Think Again: Our Broken Political System

• So the next time you hear some cable TV bloviator call the United States the “best” country in the world, inquire about the category. Now we are coming to realize that our vaunted constitutional system of government is failing us because wealth trumps the common good almost every time. This sure as heck isn’t democracy. What do we have left?
• The Shredding of Our Fundamental Rights
• The National Security Complex and You
• Congress Set to Waste 57 Percent of Our Taxes

Eric Alterman, Center for American Progress

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Conservative Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has  proposed a significant slashing of Canada’s defense budget, bringing the overall cut to nearly 10 percent of what had formerly been projected, while Washington lawmakers may not respond to the public's desire to reduce U.S. defense spending. Source: AP/ Mark Graham


Much of Washington is in a panic about the possibility of $500 billion in sequestered defense spending over the next 10 years should both sides of Congress fail to reach a budget deal for the coming fiscal year, yet a significant majority of Americans appear to be looking forward to just such an outcome.

According to a recent survey <> by the Stimson Center and the Program for Public Consultation, this roughly two-thirds majority (including those who actively support it—44 percent of those surveyed believe an immediate 18 percent ($103.5 billion) cut in defense spending would help the economy—along with those who think it won’t make any appreciable difference) turns out to exist even for those living in districts that receive significant amounts of the money in question. And it also holds well for districts that reliably vote red rather than blue. “The idea that Americans would want to keep total defense spending up so as to preserve local jobs is not supported by the data,” according to Steven Kull, director of the Program for Public Consultation.

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Related:

The Shredding of Our Fundamental Rights, Noam Chomsky, AlterNet

• The Magna Carta - the charter of every self-respecting man - is being dismantled in front of our eyes.
• Bill Moyers | Fighting Disclosure, Killing Democracy
• Woody Guthrie’s Centennial
• Anti-Tyranny Quotations for These Times

The National Security Complex and You, Tom Engelhardt, Tom Dispatch

• Your Security’s a Joke (and You’re the Butt of It)
• That Makes No Sense!
• Arms and the Budget

Congress Set to Waste 57 Percent of Our Taxes, RootsAction Team, RootsAction
"War is obsolete. It cannot be used as a tool of our foreign policy. It's barbaric. ... If I had to do it all over again, I would have voted with Barbara Lee. It was raw courage on her part. So, because of that, I don’t vote for funding for war. I vote against preparation for the military. I will never again go down that road." --Rep. John Lewis, the legendary civil rights activist