Divide & Conquer Dichotomy

The Frank O'Brien take on US politics.  Frank O'Brien is a long time resident of Troy, NY, USA, and former head of Clan na Gael in same city area.

The pretense or assumption that there is a clear dividing line in politics is a far gone myth which must be gotten rid of, before we can ever approach the true reality of where and what the political situation really is.

Most people, despite their pronouncements to the opposite, are a mix of both liberal and conservative political philosophy, the ones usually being more conservative being Republicans, and the more liberal being Democrats. We merely reflect back to each other the reflection given to us by the corporate media, unless of course we have finally broken with our broken down system, which is based upon false premises.

Most men and women go by their points of reference which have been accumulated over a life time, so in my case it is as far back as I can possibly reach in my own experience, which is around the 50 year mark. Once you have seriously taken economic and political science courses in college, you should have begun to question seriously the supposed understanding that pervades our rather cloistered society, seeing inconsistencies, and failures of explanation, that otherwise would explain the states of evolution and fluctuation that our economy, and political framework go through each decade.

For instance, though I am still a classical liberal, believing in being on the side of the less fortunate, and homeless, rather than being a ruthless and callous capitalist, who is only out for himself, I still have grown politically a little bit, being slightly more conservative than I was when I was a young radical without much of anything else in my political makeup. This could be said to be the experience of a lot of average people, who over a life time collect experiences that challenged enough of their core beliefs, that it molded them into something a little bit different.

Then there are the means and methods by which our political and economic outlooks get shaped, which for many is taking as scripture what is given to them by the 3 big networks, and cable news outlets. After 9/11 complacency was replaced for many by the desire to dig deeper below the headlines, going to other sources of news and information to supplement the drivel that is really what we've been given by the corporate owned and run media giants.

Though the public has been incredibly slow in waking up to the big lies that have been drowning out our reason for decades, there has been a substantial shift in how people view the garbage that passes for truth, with more people questioning the official party line. Thanks in part to the Net more people like myself began researching old supposedly tried and true paradigms, finding that there were even inconsistencies in what the real definitions of various philosophical points of view were.

Communism, and socialism, those two economic models that have been deliberately demonized by the government, and corporate propaganda machines, are being given a second look at, with many realizing now that the old Soviet Union, and today's still existent Communist China aren't actually, nor ever were true models of these two much maligned philosophies. A real implementation of socialism would be more along the lines of what France has had for decades, and a hippie commune would be a truer reflection of what a communist model would really be like. Since the ruthless capitalist, supposed free market economic model has only led to a steady decline in the economic well being of most people, we can see that to keep on going the way that we have been will only lead to more poverty, and the destruction of what is left of any middle class.

In our current economic model, the cost of living has always gone up, while salaries have steadily declined in relation to it, with of course taxes also steadily having gone up despite the spectacular shrinking of our bottom line. This is in part the reason why one can be working two or three jobs, but still not have enough coming in to meet the needs that are thrown upon us. This is to say that under the capitalist system there have always been poor people, but now since our economic model is finally fizzling out, there is a dramatic increase in people who live from pay check to pay check.

There was always a shelf life for the ruthless kind of capitalism that we in the West have lived under, yet thanks to strong unions, like the now old ones that gave a better than living wage to automobile assembly line workers, these workers began giving us a strong middle class, where there also was actually a retirement fund, much like Social Security, instead of this 401K bull hockey. With the decline in strong unions came the more ruthless, and conniving oligarch who paid his workers only the minimum that was required, only raising salaries if once you maybe got into management, and were no longer just an average worker.

Today the call is for a universal base line salary of $15 which only might be good if you live in a booming area, where taxes are lower than average. Most people can not possibly live on even just $15 an hour, and I remember back in 1990 getting paid about $6.25 an hour, and not even being able to live independently on that. Now that the cost of living is through the roof, with taxes also eating away the scraps that are left over, we actually need something more like $30 to $40 an hour if we are to even be above the real poverty line. Problem is that there was a major decline in hard industry, like the steel industry, which left behind what has been called the Rust Belt, and since then our jobs that were previously here have been farmed out, or out sourced, to countries where labor is much, much cheaper.

