All Comments on 'God Bless Middleclass Americans'

sad but very realistic.

about our depressing reality. (Aye, over here too, except we do have the National Health Service, so no healthcare bills. Just forty years of taxes paid.) Thank you.

I've gotta say that I'd be happy to pay taxes for health care. Currently, even after employer's contribution, am paying @ $30/wk. I doubt that the portion of your taxes devoted towards the healthcare are that high. Remember who put us here - REBUBLICANS. Bush's unfunded wars, Bush's tax cuts that benifited the wealthiest 1% of the taxpayers. Republicans who's filibuster prevented the extension of unemployement benifits, the expansion of the small business loan program (designed to give loans to businesses owned by the middle class), and the gutting of the new health care insurance bill. Obama isn't perfect, but he and the rest of the democratic party are better than the available alternatives. Vote Democrat!

You have put out there on a site that God only knows ,houses perverts and people who don't want to think about the mess our country is in. Well written it sounds like you know someone like Kathy and her husband. Alot of tragedy in one small lifetime. Bravo!

I voted for kerry in 2004 and Gore in 200. But Pete REALLY believes that if we Just elected all democrats all the time everything would be Much better.

what is the difference betwen Pete and Rush Limbaugh who holds the EXACT same views as Pete does?... expept that Rush REALLY thinks electing ONLY conservatives would make everything better.

Idiots like Pete forget we had an election in 2008. Obama won in a landslide and so did the dmes in the House and Senate. The GOP holds NO power of ANY Kind.

the GOP does not have eneough seats to stop ANY legislation in the House and Barely -- by 1 seat -- in the senate to SOMETIMES stop legislation. The reason WHY health care reform almost died 3 times was beause of Democrats. The GOP could not stop it if they tried.

we GOT here b/c republicans AND Democrats expanded the CRA act to make home loans open to people who had a history of NOT pauying their bills. Then these mortages were traded as fraud by Goldman sachs-- aka Govt sachs.

The health care was 2700 pages and without ANY republican input whatsoever. Its a fucking diasster b/c all true progerssive know that it has NO cost containment at all. Lobbyists for Drug companies and HMOs wrote this bill which is why it is 2700 pages.

how fucked up do you have to be to think elelcting all dems or all GOP will make things better?

I said that voting democrat is better than the alternative. My preference would be to the left of the current administration, certianly not the corporitists that make up the majority of the current administration. That said, the current administration is better than any of the viable alternatives. And a far cry better than another hell of republican administration.

Pete is from Chicago. Who else is from there? Let me think? Oh right. Obama. One good thing about living in Chicago, the electorate doesn't have to bother voting, the corrupt political machine does it for you.

As for the story? I think it's a cop-out to commit suicide because things get tough. They aren't alone in suffering.

Very sad, very touching and hopelessly UNREALISTIC! I can't even begin to go into all the absurd things in this story. You base all their economic sadness on "not knowing how to work the system." As if getting the help that's available is only for the low life low class whose full time job is "working the system!" If they knew enough to refinance, they knew how to get help. If they knew enough to apply for college loans -hell even get through the college application process- they knew where and how to get help.

Could have been such a nice story if you hadn't talked about things you clearly know nothing about. You want to write about people like John and Kathy, you ought to meet them in person before you guess the why's and what fors of loosing everything.

Everyone's hurting right now, I won't deny that. But for every single "down on my luck" tale, there is some kind of help out there. Might not be what you want, might not be something you can live with, but there is good help out there for those who will take it.

To say this couple represents middle class America is a god damn insult to us middle class Americans! You have just cut the knees off of that which makes this country great!

As a Canadian I don't feel qualified to comment on the plight of middleclass America. My only criticism is that you might be leaving some of the non American readers behind with your extended references to various agencies. I know I was forewarned by the title ;-) so this is not a serious criticism.

Luckily, for me the question is what do you do when everything goes wrong. For the couple in the story it was suicide. I don't think it matters if they did have options, they may have felt they did not. I have had two friends commit suicide. Eventhough they had a lot of friends and a lot going for them, they could not see it, and killed themselves.

If you wanted a less sad story one option would be for them to plan suicide and then decide life is worth living after all once they share their love.

I am so glad you did not turn Kathy into a mature hooker/exotic dancer for wierdos with fetishes just so they could make ends meet.

first thing, you said after they lost their home The US started another war. The housing market fell apart, and all the bailout bullshit (Thanks Obama for that waste of Taxpayer money) happened after the wars in Iraq and Afganistan were already started.

Second thing, the whole suicide on the fourth of july just seems like something you threw in so you could post this in the summer loving contest.

