A well-known street mantra of community organizing warns that" if you don't stand for something, you will fall for anything." Demonstrations by the disaffected working and middle class are sprouting like mushrooms in all American cities. Students seem to make up the bulk of the movement. As in all popular protests, students have the most to lose - their future.

The Take-Back Movement has an unclear agenda and unless they come up with a focused target they will, just like the Tea Party Movement fade into obscurity, irrelevance and ridicule. Such a waste of a really good movement.

Two per cent of Americans are considered wealthy and pay less taxes than the remaining ninety eight per cent of us. That is very unfair. Of course I am neither American, nor wealthy, but I do pay taxes and I resent being in a higher tax bracket than millionaires.

Money affects our daily lives. Mix a little politics with money and you can have unlimited power. That's a recipe for social unrest. No pitchfork wielding peasants advancing on the White House or Congress of course, but a national sentiment of exploitation.

The US House and Senate are controlled by big corporate donors and lobby groups. The Koch brothers who own America's largest private corporation understand this. If environmental, labour and tax laws affect your bottom line, just find the politician who controls these regulations and pay them off through anonymous corporate donations.

Corporate influence in politics is a sensitive subject, as both parties accept huge amounts of money to influence campaigns and legislation. Politicians from both parties are loathe to bring up the source of their money. Campaign donations are a sacred cow to both parties and are rarely mentioned in election debates.

To quote a Texas politician "don't ever mention rope in a family that's had a hanging". If you want to be elected, don't mention where your campaign funding comes from.

The United States has now pulled out from Iraq, which was a great move, considering we didn't belong there in the first place. Iraq is now free to descend into their ethnic and tribal feudalistic society with Iran picking up the pieces. Sunni, Shiite and Kurds will all start vying for power, until of course a Saddam Hussein replacement takes over.

No one likes a dictator, but they do tend to keep stability and order in a country. Promoting western style democracy in a region where that political system is totally foreign to them is not a good idea. Removing Monarchy, Mullahs, Despots and Dictators leads to endless civil war, which isn't in the west's interests.

As this year draws to a close governments in Egypt, Libya and Iraq have all been 'taken back' with Syrian president Bashar al-Assad hanging on by his bloodied fingertips. President Obama should have an easy re-election thanks to the motley crew of Republican candidates.

I won't be sad to see 2011 fade into history. Hopefully the New Year will bring us more sanity and peace in the World.

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