state of the union (in my opinion)
it has been 234 years since our founding fathers published the declaration of independence and here in 2010 we live in a country that they would not, in many ways, recognize. we are mired in an economic slump of our own doing with no end in sight while our two major political parties spend their time casting verbal stones at each other. (john adams thought the "party" system was the greatest threat to our political process and i think he was right but that is for another blog) while millions are out of work here in america due to greed of corporations and stupidity of government while the rich get richer and the poor get poorer and those of us in the middle watch our fortunes and futures slide farther and farther downward. karl marx said that the only true wealth of a country was the tangible goods that the country produced and if he was right, and i think he was, then america has made a horrible and possibly deadly mistake in letting our manufacturing to be allowed to be taken to third world countries in the name of greater profits for the rich and slightly lower prices for the public. now we have lost the greatest creator of jobs which is the manufacturing sector. even in hard times people need to buy shoes, shirts, underwear, sheets, towels, socks, etc and guess what? almost none of these is made in america. those "slightly" lower prices don't look so good when weighed against the millions unemployed because there are far fewer customers to buy those "slightly" lower priced (and often shabbily made) items and thus the spiral continues downward.
our founding fathers would be aghast at the following fact: we have troops stationed in 144 countries! so much for not getting involved in foreign affairs which was something that the fathers were very adamant about but because our military industrial complex now rules our foreign policy our young men and women in uniform find themselves spread out around the globe. not only does that cause economic drain on our resources it has a double whammy, we pay those troops and they then spend that money in foreign lands. we have to rent space to put house those troops and that money goes to foreign contractors (with the exception of course for haliburton which then pays no taxes on the money it makes overseas.) but all of that is not the real problem which is that those troops create more terrorists! no one wants the empire to have their storm troopers in their country and resentment against the empire grows and grows each day. (ask yourself, how would you like chinese troops in your home town?)
we have an enemy alright but we have mislabeled him (her) as "islamic terrorists" because the powers that be here don't you and i to recognize just why our "enemy" is fighting us. they are NOT islamic terrorists they are middle eastern/arab/persian/muslim people who resent and hate us for having our troops on what they consider to be holy land. they resent us for propping up brutal dictatorships in yemen, saudi arabia and egypt (whose secret police rivals anything that hitler had) and our blind and unyielding support for isreal regardless of what they do. we do not have an even handed approach to the middle east and you can rest assured that every single arab, persian and muslim inhabitant of those lands knows that. they resent us for turning a blind eye to the suffering of the Palestinian people trapped in refuge camps in their own land. ask yourself again, what do you think our founding fathers would think of this?
we refuse to accept the obvious and that is if we want peace in the middle east we must get out of there. period. albert einstein said "peace cannot be kept by force it can only be kept by understanding." but hey, what did he know?
after 9-11 almost the entire population of the middle east was on our side and they thought they attack but that disappeared when bush invaded for iraq based on either incredibly faulty intelligence (and i use that word lightly) or just plain old lies. (gee, i wonder why iran wants more weapons; they have american nuclear armed troops to the west in iraq, nuclear armed american forces on the east in afghanistan and a nuclear armed isreal to the south...make anyone paranoid wouldn't it?)
so, now we are involved in a war with no possible victory in afghanistan and thus each and every day creating more and more people who have valid reasons to hate us.
we demand greatness of our athletes but we accept mediocrity in our statesmen. we elect people based on what they say they will do but when they do the opposite we look the other way or continue playing our video games or reading about the latest scandal coming out of hollywood. we write trivia on face book and care about paris hilton but we don't hold our politician's feet to the fire for their lying. we remain uninvolved in politics and only 55-60% of our REGISTERED voters vote. for shame! but, here on the fourth of july, we wave our flags and shoot our fireworks and watch our ballgames and tell each other how great we are.
i have traveled the world and thus i know that the american people are, for the most part, friendly and kind. i also know they are woefully unaware of what is going on in the world and most couldn't find iraq or afghanistan on a globe is all the countries were un-named. they can't tell you the name of the president of iraq or afghanistan or pakistan or england or germany or italy or greece or spain and all of those countries have a vital role in our future.
and one thing we must become aware of is that we, as a people, are partially responsible for the mess we are in. we, as citizens, must become more involved in politics, we, as a people, must demand accountability of our political leaders (another word i use lightly). we must pay more attention to national affairs than we do to sports. we must demand of our schools that they actually teach the little monsters to read and write and do math. we must demand of the parents of the little monsters that they get involved in their children's education.
