I'm going to ask you to read this with an open mind.
The hardest thing to do is to take our preconceived notions and ignore them.
The fact is that every one of us is steeped in preconceived notions and faulty
belief systems. Writing for a progressive audience doesn't mean that the
average reader is "open-minded". In fact, there are just as many progressives
and liberals that tend to have as many rigidly held beliefs as our more
conservative cousins.
I have a few concerns that seem to dominate my
thoughts more than others. I'm going to keep these to a minimum as I could
probably fill volumes if I let myself have free reign. Since I'm not writing a
book here, I'll just bring out those things that I see as the most important
stumbling blocks to the success of our American culture.
I've written scores of articles about our imaginary
democracy and how we are manipulated into believing that we as a people have
some kind of choice in what direction we should be going. The truth is that in
its present structure, we the people, have very little choice in what kind of
laws are introduced, at least on the Federal level. This doesn't mean that the
American people are powerless; it only means that we shouldn't expect any type
of quick changes that conform to the will of the majority anytime soon.
The first thing I would like to discuss is the lack
of any real transparency in government. Most Americans are realizing that they
are only getting a fraction of the truth from the major media outlets. This is
nothing new; this situation is as old as mankind itself. Everyone has heard the
old axiom "The winners write the history". This has never been truer than it is
right now. Compounding this problem is this so-called "information age" that we
have entered into. There is so much information hitting us from every conceivable
source that it is difficult, if not impossible, to tell what is important and
what is not.
One way to filter out some of the more extraneous
information that we receive, is to look at trends, instead of just facts. I've
heard it said that a healthy, functioning brain is incapable of making a
mistake as long as it has sufficient information. I don't know if that is completely
true, but consider how well we can judge what has happened in the world as
compared to what we think will happen. They say hindsight is 20-20.
The media likes to believe that it reports the truth.
In reality, they don't have the time or the resources to report the truth. We
like to believe that at an earlier period in our history the media was more
honest and forthcoming when in reality, it never was. The assassination of JFK
is a good example. Most people were told that one man was behind the assassination.
It wasn't until years later that alternative versions of the same event came
out. The same can be said about the Vietnam War. In the beginning it was a very
simplistic: "America fights Communism" scenario played out in the media. It
wasn't until the late 60's when vets started speaking out and the support for
the war faltered among Americans that the narrative then changed.
Yet, things have not changed. The Iraq War is a good
example of American "Collective Amnesia". The pretext in the run-up to war in
Iraq was that Saddam Hussein had, and was ready to use, "Weapons of Mass
Destruction". These WMD's were never found, and not only that, The Downing
Street Memo's and other documents were uncovered showed that beyond a
reasonable shadow of a doubt, the U.S. and the United Kingdom planned for that
war long before those governments started beating the war drums. Still, in
America today, no charges have been brought before the courts indicting anyone
for war crimes. This is one of the more important issues we still must address.
The people that caused the war are still alive and they are still influencing
decisions being made today. As long as we remain silent about this important miscarriage
of justice, we will continue to make similar decisions in the future. It's time
that Bush, Cheney and company came to terms with what they did in our name.
Today, the Senate failed to pass a bill that would
have made it mandatory to conduct background checks for individuals purchasing
guns from the internet and at gun shows. If the legislation had passed, and gone
through the House and been signed by the President, would that have made this
nation a safer place? Well, if you have a civic minded criminal that would have
allowed a merchant to submit the paperwork to the ATF instead of paying cash
for his weapon from the trunk of a car or a back alley, I guess it would have.
Actually, there are so many weapons floating around this nation that the impact
of background checks would have been minimal.
Why the hue and cry for background checks? As much
as I hate to say this, I personally don't support gun control legislation that
has been proposed. It's too little, too late. I believe a much smarter approach
such as the stop and frisk law on the books in NYC with mandatory jail time for
the possession of an illegal firearm would be a much better move. I think that
anyone buying a buying a firearm should go through a check, but I also realize
that it probably wouldn't help much.
Why is the NRA in such opposition? Why do proponents
of the bill think it is so valuable? This is just an exercise in the appearance
of "democracy". This is just another meaningless debate to bring people around
to the opinion that what they believe matters. If they really wanted to kick
this debate up a notch and make a real difference in crimes committed with a
firearm, they would release 1st-time offenders for non-violent
crimes and start locking people up that use firearms in the commission of
crimes.
Of course they won't do that. It would be much too controversial.
Of course most Americans wouldn't think twice about seeing a gang-banger get
locked up for a decade if someone were hurt in a robbery, but the bill wouldn't
have a chance. The reason being is that this type of legislation would actually
put a bite into gun sales. In fact, almost any legislation that hurts special
interest groups is ignored. There is a long list of side issues that are
proposed from time to time to make Americans believe that they have a choice in
how this nation is run. Usually these issues come up when the government has
spent too much money, either bailing out special interest groups or spending
too much on war and the so-called "defense" budget, or when the administration
is in trouble for doing something illegal or unconstitutional.
I don't want to offend anyone with the list I'm
going to write about. I know that some of these issues are near and dear to
some people's hearts. Still, they are issues that could be decided at the State
or local level, or they matter to a very small minority. Yet, these issues are
brought up time and time again.
Abortion, same-sex marriage, contraception, sex-education,
creationism, evolution, and homosexual Boy (and Girl) Scouts along with gun
control and taxes, these are hot-button issues that never get resolved and take
the focus away from what the real major problems are. Some of the real problems
we should be grappling with:
Military Spending (We spend almost as much as all
nations combined).
Climate Change
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