The last article by Zeese and Flowers is incredibly good, and fleshes out
so much of the history I've found out in my own researches, long, long
after Public School taught me about the Mythical America we think we live
in, yet never are able to participate in.

Scott
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

*ASSASSINATIONS ARE US*
*
*
<http://radiofreethinker.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/target-killing2.jpg>
*
*
**
*It's amazing how people claim they love brilliant, dystopian novels such
as Orwell's 1984 and Huxley's Brave New World, and pretend that they've
learned lessons from them. How they spit out words like "propaganda" and
"police state" with the unshakable assumption that they apply only to
 "other" countries, never to our own. So when evidence of propaganda and
police state actions and dystopian conditions are presented to them, they
deny them all. "Impossible!" "Hyperbole!" "It can't happen here!" "We're
different!"*
*
*
*Oh, well. There's none so blind as those who will not see. And language is
an important tool in making sure they do not see. Where once we had the
word "assassination," now we have "targeted killing." Just listen to how
often you hear that term these days. Do you use it? Have you fallen into
the conformist language trap? Bill Blum takes on a tour of the legal
history of
assassination<http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/targeted_killings_a_legal_history_20130214/>,
with the latest propagandistic definition provided by the Obama
administration.*
**

------------------------------

[image: shoe fits wear If the shoe
fits]<http://marvalisa.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/if-the-shoe-fits.jpg#If%20the%20shoe%20fits>

*The sin that dare not speak its name. Except some of us are willing to
speak it. Cornel West is
one<http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/02/15-4>
.*
**

------------------------------


*BAAAAAA *
**

 <http://2012patriot.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/sheeple-1b.jpg>


*While you're getting a reach-around at the airport and telling yourself
it's okay (because who gives a sh*t about pesky little things like the Bill
of Rights), your baggage is going into the hold
unscreened<http://tsanewsblog.com/5590/news/your-pants-may-be-cleared-but-baggage-still-goes-unscreened/>,
other people's property is being
stolen<http://tsanewsblog.com/9208/news/tsa-in-atlanta-theft-theft-and-more-theft/>and
destroyed <http://tsanewsblog.com/9349/news/tsa-wrecks-20000-cello-bow/>(meh
-- as long as it's not your property), yet other people are being
handcuffed
and
jailed<http://tsanewsblog.com/9281/news/frank-hannibal-sues-tsa-for-5-million/>because
they're too mouthy (again, who needs that stupid Bill of Rights
anyway), and your slave-masters have no idea what they're
doing<http://tsanewsblog.com/9229/news/air-travel-security-data-tsa-has-no-idea/>
.*
*
*
*Meanwhile, other countries, with more sense and more brains than this
one<http://tsanewsblog.com/9361/news/northern-ireland-nixes-scanners-because-they-dont-work/>,
actually make decisions based on -- gasp -- empirical evidence and logic.
Perish the thought!*
*
*
**
------------------------------


*What's democracy? Good question. Most Americans don't know. Kevin Zeese
and Margaret Flowers posit an answer.  -Lisa Simeone*

<http://ambidextrouscivicdiscourse.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Democracy1.jpg>
*
*





Lifting the Veil of Mirage Democracy in the United
States<http://truth-out.org/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=14489&Itemid=228>
*By Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers
<http://truth-out.org/author/itemlist/user/48090>,
Truthout | News Analysis*

 *"We live in a mirage democracy," Zeese and Flowers assert, as they trace
the history and describe the institutions of a not-so-robust US democracy.*

*
*

"Democracy" demokratia = demos+kratia; or democracy = people+power.

The "greatest democracy on Earth" is how the United States is portrayed to
its people and the world.  The hallowed words "We the people" and "Of, by
and for the people" echo in the minds of Americans to characterize the
United States. But do they accurately describe the "democracy" we have?

In reality, a constant conflict that has existed throughout US history,
indeed throughout the history of democratic states, is present between the
elites and the people.* Justice Louis Brandeis said it well when he stated,
"We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of
a few, but we can't have both."*

Over the past 40 years, income inequality in the United States has exploded
from its lowest level in 1978
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/14/income-inequality-is-at-a_n_259516.html>.
What kind of democracy exists under these circumstances? And is real
democracy possible for a global empire? How does nation-state democracy
exist within the new globalized economy that serves transnational
corporations?

