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unionization.

But there is no other way that the employee rights can be as valued in practice as the shareholder's rights.

DLC, Blue Dog DUers that have rejected everything in which a progressive believes.

They support NRA talking points
They support union busting
They support DLC triangulation
They support the ACA without a public option
They don't support single payer

DU has been over-run with fake Democrats.

And of course some are straight-up trolls doing it for fun or profit, but some actually think they ARE Democrats.

and those fake Democrats here will run instantly to a jury alert if they are called on their shit!

DU used to have real Democrats, real progressives. Now, it has triangulators.

John Birch wannabees.

we all pretty much had the same ideas. . .some were more to the left than others.

But after Obama was elected, we got these bible thumper "Democrats" who don't like people talking poorly on the society destroyed, brainwashing effect of religion.

Or NRA gundamentalists who run to a jury if anyone dares demand gun control.

Or neo-DU liberals who run to MIRT if someone posts a photo of a video that makes them feel a little uneasy.

I remember the good old days. . .when Bob Boudelang was here, the Crisis Papers, Plaid Adder, Swamp Rat and EarlG doing the Top Ten Conservative Idiots of the week every Monday (the article I do now).

DU was fun. It's changed now.

I used to miss him, until I realized that I could have the same chuckle reading the comment section of the Huffington Post. EarlG's Top Ten was seriously funny stuff, too. And the hate mailbag! Nothing made me empathize with the owners of this site more than getting a brief glimpse in to their email inbox.

the non-sequiturs, the irrational hatred and venom. The racism, bigotry, sexism and homophobia. The passive antisemitism.

The hate mailbag made my eyes bleed, but it was so funny to watch pathetic wingnut heads explode. We need another mailbag entry, admins!!!

And the resultant loss of democracy, don't you think?

and the death of real democracy.

People like that shifted the Democratic Party way to the right. So I agree with you.

It called out all of the "ODS" voters, blaming them for the president's dismal performance. When I pointed out that this is a bald-faced and that the fan club should stop posting, it my post was hidden.

The right wingers have taken over DU just like they have Big Media.

...is the respect we DEMAND.

Personally, I think it's a combination of a collective case of Stockholm Syndrome, combined with the despair that set in after Occupy was crushed and marginalized so completely. People have given up and acceded to the whims of their new feudal lords, the corporations and the banks. If they dare rise up, they can expect:

1. A criminal record to follow them for the rest of their lives, damaging future employment prospects and limiting freedom of movement (for starters);
2. For some, alienation and division from their own families;
3. Marginalization within society at large;
4. Their message being completely shut out of the media.

We've lost so much in the last 30+ years. We may have to fight the same battles our grandparents did all over again.

tired. Seriously. For me that's part of it.

And yes, we will have to fight those fights again. But I wonder when we will get the critical mass we need to be able to fight them.

Universal Unions. Everyone should be Union members and The Corporation pays the Union dues.

How's that for a knee jerk?

On Edit: Oh yeah, and call it UnionCare

Without democracy unions will be outlawed. Look at Ohio, Indiana, Tennessee, and Michigan to see the attacks on unions and actually on us too.

It is just too many places do not have it, and don't see the benefits.

People complain about the negatives, and they are spotlighted by those who wish to take advantage.

Koch money or the like, that has vilified unions, and done it everywhere, so that MOST people now believe they are evil, even while their employers are taking another pint of blood directly out of their arms.

Sometimes I think that our biggest problem on the left is that we suck at PR. Seriously.

They are able to also capitalize on people's natural tendencies of being selfish.

It is easy to manipulate people by saying, look who are getting stuff, while you're dealing with this.

They never think of all the positives they get, because it has always been there.
They just experience the stuff taken away.

using the citizens as fodder for the elite.

And this is a deliberate devaluation, fed by Rush, Fox, Hannity, etc. We are constantly told that our fellow citizens are moochers, takers, lazy, evil, on and on. We are told that all people do on food stamps is buy lobster. We are told 47% of people pay no taxes, cleverly omitting the part about how this is federal income taxes only.

