What Has Happened to Our Great Country?

It hasn't been this tough to be an American since the days of Carter. Its probably not that bad yet, but its the lowest I've felt about America since.

Carter was an extension of the depression (mood, not economic) of the Vietnam war, and as such, Reagan thankfully lead us out of it.  But that was it.  Since then, we did have the 90s when we had randy clinton, but a republican congress to check him (so foreign policy suffered, but the economy thrived).  Since then, we have been told we are all bad again, and there has been no strong leader to stand up to the cancer of liberalism. 

I have not lost hope there will be another, and that is why the bad tasting medicine of Obama is necessary.  If we do not get it out of our systems now, it will fester and grow.  If Obama does not cure us, then we are doomed.  Already they are talking about pulling our AAA rating. From there, it is a quick slide into a stagnant economy that will be hard to pull out of.  Europe had America to help them out of their stagnation.  America has no one to lead them out.

 We should probably buy our language learning software now doc. I predict a need for Mandarin Chinese.

Nah, let's just take over Hawaii and declare it as our own independent nation.

That one has been taken.  However, I hear Guam is available.

to answer your question...Apathy from the people and corruption from the government. 

Would you all like some imported cheese with that Whine????????????????????????

You should look up Friedman's "Next hundred years". There is a very insightful analysis on the economical cycles the USA went through, which begins with a revolutionary economical solution with a "breakthrough president" that eventually becomes the very problem of your economy and ends with a "failed presidency" that tries the old solution to the problem while having no effect. Eventually, a new "breakthrough president" will come around and save your country, until the next problem hits (provoked by the solution to the previous problem).

A good example of Failed/Breakthrough presidencies would be Grant/Hayes, Hoover/Roosevelt and Carter/Reagan.

Hoover's failed solution was to increase taxes on companies, doing company incentives and easy access to financing. Roosevelt simply boosted the population's capacity to consume, favoring internal consumption.

Carter's problem was the lack of effeciency and competitivity of the USA. He tried to do Roosevelt's style of helping the economy by favouring the consumers, and failed. Reagan came along and revolutionnised the economy of your country.

The next crisis will hit because of over-entrepreneurship in your country and the lack of labor to support these business in development. The "failed presidency" will try to solve the problem by lowering taxes to "attract people not working because taxes are too high", but it won't work. Stratfor's projection will be that the solution will be a shift in the mentality about immigration, and you will probably open up your doors to Mexico and the rest of the world.

Obama is simply a president in the middle of the cycle. He cannot change your country's inertia, as Clinton couldn't either.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/03/16/pelosi-plan-pass-health-care-traditional-vote-riles-critics/

"Pelosi reportedly told liberal bloggers Monday that "nobody wants to vote for the Senate bill," and so she's strongly considering the non-vote vote. "

There is a lot of good debating material in your response.  However, my thrust was on the mood of the coutry, not the economic policies of past presidents, so I will leave it for another time.

But I will throw you this bone.  Carter did not really DO anything.  His problems were an extension of the Nixon years (Wage Price Controls, oil Embargo, etc,).  Reagan did something and that was what caused us to experience a resurgence over the next 20 years (it was not solely the reason, but a big part of it).

Its time for another Revolution

It worked so well the last times, after all.

Ya know, just because your country had ONE successful revolution doesn't mean it should become the modus operandi. You are overreacting.

There cannot be a revolution until the enemy comes out of the shadows. IMO that enemy is socialism. They are getting bolder, but still prefer to hide in the belly of the Democratic Party.

Let's get McCarthy out of the grave!!!

Cikomir this isn't a joke. The Democrats are turning our country into a banana Republic overnight and its stirring up a lot of passions. 

And I think you are overreacting, and seeing a caricaturised version of reality. the "Democrats" are not a unified monolithic socialist entity like you make it seem. Nor are they anti-americans, nor do they act with the idea to "Destroy america" in their mind.

If anything, it should be revealing that this is what many democrats thought of the republicans during Bush's stay. Has the country been destroy because of it? Nah. They were simply seeing a caricaturised version of the GoP.

Your country will keep being your country, and will evolve on its own naturally, as most countries do. If it happens that democrats become the major demographic weight, prepare to live in a more socialised country. If the opposite happens, then you will live in what you seem to be a better country. But whatever direction your country currently is, it is a long-term trend that won't change because a few people are talking about a revolution.

If I may give you a better insight on the perspective I am trying to give you, people have been predicting the USA's doom going as far back as a century ago. During Nixxon's era, people were saying that "We are all doomed". It's in the USA's nature to  have self-doubt and thinking that it is weak while it is actually extremely strong. You are a young but powerful culture after all.

If you look at the current state of the economy, and with news today that the U.S. AAA credit rating might be pulled, and that Social Security is starting to cash-in IOU's, I wouldn't be that confident.

You ARE going through rough times. I won't deny that (hell no!)

