The Beginning of the End? We Can Only Hope
Previously sympathetic commentators disillusioned by Obama’s unchecked lying and fumbling were heartened by the uncharacteristic candor coming from Deputy Secretary of State P. J. Crowley late last week — until he was shit-canned for the same early this week.
But there is still some cause for hope: Hillary has announced her own plans to jump ship at the end of this term as well. Check out her blunt statements to that effect here.
Is this yet another harbinger of the destruction of Obama’s career? A recognition that the situation is so bad that even the filthiest bilge rats see that it’s time to abandon ship? Seems like a reasonable possibility. Anyone working a political paradigm that relies on unquestioning tribal loyalty to the exclusion of substantive policies the way Obama does should be concerned about the defection of establishment stalwarts. Very concerned.
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. There’s been quite a bit going on at all levels…
Today: Rally To Save The American Dream
In Wisconsin and around our country, the American Dream is under attack. Instead of creating much needed jobs, Conservatives are giving tax breaks to corporations and the very rich all while cutting funding for education, police, emergency response, and vital human services.
On Saturday, February 26, at noon local time, rallies will be organized in front of every statehouse and in every major city to stand in solidarity with the people of Wisconsin.
The American Dream: The Greatest Theft In Human History
For anyone still wondering why it is that fat cat bankers are buying up the country while the rest of us are complaining that “the rent’s too damn high,” filmmakers Tad Lumpkin and Harold Uhl spell it out in a fantastic thirty minute animated documentary film, The American Dream. Well worth your time watching – Parts 1 and 2 are below:
How The American Dream Ended
It feels as if every media outlet has lamented 21st century America’s declining fortunes and crisis of confidence. Still, it’s interesting to read German paper of record Der Spiegel’s outsider perspective on the death of the American dream. The United States comes off as a rotted, moribund shell:
Florida was the finale of the American dream, a promise, a symbol, an American heaven on earth, because Florida held out the prospect of spending 10, perhaps 20 and hopefully 30 years living in one’s own house. For decades, anywhere from 200,000 to 400,000 people moved to the state each year. The population grew and grew — and so too did real estate prices and the assets of those who were already there and wanted bigger houses and even bigger dreams. Florida was a seemingly never-ending boom machine.
America has long been a country of limitless possibility. But the dream has now become a…
United States Is Officially A Banana Republic
In a recent opinion piece in the New York Times, Nicholas D. Kristof reels off some key statistics in confirming what most Americans have suspected for years —the United States has now become the largest banana republic of it’s kind, with the largest slice of income going to the smallest group of oligarchs.
The richest 1 percent of Americans now take home almost 24 percent of income, up from almost 9 percent in 1976.
As Timothy Noah of Slate noted in an excellent series on inequality, the United States now arguably has a more unequal distribution of wealth than traditional banana republics like Nicaragua, Venezuela and Guyana.
Not really breaking news, but he includes several helpful links to recent studies demonstrating the emotional toll of striving to achieve the hyper-riches of the Bushes next door, through higher divorce rates and forced moves to hunt down the more lucrative positions.
The Statue of Liberty Hit By Lightning
Via Metro (UK):
This is the moment the Statue of Liberty was hit by lightning — and caught on camera by a photographer who waited two hours in a storm-hit New York City.
New Yorker Jay Fine apparently waited more than 40 years for the shot before braving the storm last month in Manhattan’s Battery Park City.
The 58-year-old photographer caught the incredible snap — but it was a rather arduous process capturing the perfect picture.
He said: ‘I had been watching weather reports so I knew a storm was coming and it just seemed like a great opportunity.
‘I was ready and waiting and took 81 shots before finally getting this one.
‘I was shocked when I realised what had happened.
‘It was pure luck really, a once in a lifetime opportunity. It’s the first photograph of its kind I have ever seen.’
Americans, You Have the Worst Quality of Life in the Developed World — By a Wide Margin
Photo: BrokenSphere (CC)
Lance Freeman writes on Escape From America Magazine:
Americans, I have some bad news for you:
You have the worst quality of life in the developed world — by a wide margin.
If you had any idea of how people really lived in Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and many parts of Asia, you’d be rioting in the streets calling for a better life. In fact, the average Australian or Singaporean taxi driver has a much better standard of living than the typical American white-collar worker.
I know this because I am an American, and I escaped from the prison you call home. I have lived all around the world, in wealthy countries and poor ones, and there is only one country I would never consider living in again: The United States of America. The mere thought of it fills me with dread.
Consider this, you are the only people in the developed…
American Dream 2: Default, Then Rent
Mark Whitehouse encourages people to think it’s “okay” to default on their mortgages. In the Wall Street Journal of all places!
PALMDALE, Calif. — Schoolteacher Shana Richey misses the playroom she decorated with Glamour Girl decals for her daughters. Fireman Jay Fernandez misses the custom putting green he installed in his backyard.
But ever since they quit paying their mortgages and walked away from their homes, they’ve discovered that giving up on the American dream has its benefits.
Both now live on the 3100 block of Club Rancho Drive in Palmdale, where a terrible housing market lets them rent luxurious homes — one with a pool for the kids, the other with a golf-course view — for a fraction of their former monthly payments.
“It’s just a better life. It really is,” says Ms. Richey. Before defaulting on her mortgage, she owed about $230,000 more than the home was worth.
People’s increasing willingness to abandon their…
