Can we pause for a second from all the divisive diversions and
hateful rhetoric and listen to what is going on in the present. The good of America is being held hostage to
a power struggle between people that are much more invested in keeping their
power than in moving America forward. Both parties have adopted a “my way or
the highway” approach that can only lead to more extreme positions. Fear is the motivator of both parties. Arguments are framed in the horrible things
the opposition is trying to accomplish, without regard to truth. The media is
much more concerned with promoting controversy than reporting the details of
the truth. From fear it is very easy to
ramp up anger, and then hat.. Fear and
anger tend to rule out reason, and the lack of reason is our largest current
problem. Bad people have been doing good
things and good people have been doing bad things for a long time. Calling people names just ramps up the anger
and hate and doesn’t move us forward.
The following ten issues have become so imbued with fear that we have
lost track of some basic truths about them.
1.Health care: Ignoring
the ethics of making money from peoples suffering, the only way that ‘for
profit’ health providers can increase profits is by: having more sick people,
more treatable conditions, raising
prices, prolonging treatments and ignoring cures. We already have universal coverage for Emergency Room admissions, the most expensive kind. There is a huge
parasitic industry concerned only with money in healthcare consisting of
benefit managers and insurance companies.
Both Federal and State governments provide substantial funding for
reinsurance, subsidizing the insurance companies.
2,Global warming: The
conservatives are all aghast about the job losses, while the liberals celebrate
all the job opportunities. Seems to me there’s room for discussion.
3.Social Security: Liberals
are afraid of cutting benefits, conservatives are afraid of raising taxes. Politicians are afraid period. The sooner it’s fixed the easier the fix is,
why can’t we bargain?
4. Regulations: Big
money is for getting rid of them, Democrats don’t want to lose all the money
their lawyers get from lawsuits. Can’t we eliminate some paperwork by putting
the perpetrators in jail instead of giving them bonus’s while penalizing the
shareholders with large fines?
5.Immigration: We need
immigrants for our economy to run. We
have several ways to take advantage of those wishing to live with us, without
demonizing them. Dreamers need to be
dealt with, migrant labor needs to be made easier and better. Take out the fear
and much can be done.
6.Government shut down:
This is what ISIS and Russia have been hoping for. We have instituted slave labor by asking
people to work for free. Every day of
the shut down brings us closer to becoming a third world nation!
7.Abortion: The
granddaddy of all hate issues. Is making
it illegal going to keep it from happening?
More women will be in ER’s due to botched procedures. I don’t understand why the pro lifers have to
punish the “evil doers”. Is their faith
so little that they don’t think justice will come in the afterlife?
8.Public debate: First
rule of debating reads: If you can’t win with logic go with insults. The first insult tells you the loser of the
debate.
9.Gun control: The fear
is taking all the guns away. I want to
know how that could happen? Who goes door
to door? How do they know they’ve got
them all? It can’t happen. Why can’t we talk about keeping them out of
dangerous people’s hands?
10.Socialism, Capitalism, and Communism are all failed 19th
century ideas that really have no bearing anymore. Every advanced country has some state
ownership, some private ownership, a safety net for the poor, and incentives
for the exceptional. It’s just a matter
of degree.
We live in an age where we are forced to be willfully ignorant
about many things just to live an ordinary life. We must realize when commenting on issues
just how ignorant we are of them, and refrain ourselves as appropriate. As FDR
said: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself”.
