Is this the beginning of the death of the American dream?

[rhett o rick]

Two more major American corporations are filing for bankruptcy to avoid paying their employee’s pensions. The pension money was earned by the employees during their employment and was supposed to be paid back after retirement. But while the company executives where paying themselves exorbitant salaries and bonuses the money was lost. Now the conservative oriented courts will forgive the companies for loosing the employee’s monies and let the companies continue in business. The company executive will continue drawing their 10’s of million dollar salaries. The insidious part of this story is that Congress recently passed a bill making it more difficult to file bankruptcy. Not for corporations but for individuals. In other words, the Bush Admin not only allowed the corporations to literally steal their employee’s retirement money, they also slammed the door in their face if they try to seek financial help. I believe this is the tip of the iceberg. With the precedent set more corporations will bail out of paying their promised retirements. The Republicans are trying to kill the American middle class.

[Skittles]

1. the BEGINNING?

HELLO! The process of dying began Nov 2000 WHEN AMERICA DID NOT CONTEST A STOLEN PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION. Once the neocons figured out they could get away with that, they figured rightfully so THEY COULD GET AWAY WITH ANYTHING.

[WinkyDink]

7. Amen

THAT is the unvarnished, pitiful truth.

[jackster]

21. that was a milestone, but I believe that

it actually began in 1980, on that fateful November Tuesday when Raygun was elected and the USA as we knew it began it's long death spiral.

Democracy died that day, American Fascism was born.

"Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power" - Benito Mussolini quotes (Italian dictator, 1883-1945)

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

37. Beat me to the punch on that one...

...I'd place the beginning somewhere around January 20, 2001.

[HereSince1628]

2. Aren't we well past the beginning?

Workers have been left behind, not only by the corporations in which they find employment but also by politicians of the major parties.

[LiberalMandrake]

3. bankruptcy for postponing the end of the illusion of the american dream

The death of the American dream was sealed when JFK Jr was murdered.

[PATRICK]

4. Was the dream

to create a prosperous middle class for 40% of the population? A competitive playing field based on merit and desire? Individual goals versus the society?

[Paradise]

5. "The Republicans are trying to kill the American middle class."

B I N G O !

[raccoon]

38. And they're getting the job done. nt

[tularetom]

6. It's well beyond the beginning

That's been one of their goals for a long time. Too many middle class Americans were realizing the American dream through well funded and managed pensions, and other investments. Working people were becoming millionaires and it began to make the "investor class" nervous. After all what's the point of being a millionaire if your barber is one too? It's just thsir way of slapping us back into place.

[Jawja]

27. What these pigs don't understand

is that THEY wouldn't enjoy THEIR wealth and luxury if it weren't for America and what she used to stand for. They don't get it that the infrastructure paid for with TAX dollars laid the foundation for THEIR wealth. They don't don't GET IT that a well cared for military with the latest technologies fighting WARS OF NECESSITY protects THEIR wealth. They don't GET IT that a world-class public education and university system laid the foundation in knowledge and skill that helped them get THEIR wealth. They don't GET IT that they owe something back to the society that bred them into wealth through taxes for infrastructure, education, military, etc.

To destroy the middle class into some kind of rich-poor slave-indentured servant debtors prison society is to invite REVOLUTION, which would eventually destroy their wealth. History teaches this.

The "American Dream" ensured prosperity across the board. It is MORAL for any wealthy society, as ours, to provide a little socialism in order to take care of the disadvantaged and poor.

[Totally Committed]

8. This is what CORPORATIZATION hath wrought....

Corporatization of our political system, corporatization of our economic system, corporatization of our medical system, and frankly, corporatization of our government (Bush said he would be our first "CEO President"... how do you think that's going for America, friends?)

As anyone who has read even a portion of anything I've written in the last couple of weeks knows -- *understatement alert* -- I'm not into this "CORPORATE" thing. And, I despise the entities that espouse it. It is one of the things standing between the poor, and a good deal of the middle class, and The American Dream.

Just some examples:

**** The corporatization of the media has led to less and less real news being given to the masses, despite 24-hr cable news. It has led to one-sided political reporting.

**** The corporatization of our government has led to the destructive policies and the gutting of agencies designed to protect the most vulnerable of our citizens, which has led to disasters on a gigantic scale, most recently Katrina.

**** The corporatization of our Party has led to the destructively divisive policies and pronouncements of the DLC (largely by Al From) that tend to destroy unity. It has also led to such follies as NAFTA, CAFTA (which had over a dozen Democrats cross Party lines to enable the RNC to steamroll this through Congress), The Welfare Reform Act, The Bankruptcy Reform Bill, the ANWR bill, and more.

We, as a people, and as a Party, need to resist the policies and ideals of corporatization, and those who are devoted to it. Our survival as a political Party depends on it, and it is simply wrong for America.

