I fear few people remain who are actually trying to save the America that, once upon a time, at least seemed like a great country. These audacious souls find themselves in an increasingly hopeless situation. They are, apparently, engaged in an exercise in futility.

Let's make an omelet. (I guess we'll have to break some eggs.)

Start with an empire grown in genocide & fertilized with greed & corruption.Completely saturate for over two centuries in a marinade of government brewed from war, annexation of lands, corruption, cronyism, nepotism, corporatization, bowing to special interests, lying to its' own citizens & those of other nations, illegal intervention in the affairs of sovereign nations, assassination, theft, extortion, murder, bribery, torture, suppression of democracy & a long list of exotic ingredients to numerous to be included here.

• Carefully select an alcohol soaked, un-elected, psychotic tyrant who absolutely believes he answers to no one.
• Blend with a fully compliant congress "full of sound & fury, signifying nothing", enabler to said tyrant.
• Combine with a radicalized judiciary, especially the Supreme Court, steeped in far right ideology.
• Add an overripe system of corporations having the same rights as but vastly more power than persons.
• To enhance corporate flavor, outsource manufacturing & associated jobs & sweeten with lots of subsidies.
• Include one privatized, debt based monetary system to issue currency & control the funding for everything.
• Enhance privatization bitterness by including all essential goods & services, especially education & healthcare.
• Don't forget pacified citizens marinated in a mix of public education & rampant consumerism for decades.
• When adding citizens be sure there are large pinches each of disenfranchised voters & impoverished workers.
• To accent the sourness of citizens remember a generous dollop of Christian fundamentalists.
• Remember to include callous disregard & contempt for the least fortunate of the population.
• Mix in a dwindling supply of crude oil whipped to a frothy consistency by increasing energy demands.
• A large portion of fresh, human-enhanced, global climate change will add savor.
• Extra body will be added by illegal, pre-emptive attacks on non-threatening nations (occupy for extra zest).
• Remember lots of military bases everywhere for that nice, meaty chunkiness.
• To speed up the process of destruction include a large portion of depleted uranium munitions.
• Stir in a mainstream media that is pure, unadulterated propaganda.
• Start on a low flame & cook slowly, about six or seven years, increasing the temperature slightly each year.
• Sprinkle with a generous helping of nuclear weapons & insane fanatics eager to use them.
• Season to taste with racism, intolerance & divisiveness.

Voila! We have a perfect recipe for a complete, global, fascist disaster.

Best served spread evenly over entire planet to ensure consistency of destruction and less chance for survival.

Have you ever found yourself with your back up against a very high wall?

Meanwhile, there are still multitudes of SUVs to be seen sporting "Bush/Cheney 04" bumper stickers.

There is no shortage of rabid, propaganda spewing, neo-conservative websites mimicking the lies of a Limbaugh or Coulter. Of the top ten most popular political sites, last time I checked, number one was nothing more or less than a clearinghouse for radical right wing extremism. Like the current American mainstream media these sites purvey a strange collection of elliptical untruths that are simply regurgitations and embellishments of whatever the administration has decided is the truth at the moment. No effort is made to provide statistical analysis or substantiate the claims being made. Members simply accept the dogma presented as gospel. If by some chance an article actually exposes some flaw within the existing government, whatever it may be is ultimately blamed on left wing extremists, tax and spend democrats or radical liberals.

There is a plentitude of fundamentalist "Christians", no less barbaric than their "Islamic" counterparts, who want to teach our children that our planet is only six thousand years old, that the sun orbits the Earth and that ONLY those who look, act and believe EXACTLY as they do are worthy of life. All others are heretics and should be righteously slaughtered in a holy crusade. Sound just a tiny bit like Islamic jihadists?

What it basically boils down to for these folks is something like; "this is America and we can do whatever we want", "god is on our side", "if you don't like it here go live someplace else" or some similar ideological shibboleth. Somehow there is a significant element of the population who still believes that, if they live by such mantras and ask no questions, they can go along to get along. I doubt they will be particularly concerned by the declaration of martial law when it comes. Maybe when the job is outsourced, the Escalade is towed away and the Mcmansion goes into foreclosure there will be an epiphany. Perhaps when the "gated community" is converted to a guarded prison camp they'll start to wonder. When the lights finally go on in those long unvisited cognitive attics it will be far too late. Those who believe they are financially secure would do well to keep a wary eye on the changing reality of wealth. Before too long, anyone whose worth is less than a hundred million dollars or more will wake up one morning to find they have become a member of the lower middle class. From there poverty is only one wrong word, one bad investment, one missed payment, one pink slip away. Ask any former middle class citizen now living in a homeless shelter.

