General Discussion

..... and well written post, I'd hardly call it a rant because I don't think there is much in the way of exaggeration in your words.

Things are bad, and sometimes I think a lot of Americans have taken to "whistling past the graveyard" lest it happen to them also.

I have been preparing for a possible serious breakdown in what we consider to be our inviolable right, normality, with food on the shelves, gas at the station and water from the tap, for many years. I do not talk to many friends/acquaintances about it because in the real world, just like on DU, most people believe everything will just limp along for a while and then improve.

I'm not so sure.

What is SUPPOSED to happen in America when thing go off the rails? Well, we are supposed to vote in better leaders who will right the ship. But IMHO that is no longer working for various reasons. We voted for the "progressive" president but he really isn't. We have a serious and pervasive system of gerrymandering (I thought that was illegal , "illegal", another quaint term) that gives one party an near impossible to shake chunk of the House. We have "voting rights" laws springing up everywhere whose sole purpose is to prevent the wrong people from having a vote at all. We have pervasive "surveillance" (possibly the most pernicious abuse of govt power possible) and police trained to ignore quaint notions like the Constitution when it comes to things like protests or civil disobedience of any kind.

IOW, the usual remedies for our situation have been systematically dismantled. Not by accident. So since where we are is no accident, one can reasonably assume that the train we are on has not yet reached its destination, and it is unlikely that it is going to reverse course on its own.

Is there any possible way to turn it around? There are signs that people are finally, in the wake of its abject failure to deliver, giving up on "trickle down"/deregulation, etc. But this is a very slow process with maybe only a few percent of the population catching on. Will enough catch on in time for the damage to be rolled back? I really don't know.

I wish I could offer a more optimistic assessment but it is what it is. You did not ask for advice and I hope you will not be offended if I offer some. Yes, your generation got a raw deal. It's not fair but to be fair there is a lot of unfairness going around right now, not all directed at your generation. Folks younger than you are getting screwed and so are many older boomers.

All that said all you can do is keep your head. Try to understand what is really happening and where we really are and what opportunities (there are always opportunities of some kind) are available and realistic for you to pursue.

If you do all that one could reasonably do, at least if things do not turn out as well as you'd hoped you will not have to blame yourself.