Who is America ?

Casual conversation between friends. Anything goes (almost).
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Dan74
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Re: Who is America ?

Post by Dan74 »

conebeckham wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 4:07 pm
Dan74 wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 3:41 pm
conebeckham wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 8:07 am THis past week there was a great and eye-opening Frontline épisode about the Alt Right. These people are organized and dangerous.
What do you think are the right tactics to combat the alt-right, Cone?
Outing them individually.
This is what the reporters have done, and I believe it has had an effect.

Maintaining resistance, and continually calling out Trump and any other elected official when the racists are being defended by government officials.
To me, this is no different to the witchhunts of McCarthyism, when outing people for their beliefs ruined careers and lives. Of course, we could say the beliefs are poles apart, so that the tactic is justified. And yet to me this methodology smells bad both on a personal level and as a principle. There is a reason why freedom of thought is guaranteed in your constitution and curbing it by punishing people for their beliefs is an attack on something fundamental, is it not?

But the worst part to this approach seems to me to be the implied defeatism. "We cannot beat this ideology, so let's go after the people 'infected' with it. Let's punish them, make them suffer for their beliefs, make them even more resentful of the mainstream and the status quo, let's persecute them, drive them out. " Sounds familiar? Last thing I would want to make out of the fascists and the neo-Nazis, is martyrs.

I am sure I am missing a lot here, Cone, so please bear with me and if you can be bothered, set me straight.
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Re: Who is America ?

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Many of these guys travel around the country to participate, and they are set on violence. Though I don't advocate violence in general, I do think there are instances when it is an appropriate response. Antifa don't start things, really, as far as I can tell....these traveling White Supremacists do. And from what we saw in Charlottesville, the racists beat several people with no police response, even right in front of the police station itself.
དམ་པའི་དོན་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ཆེ་བ་དང་།
རྟོག་གེའི་ཡུལ་མིན་བླ་མའི་བྱིན་རླབས་དང་།
སྐལ་ལྡན་ལས་འཕྲོ་ཅན་གྱིས་རྟོགས་པ་སྟེ།
དེ་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ལ་ནི་ལོ་རྟོག་སེལ།།


"Absolute Truth is not an object of analytical discourse or great discriminating wisdom,
It is realized through the blessing grace of the Guru and fortunate Karmic potential.
Like this, mistaken ideas of discriminating wisdom are clarified."
- (Kyabje Bokar Rinpoche, from his summary of "The Ocean of Definitive Meaning")
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Grigoris
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Re: Who is America ?

Post by Grigoris »

Dan74 wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 7:00 pmblah
Can you please describe what YOU believe is the correct tactic, because it seems to me the only thing you have been doing so far is to hover around and swoop down on other people's recommendations.

It is awfully Socratic, but oh so tedious...
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE

"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
The Fundamental Tantra of Dzogchen Semde
Malcolm
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Re: Who is America ?

Post by Malcolm »

Dan74 wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 7:00 pm
conebeckham wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 4:07 pm
Dan74 wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 3:41 pm

What do you think are the right tactics to combat the alt-right, Cone?
Outing them individually.
This is what the reporters have done, and I believe it has had an effect.

Maintaining resistance, and continually calling out Trump and any other elected official when the racists are being defended by government officials.
To me, this is no different to the witchhunts of McCarthyism, when outing people for their beliefs ruined careers and lives. Of course, we could say the beliefs are poles apart, so that the tactic is justified. And yet to me this methodology smells bad both on a personal level and as a principle. There is a reason why freedom of thought is guaranteed in your constitution and curbing it by punishing people for their beliefs is an attack on something fundamental, is it not?

But the worst part to this approach seems to me to be the implied defeatism. "We cannot beat this ideology, so let's go after the people 'infected' with it. Let's punish them, make them suffer for their beliefs, make them even more resentful of the mainstream and the status quo, let's persecute them, drive them out. " Sounds familiar? Last thing I would want to make out of the fascists and the neo-Nazis, is martyrs.

