What Obama Really Meant Was ...

[HomerRamone]

by Chris Hedges

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/what_obama_really_meant_was_20140119

I will propose turning over the storage of all your data to a third party, perhaps a private corporation. This will offer you no protection, but it should provide a good government contract to one of my major campaign donors.

The cosmetic reforms I’m proposing today will, I hope, give the American people greater confidence that their rights are being protected, even as our intelligence and law enforcement agencies, along with our courts, continue to eviscerate those rights. I recognize that there are additional issues that require further debate, such as your constitutional right to halt the wholesale capturing and storing of your personal information and correspondence and evidence of your geographical movements. But don’t expect me to help. I sold out long ago.

The bottom line is that people around the world, regardless of their nationality, can be assured that the United States follows everything they do or say. It does not matter if they are ordinary people or foreign leaders. I am not going to apologize for monitoring the communications of friends and allies. We know what we are doing. We know why this is important. The effects of declining incomes for working men and women, the massive debt peonage that keeps people trapped, the slashing of government assistance programs, the chronic, long-term unemployment, and the effects of climate change will eventually trigger volatile unrest. We are ready. The likelihood of totalitarianism no longer comes from fascism or communism. It comes from corporations. Corporations, for which I work, fear those who think and write and speak out and form relationships freely. Individual freedom impedes their profits. And the surveillance system I am protecting today is designed to keep these corporations in power.

Our democracy is a fiction. We seek to maintain this fiction to keep you passive. Should you wake up, we will not shy away from draconian measures. I believe we can meet high expectations. Together, let us chart a way forward that secures your complete subjugation, the iron rule of our corporations and our power elite—at least until we make the planet wholly uninhabitable—while we continue to snuff out the liberties that once made our nation worth fighting for.

[1000words]

1. Hedges nails it!

Rec

[PowerToThePeople]

2. Damn Chris! Way to pull back the curtain... n/t

[BelgianMadCow]

5. The coup already happened

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1269539

[Demo_Chris]

3. Well said. But Chris, Corporatism IS fascism. nt

[Scuba]

4. Bingo!

[bvar22]

6. WOW.

I just posted essentially the same thing to another thread in GD by Liberal Ernesto,
though Chris Hedges says it so much better:


"We are not the enemy. Or are we?"
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024363179

Because the current transfer of the Nation's Wealth to the 1% is unsustainable,
and when the Working Class & The Poor realize how badly they have been fucked by BOTH Political Parties aiding the pillaging for the 1%,
a lot of people are going to be very, very angry.
The Working Class & The Poor ARE their enemy.

So far, the Propaganda Campaign presenting the illusion that America is a divided country
Democrats vs Republicans.... Red Team vs Blue Team.... is successful,
but that won't last forever.

More and MORE are waking up the the fact that it is the 1% vs All the rest of us.

When THAT reaches a Critical Mass,
the 1% hopes that the Security/Surveillance State will protect them and their money.
That is WHY both RICH Republicans and RICH Democrats are very busy working together to build and arm that weapon.

It may work, but I hope not.
I probably won't be alive to see that confrontation,
but my Working Class Soul will be with those who Stand Up and say,
"We have had enough. Fuck you."


There IS "hope".
Many nations in Latin America have wrested their governments from the hands of the 1%.
They have achieved successful, near bloodless Ballot Box Revolutions.
Many of these countries dealt with Police State Governments and completely owned Media too.
They have given us the Blue Print.

When the American Working Class & Poor realize WE have more in common with each other
than we have in common with the 1% and their Mouth Pieces in Washington,
THEN we can have "change" too.

VIVA Democracy!
I pray we get some here soon.

---bvar22

I hope there is a lot of that kind of thinking going around.

[WillyT]

7. Yep... K & R !!!

[DeSwiss]

8. K&R

[Joe Shlabotnik]

9. K&R

Well done Mr. Hedges.