First,
Let me join the ranks in thanking Justin for starting this thread.
I for a long while now have been a proponent that there is a revolt soon coming into the mix here in the US.
For decades now, both the Republicans as well as the Democrats have failed to take into account what the will of the citizens of this great nation. Instead, they have been more interested in not only firming up their hold on power but to increase it. In most cases, they (the goverment) as.have used (and been used by) large corporations as well as overly powerful special interest groups.
We have seen numerous instances where the goverment have outright taken away the freedom and liberties of the US citizens
To give a couple of examples of this I will just name them here and will go into them more in depth later.
Eminent Domain- a law that once was only to be used for the betterment of citizens such as adding a new road or highway, is now being applied to allow private businesses to flatten homes so that they can build new office buildings. (reference Connecticut 2005). Note, the Supreme Court has refused to look into this.

The governments authorization of wire taps as well as home / business without a court order. This was imposed to help track down possible terrorists. To date, it has only netted a couple of drug houses.

The goverment's foot dragging on taking any action for or against the issue of illegal aliens in the US.

One of the underlying reasons for the marked increased in Home foreclosures over the last couple of years is that the goverment, in order to appease the banks and lending companies, made it more difficult for people to file bankruptcies insuring that the citizen pay in full credit card debts. This includes any penalties fees and fines. This along with some very questionable lending practices by mortgage companies have put people into homes that they could not afford using such things as variable interest rates which steadily climb (never decrease) to the point that no one can pay.

The lackadaisical effort of the goverment to ensure that our food, water etc. are safe.
Now in response to Roper:

As long as people have food to eat and a roof over their heads there is little chance of a civil war.
Now I believe that a catalysis to a civil war will be firearm registration and then confiscation .
Now having said that, it didn't happen in California. Here again they are well fed.

Actually, as I just stated, people are losing the roofs over their heads. There are more families that are homeless now than ever before in the history of the US.
As for the fire arm registration / confiscation... well we saw that happening in LA during Katrina. There are numerous threads here on ATS covering that.
Also if you (the audience) will remember a little story that did not make really big news, recently in Texas, the local police department had corrond off an area so that they could test a new UAV for use in US cities.

There are a number of indicators out there if you look that shows that the US goverment has taken notice of the restlessness that is growing in the Us population and they are taking steps to curtail it and even take offensive actions to crush any unrest.
There is a growing unrest in the US due to the dissatisfaction that the US people have with their goverment. This unrest is due to many many factors and it is growing exponentially. There are now many more groups who have setup situation x scenarios. Just in the DFW area, I am aware of at least 12 fully outfitted groups that are ready for anything especially for a civil war or governmental tyranny. Most of these groups have more firepower and training than most of the present armed forces.
It is my firm belief that we as a nation are closer to an armed conflict between the citizens and the Goverment. It would not take another 9-11 type event, a bird flu outbreak or any really major type of catastrophe to occur to make this happen. It could take as little as another snafu like the FEMA's response to Katrina to spark the fire.

You make a good point about the ever widening gap between the have's and the have-not's.

I'm not ready to blame the housing problems on the government.

My question is what drives housing prices so high? My house in San Antonio Texas is 200k and if I had the same house in north California where my friends live it would be over a million.

When one looks at the middle class in America I estimate it to be 60 to 100k in income, and that is equal across all America. One of the big housing issues like in California is for the middle class to have a house there they can only afford about 2k a month max, but when you see the smallest houses going for 600k plus this puts the middle class into the position to go subprime with a interest only loan in the hopes the house value continues to go up.

In an area where the inflation is already 5 times my area the chances of the market to continue to increase in value is small, and so many found themselves with interest rates going up and their 2k a month mortgage turned into 6k a month. Then on top of it all their house overnight lost 30% of value.

I’m not sure how this is blamed on the government and to the point to facilitate a revolt.

In the case of Katarina the housing problem there was due to the vast majority of the home owners being very low income families and they didn’t provide the proper insurance needed, with most having none.

Even with the massive wastes in government spending for that area it still doesn’t present a case for revolt. For whom do you revolt against, State, Federal or both?


[edit on 4-1-2008 by Xtrozero]

Failures in housing and credit are just two symptons of a larger problem. by themslves, they aren't enough to spark revolt. We'd need to witness a prolonged depression (with everything in short suppy) for that to happen.

It's been estimated that there are something like twenty million Americans in your situation. I speak to this issue from first-hand experience, because I was born with a few problems of my own. It's true that your situation underscores the need for health care reform. In the future, I hope you'll be an educated advocate for the kindso f health reform that your child needs.

