The Real America
— Poverty, A Kept Condition!
[originally published as a Facebook Note on December 1, 2016]
If you’re an American, would you like to know what kind of country you live in? Well, please read on.
America, a land which prides itself on liberty, imprisons more people than any other nation on the planet. Imprisoning people has become so lucrative that a private for-profit prison industry has flourished and become rooted within our nation.
Back when President Richard Nixon recognized that the anti-Vietnam War protesters were also pot smokers, he federalized the nation’s marijuana laws to make the plant completely illegal. Any states not comporting their state pot laws to the federal code were threatened with having its federal transportation monies withheld. And following the peace protests and from the war, America became flooded with cocaine and heroin. Its consumption becoming the largest market in the world.
The table was set, and so began America’s Drug War! Three key considerations:
First, for politicians and profiteers, The Drug War proved very valuable. One sure benefit was illicit drug smuggling routes became weapons smuggling routes, which was helpful funding and weaponizing actual or attempted overthrows of unfavorable governments (see Iran-Contra and exploits of former CIA contracted pilot, Barry Seal). In fact, take a quick look at America’s friendly dictators (and take some extra time and research who got to become the ambassadors to such nations):
Secondly, the Drug War also helped to limit the voting pool of the electorate. As so many family and friends get arrested, it got to a point where nobody wanted to serve on jury duty. Take a poll. Too many people believe that if they register to vote they will be called for jury duty — and nobody wants to put their family and friends in jail. Not only did this change the structure and make-up of jury pools, but it also helped to limit who voted. Plus, those who became felons could no longer vote.
Since Nixon, approximately 50 percent of those who can vote do vote in national elections; 33 percent in state elections and only 18 percent in municipal elections. Now you know why big corporate money is so important during election season. Due to the limited voting pool, to become president, one needs 25.1 percent, to become the governor one needs about 17 percent and to be the mayor all you need is around nine percent.
If you’re an American and you’re reading this? Well, you must know that money influences and now you know how politicians get bought! Plus, the standard bought politician gets to pretend how good they are and how busy they are as they pollute legislative agendas with draconian anti-drug laws. And the beat goes on …. la-da-da-da-de, la-da-da-da-do …!
Thirdly, the Drug War became so damn profitable not only for the mobsters who politicians could call upon in a pinch, but also for the banks which laundered the money. Again, the underground economy helped to keep people from participating in America’s electoral system.
So let’s move on.
America’s longest lasting war in Afghanistan has indeed proven profitable for American corporations. And the US wars and bombing campaigns in the deep Middle East and Northern Africa have also proven profitable for American corporations. That America’s largest banks and oil companies stand to gain profits from the Dakota pipeline is an economic given.
This is so sad; but so true!
So who are the police now hired to wage war tactics of brutality on over 100 Native American Tribes who’ve finally united in cause and decided to make a much-needed stand to defend their continuously treaty-broken lands? The oil pipeline is targeted to run not only through ancient burial grounds, but also under the Missouri River which is a source of water for Native Americans living at Standing Rock.
The oil company’s security force is likely comprised of members of Metro-police units organized as super SWAT teams within our communities, mostly to wage the Drug War. Nationally, once normal police departments now possess adjunct militarized units way beyond the scope of community policing and Officer Friendly.
Who hires these militarized police units and private attack-dog security firms and supervises their actions against tribal nations of innocent water protectors? They are led and sub-contracted by a private mercenary firm called TigerSwan which spawned from the infamous Blackwater Company, renowned and hated from the Bush-Cheney War on Iraq — there’s a reason why the company changed its name!
One can even make a reasonable argument that the massive police presence at Standing Rock amounts to on-the-job training for potential future policing roles as America further tightens into a police state under the Trump Administration. Donald Trump will certainly beef up immigration policing, intensify a renewed push with the drug war and further develop and contract the privatized prison industry. We’ll also likely see more privatized probation departments and urine testing companies — big business!
A good American would have read all of the above and studied the references carefully. If you did, then you now know how America’s middle class collapsed and how poverty has become a kept condition in America, the richest nation on earth. In prior days, global oligarchs squeezed Third World nations for oil, diamonds, gold, silver, copper, tin, timber, rubber and plantation labor in agriculture, etc.. But, today, they pretty much have already exhausted those resources while providing the people from those nations little to no benefit — hence the friendly dictator!
But capitalism needs its growth and if a war is needed, so be it. Today we’ve discovered that every day Americans have now become victims to the squeeze of the profiteers. Thus, we see the one percent vs. 99 percent and the CEO to worker pay ratio at 450 to one, compared to most nations which is 15 to one. Income inequality is rampant and American consumer buying power has markedly diminished, as well as the jobs which accompany a strong consumer market. Today, people are placated by being drugged out and fending for themselves, many of them dying.
This is no longer the America I grew up in as a Baby Boomer! Shall we welcome America’s new ultimate friendly dictator, Donald Trump? In pretty simple terms: N-O-P-E !!!
PS: Americans truly need the sound governing policies of Bernie Sanders!
