Author Topic: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?  (Read 3607 times)

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Online Bigun

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Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« on: August 12, 2018, 02:31:50 am »
Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?

Paul Craig Roberts  August 9, 2018

As many readers of this website have noticed, the United States has lost its character and become a dysfunctional society. In place of a largely homogeneous population once united in veneration of the Constitution, there exists today massive diversity which Identity Politics has used to disunite the population into separate interest groups.

No clause or article of the Constitution, nor the Bill of Rights, is safe. The George W. Bush and Obama regimes destroyed two of the most important protections of civil liberty—habeas corpus and due process. Bush declared indefinite imprisonment on suspicion alone without evidence or trial. Obama declared execution of US citizens on accusation alone without due process. The Justice (sic) Department wrote legal memos justifying torture, thus destroying the constitutional protection against self-incrimination. One of the authors of the memos is now a professor of law at UC Berkeley. The other is now a federal judge, indications that respect for the Constitution and enforcement of US and international laws against torture is fading in law schools and the federal judiciary.

A third important protection of civil liberty—freedom of speech which is necessary for the discovery of truth and to serve justice—is being destroyed. Apple, Google/Facebook, Twitter, Spotify, university speech codes, legislation against protesting Israel’s atrocities against Palestinians, and the presstitute media that has been turned into a propaganda organ in behalf of vested interests are all actively involved in protecting lies against truth.

Excerpt: Much more at https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2018/08/09/is-there-enough-of-america-left-to-be-saved/
"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Online Bigun

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #1 on: August 12, 2018, 02:32:51 am »
I honestly don't know Mr. Roberts. But IMHO the next few months will tell the tale once and for all.
"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Offline goatprairie

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #2 on: August 12, 2018, 03:35:20 am »
Roberts is a crank. Some of the things he says might make sense, but that could be true of any run of the mill nutjob. A blind squirrel finding an acorn and all that.

Offline Absalom

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #3 on: August 12, 2018, 04:42:46 am »
Roberts reflects and offers opinions which are accepted or rejected. So?
Anyone believing that a robust economy is the answer to our malaise, is a fool.
We have very serious problems because of the type of people we have become.

Online Bigun

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #4 on: August 12, 2018, 01:39:41 pm »
Roberts reflects and offers opinions which are accepted or rejected. So?
Anyone believing that a robust economy is the answer to our malaise, is a fool.
We have very serious problems because of the type of people we have become.

 :amen: @Absalom and I can tell you that it isn't easy watching the country you and every generation of your ancestry have fought and bled for die.

"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Offline INVAR

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #5 on: August 12, 2018, 03:57:19 pm »
Anyone believing that a robust economy is the answer to our malaise, is a fool.
We have very serious problems because of the type of people we have become.

^^^ THIS!!

We are become a people incapable of maintaining liberty, we have become slaves. Slaves to perversion, stupidity, idiocy and a ravenous government that we feed with everyone else's money and have made a god over us.

I'm no fan of PCR, but he always manages to get a line or two in his rants that are golden.
Fart for freedom, fart for liberty and fart proudly.  - Benjamin Franklin

...Obsta principiis—Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people. When the people give way, their deceivers, betrayers and destroyers press upon them so fast that there is no resisting afterwards. The nature of the encroachment upon [the] American constitution is such, as to grow every day more and more encroaching. Like a cancer, it eats faster and faster every hour." - John Adams, February 6, 1775

Offline TomSea

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #6 on: August 12, 2018, 04:16:39 pm »
Every era has its challenges, look at the '60s and prominent leaders assassinated. I guess, the '70s and '80s were pretty good but I'm not one to always hearken that it was better in the old days. That said, we do need to be careful to not lose American principals and values.

Offline Sanguine

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #7 on: August 12, 2018, 04:19:57 pm »
Every era has its challenges, look at the '60s and prominent leaders assassinated. I guess, the '70s and '80s were pretty good but I'm not one to always hearken that it was better in the old days. That said, we do need to be careful to not lose American principals and values.

No, the 70's were horrible. Hippies and riots and crime and all sorts of other stupid ideas. And, we had that "rolling recession" in the 80's and a number of my neighbors had to declare personal bankruptcy.  Nostalgia just ain't what it used to be.

Offline skeeter

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #8 on: August 12, 2018, 04:39:36 pm »
Roberts reflects and offers opinions which are accepted or rejected. So?
Anyone believing that a robust economy is the answer to our malaise, is a fool.
We have very serious problems because of the type of people we have become.

