Coincidence ?

[muscle]

America is still fundemantally sound it is definelty mismanaged, but I believe strong enough to recover. But it is going to take years.

I would like to believe that but can't. The American population is largely uneducated and unconcerned about world events. Americans could care less as long as it does not affect their ability to shop, watch tv or play computer games.
I e mailed Fox News the morning after the coup, asking why they were not even mentioning it in their newscasts. All the other news sources were dead air on the cable. Fox News e mailed me back that they were unaware of a coup and that most Americans were far more interested in the "Baby Amber" rescue. Two hours later they mentioned it and Home Cable pulled the plug on them. Promos played on that channel for about an hour, then they came back on. The coup was mentioned about a half hour later and this time they stayed on.
Why is Rupert Murdock, who is not an American, allowed to even own news outlets in the US? Prior FCC regulation limited television station and communications ownership to US citizens. Whatever happened to that law? Why is T-Mobile, formerly D-Telecom, the government owned phone company of Germany (and still a German company), allowed spectrum space in the US? Who has sold us out?How far has it gone?
Remember your high school civics and history classes. Was anyone (other than you) interested in what was being discussed? That 95% of disinterested Americans are the ones who are more concerned with mini-vans and shopping malls than world affairs. All that thought will just give you wrinkles and require Botox. Easier to let Rush or O'Reilly do the thinking. Who do you want me to vote for Rush?
Sorry Ray, but I think America is on a nosedive that it can't pull out of. It is seen as a cash cow and is being milked for all it is worth. People of my lackluster Boomer generation gave birth to Generation X (I was actually married to an Xer-23 years younger than me) and they could care less about world affairs. We reallly messed up post-Vietnam. The teens and adolescents now are even less interested, if that is possible. Get out of my way, there is a sale at Target!
The only hope now for America is that the younger deployed soldiers in Iraq bring back a sense of world affairs that gets applied to American society. That hope is a real crap-shoot knowing many of them. My ex got a nasty wake-up call when her ROTC commission came and her Reserve unit (2 years later) found itself depolyed. She is now on her second one-year tour, running convoys from Kuwait to Iraq. The e mails I get from my younger soldier friends have nothing to do with politics or real news. They are more interested in what kind of a Hummer they will buy with their combat pay and tax deferred money. Or, they are planning to volunteer for another deployment because their spouse has run up so many credit card bills while they were gone, that they have to.
I am reading a book now that mentions Cheney's grad school days in Madison (1967). Fascinating and scary. He was there during the demonstrations against Dow and was involved with Wisconsin politics even then. His relationship with the Bushes is akin to the Romulans and Klingons joining forces against the Federation.
Eisenhower's farewell warning about the "military-industrial complex" was probably the smartest thing an American president has said in my life time.
Although I did still use The Gipper's "Trust, but verify".

[cookie]

Muscle,
I agree with almost everything,
especially about the education.
But in your anger I think you are mixing up things:

Why is Rupert Murdock, who is not an American, allowed to even own news outlets in the US? Prior FCC regulation limited television station and communications ownership to US citizens. Whatever happened to that law? Why is T-Mobile, formerly D-Telecom, the government owned phone company of Germany (and still a German company), allowed spectrum space in the US? Who has sold us out?How far has it gone?

Are you telling me now that you want protection??
And what about FREEDOM, CAPITALISTIC SYSTEM, FREE MARKET, GLOBALISATION,...
How many US companies are allowed all over the world??
I also don't like Murdock and I surely don't like FOX or guys like o' Reilley,
but I also don't like protectionism.
The only way is to come to mutual agreements, and that is the big problem.
Simply look how long we are talking now to try to stop the farming subsidies: they all try to protect themselves : Europe, Usa,... and the result we all know: farmers in poorer countries have no possibility to compete.
Imagine tomorrow Europe (France, England,...) would say we stop the farming subsidies. Imagine the US would follow.
result: the world would be a better place to live.
Sounds easy not.

[Bump]

Yuo know I'm going to keep my faith, is it different then when we grew up in someways yes, but I still remember the protests of Vietnam something the young troops of today haven't went throught yet. I hope they don't but I would be surprised.

When I volunteered for Vietnam duty I did for one reaon only I beleiebed what ny governemtn was telling me, had no cklue about the real world. I have met some of those guys on convoy duty from Kuwait, in my short stint there. Didn't seem any different then I was at that age. There good kids being forced to face things they are not ready for just like we were.

By the way I think mine was a Shelby GT Mustang never got it real world got in the way. Give then sometime not really much different then most of us when we were kids. If peopel go into the reserves thinking they will never see combat, that is gambling, for some it may work for others not.

I also did three years of Air Force Reserve duty, I knew what I was doing and was prepared for what may come in my case it didn't.

