America NEVER STOPPED BEING GREAT

America Has Always Been Great

America has ALWAYS BEEN GREAT and has never ceased to be great.  “American exceptional-ism” is not because of politicians and political parties.  Individual American citizens have been endowed by Creator-God with certain specific talents that have made human life all over the world so much better.  Henry Ford envisioned the assembly line for efficient production applicable to more than the auto industry.  Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin.  Then there are inventors like George Washington Carver and in the medical field pioneers in open-heart surgery and blood typing and blood-banking.  Jonas Salk found a cure for polio.  There are so many examples of talented Americans doing great things for humanity and the world.  NONE OF THESE PEOPLE WERE POLITICIANS OR POLITICAL PARTY OPPERATIVES.  No politician invented the telegraph.  No political party invented the telephone.  Who invented radio?  Was it a politician or a political party?  Donald Trump is duping brain-dead voters with political sleight-of-hand with his slogan.  America has a great experimental system of representative democracy, because the great majority of American citizens ascribe to the US Constitution and they are governed by its tenets.  Republicans today LIE TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE crowing about their great love for “the Constitution”.  But when elected they have marched in lock-step to defy its “separation of powers” by sabotaging the Executive Branch because Obama is “black”.  Ted Cruz, a senator, meddled in House business interfering with John Boehner as he attempted to manage House business.  He sabotaged speaker Boehner and now he wants you to make him POTUS!  Their Tea Party wing vowed to “break the government” so it cannot function and do its business.  They managed to shut down the government for a few days and caused the US to have a lowered credit rating.  Obama cannot fill the judge seats as in his job description because of right-wing GOP intransigence and sabotage.  If the American brand of representative democracy fails, it will be because the 1% who finance conservative seditionists and plant them in positions of political power.  They have bought Congressmen to do their bidding to move us into a plutocracy/oligarchy very slowly over time.  Stacking the Supreme Court with conservative justices has resulted in SCOTUS interference in the electoral process to overturn the will of the people to elect Bush over Gore.  The founding fathers created a separation of powers to prevent such shenanigans, but the Court exceeded its mandate and authority.  Now right-wing Congressmen boldly say they will not do their job to consider any appointments Obama might submit to fill court vacancies.  This is treasonous, seditious, and unconstitutional behavior.  It must be checked before it destroys the American system of government.  Because of right wing SCOTUS decisions, “corporations are now people” and BIG business can buy elections through campaign financing.

We wonder how sane Germans allowed themselves to be seduced by a mad dictator named Hitler.  Look in the mirror America!  Observe your politics today.  Anti- government madness must be stopped.  Making scapegoats of minorities, despising immigrants while tolerating America’s home-grown terrorist group, the KKK, are seeds sown to our destruction.  We do not need Hitler’s brown shirts!  We have government separatists in the military and in our police departments that kill blacks and people of color without justification or provocation to further their dark agenda.  Para-military groups can be found in almost every state as they prepare themselves to take on the US government.

There is a National Geographic Channel series called “American Genius”, which I am watching on NETFLIX.  In it they compare and contrast the pairing of competitive accomplishments by certain men who made this nation great.

1. In computer science and computer operating systems it was Steve Jobs VS. Bill Gates
2. The invention of the airplane by the Wright brothers VS. Curtiss
3. The invention of televison by Farnsworth VS. Sarnoff (RCA)
4. In great newspaper publishing and editing it was Hearst VS. Pulitzer
5. Space technology dominance continues with “man on the moon” and flights to distant planets and photos of their atmosphere and terrain.
6. Tesla VS. Edison in the harnessing and use of electric power
7. Oppenheimer VS. Heisenburg in harnessing atomic power and the creation of nuclear weapons.

I could add to that those who pioneered the open-hearth and blast furnace processes in steel production.  These men were American geniuses who made America great.  They were not STUPID POLITICIANS like Donald Trump, who wants lift up himself by standing on their achievements.  Don’t be fooled!  AMERICA HAS ALWAYS BEEN GREAT and it has never ceased being great.

Most of what you said in the OP is true, but I still suspect that
Donald Trump win the Republican nomination and that the
2016 elections will end up looking like something you'd expect
in a banana republic, not a great nation like the USA. I have no
idea who will actually end up in the White House and the two
Houses of Congress, but I'm pretty sure the traditional two-party
system is in the process of destroying itself. There's no way to
predict at this point what it will be replaced with, or how long the
process will take, so I'm not going to speculate what will happen
before the 2018 and 2010 elections. A lot depends on economic
and foreign policy matters that also can't be predicted. But in
any case, I expect the country will come through the upheavals
OK, because the positive factors you mentioned, but I definitely
feel we're headed for "interesting times"...

