Politics IS an illusion. Some insiders even write about it ("Deep State" by Mike Lofgren, 2016 comes to mind. Lofgren, a career REPUBLICAN staffer on Capitol Hill, for some "bigger than average" Senators and Congressmen). He saw "how the sausage is made". Lofgren notes that on the things that matter, both parties are invested in the stat…
Politics IS an illusion. Some insiders even write about it ("Deep State" by Mike Lofgren, 2016 comes to mind. Lofgren, a career REPUBLICAN staffer on Capitol Hill, for some "bigger than average" Senators and Congressmen). He saw "how the sausage is made". Lofgren notes that on the things that matter, both parties are invested in the status quo and their "sponsors". America is a largely controlled society with the veneer of a "constitutional republic". He notes several examples, including health care and the Middle East, both controlled by powerful lobbies which promote policies (and Congress legislates accordingly) that are OPPOSED by a majority of Americans.
A lot of it has to do with the relatively very high (relative to America's level of affluence) level of ignorance among Americans. Public education has completely failed for many people. Most schools have failed to develop the vast majority of young Americans to their full potential--and a big factor is many American kids come from broken homes (or "non-conventional familis), or when they don't, American parents are too busy with BS to get their kids in the mindset that school is important. They offload their kids to schools that look like prisons, to baby sit them.
In "Bowling Alone" by Robert Putnam (circa 2005, by Putnam, a liberal Ivy League professor, who in this very book, with HIS research, shreds many liberal illusions) referenced a study that showed the average US high school graduate from 1948 was more proficient in math, basic science, English, and history than the average US college graduate 50 years later.
One example: despite the lies of the US government ("victory is around the corner!") and the pro-US media coverage of the Vietnam war until the Tet Offensive, in the mid-1960s millions of Americans were opposing the war. Today, a plurality of the public went along with COVID and the vaccine, hardly anyone protested the US role in Ukraine, and Americans who protest US policy in Palestine are deplatformed or fired.
Today's twenty-somethings are more adept at using TikTok, Facebook, and smartphone than those of the 1990s in Putnam's book, so we should be OK.
Politics IS an illusion. Some insiders even write about it ("Deep State" by Mike Lofgren, 2016 comes to mind. Lofgren, a career REPUBLICAN staffer on Capitol Hill, for some "bigger than average" Senators and Congressmen). He saw "how the sausage is made". Lofgren notes that on the things that matter, both parties are invested in the status quo and their "sponsors". America is a largely controlled society with the veneer of a "constitutional republic". He notes several examples, including health care and the Middle East, both controlled by powerful lobbies which promote policies (and Congress legislates accordingly) that are OPPOSED by a majority of Americans.
A lot of it has to do with the relatively very high (relative to America's level of affluence) level of ignorance among Americans. Public education has completely failed for many people. Most schools have failed to develop the vast majority of young Americans to their full potential--and a big factor is many American kids come from broken homes (or "non-conventional familis), or when they don't, American parents are too busy with BS to get their kids in the mindset that school is important. They offload their kids to schools that look like prisons, to baby sit them.
In "Bowling Alone" by Robert Putnam (circa 2005, by Putnam, a liberal Ivy League professor, who in this very book, with HIS research, shreds many liberal illusions) referenced a study that showed the average US high school graduate from 1948 was more proficient in math, basic science, English, and history than the average US college graduate 50 years later.
One example: despite the lies of the US government ("victory is around the corner!") and the pro-US media coverage of the Vietnam war until the Tet Offensive, in the mid-1960s millions of Americans were opposing the war. Today, a plurality of the public went along with COVID and the vaccine, hardly anyone protested the US role in Ukraine, and Americans who protest US policy in Palestine are deplatformed or fired.
Today's twenty-somethings are more adept at using TikTok, Facebook, and smartphone than those of the 1990s in Putnam's book, so we should be OK.
"A lot of it has to do with the relatively very high (relative to America's level of affluence) level of ignorance among Americans." ~ SocratesDetroit
Contrast that with ...
What do Russians want in 2025? | BBC News
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jc_4jOUrJgs&t=1s