*A New Vocabulary for "Democracy"*

A new vocabulary is developing to describe the current state of democracy
in the United States. We begin with some key words and phrases.

*Managed Democracy:* A governmental system that includes widespread voter
franchise and competitive elections, but the elections are managed so that
no matter what candidate(s) are elected, the elites win. The role of
citizens in government is to choose between two pre-selected candidates,
neither of whom will represent the people's interests and both of whom will
represent the elites' interests. Chris Hedges refers to this as "political
theater."

*Polyarchy:* A term highlighted by Cliff DuRand, author of "Recreating
Democracy in a Globalized State,"
<http://www.claritypress.com/DuRand.html> that
is very similar to managed democracy. He calls it a low-intensity democracy
that veils the rule of elites and allows citizens to think they are
participating in power through contested elections that do not change the
elite power structure.

*Inverted Totalitarianism:* Classical totalitarianism is the model of
Hitler or Mussolini, an all-powerful government led by a charismatic leader
that partners with business interests in a security state. Inverted
totalitarianism is a similar marriage of government and business, but the
measures employed to maintain this relationship are more subtle. It is the
coming of age of corporate power, maintained through a security state
working in tandem with corporate propaganda that permeates influential
institutions such as the media, education, popular culture, and evangelical
religion.

*Globalized State:* This is a government that serves the interests of
transnational capital devoid of any real connection to the people of the
nation. The globalized state rules through economic structures such as
trade agreements, the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, World Trade
Organization, and through international military actions.

*Capitalism:* An economic system based on private ownership of capital,
goods, and the means of production. Goods and services are produced for
profit. It is an inherently unequal system. In feudalism, political power
and the economy were united in the noble class. Under capitalism, there is
a separation of political and economic power, which gives people the
impression of participation.

*Neoliberalism:* The dominant economic ideology of the last 30 years, which
insists upon an extreme separation of government and capital so that the
market can operate "freely." The market operates only in the interests of
individuals without allegiance to the collective society. Government exists
solely to provide basics such as standards for weights and measures, laws
and courts to protect property and infrastructure for the market.
Neoliberalism welcomes state intervention only when that intervention is to
corporate advantage as in trade agreements, bailouts, or corporate welfare.
Under neoliberalism, state resources and public programs are decreasingly
funded and increasingly privatized. DuRand states that neoliberalism is the
"default position of capitalism to which it reverts unless restrained by
popular struggles."

*Neofeudalism:* This is the reconfiguration of political and economic
systems to create an empowered tiny oligarchic elite class. Chris Hedges
points to the structure described by George Orwell in "1984" in which there
is an inner party (2 to 4 percent) of corporate and political managers, an
outer party (12 to 14 percent) that consists of managers, the security
state, and the propaganda arm, and the rest of the population exists as
"proles."

*The Birth of US "Democracy"*

The United States celebrates the founding of the country and the so-called
"Founding Fathers" as the birth of democracy, but the real democracy
movement occurred before the American Revolution. In fact, it was the
founding fathers, a group of propertied elites, slave holders, noted
lawyers, and wealthy merchants, who created a system *designed to prevent a
truly democratic state*.

In the pre-Revolutionary period, the American democracy movement involved
small farmers, laborers, artisans, shopkeepers, seamen, women, African
slaves, and native Indians who revolted against the grievances of the day.
There existed abolitionists who opposed slavery and slaves who rebelled
against plantation owners. Disputes over taxes, ordinances, and land titles
and of being ruled over by a royal governor, who represented a distant
British government or a corporate monopoly like the British East India
Company, were sources of democratic revolt.

Colonial governments were structured for the elites, and only those with
substantial property ownership had any right to participate. Sheldon Wolin,
in *Democracy
Inc.*<http://www.amazon.com/Democracy-Incorporated-Managed-Inverted-Totalitarianism/dp/069114589X>
describes
the rise of a "fugitive democracy" in this period. There were spontaneous
protests, assemblies, petitions, tarring and feathering of government
officials, burning effigies of officials, surrounding of courthouses and
removing government officials from office, and storming jails to free their
own. Committees of correspondence were formed to coordinate actions with
counterparts in other colonies. This democracy movement was born out of
necessity, out of the struggle for survival against deep-seated grievances
and was improvisational rather than institutionalized.

