Are you a racist?

In all likelihood, you are to some extent or another. Even I am guilty at times of falling prey to this. The ways I'm thinking of are far more subtle than you may think though. I'm not talking about thinking you're superior to other races or thinking other races to be more violent and dangerous. Instead I mean that you subconsciously are supporting laws and ideas that hurt minorities while leaving yourself and your fellows unharmed.

While I'm tempted to launch into a discussion about the new healthcare reform, I would like to touch on ideas not so close in mind. For example, the national election day is not a national holiday. The government and many businesses are open full time. While many middle and upper class Americans can easily get off of work long enough to vote. However, minorities find themselves far less able to make time in their days to vote; in poverty, they work more for less, making taking time off from work less possible. Yet, we do nothing about it. We close for irrelevant holidays, but the most important holiday (Elections) has yet to be given the same respect. The one holiday that shapes our government and embodies the very soul of it is left a normal day, a day that deserves no respect. Minorities continue to be unrepresented in elections and the current Election day makes up a part of the reasons for that underrepresentation.

Another dangerous form of our subconscious racism is the failure of our inner city schools. These schools continue to be populated mostly by lower class, minority families and they continue to perform far below their suburban counterparts. However, when inner city students are placed into high performing schools, they score stronger than their white counterparts. The mechanisms in place prevent our inner city students from performing at the level they are capable of. The poor teaching, dangerous environment, and lack of proper materials prevent inner city students from getting the same access to resources that their suburban and rural counterparts receive. As a result, they are less able to get into college and less prepared for skill base careers. We must improve our inner city schools and give all students the same opportunities for success, we cannot let these students fail because of our inability to see the inequity. It is our failure.

The hatred this country feels for welfare is awe inspiring. Yet Welfare programs make up less than 1% of our federal budget. Meanwhile, our military budget exceeds 600 billion dollars a year. Our problem is priorities. We focus on the need to defend ourselves from distant and sometimes made up enemies, and fail to see the conditions of so many of our fellow Americans. These people are not leeches sucking away your blood. Many are in desperate need of assistance just to survive, even when holding jobs. For a country so enthusiastic about Christianity, you seem to have forgotten that your Lord and Savior dedicated himself to the poor and meager. You have failed in your faith if you are so selfish, that you cannot help your fellow human when they need you.

I hope that every single person can recognize the inequities in society and the blinders that prevent them from seeing such noble solutions as basic healthcare, aid to impoverished families. We must be willing to examine our own self and see the successes and faults we have. We have done such amazing things, but there are many more illnesses that we have failed to remedy. Do not sit idly by.

The Number One Reason Why so Many Americans are Idiots

If you hate socialism and everything about it, you are officially an idiot. Not only do you probably lack a proper understanding of the word and use only the negative connotations spoon fed to you by moron pundits on Fox News, but you also fail to realize that socialism exists, and has existed, in our country for a quite a long time. Not only has it existed, but it flourishes both within the United States, and much of the world. Things we expect to see in every nation like publicly maintained roads, police officers, firefighters, public education, all of these are socialist ideas.

 

Do you really want to destroy socialism and all of the unnecessary taxes it provides? If so, I hope you’re willing to fork out the even greater amount of money I’m sure you’ll be paying to be protected by privatized police officers and firefighters. Everyone will be paying for private education as well, which is pretty sweet. Oh, and I guess we’ll need to figure out a way to build and maintain our intricate highway systems without allowing the government to control our lives, m I rite?

 

I’ve only listed a handful of the seemingly endless list of socialist programs that every American utilizes on a daily basis. You hate taxes, eh? Well maybe you should keep in mind that if you weren’t paying those taxes for services, you’d be paying even more money to get them privately.

 

With all of this in mind, I think it’s time I move onto that which you were all waiting to hear about. Socialized healthcare.

 

Is it really all so terrible? I mean, it exists in Canada, the United Kingdom, France, and even Cuba, just to name a few. And guess what, their healthcare systems are stronger than ours are, and better for the people. You can say all your bogus claims about socialized medicine that you were, once again, spoon fed by your pundits. But at the end of the day, there is a very simple argument that you would think would convince everyone, yet it doesn’t.

 

Privatized healthcare means that your well being is in the hands of people whose number once concern is turning a profit. For how hell bent you conservatives and moderate liberals seem to be on NOT trusting the government, how are you so quick to trust BUSINESSES? Not just any businesses, but huge businesses. They do not care about you, and they will fuck you over every chance they get. Why? Because they are a business, and businesses exist to make money. End of story. The reason America’s healthcare system is so awful (and it is awful), is because we continue to allow these giant health insurance companies to buy out our politicians and lie to us. We allow these companies to create such baseless fear in us, so that we’ll continue to pay them ludicrous payments.