But you are far from the pit of despair. The U.K. also are close of loosing that rating. Yet you are far from being Greece, eh? Things are "worse", not "worst". The USA have an incredible economical potential because of your geographic features, military might and geopolitical necessities.

Yet, not forget that they are talking about downgrading the rating, they haven't done so yet. It's just a sign that you current finances are more fragile than they used to be. Like a man with a good job who badly managed it's finance, you still got a good job to back your debt.

I ain't saying that it won't be difficult to get back to top-shape, however. Just that you aren't close of loosing your world supremacy.

Bet you didn't know the level of communists in the FDR government? The reason for the "Red Scare", and McCarthy was the fact that these avowed communists (which is one small step above a socialist IMO) were being exposed at an alarming rate. While they may be no "motherland" to divulge secrets and information to, their seems no shortage of those that believe somehow a socialist utopia will work here where it has failed elsewhere.

Nobody is suggesting that is the entire make up of the Democrats, it just is a convenient hiding place as some of the agendas go hand in hand. Some Democrats are oblivious to what is occurring to their party. You joke about over-reacting.

Aye. But the core conflict was against Russia, not against the communists. The whole "ideological" aspect of that conflict was simply used to bolster morale against them, but in the end, it was simply a Slav Dictatorship with a lot of industrial base that menaced to form an hegemony in Eurasia.

American Communists were not ready to divulge State Secrets to the Russians. The "American" part of "American Communist" is the strongest elements. I am sure many American Communists don't feel much love for Russia or China, so they are still loyal to America as a whole.

In the end, it wouldn't have put your national security that much at risk. We are getting back to the basic argument that people in power will do everything in their capacity to preserve that power. Meaning that a freaking communist in high office of the USA won't back down to China just because of ideological economical similarities. He has more to win by making sure his high office is protected and that the power he can project because of it is left intact.

Do you know how the Russians got the atomic bomb in 1948? And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

American communists have always treated Soviet and Chinese communists differently. After WWII Mao split with Stalin and trust fell by the wayside, not many opportunities for US-China commie love to grow, especially from a logistics point of view. A little different today, since their are many more American Chinese in prominent positions (Los Alamos comes to mind).

Some additional reading straight from the source (my bolding and underlining):

"The Communist Party stands for the interests of the American working class and the American people. It stands for our interests in both the present and the future. Solidarity with workers of other countries is also part of our work. We work in coalition with the labor movement, the peace movement, the student movement, organizations fighting for equality and social justice, the environmental movement, immigrants rights groups and the health care for all campaign.

But to win a better life for working families, we believe that we must go further. We believe that the American people can replace capitalism with a system that puts people before profit - socialism.

We are rooted in our country's revolutionary history and its struggles for democracy. We call for "Bill of Rights" socialism, guaranteeing full individual freedoms.

Until we win enough support to change the system, communists call for radical reforms under capitalism. We call for nationalization of the banks, railroads, and industries like steel and auto. Everyone who wants to work should be guaranteed a job or get unemployment payments until she/he can find a job. We say put the unemployed to work at union wages on massive public works programs to rebuild our cities, provide affordable housing for the homeless, build mass transit, and clean up the environment!

Our outlook is based on the social science of Marxism-Leninism. We study history, politics and economics in order to change the world."

Does any of this seem to have a parallel to what is occurring at the pleasure of the White house and Congressional majority? It does to me. Sure it's easy to dismiss, McCarthyism, a few nuts, but who is doing the dismissing? The left, that is nationalizing industry, health care and environmental issues. Oh here's the source for the above blurb if you care to read more, Communist Party of the USA

I do not have the time now to respond in depth.  But will soon.  You are correct.  And you are not.  Is that definitive enough?  Will try to get back to it tonight or tomorrow.

Not sure what "supremacy" we have left.  We have a President who is more inclined to stop Israel from building houses than stopping Iran from getting nukes.  The dollar is worth nothing, and is only getting worse.  Unemployment in reality is near 20%.  

Are we going to fold completely, of course not, but the United States is looking at a crisis that it has never seen before.

Research? Stealing the works of the german's labs? Using german scientists in their own labs?

I wouldn't call that "nothing". It is weaker than has been. You are just using hyperboles to prove your nonpoint.

The Euro actually lost a lot of value compared to the USD in the past 2 yeasrs. So did the GBP. The CAD and AUD have won compared to the USD, but that's because of the commodity boom.

You unemployment rate is nothing to scream "end of the world" yet. It's little over 10%, and you call that "critic"? Germany's has been as high as 11.6% back in 2006, and look where they are now. It's nothing that isn't solvable on the medium term.

You president is doing it's darn best to stop Iran from getting those nukes. Problem is, there isn't a lot of option on the table that would actually work, and the little that would, well.. let's say that it needs Russia cooperation, and they aren't close.

Please read the "Thinking the Unthinkable" thread, Starfor has a very interesting piece about it. Nobody wants a shooting war there, but you cannot succeed to have sanctions.