The days of ruthless capitalism also left us with the consequences that came from the huge growth of credit cards, and debt from it, and just mere regular borrowing that has gone on in order for a lot of people to remain afloat. There is no chance at the rate we are going for people to even pay off the principle of their debt, and for them to then grow economically, at least not under the way the current system is run. This all goes back to the false dichotomy of the political Left or Right, exploited so masterfully by the likes of Donald Trump.

We usually are the way we are from the way our economic circumstance and experience has molded us. So if you today make a better than living wage, say the new middle class, which could be said to begin at $70,000, your personal economic outlook will be far more positive than say someone who is barely getting by, and is possibly even having to rely on food stamps.

Unions are all but about extinct, so job security no longer is a given, so many are living precariously on the not to be trusted good will of their employer. What we need in order to begin to change things to where there is more economic equality is to in the short term tax only the well off to very rich, giving a near to total break to the average workers, and of course the poor. If you are at where we are at right now, with only a few having the most money, you need to go to where that money is, and not be fleecing those who don't have much to begin with.

Bernie Sanders comes close to the ideal socialist model, yet doesn't quite go far enough, since he has never met a military spending bill that he didn't like. We have to pull back completely our over extended military forces, relying instead upon the other friendly militaries that there are to fill in any gap. We must bring home all the out sourced jobs that have left our country, which is how we would finally have some real job growth, which is to say that there isn't real job growth if you are basing it on the growth of minimum wage jobs. We need to pay people what they are actually worth, such as those fast food workers, who are worked to the bone, yet get crap salaries in return, which is no better than economic servitude.

Companies need to invest in retirement funds like they used to, instead of foisting the whole responsibility for retirement savings on the worker, leaving them to the lunacy of the stock market if they're ever to see any green at the end of the line. Monopolies need to be broken up, besides the near to monopolies, thereby giving a chance for true competition, where there is better money to be had for the average worker. The long lost War on Drugs must be ended, which has been highly hypocritical since the CIA, and other intelligence agencies have been running drugs secretly for decades, using the proceeds to have "off the books" slush funds. Forensic accountants need to be used in order to track down the missing trillions of dollars that the Pentagon has consistently not accounted for. These accountants need to be given total access to all areas, including the black ops budgets that usually are off limits because of the old and tired refrain of national security. Total transparency must be had, even from the super rich billionaires, who have billions in off shore accountants.

By legalizing all drugs we can open up a new market who's only major concern need be in making sure that there is an equal number of rehabilitation centers to fill the need that there would be for those who are true addicts. Drug cartels could be therefore put out of business, with a new legalized system injecting much needed billions into the economy, and of course those patients who really do need pain meds could get them without Big Brother leaving them in pain and agony. We simply need to regulate and tax the drugs, basing the cost of it on a sliding scale to meet the reality of what each person makes monetarily. Funds from this could go to paying for universal health care, and education, especially since both a free education and health care system are what we should have had in the first place.

If we don't get our heads out of our rear ends, looking at how we are "played" by the Powers That Shouldn't Be, right down to this Islamophobic, perpetual War on Terror, we will continue to see a growing discrepancy between the rich and very poor[not to forget the homeless!]. Radical changes are the only way we will even see our political system get to where it truly is representative of us, and not being polarized on both the Left and Right. The growing trend towards a fascist society, reflected well by Trump, and the growing neo-Nazi parties of Europe, needs to be violently repressed, to where it is stamped out for all time.

Political correctness might be a pain in the rear, but openly racist and fascist speech, and legislation are far more dangerous to any semblance of family values that we might have left to cling on to.

