Page 1 of Joel Hirschhorn's writing

1. Economic Revolution Believing in the classic American Dream that hard work will deliver prosperity is like believing that buying super lottery tickets is a smart way to become wealthy. Both are delusional beliefs because both are bets on incredible long shots that... (posted by Joel 49 days 8 hours ago.)

2. Losing Constitutional Competition Among Americans there remains strong pride about the US Constitution, even though there is widespread support for creating reform amendments to it. Globally, however, what should surprise Americans is a significant loss of respect for it. Other... (posted by Joel 85 days 4 hours ago.)

3. Romney, Severely Awful There are many, many reasons to have low regard for Mitt Romney. All but the totally delusional correctly see him as disingenuous, dishonest, devious and devoid of an authentic set of core beliefs. He is a shill for corporate and rich elites. He... (posted by Joel 98 days 2 hours ago.)

4. Cruise Ship Vacation Wisdom I have taken a number of cruise ship vacations. The last one was about a year and half ago. I learned a lot about cruise ships and what factors should go into decisions about selecting a specific cruise ship that I want to share with you. By now... (posted by Joel 114 days 2 hours ago.)

5. No Matter Who Wins, Americans Lose Why am I so sick of all the media attention to the Republican presidential primaries and all the blabbering about President Obama’s advantages and disadvantages for the coming election? I just cannot get excited. My answer may also be yours:... (posted by Joel 114 days 2 hours ago.)

6. Don't Mute Newt The trick to maintaining the US delusional democracy is feeding the illusion for citizens that voting and elections really matter. But when both major parties are owned by rich and corporate elites it matters less than most people think whether... (posted by Joel 158 days 4 hours ago.)

7. Occupy Movement: Next Step Convergence There is a growing convergence of thinking about where the US Occupy movement should go as a next step to turning its values, concerns and commitments into changing what most Americans see as broken government under control of corporate interests.... (posted by Joel 179 days 4 hours ago.)

8. Occupy Revolution History tells us that it is nearly impossible to know in real time whether some kind of national, grassroots public protest ends up being the beginning of a true revolution against a ruling government system. This is true for the earliest... (posted by Joel 187 days ago.)

9. Jobless and Clueless When Americans who are the most victimized by our cruel economy still believe in something that is demonstrably no longer true, they are deeply delusional. They desperately want to believe in something once great about American society. The... (posted by Joel 202 days 5 hours ago.)

10. Numbers Support the Occupy Movement Feeling angry about being betrayed by a corrupt government owned by rich and corporate elites has driven the Occupy Wall Street movement. Emphasizing how the top one percent has prospered incredibly while the bottom 99 percent have been screwed... (posted by Joel 213 days 9 hours ago.)

11. Occupy Wall Street Visited Last Saturday while in New York City I went downtown to visit the Occupy Wall Street group and also ended up walking in their protest march around big bank buildings. A terrific experience with a huge group chanting things like “Banks got... (posted by Joel 221 days ago.)

12. Slash Top Federal Salaries Are you ready for another insane aspect of American society? Read this and get angry. People on the right want smaller government. People on the left bemoan high unemployment, economic inequality and the huge amounts of money made by corporate... (posted by Joel 234 days 4 hours ago.)

13. Class War Stupidity Much is being said by Republicans about a class war being waged by President Obama and Democrats. In their fantasy world this class war is attacking so called job creators. All this talk is pure nonsense, absolutely false and misleading... (posted by Joel 241 days 10 hours ago.)

14. Two Paths to Reform: Violence or Convention By every one of countless measures the US is in a death spiral. Its political system, government and economy are hopelessly broken. No wonder that the vast majority of Americans express severe dissatisfaction with Congress, both major parties, and... (posted by Joel 260 days 1 hour ago.)

15. No Chicken at Ruby Tuesday Now I have witnessed the true decline of American society. My wife and I worked hard to find a time when our very good friend Leo could schedule a night when we could take him out to celebrate his birthday. Finally, the day was found and we asked... (posted by Joel 268 days 1 hour ago.)

16. Brain Dead Obama Everyone who voted for Obama should feel betrayed, ashamed and disgusted. Anyone who still trusts, admires and respects Obama is a fool. Here is my political fantasy: I wake up one day soon and hear the news that President Obama has a fatal brain... (posted by Joel 287 days 11 hours ago.)

17. Semantic Propaganda Feeds Stupidity We would already have had a much needed American revolution in response to the tyranny of the money-fed two-party plutocracy that is destroying the middle class except for one big problem: so much of the American population is just plain stupid.... (posted by Joel 308 days 11 hours ago.)

18. Good and Bad Capitalism With a kind of religious fervor, American conservatives love to talk about their love of capitalism, as if it has a singular definition and can always be counted on to serve public and national interests.  The intelligent way to think about... (posted by Joel 342 days 6 hours ago.)

19. Lie To Me What is the main lesson from the recent fiascos of former Senator John Edwards and Representative Anthony Weiner? If you follow the news shows you saw a number of video clips where each of them had lied many times about what eventually they... (posted by Joel 347 days 11 hours ago.)

20. Pick Your Poison One of the hardest truths to accept is that for most sources of pain hitting humans there seems to be nothing effective for government to do. Nowadays, those of us who do not gobble various distractions but work to stay connected to reality see... (posted by Joel 354 days 9 hours ago.)

21. Thank You Cornel West The outspoken scholar and Princeton University professor Cornel West has been viciously attacked by many on the political left, especially supporters of President Obama. Why? Because he had the courage to call Obama a “black mascot of Wall... (posted by Joel 1 year 3 days ago.)

22. Inflation Hits Money and Lies How do the powerful keep the US population dumb and distracted? A key tactic has been using methodologies that produce totally misleading underestimates of key economic factors. First we learned that official unemployment figures are too low by a... (posted by Joel 1 year 39 days ago.)

23. Fight Economic Oppression, Target the Top One Percent Massive economic inequality is killing America and we the people. It has already killed American democracy. The rich have captured the political system so they could manipulate the economy and benefit unfairly. Economic freedom and opportunity are... (posted by Joel 1 year 45 days ago.)

24. Despicable Lies, Delusional Recovery The US government lies. Sure looks like most Americans gobble up false and misleading information that is nothing less than political propaganda. Take the highly hyped unemployment number for March, 2011 of 8.8 percent that moved like a tornado... (posted by Joel 1 year 50 days ago.)

25. Explaining Obama Hate I can explain why so many Americans are angry about President Obama and dislike or hate him with passion, and why it has little to do with his actions and policies. But first I must examine the confluence of two historical inflection points that... (posted by Joel 1 year 78 days ago.)