor, better known as consumerism, has come into the spotlight over the past couple of years. There are a number of campaigns afoot to educate people to the high human cost of the cheap s**it they buy. A number of the major outlets have stopped buying ‘stuff’ from places with slave labor practices (eg China) and have come back to looking at local producers. (grassroots??)

Politicians. This land has 6 major parties ranging from the extreme right to the extreme left sitting in parliament. The major lobbies are the banks and pharma industries. Government is democratic and not republic. It works on a referendum system.It seems to work but it takes work, personal work. The argument is not liberal vs. conservative, socialist vs capitalist, christian vs whatever. each view has its pluses and minuses. the trick is to put them together into something that works the best for the most. the country is broken down into four major areas. each area speaks a different language (DE, IT, FR, RO). 20% of the folks are ‘foreigners’ (including me) plus a couple of ex-guantanamo detainees. unemployment is around 2%, the federal budget usually runs at a surplus. there is a shortage of professionals (doctors, engineers, IT).

Now i’m not saying everything is rosy and i’m not saying this is a model for everyone. All i’m saying is that there are solutions out there and that it takes involvement, grassroots involvement, all the time.

Nicely stated, David.

Let’s hope that the polarities become even bigger, that conservative and progressive Dems hate each other with ever-growing venom.

Let’s hope too that the Democratic Party re-elects Botox Pelosi—and that she and Harry Reid alienate the progressive caucus to the point where it decides to do the unmentionable.

Kucinich won’t, but what if progressives began to publicly resign from that party in indignation and anger?

What if they began to speak honestly of what they’ve had to endure not just under the Blue Dogs, but under the tutelage of these despicable leaders (sic) that the Dems always seem to nominate?

What if a political vacuum were created—not one that was planned, but one that just arose because a score of senators and representatives suddenly bolted from the Party?

Oh, they would still retain their seats, of course, but what if they suddenly told Pelosi and Reid to take a flying fuck—and what if they did all that publicly, for all the world to see?

If it happened at all, I think that might happen sooner rather than later, actually. And if it did, the “uprising” of Act III would just be commencing.

It just might have legs.

Both parties are racing towards fascism, one by design and one by necessity . Who
gets there first and and has the guts to declare marshal law is the winner. My
money is on the Repugs although I believe Barry is capable, depending on the
critical circumstances orchestrated on his behalf. Other than his phony speeches, 
I believe this man is a big zero in regards to his compassion for humanity. So the
powers that be may allow his participation in the grand scheme of things if he
remains a good little boy. My biggest worry, and I believe the trend is happening,
is that Americans will buy into the neocon’s plan of imperialism through fear of
losing their way of life with all the perks, full tank of gas and all that goes with it. 
Thinking will be, it’s them or us, and winning is paramount to team USA. The fear
factor is palatable and poverty and hunger makes many people do things they
would not normally do.

“If you look at the U.S., you look at who we’re electing to Congress, to the Senate—they can’t read.” Michael Bloomberg

What?

Forget the damn birth certificate. Show me the high school diploma. Seriously. We need to insist that the ability to read is a minimum qualification for political office. Quick, call Nancy Pel… Oh yeah.

Both parties are the same, right, Dave?

Thanks for being so effective.

IN THE MIDDLE

RH: And, my suggested outline below can place anyone back in the drivers seat of their own destiny.

And this is where I part company with Le Cheval Rouge.

The above promises a false outcome. There will be no driving one’s self-destiny because ours, as a nation, is a common destiny. (E pluribus unum, “One out of many”)

Yes, we can all do our part. As I commented upon RH’s post, it is necessary to distinguish, in any group of political militancy, those who want to “walk the walk” and those who simply want to “talk the talk”.

Yes, talk is cheap, which is why the blogosphere is overwhelmed by it -  most of it being useless blather. Including the editorials on this site, which are far too emotionally strident.

I will repeat a basic premise: The US is a country of inveterate individualists. It is almost human nature to believe that “my destiny” is the most important that can possibly happen on earth. That “my happiness” (and perhaps that of my family) is paramount. Both are false trails. Why?

One must go back into the development of mankind to understand the roots of society. We humanoids were once nomads, like animals roaming about in herds (tribes) for communal self-defense and common hunting.

We learned ultimately however two basic facts:
•  By pursuing a collective existence in one place, we could till the soil and live of its produce, and concurrently,
•  If we divided the labor amongst us, thus specializing and trading our surplus, the total produce was larger than if we tried to do everything ourselves.

In this manner, our societies are basically collective. We collect to both procreate, defend and sustain the family. Ours is a collective existence, based upon a collective market, both with a set of social mores to guide our personal behavior. We fundamentally need one another and cannot exist individually.

