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Gore's territory mostly encompassed those citizens living in government-owned tenements and living off various forms of government welfare...' Olson believes the United States is now somewhere between the 'complacency and apathy' phase of Professor Tyler's definition of democracy, with some forty percent of the nation's population already having reached the 'governmental dependency' phase.
Er, this ignores the contribution of the big corporate headquarters and universities in the cities. These are the wealthy, liberal powerbrokers...
Fraud or not, there is a lot of truth to what was originally posted. We are somewhere between 6 and 7 on that list. The culture is crumbling around us. It is just a matter of time before we get a couple more liberal activist judges on the SCOTUS that will wipe out what is left of the U.S. Constition and Bill of Rights. The mob will applaud as it happens. I am actually an optimistic person by nature, but I am also very concerned about the direction we are heading.
They said that rock and roll would never die. Well, maybe it hasn’t. But it sure doesn’t sound anything like it did in the beginning.
I have seen this type of things going back decades. I don’t think it makes political converts, presented with the tone it uses.
For instance, claiming 40 percent are on the dole, lumps together widely different types of situations.
And when your objective is to make persuasive arguments, you shouldn’t leave gaping holes in your argument. The ones on the dole, include seniors who have paid into FICA for decades—yet this writer would lump them together with crack whores collecting welfare.
And then don’t miss on the benefits to corporations, through such goodies as farm subsidies, depletion allowances, etc.
It’s a Conservative forum again? That’s a relief.
I would contend that this is at best an incomplete statement.
No information is given about how starting and ending dates are calculated. But note that he references "civilizations," not governments.
On that basis the Roman civilization lasted almost a thousand years till the Western Empire fell, and almost another thousand till the Eastern Empire collapsed. That's close on 2,000 years of continuous Roman civilization.
The Chinese have had major interruptions and modifications to their system, but a unique continuous Chinese civilization with a great many characteristics in common throughout, can be traced back at least 3,000 years.
The same, although not quite as long, can be claimed for Japanese civilization.
The Maya civilization started sometime before 200, and was still plugging along, although somewhat tattered, when the Spanish arrived. That's 1300 years plus.
Andean civilization apparently goes back several thousand years before Christ. While it's probably wrong to call this a single civilization, it had strong elements of continuity throughout.
Heck, look at England. It's present government is just a continuous evolution from the one installed in 1066, and it's not been conquered by an exterior invader in all that time.
I will accept as a given what others have said about the words... As to the meaning of them- I am very concerned about the fact that about half the pop does NOT pay income taxes, yet votes more for the rest of us that do. There is little to say about the character of Americans in comparison to previous ones- much of what shapes us is what circumstances we are born into. Even the poor of today are rich in many ways. We don’t have a draft anymore. Social Security & Medicare take care of our old, instead of their families. I could go on and on. There is something inherently unfair about our tax system. Many of our problems spring from it. The other big threat from govt per se is the constant stream of well-intentioned legislation and regulation shoved at us - the War on Drugs, the War on Terror to name two, with many of the same problems - we frequently have to prove our innocence to this once small Federal govt of ours. Really, there aren’t that many problems the Feds can fix. They try to do too much, and when they fail, they take more money to try harder.
Ping!
Jesus is the way the Truth and the light....nothing else amounts to a hill of beans....LOL! I cannot believe I remembered that!
Huh? What does this mean? Most "counties" I know number their populations in the thousands to tens of thousands, not hundreds of millions.
Is it "number of counties"? And if it is, why can't the professor say so?
Even if we don't, the time is not much extended. Look how fast the UK is sinking.
Bump!
I'd put us about here:
7. From apathy to dependence
"We are not a democracy!"
and if we held true to our foundations we would not have gotten into this mess."
Ironically, a rat President could never get this done because the GOP could unite in "loyal opposition"... On the other hand, a scumbag like McCain COULD get it done, with the help of just a few friendly "moderate" Republicans.
Here are some quotes by Ludwig Von Mises, the "dean of the Austrian school of economics," expressing much the same concept.
"There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion. The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as a result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved."
"Credit expansion can bring about a temporary boom. But such a fictitious prosperity must end in a general depression of trade, a slump."
"True, governments can reduce the rate of interest in the short run. They can issue additional paper money. They can open the way to credit expansion by the banks. They can thus create an artificial boom and the appearance of prosperity. But such a boom is bound to collapse soon or late and to bring about a depression."
"Credit expansion is not a nostrum to make people happy. The boom it engenders must inevitably lead to a debacle and unhappiness."
"What is needed for a sound expansion of production is additional capital goods, not money or fiduciary media. The credit boom is built on the sands of banknotes and deposits. It must collapse."
"If the credit expansion is not stopped in time, the boom turns into the crack-up boom; the flight into real values begins, and the whole monetary system founders."
Howdy, ImpBill. Please ping me when y’all start talking about remedy. Not talking about band-aids. Thanks.
We are in deep chit, that’s for sure.
Look around. This is exactly where we're headed!