These times are wild. It's like the acceleration, crescendo, to the end...

..., no the acme, of a great orchestral piece...Or perhaps a big budget horror movie, I don't know really. Maybe
"Scary Movie: Attack of the Wolfowitzs"?

I see these insane neo-cons, PNAC supporters all, to be the true emergence of the overt control of American Oligarchy over all aspects of our Society. The covert Plutocrats must be appalled...I'm no fan of them either but at least they gave the impression that this country was a Democracy, game effort at that.

So many great authors predicted, what we may be seeing the beginning of now, American Fascism. I remember one quote, can't remember the author though, that went something like this: "It was always accepted that the iron boot of fascism would step on America, how could it not do so? Little did anyone guess that it'd keep landing in Europe". OK I just mangled that, anyway.

Orwell, London, Lewis all wrote dystopic novels, each in their own style of course, and years apart too, so instead of taking a quote from each I'll grab the one that sums our potential dangers very, very, well...

"If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot
stamping on a human face - for ever."

George Orwell
<1984>

OK...Let's hope not. We ought to be developing...No...No polemics. I'll leave it at that.

while eating breakfast, and some guy called in and said "I don't see anything so wrong with imperialism." Yeah, just as long as it's the sons and daughters of the lower classes who have to go overseas with bullseyes on them, and not YOU. Do people like that ever stop to think that American imperialism will mean that Americans will be targeted all over the world, and it won't matter if they're troops or tourists?

...CBS canceling "The Reagans" because the WH was "concerned" that the made-for-TV movie wasn't historically accurate (*snort, snark*); and learned that a conservative think tank -- backed by 45,000 churches -- had developed and was distributing to Congress a hit list of NIH-funded AIDS and sex-ed researchers.

I knew in that moment that we had lost. Game over. The facist state is here, and the Bush* facistas are *not* going to lose in 2004 -- or anytime in the foreseeable future.

Why?

NO ONE demonstrated in the streets. The media reported these things in the same tone in which they reported the stock market and the weather. Not one public voice mentioned that the last time the federal government concerned itself with the entertainment industry, we ended up calling that era the "McCarthy witchhunts." And since when has the aim of medical research been political? Oh, wait. Nazi Germany.

And since Whistle Ass controls the media, the money, and the churches -- which, in turn, control everyone else -- why the hell are we wasting a single electron whining about it?

I give the hell up. The Dems in Washington must be complicit in the whole thing, because there's not a single testicle among any of them. Every time I see some new outrage posted here on DU, everyone says, "This is it! This is the end of the junta."

But it's not. It never is. It never will be. The assholes won when we didn't have a civil war after the sham election of 2000. We lay down, cowering under the "Bush won. Get over it." slogan. Afraid for our lives of being considered spoilsports, or sore losers. Or whatever.

So. As I said, I give the hell up. Since I'm a college educator, I'll be one of the first in line for "re-education." And my musician friends? Obviously anti-patriotic. Philosophers? History professors? Scientists? Man, gotta watch out for these evil secular humanists. Watch for the patriot committes, coming soon to a neighborhood near you!

/rant

...co-host hack. Second tier for the Bill Bennet run camps IIRC.

The least we can do is have a good time I suppose...That and persevere.

You can operate the underground "Free-Americans" radio.

Evolutionary psychologist, atheist writer, Dem election worker.

Any Canadians with a guest room for a neat, tidy, organized couple and their three kitties?

"They got the guns but we got the numbers" Do we?

...a losing battle.

This Sunday's Parade magazine (comes with the Washington Post, and probably countless other newspapers) had 2 stories:
"The Pledge Will Never Be Just Words For Me" - by Jessica Lynch

and

"Honor Killings Reach England" (about Muslim father killing his daughter for marrying a Christian boy).

Also included were ads:
"Celebrate American Heroism" - videos about WWII

and

"Vietnam Veterans Service Ring" - "now you can wear the symbol of service, sacrifice and sacred duty."


How can this NOT be state-run media?????????!!!!!!!

it will not then just simply be purged out of our system...the peak, the crescendo of all this is dark.
the majority are not conscious.
You say State run...no...I say fascist run...when the State has so many fascists in the general population, the State does not need to "run" it's propaganda arm. They just let their numerous rich zealots sing their praises. It works more efficiently and more deceptively than the classic government control.
It is neo-Orwellian, rather than classic Orwellian...they have adapted. Evolved. And it is scarier.

the 50's. When they took control of the Media (through Corporate Compliance) was when they finally reached their Zenith. Now we can start to fight them back because we know WHO they are and WHERE they are and What they are up to. The rest of America is still trusting and not aware. Slowly they will wake up, but when they do they need a counter movement in place. That's what we Dems on the Left are trying to do. Point out what the NeoCons and RW Whaco's have been up to and try to stop the lies, spin and manipulation.

