yess, ThaDDperson–I really do believe that. And the proof is that even with high unemployment, the American people have not taken to the streets. The past week in France has been total chaos–at general strike has shut down ALL transportation, all public services. They are striking to demand more government services. Americans understand that the old cowboy ethic of hard work is what built this great country. We may be bitter at our lot in life, but we blame ourselves, not the government. And we turn to help from our families, not a socialistic attitiude that the government must provide all our needs.
Thats why so many people dont vote, and don’t try to shut down the whole country like the French.
Is it apathy or ignorance? I don’t know and I don’t care.
Are these unemployed people mopping floors as a hobby? 
They’d do better to use a pancake flipper.
:::BACKGROUND MUSIC – The Grinning Americans sing “America the Beautiful” in hushed, artificially sweetened tone. Post is to be accompanied by a montage of happy, healthy Americans of all races, ages and ethnic backgrounds happily working on golden farmlands and spacious cubicles, taking quiet pride in their work, however low their pay and negligible their benefits. Because this is America, where work at one crappy job can and does lead to work at another, slightly less or sometimes slightly more crappy job!:::
Please explain to us all how a complaining about underemployment leads directly and irrevocably to Communism. I am bracing myself for a brilliant series of logical extrapolations – don’t let me down!
My mom used to say that. 
Prunes are a laxitive. Any connection?
Peace,
mangeorge
I can testify to that, somewhat anecdotally. I’m a low-level geek, make applications for Access/Excel. Not real high up on the geek food chain, but I make a tidy living when I can get the work. Right now, I’m stuffing envelopes for chickenfeed. Theres about five other people there, also temps, equally overburdened with skills. I am the only person there who isn’t a college grad, and I’m a seriously pedantic autodidact. (See what i mean?)
But those poor schmucks have $10 - 20,000 in student loans, where I only have useless children.
Back in the old days, a college education signified not so much admission to the upper class, but a native membership in it. Somebody paid for your college, and that somebody had money.
With the advent of the GI Bill, we have made an industry of higher education, and the educated are thick upon the ground. Hence, we turn out more architects than we can employ, more archeologists than we need, and more lawyers than are possibly worth having, save for thier tendency to make work for each other.
What, do you imagine, is the ratio of Art History grad students to the ratio of people actually employed as art historians?
Oh, lighten up, Vladimir.
(good lines, december)
No. What we want is a society where people aren’t wasting their money (or the gov’t’s money, which is really tax monies) on education they won’t get to use anyway. Meanwhile, the oh-so-liberal-and-nice-and-decent folks at the colleges rake it in, promising each of us a “better job”. Humbug.
For what its worth… Roe v. Wade HASN’T yet been overturned, the gay rights campaign is doing rather well, and the margin by which Republicans in Congress is not significantly larger than historical majorities. Economically and in foreign policy terms, we are moving right- but this represents a shift in issues, not the end of the bipartisan system.
In twenty years, people will be complaining that Bush screwed up the nation and the world this decade as Reagan did in the 80’s, and all will be well in the two-party system. Don’t worry.
I don’t think that Bush in '04 is a foregone conclusion. If the dems put up a strong candidate, and Bush’s job is held to close scrutiny, and the economy (unemployment) doesn’t do something pretty dramatic, they have a real chance.
I don’t know what it’s like in other parts of the country, but around here, among the working class, there’s quite a bit of yearning for the Clinton era. Many of us cast a :dubious: eye towards claims about the “Clinton/gore Recession”.
Things better start trickling down pretty soon or the republicans could be in trouble. Already. Having people in high places doesn’t guarantee success.
Posted by John Mace:
What you say might hold true in some times and places, John, but not here and now. The government in which so many Americans are declining to take in interest happens to be the most important government in human history. Its potential to do good or do evil in the world is without precedent on any scale.
Furthermore, the threat our global ecosystem now faces to its carrying capacity is without precedent at any time since the Pleistocene extinction – and that is a political issue, like it or not. And it really is everybody’s business. Everybody’s. Whether our species gets through this depends, more than anything else, on what governments have or have not done about the problem.
That’s why – insofar as they can afford to pay any attention at all to anything outside their private lives – government really does need to be the primary concern for all citizens. Nothing else even comes close.
I have seen near-infinite capacity among lower amd middle class people for being gulled. Many are so worried that homosexuals will marry and get health insurance for their lovers, or that women have abortions, that they vote for a party that will happily leave them unemployed, or drastically underemployed. No matter that in doing so they are voting to reduce their kids’ chances of getting a good a college education, or their own chances of getting good health care. The important thing is, those godless dingleberries must be stopped, no matter how miserable their employment prospects, or how miserably their children fare because of it!
Evil:
You are asseting, essentially, that only the gullible would vote Republican. Guess what? If everyone voted Democrat, then this would be a one party state.
And surely you are not serious in saying that gullibility is a monopoly of “lower and middle class people”.
Actually, the article I read this morning said that the Republicans were out-money raising the Dems in numbers of small contributors in particular. I will dig up the cite if anyone is interested.
Regards,
Shodan
I thought we Republicans were supposed to be the Party of the Rich[sup]TM[/sup]. If we’re also the Party of the Lower and Middle Classes[sup]TM[/sup], then maybe the US really is becoming a one-party nation.
Having the Evil Islamic Fundamentalist Terrorism Bogeyman™ does wonders, doesn’t it?
“Booga booga! Vote for me or Osama Bin Laden will blow up our country!”
–Proposed Bush 2004 campaign slogan
How many people do you know who can write a check for a thousand dollars as a political contribution? If you know two, that’s two more than I know. Then, of course, you also have your franks and beans dinners at what…$20,000 a pop? And you thought ball park prices were a rip-off!
Is it your Uncle Frank and Aunt Tilly who pony up 20 grand to eat rubber chicken and listen to Fearless Misleader spout drivel? I think not.
Indeed, it terms of contributions from individual persons are concerned, the Pubbies far exceed the Dumbocrats. You’re point being what, exactly? That far more people who can afford to chuck away a thousand bucks are Republicans? Was this in the “Breaking News!” section of your morning paper?
You’d better. This smells a lot more like RNC lies than
anthing else. Kinda like when Ari said that the fact that Bush is getting $millions from $2000 a plate dinners shows how broad his support is among the american people.