Where Does America's Fear Come From? 926
An anonymous reader writes "While far from a dictatorship, the United States has employed a number of paranoid tactics that delegitimize its democracy. And the motivation for doing so is — fear. That seems to be a long way from 'So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is...fear itself: nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and of vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory. And I am convinced that you will again give that support to leadership in these critical days.' Where is the U.S. heading?"
Re:Control... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:totally normal (Score:5, Informative)
It's older than that... (Score:4, Informative)
It's older than that. People haven't changed for 10s of thousands of years. We just have better records of the more recent stuff.
Re:America's fear comes from... (Score:4, Informative)
CNN: 54% factual reporting, 46% commentary/opinion.
FOX: 45% factual reporting, 55% commentary/opinion.
MSNBC: 15% factual reporting, 85% commentary/opinion.
Here is the full report. [stateofthemedia.org]
Re:Fear and Paranoia... (Score:4, Informative)
Well, I live in Europe and have been to the US. And the waiters in Paris pale in comparison to some waiters in Florida ;-). But on average people are people wherever you go. You got friendly and entertaining people in all societies as well as rude obnoxious ones. In areas with high populations like big cities you got more of both of them.
Re:America is a dictatorship alright... (Score:5, Informative)
From a European perspective, America doesn't have 'left' and 'right' wings. They have the 'right' and 'extreme right' wing.
Re:Fear and Paranoia... (Score:5, Informative)
My family visited Europe this Fall and were surprised at the level of civility experienced there.
I just visited the US last week, and was surprised at the level of civility I experienced there.
Seriously, whenever I meet USians (even in the wild), they're generally friendly, sensible people. Which makes it perhaps even more depressing that the country as a whole is run by sociopathic assholes. Unfortunately, European leaders (both political and corporate) are learning quickly.
Re:A century ago, Progressives (Score:5, Informative)
#4 is largely incorrect. There was a big burst of inflation in the 1970's that basically halved the value of money in 9 years, and that's the kind of thing you fear. But since then, it's been closer to a rate that halves the value of money in over 20 years, which is neither unusual nor particularly harmful. And all you need to do to beat inflation is to hold assets that aren't cash, such as stocks, bonds, a home, land, or commodities.
Comment removed (Score:3, Informative)
Re:America's fear comes from... (Score:2, Informative)
I think the tall claim is " In Europe, for example, facts and figures are checked and cross checked. When opposing parties discuss the direction of public policy, they discuss, often from very different ideological points of view, from the same set of facts and figures.".
Do you have any evidence to back THAT up?
(I'm from Europe, politicians never let facts and figures get in the way of ideology).
Re: Control... (Score:5, Informative)
In Europe? It's common to speak 3 or more languages.
In the USA our education system is so bad most can not speak the native English very well.
Re:Control... (Score:5, Informative)
AD = CE. CE expands as Common Era, and is generally more accepted in a global context, because it doesn't reference a god you may not believe in or adhere to. More than half the world's population does not follow an Abrahamic religion. The dates are exactly the same, just a different name.
You did know that AD means "Anno Domini", right? In English, that's "the year of our Lord". If you want to claim adherence to the Christain God, that's fine. You have that right. But don't expect me to pay lip service to a God that, to me, comes off as a petty, cliquish and vindictive sort, according to your own holy books.
Re:A century ago, Progressives (Score:5, Informative)
"with basically no inflation"
You are an utter fool if you believe that.
There has been almost double digit inflation during this years long period of low employment. My $1.00 buys only $0.70 today than what it did only 3 years ago.
It's the bulshit made up numbers that the Government releases that people listen to... "we have 7% unemployment!" if you don't count the unemployed that are not getting Unemployment insurance. Actual is near 20% unemployment. under Employment is higher than that, and then what I call the "bullshit employment" People that have skills but are working Mcdonalds,Walmart,etc instead of their skilled labor job the numbers hit near 40%
The cost of living which is the real inflation, has steadily increased. Loaf of the cheapest crap white bread was $0.90 just 4 years ago. Today it is $1.19 That is so close to a 30% increase it's scary. Meat, etc... all up about the same amount. People that actually track their expenses will all see about a 30% increase in costs over the past 3-4 years. And a 0 to -10% change in their income.