Unlike the brief rollback of the RW and Neo's during the late 60's and 70's which had the VietNam War and the "Women's Movement" to push for change, they've had a pretty smooth ride from Reagan on. (The efforts against Clinton showed how much power they had already achieved through Reagan and Poppy's term).

Without a cohesive Alternative to NeoCon/RWingers it's going to take years. So many of our Dem House and Senate Reps are co-opted and corrupted at this point we don't have much to fight back with. We need new voices. They have to come from outside and places like here on DU and the other places where people are fighting to take our country back on the internet.

Just MHO, in a simple form.

...who in his or her right mind would go it alone on the front line?

On edit: Remember, people who do things like speak out have a strange habit of ending up dead.

i just wanted to say that i've enjoyed meeting all of you and i hope you are well because du will be forced out as a terrorist site and shut down by ashcroft.

Well, said, salinen. Welcome to DU! :hi:

Oh, BTW, his name is spelled, "Ass-kkk-Crack." Pronounce the kays as "kay-kay-kay," not "kuh-kuh-kuh." :evilgrin:

On edit: Clarification. I posted like I had oatmeal in my keyboard.

what an insult to all law abiding ass cracks. i'm soooo sorry that jean carnahan won her husbands senate seat. although flightboy would have found an equally hard core religiously perverse buttpuss to fill that respectable cabinet position.

The fascists are coming, the fascist are coming. They're here.

and other accessories like is being used to promote this horror movie.

And STILL I say:

NEVER GIVE UP!

and I also say...

The outcome of this has yet to be decided.

I share your feelings. I remember reading "Farenheit 451" in high school and saying to myself, "Thank God I live in America. Thank God this could not happen here."

When Clinton got elected and began to turn the country around in his centrist way, I was very happy. I LIKED gridlock, to me it was the apothosis of how the Founding Fathers intended the country to run. When he began to pay off the debt and set things right, I even allowed myself a dose of optimism...at least until the Attempted Coup of 1998 which felt so very very wrong. A product of Imperial Rome, it felt like pages had been torn out of "I, Claudius" and transplanted to the nightly news.

Back during the 12 year reign of Bush I, I instinctively noted the precursors of the doom of the Old American Republic. I was pretty fatalist for awhile.

During the Last Days of the Old Republic, the Clinton Era, as my optimism began to wax strong, my last negative thought, so to speak was, "What if this is just a hiccup in the overall trend? What if we are still sprialing down to the Dark Ages and possibly extinction, but this is just an upward blip that will rapidly be pulled down."

And now that prophesy seems to be coming true, as does the remarkably prophetic vision of "Farenheit 451" (I mean the guy predicted SONY WALKMANS and BIG SCREEN TVs and "Winston Noble vs. Hubert Hoag" and dozens of other things).

But we must not surrender to gloom. Not while we have breath in our lungs or fire in our hearts. NEVER GIVE UP!

Well said my friend! I will gladly fight and die alongside you if it comes down to war in this country, which I fear it may.

That does NOT mean I will ever give in. To quote a very great man, "We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender." We must not give in, we must not fall back, we must not surrender. As the SCots knew over half a century ago, "We fight not for glory nor for wealth nor honours; but only and alone we fight for freedom, which no good man surrenders but with his life." We fight not to determine American policy as we see fit, but we fight to ensure that America, as the Founders envisioned it, a nation where freedom and liberty were the most prized virtues, remains true to her course. Should our government be torn asunder by the facists, then we will take the fight to them whatever way we can. We will fight them on all fronts without mercy, without relent. We will not pull back, no surrender, no mercy for the honourless foe! In the end, the facists desire that they alone rule this nation and this world, which is not what should be. We must fight them always, no matter how long the odds may seem. We must not back off, we must harry them endlessly, give them no rest and no respite. We must give them hell, or we face the creation of a hell on earth worse then any human can possibly imagine.

"And regretted this moment"

OMFG...I just quoted the Flaming Lips! For shame but to be honest I think this song sums it up. Sure it's about a relationship but the words could easily apply to the way I feel about our current battle with our desent in the the madness of a real live Dystopia.

