This Obama hype is just way too much. People started to pray to this guy like he was God before he even became president. I don't trust this guy. Or to be more precise, the powers behind him. I've never had much believe in the power of the president. I think he's just a puppet. And his masters chose him because he's "kind of black", but not too much though so they get the black community to support him without loosing much support from the white people. And if you criticize him then you're a racist. They make him do things at first to make you blind. Maybe he closed Guantanamo but the same day he might have opened another place like that somewhere in the world but we won't find out until later. And then he and the government will deny everything. And maybe he put some rules on the CEO's of the banks, but he didn't make things harder for the people he works for. The people behind the curtains. A president that doesn't follow their rules will be shot! Look what happened to Kennedy.
I think most N-Americans are easily brainwashed. And media manipulation was invented in the states. And the government needs as much support as possible before starting WW III or some other plan for world domination. The American government has always been powermad!

i would have to agree that MOST n. americans are easily brainwashed..but that doesnt mean we all are

Hehe fortunately But It's very hard to find an American today that doesn't worship Obama. But you can find a lot of people here in Europe that think there's something doobious about that Obama guy!

haha well of course!! i knew he was going to win almost two years ago..not sure how i knew...but i didnt vote for him..or anybody else..because i have come to find out that whoever THEY want to win does...

its all planned out..a show..just to keep the masses in check...thats all...while the people that actually run the world go about doing it

In russia things certainly go that way. But in america those coalitions are less stable because there are too many people with money and power with too many wishes for such coalitions to be stable enough.
It is likely that the right wing faction amongst the republicans deliberately let John mc Cain win, knowing another republican right wing dude with another war agenda would not be the most popular thing at this time. Speculations like this have been going around about clintons second election as well; the intermission between bushI and bushII had to be large enough for W to make a chance.
What i'm trying to say is; there is a lot of secret dealmaking going on, but not to the extent that everything to come is fixed already.
If obama will have some successes in his economic policy, he is less likely to need the republicans, so then his agenda will be more liberal. But it's more likely that he will need the republicans in order to pull off a succesfull economic policy and that therefore he will have to give them something.
It could be that the DEA position depends on how succesfull he will be economically.

It's true, the USA is full of brainwashed radical right-wing christians that are destroying the earth which sustains us. As a N.American, I am scared to travel the world because of this.

At leat it's wise to cancel your trips to iran as long as they're working on this nuclear arsenal of them.
The right wing zealot's have proven to be capable of doing quite some damage. Fortunately there are plenty of places in and outside of the U.S. where people are judged for what they are instead of their nationality.

In comparison to china, we're rather gentle with the earth, although we don't do it a whole lot of favors either.

yes but how many products bought by americans (or by everybody else... ) are chinese in origin? parts of computer and many other things...

mind you, I dont like to generalize people by their nationality. I think it is no use make finger pointing. All we can do is look at our own actions and see how what we do is good or bad for the world. The fact that we are born or live in a country is in a great part accidental and we could not choose otherwise. and even simply moving out doesnt necessarily do good to a place, would be better to do our part wherever we are

The majority of people on this board probably agree. Psychedelic enthusiasts seem to have a better conception of what's right and what's wrong. The majority in my country however does not view it this way. People are proud to be american cause they were born here. People are proud of being white, because they think it matters what color your skin is. It's truly pathetic. Nationalism is an utterly stupid concept which does nothing but separate us. Fuck nationalism... fuck nations! ONE Love...

Real chauvinists should always envy immigrants; they've chosen to live in country X

There is absolutely no reason or excuse not to vote. It's not the fact that you don't vote that's the problem, it's the fact that this is the prevailing attitude, and that it's attitude held with some malformed sense of pride. How do you think the elections are so easy to influence? Because most citizens simply don't vote. The democratic process is shit because we have failed it, we have let it go to shit out of apathy and cynicism; not to say that it's ever necessarily been an adequate mode of government, but how the hell would we know if we don't even take advantage of it. Voting is not an admission to conformity or adherence to propaganda, not voting is more-so if the statistics are of any consequence.

If you really don't feel that you influence the outcome, at least throw your vote in with a third party and add to their numbers.

Sorry Jorkest, this isn't an attack on you. It's a much larger problem than that, but it does require an individual sense of responsibility. We are being absolutely crushed by the forces of nihilism and the post-modern void, because it's simply easier and more comfortable that way.

the western democratic idea has its flaws to begin with, imo..

it becomes the dictatorship of the majority. It has a built in competition between opposites.

I dont expect any real lasting change to come from voting, it seems more a matter of 'voting for the least worst', and its anyways quite a pseudo participation. We are not really represented in our votes, the voices are not really heard.

I think the only way is development of consciousness, which doesnt come from politics but from everyday life, from education, from our actions also and how we present ourselves to the world.

Im not saying for you not to vote, each one decides what he does and consequently impacts the world, but I dont think that people not voting is the main problem or one of the main problems we have in our hands

What I'm trying to get at is that it's a prevalent symptom of a much larger problem. And certainly I get the "tyranny of the masses" idea (exactly what I wrote my last research paper on, in fact), but this tyranny is perhaps more exacted by overwhelming mass apathy and cynicism than by the fulfilment of civic responsibility, no? No matter how trivial, we only get a very few chances to vote, and it's about the simplest task asked of us as citizens, so why not? Unless you're fearful of being struck down by some god for participating in such a sinful establishment as the US government. I'm no democrat by any means, but if we're not even worthy of a democracy, what worth do we really have as a society?

We don't have real tyrants in America, because we tyrannize ourselves and each-other well enough as it is. I'm glad to have a president who perhaps isn't as much of culprit in this immanent totalitarianism (not by our government so much as by our society and our culture) we seem to be vaulting toward--one who actually values the power of reason--but maybe a true tyrant is what we really deserve, or even require.