Do you ever get the feeling that there's a giant chessboard and we're not even on the board?

[Sanity Claws]

I was very disheartened by Tuesday's results. A lot of rambling thoughts have followed me around while I try to make sense of what happened.
I'm in NY and was stuck voting for Cuomo whom I truly dislike. He is every bit of a corporate lackey as the Republicans. Why are we as Democrats left with candidates like that?
Elections occur to make appear that we have a choice. But we really don't. It's just bad or worse. Slow death or fast death -- it's still death.
Who/what is putting the pieces on the board that we are supposed to choose from? We are off the board and The Powers That Be decide who/what is on the board. Do we pick black or white? Do we pick Republican or Democratic?
All morning I've been thinking about what is called the Deep State or something like that. It gave us Judith Miller. It gives us propaganda disguised as news.
Who is the Deep State? How do we distinguish it from the chess pieces on the board? BTW, I think Obama is just a chess piece.
How do we take power away from them?

Maybe I need to take some of those magical mushrooms someone else posted about to figure this out. Pass the "srooms, please."

[cantbeserious]

1. The Oligarchs, Corporations And Banks Own And Control The Politicians That Own And Control Us

eom

[Sanity Claws]

2. But who are they?

Many within the corporations and banks are just pawns. Lawyers and MBAs are tools, pawns of The Powers That Be. They are expendable. Many in the corporations and banks are expendable.
I'm not sure that even the top level of corporations and banks are The Powers That Be. They attain their positions because they are useful to the one with the real power.

[cantbeserious]

25. 300 Hundred Or So Wealthiest People In The World

eom

[RKP5637]

3. Here's a start!

http://www.kochwatch.org/2014/09/30/koch-central-bank-freedom-partners-distributed-millions-in-dark-money-in-2013/

[Sanity Claws]

4. But they put one side of the pieces on the board,

not both. Right?
Why is the other side of the board so limited in its options?
Why do all the media spout the same propaganda?

[hedda_foil]

19. No. They lay out both sides. We are pawns at best.

[RKP5637]

23. Many Americans are deluded into thinking they have choice. What a cruel joke.

They need to pull back the curtain and see what is going on.

[RKP5637]

22. That's what I always wonder too, is there another side? For the media, it's

all the same, all corporate owned, 6 companies control just about all of the media in the US. Here are some charts.

http://www.businessinsider.com/these-6-corporations-control-90-of-the-media-in-america-2012-6

[Baitball Blogger]

5. The world is a three dimensional chess game and

political strategists have insured that you never move your pieces from the bottom board.

[Sanity Claws]

6. But who are these political strategists and how did they get there?

How do we take power away from them?

[Baitball Blogger]

8. Easy peasey, actually.

Look for the sources of inequality and be unforgiving in your criticism when you find disparities. And don't ever let anyone convince you that the end justifies the means.

You have people, organizations and communities who exist above the daily complications that slows down ordinary individuals. Their realities are different than the ones we're exposed to. Some of these worlds are more obvious to see than others. Wall Street, for example, provides a good living for a privileged culture. To talk to anyone who has a son or daughter working in a bond company, or in the stock market, their reality is completely different than someone who makes a living anywhere else in the country. You do get the feeling that life is much facilitated by their environment--and it's based on privilege and favoritism.

[Sanity Claws]

9. Many on Wall Street are pawns

who will be tossed after they are no longer useful. Same for lawyers and many corporate officers.
Think about what you wrote, ""Wall Street provides a good living for a privileged culture." The ones working on Wall Street are by and large tools. They try to partake in the riches by helping the privileged but they themselves are mere tools. They are just cogs in a wheel. They are not the wheel or the ones who control the wheel.

[Baitball Blogger]

11. Willing pawns.

Temptations in a capitalist culture are everywhere, and there are people who have adapted and willingly, sell their souls, happy to be cogs in a wheel that will run over people that are less fortunate than they are.

I don't feel sorry for them. They are only making things more difficult for the rest of us. Many of them feel they have a right to make a living, and do not at all feel victimized by their very well compensated choices.

[Sanity Claws]

12. I agree with you

But the question is who are the real powers that be and how do we deprive them of this power over us?

[Baitball Blogger]

20. It was easier when the Democrats had the power to apply a 90%

tax rate on them.

At least then, the government could rectify some of the social ills that these abusive situations create.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

26. Kobeyashi Maru it.

(My spelling might be off).