I've taken a few words fom this one.

http://www.lyricsondemand.com/f/theflaminglipslyrics/flighttestlyrics.html

"I thought I was smart
I thought I was right
I thought it better not to fight
I thought there was a virtue, in always being cool
So it came time to fight
I thought "I'll just step aside"
And that the time would prove you wrong
And that you would be the fool"

Well...That's what we did in 2000. Bummer eh?

"Oh. To fight is to defend
If it's not now then tell me when
Would be the time
That you would stand up and be a man"

Right bloody now:mad:

My reaction to Clinton's tenure was quite the opposite. His termsmade it quite clear that Farenheit 451 could happen ragardless of which of the half-parties were in office. The passage of the DMCA and the copyright extension acts made that very, very clear. The long-term trendline is towards fascism and Clinton was no exception.

...than live with my hands working to further his goals.

I'm serious on this. Many people think I'm slightly (or not so slightly) nuts to even state it this way, but it's a simple truth.

I am ready, willing, and able to die to protect true freedom. It's just that important.

What could be more important than the ideal that should be America - indeed, the world? There is no greater cause which to be called to, and no greater loss should we fail to heed that call.

I will stand alone if necessary. I will die, alone, in pain, shackled and beaten, if need be, in the fight against tyranny.

I do not think I stand alone in this.

"Strike A Blow Against The Empire" by David Rovics
(Download it here:
http://artists.mp3s.com/artists/16/david_rovics.html)

When the rich man on the TV
Said this world's mine
When he asked which side you're on
Told you to step in line
When he gave his reasons
For his war of conquest
When he talked about your wallet
Said it was in your interest
Did you shrug your shoulders
And do as you were told
Hang a flag in your window
And buy the goods that you were sold
Or did you shut off his craven image
And call the man a liar
Did you strike a blow against the empire?

When they were rounding up your neighbors
You know the ones with darker skin
Clerks and teachers, engineers
With names like Sami and Mazin
When they were breaking down the doors
And taking them away
Holding them on secret charges
Hidden from the light of day
What did you tell their children
When you had a chance to meet
Could you look them in the eye
Or did you walk past them on the street
Could you say that you stood up
When their lives were on the wire
Did you strike a blow against the empire?

As the bombs were falling
And the children lost their lives
Lying broken on the pavement
As the ambulance arrives
As the soldiers opened fire
With their heavy guns
Could you hear the demonstrators hit the ground
See how their red blood runs
What were you doing
In those fateful times
Did you raise your voice
Against these awful crimes
Were you hiding in your bedroom
When the situation was so dire
Or did you strike a blow against the empire?

And when the time had come
And the Reich was at your door
When the fascist state was here
And they brought home the war
When the Gestapo was in the city
And they had really taken power
When there was nothing left to do
Here in the final hour
Did you find a place to run to
And hope to live a few more years
When the slaughter was around you
Did you cover up your ears
Or did you set your sights
Take your aim and fire
DID YOU STRIKE A BLOW AGAINST THE EMPIRE?

Most, no almost ALL, people dred situations where they have to make life altering choices. I think we're all about a year or two away from some awfully serious shit.

I just hope that I make the "Right" decisions and I hope my friends here at DU do too.

In that same vein, not giving an answer, but certainly posing the question:

First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.

Pastor Martin Niemöller


IIRC there's some people that challenge the veracity (That it's made up?) of quote but it doesn't matter, it's the way things happened in a place just 70 years ago.

http://www.terminalproduct.com/empireneverended.rm

for the end credits theme to this thread...

If anyone reading this thread is seriously concerned that we, as Americans, are becoming an oligarchic police state, I'd advise you to take some basic preparations.

1) Self defense. This is an aspect of life that seems to be lost on many leftists. I imagine (or hope at least) it is due to sincere idealism and a genuine belief in the inherent goodness of humanity. In the current socio/political climate of "if you ain't with us, yer for thuh terrists", you should undertake some basic preparations for yours and your families physical safety. This should include at minimum:
A) A center fire rifle of a common military caliber. With the fall of the Warsaw Pact, a bolt action rifle, cleaning kit, ammo pouches, and a 500 round tin of cartridges can be had for less than $200. If you can not afford this, at minimum buy a used single shot 12 or 20 bore shotgun for $40-50. Obtain safety training and KNOW YOUR WEAPON! Know its limitations and become familiar with the basic gunsmithing of it to perform field expedient repairs. Most gun shops are happy to assist new customers with such information.
B) A pistol of a common military/police caliber. Again, I include the absolute caveat of safety and weapon familiarity. Czech surplus pistols that fire a fast and lethal round are about $100 or so at gun shows. If you want to look for these weapons, email me and I'll give you URL's to wholesalers.

