Yes We CAN!? (Wait, where's Obummer?)!

Government union employees did not organize against capitalism, but set up a racket to screw citizens. Most make twice as much as they should, and are bankrupting our communities. Use a better example.

Everything encroaches upon everything among limited loyalties. All borders, however porous, to their benefit and undoing.

We will be a great America only when we have public funding of campaigns. When politicians even speak the truth today I can't trust them because I know they are cashing checks from one special interest or the other. ONLY when we the taxpayers are funding their elections will we be able to trust that they are working for us. And at $5 per taxpayer per year it will be a terrific bargain.

Right now we must get our congressmen to co-sign The Fair Elections Now Act at http://www.fairelectionsnow.org/more/summary

If they don't they must be unelected in November.

Jack Lohman ...
http://MoneyedPoliticians.net

As much as corporations need to stay out of politics, Unions should too. Elected officials should represent their local people with integrity. Today what matters s connections, money and influence. The social vehicle called "democracy" is now an illusion and nothing will change until we get all people off this vehicle and admit that. What is the movement that will achieve that? It may be REPEACE. look it up

Scarier than Friedman.

An earlier post makes a deprecating reference to Milton Friedman.

What is scarier than the influence of Milton Friedman on the right is the influence of Ayn Rand, for example, in the form of Alan Greenspan convinced that market forces alone take the place of ethics. laws, supervision and enforcement. A religion (and that's what it is) based on the exaltation of purest egoism.

I am troubled by all of this "brave warrior" stuff, which infects this piece also.

"Here is a country that makes men of such courage that they volunteer to die thousands of miles from home, who scramble to save each other when the bullets are flying, and can still smile about it. "

My edit:

"Here is a country which fights its wars virtually exclusively with the poor and disadvantaged. And like every country on earth, these soldiers buy into the hideous warrior mentality, never thinking about why they are fighting."

Talk of our brave boys and girls is very destructive. Are they any braver than the Taliban, Al Quaeda, the Serbians, the Croats, the Sunnis, the Shia? Not that I notice.

Bravery is not the issue

I recently met a homeless man who had to go to court for two misdemeanors, J walking and for having a dog running the neighborhood. The J Walking ticket happened at the end of this winter season, March, and the guy was cold, hungry and trying to survive. The man doesn't even own a dog. When the guy checked in and got a docket to find that his case had already been decided and he was given the maximum fine on The J Walking ticket. Because the man tried to explain the dog's ownership the judge ordered him to stand trail, even though the docket indicated the charge had been pre-decided. We arrived at the time the trial was to start, 10:00am. The Judge arrived at 10:40am. I looked at the lady sitting next to me and noted that we were showing up 45 minutes late, we'd be fired. During the 45 minute delay a Supervisor arrived to inspect the furniture and field complaints from the trial's bayliff. For 40 minutes we waited while the civil servants complained about furniture not being properly lined up, someone using his pens and highlighters. He even went as far as to tell the Supervisor how he had spent the citizen's tax dollars trying to resolve his complaints. The taxpayer's in the court room were astounded at the hilarity justice has become. The Judge complained that my homeless friend had a bad attitude. Really I thought, the Judge shows up 40 minutes late, with cases pre-decided according to the court's own documents, and yet, this idiot pre-supposes that because my friend is homeless, he can choose to spend the taxpayer's money like this. Time to talk to the Mayor...

Unions and corporations serve different masters. Unions are mass membership organizations that represent the interests of the members and bargain to further and protect their interests. Corporations are private, moneymaking structures that attempt to use the state to secure more wealthy at the expense of the entire people. The least union is more democratic than any corporation. Corporations are run by boards not elected by the total shareholders, only certain classes with large chunks held by the very wealthy and "financial institutions" who control the policies by controlling the voting stock. Learn about unions and the difference and then stop the stupid blither about treating them the same when they are not.

I keep saying this. Instead of teaching our children we are the greatest nation in the world, we need to teach them, we can be the greatest nation in the world ....with their help.

