And this is more of because we didn't do the ounce of prevention years ago, we now are at the point where we need pounds of prevention and tons of cure. And yes there has been some attempt to do something, but the attempt was all in wrong vain and never really created a prevention aspect.
This problem is now so huge and so underdiscussed it is absolutely scary. This is the problem of poverty in this country. There is so much on the horizon with this problem that poverty is now one of the biggest threats to our democracy. I will come back to this point later. And I do promise some positive ideas eventually too.
If you have read any of my previous posts you know I am not a fan of either democrats or republicans. And the situation with poverty in our country is to me a glaring example of failed policies by both our political parties. The current situation in our country represents why the political process not the constitution needs to be changed.
Remember the phrase war on poverty. We were going to wipe out poverty, yes a grand and noble gesture, but never took into account we are a capitalist society so there is always going to be winners and losers. This is something we can work with, but you need to remember if you choose this path you still have to treat all with complete respect and never let them become losers on a permanent basis. Opportunity must always exist for all and this is something we have prided ourselves on as a country. We have failed to meet this contract with ourselves.
First lets look at the democrats way of thinking. Another well known phrase can be used to highlight the democratic failure. You can give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach him to fish and he eats for a lifetime. We have failed to teach. Yes there are some government programs out there, retraining etc, but so little is put into this you really cannot see what we are doing. Democratic policy has been an overabundance of feeding for the day. This leads to over spending, over reliance on the government, taxpayer angst, and engrained generational poverty. Also a sense of hopelessness grows out of this and this hopelessness is adding to the current disaster facing our country because of poverty.
Republican policy has been more of leave people in poverty to their own devices, if they want out they will find a way out. A man must pull himself up by his bootstraps. And there have been a few examples of people doing this. Way too few, and this thinking does not take into account that once poverty becomes generational it is hard to instill a sense of pride in oneself to actually do this. For a person to overcome less he needs more (not money)support to find his way.
Yes the two paragraphs above are somewhat simple discussions on what has gone on over the past fifty years since we declared war on poverty, but state the simple truth neither party has responded to really trying to win the war. Democrats have created a financial burden on the American taxpayer that the Republican party uses to rally its base to vote, but has no policy of its own to actually do something so the mantra we want less taxes wins votes but loses a war we need to win.
Any why is it so important to win. Well for many reasons, first we are a nation based on priniciples of treating people equally, we all have rights, a Nation of Christian ideaology that all people have dignity, terms like inalienable rights, life liberty and the pursuit of happiness, etc is what we based our constitution. We added amendments that added even more value to this and continually as a nation find ways to make sure none are left out. Well that is what is on paper. An aside here, I find the current group of people calling themselves conservative severly lacking in the values we hold dear to our nation. Isn't the route word of conservative to conserve, so what is conservative in America, something that needs to be discussed, but will do at another time. Big difference between being conservative and being right wing.
Another reason to worry about the war on poverty is much more pressing to our nation. I am talking current way of life, long term of our nation, our constitution (it fails if we fail), and the future for our children. How you may ask. Have you ever noticed that social scientists are really good at coming up with a name for the problem, well I haven't seen one yet for the situation I am trying to describe, but sooner or later you might get a term. First a bit of history to try and put this in perspective.
Over a hundred years ago this country was under the European immigration wave. The different groups would tend to gather in the same neighborhoods, some of the assimilation we have today hadn't occurred yet. These neighborhoods were sometimes run by leaders that well had questionable intents, some even developed organized crime that ran the neighborhoods. These neighborhood leaders were then able to deliver votes etc to certain politicians and so a power structure developed. Over time assimaltion weakened this base and we grew into the 20th century with a much broader electorate. Nothing ever became perfect, but the political power of some the early immigration bosses dissapated. A larger electorate helped to develop a national government that could focus on national policy. Yes even the war on poverty initiative. Also better education possibility, more opportunity for all etc started to evovle.
So how does all this affect us now. Imagine a reversal of this effect that creates localized politics run by drug lords, crime lords, gang leaders, etc that now are much more sophisticated, the people that live in the areas have much less hope than the immigrants that came over in the 19th century and you can start to imagine where we might be headed. Large tracks of this country run by fuedal lords that hold nothing of our values in their thinking. People in poverty now run by gangs that control their very way of life. Our belief in education, religion, our constitution, our way of life, non existent.
Some of you may think this is an extreme example, unfortunately I am telling you that this is already developing way too fast for our country's good. If you cannot see how much poverty has progressed in our country especially with the last economic disaster than you really need to get out more. Quite frankly your ignorance is appalling. And currently the democrats inability to figure out how to be productive with our tax dollars and the Elite Republican leadership who tell you; that if your 401k is good everything is good and you should just stick your head in the sand, is dividing this country not into a have vs have nots, but a much more chilling future of lawless sections run not by what we value, but indivudual fiefs run by ruthlessness and lawlessness.
If we continue on with a lack of productive fight with this problem we lose this war and that means the country. Poverty now is much more of a threat than terrorism (it will create a whole new type of domestic terrorism), Iran, North Korea, or even China. Yes these foreign policy problems are real, but poverty is the cancer within that is killing us. And the tumors are huge right now. You can say I am overplaying this, but really if you cannot see this by now you are severly ignorant, need to get out more, and really need to realize you are grossly mislead about what is going on in our country. You cannot sit back and have people tell you things are okay if you vote for me and buy this much longer without hearing how they are going to solve this problem. If you consider yourself patriotic, a true American then you need to press the President and Congress to address this problem with the zeal we say we put into everything else we do.
Now what can we do, well if you have read this far you are probably as tired of this subject as a person can be. I know just whining about a problem doesn't solve it. There are solutions out there. Along with everything else I know I am not bringing up anything new with this subject, but trying to get your attention. The crux now is that we have let this cancer grow for so long that curing it will be expensive, time consuming, even emotionally draining, and will become a political nightmare. Winning the war of all things though will actually help our economy, show the world that democracy is still the best form of government out there, reinstill within ourselves what it truly means to be an American, define correctly what conservative is, and redirect much of the world to find solutions to remove tyrants etc from other countries. Basically the benefits of winning the war on poverty grow exponentially for the whole world.
So solutions? I hope to be bringing some to you, but you can actually research yourself, it is a topic well written about. I do have some thoughts and like some of my other thoughts better taxation policy, better revenue creation, and better opportunity are some of the answer, but not all. There are some deeply ingrained problems that will need to be overcome with attitudes, both by the poor and the upper middle class to solve this problem. The middle class is slowly being eaten by the problem that is causing the destruction of values in areas of poverty. And we will have to fight fire with fire at times.
Look for future posts that talk about this and the next topic should be about taxation policy not necessarily on solving poverty but addressing an attitude that is causing poverty to being a much larger problem than poverty itself.
What I hate is that I am never near a computer when all these ideas come racing into my mind so I try later to recreate what I originally want to say and it never comes out they way I wanted or originally processed it. So the above is more scattered than I wanted, but holds the gist of it.
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