Savvy to a Fault: Coming to Terms With Imperial Power - by Chris Floyd (MUST READ!)

[lildreamer316]

Written by Chris Floyd
Thursday, 03 December 2009 17:17

"How does it become a man to behave toward this American government to-day? I answer that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it." -- Henry David Thoreau

To me, this quote from Thoreau expresses the only rational, moral and humane stance that a citizen can take toward the vast and brutal machinery of the American imperial state in our time. The crimes of this state are monstrous, and mounting. But what is worse is that these crimes are not aberrations; they are the very essence of the system -- they are its goal, its product, its lifeblood.

And what is this crimeful essence? Matt Taibbi described it well in a recent article:



Our Western society quite openly embraces war as a means of solving problems, and for quite some time now has fashioned its entire social and economic structure around the preparation for war.


I believe this is an indisputable fact. Decades of historical evidence give it proof. The last three decades especially have seen the relentless acceleration of this systemic evolution. The quality of life for ordinary Americans, those outside the golden circle of the elite and their retainers, has decayed immeasurably – and measurably. Stagnant wages. Degraded infrastructure. A poisoned food chain. Whole communities -- with all their social, political, cultural and family networks -- gutted by the heedless flight of capital to cheap labor (and slave labor) markets abroad, and by the dissolution of an embodied economic life into the shadow-play of high finance, the ghostly manipulation of numbers that produces nothing of value except gargantuan profits for a very few. A bonfire of public amenities, making daily life harder, harsher, constricted, diminished. Ever-growing social and economic disparity, shrinking the circle of opportunity. Two million citizens behind bars, in prisons overflowing with non-violent drug cases – nightmarish institutions given over to gangs, neglect, punitive regimens and private profit.


.....more at link, MUST-READ!!!!

http://www.chris-floyd.com/component/content/article/1-latest-news/1883-savvy-to-a-fault-coming-to-terms-with-imperial-power.html

[CHIMO]

1. Thanks

For the link to the article.

[SHRED]

2. K & R

[pscot]

3. All those great stories we tell ourselves

about our democratic values and our national greatness are lies. We no longer govern ourselves. We are ruled by powerful cliques of rich men who believe only in their own wealth and power.

[yurbud]

4. someone criticized Iranian elections because the mullahs get to decide who is and isn't on

the ballot, but we have the same thing here--except the mullahs are on Wall Street.

[katty]

5. when a society constructs more prisons than schools and libraries

close because there is no funding, that culture is in deep shit trouble.

[wuvuj]

6. The US is currently a worst case...

...latter day example of WW2 fascist Germany.

Most people...especially in the US...CAN'T SEE IT...I guess because they are right in the middle of it....some waving the flag.