On Becoming Part Of The 1%

[Erand7899]

You speak as if income is static.

Anyone can raise their income anytime they want so anyone can increase their mobility.

Income of a population can be static even if people can go up or down the socioeconomic ladder.

For example, the median income of an uneducated white male has fallen after inflation over the past 40 years. That doesn't mean that one specific uneducated white male in 1968 makes less today than he did 46 years ago. What it means is if you took all the incomes of all the uneducated white males in 1968 and compared the median to the median income of all the uneducated white males in 2014 adjusted for inflation, it would be lower today than it was two generations ago.

To understand how everyone is progressing, we look at populations, not individuals.

No one needs to understand how everyone is progressing, because everyone is not anyone real. Uneducated White males make less today for the simple reason that there is little demand for uneducated White males in a highly technical work environment. People are individuals, they work, eat, live, hurt, and die as individuals, and not as any mass.

The fact is that individuals continually move up the economic ladder, while others move down the same ladder. That means that no one is stuck in any economic strata. Most of us, when we leave high school and start out on our own, start at the bottom and begin to work up the economic scale. Some progress farther than others, some never get off the bottom, and some fall back. Some get struck by lightening, others win lotteries. Some get sick, some become drunks and druggies, and some die. That is life. It will never be fair, but it is well worth the trip.

One serious problem that we have in our economy today, is the lack of entrepreneurs. These are the new business entries that keep existing businesses hopping to stave off the competition. New business starts are at an all time low, and that is because government regulation and red tape is becomming too difficult to sort through and too expensive for those with limited capital to overcome.

 

[thereisnospoon]

[

Bob would like to have kept his business open. Federal regulations, taxation, technology and competition put him out of business.

Yeah, Regulations like you can't pour carcinogens into the water or belch filth into the air or have unsafe machines that maul workers. Those "regulations".

How about this. When Bob tries to move his factory, the government confiscates it. Betcha they'll run it better.

[
You are short on fact. Long on liberal talking point whines and utter bullshit.
You are one miserable individual. Nothing you state on this forum is productive.
And where does it get you? Nowhere. Add to the list above, "unproductive".
BTW Jose...That's your new name.....
Here a list of people you can be pissed at. Pay close attention to 5 of the top 6..
[/url]

Oh, Look, Spoony found a list with rich democrats on it.

And I've very productive. I expose the douchebaggery and greed that has destroyed the REpubilcan Party.

Hey fucko....It's the ENTIRE LIST.
Dude ,the only things you produce are CO2, methane and bullshit.
Truth hits a nerve, doesn't it? Ass.
"Yeah, Regulations like you can't pour carcinogens into the water or belch filth into the air or have unsafe machines that maul workers. Those "regulations".
Ahh yes, when all else fails, the lib heads right to the shelter of the all or nothing straw man argument.
Government running a factory? First, it's illegal. The federal government is barred from operating a for profit business. Of course the TVA is an exception.
Government takeovers of private business? Yer kidding right?
The feds would close the doors and sell off the assets.
Man, are you an incredibly convenient useful idiot for the class envy left.

 

[thereisnospoon]

[

None of the above.
Unions "busted" themselves. That's a fact.
At will employment laws were enacted to give people the CHOICE of whether or not to join a labor collective.
Nobody looted 401k's.
401k's are investments. As with any investment, there is risk.
Each employee has a CHOICE whether or not to invest in their company 401k...If one CHOOSES to not take the risk, they are under no obligation to invest in a 401k.
As we have seen, from the lows in 2008, value has returned to pre recession levels and gone beyond that.
Buy and hold. It's always been the best method of investment.

No, guy, "At Will" laws were passed to make it easier to fire people without reason. "Right to Work" laws tell dumb Bubba-rednecks that they don't have to pay for a union to get union benefits, and then wonder why the union benefits vanish.

401K's were a scam that Wall Street invented to loot what little money they hadn't sucked out of the middle class.

At will and right to work are mutually exclusive.
You miss the point. Right to work is to protect employees from union coercion.
At will is to protect business owners from lawsuits filed by people who believe a job is an entitlement.
Try operating a business without it.
DUmb bubba rednecks. Holy shit....
As if no state north of the mason-dixon line is right to work....Sheesh...

