has been "things will get better".

It's the political knee jerk meme.

It has to become viral for the politicians to survive. Without that, what do they have? Reality? Pfft! When did reality ever play a roll in the national discourse?

There is no recovery. In the traditional sense and there never will be.

Instead, what we will be subject too is a retooling of how we are to think. Think of it as a grand reeducation.

We will be lead to believe that things are better while the problems are nothing more than papered over.

New and creative methods to parse the unemployment numbers will be the norm.

Wages will continue to stagnate while headlines will state that "business budgets have gone up!".

Health plans will become more expensive and those who still can't afford it will still be without, but hey, we did get "health care reform". right?

We will do more with less and be told it's more.

We will be told to keep buying crap but the crap we buy we won't be able to afford.

The reality will be a life much harder, much slower, much hungrier.

But even if we get proper representation by various "leaders" who actually pay attention and listen to the people. Then what?

We are still a nation with a crumbling infrastructure. Which, I might add, will cost us on the tune of 2 trillion bucks to fix at last estimate.

We are a nation built on oil. Oil which is peaking to demand, yet we can't agree nationally on a energy program.

What will we recover to? I'm thinking of something along the lines of post WW1 Europe.

We are a nation in transition. We are a nation without real direction. We are a nation without a guiding mission or hand. We are not exactly "rudderless" but we aren't far from it.

When the fringe elements of society are given the same gravity on the national stage as those who are sane, we are in very serious trouble.

What will we recover to? As our various support systems continue to go underfunded, as our voices continue to be squelched, as our rights and civil liberties are taken away, our recovery will look more like feudalism with a corporate/police smiley face plastered on it.