Friday, February 13, 2009

Our Unhappy Rulers


Our corporate rulers and their lackeys in government don't seem to be too happy with us lately.

The stimulus bill is "generational theft," says John McCain, after he'd voted for tax cuts that would cost about four times what the stimulus bill will cost.

The stimulus is “destroying my daughters’ future. It is like sitting there watching my house ransacked by a gang of thugs,” says Arnold Kling of the Cato Institute.

(Both these spear carriers for the corporatocracy are quoted in Krugman's Times column today.)

I don't know about anybody else, but if they're that mad at us because of the Depression they caused, I think we ought to give them something to really be pissed about.

Why don't we figure out how to live without buying their shit and stop supporting these clowns?

I've read in a couple of places over the last month that this economic meltdown is being fueled by the fact that people are buying only what they need. Think about the ramifications of that simple statement for a moment: buying only what they need!

Ever thought about moving closer to your work and getting rid of your car? Renting a car if you need to go somewhere far away, or maybe joining City Car Share? If you've lost your job, you might have to get rid of your car anyway, and ride the bus.

Mass transit, anyone? Yeah, I know, it's tax-supported and it doesn't make a profit.

I won't even go into how such changes would benefit everybody by addressing the peak oil situation, the ecological meltdown, etc.

The revolution this time won't include shooting people. Instead, we'll hit them in their most vulnerable spot -- right in the wallet.

Forty years ago, a movement was underway among young people who had seen the future, and realized the kind of society we lived in then (and still do) wasn't in it. We wanted to drop out of that society, and form a society of our own. But we didn't have the means, or the numbers, or sufficient motivation for that idea to work.

But we're still here, and we're still right.

The most revolutionary thing you can do today is get rid of your car.

Walk to work every day. You'll save the environment and give some plutocrat a coronary.

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