 

[alan1]

Eh, only for a time. After a while, people are going to get wise, and watch out.

But I told you, my idea for the next guy who offshores a factory. The AFL-CIO needs to buy commercial time and broadcast the following.

"This is Bob. (Picture of Bob)
This is the factory that bob Closed and moved to China.
These are the nice people Bob Put out of jobs.

This is where Bob Lives. Here's his Address. "

"This is Ming. (Picture of Ming.)
This is the factory that Ming. Closed and moved to India.
These are the nice people Ming. Put out of jobs.

This is where Ming. Lives. Here's his Address. "
The Chinese are outsourcing in a big way.

Or,

Do you have a problem with a poor Chinese family finally getting a job?

 

[Toro]

The fact is that individuals continually move up the economic ladder, while others move down the same ladder.

According to empirical evidence, people are moving up and down the economic ladder in America less than before. One is much more likely to move up and down the economic ladder in Sweden, France, Canada, etc., than in America. That wasn't true in the past. The American Dream is based on the idea that you can be anything you want to be. But the data is telling us that one is more likely to be what they want to be elsewhere. It's no longer an American trait. It's not something that Americans can say differentiates ourselves from others.

 

[JoeB131]

[

Hey fucko....It's the ENTIRE LIST.
Dude ,the only things you produce are CO2, methane and bullshit.
Truth hits a nerve, doesn't it? Ass.
"Yeah, Regulations like you can't pour carcinogens into the water or belch filth into the air or have unsafe machines that maul workers. Those "regulations".
Ahh yes, when all else fails, the lib heads right to the shelter of the all or nothing straw man argument.
Government running a factory? First, it's illegal. The federal government is barred from operating a for profit business. Of course the TVA is an exception.
Government takeovers of private business? Yer kidding right?
The feds would close the doors and sell off the assets.
Man, are you an incredibly convenient useful idiot for the class envy left.

I have no problem with the government running a business. The Post office is a business, and it would turn a profit if Repukes in Congress didn't insist on them funding their own pensions until the end of the century.

Incidently, you guys w hine about the "unnecessary" regulation, but you never really define what that is.

Me, I like clean air and I like clean water and we shouldn't reward companies that move plants to places run by dictators who happily poison their own people.

 

[JoeB131]

Eh, only for a time. After a while, people are going to get wise, and watch out.

But I told you, my idea for the next guy who offshores a factory. The AFL-CIO needs to buy commercial time and broadcast the following.

"This is Bob. (Picture of Bob)
This is the factory that bob Closed and moved to China.
These are the nice people Bob Put out of jobs.

This is where Bob Lives. Here's his Address. "

"This is Ming. (Picture of Ming.)
This is the factory that Ming. Closed and moved to India.
These are the nice people Ming. Put out of jobs.

This is where Ming. Lives. Here's his Address. "
The Chinese are outsourcing in a big way.

Or,

Do you have a problem with a poor Chinese family finally getting a job?

I don't care about INdia or China.

I care about AMERICA.

I'm not sure why so many of you on the right don't.

 

[JoeB131]

At will and right to work are mutually exclusive.
You miss the point. Right to work is to protect employees from union coercion.
At will is to protect business owners from lawsuits filed by people who believe a job is an entitlement.
Try operating a business without it.
DUmb bubba rednecks. Holy shit....
As if no state north of the mason-dixon line is right to work....Sheesh...

No, right to work is to protect employers from unions by allowing them to hire rats and scabs.

Frankly, if an employer fires someone, they'd better have it documented why that was necessary.

I've seen people fired for being gay, fired for getting sick or injured, fired because their ex-girlfriend was now sleeping with a manager.

This is what "At Will" employment looks like. Workers without rights.

 

[RandomVariable]

I keep reading about how there is this 1% and how much they have and how much more they are amassing and so on and so forth, but what is stopping anyone in America from joining them? Anyone can invest in the stock market or trade bonds, free education is available to every child and anyone can go to college thanks to student loans and scholarships. The sky is the limit here, so how much of the class divide is really class warfare and how much is people not using the opportunities they have or making poor choices?

What is stopping people in America from become part of the one percent, is the one percent themselves.

Most people believe, falsy that the one percent is composed of people such as the Koch brothers, Bill Gates or the Waltons. While these families do have a considerable amount of wealth and do qualify as "the one" percent in economic terms, in political terms, they are mere interest groups.

