I THINK . . .: The Government Cannot Solve Societal Ills

I THINK . . .: The Government Cannot Solve Societal Ills: Some people are convinced that the government could solve the problem of poverty, poor housing, inadequate medical care, a substandard educa...

The Government Cannot Solve Societal Ills

Some people are convinced that the government could solve the problem of poverty, poor housing, inadequate medical care, a substandard educational system, if it would devote more resources. I do not agree. I think the government is ill-equipped to solve any societal ills.  Remember when President Johnson began waging the war on poverty in the 60s?  Since that time, trillions of dollars have been spent on housing, food stamps, Medicaid, education, and welfare, yet the percentage of people who are poor is greater than when the war began and our educational system has failed all but the affluent.  We speak of "government" as if it is some computerized contraption that can be fed a problem and spit out a solution. We think of the government as if it was IBM’s Watson.

The government is made up of a bunch of people in Washington who sit around and ponder how they can line their pockets, get reelected, or how can they get a promotion. We might define a politician as one who will say anything or make any promise, to get elected.  They talk about change we can believe in while hiding what they believe in.   The only hope they deliver is the hope we will not discover who and what they really are.   These are the same people who broadcast their genitals via tweets. These are the people who think that a report that Medicare will be broke in 10 years and Social Security benefits will be reduced by 25% within the next 23 years is proof that the programs are in good shape. These are the people that pass a health care law which prohibits Medicare from negotiating prices with drug companies. These are the people that want 310 million people to have health insurance yet do nothing to increase the number of primary care physicians or bring down the cost of health care.  These are the people who must be led kicking and screaming before deciding whether to intervene in Syria before the November election because their courage to act only occurs during lame duck sessions. These are the people who will not reform an unfair tax code and would rather keep corporate profits overseas than expatriate them at a lower corporate tax rate. These are the people that tell us there is nothing wrong with borrowing 40 cents of every dollar spent or that the national debt is 16 trillion dollars when it is actually 54 trillion dollars.  These are the people who refuse to cut the level of spending that brought about the fall of Rome, the British Empire, and today is threatening the economies of Greece, Portugal, Spain, Ireland and Italy. 

It doesn’t matter who wins elections.  Consider the Black and Hispanic Congressmen in Washington.  They were voted in because it was believed they could represent the interest of their constituents, many of whom are disadvantaged. In the end, most of them have turned out to be no better than those they replaced.  Like all of Congress, these lawmakers have accumulated power and wealth, while their constituents are still poor, live in the most dangerous neighborhoods, have the highest rate of incarceration, the highest rate of unemployment, and attend the worse schools.   For two years following the election of Barack Obama, the Democrats had a filibusters proof Senate and a large majority in the House. Yet during this same time, there was no Buffett Rule proposed, no comprehensive immigration bill introduced, no attempt to pass the so-called Dream Act, no attempt to extend the minimum wage beyond the 2007 amendment which only provided for $7.25 per hour effective July 24, 2009, no attempt to extend the low interest on student loans beyond 2012, no attempt to rein in the high cost of prescription drugs, no real attempt to aid homeowners who were underwater on their mortgages in spite of the banks receiving almost a trillion dollars in bailout money, no attempt to end corporate subsidies, and, no stimulus money was used to put large numbers of people to work on any major rehabilitation of roads, bridges, rails, airports, or electric grids.  These are the people that want us to forget the past when they did nothing but remember to vote for them now when they can do nothing.

As for those employed by the government, these are the people who get into arguments with prostitutes in Columbia over the fee for services, who spend almost a billion dollars on team building retreats in Vegas and give out “jackass” awards in order for their meals to be paid by the taxpayers, who allow drugs to be smuggled onto airplanes in exchange for money and demand that old ladies remove their underwear, or who loss track of guns they have allowed to be run into Mexico, one of which was used in the death of a border agent. I once saw a definition of these bureaucrats as officials who work by fixed routine without exercising intelligent judgment.