2) Food, water, and medical supplies. Canned food can be found cheap; beans, preserved meats (IE Spam), and other vegetables and pastas,so stock up with a minimum of 1200-1700 calories per family member for 30 days. Try to save at minimum 30 gallons of drinking water. Ideally, a PUR or Katydyn water filtration system would be great so if you have any source of water, you can filter yourself. 2 quart canteens and carriers would be nice as well. If you have to, obtain chemical tablets for water, but be mindful that they will not cleanse the water of metals, chemicals, and they taste bad. Obtain at minimum a stocked field medic bag (available on the net). Abdominal pads, Betadine, cough syrup, aspirin, etc can be found cheap at discount stores. If you have a Dollar Tree, Family Dollar, or Dollar General you can build a decent first aid kit cheaply. As a side note, the growth of these chains seems indicative of the average worker's spending capacity. I'm just saying....

I am extremely concerned about the direction we are going as a nation. Bush boldly tried to eliminate overtime pay this fall, an action that would have been unthinkable years ago. With each action he takes, he becomes bolder and more likely to succeed. I want electoral change, but the current administration seems more authoritarian with each and every action which leads me to think we may have another coup like 2000.
Any of the above items would be useful for survival; by survival I also mean unemployment. We used our food stocks from preparing for the Y2K non-event to get us through several months of lean earnings. Remember the scout motto, "be prepared". This is the crux of my post.

I think anyone that believes that "It Can't Happen Here" is sadly setting themselves up to be a victim, or worse, capitulate.

I know that a few here would view you post paranoid, I don't.

Spot on about not being paranoid. We have an administration that squelches dissent with such Orwellian names as "Free Speech Zones", masses of protestors detained and brutalized without due process, and the media actively promoting an "us vs. them" mentality among our own. When Anne Coulter states that dissenters should be shot and is given both print and broadcast media outlets to say so; that should be indicative of the state of the nation.

The current state of affairs is reminiscent of 1903. We're seing a return of unfettered capital controlling the government at every level. The dominant socio/political philosophy is the market economy. If one suggests that unleashed corporate control is a condition detrimental to the lives of Americans, you are treated as some sort of heretic. Worker's rights are nearly gone, collective bargaining and unions have evaporated, and we have an administration on the offensive against the few remaining protections that stand. Look for some emergency decree that will end overtime pay, end political dissent, and require some manner of collective registration. I hope I'm wrong but.....:scared:

Be as self-sufficient for your own energy needs as you can be. Oil and gas production is peaking, and the far-side of the curve, as demand continues to outstrip supply, is not going to be a gentle slop. With no replacement fuel of equal value, the shock to the system is going to be cataclysmic. Best to opt out of the system as much as possible.

This is a crisis which could have been met with imagination and cooperation, conservation and massive research and development of alternative energies. Or, it could have been met as it has been, with imperial force in order to dominate the oil which peaks last, that of the Middle East.

We're living through the early days of an unprecedented crisis for industrial civilization, and it's what, to a considerable degree, accounts for the end of the stasis we've known most of our lives.

No credit cards.

Pay as you go Cable (Comcast finally got smart here)

Move closer to work.

Learn how to cook. Learn how to pack a lunch. Learn how to eat well but sensibly.

meantime, we have to keep up a fight. We have a year to apply for citizenship in Canada if we have to flee next November, and other places might be quicker to get into in an emergency.

So, while we figure out our housing situation....(storing our possessions we can't take and organizing our finances and mail and the "stuff" that we need to deal with) we still can be "Pro-Active" and not cave into them.

The coming year....will be a "make it, or break it" time. We must be very watchful, prepared, and have "contingency plans" but we shouldn't panic yet and declare we've lost. Because if we don't stay and fight for awhile longer who will we give the torch to? If we don't build the foundation, what will the "new house" be built on?

Some might find this too hard to deal with. We've lost so many battles, but we've won some big fights. The "Overtime Pay" roll back was stopped by our Dems. (they can get up to battle for really big issues...base issues)

And, there have been other sucesses which have stopped the jackboots, but not enough to keep us from being so disheartened that we stop making our contingency plans.

