I am not known for my "liberal"thinking. In fact most anybody who knows me would , perhaps, label me as conservative. That , Of course, is no more accurate then the liberal label, but still I think most would at least consider me to be somewhat to the right when it comes to politics and religion. I am a firm believer in the constitution and our G-D given rights as expressed by the founders and I am a firm believer in the Jewish bible and of G-D. I think however that this is just about where my conservative side ends.
Lately I have been listening to a growing sound coming out of a lot of prominent conservatives on both the radio and through various news sources and all of them seem to be blaming the woes of the economy on all the "entitlement programs" and those of us who are poor enough to, at times,have to use them, and I find this trend to be a bit troubling.
I agree that there are many people who take advantage of the situation and just leech off the state even though they are physically able to actually work,but I have also witnessed those who desperately needed the help get turned down because , at least in one case,they had $7 too much in the bank. I personally know of the struggles that come from living on such a low income. I receive nothing more then VA benefits and while the cost of everything has gone up, my pay has not in 3 years. This really isn't about me though, nor is it about those who receive various assistance programs, it's about those who make an incredible amount of money being critical of those who don't and, quite frankly, looking at the wrong place to put the blame.
Now let me state for the record, that I have no problem with people making decent money on their skills and talents. If you can make big bucks doing what you do, I am happy for you. If you can enjoy the finer things in life because of your skills ,great, but I would also say to you that you should take the time to get to know some of these people that you are so critical of.
Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol", is one of my all time favorite movies and I think that there are many parts of it that are very relevant for today. When the ghost of Marley arrives, in the course of the conversation, Scrooge tells Marley that he had always been a good man of business and Marley's reply is perhaps the most condemning of our world today," Business! Business?! Mankind should have been my business!" He goes on to explain to Scrooge that because he never did anything to help anyone in the world that he was now condemned to walk the earth for eternity and see all the misery and be able to do nothing about it. The Ghost of Christmas Past has ignorance and want hidden under his cloak in the form of children and tells Scrooge that these belong to all men and to be ware of them both because if things stay as they are they spell the doom of all of mankind. Bob Cratchet was a hard working man by all accounts, yet he had a very sick son and he would die if nothing changed.The point being that you should get to know who "the surplus population" is before you condemn them to conditions that you wouldn't willingly live in.
So who or what is really to blame for this mess? Is it the wealthy guys on the airwaves? Nope.Though I think they are looking in the wrong direction. Is it the military? Not really, at least not at the troop level. I do believe however that we could save a huge chunk of money by ending all of our wars and overseas bases and bringing everyone home but the average grunt is not the problem. How about the politicians? I would have to say at least partially, why only partially? Because the only power that they have comes from us, what we allow them to do, so that leads to my answer which is; you and me. Yes, we are the one's to blame.
Every two years "we the people" have an opportunity to vote out those who are corrupt and power hungry, those that refuse to do ,as we the people, tell them to but we don't. As a matter of fact if you ask the average American what is actually going on in politics and how it effects them they won't have an answer and yet when it comes time to vote they will vote simply on name recognition. Some politicians have become so powerful that no one even bothers to run against them. Is this the way that things are supposed to be in a Republic? No!What needs to happen is that everyone should educate them selves as to what is going on in their government and then vote them all out of office and then if that doesn't work , you recall them,which most states have the power to do, and fire them until you get people in office who are accountable to us and not to powerful lobbies.
Lest any of you think that I believe that government is the answer, let me end that in a hurry. We need a whole lot less government intruding in our lives and coming up with more and more insane laws and regulations and ways to spend our money. The paragraph before was simply to illustrate that if we do not fire the whole lot of them , and I do mean all from all parties, we will not get this monster under any kind of control. It will simply get worse.
The other half of this though is our own fault. We have become an instant gratification, social networking, isolationist types. By isolationist I mean that we don't really interact with people anymore. We "speak" to each other via various social networking sights and occasionally might run into someone we haven't seen in a long time at Wal-Mart but we really don't interact with each other the way that our parents and grandparents did.
I remember a day when you didn't have to lock your doors and your neighbors were practically your parents, because if they didn't whoop on your backside, they would make sure that your parents knew what you had done long before you got home and , at least on a few occasions getting it from all sides! The good part of all that though was that people knew each other and they knew who was poor and struggling and,as a community, whether it was a church or just a bunch of neighbors, they would gather up what ever was necessary to help. There was no need for all the government programs because people took care of each other as was intended by G-D.
Something has changed though over the years and now most people don't bother to even know their neighbors, never mind if they are hurting in any way, and because we are taught that we are supposed to be able to "keep up with the Jones" many of us hide the fact that we are struggling. The government, of course, not wanting to let a good opportunity for control go by, fills in the gap where the churches,synagogues and neighbors once stood. We have, as a society, essentially relinquished control of our lives to those who's joy of spending our money knows no end and shows no sign of stopping.
My solution to this is really simple and rather old fashioned. We need to get off the computer, put down our massively entertaining cell phones, shut off the TV and go out and get to know each other again as we once did. You want to see an end to ridiculous spending in DC? Help each other out and there will be little need for all the government programs, get back into your churches and synagogues and start programs to help the needy. Take food to the local food bank or shelters, almost anything that you can think of will help. The government won't ever give up it's programs but perhaps we can all share the burden and lessen the need for them. Help people get on their feet rather then leaving them dependent on anyone and you will have accomplished that which the government cannot.
End the wars and bring everyone home. You want to see a major savings? Just do that one thing and you will have accomplished your goal.
Of course the government itself could take a pay cut as well,seems to me that if there is so little money that seniors and veterans can't get a raise that they should have a major cut in pay until that issue is resolved.
So there you have it, just a few simple solutions that would make a world of difference, I realise that it's just a pipe dream, but when that's all you have left...dream away.
Shalom
Ignacio
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