we have porous borders and scream about "illegals" but refuse to recognize that it is the corporations who are hiring them who are the real problems. (see tyson foods or any of the meat packing plants to see just how many illegals work there.) if no one was hiring these people they wouldn't come. and, by the way, how many times have we found some congressperson using an illegal for household work? if we were to go to all the rich people in this country who have a gardner or a maid or a cook or a butler or a pool boy or.....any menial laborer working for them and then arrested not the illegals but the rich who hire them we would need to build some more jails that is for sure. yet, it is these same rich people who are screaming about the illegals.
happy birthday america.
our founding fathers would be aghast at the following fact: we have troops stationed in 144 countries! so much for not getting involved in foreign affairs which was something that the fathers were very adamant about but because our military industrial complex now rules our foreign policy our young men and women in uniform find themselves spread out around the globe. not only does that cause economic drain on our resources it has a double whammy, we pay those troops and they then spend that money in foreign lands. we have to rent space to put house those troops and that money goes to foreign contractors (with the exception of course for haliburton which then pays no taxes on the money it makes overseas.) but all of that is not the real problem which is that those troops create more terrorists! no one wants the empire to have their storm troopers in their country and resentment against the empire grows and grows each day. (ask yourself, how would you like chinese troops in your home town?)
we have an enemy alright but we have mislabeled him (her) as "islamic terrorists" because the powers that be here don't you and i to recognize just why our "enemy" is fighting us. they are NOT islamic terrorists they are middle eastern/arab/persian/muslim people who resent and hate us for having our troops on what they consider to be holy land. they resent us for propping up brutal dictatorships in yemen, saudi arabia and egypt (whose secret police rivals anything that hitler had) and our blind and unyielding support for isreal regardless of what they do. we do not have an even handed approach to the middle east and you can rest assured that every single arab, persian and muslim inhabitant of those lands knows that. they resent us for turning a blind eye to the suffering of the Palestinian people trapped in refuge camps in their own land. ask yourself again, what do you think our founding fathers would think of this?
we refuse to accept the obvious and that is if we want peace in the middle east we must get out of there. period. albert einstein said "peace cannot be kept by force it can only be kept by understanding." but hey, what did he know?
after 9-11 almost the entire population of the middle east was on our side and they thought they attack but that disappeared when bush invaded for iraq based on either incredibly faulty intelligence (and i use that word lightly) or just plain old lies. (gee, i wonder why iran wants more weapons; they have american nuclear armed troops to the west in iraq, nuclear armed american forces on the east in afghanistan and a nuclear armed isreal to the south...make anyone paranoid wouldn't it?)
so, now we are involved in a war with no possible victory in afghanistan and thus each and every day creating more and more people who have valid reasons to hate us.
we demand greatness of our athletes but we accept mediocrity in our statesmen. we elect people based on what they say they will do but when they do the opposite we look the other way or continue playing our video games or reading about the latest scandal coming out of hollywood. we write trivia on face book and care about paris hilton but we don't hold our politician's feet to the fire for their lying. we remain uninvolved in politics and only 55-60% of our REGISTERED voters vote. for shame! but, here on the fourth of july, we wave our flags and shoot our fireworks and watch our ballgames and tell each other how great we are.
i have traveled the world and thus i know that the american people are, for the most part, friendly and kind. i also know they are woefully unaware of what is going on in the world and most couldn't find iraq or afghanistan on a globe is all the countries were un-named. they can't tell you the name of the president of iraq or afghanistan or pakistan or england or germany or italy or greece or spain and all of those countries have a vital role in our future.
and one thing we must become aware of is that we, as a people, are partially responsible for the mess we are in. we, as citizens, must become more involved in politics, we, as a people, must demand accountability of our political leaders (another word i use lightly). we must pay more attention to national affairs than we do to sports. we must demand of our schools that they actually teach the little monsters to read and write and do math. we must demand of the parents of the little monsters that they get involved in their children's education.
we have porous borders and scream about "illegals" but refuse to recognize that it is the corporations who are hiring them who are the real problems. (see tyson foods or any of the meat packing plants to see just how many illegals work there.) if no one was hiring these people they wouldn't come. and, by the way, how many times have we found some congressperson using an illegal for household work? if we were to go to all the rich people in this country who have a gardner or a maid or a cook or a butler or a pool boy or.....any menial laborer working for them and then arrested not the illegals but the rich who hire them we would need to build some more jails that is for sure. yet, it is these same rich people who are screaming about the illegals.
happy birthday america.
posted by Ron Shock | 10:02 AM
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