In the meantime patriotic Americans, desperate to save their country, find themselves marginalized, disregarded and even vilified. Nothing they say or do has ANY impact whatsoever on the Bush administration or the congress. In fact, given recent royal decrees by King George, even to question his dictates could magically transform the dissident into an "enemy combatant". Such a designation provides the recipient an exciting opportunity to disappear, never to be seen or heard of again as well as having all assets frozen, probably to be seized and added to the royal coffers! Included in your "extraordinary rendition" vacation package is the very good chance of being murdered or, at the very least, tortured in a secret, exotic, foreign resort!

Even back in 2000 the thieves and the complicit media willfully ignored demonstrations in protest of the stolen election.

During the run up to the invasion and occupation of Iraq, people took to the streets IN THE MILLIONS, ALL OVER THE WORLD, in protest. They were scarcely noted.

Once again in 2004 the election was rigged. Once again, the protests were ignored. It was as if they never happened.

In July of 2007 Cindy Sheehan delivered a petition for the impeachment of Bush/Cheney to the office of Democratic Rep. John Conyers, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. OVER ONE MILLION AMERICAN CITIZENS had signed it. She was arrested for her trouble! The petition was disregarded.

King George continues to pen royal decrees granting him virtually unlimited power while completely scoffing at any law he doesn't like. He instructs his minions to ignore subpoenas from investigators into these crimes since anyone working for him is cloaked in "executive privilege". He purges the government of individuals he finds unworthy and rewards convicted criminals with freedom and wealth. There are NO REPERCUSSIONS from these actions!

Plans move forward apace for the dissolution of the United States and the formation of the North American Union. This will be something a bit like the good ole' USSR. Along with the latest military bases in the Middle East, and the hundreds already in existence around the world, it will be the new and improved control center for the realization of the Project for the New American Century and the eternal "War on Terror".

Those who believe themselves to be "progressives" are reduced to ranting on the Internet while their voices are drowned in a sea of business as usual, consumer delirium and fascist indoctrination for the faithful.

So it seems that, finally, the "American Spirit" has been crushed. After decades of mind numbing assault by public schools, mandated not to educate but to indoctrinate, and corporate marketing, intended to manipulate the public mind rather than present useful, quality products, nothing is left of the U.S.A. but an ocean of mindless consumers. They are seemingly willing to go to any lengths to buy barrack-like rows of needlessly huge, energy inefficient, unfriendly, zero-lot line boxes. Then, of course, they need mountains of substandard products they don't actually need with which to fill them. Everyone needs at least one gas swilling SUV to put in the three-car garage. Last I checked the monstrous excesses of the WalMart worshipers had created over FIFTEEN TRILLION dollars in consumer debt.

Foreclosure numbers are setting new records and the number of Americans without work, a living wage, or health care is growing every day. The number of children living in poverty here approaches Third World status. In addition, the vast majority of the unneeded things we buy, once made with at least some semblance of quality by Americans, are now produced, far in excess of demand, by slave labor in foreign lands and are of a quality that can generously be described as abysmal. What was once a source of national pride is now a glut of worthless junk. What was once a living wage for the American worker are now an obscenely extravagant salary and an unconscionable bonus for a parasitic CEO and windfall profit for corporations whose leading product is death.

Americans have ransomed their future, that of their children, grandchildren and who knows how many generations to the glory of free market capitalism. Hey! Ask any billionaire in town. The economy is doing GREAT!

This is the thing. I can understand how some insecure individuals may feel they need more money than god in order to validate their existence. They may need others to do everything for them because they're not capable of doing anything for themselves. I guess it's OK to be rich. Up to a point. As long as there's enough left over for people that actually do the work. I'm just talking about enough to provide a decent life; enough to know that when your working days are done you will still be able to eat, have a roof over your head, clothes on your back, and enough health care to live a few years in peace and comfort. Is that a disgustingly selfish desire or an undeserved handout to a freeloader?

