I think Bush has corrupted all our institutions beyond repair.

[Veggie Meathead]

His very first act was to compromise the integrity of our electoral process.He then coopted the willing stooges on the Supreme Court to validate his election and deny Al Gore his rightful election to the presidency.He was asleep at the switch ( my most charitable interpretation)on 9/11 and stonewalled all calls for an impartial investigation into that event.During the elections of 2002 many of the crucial elections were compromised by the electronic balloting
frauds.His economic policies are a continuing scandal with the budget and trade deficits at astronomical highs.His invasion of Iraq on trumped up pretexts received a go ahead from a Congress that was deceived by him.He has used the threats of terrorism as a way to browbeat the Congress and the Press with a few notable exceptions.

If we thought this was accomplished by a mesmerizing orator or a war hero, it could be understood as the failings of any nation.But here we are at the dawn of the twenty first century led by a crass,lying and uneducable fraud who may very well be planning another terrorist act to secure another term after stealing the first.Is this nation that gave birth to some of the wisest minds the world has ever known
permanently jinxed? What have we done to deserve this fate?

[Kenergy]

1. Well said!

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

2. We got...

Dumber-Than-A-Ditchcarp Lazy. No kidding.

[Disturbed]

7. Multi Party System.

The two dominant parties have been co-opted by US Corps and Multi-Corps. It's the "Power corupts" concept. The USA has been a Plutocracy for many years. The Neo Fascists are more agressive in siezing power than the Dems. The Media is in the hands of a few Corps that also reap profits from the Military Industrial Complex. Neo Fascism has taken hold. Will their grip be impossible to losen?

[Kanary]

8. Yet, we the people still keep selecting representation by corporation.

I guess we have to learn the hard way?

[J Williams]

3. Not beyond repair

I understand your concern, and it's certainly valid given all that Bush & Company have done.

However, it's not beyond repair. Not by a long shot. Don't lose faith in the people, because even though many gullible people have been deceived and misled, it won't be for too much longer. The truth will prevail. As soon as I have permission to start my own thread, I'll tell you how.

[glitch]

5. Welcome to DU! I like your optimism

Can't wait to hear what you have to say.

[Veggie Meathead]

11. Welcome to DU! I want to share your optimism because I too

have faith in our people and our Constitution.But,I think the fact that Bush still commands the support of 40% or more of our electorate make sme think that even if Bush is removed from power, his allies in government, media and corporate power structures with all the vast power at their command will find another stooge to deny the people their rightful voice.And because no act or statement is too low if it wins and maintains them in power I believe our Democracy is jinxed.
I am awaiting your post because like you I want to believe that power in our democracy is vested in the people.

[J Williams]

20. See my new thread: Of, By and For the People?

It says what I really want to say.

[Veggie Meathead]

21. I just saw your thread and am not clear how a different system

that truly disperses power to the common people can be implemented.Please explain.

[salinen]

4. And used his payed-for

(publically owned) media to cheerlead.

[DemoTex]

6. 'Twas the PNAC plan. He is their boy.

Four more years of Bu$h and PNAC will dismantle the USA as we knew it in 2000.

What have we done to deserve this fate? Good question. Damn good question. We are a stupid nation. We are not intellectually curious. We are slovenly. We cower before the religiously insane and the ultra-right hate mongers. It's about as bad as it gets, but it keeps getting worse.

[amber dog democrat]

9. If enough decent and thoughtful people get involved,

this can be reversed. I am not saying when but I honestly believe it is going to get a whole lot worse before this happens. Tighten your seat belts in the meantime.

[DemoTex]

12. Agreed

That's why we are here on DU tonight (IMHO). I used to joke that "things would be different after the revolution." What we are experiencing now (the illegal invasion of Iraq, for example) is a second neo-con/PNAC revolution or coup. The first was the Clinton inquisition. That was the bloodless coup. This coup is far from bloodless as evidenced in Iraq. Our day will come. I don't knit but sometimes I do feel like Madame Defarge. I truly feel that our revolution will be a landslide in November. The Bu$h regime looks like they are thinking that too. Look for them to get more desperate. If they steal this election, then ... see you in the streets my friend.

[amber dog democrat]

15. I'll be there.

You can count on it. The risks for the bush camp are staggering. They MUST play for all the marbles and for keeps. Its like their souls have already been sold to the guy in the red union suit. Winning is their only option.

[Kanary]

10. Add "judgemental" to "lazy", and that about sums it up.

I've been talking to many, many people who are "comfortable", and yet they can't be bothered to even take part in primary elections, and have a say in who represents them.

Yet, there is so much criticism of poor folk for not participating, even though they have been ignored and abandoned by both parties, time after time. It's OK to judge those who have been stepped on and ignored, but those who are lazy get pandered to. Amazing.

Kanary

[indepat]

13. By buying into the far right's propaganda, its duplicitous double speak,

its mendaciousness, its reichous, hypocritical, and sanctimonious religiosity, just for starters, and its approach to the war on crime and the war on drugs, its seeming determination to have every weaker government on the planet overthrown if its politics are not right, its willingness to raid the treasury for sprinkling on the most affluent and large corporations, its willingness to destroy the environment for corporate gain, its willingness to implement highly regressive tax schemes, again for just a few starters: If we deserve this fate, it's because tens of millions of voters who are adversely impacted by the policies of the far right nonetheless vote them into office

[Selwynn]

14. Sadly, our institutions were corrupted a long time ago

[Robbien]

16. The fact that BushCo twists arms to make corporations

put "their" men on the company boards was an eyeopener. With the BushCo appointed board members on PBS we now get Carlson and all the BushCo approved shows bumping off non-partisan shows. Now with this arm-twisting non-political corporations are now having to toe the BushCo line.