Yes we do. I have for my entire life automatically assumed the old America will win over creeping globalist/socialist - Godless - influences. The advantages to our traditional heritage were so obvious, or so I've believed. But there is a pattern of thought in recent generations totally foreign to me and it seems to be gaining in momentum. I don't think it can be overcome much longer.
« Last Edit: August 12, 2018, 04:41:42 pm by skeeter »

Online Bigun

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #9 on: August 12, 2018, 04:44:50 pm »
Yes we do. I have for my entire life automatically assumed the old America will win over creeping globalist/socialist - Godless - influences. The advantages to our traditional heritage were so obvious, or so I've believed. But there is a pattern of thought in recent generations totally foreign to me and it seems to be gaining in momentum. I don't think it can be overcome much longer.

When I was in a foreign land fighting Communists in my youth I never remotely imagined that I would wind up fighting them at home much later in life but it has come to pass.
"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Offline skeeter

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #10 on: August 12, 2018, 04:51:22 pm »
When I was in a foreign land fighting Communists in my youth I never remotely imagined that I would wind up fighting them at home much later in life but it has come to pass.

Communism is greed and a desire for power cloaked the rhetoric of good intentions. It is the default mode of ambitious people everywhere when they decide to go their own way.

Offline INVAR

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #11 on: August 12, 2018, 04:53:56 pm »
Yes we do. I have for my entire life automatically assumed the old America will win over creeping globalist/socialist - Godless - influences. The advantages to our traditional heritage were so obvious, or so I've believed. But there is a pattern of thought in recent generations totally foreign to me and it seems to be gaining in momentum. I don't think it can be overcome much longer.

When society rejects foundational principles for the empty promise of equality, safety and provision; when it rejects it's past and rewrites it to assuage modern ideas; when it eschews the biblical religious heritage that made liberty possible here; when it does not pass on those values to their children - the 'old America' is lost and we arrive where we find ourselves today: on the way down off the cliff.
Fart for freedom, fart for liberty and fart proudly.  - Benjamin Franklin

...Obsta principiis—Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people. When the people give way, their deceivers, betrayers and destroyers press upon them so fast that there is no resisting afterwards. The nature of the encroachment upon [the] American constitution is such, as to grow every day more and more encroaching. Like a cancer, it eats faster and faster every hour." - John Adams, February 6, 1775

Offline Sanguine

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #12 on: August 12, 2018, 04:54:22 pm »
Communism is greed and a desire for power cloaked the rhetoric of good intentions. It is the default mode of ambitious people everywhere when they decide to go their own way.


And, greed on the part of the less ambitious: "someone else will take care of me if I don't do it myself". 

I'm not sure we really understood that about human nature.  Many of us assumed that people really do want to be free and in charge of their own destiny.  Turns out that sentiment isn't as common as we had thought.

Offline skeeter

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #13 on: August 12, 2018, 04:56:03 pm »
When society rejects foundational principles for the empty promise of equality, safety and provision; when it rejects it's past and rewrites it to assuage modern ideas; when it eschews the biblical religious heritage that made liberty possible here; when it does not pass on those values to their children - the 'old America' is lost and we arrive where we find ourselves today: on the way down off the cliff.

Absolutely 100% correct. Well said.

Offline Right_in_Virginia

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #14 on: August 12, 2018, 05:01:55 pm »
When society rejects foundational principles for the empty promise of equality, safety and provision; ....

The unkindest cut of all is the generation poised to assume power has no idea what foundational principles are ... and what they are throwing away by rejecting them.

Online Fishrrman

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #15 on: August 12, 2018, 05:02:32 pm »
Lots of sniping so far, but no one has addressed the original premise:
"Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?"

I believe there's "enough left", but that we won't be able to "save it all".

Some appendages will have to be let go -- for the same reason that it's sometimes necessary to amputate a gangrenous body part in order to save the rest. Fortunately, most of these geographical "appendages" are "extremities", and the inner core of the nation can survive without them.

For example, it's almost certainly necessary that we "cut California loose", or at least the coastal/southern third of the state. They want to be a separate nation, well, let them have at it. We'll keep the central agricultural region, and the north full of timber.

Same thing with southern Florida, particularly the Miami region.
That place is no longer a part of the America that I remember. Let it go, perhaps unite with Puerto Rico to form a new Caribbean nation. We'll be better off, free of both.

New England/New York state is more difficult. New Hampshire and Maine at least have semblances of sanity remaining, while such sanity has long since departed from Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island. Perhaps we could exchange those states with Canada, in return for the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. Hey, if Canada will throw in the Yukon, we'll offer them Hawaii in exchange!

And of course there are New York state and New Jersey. But... draw a horizontal line through the map at Poughkeepsie, divide the state into two states, and northern New York (let's call it the new state of "Adirondack") would actually become red. So... merge New York City and Long Island with New Jersey, forming the new nation, "Metropolis". Might as well give them the "Philadelphia corner" of Pennsylvania, too (but definitely KEEP the rest!).