Still, we must work hard this next year. For our own presevation.....just in case...but to leave a foundation behind for those who will be left who will need to build.

So, Jan Michael, I see where you're coming from and why you've given up hope, but I still think we have a duty to not only ourselves but those behind us.

But, if Chimp is re-elected.....I defintely am working on a plan that I don't have to spend another four years of my live with this kind of despair and misery. If he isn't....then I hope we have a chance to undo this. Depends on the next year.
:shrug:

I have NOT "Given up hope", period.

I post these threads to either alarm or enrage people that read them.

I'm not stopping the fight, period.

I do not put my faith in "so many great authors," especially ones lauded as prophets. That way leads to never-ending streams of paralyzing fear or worse, paralyzing defeatism.

Predicting the rise of American Fascism, loudly and to everybody who pauses, is a self-fufilling prophecy. The louder you quote Orwell, the louder you gather your weapons in preparation for the jackboots, the greater the hue and the cry about how the United States is no longer democratic and it's time for aux armes, citoyens, every time you do that and make somebody believe it, the closer it comes to reifing.

Maybe that's what you want, a noble last stand against the Homeland Security Forces, the brave final defenders of Liberty standing tall against the hated enemy. I'm not fond of that kind of romantic foolishness - throwing lives into that meatgrinder strikes me less as noble and more as a demonstration of poor prior planning. Everybody wants to fight against dystopia, but nobody wants to fight for utopia. (Okay, everybody but the Kucinich supporters.)

And if the bad guys win, well... here's another quote for your collection:

"The eyes were hollow and the carven beard was broken, but about the high stern forehead there was a coronal of silver and gold. A trialing plant with flowers like small white stars had bound itself across the bows as if in reverence for the fallen king, and in the crevices of his stony hair yellow stonecrop gleamed.

"'They cannot conquer for ever!' said Frodo."

--JRR Tolkien

"If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen. "
Samuel Adams

That's playing quotation tennis. If you have a counter-argument that can be expressed in terms other than the 18th Century version of "kiss the whip, sheep-boy," I'm all ears.

Nope, it just summed up my essential view. The problem with utopia is that it is it's literal translation: nowhere. Nearly a century ago, Marxism motivated a group to transform society and it turned into a monstrous incarnation of human misery. Power is a central corrupting influence among us regardless of our intent. The Framers knew that and they attempted to create a lasting republic. Because of the unlimited influence of corporate money, that republic is now driven by money. Justice and political influence are commodities in this country that are brokered, bought, and sold. I hope for Howard Dean to win, but I honestly have low expectations as both parties are driven by corporate money and have no interest in their constituency.

This corruption has been overtly manifested in the Bush administration's every action. He has been against the working and middle class, has abrogated civil liberties, and has committed all these actions in an ever-escalating manner as he has nothing to fear. Why take physical preparations? Because I want the option of resistance. Because when I am declared a terrorist, I do not want to tremble in fear of the police; rather I want to have the means of escape and evasion. I do not want to be helpless in the face of a police state. Sincerely, I hope that I'm wrong, but I essentially hope for the best and prepare for the worst. Does that, in a roundabout way, address your question?

Personally, I believe that by publicly "preparing for the worst" you're aggravating the situation - helping ratchet up the general level of Fear and Despair to the point where somebody will do something stupid and set off the avalanche. The energy you put into securing caches of food and weapons would be better funneled into heading the situation off before it gets that bad.

I also believe that the "option of resistance" is fundamentally foolish. If it came down to the actual use of military-grade force on US soil against US citizens, the only smart option is to run like a motherfucker. Run for the borders, run for the hills, but just run. Do not stand, do not fight, because if you stand and fight You Will Die For Nothing.

And that, in perhaps plainer language than necessary, is my position.

Either you speak what you feel is true, or you lie by ommission.

Also in regard to "Resistance"...Nobody, not you, not me, can predict how fast, or far, the Bushites will go. We also can't predict how the population will react, if at all. My guess is that your statement of: "the only smart option is to run like a motherfucker. Run for the borders, run for the hills, but just run. Do not stand, do not fight, because if you stand and fight You Will Die For Nothing." is more than likely correct.

That doesn't mean however that one shouldn't take two tracks.

You're expressing opinions and bad feelings and quoting Orwell, but you're not declaring facts.