BushCo corporatism is being implanted into every industry and foundation. Hopefully Kerry will stop this. A Democratic senate will definately stop it.

[Cleita]

17. Well, we did steal a continent away from the original residents.

Maybe it's karma calling, or maybe it's a wake-up call for us to replace the institutions he has corrupted with new ones. Remember when the Roman Empire became corrupt and dissolute, Christianity made inroads basically ruining the Emperor's claim to be a god. I'm all for forming new institutions alongside the corrupt ones and letting the bad ones die from the disease they were infected with.

[Minstrel Boy]

18. No - Bush arose because the institutions are inherently corrupt.

Bush merely holds their corruptions in the starkest relief against their hollow promise.

[Veggie Meathead]

19. If Bush is showing up the corrupted nature of our institutions for

what they are, are we complicit in his misdeeds ( or atleast those 40 odd perecnt of us who still support him)?

[Disturbed]

22. Guessing.

In my view a small % of the people that support the Neo Fascists actually know what the Neo Fascists have done and are planning on doing. Most are ignorant of how the Neo Fascists are destroying the environment, the Middle Class, and liberty.

[Minstrel Boy]

23. I don't think so, because their success depends on

maintaining the illusion of representative government. And the illusion is supported by both the institutions, including corporate media, and the misinformed goodwill of many Americans, who take great comfort from it.

[Veggie Meathead]

25. I think you have correctly termed it the illusion of representative

government.The fact that he stole the Presidency and followed it up by
stealing several crucial elections to control the senate and the House
tells us that he wants to maintain the fiction that he is a legitimately elected leader of our government.He is clearly aided in the maintenance of this myth by the rubber stamp Congress that he now controls and the Press which, for all intents and purposes, is now his propaganda tool.

But the core of his thinking is revealed in BUSH AT WAR by Bob Woodward.He is quoted by Woodward as saying " Everything would be so much easier if this weere a dictatorship, with me being the dictator".This is the arrogance and sense of entitlement that Robert Byrd correctly equated with the megalomania of George III. On another occassion, when a reporter prefaced his question with the phrase " I think" Bush said "Who cares what you think?".This is the leader of a supposed democracy and his contempt for ordinary people shines through in that single sentence.

Even though many previous presidents were also controlled by moneyed plutocracts, Bush is the first one, in my opinion ,who blatantly displays a contempt for our institutions that was missing in the previous office holders.In this, as you say, he has thrown the corruption of our representative government in stark relief.

[Minstrel Boy]

27. The mask is truly off with Bush.

I've thought a lot since 2000 of what Frank Zappa said:

"The illusion of freedom will continue as long as it's profitable to continue the illusion. At the point where the illusion becomes too expensive to maintain, they will just take down the scenery, they will pull back the curtains, they will move the tables and chairs out of the way, and you will see the brick wall at the back of the theatre."

Bush's radical contempt for democratic institutions has helped many people to see the brick wall that's been there all the time.

[Veggie Meathead]

30. How appropriate! Frank Zappa in that one sentence has shown

more intelligence and understanding of our institutions than all the paid performers of our press.

[jukes]

24. corporate oligarchic republic

fascism is not the goal. world wide corporate feudalism.

[BillZBubb]

26. Well, that's pretty close to fascism!

I don't know how you could get any closer than corporate oligarchic republic.

[walldude]

28. While I don't think we are "beyond repair"

I don't believe that we as a nation are going to "fix" things anytime soon. It's going to take an entire generation before we are out of this mess. I do think that if Bush manages to get into office again he may take it beyond repair. I saw a blog awhile back citing the ages and tenures of the current Supreme Court Justices, there are 3 or 4 judges who probably won't make it past the next 4 years. Which means if Bush get's to appoint even 2 justices the balance of the Supreme Court will tip far to the right and Bush will be in a position to roll back 100 years of progress. If for no other reason, we at least need Kerry to make sure the court stays balanced.

[Skip Intro]

29. Its like he (or his puppetmasters) is trying to break our government

as in smash it to the floor, smash it into peices

I've thought this for a while now

this regime has seemingly grasped our democracy on all sides, and has shaken it, and slammed it, and spun it around so fast - forced so much through its intricate vessels so fast that the result is a weaker, running on empty and shuddering America that miraculously has held on - at least so far.

Its like the bush gang is trying to overload, overheat and undersupply this great mechanism we know simply as our country.

We are weaker at home, weaker abroad, technically bankrupt (if this were my budget, I'd not only be bankrupt, I'd be in jail). On every front, we have taken huge hits at the hands of this gang. Its hard to believe its not by design.

I honestly, deep in my heart, hold little hope that my America will survive another four years of this power and greed mad regime. Hell, the thought that they'll stil be in power for six months scares the hell out of me. I really wonder where their loyalties truly lie.

[Veggie Meathead]

31. That all the things you describe have happened so fast is what

surprises me the most.I am sure that the foundations for this total devastation of our government were laid during the Clinton administration by what Hillary Clinton correctly identified as a Vast Right Wing Conspiracy.After the past three and half years of what one can only call a fascist dictatorship, the America that I have known all my life appears to be on life support if not dead.Eveen my friends from Europe and Asia during their visists here on business tell me how coming to America has become a chore for them instead of the pleasure they used to get in previous times.They laugh at our pretensions of being the greatest democracy the world has ever known,when we cannot see through the transparent lies of a man who cannot string two coherent sentences together.

We have fallen so far so fast.Unless we have courageous and truthful men who can rescue us from this uncontrollable descent to oblivion, we are doomed.