Is the country of the USA a social and historical experiment?

[Ludmila]

 Love America. Love its glorious history. Love its boundless land, “from Sea to shining Sea”. Love to visit cities and towns where there is history. Love to look, ponder, contemplate, and think about this country’s past, present and future. I have arrived at the conclusion that the more I think about the history of humanity in general, and the history of America, in particular, the more the notion of a “social and historic experiment” is coming to my head. ( A propos, whenever I visit Quebec, talk to its people, listen to their songs and read their newspapers, I cannot help thinking of the phenomenon when part of a socium breaks away from its roots and forms a new socium far away from the Motherland).
But let’s leave the phenomenon of ethno-preservation far away from the motherland for another occasion, and talk about America.
The United States were founded on the idea of finding freedom,  pursuing happiness far away from the oppressor, building a new country  based on a whole list of values and RELIANCE ON YOURSELF. Not asking anything from anyone and not owing anything to anyone. Interfering with no one and not letting anyone destroy its basic, core values. This is the idea, as is known.
American history has covered a long way, from the War on Independence to Sep11, 2001, from G. Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Hamilton  to the Obama/Clinton social delirium and the society political, racial, economic, cultural divergence the history of this country has ever known. So, from RELIANCE ON YOURSELF  and LAISSEZ-FAIRE capitalism, the least interfering of the Government with the citizens’ private life…  to socialism and totalitarian politically correct Orwellian state. The country, where, in the opinion of dems, there is so much of democracy that its surplace should LAVISHLY  be shared with far away nations of the world (and if the latter refuse to accept it, that very democracy should be accepted by them  in the voluntary-mandatory mode).
So, the United States, as a society, has made a full cycle. May be the history of societies is doomed to be cyclical? From: FREE MARKET – SOCIALISM—EXPORT OF SOCIALISM--FREE MARKET?
And another question. Who are the Americans of 2016 (I am often asked this question when back in Russia)? Is it one country only on the map? What is this country’s unifying idea in 2016/2017?
Is the very fact that decent AM have to seek their partners across the ocean a sign of a failed social experiment, (as well as that of the Soviet Union)?
What do you think, folks? Would be especially interesting to listen to the young Americans, (as well as more mature), opine.
 
 

[wallm]

I got a headache reading that.

[BC]

I got a headache reading that.

Is really an interesting question.

If a picture says a thousand words, I'll save a couple thou..






Ludmila,

I think we're towards the end of both cycles...

[fathertime]

Is really an interesting question.

If a picture says a thousand words, I'll save a couple thou..






Ludmila,

I think we're towards the end of both cycles...

Boy o boy if those little circles are correct we do need to short circuit the ending point! 


Fathertime! 

[Goombah]

I call BS on the circle.  Looks pretty, but in order to call it a "historical" circle, there must be multiple occurrences (ideally 5 or more to make it a solid pattern).  References please. 

[2tallbill]

What do you think, folks? Would be especially interesting to listen to the young Americans, (as well as more mature), opine.

The USA is fairly complicated to sum up in a few words. We tend to swing like a
pendulum more socialist to more capitalist, back and forth. Today we are swinging
to more capitalism.

I advise men not to consider 20 year old girls for marriage because they are like a
loaf of bread that has been in the oven for 10 minutes. It looks great on the outside
but the inside isn't done yet. I make the same recommendation of listening to
youngsters regarding politics/economics/history or their predictions.

Young people base their opinions on very little information or experience and are
often influenced by dubious people and sources. A more experienced person know
when they don't know something but young people often don't know what they don't
know (yet they still are confident).

Udachi!

Bill

 

[ML]

I will say that I agree with the charts, and that we are heading toward the 'bad' zones.

Big Bill is correct that the pendulum swings back and forth but . . . the swing is not symmetrical.  We do keep moving more and more toward the 'bad' zones.

One very telling feature of life in USA today . . . Less than half the adults in USA pay any Federal Income taxes, and many even get 'negative tax' money (welfare) when they file their tax returns.

This fact, virtually alone, is leading us more and more into the 'bad' zones.  A 'give me' cultural can never lead to good outcomes as it defines the dependency stage.

[Gator]

America's economic strength derives not from socialism as per the USSR model but from diversified, free enterprise.  America's flirtations with socialism, which has restrained free enterprise,  will be on hold for at least four years, and hopefully longer than that.

[2tallbill]

Less than half the adults in USA pay any Federal Income taxes, and many even get 'negative tax' money (welfare) when they file their tax returns.

0% of people paid Federal Income taxes back when the founding
fathers were alive. The 16th amendment should be repealed !

[GQBlues]

These *social theories* are simply that, theoretical. Summation/conclusion are highly subjective depending on your socio-political leanings. It's mainly hogwash...

...Is the very fact that decent AM have to seek their partners across the ocean a sign of a failed social experiment, (as well as that of the Soviet Union)?...