I do not aspire to associate with beings that cherish money over life and I doubt that it's even possible to coexist with them. I have seriously come to wonder if there is any justification to call them human.

Why do those addicted to wealth believe that anyone who gets his or her hands dirty at work is some kind of lower life form? Why do those who live in obscene opulence, those who have never broken a sweat working for a dollar, consider anyone who labors for a living less than human? Even worse is the rare case of someone who actually "worked their way up" from manual labor to independent wealth and turned their back, forgot where they came from and happily joined the inhuman ranks of the elite.

There is always a small segment of humanity that believes there are only two kinds of people in the world: masters and slaves. Their logic is basic. Those who work at "menial" jobs are obviously not deserving of anything beyond a life of poverty and servitude. The simple fact that they don't have wealth and power is prima facie evidence that they are inferior.

For years, as a child and on into my teens, I assailed all manner of adults, including parents, most of my relatives, teachers, school officials or anyone I could corner, with harsh criticisms of what was being done to us by our schools and the "advertising industry" as I called it. At first, from around ten to my early teens, everyone was amused by how precocious I was. After that they grew increasingly annoyed at the gnarly issues I wanted to discuss. Many of them are now dead. They're probably the fortunate ones.

I have always maintained that we are, literally from birth, subjected to a relentless barrage of messages and signals designed to mold our consciousness. In school we are trained NOT to think but only to accept as fact, without question, what we are told by those in authority. We are conditioned, like Pavlovs' dog. Our denial of this reality is actually an elegant, built-in aspect of the very conditioning being denied. Call it a cognitive feedback loop making it possible for the indoctrinated to refute their indoctrination. "When I snap my fingers you will wake up completely refreshed. You will have no memory of being hypnotized." I have watched, for sixty years now, as nearly an entire nation and a large chunk of humanity has succumbed to this interminable, ruthless siren of free market capitalism. I've been kicking and screaming the whole time, to no avail.

By now, I awaken every morning fully expecting to learn that, due to the destruction of a nuclear power plant or the detonation of a "dirty" bomb in a major U.S. city, the country is henceforth under martial law and that, once again, the terrorists masquerading as our elected government have sacrificed the lives of innocent, unsuspecting American men, women and children to their slobbering lust for global, totalitarian domination. After it happens, and it will, I imagine all "entitlement programs" will be eliminated in fairly short order.

In all fairness, people who are, for whatever reason, unable to contribute meaningfully to the "War on Terror" are just wasting resources that could be used to create more corporate profit! It's thanks to these unpatriotic, left wing freeloaders that the trickle in trickle down economics isn't trickling! All that money is being wasted on ne'er-do-well retirees, disabled workers and veterans! These people are a liability that needs to be liquidated! We need that cash for subsidies! The oil industry isn't doing very well! Agribusiness is being plowed under! The pharmaceutical and health care companies are in desperate need of a cure! Perhaps I could host my own "conservative" talk show?

April 14, 1775 - Massachusetts Governor Gage is secretly ordered by the British to enforce the Coercive Acts and suppress "open rebellion" among colonists by using all necessary force.

At dawn on April 19 about 70 armed Massachusetts militiamen stand face to face on Lexington Green with the British advance guard. An unordered 'shot heard around the world' begins the American Revolution.

Where will it begin this time? Washington?

In 1775 the British military were an occupying force. Apparently they had no qualms about doing their duty. Likewise, it seems the rebels did not hesitate to kill the enemy.

How will it be this time?

Will Police and Soldiers be reluctant to kill their fellow Americans? If our brief history, its' moments of unrest, its' outbursts of violent confrontation, is any indicator I would say the answer is no. Those who dress in militaristic uniforms and carry guns for a living are often highly adversarial. Some would even welcome such a moment as validation.

Can citizens bring themselves to kill those they have been trained to think of as protectors and defenders? Most clashes of this nature have been very one-sided in the past. Even when dissenters outnumbered "law enforcement" they were hopelessly outgunned. Today Americans own millions of firearms. Will the whole civilian population rise up? 90%? 75%?

If the madness that currently holds sway is not stopped now, what brief time the people of Earth have left will be spent in a world the inhuman money worshippers long for; a world with only masters and slaves.