[valentine]

I guess the major difference between then and now is the trillions the states are in debt. As has been said before on this forum, there is no way the current generation are going to even reduce this, yet alone clear it. If at all, it will be your grandkids, but of course thats only if the Bush family doesn't produce any more descendants that will become presidents.The more I hear on this the more I am convinced the present level of the dollar is a permanent devaluation against all major currencies, not just the baht

[muscle]

Muscle,
I agree with almost everything,
especially about the education.
But in your anger I think you are mixing up things:

Sounds easy not.

Not really anger, just concern. It used to be against federal law for a foreign interest to own telecommunications companies in the US. I do not know when that law changed.
Just as it used to be against federal law for a US company to own more than one media outlet in a market. In 1971, the company I worked for owned a tv station a radio station and the newspaper in Duluth. They were forced to divest themselves of the radio and tv to keep the paper. Knight-Ridder was the company. I stayed working for the radio station as it was purchased by another company.
Due to changes under the first Bush administration, those controls are gone. One company can own all the radio and tv stations in the market if it can afford them. Check out Clear Channel's website and ownings as an example of that,
Verizon is not allowed to operate in Germany due to German law. I can not buy a radio station in the UK. We allow foreign investments that other countries deny.
Most countries have government owned and operated telecoms with a few independant operators allowed. National security reasons. While I do not believe in protectionism, should the US allow itself to be totally overrun by foreign investors? Is that not the road to becoming a 3rd world nation?

Ray, I agree, we have a lot of good young troops out there. Promotions are coming way too fast. There are E-7s out there that would still have been E-4s during the Cold War. The ex apparently has also become more chastened according to my daughter. I hope that maturity spreads and becomes a rallying point once they return.
I deployed 4 times in 5 years as a Reservist/Flight Nurse. During my volunteer process for a 5th deployment, someone actually read the medical updates I was required to file annually and realized that I should have been medically discharged in 2001 due to two Line of Duty injuries which required surgery and 6 months of convolescent leave. When the leave was done, no one at Reserve Command followed up. I just went back to my unit and back to work. I had been deployed four times, as a volunteer, since then. So, in March of this year the AF Reserve did a quick and dirty Medical Examination Board (MEB) on me, where I was not allowed to submit evidence, and medically retired me with 28 years in service. I had formally refused to retire.
As of last week, even the Army would not take me back due to the MEB or I would have changed services (again) and volunteered for deployment. I am completely against this conflict but realize that we can not forget the people we have deployed. I just came down on the list for a medical teaching position. I had been training medics as a civilian Army employee before moving to the Pentagon as my clock in Europe had run out (5 year rule). I would be messing up both my SSDI and my 100% disability from VA by doing that but would, just because of the concern I have for our troops downrange.

[Bump]

Well your heads on straight thats a good thing, I think there is something in some peoples makeup that makes them want to help. Sounds like where your at. However, there does come a time where it is better to change directions and take care of self better. Found that out the hard way. My job in Kuwait was about as easy as it gets, I hated every second of it.

Hang in there it takes alot of time to get used not to being involved but it will come.

Two decades from now I don't have any doubt that we will not recognize this old world if we are still in it. I'll tell you a funny but very true story, When I started with LAPD 21 years old, you could hear the old timers walking down the hall where the heck did they get this guys, they don't have a clue. Twenty years later I found myself making the same statements.

Somehow things just seem to work out. But I do wish better for my Country then what I see now.

[muscle]

I now find myself saying they same things the "brown-shoe Army" vets who hung out in my step-father's bar or at the VFW said. Somehow it has all survvived in spite of the Boomers being completely incapable of conscious thought. The Xers will adapt and overcome...or they won't.
You are right, we won't recognize the US in 20 years. As those changes were for the WW II Vets, they were not for the better. The US went from a manufacturing and agricultural economy to an importing economy. Our biggest export now is jobs. The undermining of the US probably started earlier than the documentation on Ford, DuPont, IG Farben and BASF during that war but the lessons learned there sure helped the next generation of business people get rich off one manufactured crisis
after another. That's the sad part for me.
I never minded being deployed. I loved my jobs and volunteered frequently enough for active duty that it annoyed my Reserve program director. Whether I sleep at the Hilton or in the back of a C-130, I could care less. Actually, I sleep better in the back of a C-130.
You are right, it is hard to adapt to not being part of it.
You can love your country without respecting your government.

[JimboPSM]

With the various mentions of Rupert Murdoch, I thought a little basic reseach might be appropriate.

From Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Murdoch
[quote]Murdoch made his first acquisition in the United States in 1973, when he purchased the San Antonio Express-News. Soon afterwards, he founded Star, a supermarket tabloid, and in 1976, he purchased the New York Post.

On September 4, 1985, Murdoch became a naturalized citizen, to satisfy the legal requirement that only US citizens could own American television stations.