 

Get over this ridiculous fear you have of “socialism” and wake up. Your healthcare sucks, and it will only get worse if we continue to allow private companies to hold your health in their hands. 

Stop Supporting the Troops

I saw a facebook group today and it reminded me how much I can’t stand the military and the mindless support it receives. The group was titled “Facebook Silence.... Pay Your Respects To Our Fallen and Injured” and, of course, it was filled with people talking about how important it is to show them we care, as if soldiers getting shot at give a fuck about facebook silence. I’m sick of the empty gestures that all these pro-military people make constantly. You aren’t doing anything but trying to make yourself feel good that these people are off dying for no reason. There was a silver lining to the group though, and it was that more people had selected not attending. Absolutely priceless. And the people supporting the group are giving the people choosing not attending shit, like it is a big deal.

 

More than these people, I’m sick of the military and the attitude that most people seem to have about it. If you don’t support the troops, get the fuck out. Even reasonable, sensible people seem to have this mindset. I don’t understand it. You can’t oppose the war and support the troops. The troops are what make war possible. They make a choice to sign up for the military and they understand the implications of doing so. We’ve been at war for nearly a decade now, anyone signing up knows they are going to fight in Iraq or Afghanistan. They know they are supporting a pointless war, a war that has led to countless civilian deaths in both Iraq and Afghanistan. They know that they are in an illegal war in Iraq, a war that Congress never declared and therefore, should not exist.

 

Soldiers are the cement of the American war machine. Until Americans can realize that war is unnecessary, that a standing military is the greatest threat to our freedom, and that we will never know peace until we say no to constant war, there is no hope for us.

 

For those who tell me to get out of the country if I don’t support the military, you’re a moron. Do you not understand that the military, in it’s present state, is not “American.” Our founders were terrified of a standing military and anxious about meddling in foreign affairs. The United States was a neutral, isolationist nation until the first World War! And even after that, we attempted to continue being an isolationist nation. The militaristic system we live in now has only existed for a little over sixty years. It is NOT necessary to survive, we did so for 150 years. Standing militaries are not necessary, even in today’s time. Our armies will not stop some rogue nuclear missile, our defense systems will. We live isolated from all of our significant enemies, with giant oceans on both sides of our nation.

 

We spend 6 or 7 times more money on our military a year than the second largest military spender in the world. How can I say this and people not see the problem in this? Do you realize a fraction of the money we spend on the military could provide healthcare to all Americans? A fraction! You complain so much about our budget, big government. The military is big government. Military leaders have created a bubble protecting them from ever losing anything. What congressmen would dare try to take away funding for the military? Once it has placed itself in a war, we are powerless. Or so they would have us believe.

 

Stop supporting the military, stop supporting the troops. If we have any hope of finding peace as a nation and as a world community, we must take the power out of the military’s hands and return it to the people.

When Intelligence Becomes a Sin

In the last election I noticed a phenomenon that is either new to our political landscape or it just recently resurfaced. When did having intelligent, informed politicians make them unfit to lead our nation. Ex-Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin, seemed rather comfortable attacking the "political elite" in Washington. Their ability to articulate opinions on key issues was simply a symptom of their ignorance to the needs of the American public and their own obsession with money and power. President Barack Obama provides an excellent example of the disconnected political elite. A black man who carried himself into Harvard and graduated in the top of his class, obviously a man incapable of understanding the needs of American people. 

When did intelligence become a sin? The more I learn, the more rooted in knowledge my ideas become, the more often I feel others dismiss me. Instead of being rational human beings, it seems our other half would prefer the President and Congress consist of uninformed people who need to read notes off of their own hands to express the most basic of their own beliefs.

There is a reason that America was founded and established by the most well read, most intelligent men in the country. They were capable of understanding the needs of the nation, the needs of human beings, and the best ways to establish a government in that time. They were capable of articulating their beliefs intelligently, and the public was able to understand it. But now, most are incapable of even understanding the principles of the very nation they live in. For a group of people so obsessed with returning America to the principles it was founded upon, they seem so unprepared to understand those principles.

The culprits most responsible for the decay of our minds, for the decay of the American spirit are the ones most vocal about returning to that state. Tea Party? How inappropriate. A political movement based entirely on refusal to cooperate, compromise, and work together is not in the spirit of '76. You are not promoting the America ideal, tyranny is not an ideal. You have become that which our founders despised and feared most, that which our founders fought hardest to prevent from returning.

Frustration Tirade

Seriously, why do I EVER look at user comments on political articles? The only people that bother saying it are morons who do not understand politics or basic political theory. Communism and socialism aren't the same you fucking morons. Also, please stop talking about how its racist that black people have the NAACP but white people can't have a similar organization.