I am sure I am missing a lot here, Cone, so please bear with me and if you can be bothered, set me straight.
Dan, perhaps it escaped your attention, but active members of the Communist party and Nazis are barrred from immigrating to the US because of their beliefs.
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Dan74
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Re: Who is America ?

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Grigoris wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 7:03 pm
Dan74 wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 7:00 pmblah
Can you please describe what YOU believe is the correct tactic, because it seems to me the only thing you have been doing so far is to hover around and swoop down on other people's recommendations.

It is awfully Socratic, but oh so tedious...
Greg, I've said what I find to be worthwhile here viewtopic.php?f=36&t=29049&start=160#p460583 and in other posts.

But yeah, you're right, it's getting repetitive.
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conebeckham
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Re: Who is America ?

Post by conebeckham »

Dan74 wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 7:00 pm
conebeckham wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 4:07 pm
Dan74 wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 3:41 pm

What do you think are the right tactics to combat the alt-right, Cone?
Outing them individually.
This is what the reporters have done, and I believe it has had an effect.

Maintaining resistance, and continually calling out Trump and any other elected official when the racists are being defended by government officials.
To me, this is no different to the witchhunts of McCarthyism, when outing people for their beliefs ruined careers and lives. Of course, we could say the beliefs are poles apart, so that the tactic is justified. And yet to me this methodology smells bad both on a personal level and as a principle. There is a reason why freedom of thought is guaranteed in your constitution and curbing it by punishing people for their beliefs is an attack on something fundamental, is it not?

But the worst part to this approach seems to me to be the implied defeatism. "We cannot beat this ideology, so let's go after the people 'infected' with it. Let's punish them, make them suffer for their beliefs, make them even more resentful of the mainstream and the status quo, let's persecute them, drive them out. " Sounds familiar? Last thing I would want to make out of the fascists and the neo-Nazis, is martyrs.

I am sure I am missing a lot here, Cone, so please bear with me and if you can be bothered, set me straight.
The people who are outed are not outed simply due to their beliefs, Dan, but due to their actions. Those who engage in acts of violence based on their beliefs should be outed. Frankly, those “assemblies” were never meant to be “peaceful assemblies” and I think anyone who participated deserved to be outed.

I don’t condone anyone, Antifas or otherwise, who instigates violence—but by my reckoning the Charlottesville assembly was practically an instigation in the first place.
དམ་པའི་དོན་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ཆེ་བ་དང་།
རྟོག་གེའི་ཡུལ་མིན་བླ་མའི་བྱིན་རླབས་དང་།
སྐལ་ལྡན་ལས་འཕྲོ་ཅན་གྱིས་རྟོགས་པ་སྟེ།
དེ་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ལ་ནི་ལོ་རྟོག་སེལ།།


"Absolute Truth is not an object of analytical discourse or great discriminating wisdom,
It is realized through the blessing grace of the Guru and fortunate Karmic potential.
Like this, mistaken ideas of discriminating wisdom are clarified."
- (Kyabje Bokar Rinpoche, from his summary of "The Ocean of Definitive Meaning")
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Queequeg
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Re: Who is America ?

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Dan74 wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 7:00 pm
conebeckham wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 4:07 pm
Dan74 wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 3:41 pm

What do you think are the right tactics to combat the alt-right, Cone?
Outing them individually.
This is what the reporters have done, and I believe it has had an effect.

Maintaining resistance, and continually calling out Trump and any other elected official when the racists are being defended by government officials.
To me, this is no different to the witchhunts of McCarthyism, when outing people for their beliefs ruined careers and lives. Of course, we could say the beliefs are poles apart, so that the tactic is justified. And yet to me this methodology smells bad both on a personal level and as a principle. There is a reason why freedom of thought is guaranteed in your constitution and curbing it by punishing people for their beliefs is an attack on something fundamental, is it not?