Maryland/northern Virginia -- not worth keeping. Let them become their own nation, and take DC with them, perhaps as part of Metropolis. We'll build a new capital for the red states somewhere else, more in the heartland. New Pentagon, too.

Chicago/Minneapolis -- give 'em to Ontario. Do you really care if Chicago remains part of the USA? If so, why?

Finally, Georgia (or at least a major part of it). In time, it's going to become the first "black majority" state. They can't stand the thought of whites ruling them, so... let them go their own way. The new nation of Kwanza, or... whatever. Just be sure to build a tall wall around the borders.

Yes, there is still a large -part- of America which can be saved.
Will we take the steps necessary to save it?
« Last Edit: August 12, 2018, 05:14:51 pm by Fishrrman »

Offline Sanguine

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #16 on: August 12, 2018, 05:09:48 pm »
There is another option, @Fishrrman, though it would be at least as difficult to get to as what you propose.  Go back to the FF's vision of states' rights and a very limited federal government.  If NY and California want to provide free college tuition and a living wage, have at it.  Of course, in short order, all of their productive residents will move to other states where they can keep some of what they earn and deserve.  NY and CA will be rapidly forced to borrow money to keep up the social programs, and will be unable to pay that money back.  Consequences will be swift, clear and inescapable. 

Online Bigun

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #17 on: August 12, 2018, 05:11:12 pm »
Communism is greed and a desire for power cloaked the rhetoric of good intentions. It is the default mode of ambitious people everywhere when they decide to go their own way.

@skeeter

"Good intentions will always be pleaded for every assumption of authority. It is hardly too strong to say that the Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions. There are men in all ages who mean to govern well, but they mean to govern. They promise to be good masters, but they mean to be masters."

Daniel Webster
"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Online Fishrrman

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #18 on: August 12, 2018, 05:16:56 pm »
Sanguine wrote:
"There is another option, @Fishrrman, though it would be at least as difficult to get to as what you propose.  Go back to the FF's vision of states' rights and a very limited federal government."

Which option -- mine or yours -- is more likely to actually happen?

Offline INVAR

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #19 on: August 12, 2018, 05:23:13 pm »
The unkindest cut of all is the generation poised to assume power has no idea what foundational principles are ... and what they are throwing away by rejecting them.

That would be the fault of parents and the churches, who abdicated their responsibilities to teach and left the education of their children to corrupt Godless Communistic school systems for the purpose of equipping them to earn wealth, devoid of wisdom.

So they have been indoctrinated into the dogmas of Socialism and Communism, having learned a history of the country that is entirely and willfully perverted so that it might be rejected.

And those generations are now of age to assume power, without any conscience beyond self, and the pursuit of obtaining wealth from others using the government to take it for them and to use the same to impose ideas hostile and anathema to liberty itself.
Fart for freedom, fart for liberty and fart proudly.  - Benjamin Franklin

...Obsta principiis—Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people. When the people give way, their deceivers, betrayers and destroyers press upon them so fast that there is no resisting afterwards. The nature of the encroachment upon [the] American constitution is such, as to grow every day more and more encroaching. Like a cancer, it eats faster and faster every hour." - John Adams, February 6, 1775

Offline Sanguine

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #20 on: August 12, 2018, 05:26:50 pm »
Sanguine wrote:
"There is another option, @Fishrrman, though it would be at least as difficult to get to as what you propose.  Go back to the FF's vision of states' rights and a very limited federal government."

Which option -- mine or yours -- is more likely to actually happen?

Neither, I think.  I think we will slide into a Venezuela-lite kind of situation, where we're not third world, except in places, but not exactly first-world either.  People will eat and have shelter, but it will be more Rust-Belt and less Silicon Valley.

What do you think?

Online Bigun

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #21 on: August 12, 2018, 05:27:52 pm »
The unkindest cut of all is the generation poised to assume power has no idea what foundational principles are ... and what they are throwing away by rejecting them.

And THAT @Right_in_Virginia is no accident!  FAR from it in fact!
"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Offline Right_in_Virginia

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #22 on: August 12, 2018, 05:30:41 pm »
And THAT @Right_in_Virginia is no accident!  FAR from it in fact!

I agree @Bigun   The question is:  What the hell do we do about it? 


Online Bigun

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #23 on: August 12, 2018, 05:34:50 pm »
I agree @Bigun   The question is:  What the hell do we do about it?

@Right_in_Virginia

As for me, no grandchild of mine will ever see the inside of a government school if I can prevent it and that's just the beginning!
"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Offline Right_in_Virginia

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Re: Is There Enough of America Left To Be Saved?
« Reply #24 on: August 12, 2018, 05:35:56 pm »
@Right_in_Virginia

As for me, no grandchild of mine will ever see the inside of a government school if I can prevent it and that's just the beginning!

Good move.   888high58888