Here's the reply I posted when Goodnewsinc started
a thread with this same message on my
"Elijah's School of the Spirit" Yuku Community
http://theschoolofthespirit.yuku.com/

Spiritrebel #2 03/14/16 19:23:18
re: "Jul777 wrote: Goodnews, I agree that we live in a
wonderful country ... but in this wonderful country
there are a lot things that need fixing. People are
voting for a change, and the people will vote in who
they think will be the best person for the job. Their
voices are being heard and counted. It' s an exciting
election."

Yeah, it's going to be an exciting election, but it looks to me
like there's going to be a major political upheaval in this
country over the next few years no matter who gets elected
President. The Republican Party seems to be in the process
of destroying itself, and I have no idea what will end up
replacing it. This isn't Donald Trump's fault. He didn't create
the deep rift between a number of different factions within the
GOP, he's just taking advantage of it to run as a right-wing
populist. And it doesn't matter if he ends up in the White House
or if the Democratic candidate wins: in either case, the
two-party system that's existed in this country throughout most
its history is probably broken beyond repair, and there's no way
to predict what will replace it over the long term.

Here's the reply I posted when Goodnewsinc started
a thread with this same message on my
"No Holds Barred" Yuku Community
http://noholdsbarreddiscussion.yuku.com/

03/15/16 07:00 AM
Goodnewsinc, re: "Henry Ford envisioned the assembly line
for efficient production applicable to more than the auto
industry. Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin. Then there
are inventors like George Washington Carver and in the
medical field pioneers in open-heart surgery and blood
typing and blood-banking. Jonas Salk found a cure for
polio. There are so many examples of talented Americans
doing great things for humanity and the world.
NONE OF THESE PEOPLE WERE POLITICIANS OR POLITICAL PARTY
OPPERATIVES. No politician invented the telegraph. No
political party invented the telephone. Who invented radio?
Was it a politician or a political party?"

I'm agreement with almost everything you said in your OP
article except the passage I just cited and the elabortations
you made further on,but my exceptions to these contentions
are fairly large ones. A large number of important scientific
and technological breakthroughs in this country have been
financed with government money, and the politicians have also
used their power to regulate business activities to encourage
some innovations but discourage others. And quite a few of
the innovators had a lot of political influence from behind
the scenes.

For example, Henry Ford's motivations for creating some of
the precursors of industrial automation were grounded more
in his personal political philosophy than in just a desire
to make money. Here's a quotation from his Wiki bio that
gives an over-view: "Ford had a global vision, with
consumerism as the key to peace." He made a big deal out
of trying to pay his employees well enough that they
could afford to own one of the cars they built. And he
tried to keep the prices of his cheapest automobiles
low enough that very large numbers of working Americans
could afford them.

A large number of important inventions have been financed
by the government, starting with modern pumping systems
for both mine drainage and public water systems in the
1700's. In the 1800's, the development of the telegraph
and telephone systems was financed and regulated mostly
by government at every level from local up to federal,
and so were the railroad industry and the replacement
of sailing ships with steam ships.

And this trend became more important in the Twentieth
century. Most of the medical innovations you mentioned
were made by people receiving government grants or working
for public colleges and universities. The development of
the radio and TV industries has been heavily regulated by
laws throughout their existence, and so has the private
aviation industry. The nuclear industry has always been
completely dominated by the government and so has the
space technology industry.

And a lot of people aren't aware of this, but government
regulation and financing have also always played a major
role in the evolution of the computer industry and everything
associatedwith it, such as the Internet. I worked in the field
for many years, and watched this occur. Yes, a few individual
entrepreneurs have made massive fortunes, but "Silicon
Valley" is mostly the creation of local governments who
deliberately made it easy for the computer industry to
concentrate in one place rather than spread all over the
country and as majority of new industries have done.

And here is the reply I posted
on my "Revolutionary Spiritualism" Yuku Community
http://revolutionaryspiritualism.yuku.com/

Spiritrebel, 03/15/16 12:20:28
After rereading goodnewsinc's message and the three replies
I've posted so far, I've decided to make some more detailed
comments on his excellent critique of the Republican
Party's general polities over the last couple of decades.