But the worst part to this approach seems to me to be the implied defeatism. "We cannot beat this ideology, so let's go after the people 'infected' with it. Let's punish them, make them suffer for their beliefs, make them even more resentful of the mainstream and the status quo, let's persecute them, drive them out. " Sounds familiar? Last thing I would want to make out of the fascists and the neo-Nazis, is martyrs.

I am sure I am missing a lot here, Cone, so please bear with me and if you can be bothered, set me straight.
They're appearing in public and asserting their beliefs. While they have a right to say what they want in public, they don't have a right to privacy when they stand on a public street corner and say, "Race war now!" And they don't have a right to associate with people who don't want them around.

All that is happening is that a name is being put to the face that espouses these ideas.

Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences. They want to be a pariahs, they can knock themselves out. The rest of us don't have to associate with them.

Actually, this is the how the worst offenders are punished in the sangha - they are not allowed to be part of the community. They get the silent treatment.
There is no suffering to be severed. Ignorance and klesas are indivisible from bodhi. There is no cause of suffering to be abandoned. Since extremes and the false are the Middle and genuine, there is no path to be practiced. Samsara is nirvana. No severance achieved. No suffering nor its cause. No path, no end. There is no transcendent realm; there is only the one true aspect. There is nothing separate from the true aspect.
-Guanding, Perfect and Sudden Contemplation,
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Grigoris
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Re: Who is America ?

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Dan74 wrote: Sun Aug 12, 2018 7:21 pmGreg, I've said what I find to be worthwhile here viewtopic.php?f=36&t=29049&start=160#p460583 and in other posts.

But yeah, you're right, it's getting repetitive.
I do not disagree with you about these means, I think that they are useful too. I am not under delusion that punching fascists is enough. I just think it is a valid tactic, as well.
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE

"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
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Re: Who is America ?

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It may feel like a valid tactic to you, but I would wager that it is losing support for the antifascist cause among the population at large. While the Antifa pat themselves on the back (and no, Cone, from my reading, they initiated the violence some if not most of the time), the voters start thinking that it's the antifascist guys that are a real threat to peace. Well done that...


Incidentally, was just making my wife an unrelated meme to cheer her up and on the front page of memegenerator is this:
Screenshot (192).jpg
Screenshot (192).jpg (262.92 KiB) Viewed 2304 times
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Re: Who is America ?

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What if I told you that fascists make memes?

What if I told you that the "common voters" were the one's responsible for putting the current fascists in power?
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE

"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
The Fundamental Tantra of Dzogchen Semde
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Re: Who is America ?

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Yes, fascists/alt-right are big on memes and that screenshot proves nothing.

But your second comment is telling. I don't think most voters in the US thought about it this way, but the fact that all the various faults of Trump on full public display were not enough of a deal-breaker should be a huge wake-up call to the those in the political establishment who still manage to believe in something other than filling their own pockets.

The Left has failed in the West. Dismally. Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn are the death throes of the once healthy and inspirational body of progressive politics. What is to come after I can only shudder to think..
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Re: Who is America ?

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Dan74 wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 1:42 pm Yes, fascists/alt-right are big on memes and that screenshot proves nothing.

But your second comment is telling. I don't think most voters in the US thought about it this way, but the fact that all the various faults of Trump on full public display were not enough of a deal-breaker should be a huge wake-up call to the those in the political establishment who still manage to believe in something other than filling their own pockets.

The Left has failed in the West. Dismally. Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn are the death throes of the once healthy and inspirational body of progressive politics. What is to come after I can only shudder to think..
I don't think the "left" has failed, I think representative democracy has died (long ago) and all that is left is the corporatist worms feeding on it's moldering corpse.
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE

"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
The Fundamental Tantra of Dzogchen Semde
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Re: Who is America ?

Post by amanitamusc »

Dan74 wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 1:42 pm Yes, fascists/alt-right are big on memes and that screenshot proves nothing.