We work the longest hours, with the least security, least time off, worst health care and worst worker rights in the first world, and yet we are constantly told how lazy the average American is. It is no wonder that people turn on each other.

you are forced into survival mode. Everyone else except your own becomes your adversary, your ememy, your competition, your object of envy or disgust.

We are a society which is in every moment on the verge of collapse.

this is how people think who are downtrodden, have no real political power, and are made to pay for all the sins and mistakes of their rich masters. How long do we tolerate the continual stress of this, taking all the risk with no benefits? In survival mode, everyone else is a potential enemy. People close down, become selfish and small-minded. Survival mode--we are there. Wake up people.

Agree--it can't be sustained. A smart country with responsible government invests in its people.

Can we even IMAGINE what that America would be like? How amazing to feel that your government works for you and for the future of your children--not just for a privileged few. That is real Democracy --not this sham of a DINO Corporatocracy.

Bring Democracy to America.

family with money and they know some other family members REALLY struggling and they won't even help them.

"our country" is "me and you" (to quote a Kansas song)

So to say "our country does not value it's (SIC) citizens".

is basically to say that "we do not value our fellow Americans".

But certainly THAT is just as true of the American left as it is of any other America. WE do NOT value the other Americans who are a bunch of racist, sexist, xenophobic, homophobic a$$hole bigot morons who are just wasting oxygen and destroying our country and our world.

Which would be fine, IF we saw that group of people as maybe 10% of the population, but it's not, in our view. It's closer to 40% of the American population.

I can't tell you how many even so called educated professional people think our way is the best and only way. I try to explain how healthcare and education are provided in other civilized sophisticated nations and they don't believe me. Or it's "but... but... but I bet the taxes are really high". So? I would gladly, gleefully and enthusiastically pay TWICE, hell, make it triple, in taxes, if I know all my healthcare, old age pensions, and college education as high as I want to go are guaranteed. I would happy dance all the way to the IRS to pay my bill.

So I make it easy to understand, in the case of Norway, I say "you know all that oil in the North Sea? Well, all that money goes directly to the PEOPLE. The people own the oil, not some Texas billionaire, and the people benefit from it."

night shift. I will say that since I am one of a hand full that are full time at the hotel so I am lucky to have sick days (paid) vacation paid and insurance that I pay $400.00 a month. almost everyone else is considered part time or as needed.


Now my wife in her home health aid job it seems they don't want co-workers to know one another. Because all workers are listed as "As Needed" there are no full time positions except the 4 people in the office. So my wife and her co-workers have no sick days no paid vacation AND because everyone is listed as needed they where able to not have to worry about providing insurance.

in one as well her mother and Grandfather where union members in there jobs and my wife and I know the importance about unions and the good they do.

my co-workers would.

The state is indifferent to its citizens.

Sadly, that is basically the way it has always been. "America" as the English speaking commercial venture and/or political state between the too hot and too cold zones of the New World was founded as a get rich(er) quick scheme for wealthy and well connected friends of the King of England. "America" literally began as a join stock corporation founded to steal gold from Indians, in hopes that the Spanish windfall profits from Mexico to S.America could be replicated. Because the Indians in VA and NC didn't have gold, the venture had to be taken under government control as a Crown Colony, with a longer break even horizon, but the goal of extracting profits was the same. Despite some brief interludes of revolt, (Civil War, New Deal) when the downtrodden ordinary folk who were tasked to make the plan work rose up, it has remained true to that original nature. Its citizens count for shit. They have no irrevocable rights. They are squeezed to make profit for the owners. That is why they (we) exist. And if they go dry and can no longer make (sufficient) profit for the owners, or they will not, they are to be incinerated. Put down like an old plow horse.

