Ake, I think that most of those here, those of a liberal persuasion whom you regard with such disdain and contempt "see immediately the contradictions in our present system and would recognise that it is unsustainable." And they (we) are most interested in doing a great deal about it.

The first thing on the agenda would be to throw out the bums in both parties—the bums who are getting rich by accepting bribes from corporations so the corporations can shuck all regulations and run the country any old way they want to (think "feudal system").

Bribes? They like to call it "lobbying," but no matter how you slice it, it's bribery!

The last thing we need in the government is someone like Sarah Palin, with her motives and the shallowness of her views.

Yes, there is a lot of anger in the country. Outfits like the Tea Party are evidence enough of that. But ANGER is not enough. These people want to take more of the poison that made them sick in the first place.

I see ominous parallels with Germany in the 1930s.

But--in the meantime, there are other groups gathering together, largely through the internet, but also getting together face-to-face in living rooms, to figure out intelligent ways of taking the country back from the would-be tyrants and exploiters. And these people know history and political science. They don't shout much and they don't wave guns around, but that doesn't mean that they aren't plenty angry.

Don Firth