But you can't seriously think that the Bush Administration, starting from a disenfranchised Florida voter Coup in 2000, is anything but borderline insane with totalitarian tendencies, no?

Need I state all they've done, and plan via PNAC documents, to make that claim here?

I should hope not:-)

You need to speak honestly. If you're going to declare fact, then you need to read the litany of the administration's sins. Or at least a summary, since the whole litany would take forever to pull.

Opinion does not equal fact, and it is Wrong to attempt to equate the two.

Based on perception, perhaps even conjecture (Bwah, sorry, I had to add that), of factual events.

If only I could edit my initial post I'd add a disclamer.

Contrite enough?

PS~ I won't take you post as an insult. I won't take it as if you're calling me dishonest. Are you though?

I won't take it as if you're calling me dishonest. Are you though?

I'm calling you imprecise. Or maybe showing signs of sloppy thinking. It's no great sin - everybody does it, we're human after all - but when discussing matters of great importance sloppy thinking leads to errors in judgement, which can cause serious problems down the road.

And at the risk of being pompous;-) I link another of my responses to a similar view of my particular state...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=675099&mesg_id=677793&page=

It's never truly "Over". That said, I'm fairly certain that I'll live but one time, I want to make it worthwhile for not only myself but for all.

"Romantic Foolishness" is I agree oftentimes suicidal, however the World, Mankind, needs the occasional jolt to continue into that (hopefully nicer than Huxley's) "Brave New World":-)

Our society is a mixture of the two. We have electronics, rap music, NASCAR, and other sports for the distractions, but the mailed fist of a police state is always there.

I don't think you quite grasp my meaning there. Maybe I was unclear.

When I talk about romantic foolishness, especially on DU, I'm referring to the undercurrent to threads like this one: The idea that okay, the country's under an iron jackboot, but I can fight bravely and nobly in La Resistance. It's this meme we're reinforced with over and over again in the popular culture. It ignores the grimmer reality of the situation, where La Resistance gets slaughtered every time they try anything more than sneak attacks, unlike the movies where they always win.

The meme is dangerous, because it leads to a sort of complacency in terms of trying to avoid the dystopia. If you know, or think you know, that you'll be able to evade the stormtroopers and join the rebellion you're not necessarily going to work as hard to prevent the stormtroopes form being unleashed in the first place.

Ya dig?

No, I did not mean to imply that physical resistance was the only option. I stated that I believed we should work for the best situations, ie: reversing the police state, while preparing for the worst; the escalation of the same.

FWIW though, discussing your preparations for the worst on an open channel is kind of dumb.

See how easy-peasy that was?

While we all appreciate the advise, hmm, thanks but this is still a free "discussion board" no?

Or has the prediction, opinion, that started this thread come true?

When making plans to abandon or resist a possible fascist government, you do not make your plans right out in the open where any idiot can see.

Basic security, man. I mean, Goddamn.

DU is not exactly "Public Enemy #1". I doubt that there are FBI agents sufing every thread. Better yet I doubt that stating the advice, desire, to hoard rice is illegal, even now. Oh and the 2nd Amendment is still in effect too.

And if it isn't? I'm right, well sort of-but this is way too soon, and it probably doesn't matter what we say, we're all fucked;-)

Better yet I doubt that stating the advice, desire, to hoard rice is illegal, even now. Oh and the 2nd Amendment is still in effect too.

And yet at the same time, not mentioning in public that you're hoarding rice and ammo for when you might need to hide in a hole during the Revolution helps reduce your visibility and thus increases your chances of Not Being Caught. Basic bad shit planning 101.

I was also trying to show people that core survival preparations can be affordable. One can purchase arms, food, water, and medical supplies with some camping gear all for less than $1K, likely about $500-700. I want people to be ready, otherwise they have no choice other than being victims.

I was just pointing out that discussing such preparations might be better left not discussed on such a very public forum, especially couched in the suggestion that it's surviving a rabid goverment.

Just some halfway sensible advice, FWIW.

but to put it mildly, I'm certainly on so many shit lists that I cease to worry.

However I think that the fight against them must continue.

Here's a question. Do you think that these people are still playing by the traditional rules?

Better yet...How do you interpret what has already happened since 2000? Business as usual?

Do you think that these people are still playing by the traditional rules?

Define traditional. This sort of nonsense was popular during the time of the Medicis. They don't call Rove's fixers the "Mayberry Machavellis" for nothing, after all.

How do you interpret what has already happened since 2000? Business as usual?

