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Danger Lampost

Futurist & Technology Consultant,

TEDCRED 10+

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Are we slaves to the forces that conspire to keep Republicans and Democrats in the United States in a 50/50 stand off?

I have been increasingly amazed about something in American politics: Half the country apparently thinks the other half is some combination of insane, immoral, or perhaps just misled. I can't quite grasp how that can be true, but it seems to be true to me, as I listen to and talk to the vast majority of people who are firmly republican or democrat.

These aren't just simple things we're fighting about. We're fighting about life and death issues, like what happens to women when they get raped, and what our health care policy should be. I would think that with such disputes, eventually one side or the other would win out. Both can't be right. Yet both sides seem perpetually evenly balanced. Is there some force at work forcing this even balance? If so, what is it? Are we all just slaves to this force?

Throughout American history, there have been roughly equal numbers of republican (18) and democratic (16) presidents, ignoring other parties throughout American history. (Hopefully I got that right, but fact check me if you are so inclined...) This leads me to conclude that there must be some larger social force at work influencing the masses of people, to keep these numbers perpetually balanced. Because I can't understand how these forces can be so evenly balanced over so many years without some force keeping them balanced.

What force(s) keep on keeping republicans and democrats so evenly balanced in the United States? Are we slaves to this force?

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    Ella Zimmerly

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    Nov 5 2012: The core problem with America is "The System" (government, business, academia, finance) promoting what I call "The Game" (the mindset that promulgates people using people for gains). To restate it, the imposed societal structure squelches true democracy for its own advancement.

    After months of research in present and historic societal structure and utilizing my nutrition training (MS) to apply science to life, I accepted that conspiracy to convert our republic into a fascist society has and is occurring. READ ON! The System is run by the bankers, and they have been working since the beginning of the United States of America to accomplish their aims, which include enslavement (through personal indebtedness, wars, and national indebtedness) and the drastic reduction in the world's population. Tactics include education, marketing, media coverage, official policies, marginalization of groups, etc.

    A portion of the qualitative data: Bread and games to keep the masses complacent (cheap food, food stamps/EBT, entertainment, sports, recreational activities) while teaching them to be indebted to banks throughout life; Lobbying groups' dynamics in the legislative process; The law: are groups favored over individuals?; The unequal enforcement of the law; Political races; War, even its existence; Monopolies and their history; The layout of Washington DC; The monuments in Washington DC; The history of eugenics; The dynamics of funding for research; The history of mind control; Propaganda (in government, campaigns, recruitment, public education, "higher" education, business, NGOs, non-profits, media, advertising); The prevalence of conspiracy theories in American culture and the marginalization of their believers; The marginalization of so many other people groups: those with religious, spiritual, and/or New Age beliefs, psychic abilities, practitioners of alternative and traditional medicine, unaccredited schools and alternative media.

    More is in my twitter feed, FB notes.
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      Krisztián Pintér 200+

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      TED Translator
      Nov 5 2012: incredible to see how far denial of responsibility goes. what stops you from living off of your wage, and not emptying your credit card? surely, there must be some evil mastermind behind it, and not personal greed and shortsightedness. blame canada!
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        Ella Zimmerly

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        Nov 5 2012: Quite the opposite. I am arguing that everyone is responsible. Everyone is told to join the System and socially punished if they do not comply. Everyone is responsible because everyone puts up with it.
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          Krisztián Pintér 200+

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          TED Translator
          Nov 5 2012: that what was that about mind control? people are responsible for being mind controlled? in my book, mind control and responsibility contradict each other.
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        Ella Zimmerly

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        Nov 5 2012: When you try to convince me to agree with you, you are trying to tell me what to think, yes? When marketers do their thing, they are trying to tell me what to think, yes? What you say influences me, but I am still responsible for what I think. Mind control and responsibility are NOT mutually exclusive; they must be balanced. (And I don't think this response is in the right column, sorry.)
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        Ella Zimmerly

