Thread: What is wrong with America today?

What exactly has caused our willingness to submit to a strengthend executive, and away from a strengthend congress, as originally intended?

Simple. To keep people afraid and confused is an age old method of control. History will always repeat itself... ~Inky

Since the internet began to enter so many American homes I have seen a terrible lack of education in the masses. It is not only their inability to express themselves but their lack of how the government runs is shocking. Too many people do not realize that we have 50 separate states with 50 separate Constitutions. We have only one Federal Government with one U.S. Constitution.

What did these people learn in school and what did they miss; or is it that they just don't care? I also wonder if they have ever voted before? Do they not realize that Jesus Christ is not our political leader and would not want the job? What is it about individual freedoms that they do not understand?

I went on line in 1992 and headed for my own kid's government text books to refresh my memory of the Constitution. My kids went to private school but their civics training was missing in all the things I learned back in 1949. I had supplemented my own kids in books written about and by our founding fathers and it was a good thing I did or they would have never understood the real meaning of individual freedoms found within our U.S. Constitution.

The majority of Americans are church going Christians and simply cannot discover a second form of leadership in their lives based on the U.S. Constitution. They are truly lost at sea. Their first step into our national elections had to be behind Bush because they learned that Clinton was the spawn of the devil.

My grandkids who attended Catholic schools all the way through have no knowledge of the various governments in America. They know nothing about our wars, who we fought or who won.

Nobody seems to realize that our government is run by an equal balance between the Executive, Legislative and Justice. Our Congress has the oversight powers over the Executive Division but is it ever taught in our schools?

We are one mass of ignorant Americans and we do not know what we want in government or how to vote for what we want. Blame the schools! It's too late to blame the parents or grandparents as they haven't a clue in hell what they are voting for or against. Most will vote as directed by their clergy and then they will forget what they wanted.

Could it be they spend more time in front of the television and do not read books? Without a proper academic background they will vote like sheep following the loudest voice in their ear. I keep hoping that one or two political parties would come out with academic views of their opinions but would it be over the heads of the voters? We must sharpen up!

I am sorry you had such a strange and sad experience with your children's education. I beg to differ, from my own experiences.

I grew up in provate schools, and attended pubic school in my latter years of education. I have seen both sides from the inside.

With both private and public schools, the quality of education is entirely individual to that school and its compliance with the laws of the state it is in. In private school, we had to memorize the Decleration of Independance. We had to know ALL of the ammendments (not just the "Bill of Rights") by heart. In public school, we only had to read it once and answer questions about why it was written.

I agree that not many Americans in today's education system, private OR public, know the history of their country. Plymouth claimes to be the first European settlement in America, for example. Before we took Northern Mexico, it was. But there is an older European settlement that is now American - San Diego. Plymouth was founded in 1620. San Diego was founded in 1542.

Many Americans are under the impression that America was founded as a nation in 1776. The reality is that it was not a nation, but a united treaty of nations (states) against a common enemy, and an agreement to honor certain human rights among them - very much like today's United Nations. President Linclon was the first President in the history of this union - the United States - to call it one nation. This sparked the American Civil War, since many states did not wish to lose thier independance. It would be like the United Nations president declaring that all members are under one central government in Europe, and we must adhere to it. Many nations would not like it. Lincoln won the war, and all states lost their independance as of that time. It was not until 1913 that the US was incorperated as a nation though.

Ad for the powers and seperation of powers of the branches of the US Government, that is entirely dependant on who speaks the loudest to which representatives. The more assertive the citizens, the more assertive the congress.

David, I too am a product of Private School. I was sent to a very exclusive girls school in 1946 where we were given a thorough background in the Constitution and how the government works. My mother had been a Hollywood studio musician and my dad handled the money for a major studio, now closed. The school I attended came right out of the Hollywood scene and our academic standards were the highest possible. In thinking back most of the other girls were Jewish as that was the make up of Hollywood in the 40s. We had no religious training as some of the girls were from the Arab states and of course Muslim.

100% of the graduates went on to college, and it was the perfect place for me. I boarded due to my obsession with surfing and againa the decision was a good one. (We lived on the Pacific Ocean and I could swim and surf before I could walk)

In the early 60s when my kids were ready for school I chose a school that was based on "The Carden Academy Phonics" and realized that they were all Christians and I reluctantly allowed them to attend. They loved the school and by 3rd grade could read and write in 2 languages. It was when my own kids would tell me that they could not discuss evolution or work the ouiji board that someone had left in our house that I began to see the limits the religion had over my kids.

I search out and found a secular private like my own and the rest is history. I will never allow any Christian to direct what I can or cannot discuss in my home. My own husband was the sun of a Baptist Minister and would leave any discussion if it was considered evil in his brain. He also felt that putting money into the girl's education was wasted as they were only girls.

He was soon gone from our home! He is now a lost 80+ year old loser fighting with this 5th wife. It's been 30 years since he had contact with his children.

I am far more comfortable having all Christians ignoring me, and staying out of the U.S. Consltitution with their cheap and hypocritical moral codes. I consider the U.S. Constitution the ultimate promise of freedom and your friend Jesus Christ is not mentioned anywhere in that document. You will not change the Constitution to include your wavering morals. All you have to do is look at the Christians in our government to understand why we need that Separation! America is not built only for white, straight Christian men.

Simple. To keep people afraid and confused is an age old method of control. History will always repeat itself... ~Inky

AMEN

if it has to do with the fact that we are constantly at war with something other.
Whether it is the cold war, or the war on terror, or something else.
That and the efforts of 'globalization', and we have too much damn wealth.