Ray Raphael in *The First American Revolution:
<http://www.rayraphael.com/First_American_Revolution.htm>Before
Lexington and Concord* describes colonists in Great Barrington,
Massachusetts, filling the courthouse to prevent British judges from
entering. And, in Worcester, 4,622 militiamen from 37 surrounding
communities lined Main Street as crown-appointed officials walked the
gauntlet, reciting their resignations 30 times each, "so all could hear."
Raphael reports that these common people were intensely democratic,
disavowing all leadership. In fact, "when they elected representatives,
they did so on a day-to-day basis."

Wolin writes that in the period from 1760 until the Constitutional
Convention, there was intense political interest that formed an "American
demos" that "began to establish a foothold and to find institutional
expression, if not full realization. State constitutions were amended by
provisions that broadened voting rights, abolished property qualifications
for office, and in one case, instituted women's suffrage. There were also
efforts to ease debtor laws, even to abolish slavery." It was these attacks
on property that prompted several "outstanding politicians" (also known as
the founding fathers) to "organize a counter-revolution aimed at
institutionalizing a counterforce to challenge the prevailing decentralized
system of 13 sovereign states in which some state legislatures were
controlled by 'popular' forces."

These outstanding politicians were some of the wealthiest property owners
in the United States, slave holders, well-known lawyers and merchants.
James Madison, credited as being the "father" of the Constitution, wrote
in The
Federalist Papers #10
<http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa10.htm>:*"Democracies have ever
been . . . incompatible with . . . the rights of
property . . . [because it would threaten] the unequal distribution of
property." The founders were concerned with "the excess of democracy" as
one delegate to the convention said. The new Constitution put property
rights ahead of human rights.*

The "founders" proposed a new system of national power that discouraged the
"American demos," removed people from the councils of government, and
reduced the power of states. The Constitution favored elite rule and
protection of property. It established a republic in which courts protected
minority rights and property rights from majority sentiment, and government
power was limited.

Only the House of Representatives would be directly elected by the people,
at least the limited group of six percent of the white, male
property-owning population that was allowed to vote. Wolin writes, "The
Constitution of the Founders compressed the political role of citizen into
an act of 'choosing' and designed it to minimize the direct expression of a
popular will." The president was not directly elected, but rather citizens
voted for electors who chose the president in the Electoral College.
Senators were selected by state legislators, and judges were appointed by
the president. It created *a representative, not participatory or direct,
democracy. The "right to vote" is not even mentioned in the Constitution.*

*While people were declared "sovereign," they were, in fact, "precluded
from governing." "From the beginning," Cliff Durand writes, the country
"was designed to be undemocratic." *The role of the people was limited to
choosing from among the political elite the representatives who would rule
them. This managed democracy or polyarchy is far removed from the people
power of real democracy. As Durand writes, "Democracy means people's power,
not the legitimizing of elite rule."

Throughout US history there have been democratic moments when the people
sought to seize power. These included Jacksonian democrats, abolitionists,
suffragists, populists, progressives, civil rights activists, and '60s
radicals; and the Occupy movement of today. These political conflicts have
"often been described as a war between 'the haves and the have-nots.' "

*The Rise of the Corporate State*

Beginning in the 19th century, wealth and power shifted from property
owners and merchants to corporations. This shift was accelerated during the
industrial revolution, when corporations gained great economic and
political power. Wealth became more concentrated in the hands of a few
robber barons, who used it as political leverage. *President Abraham
Lincoln warned in a November 21, 1864, letter to Colonel William F. Elkins
about the corruption that would follow this rise of corporate power:*

*"I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes
me to tremble for the safety of my country. . . . corporations have been
enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the
money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working
upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few
hands and the Republic is destroyed."*

Mass production and new forms of energy and transportation allowed
industrialists to accumulate wealth rapidly. This wealth was used to amass
more resources and control over the economy. Industrialists bought up their
competitors and formed monopolies. They enriched themselves through cheap
labor. Workers were housed in unsanitary factory towns and forced to work
in unsafe conditions. They were paid low wages and charged high prices for
basic goods in factory-owned stores.

