pan6467

Maybe, I'm naive. I used to believe that people were pretty much the same today as they were 100 years ago, just more people which means you'd see more crazies, more deviant behavior and so on. Add that to 24 hour news stations that make people infamous in a mater of minutes... ok sometimes it takes hours for police to release names or the press to get them.

But anymore, I'm not sure. One of he downfalls to the Roman Empire was insanity, the people of Rome for many reasons just started going insane. Is that what is happening to our country today, we are just becoming a nation of narcissists, megalomaniacs, greedy, self serving, easily led by the media peoples?

I look around:

Sports... the NBA has refs on the take, the NFL has coaches taping games illegally (not civil but by NFL laws), the MLB has steroids, the NCAA has fucked up championships, officials gambling and more and more universities screwing the students by having their teams make millions yet it never seems to help keep tuitions down, rather they keep increasing he tuitions. (Oh yeah, the sports are separate, and that money goes into the scholarships and so on.... I find that hard to believe someone in these schools is making a mint and yet, tuitions and housing keep skyrocketing.)

Music and radio.... let's see the top 10 grossing concerts last year were.... TOP CONCERTS
1. Hannah Montana
2. The Police... 80's music
3. Céline Dion... 80's and 90's superstar, more of a Vegas act now
4. Kenny Chesney... the only one on the list to have truly recorded anything "new" in the last 3 years
5. Van Halen.... 80's super band
6. Bruce Springsteen.... been around forever hasn't done anthing good in 15-20 years
7. Jimmy Buffett..... parrotheads... been around since the 70's
8. Bon Jovi...... 80's superband
9. Soul2Soul: Faith Hill & Tim McGraw.... still what late 30's
10. Dave Matthews Band.... has an immense following but again been around for quite awhile

Anyone know where any of today's original stars other than Kenny Chesney ranked? I didn't think so, thought I'd ask.

So new music is pretty much dead in great part to FM radio stations promoting garbage. The music company monopolies manufacture singers for 1 or 2 alums and then they disappear.... (oh yeah, artist vs. record company problems... IE he artist wants paid and the monoplistic company says no... so the band breaks up, maybe has a small following left and tries to sell music on their websites.

So you listen to AM... ok talk radio maybe ok.... except it has all become primarily right winged political talk... even fricking sports talk shows are political and again more focussed on all the scandals plagueing the respective sports.

All this IMHO, is due to the monopoly of Clear Channel, CBS and a couple others owning just about every radio station and finding it cheaper to just syndicate all the programs than have live talent on the air in the city the station is in.

So let's look at television.... mmmm Reality TV.... need I say more. Ok when was the last truly original show on? And again pretty much a TimeWarner, CBS/Viacom, NBC/Universal/Vivendi, Fox/NewsCorp, Disney monopoly with maybe some a couple others owning a channel or 2.

Newspapers, magazines, books...basically publishing itself is owned by a monoploy of Gannet, NewsCorp, Thompson, Disney, TimeWarner.... and they will go with what sells which means very few new writers are discovered and pushed, when was the last great author discovered? Rowlings????? give me a break. But ok who else?

In Nov. we will have 2 candidates that scare the living fuck out of me. Obama/Clinton vs. McCain is not the best selection we could have come up with people..... BUT it is the selection the media wished for. The one they have been building up for the past year or 2. None f them are willing to do anything about the illegal alien problem.... bring in the cheap labor guys.

Speaking of cheap labor, we have companies moving overseas for cheaper labor.... so we can afford the cheaper products.... but the problem here is in the process those companies throw out decent waged employees to make far less money, so they can only afford the imported cheaper labor made goods, so that more companies have to move overseas so that they lay off more good waged people who can only afford..... it's a vicious downward spiral..... WAKE UP.

I won't even discuss how this affects the foreclosures, ok (this is an example... (actually someone I know, a good friend), has not happened to my wife and I yet)... I make $20/hour, my wife makes $17 and we buy a decent house. We can afford the payments easily and we are happy in our house and have a nice disposable income ... then my company lays me off and I have to find a job that pays me $7.50, part time because the company doesn't want to pay benefits but maybe if we tighten up.... then my wife's company closes her office down claiming lack of business (downsizing).... she has to find a job.... she is unemployed for awhile and we fall behind but she finally gets a job... at a temp service making $8.50 an hour, hers is full time but no benefits. So our happy house that was making roughly $76,000 a year now makes roughly.... $30,000....we're fucked. No disposable income, the cheapest generic products out there, sell the cars get rid of the payments and buy cheap used cars, then, if we don't have any major problems (a car/washer/dryer/fridge breakdown, no major health issues, etc.) we maybe able to hold onto the house and believe it will get better. Yeah, right.... then the Fed hikes the rate, our ARM goes up and we an no longer afford our mortgage..... Foreclosure. We look around and we can't even afford a decent apartment anymore because our credit has just become shit.

But then the right winged talk show hosts and the brainwashed Neocons want everyone to believe the above was the family that bought the house's fault not big business or the greed our society has spawned.

Our healthcare is in shambles. We promote it as the best in the world.... (if you have insurance... and if you have an emergency or for some reason you have to go "out of network", then you better have REAL good insurance or a lot of money....

So what is good out there left in our country? The internet and even that Congress and big business want to control. Hell, Yahoo is preparing to be bought out by either Microsoft or NewsCorp.... then Google will be next, then anything else original. Eventually it won't matter what's out there if they don't have the money to advertise the site to get the hits to bring in some advertising to stay running... they're as good as done anyway.

I Love my country, I love he United States, I wore the uniform for her. I just wanted a chance to have a better life than that which my parents had..... I don't see that chance out there and I sure as hell don't see a better future for my child.

The USSR and China never had to fire 1 shot to destroy this country, our own insanity, greed, self righteous, over indulging, gluttonous egos did it to ourselves.

I am just as guilty as everyone else, because 20 years ago when we saw it taking shape and people predicted it..... I was one who ignored and laughed at them. Now, they are in Europe or Australia living a life that our country today can only remember how great it was and dream that it may someday get back there.......

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I just love people who use the excuse "I use/do this because I LOVE the feeling/joy/happiness it brings me" and expect you to be ok with that as you watch them destroy their life blindly following. My response is, "I like to put forks in an eletrical socket, just LOVE that feeling, can't ever get enough of it, so will you let me put this copper fork in that electric socket?"