But your second comment is telling. I don't think most voters in the US thought about it this way, but the fact that all the various faults of Trump on full public display were not enough of a deal-breaker should be a huge wake-up call to the those in the political establishment who still manage to believe in something other than filling their own pockets.

The Left has failed in the West. Dismally. Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn are the death throes of the once healthy and inspirational body of progressive politics. What is to come after I can only shudder to think..
Your lucky to live in such a lovely country.
https://forward.com/opinion/208252/swit ... locaust-p/

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/us-airmen- ... ecognized/
Last edited by amanitamusc on Mon Aug 13, 2018 3:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Dan74
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Re: Who is America ?

Post by Dan74 »

amanitamusc wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 2:22 pm
Dan74 wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 1:42 pm Yes, fascists/alt-right are big on memes and that screenshot proves nothing.

But your second comment is telling. I don't think most voters in the US thought about it this way, but the fact that all the various faults of Trump on full public display were not enough of a deal-breaker should be a huge wake-up call to the those in the political establishment who still manage to believe in something other than filling their own pockets.

The Left has failed in the West. Dismally. Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn are the death throes of the once healthy and inspirational body of progressive politics. What is to come after I can only shudder to think..
Don't worry about the usa.Switzerland is truly a shit hole.Lots of Nazi lovers.
https://forward.com/opinion/208252/swit ... locaust-p/
Trump used the term "shit hole" to describe poor country's.The opposite is true in most cases.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/us-airmen- ... ecognized/
Nice article, thanks, Amanitamusic. Have you actually read it or just googled to try to find some dirt on Switzerland? Come on, man.
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Re: Who is America ?

Post by amanitamusc »

Dan74 wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 3:04 pm
amanitamusc wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 2:22 pm
Dan74 wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 1:42 pm Yes, fascists/alt-right are big on memes and that screenshot proves nothing.

But your second comment is telling. I don't think most voters in the US thought about it this way, but the fact that all the various faults of Trump on full public display were not enough of a deal-breaker should be a huge wake-up call to the those in the political establishment who still manage to believe in something other than filling their own pockets.

The Left has failed in the West. Dismally. Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn are the death throes of the once healthy and inspirational body of progressive politics. What is to come after I can only shudder to think..

Don't worry about the usa.Switzerland is truly a shit hole.Lots of Nazi lovers.
https://forward.com/opinion/208252/swit ... locaust-p/
Trump used the term "shit hole" to describe poor country's.The opposite is true in most cases.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/us-airmen- ... ecognized/
Nice article, thanks, Amanitamusic. Have you actually read it or just googled to try to find some dirt on Switzerland? Come on, man.
So you are proud of the articles?They are nice?You are a Buddhist?
It was very difficult to find dirt on Switzerland Dan.Such great country until you lift the lid.
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conebeckham
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Re: Who is America ?

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Grigoris wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 12:23 pm What if I told you that fascists make memes?

What if I told you that the "common voters" were the one's responsible for putting the current fascists in power?
Honestly, it was the common "non-voters" who bear much of the responsibility for Trump's presidency....along with a number of people who threw their votes away in some areas. Trump did not win the popular vote.

The GOP played the game, regardless of who their candidate was, though I do think this particular candidate appealed to a certain cross-section of the populace. I think that included Authoritarian personality types, including Fascists. It also included a lot of people who have not really considered their political ideology at all.

As for Antifa, I think in every movement individuals act according to their own agendas, and sometimes those agendas don't line up neatly with the stated goals of a given movement. The clowns who were inciting violence this past weekend were obviously not targeting Fascists, and may have been "Antifa" merely in name. These events allow for cover for bad eggs of all colors. We saw a lot of opportunistic looting out here in the Bay Area during BLM marches, etc. and I personally think people need to be individually held responsible, and movements should not get blamed. Unless, of course, those movements are worth blaming--White Supremacists, Ne-Nazis, etc. are worth blaming, as organizations, and their members must be held to account. If such movements did not exist, there would be no need for Antifa.
དམ་པའི་དོན་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ཆེ་བ་དང་།
རྟོག་གེའི་ཡུལ་མིན་བླ་མའི་བྱིན་རླབས་དང་།
སྐལ་ལྡན་ལས་འཕྲོ་ཅན་གྱིས་རྟོགས་པ་སྟེ།
དེ་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ལ་ནི་ལོ་རྟོག་སེལ།།


