50 replies to this topic

[conspiracybeliever]

act.alternet.org said:

Several years after the Wall Street-ignited crisis began, the nation’s top bank CEOs (who far out-accumulated their European and other international counterparts) continue to hobnob with the president at campaign dinners where each plate costs more than one out of four US households make in a year.

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Excellent article. This is so true.

This is not the American Dream that says if you work hard you can be more comfortable than your parents; but rather, if you connive well, game the rules, and rule the game, your take from others is unlimited. In this paradigm, human empathy, caring, compassion, and connection have been devalued from the get-go. This is the flaw in the entire premise of the American Dream: if we can have it all, it must by definition be at someone else’s expense.

[Parsip]

America is still by far the dominant military, cultural, technological, etc. power in the world, and this will likely continue to be the case for the foreseeable future.. Reminds me of this pic. America and the Western world is still the best place to live. Maybe you're just so used to it that you can't help but take your freedom and opportunities for granted.

[questionmark]

Last I looked it still was there (not exactly in the same shape as 1960 but alive and kicking... sometimes even run by a war monger)

[ExpandMyMind]

It hasn't collapsed yet... and with a big war with the empire on the winning side, it might not for a long time.

[questionmark]

ExpandMyMind, on 09 March 2012 - 03:17 PM, said:

It hasn't collapsed yet... and with a big war with the empire on the winning side, it might not for a long time.

Problem is that I don't see that....

[ExpandMyMind]

questionmark, on 09 March 2012 - 03:20 PM, said:

Problem is that I don't see that....

What is it you do not see? War, or the collapse?

And just to let you know: I won't have access to the net for a few more days, but, when I next do, I'll check your reply (in case you think I'm ignoring you )

[questionmark]

ExpandMyMind, on 09 March 2012 - 03:29 PM, said:

What is it you do not see? War, or the collapse?

And just to let you know: I won't have access to the net for a few more days, but, when I next do, I'll check your reply (in case you think I'm ignoring you )

That they finally win a war, last that happened it involved 2 policemen and about 50 Cubans armed with shovels on their side and 5000 marines on ours. And the conquest was so big you could spit from one shore to the other of the island (Grenada).

[Parsip]

America always easily defeats the enemy with its military, but often messes up the political aspect of war.

[The New Richard Nixon]

Parsip, on 09 March 2012 - 03:45 PM, said:

America always easily defeats the enemy with its military, but often messes up the political aspect of war.

Vietnam comes to mind and Afghanistan and Serbia and Iraq.

[Neognosis]

all empires collapse. it is just happening faster because modern communication has increased the speed of all life cycles.

[conspiracybeliever]

But the article isn't really about war. It's more about people. Or that's what I got out of it. Did anyone read the article?

[Colonel Rhuairidh]

Parsip, on 09 March 2012 - 03:12 PM, said:

America is still by far the dominant military, cultural, technological, etc. power in the world, and this will likely continue to be the case for the foreseeable future.. Reminds me of this pic. America and the Western world is still the best place to live. Maybe you're just so used to it that you can't help but take your freedom and opportunities for granted.

As long as you don't imagine that you have any say at all in anything the Government does.

[Parsip]

No, Miss, I did not, but my post about the American Dream and "Empire" is still true. The American dream is alive and well, it's just that Americans think it's something other than what it is.

[Parsip]

747400, on 09 March 2012 - 04:29 PM, said:

As long as you don't imagine that you have any say at all in anything the Government does.

Ha! Only a Westerner can believe he's oppressed when in truth he's free. I am pretty sure every elected official was elected by the people.

[conspiracybeliever]

But the main narrative here is that from Captain John Smith and the Puritan divines through Thoreau and Emerson to Lewis Mumford and Vance Packard and John Kenneth Galbraith to Jimmy Carter, this tradition of capitalism’s discontents never really stood a chance. It never amounted to anything more than spiritual exhortation. Reaganomics, also known as “greedism,” was not born in 1981; more like 1584. The result is that for more than four centuries now, America has had one value system, and it is finally showing itself to be extremely lopsided and self-destructive. Our political and cultural system never let fresh air in; it squelched the alternatives as quaint or feeble-minded. Appearances to the contrary, this is what “democracy” always meant in America—the freedom to become rich. The alternative tradition, in the work of the figures mentioned above, sought to question the definition of “wealth.” If the dominant culture was following the template of “they eat each other,” the alternative tradition can be encapsulated in that famous line from John Ruskin: “There is no wealth but life.”