...... In 1995, Murdoch's Fox Network became the object of scrutiny from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), when it was alleged that News Ltd.'s Australian base made Murdoch's ownership of Fox illegal. The FCC, however, ruled in Murdoch's favor, stating that his ownership of Fox was in the public's best interests. In the same year, Murdoch announced a deal with MCI Communications to develop a major news website, as well as funding a conservative magazine, The Weekly Standard. In the same year, News Corp. launched the Foxtel pay television network in Australia, in a partnership with Telstra.

...... In 1996, Fox established the Fox News Channel, a 24-hour cable news station. Since its launch it has consistently eroded CNN's market share, and it now bills itself as "the most-watched cable news channel." This is due in part to recent ratings studies, released in the fourth quarter of 2004, showing that the network had nine of the top ten programs in the "Cable News" category.

...... In the US he has been a long-time supporter of the Republican Party and was a friend of Ronald Reagan. Regarding Pat Robertson's 1988 presidential bid, he said, "He's right on all the issues." However, Robertson's social conservatism seems very different from Murdoch's social liberalism; many Christian conservatives were dismayed when Robertson sold his television network to Murdoch.

Murdoch's papers strongly supported George W. Bush in both the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections.

In Britain, he formed a close alliance with Margaret Thatcher, and The Sun was widely credited with helping John Major win an unexpected election victory in the 1992 general election. However, in the general elections of 1997, 2001 and 2005, Murdoch's papers were either neutral or supported Labour under Tony Blair. This has led some critics to argue that Murdoch simply supports the incumbent parties (or those who seem most likely to win an upcoming election) in the hope of influencing government decisions that may affect his businesses; though it should be noted that the Labour Party under Blair had moved significantly to the Right on many economic issues prior to 1997. In any case, Murdoch identifies himself as a libertarian.

In a speech in New York, Rupert Murdoch said that the UK Prime Minister Tony Blair said the BBC coverage of the Hurricane Katrina disaster was full of hatred of America. Mr. Murdoch is a strong critic of the BBC, which he believes has a liberal bias.

Murdoch's British media outlets generally support eurosceptic positions and generally show contempt for the European Union. Murdoch's publications worldwide tend to adopt anti-French, pro-Israeli and pro-American views. During the buildup to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, all 175 Murdoch-owned newspapers worldwide editorialized in favor of the war. Murdoch also served on the board of directors of the Cato Institute.

On May 9, 2006, the Financial Times reported that Murdoch would be hosting a fundraiser for Senator Hillary Clinton's Senate reelection campaign. Murdoch's New York Post newspaper opposed Hillary's Senate run in 2000.

On June 28, 2006 the BBC reported that Murdoch and News Corporation are flirting with idea of backing Tory leader David Cameron at the next General Election [9]. However in a recent interview, when asked what he thought of the new Conservative leader, Murdoch replied "Not much".

In 2006, the UK

[cookie]

Nice work Jimbo, thanks

[ctm]

“The American population is largely uneducated and unconcerned about world events. Americans could care less as long as it does not affect their ability to shop, watch tv or play computer games.” I think that describes the vast majority in most countries, not just America. I do find that in America a lot of people who are educated and should know better, don’t. And many even have that Bush like pride in being ignorant and not caring.

I am surprised FOX News wasnÂ’t all over the coup. After all Taksin had just the sort of right wing pro big business anti-labor anti-human rights pseudo-democracy American leaders love. Plus Taksin is a Bush family friend. My guess is nobody (business and political leaders) saw enough changes with the coup to things that matter (big business, big capital, military) to raise a stink.

IÂ’m more concerned about Amdocs, an Israeli company with strong Mossad ties, running US phone call tracking and tapping than the Germans owning T-Mobile.

[Garnet]

So just what is ahead? I do much wonder!

Those in power in the States

[muscle]

With the various mentions of Rupert Murdoch, I thought a little basic reseach might be appropriate.

From Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Murdoch

On September 4, 1985, Murdoch became a naturalized citizen, to satisfy the legal requirement that only US citizens could own American television stations.

Thanks for that info. I have been wrong for a long time. I remember when he first burst upon the scene that he wasn't and never got wind of the update. So that's what satisfied the FCC requirement. Now, why is T-Mobile allowed to own telecom in the US?
In 1985, I was in West Berlin protecting the world and crossing through Checkpoint Charlie in my Class A uniform to shop and drink on Saturday.
Worst thing that ever happened to European GIs was having that Wall come down. West Berlin duty was sweet.

[Bump]

I have no doubt that the numbers are very high for expats, the baby boomers are finding places where they can have good retirments. I'm certain that add to the numbers with no political motivation whatsoever. There are many places I could exist in the staes, but not live as I do here.

To be honest the CNN number has went on for a very long time but in a different way in the states.