Many of the wealthiest people
<http://www.nytimes.com/ref/business/20070715_GILDED_GRAPHIC.html>in
US history made their riches during the industrial revolution: oil magnate
John D. Rockefeller; steamboat and railroad businessman Cornelius
Vanderbilt; Andrew Carnegie with his empire of steel; financiers Jay Gould,
Andrew Mellon, and J. P. Morgan; and mass producer of automobiles Henry
Ford.

The industrial revolution was also a time of gross political corruption.
Bribery of politicians and bureaucrats and the gift of political positions
and contracts in return for favors and loyalty ran rampant. The result was
two political parties loyal to the elites with narrow agendas that were
unwilling to challenge the status quo in any meaningful way.

*The courts were no better. The Fourteenth
Amendment<http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/amendmentxiv>,
passed in 1868 to provide due process of law to freed slaves, was used
mostly to empower corporations. In 1886, the Supreme Court voided 230 state
laws that regulated corporations, primarily freight rates charged to
farmers, on the basis that the regulations deprived corporations of
property without due process. *Of 307 Fourteenth Amendment cases considered
by the Supreme Court between 1890 and 1910, 288 were about protecting
corporate rights, only 19 about people. This is when the court established
that corporations were "legal
people"<http://www.poclad.org/BWA/2011/BWA_2011_MAY.html> while
at the same time protecting corporate owners from criminal prosecution.

The situation rose to a head under the presidency of Franklin Delano
Roosevelt (FDR), who was elected after the Depression began. The Roosevelt
family is one of the oldest banking families in the nation, as are the
Delanos. His great-grandfather James Roosevelt founded the Bank of New York
in 1784, and five generations of Roosevelts headed that bank. Before that
the family helped fund the American Revolution. FDR's uncle, Fred Delano,
was appointed to the first Federal Reserve Board in 1914. FDR's first job
was with a JP Morgan law firm, and he lived in the home of JP Morgan
partner Thomas Lamont when he went to Washington, DC, as assistant
secretary of the Navy. During the '20s, before he became governor of New
York, he was a Wall Street investor, banker, and lawyer.

During FDR's presidency, when he broke from the gold standard and created
mass government jobs, the financiers and big business interests who funded
his campaigns were shocked. *A group of businessmen
planned<http://www.wanttoknow.info/plottoseizethewhitehouse> a
coup and contacted General Smedley Butler, the most decorated Marine in
history, to become the American Mussolini and make FDR either a figurehead
or remove him. Butler blew the whistle and although a congressional
committee confirmed the
plot<http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/McCormack-Dickstein_Committee>,
there were no prosecutions. Many of the corporations bailed out in the
recent financial collapse came from the same corporations allegedly
involved in the coup attempt. Perhaps a more sophisticated coup has taken
place now.*

Following World War II, new institutions were created that propelled the
rise of the global corporate state. In 1944, members of 44 nations gathered
in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, to discuss how to rebuild the
international economy. The United States was the dominant power at this
meeting. Out of it came the Bretton Woods System, which tied official
reserves to the US dollar instead of to gold.

This conference also gave birth to the International Monetary Fund (IMF)
and the precursor of the World Bank. Shortly after that, the General
Agreement on Trade and Tariffs (GATT) was created, which reduced barriers
to trade between nations. In 1995, it became the World Trade Organization
(WTO). *This shift was significant because unlike the GATT, the WTO had the
power to enforce rules, which meant that nations were required to change
their laws to comply with rules put forth by the WTO. Today, the largest
trade agreement in history, the Trans-Pacific
Partnership<http://www.flushthetpp.org/>,
which is being negotiated by the Obama administration in secret except for
600 corporate advisors, will result in a global corporate coup.*

Since the 1980s, the era of so-called "free trade," the world has seen the
rise of transnational corporations. This has allowed the off-shoring of
jobs that has hollowed out the US labor market and caused labor's share of
the GDP to hit an all-time
low<http://itsoureconomy.us/2012/10/heres-whats-wrong-with-the-economy-charts/>.
It has also allowed the free flow of finance overseas, the avoidance of
more than $100 billion in corporate
taxes<http://itsoureconomy.us/2012/09/tax-shelters-a-great-threat-to-the-global-economy/>,
and
the growth of international tax havens housing tens of
trillions<http://itsoureconomy.us/2012/07/revealed-global-superrich-has-at-least-21-trillion-hidden-in-secret-tax-havens/>
of
dollars off-shore. Neoliberalism, which had been unleashed upon the world,
is now coming home to the
US<http://truth-out.org/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=14227&Itemid=228>
.