Hhhmmm...not quite. Only a very small number that do, and of those, the very vast majority of which are from the Asian region, of which, the largest majority of 'American' coming from the same region or culture.

I concur with some opinions above that the biggest danger facing American society today is dependence on government assistance programs. Liberalism had run amok and slowly eroded what had made America what it was. Opportunity and hard work. Missing these past recent years.

Damage averted when Bernie's *free everything and anything to all Americans* campaign failed. Nothing new here so everyone can safely go back home and go to *work*.

[Brasscasing]

Is the country of the USA a social and historical experiment? ...

Yes, if you are to return to what the US founding fathers were trying to accomplish...

The first mention of the "experiment' was in a letter by Thomas Jefferson...

"I have no fear that the result of our experiment will be that men may be trusted to govern themselves without a master."
   - Thomas Jefferson in a Letter to David Hartley; 1787

I think that one of the greatest lines ever spoken by one of these men was uttered in 1787. When the Founding Fathers had finally agreed on the wording of the U.S. Constitution, Benjamin Franklin answered a woman bystander's question as to what the meeting had produced, he replied...

 "A republic, madam, if you can keep it."

My guess would be he'd have the same sentiment today if he were alive to see what the 'experiment' has wrought.

Brass

[BillyB]

As long as America doesn't change a winning formula, we'll be fine.

[Ludmila]

If we take a closer look at the Russian history, we will see that after the poorest masses ( the lumpen), headed by Lenin and the activist group of revolutionaries ( predominantly of jewish descend), overthrew the ruling class, eliminated the clergy ( the jewish clergy, too, but mostly Russian Orthodox) the aristocracy--what we call today the establishment-- having drowned Russia in blood, .....made themselves the elite class.  They settled in the most prestigious cities( Moscow, St. Petersburg), assigned to themselves ( for free) residential  historical buildings (the real estate that costs $ millions today).
They assigned the  benefits , first and foremost, to themselves : special hospitals ( for free), special departments  in Department stores ( for the elite), elitist universities for their kids ( for free), etc, etc, etc.

Their kids some 20 years later, however, preferred to lead bohemian life. They were far from being workers and peasants. The sons and daughters of  revolutionaries ( former workers, peasants, laborers fighting "for the happy future of common people", "for equality, brotherhood, etc") graduated from elite universities ( where former aristocracy used to educate their kids) became poets, journalists, musicians. They began considering themselves "the elite". And, while  taking full advantage of the benefits assigned to them due to the "achievements" of their parents, began critisizing "the regime" although enjoying the priveledge that regime was granting them.
Then many of those above who drowned Russia in the blood bath, executed officers, aristocracy, engineers, doctors in 1917, were, in their turn,  executed by another dictator--Stalin in 1937-39. Some 20 years later Stalin was removed by Khrushchev.
After 40 years of the Brezhnev's Soviet Union Perestrojka took place. The Communist Party nomenclature either recolored themselves turning into bankers ( thriving on the IMF and other International Monetary Agencies' loans) or became industrialists ( owners of enterprizes). Many old communist elite grandmothers and grandfathers and their posterity had to sell their costly property to survive. They sold it to the new capitalists and their kids.
For example, this is how Mihail Khodorkovsky ( Obama's/Clinton's BIIIIG buddy) became a billionnaire:
From WIKI:

Mikhail became a fervent Communist and Soviet patriot, a member of a species that had seemed all but extinct.”[18]

From WIKI how he bacame an oligarh:

The reforms of the 1990s were mainly the work of the advisers brought in under then president Boris Yeltsin. Fearing that the population might soon have a change of heart and turn its back on reform, Yegor Gaidar and Anatoly Chubais, the chief Russian architects of the process, decided to accelerate it, selling off state resources and enterprises at little or no charge. Not long into the process, ownership of some of Russia's most valuable resources was auctioned off by oligarch-owned banks under a scheme called "Loans for Shares." Although they were supposedly acting on behalf of the state, the bank auctioneers rigged the process-and in almost every case ended up as the successful bidders. This was how Khodorkovsky got a 78 percent share of ownership in Yukos, worth about $5 billion, for a mere $310 million, and how Boris Berezovsky got Sibneft, another oil giant, worth $3 billion, for about $100 million. [...] [T]he government was generally unable to exercise much control. Since the state was very weak, these "new Russians" paid little or no taxes on their purchases."

According to Jeffry Saks ( a prominent American economist) it was "a most wicked, pre-meditated, well- thought over action with the goal of a wide-scale redistribution of wealth  in the interests of a narrow number of people"

I would add, the inetrests of those who were fervent Communist fat cats and their kids.
I can see a full cycle here.

[Ludmila]

America's economic strength derives not from socialism as per the USSR model but from diversified, free enterprise.  America's flirtations with socialism, which has restrained free enterprise,  will be on hold for at least four years, and hopefully longer than that.