Somewhere along the lines of our historical development, however, Americans decided that their existence was individualist and what was best for the individual was therefore best for the collective. (Though there is no economic evidence to prove this thesis and much, even, to disprove it.)

In fact, we’ve put the cart before the horse. Collective societies believe what is best for all is best for each individually. And, I maintain, that is what we are or should be as a society.

However, American society is presently politically divided down the middle with a significant number changing ideology back and forth – once collective (Dems), once individualist (Reps). And it is the constantly oscillating middle that decides elections along with those who simply decide to sideline themselves (for whatever personal motive, usually disgust with one side or the other).

“At the end of this $4 billion We-Didn’t-Start-the-Fire-worthy
vaudeville known as the 2010 election, what do we have to show for
it?”

Nothing. Same as we started with.

Both TAOWALKER, Mr. Sirota and I (my opinion)are all describing the state of mind that hooks and holds the average American “in thrall” to a meaningless and manufactured reality. It’s a mental disorder. Twisted enforced inhuman moral values and physical/spiritual alienation from living community, and the natural earth and ecosystems that produced us, is the difference between an animals experience of the zoo and the open experience of the natural World. Mr.Sirota’s “fuck you” is at least an attempt to wake up and draw a line in the sand.

    The fierce living energies that define us, and what we think of as America, can no longer be sublimated or contained by the manufactured false plastic gunpoint culture that holds us captive. It’s a broken system, and it has broken and damaged “We the people—”. Indeed, as TAOWALKER suggests, beginning “to help” one another IS the place to start. And, my suggested outline below can place anyone back in the drivers seat of their own destiny. And, BASHO (the poet or the singer?). I have no idea. As they say here in the West: “Talks cheap.”

      Last night I saw a Credit Card commercial that depicted a young couple expecting children. The wife had been shopping on “the card” and when the young father-to-be saw how much she’d spent he collapsed in the face of the debt. It was covered by the fact that they were expecting triplets, but the message was clear. Debt is your future. The idea that a job and living wage, in a life giving community, that would provide stability, education, savings and meaning existed, was implied, but we know what the reality is. They live at the whim of the banks, on the edge of bankruptcy, under intense pressure, bled by healtcare costs, on the verge of losing home, job, family, community and future. Yes, lets pretend. It’s a scam that repackages the old “company store” model of enforced servitude. You pay ridiculous wages to ensure poverty, deny access to education and political representation and create an inescapable burden of debt. All the while you proclaim equality, the virtue of free enterprise and the rewards of hard work. Then, you openly loot any savings or security the beaten and exploited worker might have managed to acquire. Oh yeah, you need a well paid goon squad to murder and maintain order. It’s a slavers mentality.

      This site endlessly discusses symptomology. Action toward National health is still possible. Washington D.C. is a corpse. Repeal the Patriot Act, enforce and prosecute violations of Constitutional law, and you have a Country again, not a “homeland”. Enact major Campaign Finance Reform to remove Corporate graft and our VOTE begins to have POWER again. Embrace the human emotional/spiritual wreckage and devastated community you reside in and regain life. Hell, start an independent reading/discussion group that brings young people and elders together. SOUL IS.

      We’ve reached a point where the choice of action or inaction both carry serious moral/political/social consequence.

‘But, believe the new impetus of the Replicants who want to put more loopholes into the latest Financial Regulation bill and we prepare ourselves for Recession Redux.’

= ‘powerful forces are invested in the charade.’ (imo)
..................
‘It’s never “our fault”, is it?’
it’s their fault: ‘that of a financial class that put all morality or professional ethic aside in their unquenchable thirst for lucre. Why?’

the why of it is easy. greed. we’ve all got a case of it. some of us are just in a better position to try and satisfy it. but you don’t ever satisfy greed, history shows that. morality and professional ethic does not dispense with greed. greed spawns morality and professional ethic. they come after the fact. the fact being that we are greed.

which takes us back to the 1st line in REDHORSE’s post: ‘Change yourself.’

CHIEFS AND INDIANS

basho: great post REDHORSE! do you think anyone is listening?

Yes, the post describes a rather impressive and seemingly thorough planning method.

Political lightening, like the real kind, starts from the bottom, moves up and (when it get to a certain level) induces lightening from above.

But political militancy is like any grassroots movement—first you find the Chiefs amongst the Indians. People are naturally more spectator-follower than leader-manager.

But what is important is that they vote for the right causes at the right times.