*Of Monopolies and Sacrifice Zones*

DuRand describes unfettered capitalism, or neoliberalism, as a game of
Monopoly. In the Parker Brothers game, the players begin on equal ground.
The goal of the game is to amass wealth and property to the point of
collapse, bankrupting the other players who are no longer able to
participate. He writes that, just as in Monopoly, inequality is an integral
part of a capitalist economy.

In the board game, when only one player is left, the game ends. Players may
choose to start fresh with a new game. In the real world, there is no
reset. Instead, there is the drive toward greater degrees of inequality as
the rich become richer at the expense of people and the planet.
Occasionally there is respite in the form of social programs that counter
the effects of neoliberalism, but in the absence of popular struggle, the
drive toward greater profits continues unabated.

*In his most recent book, "Days of Destruction, Days of
Revolt,"<http://www.amazon.com/Days-Destruction-Revolt-Chris-Hedges/dp/1568586434>
Chris
Hedges describes the real effects of neoliberal policies on US communities.
His words are made even more powerful through the illustrations of Joe
Sacco. Hedges and Sacco stayed in communities that have been destroyed
economically and environmentally for the sake of corporate profits. They
call these areas "Sacrifice Zones" and define them as "areas in the country
that have been offered up for exploitation in the name of profit, progress,
and technological advancement."* Their intention was to show *"what life
looks like when the marketplace rules without constraints, where human
beings and the natural world are used and then discarded to maximize
profit."*

Hedges and Sacco reported on *levels of poverty and poisoning of
communities that most Americans don't recognize as existing in the United
States.* They tell stories of drug use and violence that arise as people
are trapped in losing situations that involve great suffering. And they
describe efforts of those who try to provide some relief. Hedges states
that their stories are "important windows into what is happening to the
rest of us."

In the final section of the book, they cover the Occupy protests, which
arose in large part because of growing wealth inequality and fraud by the
elites. At some point, people do rise up and fight back. Those in power
know this and employ all sorts of tools to prevent it.

*The Maintenance of the Corporate State*

The actions of the robber barons of the 19th and early 20th centuries
resulted in such abuse of workers and poor living conditions that labor and
others joined in protest. The response of the elites was the New Deal,
which brought some relief, calmed the masses, and allowed capitalism to
continue.

Relative quiet ensued until the 1960s and early '70s, when multiple
struggles manifested in movements for civil rights, opposition to war, the
environment, and women's rights. DuRand writes that this uprising was
described by elites as a "crisis of democracy," meaning that people were
demanding too much democracy. Capitalists felt under attack once more.
Following a blueprint developed by Lewis Powell in his
memo<http://itsoureconomy.us/2011/08/how-did-corporate-power-get-a-stranglehold/>
to
the US Chamber of Commerce, they built institutions over the next 40 years,
including think tanks, lobbying firms, and courts, to promote the market
agenda and control the media and universities to prevent another outbreak
of democracy.

*We are living in a time of Inverted Totalitarianism*,* in which the tools
used to maintain the status
quo<http://october2011.org/blogs/margaret-flowers/new-world-order-blueprint-leaked>
are
much more subtle and technologically advanced. *These include propaganda
and control of the major media outlets that hide the real news about
conditions at home and our activities around the world behind distractions
such as high-profile citizen trials and celebrity gossip. *The major
electronic media, owned by six corporations nationwide, also routinely
misinforms the public about domestic and foreign policy. A recent example
is the "Fiscal
Cliff<http://truth-out.org/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=14227&Itemid=228>
."*

*Another tool is to create insecurity in the population so that people
are unwilling
to speak
out<http://itsoureconomy.us/2013/01/two-thirds-of-americans-face-financial-insecurity/http:/itsoureconomy.us/2013/01/two-thirds-of-americans-face-financial-insecurity/>
* and take risks for fear of losing their jobs and being unable to afford
food, a home, and health care. Changes in the work environment, such as the
attack on unions and the war on whistleblowers, have led to greater job
insecurity. Changes in college
education<http://truth-out.org/news/item/13299-is-education-a-human-right-or-a-privilege-for-the-wealthy>
also
silence dissent, including the trend toward adjunct rather than tenured
professors. Adjunct professors, now composing 85 percent of faculty, are
less willing to teach topics that are viewed as controversial. This,
combined with massive student
debt<http://itsoureconomy.us/2012/11/student-loan-bubble-bursts/>,
are tools to silence the student population, once the center of
transformative action.

