Don't beat yourself up. You were betrayed by those you trusted to honor and fulfill their oaths of office. While you were working hard and pursuing the American Dream, they slowly became a new ruling class. An oligarchy that quietly chipped away at the foundations of your freedoms and the pillars of the American way of life.
Sure, they openly pissed you off from time to time, but that was no reason to storm the Bastille and overthrow the bastards. Surely, they weren't intentionally selling the store behind our backs! No, we could just vote them out when they went soft, or voted the wrong way too many times. Nothing to be alarmed about.
I'm sure that you (like many of us here) only realized the depth and breadth of their real intentions when the Democrats took over Congress in 2007. It was then that we began to see them push the Socialist pedal to the metal, and sprint toward the finish line.
And with the election of The Won, they turned on the turbo booster in a mad dash to Utopia. That's when we all woke up in horror.
But in a way, it's a good thing. They woke up the sleeping giant, who's now fully awake and on full tactical alert. I think history will show that this is the moment when the leftists blew it.
Well FRiend, for some of us it came a lot earlier. Having read the link @ post 29, for some it may have been the early 60's.
Point is, the economic destruction of America was my first step toward the smelling salts. In 92, Geo H.W. seemed too establishment for me, B.J. Clinton gained popularity way too fast (no internet then to learn about he and Hillary's past), so I joined the Perot bandwagon (again, mostly on economic terms). If he hadn't of withdrawn late summer of that year, he might have won.
Sure enough, one of the first major pieces of legislation that came up in 93 was NAFTA. Fought tooth and nail against getting that passed. The only way to "communicate" with the masses was Letters to the Editor of the local. I wrote dozens. Wore down the editor too, in a editorial just before the NAFTA vote, he meekly admitted the bill was a "weak patchwork quilt" of new rules and regulations, but hey, we want Mexico's standard of living to raise up....even playing field... world-class competition.... [yeah, where are you now]. Even Rush Windbag was in the NAFTA camp. All opposition silenced by a collective yawn from the electorate, or so I thought.
After the astounding victory of the '94 "Republican Revolution" there was a glimmer of hope. GATT loomed. B.J. Clinton called an "emergency session" of congress after the November election. The ratbastard lame-duck democrats who had been voted out - voted for GATT. Ratified by the Senate. That day, moments after watching the traitors final vote on C-SPAN, I flipped over to the the local ABC affiliate. Within MINUTES, Peter Jennings smirked about the passage of GATT ... but it was far overshadowed by the "news" of the day: Jeffery Dahmer had been beaten to death in prison. That's all the sheeple cared about on that day. We handed over our sovereignty of trade negotiations to a world body, that would never ever find in favor of the U.S. -- say goodbye to tariffs and hello higher taxes. It's been a downward spiral ever since. Macro-economic policies take a good 10 years or so to have an effect on the economy (fast forward to 2004 - empty factories abound).
A good pastor at a church I attended in the late 90's warned of the moral decay that loomed on the horizon [here we are]. By then I found this website. Thank God! Others were awake as well! Then the towers came down. A bittersweet hope that more would awaken. Some did. But at that time I backed off FR as it seemed to become an altar to the Rushbots and anything W.
My hope now is that enough people are finally waking up en masse. This Obamacare is hitting them directly in the pocketbook. Some still can't believe they've been lied to. It's a natural reaction to most any trauma -
first step is denial.
Then anger.
Then bargaining.
Then depression.
Then acceptance. Or, if we're lucky, the people will decide this is NOT the America we want.