It's a lot better than it was this time last year, especially with the death of Prop 8 and part of DOMA.
Plus, more people are focused on income inequality than in decades.
And I'm looking forward to the countries first openly gay man being elected governor of a state (Maine) and possibly first openly lesbian woman (Maryland).
Still delusional, but showing signs of self-awareness.
I'm much taken with the recent Pew Research Center poll which shows that a mere 44% of Americans are identifying as middle class (a record low), while 40% now see themselves as lower class. As long as Republicans and corporate Democrats were able to convince America that it was a middle class nation and everyone benefits from sops to the upper-middle class, nothing was ever going to swing towards economic justice. Now, at least, there's an opening.
Anything but "strong". The speech could be used to spark a transformation of this country, but instead it's usually just a milquetoast photo op. Obama should call Congress and the Supreme Court to the carpet. If nobody walks out he isn't doing his job.
Sorry to be pessimisitc, but progress on the biggest issues of our time - the hijacking of our economy by the super-wealthy, our inevitable destruction of the only habitat we will ever know in 1,000 generations, random outbursts of mass violence - is being held hostage by the attachment a few legislative districts feel to a romanticized vision of a smalltown America that never existed.
I don't envy him having to get up there and state what he knows to be a lie: "The state of our union is strong" and then dance around the fracture lines the whole rest of the speech, after which some Tea Party douchebag will get a chance to speak code for: dark-skinned people, gun regulations, and poor people are killing our country.
The Democrats have become Republicans, the Republicans have become insane, and no one is looking at long-term problems in employment or environmental instability.
We're not so much rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic as beating each other with them, a la WWE.
Broken and in total denial. Our absolute state in global terms isn't horrible, but it's impossible to get anything done thanks to systemic problems in our politics, economy, and media. We are held hostage to narrow economic interests that don't give a damn for most of the people of the country or the world, and even though we have the numbers and resources and knowledge to turn things around, too many people buy the bullshit that the 1% is peddling.
I just wish Obama would come out with a banjo player, lead a complete singing of "This Land is Your Land" and walk out. It'd be better than whatever bullshit he's got.
Severely manipulated. Not all at once but very slowly and deliberately to benefit those with enough $$$ to do so could once agin be free of any infringements they didn't like. Basically billionaires throwing a temper tantrum.
Plus, more people are focused on income inequality than in decades.
And I'm looking forward to the countries first openly gay man being elected governor of a state (Maine) and possibly first openly lesbian woman (Maryland).
Not bad really.
I'm much taken with the recent Pew Research Center poll which shows that a mere 44% of Americans are identifying as middle class (a record low), while 40% now see themselves as lower class. As long as Republicans and corporate Democrats were able to convince America that it was a middle class nation and everyone benefits from sops to the upper-middle class, nothing was ever going to swing towards economic justice. Now, at least, there's an opening.
Sorry to be pessimisitc, but progress on the biggest issues of our time - the hijacking of our economy by the super-wealthy, our inevitable destruction of the only habitat we will ever know in 1,000 generations, random outbursts of mass violence - is being held hostage by the attachment a few legislative districts feel to a romanticized vision of a smalltown America that never existed.
I don't envy him having to get up there and state what he knows to be a lie: "The state of our union is strong" and then dance around the fracture lines the whole rest of the speech, after which some Tea Party douchebag will get a chance to speak code for: dark-skinned people, gun regulations, and poor people are killing our country.
but hey, a minimum wage bone and a couple gays got elected.
The Democrats have become Republicans, the Republicans have become insane, and no one is looking at long-term problems in employment or environmental instability.
We're not so much rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic as beating each other with them, a la WWE.
RUN!!!!!!!!