Dawn, thanks for having one of the shorter posts which was, at the same time, the most sensible. I get so tired of all the whining on this site, especially the "Obama didn't drive to my house and hand me a million dollars. He didn't end all wars for all time. He didn't end racism. He doesn't cure the sick using his super savior vision - so I hate him and need to call him names" people who post here. The Right, especially the Religious Reich, is basically unified in it's desire to control us and our world, yet we spend more energy whining at each other for not being perfect than actually doing things and providing constructive thoughts. Thanks for hitting the nail right on the head!

Why do we have to consider ourselves the "greatest nation in the world"? We should strive to be the best we can be, but that doesn't necessarily mean we have to be the very best in the world. To me, that sounds like an ego-trip by power-hungry leaders. What's going on in the USA now is capitalism run amok, and it ain't pretty. I agree 100% with everyone who mentions that our politicians are now bought and paid for by whoever has the most $$ to "contribute" to their campaigns. The interests of the people are not represented at all, in spite of the wonderfully lofty language of our constitution. Until we get $$ completely out of politics, nothing is going to change. Write about that, Will, and pray people will listen.

all this blather about the greatest nation in the world
what pure absolute garbage

i'm so ashamed of this putrid place

good story, wm ... the posts reveal many have their own too.

as a viet vet i can't say thanks for your service to this generation of volunteer cannon fodder. i only want to say sorry for allowing the country to be stolen again by the liars and profiteers that send them at bargain basement prices while taxes paid by the working class pay private enterprise margins for all support functions with profits supplying $1 million bar/bat mitzvahs... war is indeed a racket ... unions and the end of the "righteous war" with a warrior president made the middle class, 40 hour work weeks and two-week paid vacations and the in'tl bankers and union busters want their peons back ...

usa rip
1776-1999

Great article. When I see articles like this, it re-instills hope in me that there are a growing number of people who will contribute to huge changes in the near future.

Don't heap too much praise on these union types. Remember it is they who consume state budgets the way cancer devours a host. It is local government unions, and education, police, fire, which keep bad people on good salaries with ultimate job security and perfect pensions - and all that drives up property taxes, first and last paid for by the citizenry.
Local union employees are corrupt. I live in New Jersey. I would know. We hired Chris Christie as governor to do something about it

Ridiculous William Rivers Pitt

I'll say the U.S. is: "Ridiculous. The whole thing, and in every way"! And I further say that this article and its praise and support for war criminals who are fighting in wars that are completely illegal and unconstitutional, with said wars being war crimes in and of themselves, is: "Ridiculous. The whole thing, and in every way"! To laud such war criminals as "heroes" when they are part and parcel of criminal wars, and therefore perpetrating war crimes, at minimum, simply by being a part of the mass-murder, obscene profit-making machine, is the ultimate in: "Ridiculous. The whole thing, and in every way"! Dear God, Pitt, you are getting worse and worse, and your unconscionable support for mass murderers, and complicity in mass-murder, makes absolutely no sense whatsoever! Considering what you know, one would think you would know better; but, on the contrary, and very sadly, madness is prevailing with the "sane", who preach some truth, but believe, promulgate and perpetuate the most asinine "rational" at the same time, as well! Inadvertent "rhyme and reason" intended, for the sake of LOL.

People who fight in completely unconstitutional and illegal wars for empire, wars of aggression which are "the supreme international crime", and those who are complicit in, and support and thank such craven, ignorant mass-murderers, are NOT heroes! They are the ultimate in braindead cowards and traitors! Me thinks you have been standing outside the bar you "bounce" for, and breathing the chemtrails, far too much, Pitt; because, as I alluded to, your reasoning is definitely compromised and getting worse; and you too appear to be going insane on the "express train to hell on earth" that I sometimes speak about. God help you, and God deliver us from all of this madness, including yours and the all of the madness of those like you! Unfortunately, you are a prime example of what the U.S. and the world are coming to. Complete insanity! Including the insanity of those like WRP who should know better! Where are the voices crying in the wilderness that do not compromise, at all, with evil?! Let them be heard in far greater abundance than the perpetuaters of mass-contradiction(s)!!...