In the 'Star Trek' series, Captain Kirk was supposedly the only Star Fleet Captain to survive a war game simulation that was designed to be unsurviveable. How? He cheated.

If you play the game they hand you, by their rules, you just can't win. It's not designed to allow you (or any of us peasants) to win.

The only way to 'win' is to find ways to change the rules in ways that start moving power into OUR hands, rather than those of 'representatives' who don't have much interest in representing us.

[840high]

7. Yes - we're the pawns.

[Capt.Rocky300]

10. We're not on the board because we are the board.

[Sanity Claws]

14. Continuing with this analogy,

how do we the board prevent the powers that be from determining what pieces get placed on the board and how they are moved around?

[bigwillq]

13. Obama keeps hogging the chessboard

[Sanity Claws]

15. Obama is like one of the Kings.

He is a figurehead to be captured but by himself can only move one space at a time.

[bigwillq]

16. Ooh, I like that.

Good job.

[woo me with science]

17. That's what sham democracy means. That's what oligarchy is.

The two parties are both working for corporate America, and they are working together against us.

Third Way=Wall Street infiltration of the Democratic Party.

It's time to recognize that our government no longer has two parties, really. It's full of corporatists pretending to be Republicans and Democrats. United oligarchy, not democracy. Reject every post telling you that Democrats are "timid." They are doing exactly what they are paid to do.

The One Percent and their purchased politicians in both parties keep power, because they dupe us into believing we still operate within the old democratic system. They keep us busy with Red vs. Blue sham elections, in which both sides are actually corporatists who fight for the very same direction of policy.

The only way to fix it is to stop humoring the con game. Stop rallying around party, teach America what oligarchy really means, and unite on POLICY....unite on what actually needs to be done to fix this corruption. That means teaching and rallying the entire nation...not just Republicans and not just Democrats....to demand corporate money and power out of our elections and government.

[RKP5637]

24. Very well said IMO!!! n/t

[sendero]

29. Anyone that doesn't understand...

.. that this ^^^^^ is HOW IT IS is out of touch with reality.

[hootinholler]

18. Not really, but I do think there's a giant cheeseboard

AND we are on it.

[treestar]

21. More hopelessness

Let's sit around and be victims.

[woo me with science]

27. We are like mere dogs trying to understand the Internet.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=2671211

The implementation of a corporate authoritarian state is clearly a necessary incremental step in the long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long. long, long journey toward a liberal, compassionate future.

They can't tell us people with limited smartness why, though. It's a secret.

[CJCRANE]

28. I agree with the post that said we are the board.

Or at least we are the pieces on the board.

The PTB use the mass media and the mass social media to try to make the pieces move around the board in the way they want them (us) to move.

(Of course there might not be just one PTB but maybe several playing against each other).

The PTB can't get their way unless we do what they want us to do, like believe their propaganda, fight wars for them, give away our freedoms, give away our labor rights etc. etc.

The MSM demonizes strong political leaders because when a community or a country has a strong leader that makes it harder for corporations to take over everything.

So that's why in the west we see leaders like President Obama, David Cameron and Francois Hollande, who start off as populist leaders but somehow morph into something else. Not to mention full-on neocon stooges like Stephen Harper and Tony Abbott who are now showing their true colors.

And the ever expanding free trade treaties help to take away sovereignty from nation states, thus taking away our democratic control of our own economies.

[Cha]

30. We keep plowing ahead like we did in 2000 for 8 fucking years.. and Never Ever Give Up.. like

Robert Kennedy said, Sanity Claws..

“Few will have the greatness to bend history itself, but each of us can work to change a small portion of events. It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.”

DemocratSinceBirth http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=5787369

I know that was hard voting for Cuomo.. my sister is a teacher in NY and she's not feelin the love.

[Chathamization]

31. New Yorkers had a choice. Teachout ran against Cuomo and most people chose not to vote one way or

another. The majority of the few who did choose to vote chose Cuomo. Sure, that means most people made a bad choice (cue the chorus of "stop blaming the voters!" "it's time to realize that people don't like what Teachout was selling!&quot , but it was the choice people made nonetheless.

We get the government we choose, even if our choice is "I'm too lazy to show up so whoever other people choose is fine." Progressive candidates often just don't have enough people showing up and voting for them. They're supposed supporters here go around telling people that primaries are meaningless, that all the candidates are the same, that the game is rigged, and that there's no actual choice in the voting booth. That certainly doesn't seem to help progressive voter turnout.