Aren't Mitch McConnell and the GOP Congress equally to blame for the lack of progress the past 4 yrs?

Some of your respondents do not appear to know how the House and Senate work, and a couple have their facts wrong about President Obama and the Democrats' role in this do-nothing 112th Congress that has been controlled by Republicans since January 3, 2011 (House) and filibustered on absolutely everything--including judicial appointments on hundreds of court benches across the nation that continue to sit empty--by the snake-sneak filibuster king Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY). There is some hope on the horizon: Actress and activist Ashley Judd is considering a run against McConnell in the mid-term election (2014), so maybe we Democrats and "get 'er done" Americans can get ourselves another Senate seat on our way to the 60 we need to block unnecessary or mean-spirited filibusters. When the downgrade on our valuable AAA bond to AA+ rating occurred---August 5, 2011---the Democrats were NOT in control in the House, as at least one of your respondents suggests; the majority was rightwing extremists from the teabagging evangelical branch of the GOP bullying the rest of the Republicans over refusing to do the routine task of raising our debt ceiling unless they got their horrific policies approved---holding the entire nation hostage.

These bullying fiscal ILLITERATES among the Tea Partiers did NOT win, but they put the entire nation in peril with their stupidity---something that Standard & Poors analysts mentioned. Mitch McConnell's record-breaking number of FILIBUSTERS (blockages) in the Senate can only be overridden with a 60-vote MAJORITY of Senators, which the Democrats did not have. McConnell is worth at least $49 MILLION on a career-Senator's salary, by the way...I question his ties to lobbyists and his tendency towards market manipulations, insider trading, and corporate collusions that work against this nation's well-being.

He needs to retire or be voted OUT in 2014.

Perhaps you don't remember. Mich McConnell is the Minority leader of a Senate that passed nothing in the way of a budget in the last four years. That is because the Majority refused to vote on any.

I think we can all see the Democrats have succesfully killed of capitalism and The United States of America. It is only a matter of a short time until we have at totalitarian government.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.