Capitol Hill Blue Forums Political Issues Politics In General Are Americans waking up?

An argument has been made that the American people are beginning to become more aware of what is happening around them and as a result are becoming more engaged which in turn is causing the tide to turn on a political level.

I respectfully disagree.

While I am sure the following rant will be considered arrogant, condescending, and even elitist by some, the reality is the American people have never been more ignorant, more disengaged, more politically unaware, or more narcissistic!

The dumbing down of America has been one of the most successful endeavors ever implemented.

Sometimes in life, we tend to believe that what we experience is the same "movie" others are experiencing. But the people who participate here are not your average Americans. Oh! They may be average in allot of ways, they may be mainstream in many others, but they are not average as it pertains to being politically aware. This is simply not true of the majority of Americans. The average American is either apathetic or feels helpless to inact chance in a system that has already been bought and sold. The rest of people who are actually semi-informed and somewhat politically aware have abandoned their critical thinking skills and accept the drivel they are handed without any real skepticism.

Consider the fact that 75% of the country gets its information (and thus form their opinions) based on info from mainstream corporate sources and am talk radio and false left/right dichotomies on the talking head shows. A large percentage of those people simply repeat what they have heard from these sources and represent it as it their own views as though they have done actual objective research complete with the checking of the credibility of the information they received.

Add to that the ever-changing criteria for the political spectrum of political ideals. What was once "left" is now "far left" and what was once "conservative" is now moderate. This skewing of the presentation of the political spectrum has had a devastating effect on the average American's consciousness because most disengaged people describe themselves as "moderates" and "independents" and "unaffiliated" so that they don't have to take positions on things they really don't understand and because many people believe the "truth" lies somewhere in the middle.

But if the "middle" has been redefined as something different than what it really is (and it has), the net effect is a moving to "the right" of the voting populous. Barack Obama is representative of this trend, as was John Kerry, and Al Gore. Instead of standing up to the "defenders of empire" with substantive viable opposition, they chose instead to simply try to become a lighter version of the Republicans. The disengaged American public sees this and makes the connection and asks itself why would it want to vote for an imitation when it can have the real thing.

The Democratic party which at one time actually represented "the working people" on some level, has abandoned its traditional base believing it can get away with it because the American public doesn't have a better choice and thus surrender to the "lesser of two evils" logic one more time. The average dumb American does not make the connection that they are being "played" and that they are actually responsible for the dire straights we now find ourselves in.

So the frustration continues, less and less people involve themselves in the process, more and more apathy and helplessness is bred, until finally the only people engaged are the ones who have had their buttons pushed by racist old white men on am talk radio. The ever shrinking "left" in America is now only represented by upper middle class white liberals who have been reduced to believing that all they can do to "resist" is stand on the corner with a sign and get symbolically arrested because they live on their misperceptions of what they were taught about Martin Luther King and Ghandi.

They regard any resistance that is actually effective as being counterproductive to their utopian world (which if the truth be known, has never actually been successful in bringing about change).

Thus the "powers that be" have successfully divided any opposition by using race, and class, and religion, and fear, and antiquated views of non-violence to subdue the masses into being essentially helpless to stop us from the suicidal track we are now on.

Have Americans been made aware of certain trends that threaten the American way of life! Of course.

Has it caused them to sacrifice and change?
No, not in any real substantive way.

Bottom line, when some claim the tide is turning and the age of Aquarius is right around the corner, I say show me the evidence.

It's still bread and circuses. Until the people no longer have bread or circuses, they will continue to be apathetic and uninformed.

Most Americans don't care about anything unless it directly effects them. Once they get it up their keister, the learning curve increases exponentially. I suspect that such an economic educational experience will interrupt the bread and circuses in the very near future. Thanks in large part to MSM Americans don't see themselves as the rest of the world see us, or, the direction towards war that we're pushing the rest of the world.