Sunday, June 22, 2014

American Dreams

Sometimes I wonder how many countries the U.S. has influenced and infected?
We've ruined Iraq and President Obama says they have to get their political shit together.
Our own country is in something of a dilemma as we cause chaos around the world and then tell other countries to "man up" even though we don't. This week we have seen Iraq taken over by ISIS and act like that's a big surprise. The NSA is collecting innocent Americans conversations and we are expected to think that what happened in Iraq is a big shock, like we don't have operatives over there who know what's going on.
Then there's the migration of tens of thousands of children fleeing El Salvador, Guatamala and Honduras. We have supported regimes in these countries for years. Then we are taken by surprise as people swarm into our country, we have an immigration crises and our leaders act like it just suddenly happened.
Meanwhile we have homeless children in our own country that we don't take care of.
 It looks like we are going to send $250 million dollars to Central America, in a desperate attempt to solve the refugee problem, then we blame gangs in Central America for telling people America's streets are paved with gold.
 Meanwhile we have spent $1 TRILLION on Iraq, a country that is now in shambles. Why are we so quick to spend money in other countries and no one bats an eye? Imagine if President Obama said he was going to spend $1 trillion on a domestic jobs program or education? I can't imagine what would happen if the President said he was going to earmark $250 million for food stamps. Congress and the Senate would be outraged, then they would do everything in their power to cry socialism and call on the free markets to save us.
It seems like there is little hope and even less political will to find common ground when it comes to taking care of our own people and our own country. It is more profitable to go elsewhere and dabble in other countries in order to extract some kind of profit, then we act shocked when things don't go our way. When are we going to "man up" and take care of America? Why do we cry about having sane gun control laws and we turn a blind eye to the carnage going on around us? We bail out banks and GM only to see that a completely ineffective company can't stop defects in the products it produces causing economic devastation and loss of life. There's always plenty of money to throw at other countries, or corporations, are any politicians going to argue with that? Or are they only interested in keeping ordinary Americans from having a decent life? 
 When are we going to find the will to say enough is enough and stop allowing "job creators" to offshore their profits? We have millions of Americans struggling and doing without, but all that's ok. It's the "American dream" to work two jobs, go without healthcare, never mind being able to afford going to the dentist. Whatever you do, don't complain and don't ask why.
This week, in yet another scandal that will go nowhere, Paul Ryan (R-Wis) told the I.R.S. commissioner that nobody believes the I.R.S lost thousands of emails. Americans are expected to save their records for seven years but it's ok for the I.R.S. to  just say "whoops"? The craziest thing is that I actually agree with Paul Ryan. If we could find some way to unify and demand that America starts taking care of it's own people and stop meddling in other countries, that would be an American dream come true.

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