I completely agree that the Republicans have recently been
sabotaging the systems of checks and balances that the
Constitution was written to set up, and would like to add
something he didn't specifically mention. Since I was a
child in the late Forties and continuing up till about 1990,
I remember that practically all of the laws passed by the
US Congress had bipartisan support, because both the House
and Senate always had a significant number of conservative
Democrats, liberal Republicans, and centrists who tended
to vote for moderation on all issues. However, since then,
the Democratic delegations in Congress have remained about
the same as they've always been, but the Republican
delegations have shifted signiicantly to the right, which
has created a permanent polarization that makes it ever
increasingly difficult to pass legislation by compromise

This is a great OP and deeper and deeper replies.
Yes, I think the ship was turned back ... we wonder how long it will stay that way. Since the early eighties when I went to the US first time then for years and became a citizen.
It is wise to remember the spirit of the times in terms of mood, music and so on.
The neo-conservatives that dominate the Reps now were emerging in an era when the US made peace with China (they waited a few more years for Mao to kick the bucket and the Gang of Four episode then started exporting labor). That was in retrospect an important influence on the Friedman style of fundamentalist market economy to take root.
Punk music had morphed into new wave, destruction and shadow as an archetype were explored more than ever. I met neo-Christians, neo-Shamans, neo-everything from the mid-eighties on... seemed that religion and non-scientific stuff was also enjoying a renaissance...
Trump was a phenomenon for a while particularly in the area where he was active, on the East Coast. After the pot and LSD revolutions I was told that now cocaine was more interesting... (John Lennon summed it up well in a few words: it's a stupid drug)

I just sense a parallel between these various things and all that gave rise to modern Republican fanaticism. I know some folks who used to smoke weed and now go for this weird neomix.

The single idealist man that I dug up from my past that was a Republican in Reagan times and still I could have intelligent conversations is now an ardent conspiracy theorist and a Vladimir Putin sympathizer - I happened to stumble upon him in a left wing discussion portal last year.

I think basically these guys are still in a trance.
Unlike traditional conservatives.
But their favorite trances are different from mine.

reg, #6, re: "Yes, I think the ship was turned back ...
we wonder how long it will stay that way. Since the early
eighties when I went to the US first time then for years
and became a citizen. It is wise to remember the spirit
of the times in terms of mood, music and so on. The
neo-conservatives that dominate the Reps now were
emerging in an era when the US made peace with China
(they waited a few more years for Mao to kick the bucket
and the Gang of Four episode then started exporting
labor). That was in retrospect an important influence of
the Friedman style of fundamentalist market economy to take
root. Punk music had morphed into new wave, destruction and
shadow as an archetype were explored more than ever. I met
neo-Christians, neo-Shamans, neo-everything from the
mid-eighties on... seemed that religion and non-scientific
stuff was also enjoying a renaissance..."

I've always blamed Ronald Reagan for putting both supply
side economics and militaristic neocolonialism on the map,
which IMO makes him the worst POTUS in history, by a wide
margin. I hated him from the beginning, because I was a
left-wing political activist in California when he made
the statement "If they want a bloodbath, I'll give them a
bloodbath". I remember my friends and I all looking at one
another and saying, "Ouch! It's OUR BLOOD that he's
talking about." However, by time Reagan became President
in 1980, I was already sure that the type of spiritual and
cultural revolution I'd been hoping for since the 60's was
actually going to take place. And events since then have
proven I was right.

re: "Trump was a phenomenon for a while particularly in the
area where he was active, on the East Coast. After the pot
and LSD revolutions I was told that now cocaine was more
interesting... (John Lennon summed it up well in a few
words: it's a stupid drug) I just sense a parallel between
these various things and all that gave rise to modern
Republican fanaticism. I know some folks who used to smoke
weed and now go for this weird neomix. The single idealist
man that I dug up from my past that was a Republican in
Reagan times and still I could have intelligent
conversations is now an ardent conspiracy theorist and a
Vladimir Putin sympathizer - I happened to stumble upon
him in a left wing discussion portal last year. I think
basically these guys are still in a trance. Unlike
traditional conservatives. But their favorite trances are
different from mine."

I totally agree. I saw all this from the inside, not just
in the hard core of the counterculture and occult
communities where I've always lived, but also from inside
the computer/telecommunications industry, where I worked
from the Sixties till I became disabled in 1993.

I was reading an interview with the political science professor Keith Poole (68) of the University of Georgia today. It was done in Hungarian so all I can do is sum up his points, I found no recent publications to cover the issue. He says election politics has never been so polarized in the US since he is watching presidential campaigns in the 1960's, and the key factor is Trump. He says that it is still unpredictable if the Republican Party would split. His assessment is that apart from the stats saying that more older and white people would support Trump, while more younger people support Sanders on the Democratic side, the roots of the discontent is that while the US recovered from the latest financial crisis, the resulting gains were mostly swallowed by a few percent of affluent people (1-2%) and generally people are fed up that the standards of living for working people have not increased since about thirty years...

