Agreed.

(Even though you were kidding :P )

Many of the things that were used as examples of American superiority over the Russians we now do and no one bats an eyelash. I wouldn't break out the champagne just yet.

Anyone who thinks that anarchy is in any way desirable deserves it.

I don't know what the Russians have to do with anything. That discussion was about human rights for people with black skin. Nothing's perfect, but I'd be hard pressed to consider the U.S. more racist in the 2010's (with a President that has black skin) compared to the 1960's with, well, you know. So I would say the fact that the black population has equality under the law already makes the 2010's better than the 60's. For everyone.
Thanks. I'm listening to one hit wonder Spacehog's song "In the Meantime" to get myself all psyched up for it.

I do agree that "struggling to survive" is a pretty ridiculous thing to say about my fat, wealthy nation. People living on government assistance here live better than most of the world does.

That said, are we killing the middle class? Yes. Are we letting corporations run the country? Yes. Are we heading toward censorship and Orwellian control? Yes. Is a revolution coming? Probably not for a long time, given our complacency and ambivalence. All THAT said though, are we much different from a lot of other Western countries right now? Probably not. All I read about on international news sites is the imminent collapse of half of Europe.

I honestly think all of capitalist, Western society has been stretched too thin and is struggling to stay upright at the moment. It's leading to a lot of strife and a lot of issues, but I think in the end we will weather it. I mean, what is the alternative really? Communism is much worse and has been proven a failure. Anarchy is a ridiculous notion. In the end we will go on as best we can and still live lives better than the majority of the world does and personally I can't complain much about that.

I say we go back to Monarchy.

At least then there's no allusions of what we get. The crazy and dictatorship will be right there at the front for all to see.

Once again, StingingVelvet, you speak complete sense.

Oh cool, by a single metric life is better than 50 years ago, here's a single metric (aka anecdote) to counter your (rather randomly selected) metric:

"Papers Please", yep, we used to be really proud of travel in the US without restriction and people a mere 30 years ago would have been appalled at the TSA, border searches, and the like. We used to verbally castigate the Russians about needing travel permits and having to show ID everywhere.

So, my anecdote cancels out yours, apparently the US is no better or worse than in 1960.


As many capitalist regimes have fallen as communist ones (probably more). I think you should quit calling it a "proven failure".

Would you want to live in any of the communist countries still going?

In general I agree, with exceptions for particularly dangerous criminals and particularly complicated investigations. But such proceedings should be case by case and definitely not normal.

This (not meant as a personal offense) is what I think is a real problem in the country. I think that if we could even have ANY dialogue about alternatives, about drastic changes, about new methods of working, owning wealth, and running a government I think it would be a good thing. The way things are now we as Americans refuse to even talk about an alternative because we believe that all other options are shit because they haven't worked historically or seem too far fetched. I am not saying switch to socialism or communism immediately, but being able to have a discussion (even a current-level-political shitty non-real discussion) about communism, socialism, anarchism, whatever else would be a step forward in my opinion.

I meant that they can have their trial, but there are times when the speedy part isn't in the interest of justice.

As for habeas corpus, that can be suspended, there's a specific constitutional provision for that.
Keep government's hands off my medicare. I think you'll see the same blatant hypocrisy in other areas when it comes to conservatives. They mostly want theirs and to hell with everybody else. Few if any of them have the integrity to turn down the help when they're eligible.

To answer the topic question. No, not yet. And I stress the not yet part. We're certainly heading in that direction, but I think if we try that we can actually get somewhere.

Well, to start off, the people. I think we forgot a lot of basic things that people no take for granted, basic pleasantries that have been ignored are kind of frustrating.

I also see a major difference that got twisted. My family members used to work really hard for one job for almost all of their lives, and were treated well (and I'm sure this was the same for others as well). I guess someone somewhere got in their minds that they could take advantage of this, and a general feeling of apathy came over the middle class that we couldn't really get out of where we were, and that things were always going to be the same.

Maybe it also got twisted, because it feels like there are people who defend horrid business practices because these companies are so large and influential (look at places like Walmart)

Our biggest problem though, I think, was how at one point, you felt like you might not agree with everything that your fellows were saying about how the country was run, but you could understand the idea that at points you needed to put the good of all above petty choices. Nowadays...it seems like people don't care as long as they can get their way. They don't care about the greater good, they care more about their own space.

And yes, I believe that you can afford to focus on the greater good without limiting people to castes, or forcing people to give up their individuality and freedoms. But maybe I'm the naive one, thinking that we can really work together to push ourselves farther then we would get alone.

I would agree in the sense that we are so afraid of communism we avoid talking about socialist policies that could really improve our standard of living without compromising freedom. The obvious example would be socialized medicine, which I do strongly believe in. The media and conservatives have everyone fearing that shit means the government will take your house and kill your grandma.

I don't think communism or anarchy are realistic solutions though, and should therefore probably be left out of the conversation for practicality's sake if nothing else.