Let's have a (TEA) Party

[CedarPawn]

Back to the original topic, it would be a good thing if those of us here who don't subscribe to leftist/collectivist "thought" could gather. Whether we be Bible thumping Fallwellites or Ayn Rand quoting egomaniacs we can all get drunk and rail about how much we hate that commie heathen would-be tyrant in the white house. The OP has the right idea, though non-Americans who also dislike being pushed around by their respective statist do-gooders ought to be made welcome as well. I propose Sugar (Costa Rica 4619 for those who don't know) Saturday evening. It'll be a small group no doubt, but who's in?

 

[steveinbsas]

or Ayn Rand quoting egomaniacs ?

Are you referring to ME?

Egoist?

Yes, (in a Randy way) and with only ONE "T" (as opposed to egotist).

Egomaniac?

"Only my hairdresser knows for sure."

(A quote from a hair coloring commercial in the 60's that answered the question, "Does she or doesn't she?")

Have I ever actually quoted Ayn Rand in this forum?

Who is John Galt?

From the thread Is It Time to Bail Out of the US?

Back to the topic: Is it time to bail out of the US?

Who Is John Galt?

I have known the answer to that question for 40 years.

But I am not waiting for the radio broadcast.

It's all happening by default.

But I do find my own rhyme ironic.

 

[salgueiro]

Fred to Ethyl: You are so fat.
Lucy to Fred: Oh Fred, Shame on you. Tell Ethyl you are sorry.
Fred to Ethyl: I'm sorry you are so fat.

 

[Johnny]

Fred to Ethyl: You are so fat.
Lucy to Fred: Oh Fred, Shame on you. Tell Ethyl you are sorry.
Fred to Ethyl: I'm sorry you are so fat.

Ba da bing, ba da boom.

 

[CedarPawn]

Are you referring to ME?

No, nor anyone else here in particular, I was just throwing out hyperbolic archetypes. But, if the *ethical* egoIST shoe should happen to fit...

Also, I respectfully submit that a more pertinent question than "who is John Galt?" might be "who is Friedrich Hayek?"

 

[HeyBA]

The Tea Party started out as Ron Paul supporters, Austro-Jeffersonian libertarians who would confront the Fed, the Police State, and the American Empire.

Then it got astroturfed into spotlight rightwingers supposedly fighting socialism and talking about inconsequential wedge issues like "God, Guns, and Gays" as one commentator put it.

All the while the Obama administration struck a lot of progressive poses but started illegal military action in Libya without going to congress, in direct violation of his campaign promises.

If you stay with status quo politicians, no matter what they brand themselves as, you always get the same thing in the US. The only exceptions are people who understand how the Federal Reserve system really works and who are willing to confront the Military-Industrial complex.

Of the few that exist, the best known are Ron Paul, a Libertarian, and Dennis Kucinich, a standard-bearer of the left, both of whom propose monetary reforms that would end private banks printing money out of nothing while backstopped by a privately owned central bank.

If a politician can't explain to you what "fractional reserve banking" is and if they are not actively confronting the American Empire, they're not going to change anything.

 

[Johnny]

Also, I respectfully submit that a more pertinent question than "who is John Galt?" might be "who is Friedrich Hayek?"

Salma's brother ? Can he hook me up ?

 

[Lucas]

Last night, while watching the O'Reilly Factor (Cablevision channel 552), he read an email from a "K.P" on Buenos Aires. I'm sure that many Dumbo-ocrats watch Fox News and I don't know K.P. However, now I feel that I'm not the only EEUU Conservative in BA. I'd love to meet others. Brits, need not apply. Come out of the closets, Conservatives.

.....opinion


30 years ago was: The Day the U.S. of A. Middle Class Died

From time to time, someone under 30 will ask me, "When did this all begin, America's downward slide?" They say they've heard of a time when working people could raise a family and send the kids to college on just one parent's income (and that college in states like California and New York was almost free). That anyone who wanted a decent paying job could get one. That people only worked five days a week, eight hours a day, got the whole weekend off and had a paid vacation every summer. That many jobs were union jobs, from baggers at the grocery store to the guy painting your house, and this meant that no matter how "lowly" your job was you had guarantees of a pension, occasional raises, health insurance and someone to stick up for you if you were unfairly treated.

Young people have heard of this mythical time - but it was no myth, it was real. And when they ask,

"When did this all end?", I say, "It ended on this day: August 5th, 1981."

Beginning on this date, 30 years ago, Big Business and the Right Wing decided to "go for it" - to see if they could actually destroy the middle class so that they could become richer themselves.

And they've succeeded.

On August 5, 1981, President Ronald Reagan fired every member of the air traffic controllers union (PATCO) who'd defied his order to return to work and declared their union illegal. They had been on strike for just two days.

It was a bold and brash move. No one had ever tried it. What made it even bolder was that PATCO was one of only three unions that had endorsed Reagan for president! It sent a shock wave through workers across the country. If he would do this to the people who were with him, what would he do to us?

Reagan had been backed by Wall Street in his run for the White House and they, along with right-wing Christians, wanted to restructure America and turn back the tide that President Franklin D. Roosevelt started - a tide that was intended to make life better for the average working person. The rich hated paying better wages and providing benefits. They hated paying taxes even more. And they despised unions. The right-wing Christians hated anything that sounded like socialism or holding out a helping hand to minorities or women.

Reagan promised to end all that. So when the air traffic controllers went on strike, he seized the moment. In getting rid of every single last one of them and outlawing their union, he sent a clear and strong message: The days of everyone having a comfortable middle class life were over. America, from now on, would be run this way:

...more

 

[John.St]

.....opinion

30 years ago was: The Day the U.S. of A. Middle Class Died

Michael Moore is placing the blame on Reagan.

He couldn't be more wrong, as can be seen in his own exposure of the root cause:

"And at every step along the way, the majority of Americans went along with this. There was little opposition or fight-back. The 'masses' did not rise up and protect their jobs, their homes, their schools (which used to be the best in the world). They just accepted their fate and took the beating." ...

The autopsy shows without a shadow of a doubt that death was caused by suicide.

"We are going to have to turn the TV and the computer and the video games off"

- and stop eating junk food and get obese and stop gobling six-packs, and stop ...

- and pull the finger out of the lower opening of the alimentary canal and start taking an active part in political life, and start ...

 

[Philsword]

Sorry but its a little more complicated problem than just Ronald Regan. It has more do to with competition in industries like auto's that didn't exist prior to this time. What's happened is that most of the jobs that people use to be able to get with little or no education like working in an auto plant with high wages protected by labor unions are fewer and fewer. Low skill high pay jobs are easy to ship overseas. But erecting barriers to keep out the products now produced overseas doesn't work, check out availability and cost of goods in Argentina where this philosophy still reins. Go back to 1980 and check the quality of U.S. cars before the imports starting taking over. Look at the millions of people who have been lifted out of poverty because the jobs have moved to Asia and elsewhere. Are there problems and dislocations caused by this sure, but it's not 1950 anymore and trying to go back to a long gone age will accomplish nothing. The days of a high school grad getting a good paying union job are over, better for people to realize this and get training and education where the jobs exist. There are job categories today where employers can find no suitable candidates due to a lack of training and education.