2011 comes to a close and it could not be any sooner. That seems to be the view of many Americans. I for one cannot wait for this year to turn the page.
Where to start; that has been my issue with trying to generate a coherent essay on America and where it is going as a country. Not that I have been brain dead more like over stimulated.
In 1973 when I graduated college, America was fractured by the Viet Nam War and Racial strife. The 60’s were exciting but they took a toll on America and our way of life. From the year I was born the economy and the middle class grew and grew. That all ended when the troops from Viet Nam came home and since then the middle class has seen its wages stagnate. In real numbers the middle class saw its wealth grow by 40% over almost 40 years. The middle class has seen its ranks diminish year after year.
Where to start; that has been my issue with trying to generate a coherent essay on America and where it is going as a country. Not that I have been brain dead more like over stimulated.
Yesterday I was driving to have lunch with a friend and it just all came to me. Where is America going? What is our Point? So many questions and not enough time, for sure.
Just what are we doing? I listen to the politicians and I talk to friends and coworkers and I see two different worlds, two different dimensions.
In 1973 when I graduated college, America was fractured by the Viet Nam War and Racial strife. The 60’s were exciting but they took a toll on America and our way of life. From the year I was born the economy and the middle class grew and grew. That all ended when the troops from Viet Nam came home and since then the middle class has seen its wages stagnate. In real numbers the middle class saw its wealth grow by 40% over almost 40 years. The middle class has seen its ranks diminish year after year.
America has anywhere between 45 - 55 million people living in poverty. Do you know what it means to be below the poverty line? The poverty line is $22,000, for a family of four. Poverty Thresholds for 2010 by Size of Family and Number of Related Children Under 18 Years
In 2000 the United States had 40 – 45 million people living in poverty. The recession and the bank scandal have hurt the poorest of the poor.
Meanwhile the top 1% of wealthiest Americans has seen their wealth increase 275% over same time period.
I do not blame the Rich from getting richer. That has always been the case. I have heard “The rich get richer and the poor get poorer” since I was a little boy. I do blame the politicians for “Giving the House Away” as they say. The rich have been raiding the cookie jar for a long time. Just recently the personal wealth of the member of the Congress of the United States was published. All of the members of the Senate are worth over a million dollars. This is family money from spouses as well as their own money. The members of the Senate marry as well as they invest. In the House of Representatives, more than half reported income of more than a million dollars.
Our representative government has morphed into the exact type of government the colonist fought the War of Independence over. No, there is King but we have an awful lot of one class of people running the country and not a lot of that good old representation going on.
The rich have increased their wealth probable by good investments and a great deal of help from Washington DC. The problem as I understand it is very simple. The rich are living as Dylan Ratigan calls it a “Platinum Citizens.”
In the 1950’s during the Eisenhower Administration the rich paid an average top Federal Tax Rate of 91%.
Our country is being run directly and indirectly by the wealthiest Americans. The 1% is the most represented single group of people in America. It is very understandable that they should get the lion’s share of the benefits of that representation. They pay dearly for the right to have the deck stacked in their favor.
This single issue is at the core of America’s problems. Every issue in this country can be traced to Washington DC and the misrepresentation of a democracy. The money spent to keep the rich in power is killing our way of life.
Just who is representing the 90% of Americans who lost 8% of their wealth over the same period Congress saw their own person wealth go up by 75%? People laughed in 1988 when George H W Bush did not know what a scan reader was at the grocery store. They said he was out of touch with the American people. The reason he did not know about the scan reader was because he never went to a grocery store. Nothing has changed, if anything it is worse. How many time have you hear a politician say something so off the wall you wonder what they eat for breakfast. The average member of Congress does not understand how families living in poverty or for that matter how the middle class exist. There is no connection. When they go to bed and reflex on their day, the lives of the poor are not the first thing on their minds.
I do not like the direction the country is going. The stagnation between the two sides of the same coin in Washington is not just hurting the economy it is hurting everyone except the 1% The racism and hatred shown for Barack Obama is like what I remember about JFK and hatred some Americans felt for our first Catholic President.
My vision of our country is so much different than the view of many of the people looking to be president. I do not see a just America. I see two Americas and the differences are wider than ever.
I don’t want a president who only thinks in terms of bottom line profit and loss. I want a leader who is led by his heart and brain not how much money he was able to make as a banker. My value system does not see wealth as anything more than a means to an end. I have never been impressed with money.
Maybe it’s because I never had much or it could be my upbringing. I was always taught don’t take more than you need and leave the rest for someone else and that right there is my differences with the form of capitalism.
There seems to be always a winner and a looser. For every deal made where someone gains a financial advantage there is a looser. That is the nature of the beast. When an American company closes a plant or factory and sends the work to a third world country where workers make pennies it has an effect on all of us, every single America.
The disparity of wealth was brought to light to many Americans via the Occupy Wall St. movement, progressive news outlets some mainstream media. This ever growing disparity will end this Republic if not regulated. The first thing we can do as a country is "Get Money Out" of Politics.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dylan-ratigan/get-money-out-join-100000_b_983427.html
If we do nothing this year but "Get Money Out" on the ballot across America we may do the single most patriotic thing to straighten the direction of the country.
Happy New Year
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