No, but not the naked power grab by the Secret Masters that it's often portrayed as. This strikes me as the apotheosis of the Reagan corporate model - the robber baron on coke and heavy speed ripping everything apart in the quest for more money.

It's not a style of governance that's suited for permanent jackbooting. It's not even very good for jackbooting in the short term. It will burn itself out given time, but it would be better to throw some water on it if only to minimize the long-term damage.

As in not demeaning.

I do understand your point yet while I hope it's probable, they6 ought to burn out after gawd knows how mant deaths, I also can accept that it may not, which you seem to be ignoring. Better yet you're denying it.

I think both are possible, one is seriously disturbing, you don't seem to.

I hope I'm mis-taken.

Quickly followed by a "message deleted" notice, but that's the way these things go. But fuck that: Onward.

I also can accept that it may not, which you seem to be ignoring. Better yet you're denying it.

I'm taking the long view, which most people never learn to do. An American Fascist empire will burn itself out. It may take until 2008, it may take a generation, it may take a century, but it will burn out. It's not geared for the long haul, and would fall to it's own intrigues if Europe or China didn't take an active hand. Remember my counterquote to your Orwell: They Cannot Conquer Forever.

Please don't insist that I post them all, that's just not going to happen.

No need for barely pentup hostility either.

"I'm taking the long view, which most people never learn to do."

I am in my way, perhaps not yours, but that's not verboten last time I checked. We're on the same team, no?

If not then "fuck that":-)

But anyway...

I am in my way, perhaps not yours, but that's not verboten last time I checked.

No, but at the same time I'm not really sure that you're looking any further than the next election. At best you're looking in the medium term, but it's not really the long view.

Oh, don't get me wrong; the next election is going to be important if not pivotal, but it's not the end of history. It won't be a blatant branchpoint between Fascist and Democratic. And if there is a branchpoint waiting for us, it won't be the election.

Listen: Once upon a time there was a great and powerful Emperor who sat upon his throne and was troubled. The Emperor sent his servants to look for the wisest man in his realm and the neighboring kingdoms, and the servants came back with the sage Nasrudin. The Emperor asked Nasrudin for something that would make him sad when he was happy and happy when he was sad. Nasrudin thought about it a moment, then whispered this in the Emperor's ear: "This too, shall pass."

:-)

Edit: I'm through with this. We simply aren't hearing each other very well, that's ok though, no harm there.

Just because.

Listen: Once upon a time in a far kingdom, the sage Nasrudin made several witty remarks against the local government. The King was, of course, outraged and had Nasrudin arrested, tried, and sentenced to be executed. Before the sentence could be carried out, though, Nasrudin made a bargain with the King.

"If you give me one year, O King," said Nasrudin, "I can teach your prized stallion how to sing. If I succeed, I win my freedom. If I do not by the end of the year, then you may kill me."

The King was dubious, but Nasrudin was renowned as a master of magic and lore. He agreed to the deal, and Nasrudin was shown to the stable where the stallion was kept.

Not long after, Nasrudin's friends came to him while he was standing in the stable, contemplating the horse. Why, they asked him, did he agree to such a foolish wager?

"A lot can happen in a year," Nasurdin said. "I may die, the king may die or be deposed, and it is custom for the new King to free all prisoners. My jailers will have many opportunities for carelessness and I will always be looking for opportunities to escape."

"And finally," he said, "if worst comes to the very worst, maybe I can teach the damned horse to sing."

Read and understand this wisdom.

Read and undersatnd my post. Please.

"Nearly all creators of Utopia have resembled the man who has toothache, and therefore thinks happiness consists in not having toothache. They wanted to produce a perfect society by an endless continuation of something that had only been valuable because it was temporary. The wider course would be to say that there are certain lines along which humanity must move, the grand strategy is mapped out, but detailed prophecy is not our business. Whoever tries to imagine perfection simply reveals his own emptiness. This is the case even with a great writer like Swift, who can flay a bishop or a politician so neatly, but who, when he tries to create a superman, merely leaves one with the impression the very last he can have intended that the stinking Yahoos had in them more possibility of development than the enlightened Houyhnhnms."

A great essay by the way: http://www.online-literature.com/orwell/895/

Others here on this thread who need some hope in this dark time. A couple of weeks ago when I was really down and did a DU rant about my hopelessness, a fellow DU'er passed this along to me, and it was a GIFT! I pass along this GIFT to some of you...hoping it will help you as it did me. It's a wonderful site to bookmark. And the article is a very good read on it's own.