They are not truly entrenched in the polity, not as of yet. Among the ultra wealthy, they are what is commonly known as, "New money." In fact, they are more wealthy than old money. Among the rich, once you achieve a certain level of wealth, say, your first billion, it really doesn't matter how much wealth you have, what you crave is power.

One needs to know how to invest one's money to accrue to one's family the most power. That is what these nouveau rich are just now trying to figure out.

Here's a nice convenient list of them;
http://www.forbes.com/forbes-400/

But these folks are newbies to the oligarchy. Once you have money, you become bored. You soon learn that there is more to life than "things." If you don't discover a spiritual life, than you decide to play the sport of kings, and that is politics. Money is the ticket to play this game, and the grandest game of all is international politics. Thus, all money is then spent on social engineering projects. Why do you think all social engineering projects have traditionally been made tax deductible since the turn of the century?

We commonly believe that these are, "charitable" contributions from wealthy benefactors. When actually, these are just the play things of men who fancy themselves as the new aristocracy, or worse yet, kings of the land.

Although, by gross wealth, the old families, the truly powerful ones, the real one percent, are not listed as "the elite" one percent. The truth is, these families have more influence over the culture and the politics than the congressmen, the senators or the president. THIS is the one percent.

Once you have a business idea, or you are successful at investing, trading, law, etc., and should happen to come close to achieving the wealth necessary to enter this club, then you must know how to wield those financial resources into social engineering projects. It is one thing to become obscenely rich, but you most also know how to keep the wrong people from becoming wealthy and powerful, and becoming part of the club. . . .


America's 60 Families


http://www.nndb.com/lists/439/000127058/

How do the One percent undermine our democratic institutions and keep you from their ranks? What is the goal of the One percent?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_Select_Committee_to_Investigate_Tax-Exempt_Foundations_and_Comparable_Organizations

The final report was submitted by Norman Dodd, and because of its provocative nature, the committee became subject to attack. He began by listing criticisms of the Cox Committee, and then moved on to content.

In the Dodd report to the Reece Committee on Foundations, he gave a definition of the word "subversive", saying that the term referred to "Any action having as its purpose the alteration of either the principle or the form of the United States Government by other than constitutional means." He then argued that the Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, and Carnegie Endowment were using funds excessively on projects at Columbia, Harvard, Chicago University and the University of California, in order to enable oligarchical collectivism. He stated, "The purported deterioration in scholarship and in the techniques of teaching which, lately, has attracted the attention of the American public, has apparently been caused primarily by a premature effort to reduce our meager knowledge of social phenomena to the level of an applied science." He stated that his research staff had discovered that in "1933-1936, a change took place which was so drastic as to constitute a "revolution". They also indicated conclusively that the responsibility for the economic welfare of the American people had been transferred heavily to the Executive Branch of the Federal Government; that a corresponding change in education had taken place from an impetus outside of the local community, and that this "revolution" had occurred without violence and with the full consent of an overwhelming majority of the electorate." He stated that this revolution "could not have occurred peacefully, or with the consent of the majority, unless education in the United States had been prepared in advance to endorse it ."[6]

IOW, an administration like the current one is their dream come true. And make no mistake, it wasn't chance that landed Obama in office. It was all engineered that way. Non-profits by the one percent have controlled education and media for the past century. How can you become part of the one percent if you believe in collectivism? How can you achieve your potential if you believe it is the governments job to tell you what your potential is? Thank the one percent and their non-profit foundations for that.

The simple answer is those in the class envy crowd have been told by their leaders that being wealthy is a "closed club". That wealthy people have two jobs. One is ( joe b this is for you) 'hoarding' their money. Two keeping others from becoming 'well off'...
Such stuff is of the mind of a petulant child.

There is only one thing old money despises more than the poor, new money.

 

[JoeB131]

[

The simple answer is those in the class envy crowd have been told by their leaders that being wealthy is a "closed club". That wealthy people have two jobs. One is ( joe b this is for you) 'hoarding' their money. Two keeping others from becoming 'well off'...
Such stuff is of the mind of a petulant child.

Its the fucking reality.

Hey, Remember the 1990's when we had 3% unemployment and the worst thing we had to worry about was that the President was getting a blow job?

