the deep state elephant in the room has been tax code changes we've seen in the last four decades, that have allowed breathtaking wealth accumulations in a very short time. there will be no movement on the deep state issue until thom hartmann's message and historical context are made to appear in the main stream. but how does that happen with a media controlled by oligarchs? movies did the trick in world war two, can hollywood help the nation now with even greater emphasis on movies about american colonial history, modern despotism, morality plays about puppet congresses, or perhaps the well worn academic path last trodden by orwell?

Powerful. Your concise and blunt assessment of the wider reality beyond the comfortable niches of our everyday lives is like taking the red pill in "The Matrix." It threatens all that we hold dear, all that we know and believe and hope:

Morpheus: "This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill - the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill - you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes."

Once all ideological evasions have been exhausted, that's the stark choice laid bare before us. We must each ask ourselves: Do we seek the truth, no matter how difficult, or do we seek the comfort of our fantasies?

Full spectrum dominance, both domestically and globally, and the death of democracy, as you have described, are the predictable and inevitable outcomes of extreme wealth and power concentrated in ever tightening circles of influence in markets, in governance, and in media. This in turn is the predictable and inevitable consequence of heavily conditioned complacency, escapism, and willful ignorance. A citizenry in compliance is the flip side of fascism.

What I fear most is another attempt to become the next Germany of WWII. HItler succeeded in controling the media and making sure his opposition did not have a voice. It is exactly what Putin has accomplished in Russia.

Another fact free, repetitive ("Lefty/Socialist") post from Dianereynolds, Yawn.

There ya go again, projecting your own hypocrisy and paranoid psychology onto others, twisting reality into a pretzel to match your delusions, which is typical modus operandi for virtually every far-right Republican under the spell of Trump the liar and pervert. If you really are such a champion of free speech, tweet your Pussy Grabber in Chief -- he's the only one seriously working to restrict it.

You go, girl! I'm impressed and heartened that you wasted so much of this gorgeous day holed up in the basement researching dead archives to study what I've written. As a consequence, you must feel so much wiser, if that's even possible given your condition. Don't stop now, though; follow through by actually attempting to comprehend the material, before your lucidity slips away again, which seems to be increasing in frequency.

Obviously, everyone has a right to say whatever they want; however, everyone else also has that same right to respond and critique, or not, however they may choose. Please explain how, in your twisted logic, criticism of a person's speech -- which you do in 100 percent of your posts as a troll on a liberal blog -- is a violation of that person's right to free speech. (???) Don't explain it to me; explain it to yourself. If you ever do figure it out, you might also explain it to Big Daddy Trump, playing with his, um, twitter.

Myself, I would never suggest that anyone should not freely express themselves as much and as long as they so desire. That's your shtick, Granny/Hot Dog Lady. Quite the opposite, I am merely, and evidently futilely, offering in good faith and humor, albeit a bit harsh, some positive feedback and the tried and true techniques that are offered in any English Comp.101 course to help your two monikers improve their similar styles (suspiciously, a little too similar maybe?), so that they don't sound so predictable and boring. I only serve to enlighten darkened minds.

Forever, your humble guide.

Why not?

Most leftie/socialists lives are spent going from one mess to another anyway.

How about a good impeachment, that will fix the mess - and create a whole new one!

@26,

I think you have made an accurate, rational assessment of the mainstream media. Where it may go a bit astray is the definitions you suggest. Bernie was viewed by all but the far left as a flat out Socialist. You can try to change the definition by putting different words in front of "socialist" but the general population didn't buy it. Neither did the DNC for that matter. The public may secretly like what they heard from Bernie but reality set in and they understood that his bantering was not going to become a reality. Free everything never works.

As much as leftie/socialists want their word coined word "progressive" to be embraced by middle America, they better change their approach from hatred to something more acceptable to working middle class Americans and they certainly aren't showing they understand that since the election. This blog being a sterling example.

I suspect this same condition is also alive in the Republican/Tea Party side. The battle amongst the old republicans and the Freedom Caucus will also have to undergo the same sort of change.

All this lands in President Trumps lap and sooner or later you will all discover, Trump is not a Republican!!!! He will learn how to work around both parties to push his agenda as far as he can. Just like Obama did.

Unfortunately, most of what you say about the Reagan and Clinton Democrats is true; although, I would argue that the split(s) in the base will not necessarily remain permanent. Nothing in politics is permanent other than the fact that everything changes.