You're morons and racists. You know why white people don't have anything like the NAACP? Our entire system of government and law legitimizes white supremacy in our nation. We do nothing to help improve conditions in the inner city, but have no problem spending over 600 billion dollars a year on military expenditures. Not including the undisclosed amount of money that goes into the CIA, the same CIA that trained Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda. For a group of people who claim to hate big government (Yes, that is you Republicans), you sure as hell don't mind big government when it's using the military as the apparatus. Fixing our healthcare system would cost a FRACTION of what our military budget is, but we're too obsessed with fighting off socialism, or communism as some morons like to call it, to understand the benefits. 

Hate socialism? We better privatize the police and fire departments, as well as all education. Student Loans? Throw them out the window. Progressive tax rates? Fuck that. Medicare and Social Security? Old people don't need help surviving.

Oh, and you want to whine about welfare? It makes up less than 1% of our budget, so get over yourselves. Like I said, why don't we try getting our priorities straightened out and fix this ridiculous military budget. When you're spending 7 times more money than the second largest military spender, something has gone awfully awry.

I don't know

I experienced something today that happens very few times in some one’s life; everything before me crumbled. Meaning and purpose were lost as I became overcome with hopelessness. The experience was a culmination of events from the last few weeks, or months, or even years. 

I will start at the beginning of today though, because it seemed to be the catalyst for everything I have experienced in the last 12 hours. I was in my German class and the professor was talking about how upset she was that a bill proposed, I presume by Democrats, was shot down. It sought to require grocery stores to charge 5 cents for every plastic shopping bag some one used. How terrible, a step towards a cleaner world and sustainability at the price of carrying compact and light reusable bags. Immediately there was outrage. What kind of world would we be living in when the government made such ridiculous laws. “Its not the place of the government to regulate businesses and destroy plastic bag making companies.”

Even after the professor explained that a similar law had existed in Germany her entire life, and that she could not recall herself nor her mother ever once using plastic bags and paying the 5 cents, so many seemed to outraged. They refused to even acknowledge the idea.

Later today I found myself skimming through news articles on the CNN.com website. Why? Because I’m a ultra left wing nut job. No, because it just happened to be the links that show up on my google home page. All three articles were on politics, and none of them seemed controversial really. Yet when I scrolled to the user comments, almost every single one was bashing the article and the journalist. I found myself baffled that so many people took so much time out of their day to go to read news from sources they already hate and despise, only so that they can attack everything about them.

It was at this point that everything began to fall apart for me, that I was truly in awe at the state of the country, the government, and the political environment. Everything I saw today, everything I have seen in the last year really, has slowly eroded my faith. People no longer listen to what politicians say. Their opinions on every issue are made up before the know what the issue is, their arguments are formulated by bombardment. Bombardment from political parties, buzzwords and catch phrases that can be easily regurgitated over and over until the other side gives up. 

What can I say to this, what can I do? I am in a constant political state, everything I see in the world is something worth considering, worth analyzing. I am not a Republican and I am not a Democrat. I am not a conservative and I am not a liberal. I am a rational human being, analytical and skeptical. The unfortunate result of this is that the opinions I form and defend are corralled together with the “left.” I am labeled by all and my opinions matter only to those who agree with me. Every time I open my mouth, type into a chat box, or write an essay, I am already judged and my opinions become worthless.

Meanwhile I examine this country, and I am overcome with an unbearable sadness. The common good is dead and with it the “American dream,” the “city upon a hill,” and every other sad cliché that has described America. Do people even understand their beliefs anymore? I can’t tell. I find myself surrounded by white, middle to upper class kids who think the world starts with them and only moves up. The poor are a small part of our country and are poor because they are lazy and make no effort. Even if this were true, there is no justification for just leaving them for dead. And since it is not true and so many people are impoverished in our nation for reasons they cannot help, it is all the more painful to see so many people so utterly apathetic to these problems.

Our country is falling apart and the best argument I can get is that its falling apart because the government needs to get out of people’s lives. That we need an unregulated economy. That we need lower taxes and to compensate we need to cut more social welfare programs, while we let our budget be consumed by the military industrial complex, a relic of World War II. Terrorized into thinking that everyone who does not agree with our cultural values is an enemy that must be killed or converted. I say all of this knowing that those who I wish to persuade are the ones least likely to give this any thought. That they have already rejected me because I do not agree with them and am therefore wrong by default. Why do I try, why do I do anything? I see nothing but personal attacks and insults. I am not perfect, and I do lash out. But I have the decency to apologize most of the time.

In all of this, I still have failed to explain the emotions I feel today, the despair. The common good is dead and there is nothing I can do to resuscitate it. Discussion and cooperation are dead and replaced by ignorance, ignorance to everything different. Merit is irrelevant today. All that matters is what party you claim to be. What can I possibly hope to salvage from this mess?