Gator,  in case a clinton/ sanders/ axelrod scenario of events it will not matter where America's economic strength derives. There will simply be redistribution of wealth and the infringements of rights ( like it is currently for a white male). Right after the revolution in R, those whose background was much higher than that of workers and peasants were infringed in their rights. Many had to hide their background to make it in those times.

[Gator]

Gator,  in case a clinton/ sanders/ axelrod scenario of events it will not matter where America's economic strength derives.  There will simply be redistribution of wealth and the infringements of rights ( like it is currently for a white male).   

I agree.  An expression for wealth redistribution is  "dividing the pie, not making the pie bigger."   Such is what happened in Soviet days.  Such is what Obama attempted during his 8 years as President. 

During Obama's 8 years of dividing the pie, a few Americans at the top did well (the wealthiest Americans usually do well in the land of opportunity).  The lower class improved too.  However, Obama did not make the pie bigger, and the middle class worked longer and harder just to stay even.   

This working middle class was largely responsible for  electing Trump.  Trump and the Republican Congress will make changes to improve the economy:    1) tax cuts for individuals and corporation, 2) streamlined regulations, and 3) new trade agreements.  The pie should grow, and everyone's piece should grow too. 

Right after the revolution in R, those whose background was much higher than that of workers and peasants were infringed in their rights. Many had to hide their background to make it in those times.

Sounds like those the people who knew how best to make pie were pushed aside. 

This happened again with the fall of your CCCP.  Once again the pie was divided, except this time a select few oligarchs grabbed most of the pie and the masses became poorer.   Enterprises were started, yet they were not exactly free given the rampant corruption. 

Look at Russia in 1900.   It  had the natural resources and human resources to equal the achievements of the United States.   So sad.   Russia fell well short of its full potential because it did not foster free enterprise and did not have a democratic government. 

[Ludmila]

Gator, I enjoyed reading your reply, although the above written by you would be more beneficial for "the young and the fearless"  :-)  members than me. I follow the events of history/politics pretty closely. I would rather listen to your comment of Obama's lamenting that 37% of the Republican electorate approve of V. Putin. Any comments/thoughts/analysis? Thanks.

[Ludmila]

This happened again with the fall of your CCCP. 

Gator, I am sure, by saying your CCCP you mean the political system , not the R. people. I will only add that I am glad that YOUR OBAMA administration will leave the scene ( although the  legitimate President elect DT is complaining in the Twitter that O is creating a lot of obstacles and does not want to give the power peacefully). Coupled with the call of the defeated party to its electorate to cancel the results of the elections YOUR OBAMA administration is undermining the foundation of the democracy in the USA.
:-)  :-)

[Boethius]

The term nakhvatalas' verhushek comes to mind.

[Ludmila]

Boe, it is impolite to speak the language/insert foreign words that some ( in this case-- the majority) members do not understand. Your above  comment is humiliating and derogatory.
I understand the reason though. As is the case with all the liberals after Clinton's defeat: sour grapes.
Breathe deeper. 

[Boethius]

They all have FSU spouses who can explain the term if they are interested.

I am not American. I am on record here as stating I didn't care who won the US election and I did not nor do not.  So yet again, you are mistaken in your assumptions about me.

[Ludmila]

They all have FSU spouses who can explain the term if they are interested.

Please, don't shift the accent. Your  language behavior above is improper, your discourse ethics is poor and disrespect to the interlocutor unacceptable.

[Boethius]

Pointing to the superficiality demonstrated is neither disrespectful nor improper.

[Ludmila]

I am not American. I am on record here as stating I didn't care who won the US election

However, your die hard liberal view and fervent liberal stand is ever present in all your posts on political events, which disproves your attempt to state that you didn't care about the results of the elections.

[Ludmila]

Pointing to the superficiality demonstrated is neither disrespectful nor improper.

Your right is to verbally point to whatever you like.
My right is to comment on your verbal choice and give my assessment of the latter as improper and humiliating.

[krimster2]

Bo’
“nakhvatalas' verhushek” is now the most universal condition of the American people, but we do need to come up with a shorter description and in English.  Russia has “Vatnick”, how about “Kardashick”  This hollow empty mentality is a direct consequence of what happens when the vast machine that has created the Kardashian empire ventures into politics, it turns politics into another form of Kardashia, with all of its followers becoming whatever is the opposite of enlightened.

So Luda, lighten up on Bo dahlink, I imagine your sensitivity would be threatened at discussing either Vatnicks or Kardashicks, maybe in your case this hits “close to home” and you are in the habit of shooting the messenger every time they bring you bad news, but the message my dear is still quite valid, and your reaction is actually proof of that, but looking forward, my advice to you is to get used to bad news and save your ammo for other things, you're probably going to need it...