Castanet

It's Not Going to Be OK
by Chris Hedges
Posted on Feb 2, 2009

'The daily bleeding of thousands of jobs will soon turn our economic crisis into a political crisis. The street protests, strikes and riots that have rattled France, Turkey, Greece, Ukraine, Russia, Latvia, Lithuania, Bulgaria and Iceland will descend on us. It is only a matter of time. And not much time. When things start to go sour, when Barack Obama is exposed as a mortal waving a sword at a tidal wave, the United States could plunge into a long period of precarious social instability.

At no period in American history has our democracy been in such peril or has the possibility of totalitarianism been as real. Our way of life is over. Our profligate consumption is finished. Our children will never have the standard of living we had. And poverty and despair will sweep across the landscape like a plague. This is the bleak future. There is nothing President Obama can do to stop it. It has been decades in the making. It cannot be undone with a trillion or two trillion dollars in bailout money. Our empire is dying. Our economy has collapsed.

How will we cope with our decline? Will we cling to the absurd dreams of a superpower and a glorious tomorrow or will we responsibly face our stark new limitations? Will we heed those who are sober and rational, those who speak of a new simplicity and humility, or will we follow the demagogues and charlatans who rise up out of the slime in moments of crisis to offer fantastic visions? Will we radically transform our system to one that protects the ordinary citizen and fosters the common good, that defies the corporate state, or will we employ the brutality and technology of our internal security and surveillance apparatus to crush all dissent? We won’t have to wait long to find out.

There are a few isolated individuals who saw it coming. The political philosophers Sheldon S. Wolin, John Ralston Saul and Andrew Bacevich, as well as writers such as Noam Chomsky, Chalmers Johnson, David Korten and Naomi Klein, along with activists such as Bill McKibben and Ralph Nader, rang the alarm bells. They were largely ignored or ridiculed. Our corporate media and corporate universities proved, when we needed them most, intellectually and morally useless.'...

Check out the rest of the essay here

It's my humble opinion right now that fear being projected by the media is way way worse for economy than greed that caused it.

The media's constant projection of fear is part of the 'package' is it not?...keep the masses afraid and on their heels in order to maintain their control. The citizens aren't told the half of it from a complicit MSM when it comes to the realities of recession and the impending depression...if it did, revolutionary action would be inevitable (who am I kidding, the Bush regime murdered thousands of people on 9/11 in order to take the US to war and, given the preponderance of evidence, most cannot even find the strength to question the 'official story'...our tolerance astounds me).
What many people need to realize is that the current 'monetary system' doesn't work...it doesn't work for the whole, it only works for the chosen few, the 'rich'...there is always 'someone' left in the cold (bankrupt) when the system fails...and the system always fails. The current 'monetary system' can only exist with debt being provided by the consumers...just as debt can only exist with the 'created money' offered by the system...this longstanding relationship between debt and money is perpetual and needs to be changed.
The economic stimulus packages being offered by countries worldwide are not a cure to the problem...they are only a 'band-aid saturated with debt' and will result with even more packages being needed.
The grandchildren of the current Grandparent's grandchildren will be paying off these debts!

WOW , and I thought people were already depressed . I do question this , have you been in an airport , mall , traffic or a bank , they all seem just as busy and people are still spending . Hopefully not on credit.

peaceseeker wrote:The media's constant projection of fear is part of the 'package' is it not?...keep the masses afraid and on their heels in order to maintain their control.

If the media reports bad things, it's part of a conspiracy. If the media doesn't report bad things, it's a coverup. That pretty much screws the media.

ixler8 wrote:WOW , and I thought people were already depressed . I do question this , have you been in an airport , mall , traffic or a bank , they all seem just as busy and people are still spending . Hopefully not on credit.

I'm not sure if your comment was addressed to me directly...nevertheless, nothing happens overnight ixler8. It takes time to fool many...and many have been fooled for decades (our little piece of history).


writerdave...Chris Hedges is the author of the article. Regarding your comment about the media, 75% of the worldwide media is owned by one man, Rupert Murdoch. I'm sorry if you can't realize the harm this brings to the minds of the masses who expect/understand what they read/watch/hear as being 'truth'.

peaceseeker wrote:Regarding your comment about the media, 75% of the worldwide media is owned by one man, Rupert Murdoch.

You don't do your credibility much good with hyperbole such as this.

peaceseeker wrote:Regarding your comment about the media, 75% of the worldwide media is owned by one man, Rupert Murdoch.

Try to back that one up. You won't be able to.

I'm sorry if you can't realize the harm this brings to the minds of the masses who expect/understand what they read/watch/hear as being 'truth'.

I wrote nothing to indicate to you that I don't know about mass media ownership. That's your mind playing tricks on you. I also think the majority of the minds of the masses are able to differentiate between CNN and FOX.

Personally, I do think there should be limits on media ownership.

To rephrase my claim above in that Murdoch owns 75% of the media worldwide (which is obviously untrue)...what I should have wrote is that the heavy 'right-wing' views he holds, along with those within his corporation (you don't last in his corporation if you can't 'toe the line'), reach about 3/4 of the worlds population...75% of the worlds population!...that's a lot of minds being influenced by one person's ideological views.

Rupert Murdoch's 'News Corporation' owns...

9 satellite TV networks
175 newspapers
100 cable channels
40 book imprints
40 TV stations
1 movie studio

US TV network reaches 280 million people
Asian satellite network reaches 300 million people
Cable channels reach 300 million people
Magazines reach 28 million people

The above stats taken from 'Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism'
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 3434902428

Anyways, I just wanted to straighten that out. I apologize for the confusion.

peaceseeker wrote:US TV network reaches 280 million people
Asian satellite network reaches 300 million people
Cable channels reach 300 million people
Magazines reach 28 million people

So...all together it's roughly 1 billion. Or 1/6 of world population - 15%.

Or am I missing something?

Hey Peaceseeker, are we near a full moon? The 3 amigo's (Writerdave, Captainawsome and Roadrunner24K) who love take certain subjects and take them way off topic and ridicule! I read old posts by them and what a waste of everyone's time. Like I don't thing any of them can actually carry a conversation. But then again I wonder why they like doing that. I could imagine what their motives are. Oh that's a conspiracy!

It's not my problem if you can't handle the truth, joe. Both Awesome and I called peaceseeker on his claims about Murdoch and it appears peaceseeker has had to backtrack.

I would also state that just becaue FOX news reaches a couple of hundred million people doesn't mean every person watches it or that they believe it like gospel.

All I did was ask how 280+300+300+28 millions equates to 75% of 6.75 billions. Rather simple question really.

averagejoe wrote:Hey Peaceseeker, are we near a full moon? The 3 amigo's (Writerdave, Captainawsome and Roadrunner24K) who love take certain subjects and take them way off topic and ridicule! I read old posts by them and what a waste of everyone's time. Like I don't thing any of them can actually carry a conversation. But then again I wonder why they like doing that. I could imagine what their motives are. Oh that's a conspiracy!

Now I'm insulted, I go through great pains to call you on *removed - Jennylives conspiracy theories, incorrect stats, and subjects you have no possibility of comprehending due to your lack of research.

Now then, please explain how 400 Million people equates to 75% of the world's population.