Well, funny thing happened. The wealthy actually had to share. They actually had to pay kids above minimum wage to flip burgers. They actually had to take a shot on someone they had to train because the qualified person had already sent a resume to someone who'd pay better.

Man, they couldn't put an end to that shit fast enough. First they stole an election, and two recessions later, we totally fixed that shit.

Here's the thing. Make the rich pay their fair share and make them pay the people who do the real work fairly.

If they are still rich after that, they can have all the Dressage Horses they can eat.

 

[MisterBeale]

How many of you have seen friends, relatives, or perhaps yourselves, who have received a modest sum from a bonus, an inheritance, or even a lottery winning, run right down and buy a new car or a boat, or possibly a motorcycle, with that money?

Did they think about investing that money and begin creating a better future? No, and that is the difference between those who get ahead and those who don't.

I started a business with what was left after the government looted a little under half of my inheritance.
Maybe I should have bought some camera equipment and made a movie throwing stones at my parents so I could be respected by the people who want the other half.

.

Ain't that the truth.
There are those who believe the government should take it all.

BlackSand is an ignorant poster. She never watched the full documentary. I have already addressed this topic. The one percent isn't about money, it is about political power. Most posters on this board have been blinded by material culture and are so concerned with money, that is all they think about. Money money money.

The one percent don't really care about money. They have all they could ever want or need. It is money is endless to them. . .

What they crave is power. Power over culture, power over nations. Power over the future of mankind.

 

[MisterBeale]

I keep reading about how there is this 1% and how much they have and how much more they are amassing and so on and so forth, but what is stopping anyone in America from joining them? Anyone can invest in the stock market or trade bonds, free education is available to every child and anyone can go to college thanks to student loans and scholarships. The sky is the limit here, so how much of the class divide is really class warfare and how much is people not using the opportunities they have or making poor choices?

What is stopping people in America from become part of the one percent, is the one percent themselves.

Most people believe, falsy that the one percent is composed of people such as the Koch brothers, Bill Gates or the Waltons. While these families do have a considerable amount of wealth and do qualify as "the one" percent in economic terms, in political terms, they are mere interest groups.

They are not truly entrenched in the polity, not as of yet. Among the ultra wealthy, they are what is commonly known as, "New money." In fact, they are more wealthy than old money. Among the rich, once you achieve a certain level of wealth, say, your first billion, it really doesn't matter how much wealth you have, what you crave is power.

One needs to know how to invest one's money to accrue to one's family the most power. That is what these nouveau rich are just now trying to figure out.

Here's a nice convenient list of them;
http://www.forbes.com/forbes-400/

But these folks are newbies to the oligarchy. Once you have money, you become bored. You soon learn that there is more to life than "things." If you don't discover a spiritual life, than you decide to play the sport of kings, and that is politics. Money is the ticket to play this game, and the grandest game of all is international politics. Thus, all money is then spent on social engineering projects. Why do you think all social engineering projects have traditionally been made tax deductible since the turn of the century?

We commonly believe that these are, "charitable" contributions from wealthy benefactors. When actually, these are just the play things of men who fancy themselves as the new aristocracy, or worse yet, kings of the land.

Although, by gross wealth, the old families, the truly powerful ones, the real one percent, are not listed as "the elite" one percent. The truth is, these families have more influence over the culture and the politics than the congressmen, the senators or the president. THIS is the one percent.

Once you have a business idea, or you are successful at investing, trading, law, etc., and should happen to come close to achieving the wealth necessary to enter this club, then you must know how to wield those financial resources into social engineering projects. It is one thing to become obscenely rich, but you most also know how to keep the wrong people from becoming wealthy and powerful, and becoming part of the club. . . .


America's 60 Families


http://www.nndb.com/lists/439/000127058/

How do the One percent undermine our democratic institutions and keep you from their ranks? What is the goal of the One percent?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_Select_Committee_to_Investigate_Tax-Exempt_Foundations_and_Comparable_Organizations

The final report was submitted by Norman Dodd, and because of its provocative nature, the committee became subject to attack. He began by listing criticisms of the Cox Committee, and then moved on to content.