Acts of Hope
Challenging Empire on the World Stage
by Rebecca Solnit

What We Hope For

On January 18, 1915, six months into the first world war, the first terrible war in the modern sense --
slaughter by the hundreds of thousands, poison gas, men living and dying in the open graves of trench
warfare, tanks, barbed wire, machine guns, airplanes -- Virginia Woolf wrote in her journal, "The future is
dark, which is on the whole, the best thing the future can be, I think." Dark, she seems to say, as in
inscrutable, not as in terrible. We often mistake the one for the other. People imagine the end of the
world is nigh because the future is unimaginable. Who twenty years ago would have pictured a world
without the USSR and with the Internet? We talk about "what we hope for" in terms of what we hope will
come to pass but we could think of it another way, as why we hope. We hope on principle, we hope
tactically and strategically, we hope because the future is dark, we hope because it's a more powerful
and more joyful way to live. Despair presumes it knows what will happen next. But who, two decades
ago, would have imagined that the Canadian government would give a huge swathe of the north back to
its indigenous people, or that the imprisoned Nelson Mandela would become president of a free South
Africa?

Twenty-one years ago this June, a million people gathered in Central Park to demand a nuclear freeze.
They didn't get it. The movement was full of people who believed they'd realize their goal in a few years
and then go home. Many went home disappointed or burned out. But in less than a decade, major
nuclear arms reductions were negotiated, helped along by European antinuclear movements and the
impetus they gave Gorbachev. Since then, the issue has fallen off the map and we have lost much of
what was gained. The US never ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, and the Bush
administration is planning to resume the full-fledged nuclear testing halted in 1991, to resume
manufacture, to expand the arsenal, and perhaps even to use it in once-proscribed ways.

It's always too soon to go home. And it's always too soon to calculate effect. I once read an anecdote
by someone in Women Strike for Peace, the first great antinuclear movement in the United States, the
one that did contribute to a major victory: the 1963 end of aboveground nuclear testing with its
radioactive fallout that was showing up in mother's milk and baby teeth. She told of how foolish and futile
she felt standing in the rain one morning protesting at the Kennedy White House. Years later she heard
Dr. Benjamin Spock -- one of the most high-profile activists on the issue then -- say that the turning
point for him was seeing a small group of women standing in the rain, protesting at the White House. If
they were so passionately committed, he thought, he should give the issue more consideration himself.

Unending Change

A lot of activists expect that for every action there is an equal and opposite and punctual reaction, and
regard the lack of one as failure. After all, activism is often a reaction: Bush decides to invade Iraq, we
create a global peace movement in which 10 to 30 million people march on seven continents on the
same weekend. But history is shaped by the groundswells and common dreams that single acts and
moments only represent. It's a landscape more complicated than commensurate cause and effect.
Politics is a surface in which transformation comes about as much because of pervasive changes in the
depths of the collective imagination as because of visible acts, though both are necessary. And though
huge causes sometimes have little effect, tiny ones occasionally have huge consequences.

more............http://www.oriononline.org/pages/oo/sidebars/Patriotism/index_Solnit.html

I am not hopeless, just concerned. Protest, without media coverage, is essentially useless for the practical consideration of influence. This "liberal" media has turned the blind eye to mass arrests of protestors in DC. I think the last effective act of protest was the anti-WTO actions in Seattle in 1999. That was an act of righteous outrage.

seen as I was posting while you replied, I think. I was trying to comply with the rules of 3-4, but the 4th
is the paragraph which sucks you into the article. Small acts....whether covered by the Media or not...are what can make a difference. In the 60's the media didn't give a crap about the Viet-Nam war. They thought people against it were "Pinko-Communists." It took a long time....for awareness. Just as it did with Nixon.

We think it should go faster today because everything's SO FAST! I WANT IT TO BE FAST. But, it isn't. It's only the "Spin" which is faster. This article puts a perspective on what we all WANT SO BADLY...and the REALITY.

That's why it's good. It's a slow article, but it gets into your brain and stays with you.....because it's true.

That's from an old REM song and I can't get the lyrics out of my head lately when I think about all of the self-destructive/planet-destructive actions these guys in DC are up to. Like the neocons giving tax breaks on Hummers, oil drilling in ANWAR, ignoring global warming when the ice caps are melting, and people bulldozing the very old olive trees in Palestine.