Having said all that, let's get real. Insurance companies are not in the business of being compassionate. there's a lot you don't know about just now, and they'll be more than happy to take advantage of your ignorance.

The first thing you need to do is get educated. In your own way, you're about to investigate a conspiracy, and break it wide open. Insurnace companies lay fast and loose with terminilogy. "Birth defect" and "pre-exhisting condition" are not the same thing. Always remember that insurance companies won't pay unless you force the issue.

Here's what you do to get educated, and to beat these guys at their game.

1. Speak with your doctor, and quiz him about the nuts and bolts of your child's doagnosis. Ask them directly about getting an insurance friendly diagnosis.

2. Read the fine print in your policy over and over again until you can talk about it without getting mad.

3. Find your closest Shriner's Hospital representative, and meet with them. Even if you have to spend a few hours on the phone with then, it will be worth your time. Think of it as part of your boot camp.

4. Make an appointment to speak with a Social Security claims rep. You'll probably end up doing this by phone.

5. Write a letter explaining your situation to your Senators and Representatives in Washington D.C. Ask them specifically about Social Security, Medicare, and Medicade coverage. They will send you a raft of material that'll make good bathroom reading.

6. Contact your nearest United Way rep, and ask them about insurnace recommendations. UW is a hub organization that deals with every disability you can think of. they know the insurance racket.

Here's what it boils down to. You're gonna fight the pre-exhisting condition label. The law is quite specific on this point, and it is on your side. Trouble is, the legal code is very complex and hard to understand. If the inurance company won't cover your child, you'll need to find one that will. that's where your doctor's carefully worded diagnosis comes in.

My parents had to fight the same battles. I can't name specific insurance options here, but you will learn enough from the suggestions I listed to start heading in the right direction.

A lot of us here on ATS have been talking about what's coming in 2008. Some of us having been talking about this for the last four years. I'm a relative new comer, so I've only got a two year track record on ATS. Even so, this economic down turn hasn't been too hard to predict.

the next decade is going to be hard for a lot of people, and some of them are bound to radicalize. We should epxect to see a slow but neasured increased in domestic terrorism.

I guess the US will go through as big a fundamental societal change as the period 1920-1941 where the Jazz Age gave way to the Depression and finally the entry to World War 2 which crystallized a lot of values for the duration of the war.

The Old Tigers Are Scared...

Originally posted by DogHead
The Old Tigers Are Scared...

The should be. We are on the leading edge of a social and technical transformation that is new for our country, and...at the risk of sounding too proud...we might be about to evolve in a way that most democracies will never see.

The hard times we face in this next decade will seem much worse than they really are because its been more than 70 years since we tasted anything like the Dust Bowl and the "heck" of the 1930's.

In another thread, we're talking about radicalization. I think the extent of that radicalization will play some role in determining whether or not we have social disorder, insurrection, or a civil war.

I don't think this President will manage a coupe de'tat. He's no longer popular with the senior members of his own party. Republicans no longer control the levers of power in Washington, and they're about to become an even smaller minority in Congress.

I have maintained (since my arrival on ATS) that we're at greater risk of this in the next decade. For many reasons, conditions will be so bad that it may be seen as "necessary" for a Democrat or a Republican to sieze power. It's likely to be a Democrat, but we can't rule out the possibility that John McCain may win in November.

Bush43 has done more by his own hand to "facilitate" a coupe than even I would haven've believed, prior to 2001. As you point out, he's passed a whole stack of laws that have shredded the Constitution.

I've got several threads going in this forum that relate to the declining U.S. economy, and the radicalizaiton that we face as a side-effect of that downturn. I really do think our politicians won't be able to resist the temptation to exploit homegrown terro, when it hits.

You may be right; however, as I said, things are lined up too neatly for Bush and Cheney not to take the opportunity. It would be too easy. And since there isn't a weak enough candidate that they can take control of, I think that they will seize the power for themselves. I'm not altogether denouncing the idea that I could be wrong on this one, but I'm not going to wait to prepare myself either. I work hard in my college classes every day to make sure that my students are aware that there is more going on than what we are told.

My personal opinion is that in our drive for basic mathematics and science education, we have sacrificed the right to educate our children on their own constitutional rights. This has helped lead to the erosion of those civil liberties because we, as Americans, have very little understanding of what we are losing.

Originally posted by scarlett1125
This has helped lead to the erosion of those civil liberties because we, as Americans, have very little understanding of what we are losing.

That erosion has been taking place for a very long time. Slow and steady. It's regrettable that they don't teach civics in school any more. How do parents teach their kids about Constitutional matters when they don't know what their own rights are?

We win when more of us have these discussions. They win when more of us stay quiet. They serve us, or we WILL serve them.