RECESSION REDUX

DS: Ending this tail-chasing exercise and constructing a truly transformational and results-oriented politics is essential—but won’t be easy because powerful forces are invested in the charade.

Here we go again with the conspiracy theory - which is always difficult to prove but easy to propose.

It’s never “our fault”, is it? Our present misery is always due to “evil forces at work”, bending our minds to do their bidding. Which is simplistic and childish nonsense.

The economic mess the US is in today can be attributed to many factors, but one stands out. It is simple cupidity, that of a financial class that put all morality or professional ethic aside in their unquenchable thirst for lucre. Why?

Because everybody was supposedly doing it. Which may be a pathetic excuse for immorality but never a valid reason.

And why shouldn’t those who perpetrated the scandal not be incentivized to leave their ethics by the wayside? American marginal gain and equity taxation entice them to do so.

Raise income taxes above a certain threshold, say 10 megabucks annually, to confiscatory levels and the greed will still be there, but considerably modulated. Perhaps enough to prevent the next Great Recession.

But, believe the new impetus of the Replicants who want to put more loopholes into the latest Financial Regulation bill and we prepare ourselves for Recession Redux.

Pogo (by Walt Kelly):

We have met the enemy and he is us.

great post REDHORSE!

do you think anyone is listening?

“a unified theory of the last three elections: In an America straitjacketed by a two-party system, these contests have been all about voters trying to support any available uprising, irrespective of party labels or even ideology.”

They aren’t going about it in a very intelligent manner, are they? What’s the difference being gullible and being stupid?

Eventually, even David Sirota, who wrote a faux populist book called “The Uprising”, will understand what genuine populists understood when the term “populist” was invented to describe them back in ye 19th Century.

The issue for those true populists of yore was not just money, but who controls the money. The term populism does not refer to a gang of disgruntled rabble shouting slogans, appealing to the lowest common denominator. It refers to a specific movement in American politics that created the People’s Party, probably the most significant third party we have had. And for them, the issue was the private financial system.

They understood money much better than we do, and they knew that economic justice was purely a matter of whether the banking system was owned and controlled by an elite few or by the people. They fought for economic democracy, which can only happen if the financial system is designed to serve the public interest.

Sirota styles himself a sort of populist and believes telling people to go fuck themselves is proof of his populist credentials. Populism isn’t vulgarity, inebriation, random fornication, anger and dissatisfaction, and other cool traits of character. Populism is a reasoned critique of the power structure and the intelligence to define the public interest and the courage to fight for it.

Ron Paul is closer to a real populist outlook because he wants to do away with the Fed, and even though his monetary ideas are completely ass-backwards, he does recognize the need to change the financial system. Sirota does not. He’d rather spend his career complaining about ill effects he sees everywhere and never inquire too closely for the cause.

Since, as a commenter suggests below, those “in-power” are completely helpless to actually address effectively the disease at the root of that congeries of “problems” providing endless fodder for the chattering classes, those hapless bought-and-paid-for “political animals” are reduced to all the varieties of posturing that are intended to create the illusion of their wrestling heroically (but interminably) with faux “issues”....and with each other, of course.  If simply passing “legislation” was the panacea its flacks want the public to keep-on believing it is, wouldn’t they long-since have outlawed….oh, say cancer, for instance?

What David Sirota and many of his colleagues are describing at such length is a political/financial apparatus entirely unconnected, in its actual operations, to anything but itself….one that is shaking itself to pieces as it red-lines out-of-control, fueled not so much by money but by the squandered precious attention of deluded captive “individuals” who are addicted to magical thinking.  The machinery is delivering exactly what is intended to deliver.  By its very nature this is what you get from it….and nothing else….ever.

Giving that same precious attention to our Mother Earth, on-the-other-hand, will not only free our tame Sisters and Brothers from the futile (and fatal) thrall they’re in, it will be the genuine Medicine for everything that ails them.  Clean up the mess homo domesticus has made and is making in our Living Arrangement, and get well in the very doing of it.

Anybody saying there’s some other remedy, whatever their motives, can safely be ignored….and ought to be.

HokaHey!

The system sucks, but the alternatives are worse.

Yesterday, Sirota posted a blog at Open Left, some of which was on this site, telling moderate Democrats to go f*ck themselves because the reason the Democrats lost is that Obama didn’t do what the progressives wanted him to do.  Today, Sirota says that the explanation for the Democrats’ loss at the polls is because the voters are perennially angry with the party in power and want to vote it out in order to accomplish a change.  It would be nice if Sirota were to explain the reasons for making two such different arguments. 