People just want their politicians to do what's right by them. If one party fails to deliver, then the electorate swings to the other party the next cycle, usually every eight years, sometimes in just four or even two (as happened in the 2010 midterms).

Perhaps another way to put it is that starting with Reagan, more or less, the entire political dynamic of both establishment parties began their inexorable march to the far right, chasing after bucket loads of filthy corporate cash, thanks to the various right-wing Supreme Court rulings -- primarily Buckley v. Valeo in 1976 and Citizens United v. FEC in 2010, but also First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti in 1978, McCutcheon v. FE in 2014, and certain other corporate friendly rulings over the intervening decades -- which, in effect, legalized bribery on a scale virtually no other developed democracy would tolerate.

Traditionally, the Democrats are the party of the poor and the middle class, as you said, and the Republicans are the party of the rich, which now means the billionaires. It amazes me to no end that right-wing spin can reverse that perception so easily.

You are also correct that this is due in no small part to the disingenuous efforts of donor-money-hungry Dems, who were dumb (or depraved) enough to climb in bed with the billionaires, promoting such abominations as NAFTA, CAFTA, TPP, TAFTA, etc. Keep in mind, though, that originally these were all basically anti-labor, ultra-conservative, corporate/Republican-sponsored, so-called "free" trade initiatives.

There is no question that through these phony deals Republicans and their corp-Dem Bobbsey twins have already (or will have in the case of TPP and TAFTA, if they are ever passed into law in some slightly altered version under a different acronym) dealt a fatal blow to America's manufacturing base, busted up unions, and screwed American blue-collar workers until their heads fell off.

It's called moving factories and offshoring jobs in a race to the bottom and third-world status. Is Trump the Liar, the fake billionaire who has continuously screwed over his own non-union labor force, capable of convincing a Republican congress to reverse this decades-long course and forsake their genuine billionaires and benefactors? Yeah, right!

The one great thing about Trump and Republican hegemony -- the only great thing -- is that they are lurching so far to the fascist right and are so erratic (and downright scary) voters across the spectrum are genuinely alarmed and are paying attention like never before, notwithstanding the starry-eyed Trumpists who think he's their Great White Saviour.

If Democratic leadership can realize the error of their ways and fill the vacuum Republicans are leaving in their wake -- starting right efing now! -- and can successfully re-frame the issues and narratives to once again reflect the people's basic concerns, rather than the billionaire's, then the pendulum could swing back in their favor beginning as soon as 2018.

That's the hope anyway. Of course, it depends largely on breaking the corporate media sound barrier and overcoming the spin. It also depends on the distinct possibility that Generalissimo Trumpnino may soon become the war president he so transparently aspires to be. If he manages to pull off a Reichstag fire type of incident, declare martial law, stage a coup upsetting our democratic institutions, or a combination of any of the above, then all bets are off.

We live in interesting times.

@ Granny/Hotdog Lady:

Naw, sorry, just not there yet, not quite lively and insulting enough. A little more lengthy and fleshed out than the usual tripe perhaps, but, frankly, your broken-record reflex response of overused expressions still sound flat and, well, overused -- just no zing left in the old zinger, so to speak. No worries, it happens to everyone as they age.

Keep struggling with it though, and eventually (if brain plaque doesn't eat too far into the cortex, god forbid) hurling peppy insults at your neighbors over the virtual backyard fense will become second nature, flying off those boney fingertips in no time at all. Sometimes a prop can help rekindle the fire and get your blood boiling again -- maybe a big, framed portrait of Hillary above your monitor smiling down at you.

Bill Clinton had signed on to NAFTA, so we weren't surprised to see Hillary Clinton work hard on behalf of the TPP prior to launching her campaign. Obama was against the TPP before he was for it, claiming that it would "remove 18,000 tariffs other countries have levied on our exports."

So Trump has wet his pull-up about the filibuster after just 100 days???..LMAO.

McConnell filibustered Obama and the Democratic Party for eight years. Obama didn't go insane...he didn't even bother to fight back. Obama could have easily used the bully pulpit to inform citizens of what McConnell and the Teapublic Party were doing to us, but for some reason decided silence was better.

Obama however did get a lot of press coverage for his support of free trade/ TPP leading up to the 2016 election!!!! Oddly enough the media never associated the Teapublic Party with TPP support.

Trump on the other hand has total command of the corpse media...and manipulates it well.