In the Dodd report to the Reece Committee on Foundations, he gave a definition of the word "subversive", saying that the term referred to "Any action having as its purpose the alteration of either the principle or the form of the United States Government by other than constitutional means." He then argued that the Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, and Carnegie Endowment were using funds excessively on projects at Columbia, Harvard, Chicago University and the University of California, in order to enable oligarchical collectivism. He stated, "The purported deterioration in scholarship and in the techniques of teaching which, lately, has attracted the attention of the American public, has apparently been caused primarily by a premature effort to reduce our meager knowledge of social phenomena to the level of an applied science." He stated that his research staff had discovered that in "1933-1936, a change took place which was so drastic as to constitute a "revolution". They also indicated conclusively that the responsibility for the economic welfare of the American people had been transferred heavily to the Executive Branch of the Federal Government; that a corresponding change in education had taken place from an impetus outside of the local community, and that this "revolution" had occurred without violence and with the full consent of an overwhelming majority of the electorate." He stated that this revolution "could not have occurred peacefully, or with the consent of the majority, unless education in the United States had been prepared in advance to endorse it ."[6]

IOW, an administration like the current one is their dream come true. And make no mistake, it wasn't chance that landed Obama in office. It was all engineered that way. Non-profits by the one percent have controlled education and media for the past century. How can you become part of the one percent if you believe in collectivism? How can you achieve your potential if you believe it is the governments job to tell you what your potential is? Thank the one percent and their non-profit foundations for that.

The simple answer is those in the class envy crowd have been told by their leaders that being wealthy is a "closed club". That wealthy people have two jobs. One is ( joe b this is for you) 'hoarding' their money. Two keeping others from becoming 'well off'...
Such stuff is of the mind of a petulant child.

I can see reading, and comprehending what you read, is not your strong suit. If you go into something with a preconceived notion, you have what psychologists call, a cognitive bias. Communication is shut down a priori. No learning will take place at all.

This is the sign of the mentally conditioned, or, indeed, the brain washed.

This has nothing to do with class envy. Really, who would want to be part of the One percent? How dismal? How dull? How absolutely dreadful that would be.

 

[MisterBeale]

Do you think Boxer or Pelosi will ever cast votes that will take them out of the 1% crowd?

Boxer and Pelosi don't even come close to the 1% crowd. They only make enough to shine the shoes and wipe the ass of the 1% crowd. Puppets, mere puppets. That is why this entire forum is divided along partisan lines. They just don't get it, hardly a one of them.

Do you think the 1% are divided along partisan lines? There are no left or right politics among the elites. Just us and them. Those who understand they can't let the people know what is going on, and those who are sympathetic to the masses. That is all.

It would be like Kings having partisan politics, how absurd would that be? The elites created partisan politics to have the proletariat keep the eyes off the real rulers.

The Romans, who first tried Republican rule, had several technique for this. The first was Divide et Impera (Divide & Conquer), keep the different interests or sections you need to rule fighting and quarreling eachother. Our system does this beautifully. Better than in Europe. Another is panem et circenses, "bread and circuses," food stamps, NFL and American Idol anyone?

The One percent ARE the ones who are in charge. And you don't even get a vote.

That is the point here. It isn't about money, it is about power.

Do you want you and yours to go to war in Ukraine or Syria? Well, too bad, it doesn't matter, it is up to them. And with their total domination of the press, if they decide they want to, they'll make you want to with their total mind control anyhow. And if they don't, well, their control of the media will then make you against it.

Nancy Pelosi and her husband are worth millions..
The 50 Richest Members of Congress — 112th : Roll Call
The Majority of Congress Are Millionaires - TIME
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...Nld3cGttc0hVc09NRDRoaDdab0E&usp=sharing#gid=1

If one is a millionaire, they are wealthy..
That may not get them in the official list of the top one percent, but the perception of the envious entitled class warfare crowd, they are. And if the court of public perception has made a ruling, that is THAT.
To all of that I say So frggin what? It's THEIR money.
What I don't accept is when a wealthy person, fans the flames of class envy pretending to be an 'outsider' in the wealth community.
Bullshit.

So this is what it has come to huh? We are talking past each other? We can't have a conversation if we can't agree on the terms. The title of the thread is about the "One Percent."

I thought we were talking about the ruling elite. What you are doing is called moving the goal posts. It is a fallacy. If I make 100k a year, and you make ten million a year, to the person that makes 10k a year, we're both fabulous wealthy, aren't we? So they might want to pass a law the equally affects us both. But would that be fair to us just because this poor person is to ignorant to see the difference between us?