Sanders IMHO is not saying anything very radical, I can identify with most of his program, though he identifies as a Socialist. He simply wants to bring people closer to whatever is natural in Western Europe.

However, Europe itself is split these days. Hungary is a bad example, we are Putin's puppet in the EU with a robber baron style of governing. In Poland, a similar system threatens though they are decidedly very wary of Russia's new direction for traditional reasons. The Supreme Court of Poland brought a verdict that the restriction of the powers of the Supreme Court by the new rightist government is unconstitutional...

The Western EU countries, Britain foremost, are seeking all sorts of legal ways and means to restrict the rights of citizens of former East Block countries to move or take jobs there, plus there is a constant wariness on the recent refugee flux. All this fundamentally questions the tenability of the post-war model of Western European welfare capitalism which was influenced by the practical results of the reforms that can be tied to Roosevelt in the US.

I still wonder if the winner of the polarized political struggle will be Hillary Clinton. My relatives think that it's so bad that if she is elected they will leave the US. (Frankly, I think they won't, it's just a wild exaggeration.) I on the other hand would think twice about wanting to resettle there if Trump goes to the White House.

Many people say that despite Roosevelt's reforms, economically the US would never have gotten to the relative comfort of the 1950's without winning the war. (The funny thing is that the Soviets won it too... but postwar Soviet reality was a nightmare to most.)

reg, #8, re: I was reading an interview with the political
science professor Keith Poole (68) of the University of
Georgia today. It was done in Hungarian so all I can do is
sum up his points, I found no recent publications to cover
the issue. He says election politics has never been so
polarized in the US since he is watching presidential
campaigns in the 1960's, and the key factor is Trump. He
says that it is still unpredictable if the Republican Party
would split. His assessment is that apart from the stats
saying that more older and white people would support Trump,
while more younger people support Sanders on the Democratic
side, the roots of the discontent is that while the US
recovered from the latest financial crisis, the resulting
gains were mostly swallowed by a few percent of affluent
people (1-2%) and generally people are fed up that the
standards of living for working people have not increased
since about thirty years..."

I agree with everything Professor Poole said in the
interview, but he didn't touch on the issue that I'm most
interested in: WHY has Donald Trump become the key factor
in the 2016 election campaign? Especially, why are so many
Americans supporting him even though he's obviously nothing
more than a comic actor playing the role of a right-wing
populist politician? And why haven't the ultra-conservative
and moderate wings of the Republic wings made a serious
effort to stop him from winning the Republican nomination?
My slant on the first question is that Trump doesn't really
have either a personal or ideological "following" as such
things are usually defined. This is because he deliberately
projects a complex, self-contradictory of himself in both
areas, so he can appeal to a very wide range of people who
are dis-satisfied with the political and economic status
quo. The answer to the second question is just as simple:
the factions within the Republican Party simply have never
been organized enough to do so.

re: "Sanders IMHO is not saying anything very radical, I can
identify with most of his program, though he identifies as a
Socialist. He simply wants to bring people closer to whatever
is natural in Western Europe."

This how I've always viewed Sanders myself, which is why I've
posted over and over that while I'm in closer ideological
agreement with him than with any other well-known Democratic
official, my primary vote will go to Clinton or whoever else
runs against him, assuming he's still even in the race when
the California Primary occurs on June 7th.

However, Europe itself is split these days. Hungary is a bad
example, we are Putin's puppet in the EU with a robber baron
style of governing. In Poland, a similar system threatens
though they are decidedly very wary of Russia's new direction
for traditional reasons. The Supreme Court of Poland brought
a verdict that the restriction of the powers of the Supreme
Court by the new rightist government is unconstitutional...
The Western EU countries, Britain foremost, are seeking all
sorts of legal ways and means to restrict the rights of
citizens of former East Block countries to move or take jobs
there, plus there is a constant wariness on the recent
refugee flux. All this fundamentally questions the tenability
of the post-war model of Western European welfare capitalism
which was influenced by the practical results of the reforms
that can be tied to Roosevelt in the US."