Corporatization and "The American Dream" FOR ALL PEOPLE, cannot co-exist. And, the continued corporatization of the Democratic Party is the guaranteed end to it as a political entity.

TC

[rhett o rick]

12. Well written, but when you say we need to resist do you mean

blog our brains out? Sorry for the cynicism, it isn't aimed at you. but i am frustrated with not having any avenue to fight the rich corporations.

[Totally Committed]

15. Don't vote in anymore Democrats who have affiliations with or

support for corporatization or corporate entities.

Work to help elect truly progressive and democratic (small "d") Democrats.

That's all i can think of right now. I am as frustrated and cynical as you are, at this point, so I empathize...

TC

[brokensymmetry]

9. It began some time ago....

along about ray-gun's time.

Take a look at any metric you wish, and you'll find that 99% of us are worse off. The top 1%, on the other hand, are doing fine.

If you think it's bad now, wait a bit. Ultimately all that foreign debt we're incurring will be marked due and payable.

[teryang]

13. Take a look at any metric

You've got that right!

It's the frog in hot water analogy all over again.

Are we boiling yet?

[brokensymmetry]

14. Boiling? No, we're just warming up.

1) New bankruptcy bill

2) New minimum payment level on credit cards

3) Higher home heating bills coming

4) Higher gasoline prices, with pass-throughs for EVERYTHING.

That will get the pot simmering.

Then we get:

1) Peak Oil

2) Global warming problems

3) Foreign debt problems.

At that point, the pot will be boiling. I suspect it will be about 2008. :evilfrown:

[teryang]

18. Well said

There is a nexus between economic status and education where the boiling starts. A lot of people in crisis now don't even know how they got there and how it is related to national policy.

The crisis is already pervasive at the bottom of society. As crisis invades the provinces of the better educated, they will start to boil as well, then the insight "I'm boiling" will dawn. Part of the realization is that this is not just a cyclic change in economic circumstance, this is the product of a long term trend without a positive outcome for tens of millions of Americans.

The inequities in America have reached a point not seen since just before the great depression. The construction of a police state is no coincidence.

[rhett o rick]

10. Are the final nails being driven into the coffin of the American Dream

is what i should have said. Good comments.

[pnorman]

11. It began to falter in the late seventies,

but that so-called Reagan Revolution was when it really reversed course and headed South. Clinton, for all his DLC faults, did a fairly good job of trying to get it back on course. But Dubya? ... you all know the answer to that.

pnorman

[LiberalEsto]

16. It began when Ray-gun fired the air traffic controllers

and destroyed their union back in the 80s. RFK Jr. recently said the real trouble began when the Ray-gun administration killed the Fairness Doctrine governing media.
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0916-27.htm >

RFK Jr.: "This all started in 1988 when Ronald Reagan abolished the Fairness Doctrine. The Fairness Doctrine said that the airwaves belong to the public. They were public trust assets just like our air and water and that the broadcasters could be licensed to use them but only with the proviso that they use them to promote the public interest and to advance American democracy. They had to inform the public of issues of public import. They had to have the news hours. None of those networks wanted to show the news because it’s expensive, they lose money on it. They had to avoid corporate consolidation. They had to have local control and diversity of control. That was the requirement of the law since 1928.

Today as a result of the abolishment of that doctrine, six giant multi-national corporations now control all 14,000 radio stations in our country, almost all 6,000 TV stations and 80 percent of our newspapers, all of our billboards and now most of the Internet information services, so you have six guys who are dictating what Americans have as information and what we see as news."

[rhett o rick]

20. Well said. nt

[mhr]

17. Amazing How Long It Has Taken For The Masses To Figure This Out

eom

[rhett o rick]

19. Are you kidding, the masses still haven't figured it out. 59 million

didn't have a clue in 2004. Those that have figured it out aren't republican.

[mikelewis]

22. Are you kidding? This is the American Dream

What America are you from? Wasn't the roots of Americana sowed in the backroom teachings of James Otis and Samuel Adams? Was the "shot heard round the world" fired from a U.S. soldier or a anti-colonial rebel? Nations are seldom defined by the times of prosperity and peace. They're measure is taken when that peace is threatened an a way must be found through the darkness. The American dream is the dream of struggle. The Declaration of Independence was written to legitimize that continual battle for self-determination. It was not a peace treaty nor a capitulation, it was an act of defiance and that principle still lives on today. The American Revolution was not merely one group of people taking charge of their own government; it was, and still remains, the struggle of the ideals of Democratic rule over despotism.