Some places can see an almost 50% increase in cost of living over that same time period.
The Power of Nightmares .. (Score:3, Informative)
"Narrator: In the past, politicians promised to create a better world. They had different ways of achieving this, but their power and authority came from the optimistic visions they offered their people. Those dreams failed and today people have lost faith in ideologies. Increasingly, politicians are seen simply as managers of public life, but now they have discovered a new role that restores their power and authority. Instead of delivering dreams, politicians now promise to protect us: from nightmares. They say that they will rescue us from dreadful dangers that we cannot see and do not understand. And the greatest danger of all is international terrorism, a powerful and sinister network with sleeper cells in countries across the world, a threat that needs to be fought by a War on Terror.
But much of this threat is a fantasy, which has been exaggerated and distorted by politicians. It's a dark illusion that has spread unquestioned through governments around the world, the security services and the international media. This is a series of films about how and why that fantasy was created, and who it benefits. At the heart of the story are two groups: the American neo-conservatives and the radical Islamists. Both were idealists who were born out of the failure of the liberal dream to build a better world, and both had a very similar explanation of what caused that failure.
These two groups have changed the world, but not in the way that either intended. Together, they created today's nightmare vision of a secret organized evil that threatens the world, a fantasy that politicians then found restored their power and authority in a disillusioned age. And those with the darkest fears became the most powerful."
Re:Control... (Score:4, Informative)
and of course many other creative spelling attempts that are blamed on auto-correct but rather should be blamed on lousy education or the willful butchering of words.
I agree with you mostly. But I have to say -- when I first got my iPhone, I tried Autocorrect for a month or so. I discovered that my phone would NEVER let me type the word "its", i.e., the possessive third-person pronoun. It ALWAYS "corrected" it to "it's", i.e., "it is".
Of course, there were the other inanities Autocorrect introduced -- often any word other than the few thousand most common English words was in danger of being randomly converted to a nonsense phrase or something.
But Apple's Autocorrect was actively promoting the decline of English syntax. I looked like an idiot in emails I would write where I'd forget to go back and fix the words my phone had helpfully "corrected." And there were no convenient ways to fix it. So I turned Autocorrect off, and I've been spelling words correctly again ever since.
Somewhere in here, I think there's a metaphor for what Apple is doing to society.... [just kidding... mostly...]
Re:The path, not the position (Score:5, Informative)
Giffords wasn't shot by a "patsy", and her shooting had nothing to do with her political views. She was shot by a crazy guy who had no coherent agenda at all. The only connection between the way she practiced politics and her getting shot was that she was holding a "talk to the voters" event in a supermarket parking lot when it happened.
Re:While far from a dictatorship... (Score:4, Informative)
No, progressive is used in the same way in the US, for pretty much the same political spectrum. The missing piece of the puzzle for you is that fascism was once understood as a progressive movement until political and practical considerations forced a demarcation.
You may find these items interesting even if much of the discussion is framed in an American context.
What Is a Progressive [townhall.com]
A Nicer Form of Tyranny [claremont.org]
Hitler, Mussolini, Roosevelt [reason.com]
Re:A century ago, Progressives (Score:5, Informative)
This is a simplistic and hence inaccurate view. Government spending on things like large infrastructure projects can contribute to increasing the overall wealth of the nation. In this case, reduing spending can result in reducing the wealth of the nation.
Furthermore, providing a safety net for people (welfare) can allow people to take more risks, so the population can be more mobile, more entrepreneurial, etc.. Such risk taking can result in new businesses and increased GDP.
If you think otherwise, let me suggest that you move to Somalia. I expect tax rates are very low there.