Violent revolution

"I wonder what those multinationals privatizing water, plus Banks and NG Os forcing nations into debt are doing then... "

Source? In any case, I'd venture that in the case of the water, the local governments are perfectly capable of seizing their own water supplies from a company. The only thing to stop them would be more powerful governments backing the corporation, making it a case of one country dominating another, not corporations dominating a country.

"Ghetto people and/or immigrants a la the Rodney King Uprising, or the French uprisings in 2006 by descendants of Algerian immigrants..."

You don't seem to be quite clear on the difference between "a revolution that changes a society" and "a bunch of worthless punks setting some cars on fire before the local police run them off."

"Nice joke assuming all "revolutionaries" are rich punk white kids from suburbs, esp. given the recent to middle past (e.g. Black P Anthers) Not to mention the rightists in the USA who have been rearming and forming militia movements since the election of Barack Obama, and I'm sure they have more will, training, and werewithal given some of them are former military-esque people and survivalists."

Insignificantly small violent fringe groups =/= popular revolutionary movement. People with guns and survivalists =/= "militias." And in the case of those militias, source?

"Given large sections of such "Revolutionaries" end up remembering how both are in bed with each other....its not much of a difference."

If by "in bed together" you mean "already for all practical intents and purposes the statist circle-jerk most revolutionaries claim to be seeking," then yeah. The government certainly does hold the whip.

"IF the revolutionaries are reactionary conservatives who stage a revolt, the military would be more likely to line up behind them - as the US military has such a bias given where a lot of its' installations and personnel base comes from..... "

Have you ever even seen an American military uniform? Been inside America? Hell, have you even visited Earth, or are you just going off the Martian broadcast analyses?

Let's not strawman, Wanderhome. People are allowed to have varying opinions.

Various points and responses...

• Yes, it is traditionally the educated children of the middle to upper class who start organized revolutions. In our society, most of these are on Facebook. In short, there's nowhere near the level of anger needed to foment anything major. We've got conservatives pit against liberals and occasionally someone shoots up a school or a politician's focus group (no disrespect intended to Ms. Giffords), but the end result of this is gridlock, not revolt.

• Lower-class riots and revolts, unless organized and abetted by more powerful groups, are unfocused and difficult to direct. They are also easily quelled. Even if they overwhelm local law enforcement, you just have to seal off the affected area and let them all starve into submission.

• The U.S. military is a tool of the Federal government, more so than perhaps any other power except some European nations, who got the idea from us. It is also massively bureaucratic at the upper levels. There is less chance than all the pigs in the world suddenly sprouting wings that the military would revolt en masse.
  • About the only scenario that could possibly cause an actual military revolt would be being ordered to fire upon our own citizens without good reason.

• The rot in this country is coming not from bad government per se. That's just a symptom. The real problem is a gradual decay of the American drive to succeed, replaced by a sense of entitlement and privilege - in short, laziness. It's far more likely that we simply gradually lose our pride of place as a major power and sink into debt and economic stagnation. A revolution wouldn't fix that - heck, everyone who could revolt is too busy playing FarmVille and World of Warcraft  ^*
  ^{For the record, while I play both games, I am productively employed and raising a family, although I am also typing this at work. Make of that what you will.}
  We're trending more towards Idiocracy than revolution.

A Malthusian catastrophe is possible but would require a rather contrived set of circumstances to come about. National bankruptcy is rather more likely but the rest of the world would have to bail us out because of the risk of global economic collapse.

Here's my Doomsday scenario. The Federal government remains in a state of relative gridlock, unable to enact any major reform while the national debt slowly piles up. The economy continues to stagnate because we have no true manufacturing base to fall back on; our corporations are busy setting up shop overseas because that's where the growth is. For lack of growth, various schemes of borrowing from the future begin to collapse, starting at the state and local government level. More federal bailouts means more borrowing, but rates begin to rise. The continued unemployment rate eats at the housing market, keeping the credit markets frozen, which tip over the line into a new crisis as one or more major institutions runs out of red ink.