Communism and socialism need to be revamped, cleaned off from their long disparaged reputations, and given a second look at since capitalism has been only a failure to the greater number of people. This will hopefully lead to seismic shift in how people look at each other, and treat each other, so that as God intended, we look after those who have less than us, at least until they can be brought to where they can stand on their own two feet.

If there are secret zero point energy sources that could give near to free energy to people, they need to be brought out from their clandestine shelf to be used by everyone. The days of rugged individualism only brought misery to a lot of people who were already poor to begin with, so we must see a future where we are partners with each other, rather than competitors looking to win the door prize. Social justice needs to be the mantra, rather than every man being out for himself.

Once we see each other as truly being equals, we can start addressing the many underlying problems that cause societal problems, like drug addiction, alcoholism, domestic violence and gang activity. Only when we reach a state of complete compassion for our fellow man and woman, can we hope to stamp out poverty, homelessness and other economic and societal ills. First we must get on the same page with each other, not seeing our differences so much as our commonalities. Our differences are what give us our greatness, and of course variety is the spice of life. We have long forgotten that in a real democracy it is we the people who are supposed to pick the candidates, not leaving it to a monopoly of two political parties to choose our representatives.

We have allowed the rich, and very rich to buy their power, funneling billions of dollars into political campaigns, leaving us the regular people with literally nobody to speak up on our behalf. So we must do away with dark money, and super PACs[political action committees] for there to be a chance in hell of our getting representation, and go figure, it was our own bought and sold out judiciary that made super PACs possible, so we should look at seriously reforming our justice system, which doesn't give much of any justice.

We need to sever the ties that corporations have in the mass media, so that there isn't the blatant biases that plague us right now, with a mass media that doesn't reflect reality back at us, and is tailored for only a rich white audience. Though we have a rich ALT media to counter it, what we really need is for the undo influence to be banned all together, reducing it back to what the 4th Estate was meant to be. We must rethink the so-called War on Terror, realizing that it is our own foreign policies that have turned so many people against us. Radicalization comes from more than inequality, rather coming instead from wrongful drone strikes, and out right human rights violations. For instance, Uncle Sam has been responsible for over a million dead Iraqis, which you rarely if ever hear about in the corporate mainstream press, nor do we hear about how our oligarchs are allowed to pillage and rape many of the countries we have invaded, or which we have manipulated through coup d'etats, and monetary strong arming. Its has been the money interests that have even been behind the deliberate creation of our bogeymen like Al Qaeda and Daesh/ISIS/ISIL, and the false flag attacks like 9/11.

Conspiracy to commit a crime is on the law books, so sane conspiracy theorists aren't the crazy ones, it rather being the psychos at the top, the kakistocracy. Known also as plutocracies, and a few other descriptives, it is these psychopaths at the top who wind up writing our history, and official narratives, and our ultimate goal needs to be to bring these goons to heel. Again, this being done through unity, rather than division, seeing ourselves being in the same boat with each other, much like refugees, never forgetting that it was the ones at the top that we allowed to put us here.

Now it is high time we took back the power, borrowing from Malcolm X, by what ever means is necessary. Whether you be a conservative, liberal or a combination of the two, you need to stop feeding the beast which keeps us all apart from each other. Adopt someone of your polar opposite, and try to see what there is in their philosophy that you can eventually agree with, and whatever you do, don't give into the pipe dreams of the Pied Piper, Donald Trump.

2 comments:

  1. You forgot to mention chemtrails lol.

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  2. While correct, nothing will change in the US.

    The rich will get richer until the revolution. I can honestly see widespread civil disturbance in the US in the not so distant future. Those in power can also see it, hence they arm their police like they are the military with Armoured Personnel Carriers, Flak Jackets and Assault Rifles.

    I suspect Texas will attempt to break away from the Union when the sh*t does hit the fan, and that will be the spark that ignites the fuse.

    Every Empire Falls.

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