Personally, I think many voters are sick and tired of the fact that the vast majority of members of Congress, both Republican and Democratic, are more concerned with their own personal welfare than they are concerned about solving this country’s very real, and very significant, problems.  However, they don’t know how to correct the situation, so they have been swinging back and forth between the parties hoping that somehow that will work.  Unfortunately, it hasn’t and it won’t.  One reason for that is because our current system generally filters out politicians who actually are dedicated to solving problems, rather than lining their own pockets (and the pockets of those who supported them).  Another reason is that most of the members of Congress, and the candidates willing to run against them, lack the educational background and/or intelligence to determine what this country’s problems are, much less to ascertain what actions need to be taken to alleviate the most serious of those problems.

Change yourself.

    A recent Goodman guest estimated that Tea Party rallies he attended were obviously well financed, professionally organized/PR’d and probably cost as much as 20K to put on.

    Want to compete? You’re two years out from the next election.

    (1) Find 5 to 10 friends who will make a 1 year 1 hour weekly promise to meet as a political action discussion group. Make it clear you intend to grow the group and will ask their help in doing so. Most restuarants will gladly provide separate space at no charge for meetings of “civic” organizations. Most will even offer meal discounts above a certain number.

    You have now created an active community forum and the space to contain it.

    (2) Identify groups, organizations and individuals you consider to reflect common goals and values. Make contact and invite them to provide guest speakers to appear before your group. Provide speakers for theirs.

        (a) Create a small saddle stitched community directory and/or website that contains information and links about/to these groups and yours. Most will gladly provide information. If they rally you lend support and make it clear you need theirs as well.

          (b) Create a website/flyer that lists your concerns, meeting schedule, times and guest speakers. Identify local news outlets(t.v./radio/print) who will announce events and place you on their “community calender”. Most will do this for free. Designate a person in the group to create press releases. Monitor press and airway propaganda and get vocal in your response to it. See if other groups will form joint campaigns with you to respond to corporatist propaganda.

          (c) Begin to identify individuals in the major political parties and the corporatist who control them. Outline the political structure of your State. Separate the good guys from the bad guys.

          (d) Pick both short and long term goals. Say, immediate action on Campaign Finance Reform (short) and the 2012 election (long).

      You have now created a basic “network” able to publicly voice your concerns and respond to political thuggery.

      (3) To raise 50K for well orchestrated and publicized rallies you need either a major fund raising event (National guest speaker series/concert/fair etc.) or 2 to 4 thousand individuals willing to give between 10 and 25 dollars each. Again, other concerned groups and organizations would likely join hands if they took you seriously.

      Get to this point and you will be infiltrated. You need a clear statement of what the group stands for. Have an actual C.P.A. account for any and all money (at first a free volunteer would be easy to find). They will (and local t.v. would be the first oo board) come at you with airball scandals around sex and drugs or paint you as terrorists. Be aware of those around you and remove provocatuers (sp?) out of hand. Again, a volunteer lawyer or, the ACLU would serve with protection and clear advice.

      Within the first year you will understand who walks the walk and who just talks. You will have a deeper understanding of your commmuinity and the power structure of your State. Most importantly, you will become a total political animal and reaquire the POWER that has been stolen from you. Whatever happens, you’ll have no question about why and what is happening.

      As a thought, there are probably a number of TRUTHDIGGERS in your community. Form a TRUTHDIG meeting and then invite C.Hedges or Mr. Scheer to come speak.  See, you’re up to your neck already but the potential is limitless. Sink or swim!!

I love David Sirota’s pieces

Thanks davidbyron, you made me look back and laugh at what I once considered to be a very bad night.

After being pulled over for speeding, a friend, who I think was driving, and the other friend who was sitting beside him in the front seat (I am not sure, as I was impaired at the time)but I had sobered up considerably by the time we were sitting on a bench at the state police barracks (it seems one of my friends had some “mary jane” in his posession)one policeman was trying to tell them that all they had to do to get out of this was come clean on who was driving, and whose grass it was. The other was going tto throw the book at all of us. My one buddy asked which one should we believe? the other shouted, “neither dumbass! they are both COPS!

tesla,
media-judiciary-congress-WH-army-cia-fbi-education appears one structure
and not several independent sub-structures.
The structure had been owned by ‘nobles’ and appears to be owned by modern
‘nobles’ as well.

So, not everyone omits to posit this fact. I do on all sites and repeatedly. For
that reason, my posts go into cement, trash, or i earn deservedly banishment
from some sites.

As i have said many times, ?all scribes entertain us from seeing the most
important fact: how each of the structural members interact; each seemingly
having a specific task.

US, or as i say, from seeing a region of disunited nations-cults [ D.N ] which twelve caponis
cld easily command or use as meat for wars or to do the dangerous work, let
alone 1mn + gangsters.

