Should the United States Cease to Exist?

mcstites · Feb 24, 2018

I don't think I ever met anyone with so much hate. Given the choice between dying in Vietnam and living with such hate and bitterness, I would have chosen death.

I look around me and all I see are good people who would do almost anything for their friends and neighbors or strangers. These are exactly the people I want around me. I would not want to live anywhere else. But, all numan can see is evil and ignorance in people he has never met.

Ralph47 · Feb 24, 2018

mcstites said:
I don't think I ever met anyone with so much hate. Given the choice between dying in Vietnam and living with such hate and bitterness, I would have chosen death.

I look around me and all I see are good people who would do almost anything for their friends and neighbors or strangers. These are exactly the people I want around me. I would not want to live anywhere else. But, all numan can see is evil and ignorance in people he has never met.

Unfortunately, what we say is like water on a duck's back. :redface:

Iolo · Feb 25, 2018

numan said:
Iolo, we clearly need a few of your golden words!
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Confidence-men and burglars work extremely hard: the question is whether they individually produce anything, rather than just steaing from others?

Iolo · Feb 25, 2018

I wish we'd done more to help stop Ralph when it was suggested, by the way. The site is getting more and more to resemble a nutty monologue.

mcstites · Feb 25, 2018

Iolo said:
I wish we'd done more to help stop Ralph when it was suggested, by the way. The site is getting more and more to resemble a nutty monologue.

It has been my experience that it is a mistake to kick people off sites unless they are violating the rules. It generally gets in a political/grudge match and before long everyone is afraid to say anything for fear they will be kicked off. If I don't like a site, I just leave.

numan · Feb 25, 2018

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I don't mind Ralph's imbecilic opinions, but I don't like the way his jack-in-the-box, cartoonish gibbering makes sober, connected reasonable discussion impossible.
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numan · Mar 3, 2018

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This is a story from the era of Good Queen Victoria, of blessèd memory!

On one occasion, Sarah Bernhardt was playing the rôle of Queen Cleopatra in Shakespeare's "Antony and Cleopatra." The play had reached the point where the messenger brings the news of Antony's betrayal of Cleopatra and his marriage to Octavia. Sarah Bernhardt shrieks with anger and despair; she throws herself on her divan, weeps, starts up, tears her garments. She takes up a knife and attacks the messenger as the bearer of evil tidings; as he runs away, she smashes the furniture, tears down the arras from the wall and, amid the wreckage of her court, she collapses in a moaning, convulsive heap on the stage. The curtain sweeps down, and from the audience is heard the quavering voice of a good British matron, speaking to her friend: "How different, how very different from the home life of our own dear Queen!"

I think this story serves as an excellent metaphor for the difference between the Americans and the English.
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numan · Mar 3, 2018

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The American political system contains centers of power which were not envisioned by the old constitution and which that constitution, in practical terms, cannot control. The Central Bank, the lobbies of powerful monopolies, mass media whose ownership is dangerously concentrated, the CIA, the National Security Council, a military establishment with a life of its own, etc. etc. Whatever the theory may be, there is in fact a new constitution in which the aforementioned centers of power --- and others --- possess paramount dominance of social institutions. But this new de facto constitution serves the interests of the rich and powerful, not the interests of the majority of the American people.
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mcstites · Mar 3, 2018

numan said:
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The American political system contains centers of power which were not envisioned by the old constitution and which that constitution, in practical terms, cannot control. The Central Bank, the lobbies of powerful monopolies, mass media whose ownership is dangerously concentrated, the CIA, the National Security Council, a military establishment with a life of its own, etc. etc. Whatever the theory may be, there is in fact a new constitution in which the aforementioned centers of power --- and others --- possess paramount dominance of social institutions. But this new de facto constitution serves the interests of the rich and powerful, not the interests of the majority of the American people.
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And yet, we just keep on plugging along.

Ralph47 · Mar 3, 2018

mcstites said:
And yet, we just keep on plugging along.

Quite SUCCESSFULLY, I might add! :giggle:

numan · Mar 4, 2018

mcstites said:
And yet, we just keep on plugging along.

And yet, you just keep on collapsing.

Remember, it takes quite a while for a dead elephant to rot completely away.
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mcstites · Mar 4, 2018

numan said:
And yet, you just keep on collapsing.

Remember, it takes quite a while for a dead elephant to rot completely away.
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Collapsing? I live very happily hear. If there is some collapsing, it must be happening in La La Land, California.

numan · Mar 4, 2018

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For many years, I have noted and been impressed by the way societies that have failed to meet the challenges that face them descend into delusion and insanity.

This descent, before our own, is most clearly seen in the France of the Ancien Régime and in czarist Russia -- ruling classes literally cutting themselves off from the base that supports them, delusions of grandeur, obsessions with trivia, fantasies, superstitions and idées fixes.
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Ralph47 · Mar 4, 2018

numan said:
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For many years, I have noted and been impressed by the way societies that have failed to meet the challenges that face them descend into delusion and insanity.

This descent, before our own, is most clearly seen in the France of the Ancien Régime and in czarist Russia -- ruling classes literally cutting themselves off from the base that supports them, delusions of grandeur, obsessions with trivia, fantasies, superstitions and idées fixes.
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Now you are merely fantasizing.