Where did we go wrong?

In the late-'60s/early-'70s it seemed like my generation would change the world -- desegregation, voting rights, women's lib, technology, anti-war. I was very hopeful.

Then, during the mid- to late-'70s corporate interests reasserted themselves (and by "corporate interests" I mean organized crime, the Mafia, which by then owned a good number of industries and political power). Music became corporate disco and punk, the hippie movement fragmented and was marginalized under police pressure, the rigidity and conformity of the 1950s was brought back into vogue. As a final nail in the coffin of social change, in 1980 The Mafia arranged for the election of themselves to run the country (with an actor hired to play -- badly -- the role of president). Regulations and protections were hastily stripped away, corporate profits skyrocketed, taxes were slashed for the wealthy, and The Mafia went mainstream.

Since then it's only been consolidation of power and putting safeguards in place to make sure never again could the power of the people threaten the profits of La Cosa Nostra. Democracy has been totally subverted, although the appearance, the institutions of democracy make it appear this is not the case. But true choice does not exist anymore, and if it ever begins to appear in any small corner of the country it is quickly snubbed out.

I'm curious. Where did you get the idea that the Mafia is controlling the country?

From Bebe Rebozo.

No seriously, ties of the Reagan Administrtaion to organized crime are both well documented and uncontested.

I thought Rebozo was a friend of Nixon's.

I can't recall ever reading anything convincing about Reagan being connected to organized crime. Yes, he was closely tied to MCA and the Screen Actors Guild - nothing new there - but that's a far cry from being tied in with the Mafia. And it certainly doesn't support and by "corporate interests" I mean organized crime, the Mafia.

He did have connections to aliens, however, as proven by this undoubtedly real and uncontested photograph

Which one's the alien?

The Reagan Administration's Mafia sponsorship wouldn't be so blatant that the Internet documented it. Nothing the Mafia does is above board. You only need to look at the results of what his administration did, follow the money, see who profited to see the man behind the curtain.

And bear in mind "The Mafia" is not a bunch of Italians in sunglasses anymore. They've gone mainstream, they own the S&P 500 now, they control Wall Street and the laws that put everybody's retirement accounts in their hands.

Maybe it's not even fair to call it "organized crime" anymore since nobody gets prosecuted for what they've done to the nation.

But there has been a concerted effort to transfer the public wealth into private hands, with bailouts and tax cuts and deregulation and public policy changes. It's not hard to see the hand of the former Mafia in all this.

Am I a conspiracy theorist?

NoCoPilot wrote:

But there has been a concerted effort to transfer the public wealth into private hands, with bailouts and tax cuts and deregulation and public policy changes. It's not hard to see the hand of the former Mafia in all this.

Am I a conspiracy theorist?

There is no need for the Mafia. They never amounted to much more than a bunch of small-time thugs. The movies glorified them and made them into something that never existed in real life.

Things are working just as Big Money wants. The Mafia can only dream of having the wealth and power that comes from legal corporations.

If you really believe that the Mafia has taken over big business, then you present the appearance of a conspiracy theorist.

I have reason to suspect -- maybe not "believe" -- that Big Money and The Mafia are one and the same, or at least colluding. The ties are out there.

Although, the way things work in the world, usually accident and happenstance have more influence than intention.

And what are those reasons? Big business was cheating the public and corrupting the government long before the Mafia was in the country. It is the nature of unbridled capitalism. I have no idea what makes you think that the Mafia - or what remains of it - is in collusion with General Electric or Raytheon or Apple.

GE, Ratheon and Apple no. Koch Industries, General Dynamics, ADM, Exxon-Mobil, Northrup-Grumman, Lockheed Martin yes.

So you have a list of the Mafia-Affiliated businesses?
And why not Ratheon, GE, and Apple? Apple has more cash than any other American company. I think I heard somewhere that the Mafia is especially fond of cash, but that might just be a rumor.

Apple, Raytheon and GE do not fund tin pot dictatorships.

Apple, Raytheon and GE are tin pot dictatorships.

You've gotten me, or I drove myself, off-topic.

My original intent was to ask: whatever happened to the optimism of my generation?

NoCoPilot wrote:

My original intent was to ask: whatever happened to the optimism of my generation?

You would have to poll members of your generation to find that out.

What happened to the counter-culture movement of the sixties is a different question and would, of course, include other generations.

But the fact is that many of the issues raised or promulgated by the counter-culture are now mainstream political issues. So it wasn't a total waste of time.

But but but... We have religious conservatives working to repeal abortion and women's suffrage and women's right to drive and equal pay. We have the African American community reinforcing cultural stereotypes about minorities and women. We have financial conservatives actively working to undo The Great Society. We have serious public debates advocating loss of freedom of speech, loss of journalist immunity, loss of freedom to assemble. We have people seriously proposing constitutional amendments that would codify theocracy.

I don't think we won at all.

Many of the things being discussed today were not discussed in the fifties, because they were accepted as the norm. This sixties changed the perception so that now they are at least talked about. Maybe you don't remember how things were before the sixties.

About two-thirds of the states now allow same-sex marriage. That was inconceivable in the middle of the last century. When you watch a movie or cable tv program and someone says "shit" or "fuck" that is a direct result of the lessening of constraints brought about by the movements in the sixties. Workplace safety, food safety, women's rights, civil rights, environmental concerns, and many more matters have been brought to the fore by the sixties movements. Yes, there will always be assholes trying to take the country back to a utopian America that never existed, but at least the fight is taking place. In public.

Born in 54, so my memories before the sixties are spotty at best.

I remember seeing a campaign speech on TV by Eisenhower (maybe a State of the Union?). I remember the Bay of Pigs and the Kennedy assassination.  

I don't remember Sputnik.