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        Nov 6 2012: There are a bunch of puppets walking around the world, who feel controlled by their collective circumstances. Social structure is more than just influence; it is a type of control. Ask the slaves found in virtually every country of the world.
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          Krisztián Pintér 200+

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          TED Translator
          Nov 6 2012: i don't care too much if some people feel controlled. much more interesting whether they are indeed controlled. blaming social structure is just another excuse.

          what slaves? the real slaves, the 10-60 million worldwide? you believe they were influenced to be slaves? not really. they were forced. that's very different.
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        Lejan . 30+

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        TED Translator
        Nov 6 2012: “No one is more a slave than the one who thinks he is free without being it.”

        Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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        Lejan . 30+

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        TED Translator
        Nov 6 2012: To answer your question in this context, I had to agree on your perception of 'imaginary chains', on which I don't and therefore, I can't.
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        Ella Zimmerly

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        Nov 8 2012: Blackmail, its threat, resulting fear, and scapegoats are common types of control in institutions, where greedy, self-centered people tend to rise to the top and exploit the people beneath them. Social structure and the institutional mindset that imposes it keep people at the "bottom" working for minimum wage (or less); they keep people from being well-educated; they keep voices from being heard; they keep people from organizing and gaining collective power; they keep certain people groups from being prosecuted and being labeled criminal while others feel the force of the system; they keep human trafficking going, even in the United States, the supposed leader of the free world. In a just and balanced society, there wouldn't be a market for slaves, be they for sex, labor, or anything else (tissue?).

    • Alan Urdaibay

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      Nov 6 2012: Your main problem is one of perception. You see a system which has outcomes then assume that there is a directing intelligence i.e., that an agency has an agenda. That's not how it works. There is no agenda. Humans have very little capacity to organize outcomes on a large scale. Usually, when people claim to have done such a thing they are kidding themselves. A great deal happens by chance.

      Take town planning. A huge effort goes into town planning across the world. However, if you look at the results from space you see that towns universally look like bird droppings - literally splattered across the landscape. The 'planning' has had virtually no impact at all.

      The world is not a conspiracy - there is no need for paranoia - to quote Douglas Adams - "Stuff just happens."

      • John Smith 30+

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        Nov 6 2012: When you can just buy politicians you don't have to control the whole world to influence some outcome in the direction you desire. You can drive a car without understanding how the engine works.
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        Ella Zimmerly

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        Nov 8 2012: I agree the problem is one of perception: I had the guts to ask why nutrition science and its translation is more influenced by society and the way we think in society than by the results of scientific experiments. When I dared to mentally zoom out and ask that question, I saw the mountain range of evidence, current and through history, that supports the notion of conspiracy. If you don't believe in it, I dare you look up the story of Ron Paul, a US congressional representative who was ignored, marginalized, bullied, and silenced (to a degree) by the system. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9LN-CDRtCE&feature=related
        You could also carefully and judiciously consider the documentation continuously presented by Alex Jones (not personality and presentation) using radio, the internet, and DVDs; many others work similarly.
        More documented evidence on the detrimental effects of The Game (but by no means all of it) propagated by the system which could lead the USA through a police state into marshal law, using available characters:
        Media's lip-service to bullying being bad
        Executive orders (are they constitutional?)
        Laws undermining the US Constitution and its amendments
        Voting fraud
        The generation of cash and its flow
        The history of national banks
        The public being handed businesses' debts
        "Geoengineering"
        Vaccines' detrimental effects (and pharmaceutical companies cannot be sued)
        The public otherwise being experimental test subjects
        The history of big tobacco
        Government wastefulness
        Tax evasion
        Cover-ups
        Secrecy promotes abuse
        The history of colonialism
        Institution-based societal structure and the institution-propagating mindset
        Misleading, feel-good titles to governmental divisions (not unlike Hitler's Germany)
        The historic westward expansion of the US and marginalization of the displaced native peoples
        The economic aggression of the US
        The political agenda (interests) of US and its officials (not necessarily peace)
        The hatred much of the world has for America
        Etc.

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