...When I read such contradictory blather as this article perpetrates and perpetuates, I wonder if I too am going mad as a hatter, as WRP appears to be. Thank God, as many of the other comments here make clear, it isn't just me. Pray for deliverance from your "slough of despond", Pitt; and spare everyone the support of mass-insanity, especially the more gullible among us; for, without non-contradictory sanity prevailing, the people perish for lack of True Knowledge, and True Sanity to dispel, entirely, the darkness of perpetual war and mass-madness, and any and all support and/or complicity in same whatsoever, to prevent those who do so, and all those who listen to them, from joining the insanity and going down in flames...

Have you noticed??

In pop culture, the vampire has been reinvented as the good guy, the hero who gets the girl.
Edward Bernays would be so proud.

..
do not have such high rates of imprisonment -- such as higher than any other nation on the planet -- with large numbers of those imprisoned there for non-violent offenses, and most being members of minorities
do not permit homelessness or inadequate housing
do not permit their veterans to go without medical care, home health aide aides, or housing
do not permit economic circumstances that throw 35 million fellow citizens out of work

Pitt, Stop Confusing Capitalism With Corporatism. Jefferson - a true genius, educated in the crucible of the excesses of British Corporate Tyranny, wrote that banks are more of a threat to liberty than standing armies - and if we ever allow the control of credit and the issuance of currency into private hands, that the entities that grow up around them (the corporations) would eventually own everything, and our children and grandchildren would wake up landless and penniless.  So, on three occasions, private central banks HAVE taken over the US economy - the first two were defeated after great struggle - while the third - the Federal Reserve Bank, a privately owned corporation operating in secret - has almost completely looted the nation over the almost one hundred years since it's illegal formation, and now has the power of an unelected fourth branch of the government, in direct violation of our brilliant Constitution, which specifically reserves the control of money and credit
to the Congress.  Capitalism is not at fault.  And these writers who spout off about evil capitalism need to interview a few more people who have suffered great indignities to immigrate to the US to get away from the alternative forms of government - go to Miami, Pitt, interview a few Cubans - go to New York and interview a few Russians, go to the Gulf Coast and interview a few Vietnamese or go interview a few Indians - they would shame you for your shallow criticism of economic freedom if they were to read you.  Being free to start a business with your own raised capital is good, while granting corporate privilege (immunity from personal liability) to anyone who wants a corporation, and now granting unlimited campaign financing from corporations, is the problem - we didn't use to have this.  It is because we stopped following the plan of the Founding Fathers, who really were inspired geniuses laying the foundation for *Local* control, as much as possible.  Both the Dem and 'Pub parties are now just spending tools for the banks - by generating ever growing debt - by war or welfare, doesn't matter which one - the FRB owns us.  We are now in the corral and I can hear the gate swinging shut.  We have a choice - to wake up and drop the false Left/Right paradigm and come together and restore the Constitution and the Bill of Rights tattered by Liberal and Conservative administrations for decades, or we fall into what amounts to a very large Serfdom and live in the new Middle Ages.  Please read Web Of Debt, and also The Creature From Jekyll Island to gain a little better historical and economic background from which to write.
 

"America" is a continent, not a country.

Our young men and women are dying or being physically or psychologically wounded for the benefit of the military industrial complex, the corporations who profit from wars, the generals who earn stars, and the politicians who win election wrapping themselves up in the flag. In the meantime, the workers who built up this nation are being sold a bill of goods by corrupt union officials, corrupt politicians, and the corporations that use them.

America has always had the myth of being a nation where everyone is equal; well to paraphrase George Orwell -- everyone is equal but some are more equal than others.....

Please watch the following documentary which t is related to all of this, and is very important that everyone watch:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=NO24XmP1c5E&NR=1&feature=fvwp