@QMS

our minds with their propaganda. Not one of them believed that children hiding under their desks was going to save them from a nuclear blast. But remember how afraid we were that we would die if we didn't have a desk to hide under.
The patriotic propaganda has been a longer act. How many decades have countless millions of children stood up in route to pledge allegiance to the damned flag? Now if anyone refuses to play this game, they're immediately shamed and punished.
The worship of troops is just one more thing that people were brainwashed about.
Then little by little, our freedoms have been being removed under the guise of keeping us safe.
It's a good thing that terrorists weren't doing the mass shootings because that would show that the surveillance kabuki theater isn't working.
I get a kick out of France telling its citizens that because of the latest terrorist attack, they will have to continue their high alert status. It's apparent that keeping the terror alert system isn't working. Yet people still believe that it will keep them safe.

#1.1 I remember the bomb scares, bailing off the bus and diving in the ditch. Somehow justifies the endless wars, least the media wants us to believe. It's almost a tragic-comedy the way people are afraid of phantoms which only exist for powers' purpose. Wish I could laugh it off

@Pluto's Republic I've got no problem with the why of nationalizing. Except...it's the government that does it, and the government doesn't work for us, which is why when they "nationalize" something, it stays mostly under private control. Except the rails which they probably wanted to deep-six anyway.

#2.2

…is why to nationalize. Who will benefit? Will it make the world a better place?

The United States has technically nationalized several companies, usually in the form of a bailout in which the government owns a controlling interest. The bailouts of AIG in 2008 and General Motors Company in 2009 amounted to nationalization, but the U.S. government exerted very little control over these companies. The government also nationalized the failing Continental Illinois Bank and Trust in 1982, finally selling it to Bank of America in 1994.

Despite the temporary nature of most nationalization actions in the United States, there are exceptions. Amtrak was transferred to government ownership after several railroad companies failed in 1971. After the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the airport security industry was nationalized under the Transportation Security Administration (TSA).

How it is done: Here are some examples. The outcome differs depending on the decisions make along the way. Intelligent people can be successful. Norway is a good examplr.

MEXICO

President Lázaro Cárdenas nationalized Mexico's oil industry in 1938, kicking out US and European firms and setting up state-run Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex). Today it still ranks as one of Mexico's most popular decisions.

Pemex was not the first national oil company in the Americas – YPF of Argentina was – but Mexico's expropriation is the region's first example of a classic state takeover. Since then Pemex's door has, under Mexico's constitution, been tightly sealed to foreigners.

Although foreign governments boycotted Mexican oil in retaliation, over time nationalization was considered a boon for Mexico. With the finding of the massive Cantarell field in the 1970s, Pemex grew into one of the largest oil companies in the world. Its revenues pour into Mexico's coffers, funding about a third of the federal budget.

BRAZIL

Brazil established a monopoly over the oil industry in 1953 when President Getúlio Vargas created Petrobras, the outcome of a seven-year campaign with nationalist slogans like "The oil is ours." In 1954, operations began, and Petrobras produced only about 2 percent of the country's domestic oil consumption.

Nearly 60 years later, Petrobras is the fifth-largest energy company in the world and a leader in deepwater and ultra-deepwater oil extraction. Its monopoly in Brazil continued into the 1990s, a period when privatization, free trade, and neoliberal policies swept the Americas.

VENEZUELA

President Hugo Chávez has increased state control over the oil industry, but he wasn't the one to nationalize Venezuela's oil.

Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA), the state-owned oil company, was nationalized in 1976 at a time when many countries in the Southern Hemisphere were asserting sovereignty over their natural resources.

Mr. Chávez won 1998 elections (see chart) on a populist ticket that promised to use the country's vast oil wealth for the benefit of the poor. Though criticized for using oil money to fund his programs, he was not the first Venezuelan leader to use the revenues for political ends.

His presidency set the stage for a new wave of renationalizations, with countries like Bolivia and Ecuador following suit. None of these countries closed the door on international investment, but they raised rents and changed fiscal agreements in their favor.

Here's a good story about why to nationalize:

Want a green energy future? Nationalize Canada's oil industry

Canada’s oil corporations have made a profitable mess of the country: it’s time to put them under public, democratic control

t would be hard to invent a more destructive ritual of national self-punishment. Year after year, we hand oil companies gigantic tracts of pristine land. They skin them of entire ecosystems. They vacuum billions of dollars out of the country. Their oversized power, sunk into lobbying and litigation, upends government law-making.

And Canada’s return? The exploitation of the tar sands provides just two percent of our GDP. It has gutted manufacturing jobs and made a mockery of our emissions targets. And now that oil prices are crashing – as resource commodities predictably do – it is putting a vicious squeeze on government spending.

Faced with similar recklessness, people in other countries are setting out to take back control of their energy. As Naomi Klein documents in her new book This Changes Everything, it hasn’t been driven by ideological fervour. Towns like Boulder, Colorado, concerned by the threat of climate change, have started demanding a clean, renewable alternative from their energy providers. They are then discovering that private utility companies simply refuse to provide it.