I agree with everything you just said, and my guess is that
the EU will be following rather than leading as the radical
restructuring of Western civilization that's now underway
continues to unfold. The primary reason is that the EU
throughout its existance has steadfastly refused to become
a world-class military power in terms of troops, high-tech
conventional weapons, or nuclear weapons.

re: "I still wonder if the winner of the polarized political
struggle will be Hillary Clinton. My relatives think that
it's so bad that if she is elected they will leave the US.
(Frankly, I think they won't, it's just a wild exaggeration.)
I on the other hand would think twice about wanting to
resettle there if Trump goes to the White House."

I totally disagree with your relative and completely agree
with you. IMO, If Hillary becomes President, it's almost
certain that her Administration will just be an extension
of the Obama Administration, which has actually done a pretty
good job. But if Trump is elected, it's very probable that
the economy will rapidly be falling apart and the biggest
race riots since the Sixties will be occurring even before
he takes office. And I expect that much worse things would
happen on the international level...

re: "Many people say that despite Roosevelt's reforms,
economically the US would never have gotten to the relative
comfort of the 1950's without winning the war. (The funny
thing is that the Soviets won it too... but postwar Soviet
reality was a nightmare to most.)"

I tend to agree with you, but it's hard for me to envision
an alternate history scenario in which the USA didn't get
involved in WW2. However, there are lots of things Truman
could have done differently after he became President:
he didn't really have to nuke Japan and could have kept
our nuclear capabilities secret until we had enough A and
H bombs to totally conquor and rule both the USSR and
China. That would have REALLY altered the course of history,
though I won't try to speculate about what the world would
be like today if it had happened.

I am aware that Native Americans disagree about the greatness of America and I can agree with their perspective. However ALL PEOPLE who are citizens of this country constitute "we the people". The greatness of the USA as a WHOLE and as a destination for immigrants is inscribed on "The Statue of Liberty". You can say the French wrote that, but what is written is our aspiration to greatness that they recognized. I say, "Thank you", to the amazing French people of that day! Here is how I amended my previous post:

It just occurred to me that there were a few politicians (presidents) who helped make America great. Among these are Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt (national parks and reserves), FDR got us out of the Great Depression); Eisenhower (the highway system), JFK (challenge to walk on the moon); LBJ (civil rights, voter rights). They helped America achieve "a more perfect union" and become "a shining beacon" in the family of nations. I do not mean to slight them. So I am posting this addendum today. There is a reason why the USA is the desired destination in the minds of many immigrants the world over despite our unresolved social problems.

goodnewsinc, #10, re: "I am aware that Native Americans disagree
about the greatness of America and I can agree with their
perspective. However ALL PEOPLE who are citizens of this country
constitute 'we the people'. The greatness of the USA as a WHOLE
and as a destination for immigrants is inscribed on 'The Statue
of Liberty'. You can say the French wrote that, but what is
written is our aspiration to greatness that they recognized. I
say, 'Thank you', to the amazing French people of that day!"

My own belief on this is that the main reason the USA became
a great nation was that, until the last few decades, our
government has always had less control over private
individuals and organizations than has been the case in most
other countries. However, I don't agree with the modern
conservatives who think that reducing the size and power
of the present federal government would solve the problem.
This is because there is an economic elite that can easily
buy political power on the state and local level, as well
owning the big banks and other institutions that control
the commercial and consumer credit that finances just about
all business activity.

re: "Here is how I amended my previous post: 'It just occurred
to me that there were a few politicians (presidents) who helped
make America great. Among these are Abraham Lincoln, Teddy
Roosevelt (national parks and reserves), FDR got us out of
the Great Depression); Eisenhower (the highway system), JFK
(challenge to walk on the moon); LBJ (civil rights, voter
rights). They helped America achieve "a more perfect union"
and become "a shining beacon" in the family of nations. I do
not mean to slight them. So I am posting this addendum today.
There is a reason why the USA is the desired destination in
the minds of many immigrants the world over despite our
unresolved social problems."

I agree that the Presidents you mentioned all had a positive
influence that contributed to America's greatness, but it
mostly consisted of supporting powerful business or human
right organizations that were already trying to do the
good things you mentioned but were being held back by the
government. For example, Lincoln didn't free the slaves, he
just acknowledged that they had already been freed after
many years of hard work by private abolishonist movements
and a long, massively bloody civil war. Teddy Roosevelt
created the national parks because big corporatios wanted
to buy the land and make money running commercial parks,
and there were already envionmentalist groups that wanted
to buy the land and either hold it in reserve or open it
to public recreational use at minimum cost. FDR's real
reason for creating the New Deal was in his own words,
"to save capitalism", because there was a realistic
movement towards socialism in the country at the time.
And the other Presidents on you list were also acting
mostly because private movements were forcing them to.