The face of despotism hasn't changed much over the years either. Wasn't many of the actions taken by England a result of the economic strain caused by protecting the American Colonies and then defending British businesses from radical "terrorists". The Boston Tea Party did not throw soldiers off the boats, they threw over the symbols of corporate greed protected by a corrupt crown. We may very well be heading for a similar confrontation with the Neocons but this confrontation is not Un-American. The American Dream is the people of one nation exercising their Creator-given right to self-determination and equality. It is American to despise a tyrant and voice your dissent. It is American to stand up and resist despotism. It is American to stand amid the ruins of a decimated city and point your finger and shout "FUCK YOU, MR.CHENEY!!!" The American dream is not dying, it is being resurrected.

[rhett o rick]

24. What? The rich are getting richer and percentage of poor, unemployed, and

without health insurance are growing. The middle class is shrinking. It is the birth of the working middle class that made this Country what it is. The corporations are working feverishly to kill the middle class. The 40 hour work week is dead, no more retirement plans, no more health insurance. Many employers are choosing to hire workers as temporaries with no benefits. We are no longer in a Democracy, but a plutocracy.

[tularetom]

26. Exactly. Here's the thing

Corporations and those who run them despise the American Dream. There is a pervasive sense of resentment of any working person who is able to better his or herself.

A personal example: My last boss before I retired was the head cheese of the entire outfit. He was a walking seething cauldron of entitlement and class resentment. It pissed him off every time he saw an employee drive a new car into the parking lot especially if the car was anything more than basic transportation. He would attempt to retaliate against and he would come into my office and bitch about them until I asked him to leave so I could get something done. He was paid very handsomely but had no sense of personal financial management. He had no savings and was mortgaged to the hilt. His wife spent money like water and he had to refinance his house every time he bought a car because he had no money for the down payment.

But the employee he really hated was my secretary. She and her husband had started a small business in their spare time some years earlier and had built it to the point where her husband quit his job and ran it full time. It prospered to the point where it was bought out by a much larger company at a considerable profit. She had more money than any of us probably more than any two or three combined. And the boss hated her for it. It just ate him up that a secretary drove a nicer car than him and it he very nearly went catatonic when she and her husband paid cash for and moved into a home that was twice the size of his and in a much more exclusive area. He really made her life difficult and mine too by constantly bugging me to fire her for real or imaginary errors lapses or malfeasances. She was a fantastically efficient individual (still is although she left the company soon after I retired) and there was no way I was going to lose her so I managed to keep him off her back long enough for her to get work done.

He and I got along until I announced my decision to retire at age 57. He demanded to know how I could afford to retire that early on the pension I would be receiving, and when he found out how much money I had accumulated through the 401k plan he went into a month long snit that resulted in him skipping my retirement dinner.

I saw my former secretary at the grocery store a couple of weeks ago and we had a good laugh at his expense (he eventually was fired for embezzlement which I think was a trumped up reason for the board to get rid of him) and he's now employed as an entry level accountant at a school district in another state.

I don't think his attitude is atypical. I believe a lot of wealthy folks are deathly afraid of the American Dream and that it might enable others to reach their own economic status.

[rhett o rick]

28. Great post. I agree. What good does it do to have wealth if everyone else

does too. Because it isn't really the money, it's the power. Why do people that have 10 billion dollars want more? Not so they can own more, but because of the power it gets them. To buy and control people. The ultimate vice is power.

[welshTerrier2]

30. the only thing more pathetic than the ruling class ...

is those in the management class who believe they will one day be lifted up into the elite ruling class ...

sadly, they have aligned themselves with those who only use them as tools ...

[rhett o rick]

33. As have the ignorant class. nt

[nadinbrzezinski]

29. In the course of human affairs

and all that beautiful talk, READ the Declaration of Independence, we are going down the road of Revolution. The American Dream is what we make of it... if yuo want to capitulate that is you.. Me I no longer believe that we will retake this country through the ballot box.. but taht is me and the revooution shall not be televised, but when it comes it will be sharp and sudden for those who are not truly paying attention

[rhett o rick]

25. The ability to shout out will disappear soon too. nt

[omega minimo]

31. Beautiful

Thank you. :patriot:

linked: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=4807243&mesg_id=4816528

[abluelady]

23. American Dream???

My guess is that ended back in the 80's. It was slow, but...My children's generation is the first one that won't do better than their parents! The beginning of the Nightmare is upon us.

[The Sleeper]

32. Get Ready.

It's coming.

[zann725]

34. I keep thinking of that song, "bye, bye Miss American pie..."

n/t

[hatrack]

35. Already dead for a while, just now beginning to stink

Anybody got any buckets of quicklime to cover up the stench?

[spuddonna]

36. Beginning of the death of more Americans, that's for sure!

It's hard to dream when you work three jobs and barely get any sleep, and still can't pay the bills...

It's hard to dream when you know that they're financing this war on tremendous piles of debt that will depress the standard of living for our children and possibly our grandchildren...

It's hard to dream of a future when our tax money is given almost directly to companies who's best bet for an expanding profit margin is continued warfare across the globe...

It's just damn hard to live, let alone dream anymore...