Nothing of Value
Problem is, we no longer make any product or service in the U.S. that is useful to ordinary citizens in a wholesome way. What are we peddling? Guns, ammo, tobacco, entertainment, porn. Instead, poor people in poor countries make what we use that is useful. We don't even know how to grow our own food -- that's done for us by huge agribiz ops. We, people, have relinquished control over every resource we need to live daily life, to interests not our own.
We have to grab it all back. That means not buying imported clothing or products. It means only buying domestically made good and services. It means growing our own food, even. Or at least preparing fresh foods more often. This is all gonna happen anyway, if enough get laid off and can't afford the fancy things, and start growing their own bean sprouts, keeping chickens, sewing and riding bicycles everywhere (like our underclass is already doing -- these activities will soon spread to the middle class).
But maybe people will start having such a good time that they'll all wonder why they ever submitted to a cubicle job with unpaid overtime in the first place. Isn't it great to be outside! Looka this funky cool dress I made myself! We eat wonderful, healthy meals from our garden! Most folks are so dazzled by all the material splendor that they have no idea how much fun it is to make your own stuff. They just think going to Target for a shopping spree is the only way to have fun because they've never tried anything else. But rejection of the homegrown and homemade for the new and shiny is a spiritual problem, too. It's that "my stuff's better than yours so I'm better than you" thing. But if the whole country's got to wear hand-me-downs, what's the diff?
What would the captains of industry do if America decided it didn't need the crap they peddle any more? Might they decide to offer us work making the stuff we need on our own shores once again? It might be too late. Big money in the private sector doesn't seem inclined at all to initiate the kind of business that we need to really get the country moving again (see Tom the Dancing Bug's "Lucky Ducky", AGAIN). Perhaps because government is misdirected, as well. What we could really use is some rebuilding of our crumbling infrastructure, and those are the kinds of projects that require industry and government to work hand-in-hand for the benefit of All The People. But government has been co-opted by a few greedy private parties who are using the resources we need to rebuild the country to serve their own interests. Our manpower, in the form of the army, and our resources, in the form of our taxes, are going to an oil grab in the middle east that will drain our public coffers and make really constructive growth on our own shores impossible. What it will make possible instead is more pollution, more unemployment, and fatter wallets for the elite.
Is it time yet to overthrow this government? Why are we all being so polite and waiting for the next election? By then, Republicans will have cemented their authority in place, including co-opting the judicial system in such a way that they can never lose another national election...
Revolt! Grow your own! Make your own! Don't buy theirs! Maybe we should just stop paying taxes, I've suggested this before. That might be the most powerful thing of all to do, if enough of us did it. They can't arrest the entire country, you know.
4:34:50 PM 
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