The problem with a lot of questions done by pollsters is that the conclusion done by others is often fault. For instance, during the health care debate, a question might have been, “Do you support or oppose the President’s plan?” A majority would oppose at a given point, and his political opponents might conclude that the people felt that the plan was too “liberal” or “socialist”; the truth was some of the opponents might have thought it was not progressive enough.
So naturally, I’m going to ask the same type of question: do you think the United States is going in the right direction, and why? I say no. I fear a real push for a theocracy in this country by the Glenn Beck types. I think that the courts are not defending the rights of the underclass; yesterday, I could have talked about Miranda rights being chipped away. And government gridlock is going to get worse in January 2011.
How about you? And if you’re not from the US, feel free to add how you think YOUR country is doing as well.
There appears to be a consistent powerful minority of people in our country whom I characterize as the neoTheoCons, the Bush dead-enders and Confederacy apologists, who show up between 25 and 30% in polls, who genuinely believe that this is THEIR country that they are trying to “take back,” that was founded on White Christian privilege, and that the sky’s the limit on accumulating wealth and property, and no government has the right to regulate or involuntarily redistribute it. The rest of us apparently live here at their sufferance, must follow the rules according to their beliefs, and they scare the pogies out of me. They are well described in Markos Moulitsas’ new book “American Taliban.”
In my entire life I have never had a greater or more disturbing sense of the country going down the wrong path, one it may never be able to pull back from.
I have seen demonstrators with large, inflammatory and racist depictions of the nation’s first black president camped out in front of a U.S. Post Office for hours and no one challenged them or had them removed. I have seen racist flyers of the president tacked up on telephone polls (and torn down every one I found). I have heard and seen hundreds of references to “taking our country back,” and I wonder how much thinner the veil can get. How long before the fear and hatred at the core of the tea-bag terrorist movement emboldens them further. We know they’ve already taken up arms and stockpiled food (listen to the advertising that saturates hate radio programs like those belonging to Dennis Miller, Glenn Beck and of course Rush Limbaugh — the marketers know exactly who they are selling to), so what more need be done before they make their move?
What more must we tolerate before a counter-movement rises up to stop them?
No, it’s not. We’re becoming a nation of undereducated buffoons, and the result is growing buffoonery in our government. It’s truly appalling to think that high schools avoid teaching evolution because they don’t want to deal with the controversy; it’s truly appalling to see the size of the portion of American society that believes President Obama is things that he is not; it’s truly appalling to see the voters on poll after poll after poll indicating that on nearly every individual issue out there, they prefer Democratic positions…and are therefore preparing to sweep Republicans into office.
This country is circling the drain.
America has a history of going back and forth, liberal to conservative, we are like the waves in the ocean, sometimes the tide comes in, sometimes it goes out. Despite the loud noises made by conservatives, we are getting to be a more liberal society. Could Barack Obama even get elected 30 years ago? The hot air of Fox news will fade as America turns its attention to more “Important” thing like Lindsay Lohan’s latest drug test. We are moving To that bright shining city on the hill, the journey is as important as the destination.