Yes, a good old fashioned slave revolt would do wonders for this place, but again sadly, the oppressed are too easily bought off or deceived. They are set against each other and told their misery is their own fault - or some rotating mythical in/out group's fault. (The gay Gypsies - they're the ones who are to blame for everything - they did this to you! No! It's all the Creoles fault!) The owners tell the owned what to do and how to think, and for the most part the laboring horde eat their masters' shit right up and love it. God bless America: it may be an ugly and soulless wasteland, but as long as the victims love their victimization, wishing only to trade places with the masters, so they can maybe get their turn wielding the whip, it just "works."

blah blah blah Freedom blah blah Democracy blah blah People blah blah
Greatness blah blah Founding Fathers blah blah Public Service blah blah Principles blah blah

All that rhetoric, all that overblown grandiosity...all those star-spangled Lies.
------------
The problem is, people put up with it. As you say:

"...as long as the victims love their victimization, wishing only to trade places with the masters, so they can maybe get their turn wielding the whip, it just "works."

when people organize they can make demands.

Not with the RW-free market-American Dream BS propaganda. The propaganda in the U.S. is so prevalent, ubiquitous and permeates everything American molecule. It would make Joseph Goebbels proud. Most Americans are made stupid by all the propaganda, and turn out to be complete idiots, oblivious to reality.

to insist for years that we have universal healthcare and education

People were valued (but not financially) when they were needed to build this country and make financiers, plantation owners railroad owners, ship owners, etc. wealthy.

Now, we're dismissed as takers.

for a cold.

Other than that, yeah, we really need to do things in this country more the way they do in Europe.

Of takers by our right wing media. BUT I don't know if becoming like Europe would be the answer. Look at All the problems many of the EU countries are facing right now.
I wouldn't mind FREE COLLEGE and HEALTH CARE
But Europe also has it's own problems to deal with it wouldn't call it as the example to follow.

Rather than as a birthright of all citizens.

That's the main problem right there.

And, I'm tired of people saying that this country has the best medical care in the world? Yeah, if you can afford it. This country does not take care of its citizens. The people in charge don't give a damn about anything but profit.

indentured servants the Kocks will work on her country.

That is what W and Jeb openly called those folks 'under their station' ie the 99%. I have had the occasion to hobnob with the well heeled and the terms they use are that or worse. That is why they vote like they do and go to war like they do. I would love to see universal conscription if only to make sure there is some 1% skin in the game.

I just happened to read this obituary in the paper this morning, and it really depressed me. A guy flying his ginormous-ass America flag is a Patriot with a capital P, but Occupy demonstrators who are fighting against corporate control for things like living wages, healthcare, and affordable education in order to give working class and middle class Americans better lives, are "unpatriotic." It's so typical. I'm just so sick of it.

http://obits.oregonlive.com/obituaries/oregon/obituary.aspx?page=lifestory&pid=170046022

Knab, Charles I. (Bo) 84 Oct. 26, 1929 Feb. 28, 2014 Charles I. (Bo) Knab was born in Eureka, Calif., Oct. 26, 1929 to George and May Elizabeth Knab. . . . Next Bo bought LUSCIOUS, a 54 footer, and increased the size of the American flag to a LARGER 25'x40' (1000sq.ft.)! Bo greeted the fleet from 1970 to 2001. The Navy men were so happy to be greeted each year by Bo and his giant flag. Thus a tradition was born. Bo, Trouble/Luscious and the American Flag visited the Astoria Regatta 25 times, the 1812 Overture in downtown Portland 25 times, led the PYC opening day 44 times, visited parties at North Portland Harbor 40 times on July 4th and most importantly Luscious went to Astoria to meet the Battleship MISSOURI for its decommissioning. There were 55,000 people there! Not knowing the poor reception the New Jersey would receive from the Occupy demonstrators hanging from the bridge with their usual anti-patriotic message Luscious was hiding behind the west pier of the Burlington Northern Bridge with its HUGE FLAG FLYING. When the Big Incredible bow of the New Jersey poked its nose under the bridge Luscious and its massive flag moved from hiding and the crowd went wild. In particular, by account of a KOIN 6 cameraman, the Admiral who was on the bridge, with tears in his eyes, said, "Now that's more like it." Bo's love for this country was overwhelming. . . .

We hope.

So there. Nya nya nya.

then she is getting substandard healthcare.

Just sayin'.