Hedges describes the growing security state and is actively
fighting<http://october2011.org/blogs/kevin-zeese/appeals-court-hears-argument-ndaa-protesters-flood-court>
provisions
within *the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that allow the
indefinite detention of US citizens without trial. *Legal experts fear the
NDAA also weakened Posse Comitatus, passed in 1878 to limit federal
military powers, so that the military can be used on domestic soil. There
is obvious collaboration between military and local police departments
through joint training exercises, paramilitary police forces, and new
equipment such as tanks and drones. The Department of Homeland Security is
building a 176-acre secure compound in the lowest-income area of
Washington, DC.

Laws such as the Patriot Act and Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act
allow warrantless wiretapping of US citizens. In fact, whistleblower
William Binney, who served in the NSA for 40 years, estimates that the NSA
is currently storing between 15 and 20 trillion communications, including
domestic emails and billing transactions. And the Pentagon is set to
increase its cyber-security program by five-fold.

*Other, more subtle forms of public control come in the form of
organizations that function to protect the interests of corporations and
their servant political parties. *This may occur through direct creation of
"astro-turf" groups or by co-optation of existing grassroots and other
groups by granting them increased access to politicians and controlling
their access to foundation grants and donations. A recent example
involves Obama's
"enforcer," Jim
Messina<http://www.thenation.com/article/159577/jim-messina-obamas-enforcer>,
who met with liberal organizations during the health reform process to keep
them in line with the Democratic agenda. DuRand writes that in polyarchy,
*"it
is through its penetration and co-optation or even creation of the
components of civil society that the elite garners the consent of the
people to its rule and thereby achieves governability."*

*Those groups that directly challenge the system and cannot be co-opted by
money or access are routinely infiltrated
<http://october2011.org/blogs/kevin-zeese/part-ii-infiltration-political-movements-norm-not-exception-united-states>for
the purpose of spying, dividing, and destroying. *More
evidence<http://october2011.org/blogs/kevin-zeese/freedom-information-act-documents-show-massive-nationwide-monitoring-occupy-moveme>of
infiltration and spying on Occupy is coming to light.

We live in a mirage democracy. Elections have become expensive spectacles
with $2 billion presidential campaigns and a corporate media that reports
on the political drama every day for months on end. Elections are tightly
controlled, rigged for the two parties by restrictive ballot access laws, a
corporate-run debate commission that blocks third parties, gerrymandered
voting districts, unverifiable computer vote counts, and a mass media that
does not cover alternatives to the corporate duopoly. *US voting systems
are among the least democratic in the world.* They lack modern, more
democratic approaches like universal voter registration, proportional
representation, and ranked choice or instant run-off voting. Only half the
US public is registered, and only half of registered voters vote, so these
mirage elections provide a less than legitimate government.

Our next article, Part II of this series on democracy, will focus on how
participatory government and economic democracy are being put in place in
Latin America and steps being taken in those directions in the United
States. If we are to achieve the "We the People" government to which we
aspire and end the mirage democracy we are in, these are the twin pillars
on which real democracy will stand.

*You can hear our interview with Chris Hedges and Cliff DuRand: What Kind
of Democracy Exists in the US? on Clearing the FOG
Radio<http://clearingthefogradio.org/chris-hedges-and-cliff-durand-what-kind-of-democracy-exists-in-the-us/>
 (podcast <http://clearingthefogradioshow.libsyn.com/>) or view it on
UStream/ItsOurEconomy <http://www.ustream.tv/itsoureconomy>.*

*This is Part I in a series on democracy in the United States. Next week we
examine participatory democracy as an antidote to managed democracy.*

*You can intervene in the nation's budget debate by watching a Roots Action
video and writing your Congressional representatives and the president
here<http://act.rootsaction.org/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=7271>
.*

*
*
*This article was first published on Truthout.org. Reprinted with
permission.*

*http://truth-out.org/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=14489&Itemid=228*<http://truth-out.org/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=14489&Itemid=228>
**
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