Who gives a flying fuck about your political opinions? I thought it was a well-written piece, that deserved the Five Stars I gave it. The ending was really appropriate, the end of the American Dream and double suicide on the Fourth of July. I love a happy ending!!!

Sometimes it takes going from bad to worse before people notice.

But the Ds didn't promise worse. The promised better.

I'm still waiting.

And I'm a 'Nam Vet. FWIW.

...then the very LEAST you could do is have the chutzpah to tell the truth!

The only thing this author got right was in his statement that this couple did not know how to "game the system". Most of us hard-working Americans don't know how to scam the government into giving us all sorts of welfare and assistance so that we can sit back and vacation for 52 weeks a year.

Vacation? Yes! In many states, when you go on Public Assistance, you get a Debit Card tied to a new bank account - even if you already have your own checking account somewhere. Your welfare "check" is deposited to the new account, and the funds are accessible via the debit card. You file your regular "paperwork" online, not by going to the Welfare office - at least, once you've qualified for the assistance.

Some states are now doing that with Unemployment funds, and I live in one of those states. My neighbor works in a state-government agency that does "fraud prevention" in conjunction with both unemployment and welfare. He tells me that they have this cool piece of software that can track where and when these debit cards are used. He tells me how totally astonished he was, to see people's debit cards showing six or more weeks in a row of transactions - occurring in Florida, not in the home state.

So, there are a whole lot of folks treating this as "fun-employment", and enjoying lengthy vacations at taxpayer expense. Let's face it - if your house is in New Jersey, you can't very well be looking for work (one of the conditions of getting unemployment) if you're spending six weeks in the Orlando or Miami area of Florida!

As for funding unemployment, all the Republicans wanted was two things. First, they wanted the Democrats to agree to some concrete plan to PAY for the additional 26 billion dollars they were planning on giving away. We give hundreds of billions of dollars away, every year, to poor nations all over the world, in the form of "Foreign Aid". What would be so wrong with shrinking our foreign Aid budget, and using some of that money here at home as "Domestic Aid"? Absolutely nothing, really. It's just that the Democrats couldn't see the logic in it.

The other problem was state budgets. Historically, not one of the 50 states has ever been able to engage in "deficit spending" - spending money in this year, that won't be collected in taxes until two years from now. A few states, however, refused to trim their budgets down to the point where the spending matched the expected state tax revenues. So they whined to the federal government, and the Democrats in the Congress decided to throw about 10 billion dollars at a handful of states. The rest of us balanced our state budgets. And we are ALL expected to balance our PERSONAL budgets. In fact, they have things like "jail" for those of us who write a check we don't have funds to back. Why can't governments operate under similar constraints?

(The answer - the simple one - is that handing out money to people is a great way to buy their friendship - and their vote, if you're a politician. So the way to keep getting voted into office is to buy those votes with new "entitlement" programs that promise people that they'll get something for free... or, at least that "they" don't have to pay for, because someone else is paying for it.)

As for the Bush tax cuts helping only the top 1% of the richest folks in America, that's a load of hogwash, and a lot of you are going to find out VERY SOON just how much benefit YOU got, from those cuts, because they are going to expire at the end of this year. If you're like most taxpayers, you saved that whole booklet the IRS sent you in January - the one with all the tax-charts in the back. When you get your 2011 booklet, this coming January, do a simple comparison using your 2010 filing income, and see how much more you're going to owe.

By the way - if you do a simple web-search on "Who Really Pays the Taxes", you're going to come across a whole bunch of articles that refer to a study done by none other than our own Treasury Department - a study that shows that the top 1% of income-earners actually paid 6% to 8% MORE in taxes AFTER the Bush Tax Cuts went into effect!

And, after the Bush cuts went into effect, a whole BUNCH of Americans suddenly found themselves owing ZERO in federal income tax, when they had owed a few hundred dollars, the prior year. Of course, they'll be back to actually OWING tax money, come January of 2011.

The Democrats in Congress have spent trillions in "stimulus" money, and our economy is actually worse for the expenditure. It certainly has not "rebounded" - even in the "Summer of Recovery" - and all of that money is now a tax-debt hanging over all our heads, waiting for the demand of repayment at some future time.

And health care? The trial lawyers got a bonus, as did the pharmaceutical industry. (Has anyone ever asked WHY all those Internet companies can sell Viagra and 10% of the price you pay, here in America? It's because the manufacturer sells it at that price, overseas. And we have federal laws that say we can't buy from the cheaper overseas sources - we have to pay the over-inflated price, here, so that Big Pharma makes a killing in profits. Of course, the folks at Big Pharma were some of the largest contributors to the Democrat candidates' campaign coffers>)

No, what we got was 2700 pages of "law" which have already spawned some 20,000 pages of federal regulations. Among those is one that made a lie of Obama's "If you like your current health care plan, you can keep it" line. The new regulations guarantee that 69% of the current health-care plans cannot continue after 2013, because they won't meet the newly- created federal standards. So, 69% of you who like your current health care plans will be SOL in just under 3 years - all courtesy of Obama, Reid, and Pelosi. (Who ever heard of "You have to vote for the bill in order to see what's in it!"? But that's what Pelosi told the House, right before they voted the abomination into law!)