We then drop into Phase Two of the Great Recession, but this time there's no political will to spend our way out of it. The conservative movement, catapulted into power by the failure of programs they sabotaged, tries to cut education and social services, but this dumps whole swathes of people from "just barely hanging on" to abject poverty, further damaging the credit markets as they default on their debts. Nobody's hiring because nobody has money to buy anything. U.S. debt gets downgraded in the world market, causing a snowball effect in the still weak European economies.

By the time unemployment reaches 25%, there will be throngs of homeless, desperate folk in all the major cities. With their social programs gutted and deep in red ink, states won't be able to keep up. Medical services, bereft of federal support, can't keep up with the demand so disease will run rampant. People will start to abandon cities in droves. Riots will begin, which the military will be recalled to quell. I don't want to predict what will happen after this. I'd guess that a new secession movement will start, with Red vs. Blue states as the focal point.

edited 24th Jan '11 1:09:06 PM by Fighteer

The US Military is forbidden from quelling an insurrection or rebellion unless it is the type that would threaten a civil war. That's the National Guard that would be the ones firing on them. Even they are unlikely to follow through with firing into an unprovoking rabble via illegal orders.

Imagine starting a revolution in America and having all those now vetted soldiers coming home and believing home is threatened. yeah would not go well for the revolution.

Depends on which side the vets think is threatening their home. If random insurrectionists are bombing random houses, duh. If federal jackbooted death squads are gutting people in their sleep, also duh. And lots of gray between the duh.

Revolutionaries only know how to start revolutions and tend to be emotionally charged. They don't make good leaders. Its why Castro got rid of Che and why the Russians cleanse the former leadership after a revolution.

A good and successful revolution doesn't purge the revolutionaries for good (or powerful) leaders, it's started by and/or has the support of good leaders. Ho Chi Minh in 1954 was one such leader. George Washington in 1775 was another.

edited 24th Jan '11 2:07:48 PM by MajorTom

Before you start a revolution, you need something solid to replace the system with.

@Tom: the point being revolutionaries tend to be removed from the system fairly often.

Ho Chi Minh was a whole other issue.

And the counterpoint I made being is those kinds of revolutions don't go very far or end well.

Basically I'm pointing out Sturgeon's Law of Revolutions and Revolutionaries. The good ones are very few in number, the horrible ones prone to purges and such things are very numerous in number.

edited 24th Jan '11 2:19:06 PM by MajorTom

Weren't most of the successful ones made against an occupying power, more or less, when a government was already in place?

I haven't seen a good success rate for civil revolutions (I don't know if there is a term for revolution against yourself as compared to a revolution against an occupying force).

@Tom: I think we are both agreeing, however, and didn't realize it. At least I didn't.

Revolutions don't arise where there is no government.

^ I think we're both on the same page on that one.

edited 24th Jan '11 2:23:41 PM by MajorTom

As I mentioned, you need a system to replace it with. And hell, even then that system has to work. Thats what made the American Revolution so remarkable; they threw out one system and established another. Though the American Colonies more or less governed themselves before the revolution anyway to the best of my knowledge; it was Britains attempt to exercise more direct control (specifically, financial) that caused the revolution.

Lenin had a system to replace the system he was overthrowing... look how that turned out. They swapped one dictator for another.

Except Lenin died before he could complete it and Stalin took over. Now, Stalin did industrialize the Soviet Union but he also nearly destroyed it.

Whats ironic, at least to my cousin who frequently goes to Russia now, is that revisionism has painted Stalin as a hero for Russia rather than the murderer he was and that Poland (why Poland?) is being blamed for World War II's beginning.

I figure if you can do what Stalin did in a country and have that country still love you, or people try to make you loved, you've done something right.