But are we anywhere, ANYWHERE at all in the same ballpark? Are we even playing the same game?

Absolutely not. That is what we are talking about here. You have clearly not studied these things and have no idea what you are talking about. An individual person in the One percent makes more money than all of the members of congress COMBINED. What do they care how much Nancy Pelosi and her husband are worth? Compared to the One percent? They are trailer trash.

 

[RandomVariable]

[

The simple answer is those in the class envy crowd have been told by their leaders that being wealthy is a "closed club". That wealthy people have two jobs. One is ( joe b this is for you) 'hoarding' their money. Two keeping others from becoming 'well off'...
Such stuff is of the mind of a petulant child.

Its the fucking reality.

Hey, Remember the 1990's when we had 3% unemployment and the worst thing we had to worry about was that the President was getting a blow job?

Well, funny thing happened. The wealthy actually had to share. They actually had to pay kids above minimum wage to flip burgers. They actually had to take a shot on someone they had to train because the qualified person had already sent a resume to someone who'd pay better.

Man, they couldn't put an end to that shit fast enough. First they stole an election, and two recessions later, we totally fixed that shit.

Here's the thing. Make the rich pay their fair share and make them pay the people who do the real work fairly.

If they are still rich after that, they can have all the Dressage Horses they can eat.

If some rich kid had to wait in line behind some dot com millionaire for his shiny new red Ferrari he made Kermit the frog look drab. (Save Big Bird! )

 

[Spiderman]

You speak as if income is static.

Anyone can raise their income anytime they want so anyone can increase their mobility.

Income of a population can be static even if people can go up or down the socioeconomic ladder.

For example, the median income of an uneducated white male has fallen after inflation over the past 40 years. That doesn't mean that one specific uneducated white male in 1968 makes less today than he did 46 years ago. What it means is if you took all the incomes of all the uneducated white males in 1968 and compared the median to the median income of all the uneducated white males in 2014 adjusted for inflation, it would be lower today than it was two generations ago.

To understand how everyone is progressing, we look at populations, not individuals.

Looking at the stats of a population is more a measure of what people won't do than what they can do.

Just because people don't move up in income does not mean they can't it more likely means they won't because they don't want to.

 

[MisterBeale]

You speak as if income is static.

Anyone can raise their income anytime they want so anyone can increase their mobility.

Income of a population can be static even if people can go up or down the socioeconomic ladder.

For example, the median income of an uneducated white male has fallen after inflation over the past 40 years. That doesn't mean that one specific uneducated white male in 1968 makes less today than he did 46 years ago. What it means is if you took all the incomes of all the uneducated white males in 1968 and compared the median to the median income of all the uneducated white males in 2014 adjusted for inflation, it would be lower today than it was two generations ago.

To understand how everyone is progressing, we look at populations, not individuals.

Looking at the stats of a population is more a measure of what people won't do than what they can do.

Just because people don't move up in income does not mean they can't it more likely means they won't because they don't want to.

Agreed. It's because THEY DON'T WANT TO. Why don't they want to?

Social engineering.

It's like you haven't even been participating in this thread. At all. NOT AT ALL. Pay attention.

If you think you can't make it, you can't. If you think your job is to work at McDonalds or to pump gas, if you think it is the government job to take care of you, then that is what will become of you. Thank the elites.

I reiterate. The one percent isn't in it for the money. It is in it for the power.

I'll not argue with you that this isn't the truth, but it has become the truth for the majority of Americans. Look who is president. Look at where they choose to get their news. Do you honestly think Fox news or Clear Channel is any better? They perpetuate the myth of class warfare. Most people think that Food Stamps and Housing Subsidies help the poor more than the retailers and the slum lords that benefit from these government handouts.

Divide and Conquer work for the elites, so they use it. One of the topics that both the tea party and Occupy should BOTH agree on, is that the One percent have grown complacent. Instead of investing in America, they are now sitting on what they have been given.

It isn't even so much about the One percent any more either at this point. It is about the protection of power and wealth, the protection of entrenched power. When entrenched power uses government handouts to the poor to enrich themselves and make themselves more powerful, I think we can all agree, we have lost our way as a nation.