Certain new facts... emerge so clearly as to lead to general withdrawal of loyalty from the system. The new conditions of technology, economics, and war, in the atomic age, make it less and less possible for the guards of the system-the intellectuals, the home owners, the taxpayers, the skilled workers, the professionals, the servants of government - to remain immune from the violence (physical and psychic) inflicted on the black, the poor, the criminal, the enemy overseas. The internationalization of the economy, the movement of refugees and illegal immigrants across borders, both make it more difficult for the people of the industrial countries to be oblivious to hunger and disease in the poor countries of the world.

When a population feels alienated from the legal system under which it lives, because that system fails to protect it from real dangers while lending succor and encouragement to every possible kind of wrongdoing, the population may well lose faith in the very idea of law. That is how civilization unravels.

People were growing resentful of bureaucrats whose first mission in life seemed to be protecting their own jobs by keeping expensive programs alive long after their usefulness had expired. They were losing respect for politicians who kept voting for open-ended welfare programs riddled with fraud and inefficiency that kept generation after generation of families dependent on the dole. And they were growing mistrustful of the self-appointed intellectual elite back in Washington who claimed to know better than the people of America did how to run their lives, their businesses, and their communities.

In recent decades, public confidence in our institutions has declined. Our governing class has often been paralyzed in the face of obvious and pressing needs. The American dream of upward mobility seems out of reach for some who feel left behind in a changing economy. Discontent deepened and sharpened partisan conflicts. Bigotry seems emboldened. Our politics seems more vulnerable to conspiracy theories and outright fabrication.

The proletarian was alienated not only because he was the servant of the bourgeois but because he became a stranger to the human condition, a sort of automaton filled with economic machinery and worked by and economic switch.

every society, however it is organized, there is always dissatisfaction with the distribution of income. All of us find it hard to understand why we should receive less than others who seem no more deserving — or why we should be receiving more than so many others whose needs seem as great and whose deserts seem no less. The farther fields always look greener — so we blame the existing system. In a command system envy and dissatisfaction are directed at the rulers. In a free market system they are directed at the market.

The poor are becoming increasingly aware of the injustice of the system that condemns them to a life of indigence and misery. And they are opposing the system courageously, sometimes even violently. This leads to a situation of conflict.

The reason we feel alienated is because the society is infantile, trivial, and stupid. So the cost of sanity in this society is a certain level of alienation. I grapple with this because I’m a parent. And I think anybody who has children, you come to this realization, you know — what’ll it be? Alienated, cynical intellectual? Or slack-jawed, half-wit consumer of the horseshit being handed down from on high? There is not much choice in there, you see. And we all want our children to be well adjusted; unfortunately, there’s nothing to be well adjusted to!

I know the American People are much attached to their Government; — I know they would suffer much for its sake; — I know they would endure evils long and patiently, before they would ever think of exchanging it for another. Yet, notwithstanding all this, if the laws be continually despised and disregarded, if their rights to be secure in their persons and property, are held by no better tenure than the caprice of a mob, the alienation of their affections from the Government is the natural consequence; and to that, sooner or later, it must come.

In the final analysis alienation is, among other things a response to the frustration created by the lack of meaning in modern society. It has been pointed out often enough that politics takes on religious overtones when religion proper withers, at any rate among intellectuals. Along these lines Doris Lessing observed: "There are certain types of people who are political out of a kind of religious reason...I think it's fairly common among socialists: They are in fact God-seekers, looking for the kingdom of God on earth...trying to abolish the present in favor of some better future -- always taking it for granted that there is a better future. If you don't believe in heaven you believe in socialism."

"People are disenfranchised because they don’t vote, they are disengaged because we don’t talk to them, and we don’t listen, not directly. There is a sense of being disowned, and therefore, there’s a deep sense of distrust between the people and the government, or by the people of government. I want to bridge that gap and I want to re-engage with the people." (2012)

These are white workers, neither rich nor poor, but angry over economic insecurity, unhappy with their work, worried about their neighborhoods, hostile to government-combining elements of racism with elements of class consciousness, contempt for the lower classes along with distrust for the elite, and thus open to solutions from any direction, right or left.

Before anyone can hope to understand or appreciate revolutionary or outlaw mentality and morality they must first know alienation. It is impossible to sympathize fully with this kind of philosophy unless one shares a healthy appreciation of alienation and it is just as impossible to become a revolutionary oneself unless one is himself alienated. I'm not talking about born losers, common weirdos or run-of-the-mill anti-social types. I'm not talking about those who wouldn't make it in any society due to personal deficiencies. I am speaking of people who do not fit into THIS society because of what it IS and what THEY are. To be outside this society is a marked badge of honor. I'm speaking of people who didn't have the luxury of making a choice; people who aren't in this for fun.

Republicans have been accused of abandoning the poor. It's the other way around. They never vote for us.