EDIT: Sigh... I'm tired. Next time I'll think through my post.

edited 24th Jan '11 2:41:35 PM by GameChainsaw

Wanderhome wrote: ''the "revolutionaries" ... were young, mildly affluent children of the middle class ...

The single largest corporation in the world is Wal-Mart, that sinister supermarket chain, and it's worth $408 billion. The current proposed Federal budget for 2011 is $3.83 trillion dollars. That means that it would take about ten Wal-Marts to equal the federal government of the United States in spending power, never mind the state governments and the power of law enforcement and the military.''

Yes, the middle class always starts the revolutions. The lower class doesn't have the time or money, while the upper class has too much to lose. And oddly enough, the middle class in America is shrinking.

Yes, the federal budget is huge. Take out the mandatory spending, though—military, entitlements, health care—and you're left with a much smaller pile. Then realize that any major project has to be studied, discussed, planned, and budgeted in committees and again in both houses of Congress. And if a major contributor is against something, it doesn't happen.

Wal-Mart is only one company, but they managed to get the inheritance tax (excuse me, "death tax") changed almost single-handedly. The oil companies got the government to invade Iraq. The insurance companies got the government to give them mandatory health coverage. The banks got the government to pay for their losses while they kept the profits. They've already overthrown the government. That's how revolutions happen these days, with briefcases instead of guns.

Wal-mart killed Kennedy so they could take over the Moon to create the largest Wal-Mart mankind has ever seen. Its only available to the secret Illuminati elite of course.

Why? Why do you hate corporations so much? They aren't evil. All Wal-Mart wants is to make more money, by building more stores, selling more things, and raising prices. That's not that evil, all right? Corporations don't run the government. I'm sick to death of this belief. And the belief that "Revolutions happen with briefcases now, not guns" is equally annoying. What's your problem with briefcases? Besides, you're living in the past. Say they happen with Blackberries, or iPhones, and I might be prepared to hear you out. Briefcases? That's so...cliched.

Not to mention so 1985 Yuppie.

Yet there's no denying money talks, and wealthy interest groups have great influence over politics.

Money talks in a capitalistic government, yes, but it isn't part of a conspiracy. We know that its happening, we just don't do anything about it because of voter apathy. At least that is why I don't since I live in California where it honestly feels that we would elect a watermelon if it was a democrat.

ALL THAT SAID, the government is considerably less corrupt than it was in the 1800s when we, you know, sold our navy oil and had to be bailed out by private business.

edited 24th Jan '11 3:42:45 PM by saladofstones

Ballot boxes have bigger. Case in point the 2010 Congressional election. The AARP and several companies relating to them basically helped pay the Congress to pass Obamacare with an unconstitutional insurance mandate. The 2010 election was the single biggest bloodbath and shift in seats since 1938 and money didn't help the defenders of Obamacare.

Hey, that watermelon has a better success/failure record than your new governor.

...Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Edit: And Tom, we were having a civil discussion. This has nothing to do with your opinion of Obama or health-care reform.

edited 24th Jan '11 3:50:33 PM by Ultrayellow

As much as a derail into the chances a watermelon would have would be amusing, let's not.

Back to the issue, the watermelon joke does kind of show the issues with the current system.

But I do find it laughable to think that, as bad as things are here, they are worse in a lot of countries so cries of "REVOLUCION" seem rather excessive.

Belgium doesn't have a government (technically we do but it still hasn't been meeting, if we did I'd say, because of parliament, we would have a majority being extreme rightist and anti-foreigner but that's a non-issue since they never meet to discuss issues) + its extremely corrupt + crime is pretty rampant. Everything that should cause a revolution, in my eyes, but nothing happens. I did vote for the radical Flemish party since I'm Flemish and was hoping something would come out of it, but nothing changed. Damn my idealism. :V

Lately its become an issue of people stealing tombstones to put in their homes as decorations. What the fuck is wrong with you Belgium.

edited 24th Jan '11 3:52:54 PM by saladofstones