Here is my reasoning behind this:
- If the citizens of this country fear something, then they will look to remedy it. By remedy I really mean destroy, because that is the easiest way to destroy it. Since wars cannot be waged by a congress, but by a commander and his minions, as a result of this we see that people pay more attention to the president because he is the one 'fighting' that war.
Want proof of this? Republican senators are not tough on terror because they inherently are, but because they support bush 100%.

Secondly:
- Globalization means that there is a rise of trans-national organizations (corporations) that seek to create a world-wide market system, creating something more powerful than nation-states. If corporations become more powerful than nation states, peoples alligiences to corporations become more powerful than their allegiences towards nation states. As a result, they will be far more prone to changes in the corporations way of doing things (raise prices a lot) than if the governments change things (patriot act, moral legislation, etc)

Lastly:
- Because we have so much wealth, that means that children do not have to actively work to help support the 'family'. If they do not have to work, but go to school and such, children will be spending much time playing video games and things to kill the time (like I have -_-). As a result, more time doing, rather than learning / leading.

Any thoughts about these?

Big Business has made democracy impotent

Big business has nothing to do with democracy.

Big business is the development of products and jobs. It becomes contaminated when the government tries to control it. It is the opportunity for all of us to make money for our retirement years.

I come from a long line of merchants. None of us had the training or ability to develop a new product or service but we could sell the products of others. In my case it was books! I went to business school instead of a university because I was anxious to get on with my future. I went to work for corporations like Hughes Aircraft (during Korean War) and began to buy properties. I married had kids and still continued to buy into cheap properties and became the owner of a small apartment house in Santa Monica. By buying and selling my properties I was able to keep my kids in private schools and a house over their heads when my husband took off. We managed but my own retirement was still in the back of my mind. I honed up my sewing skills and began to design and make costumes for a bunch of actors. This paid well and I started my portfolio of investing in larger and larger corporations. This is Capitalism and I was building my own senior years of retirement.

What the hell does this have to do with Democracy? As the government grew I had more and more restrictions set on my investments and the properties I owned. My profits were heavily taxed and I had to sell property in California as the property taxes were unpayable. I was extremely careful with my money and found that after I liquidated much of my property the government took half of my profits and left me with barely enough money to live on. The more I made and saved the more the government took.

Democracy is nothing but gang rule. The majority always rules and that is not always the right way to rule a country. If we gave into the Bush Administration, America would be run by Christian ministers issuing their biblical laws on all of us. This is what our founding fathers ran from in the beginning. Our American constitution is based on a Constitutional Republic where we elect representatives to make laws for us. I want a limited government with no influence on our personal lives and simply protect us from assault from foreign lands. As America grew we need interstate highways and airways and that became the government's authority. They were to keep their hands off our businesses and corporations and let the art of supply and demand be the control over how our businesses fail or succeed.

First of all, your situation isnot big business. It is people owning property; there is a difference. The main difference is that you are not overly influential in the economy, and as such, you are not corrupting our elected officials.

Is democracy gang rule? That's a really negative way of looking at it. But my point was not whether it was gang rule or not, but whether our government really represents the interests of its people. Are the interests of the people to have a thing called 'globalization'? Are we talking short term or long term? Or is that the interests of people who want to make a few extra bucks by paying for cheap non-union labor instead of pricy union labor.

Lastly, I remember reading in high school about how there was something to an American identity, and how it was the identity of a certain type of people not based on color. Essentially, Abe Lincoln (the guy who made the quote) said that to be an american means that you have a commitment to Democracy, the constitution, the bill of rights, and all that good stuff. In a word, to be American was summed up in this line - "give me liberty or give me death."

While i recognize that you cannot eat liberty for dinner, you have to also recognize that a bigger government is better for everyone.
There is not unlimited property for everyone to buy. Some day, everything will be owned.
All businesses benefit from an educated workforce educated by tax dollars. Take a look how the states that always say 'small government= better government" also have the highest unemployment.
Like it or not, capitalism does create winners and losers. That is a fact of the system. There are a lot more losers than there are winners - that is why we need a decent sized government.

OVeral my points are this:
- Our government protects economic rights very well; except the people that have capital benefit overwhelmingly more than the people who do not.
- Since most people do not own capital, but instead work for a living, our system benefits a minority of people under the guise that 'what is good for the few is good for the many.' That may be true, but the many can be helped much better than they are being helped now. I pointed to a few examples; give them a good education, give them ways to survive if they cannot.
- Regardless of how our system is set up now, there was always some form of popular control over the fact that capitalism benefits the really wealthy. Here, I am talking about populism in one form or the other. You cannot shake the fact that the underclass is part of our society, so they cannot be ignored.
- IT is this feeling, that our government is supposed to represent the interests of the people who cannot fend for themselves, that leads me to last point; the 'give me liberty or give me death' feeling of the american people comesfrom this. If there are less taxes on you, that means someone else is going to be worse off- someone will have an overcrowded classroom, or nothing to pay for their foodbills. What is more important, 1 person making 100,000 a year, or 10 people making 10,000 a year? IF the government takes away your liberty to own property, it takes away their liberty to have a decent life. While outsourcing may save the the 100k person some money, what does it do to the 10 people who have lost their job? This is why we must protect the liberty of everyone if we are to truly say that we live in a government that protects our liberties. Otherwise, its just a government for the landed class.