What about an American day? Detroit has always held ethnic festivals for many cultures and respect for all cultures.

Why is it a group can exclude everyone else to a state fair? How can anyone distinquish a group of who belongs?

How much does the electricity cost at the fair to run the fair for 15,000 chosen people for the day verses the amount of ticket sales?

How about if everyone attends that day with american flags on their shirts?

How about a shirt with the name Rachael Corrie?

We are a nation of many cultures, and no culture has the right to exclude the rest of a state sponsored fair....especially in the name of another country.

Someone is appearing to want to piss off the large arab population in the Detroit area, but the backlash is pissing off everyone (the american people) else too.

Tyrants become obvious only when looking back, after what they have done becomes known. The German people did not stand up to Hitler because their media betrayed them, just as the American media is betraying the American people by willingly, voluntarily, even proudly, abandoning its traditional role as watchdog against government abuse.

"I wondered how the German people could have been so stupid....."

I wondered that too Mike until I watched the media sell all the lies. I was dumb-founded when I spoke about the obvious to friends and family after nine-eleven. They looked at me as though I had lost it, as if I had just told them I had just seen Elvis and we had gone on a date to the moon in his spacecraft! I am considered the hippie-trippy-dumb-blonde type of the family, so I am thinking if "I" get it, why aren't they?....what is going on? I'm living in bizarro world. Anyhow, thanks for your writing, it keeps me sane. I sometimes feel I have found a soul-mate when I read your stuff. Do you think Claire would mind? :) I look forward to your show today!

The only way we're going to see gas prices get any relief is for (A) a Steinway grand piano to fall from a thirteenth floor , and flatten O bama . (B) Hillary wins after the October (*piano crash) Surprise (C) She makes good on her promise to break up The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries .

THAT is not as far fetched as sending in the incumbent who suffers 84% deficit approval rating from his own countrymen to negotiate .

Obviously the Saudis know when someone is pissing in their backyard , while they're being told it's raining .

And maybe then he might get his old job at the Pentagon back again

An FDR , he's not . A Shakespeare , he's not . A Churchill , he's not . A Sigmund Freud , he's not . A Rembrandt he's not . A Mozart , he's not A JFK , he's not . A report reader , he most certainly , is not A Lover Of This Country , he's not . A fairly elected President , he is not

In the scheme of great men , he has no place . His place is beside Cheney . Another one who doesn't measure up to the great men of history .

Great article, Mike. The similarities are obvious.

But there are two things that make the US situation vastly different from that of the 1930s Germany: Hitler, unlike Bush, actually made his country’s economy thrive and 30s Germany, unlike 21st century USA, did not have the internet. The crappy state of the US economy and the ease with which people can obtain information without having to rely on the mainstream media make the apathy of the American people all the more shameful.

Here’s to hoping that, one day soon, the collective alarm clock will go off and the American people wake up to the harsh reality.

I have got to start sending out more e-mails to keep in touch with people. It's amazing in an era of amazing communications technology people are as far apart as ever. The main reason for this, I believe, is the type of "information" that people get. If people rely on mainstream media, like tv and newspapers, for their "information, they will undoubtedly believe just about everything the government dictates. However, people that have just a little more intelligent curiosity more-than-likely get their information from sources that have proven reliable in giving out provably correct and true information and not just selective parts of a story and not the whole story so as to prejudice people against someone or something.

Americans are in denial or are just plain stupid when it comes to realizing that any nation with any type of mass communications facilities will propagandize the people into believing and feeling certain ways. The "information" that Americans get is pure propaganda, designed to keep people in constant fear so that they will less likely use their minds critically. Fear is like a sort of hypnosis, better known as hysteria, whereby a person under fear is easier to manipulate than a person who keeps his critical composure and is able to sort out the actual facts about things.

We have a justice system that Americans are constantly calling in delusional arrogance the best in the world. I am not so sure. There are more people percapita in American jails than any other nation. And a large portion of these prisoners are victims of politically-based laws in a power hungry nation. In other words, if a candidate comes out and says "I will legalize marijuana and release all marijuana-related prisoners if he is elected, he won't get elected. The religious and family-based groups in this nation are nothing more than tools for some politician.

A nation with archaic and phony laws can NOT have the best justice system in the world.

It is so hard to speak out today about current issues that people have been lied to about. There is a knee-jerk reaction when anyone says anything about "politics". One thing that is frustrating to me is that certain members of my family and other people that I know mis-judge me big-time by thinking that I always talk about "politics". I never discuss politics- only current events. And I always have the facts to back up what I am saying. It just isn't someone else's borrowed opinion.

In closing, I would just like to hope and pray that people start talking to each other about what is going on right now and discard anything someone else says as "politically motivated". You know what? The people that throw out that accusation are actually the ones "politically motivated", unable to have a real discourse because they either DON'T know the real facts, or they do know the facts but are that shitty of human beings that they would shut out what someone else was sincerely trying to relate to them.

Let me know what you think.

Take care