"Absolute Truth is not an object of analytical discourse or great discriminating wisdom,
It is realized through the blessing grace of the Guru and fortunate Karmic potential.
Like this, mistaken ideas of discriminating wisdom are clarified."
- (Kyabje Bokar Rinpoche, from his summary of "The Ocean of Definitive Meaning")
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Dan74
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Re: Who is America ?

Post by Dan74 »

amanitamusc wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 3:23 pm
Dan74 wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 3:04 pm
amanitamusc wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 2:22 pm

Don't worry about the usa.Switzerland is truly a shit hole.Lots of Nazi lovers.
https://forward.com/opinion/208252/swit ... locaust-p/
Trump used the term "shit hole" to describe poor country's.The opposite is true in most cases.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/us-airmen- ... ecognized/
Nice article, thanks, Amanitamusic. Have you actually read it or just googled to try to find some dirt on Switzerland? Come on, man.
So you are proud of the articles?They are nice?You are a Buddhist?
It was very difficult to find dirt on Switzerland Dan.Such great country until you lift the lid.
Yes! The inspirational story of Rosli Naf, for example.

To call any country 'a shit hole', A, is basically a confession of ignorance. Lift a lid on that, and you'll be doing some good work. Some even call that Buddhism.
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Dan74
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Re: Who is America ?

Post by Dan74 »

Grigoris wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 2:04 pm
Dan74 wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 1:42 pm Yes, fascists/alt-right are big on memes and that screenshot proves nothing.

But your second comment is telling. I don't think most voters in the US thought about it this way, but the fact that all the various faults of Trump on full public display were not enough of a deal-breaker should be a huge wake-up call to the those in the political establishment who still manage to believe in something other than filling their own pockets.

The Left has failed in the West. Dismally. Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn are the death throes of the once healthy and inspirational body of progressive politics. What is to come after I can only shudder to think..
I don't think the "left" has failed, I think representative democracy has died (long ago) and all that is left is the corporatist worms feeding on it's moldering corpse.
It's been subverted, yes. "Failed' is too strong a word for me. There are still aspects of it that function to some extent. There is some rule of law (compare to absolute monarchies, for example), there is some responsible government (due to the opposition trying to dig up dirt on it and the media sufficiently free and happy to publish the said dirt), there is some protection of some Human Rights (compare with other places again, not rights such as not to live in poverty, to have meaningful employment, etc) and there is also some separation of powers and checks and balances. It even governs for the people sometimes, I've even seen some of these people (to corrupt an old Soviet joke).

For me, the question is how to preserve the good aspects of democracy and rebuild.
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Re: Who is America ?

Post by Grigoris »

Dan74 wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 5:10 pmFor me, the question is how to preserve the good aspects of democracy and rebuild.
I don't think it is worth rebuilding. The problem is that since it was built on an unsteady basis (global capitalist colonialism) it was doomed to failure. Representative democracy is dead. The Hillarys and the Trumps are just animated corpses.
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE

"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
The Fundamental Tantra of Dzogchen Semde
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Re: Who is America ?

Post by Jeff H »

Grigoris wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 6:17 pm
Dan74 wrote: Mon Aug 13, 2018 5:10 pmFor me, the question is how to preserve the good aspects of democracy and rebuild.
I don't think it is worth rebuilding. The problem is that since it was built on an unsteady basis (global capitalist colonialism) it was doomed to failure. Representative democracy is dead. The Hillarys and the Trumps are just animated corpses.
What do you see as a potentially effective form of government that could cultivate and protect the well being of citizens?
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