How Can we Take Back the USA?

I have watched with alarm the developments in my country since the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980. It seems as the nation has moved inexorably to the right we have become increasingly intolerant and mean-spirited. Most thinking people I know decry this process, and believe we are headed down the road to, if not destruction, then at least irrelevancy.
The question in my mind is how did we get this way, and what can be done to stop it. In order to understand the nature of our affliction we need to examine the historical perspective. In the 1960s the progressive movement made great strides. The civil rights movement was winning victories across the nation, the great society of LBJ was at least alleviating the most horrific effects of poverty, and the anti-war movement was making progress in advancing the idea that war was not necessarily the solution to all problems. In addition to this, the hippie movement felt that it was going to change the entire order of the universe. It seemed that the bright dawn of some new golden age was just around the corner.
Conservatives and reactionaries, naturally, viewed these developments with alarm. Their response was brilliant, in both its subtlety, and its long range vision. First, a campaign began to paint progressives as selfish hedonists. Remember the "Me decade" anyone? After three decades of this sort of propaganda the majority of Americans think liberal and libertine are synonyms.
Another prong of the attack on progressivism has been the development of consistently right wing media outlets to counter the perceived liberal bias of the media, see Fox news, the GE takeover of NBC,Rush, Hannity, etc.
The other prong in the attack on liberalism I have been able to identify is a real long term organization. The right wing, and in particular the religious right have worked long and hard at taking over government from the bottom up, from school boards and county commissions to the halls of the US Congress. This has been accomplished with the aid of large, multinational corporations who have been able to co opt the agenda of the radical right wing.
So what can we do to reverse this trend? I believe that we on the left need to begin to take a long range view of political life in the USA. We need to start doing the little things that are necessary to win back power from the grassroots up. We democrats, also greens, naderites etc need to look past this election. Even if, God forbid, we should lose this election we need to start organizing on the local level and take back the school boards, the county commissions, the state legislatures and so forth. We need to realize that this may be, to quote someone from the dark side "a long hard slog". But we should not lose hope. The majority of Americans agree with our positions, and the more we reach out, person to person, neighbor to neighbor, the more we get our unfiltered message out there.
Secondly, we need to take back the media. Strides are already being made in this direction. Witness Air America, and IndTV. Perhaps some deep pocket liberals would be willing to do for the left what Richard Scaife has done for the forces if darkness.
Finally, we need to begin wielding the weapon which will allow us to hit the neo-fascists where it hurts the most, our economic might. If we are truly serious about taking back our country we need to quit shopping at Wal-Mart, K-Mart etc. While it will hurt our collective pocketbooks initially, we need to get over the idea that the lowest price is always the best deal. We all need to research the companies we patronize and at least try to only patronize environmentally, economically responsible companies. Probably unionized, or at least union-friendly should be part of this equation as well. One simple way to get started in this area would be to look for a made in the USA label before we buy anything.
Well that's about all I have for now. Anyone else have any thoughts on this?

they learned what needed to be done to take over the country. They also learned to cater to the baser instincts of people (no surprise that so many people left the Dems after the Civil Rights Act). They have enlisted the lunatic fringe religious right, not so much because they believe in everything these nutcases say (like that we must get rid of Charlotte's Web because animals don't talk), but because they realize they have tapped into a group of individuals who are malliable to the wishes of their leaders.

I shop at local stores. I try to buy stuff made in the USA, like clothes, but find that that is often impossible. So I buy used clothing from charity outlets that raise funds for the local hospital and animal shelter, etc. I get food from local sources when possible-it is environmentally friendly. I hope other folks do the same thing whenever possible.

with an utter intolerance for things that not sanctioned by those in power. Oh, and then there's Emperor Nero too...

Are there any websites dedicated to listing companies that advertise on these shows?

If there was no profit incentive, all these right wing blowhards would be gone like a hacking cough after taking antibiotics.

If I recall, democrats outnumber republicans by 15-20 million people.

a system set up for sending out propaganda e-mails. From what I have seen, this is especially true of the religious right. (My family members, being Catholics, get and pass on lots of e-mails along religious lines.)

To counter propaganda, whenever you receive any, debunk it.

Maybe we should be writing our own e-mails and spreading them the way RWers/Republicans/conservatives do...

(Maybe we are, and I just don't have any liberal friends... :()