I don't fault anyone for having his or her own political beliefs. But, if you are going to weave them into a story, at least have the decency to tell the truth, not spew a bunch of lies.

The comments are the most interesting. It proves the old saying that "Opinions are like assholes, everybody has one." Well, I have one also. When there is the wife and kids to feed three times each day and there is no job, borrowing all the money in the world and giving it to banks and big business will not help. Just WHO in the hell do they loan it to? Free money is like shovelling dirt into a ditch, it works for a little while. I am a 1960's Democrat, the party we have today is nothing like it was back then. I do not think it ever will be again, either. It should be obvious that we tried the big "change" and it's time to do it again. We had better be quick about it, also, because blaming George Bush is getting to be a little bit old. I would much rather that goverment forget blaming and start doing SOMETHING that makes sense.

MGM

You should send this story to someone, the newspapers, your senator, and the president, not that it will make a difference.

They all blame Obama for the mess that Bush and Cheney got is in after 8 years of their greedy lunacy.

Bush had more vacation days than a no show state worker and Cheney is the devil in disguise. I hope they both die of a long, slow painful death for what they did to this country and people like most of us in this mess.

It's bad everywhere. I'm from Ohio and they say the unemployment is 15%. Bullshit! How about 30%.

The thing that I didn't like about the story is that it read too much like non-fiction, but I gave you a 5 anyway because you wrote all that I've been thinking but was unable to put it to paper in the way you did.

I printed it out and plan on handing your story to all my friends. Thanks and good luck in the contest. I hope you win. You should win for this story. It was great.

I never expected this story to illicit so many comments and so much controversy. Initially, I had written this story for the Romance category, but Literotica dumped it in the Reviews & Essay category.

I figured it would just languish there dying a slow death as no one reads that category in the way the Incest, Loving Wives, and Interracial categories are read.

Thank you all for your comments. Good or bad, I appreciate the feedback.

who have no understanding of LARGE events, forces, and cycles. Even if you break down such large evetns and forces, use plain high school statistics, these idiots would rather believe Jesus WALK ON THE SURFACE WATER, something GRAVITY and SPEED of a MASS that of a human just PREVENT from happening... but, oh, HE was some DIVINE.... <p>

people use use "reasoning" ability like that should either be shot, starve to death, or sent off into some other planet, since they are obviously not contributing to the advancement of humans or science... <p>

electing a new president, when an economy has been in STEADY and then sharp decline for years CAN NOT revise the economy --- the largest in the world --- within a year or two. <p>

EVETNS, FORCES, and PROCESSES like the largest economy in the world.... behave in ways that can be EXPLAINED through using SINE WAVES, in cycle completion taking YEARS, not hours, days, or months... <p>

You can graph all sorts of events, processes, and forces.... ranging rom sub-microscopic phenomenon like LIGHT (photon particles), on the one hand.... to the turning of galactic pin wheels, on the other hand.... <p>

and a CYCLE of an economic activity like the USA's, the largest in the world, MARCHES many more magnitudes closer to that of a galactic pin wheel than it does... to that of light particles/waves, which oscillate at hundreds of million, to trillions (at the gamma and cosmic ray spectrum), cycles per SECOND.... <p>

sometimes it's very daunting --- heart-breaking and SCARY --- living with incredibly regressive and retarded people who, even as grown up men and women, still believe in Fairies, Gods, Goddesses, Santa, Satan, Human Saints sitting alongside God and his Angels, and other such nonsense that, in a perfect world, only 3 and 4 year-olds are, should be, allowed to believe in...

you have to follow the money. and yet our "u s supreme court" has ruled that money is "free speech" in my lifetime , and i am 68 years old , i never dreamed this would happen here. these people have nazi like behavior. these people have no fear , because they insist that they own and control our government. because if they can succeed in doing this , that with the government computers , they can know all , and controll all. and that is the very thing that adolph hitler dreamed that he could have.

in the sense that the only true happiness lies in finding your inner happiness, without that everything is empty, even wealth. Inner happiness has nothing to do with financial wealth, although it is worthwhile to strive for too. Read Dave Ramsey and take the road to financial freedom, and live the true American Dream. Start meditating and experience true inner freedom and wealth. Blessings to all.