And it appears that not only uncle sam and uncle joshua rule DN but also dear
uncles tom, pedro, giovanni, hans, malcolm, deepak, boris, ali, maliki, pierre, et al.

DavidByron - Good points.  Anecdote to illustrate one
of your conclusions:  A number of years ago when Reagan
was running for his first term, I asked a really down-
and-out-on-food-stamps-living-in-a-shelter couple who
they were going to vote for.  No hesitation, “Reagan!”
Recovering my composure I asked them why.  “Because
he’s going to kick ass.” I said to myself that yeah,
he’s going to kick your ass. 

It is really all about image and personality types. 
Thanks for your comment.

felicity your comment is a little off because you confuse the two parties being the same with them being identical.  They are good cop and bad cop.  They are the same but their marketing is different.

The Republican party is framed as the tough minded “responsible” father figure party that doesn’t actually do you any good, and the Democrats are the weak willed pathetic mommy party that wants to be nice but ends up just screwing things worse because they’re so pathetic.  They appeal to different personality types.

The thing people forget about good cop / bad cop is that both are cops.

Elections don’t have consequences.

We seem to have a two-party system, Republican and
Democrat, and a populace which on the whole registers
as belonging to one or the other.  I submit that if
asked, a registered Republican could not define
Republicanism, nor could a registered Democrat define
the core principles of the Democratic Party.

The result has been that neither Party is required to,
nor does it, adhere to any principles.  In essence,
this development has put us on the road to tyranny, a
foregone conclusion when men begin to rule above law.

David Sirota wrote:

“In an America straitjacketed by a two-party system, these contests have been all about voters trying to support any available uprising, irrespective of party labels or even ideology.”
_________________

Sirota supports a fraudulent history, based upon false perceptions!

1) Everyone who claims there is a “two-party system” in America perpetuates the BIG lie upon which so many other BIG lies depend. The (R)s and (D)s are not of separate party entities. They are factions working together, with common purpose, within one corporate party… and there’s no lesser evil between them.

2) There’s been no “straightjacket” — other than the voters’ own mental chains — restraining any of America’s voters from using the ballot for an uprising. 99% of the Americans who have participated in recent elections have regularly corporate obediently cast their votes to provide a massive popular mandate for the thoroughly regressive policies of the corporate (R) and (D) party.

3) Neither the (D) voting liberals, nor the (R) voting conservatives, have ever been any part of any uprising. They biennially deliver downrisings.

4) Only approximately 1% of the active electorate has demonstrated any free will, with their votes cast, to purposefully engage in an uprising against the corporate state… against its perpetual war, and for a just, caring and environmentally sane society.

When fascist nations allow elections it’s because the people are fascists.

“An anti-Establishment/anti-corporate/anti-NAFTA/anti-government tea party”

This statement is incorrect.  The Tea Party is anti-government for social programs that benefit the poor (not Medicare), they are pro-corporate (Tea Party Express and FreedomWorks that lead them are run by corporate money), they are not anti-Establishment (they are anti Democratic establishment).

When you understand what the Tea Party ‘wants’ or is being ‘lead to want,’ it is easier to understand what happened this week.

The problem is clearly secret money—and the recent USSC 5-4 decision to allow it, even when foreign money is trying to influence our elections.

What did they do? They basically through out McCain-Feingold.  McCain, who the nation rejected in 2008 and whose revenge on us is Sarah Palin. Feingold, who lost his seat on Tuesday.

When John Roberts and Samuel Alito were nominated to fill the seats left by Rehnquist and O’Conner, the Dems should have filibustered…as the GOP have on so many judicial nominations of Obama.  But they caved and now, unless one of the 5 quits or drops dead, we are stuck with a right-wing trump card that can and will undo ANY and ALL protections against corporate business, corporate political and government intrusions into our guaranteed rights.

The investigations into Thomas’s wife and his clear-cut bias and partisanship is the right first step…but it seems to have fizzled out.  THAT is the crack in the wall to be exploited.  Find a reason to “Abe Fortas” one of the 5, and Thomas seems the most vulnerable.  Get that one seat back in Dem hands, and USSC decisions will actually follow the Constitution again—and that’s REALLY all we need—A United States Supreme Court that believes in the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the 16 active Amendments that follow it (The 18th was repealed).

So, David, instead of promoting your books complaining about the problem, how about writing some about the corrupt Supreme Court Justices—Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia—and why they should be impeached or forced to resign.

Why is that not everyone sees the unmitigated truth
being spoken here? The system IS the problem. Stop
playing along!