No, the government cannot solve societal ills until principle starts to trump self interest and desire to hold on to power at any cost.  Unfortunately, all attempts at this have failed throughout history.   Perhaps that is why it is said that in the end we must take responsibility for ourselves and voluntarily take responsibility for our neighbor.

Recently, I was asked if the government has ever done anything right. I think there is one thing. From time to time the government has been successful in waging war. However, let us all hope that it never decides it can make the guns, bullets, tank, and other armament because there will not be enough room on that hill to which we will all have to run.

I THINK . . .: Is There An Antidote To Greed?

I THINK . . .: Is There An Antidote To Greed?: Does the Occupy Wall Street movement believe it has the antidote to greed? Is simply protesting the disparity in income and assets between ...

Is There An Antidote To Greed?

Does the Occupy Wall Street movement believe it has the antidote to greed? Is simply protesting the disparity in income and assets between the 1% and the 99% enough to overcome that age old deadly sin?  I suspect that most of us belonging to the 99% think the 1% are greedy but would trade places with them in a heartbeat. So why are we so upset that some people have a lot of money when so many of us wish we had it?   We tend to think of greed as one of those seven deadly sins which afflict only rich people.  However, if this was merely a disease suffered by the rich, it probably would not really qualify as a deadly sin since so few people are rich.  Greed is an equal opportunity affliction. Greed is behind just about every major crime committed in the world.  It has been the primary cause of every revolution since recorded history.  It has been the downfall of every attempt to create a utopian society.  It is ignited by the fear that we will not get something we want or we will lose something we have.  It is at the root of hoarding.  Even if we got what we wanted or we kept what we have, we would want more. Why, because in order for greed to sustain itself, it can never be satisfied.

Earlier this week, I was invited to attend a workshop on how to organize immigrants. Since immigration is not one of those issues putting me over the edge, I spent the first part of the workshop wondering why I was there. Once I thought about the fact that I had adopted a new approach to life called “do what comes next,” I decided to sit back and listen with the expectation that I would learn something.  I had been invited to attend this workshop by a woman who is very committed to empowering Latinos. Her commitment interested me more than the empowering. She was a young white woman from an upper middle class family who was certainly not reaping any great economic reward for her effort. Although she was employed by an organization helping immigrants, she was probably just making enough to satisfy basic needs. Yet when I looked at her I saw more than a woman committed to immigrants, I saw a woman waging a war on greed simply by her generosity.

I was glad I attended the workshop because I did learn for the first time just how the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) had created wide spread poverty in Latin America. This was the driving force for so many Latinos and Haitians coming to the United States after 1994.  Days later, two questions came to my mind: who benefited from NAFTA and why is the United States so attractive to immigrants from these third world countries?  I think the answer to both questions is money. Money in the abstract is like oxygen. It serves no purpose unless we use it, unless we spread it around. Money is the means by which we fairly exchange goods and services, and unless that fair exchange is going on, we are as poor as those immigrants who fled to the States. 

Greed is like a Catch 22.  If immigrants who have come to the United States are fortunate enough to get a job, they start buying those items manufactured in countries that have benefited from NAFTA. These are the same products that cost them their security in the first place.  But fair exchange is not going on here.  Money is simply creating more money because the quality of those goods and services is declining and bears little relationship to how much is spent on them.  The poorer the quality, the more money is spent.  Today, money has become another name for greed and everybody wants some or what it can buy.

A few years ago I was in a store shopping for Christmas. The prices were low because everything had been made in China or India. I remember thinking about the number of American jobs that had been lost but I kept on buying. I was championing free trade. Now that our factories have closed up and there are around 20 million people out of work, we are still buying goods made in India and China. We are told that our economy is dependant on our spending.  We are obliging and going deeper and deeper into debt.  But what if we stopped and put our greed on hold for just a little while and shared what we have with those who have less just as this young woman is doing. I think we would learn that generosity is really the  antidote for greed.  In this way, greed might just lose its place as number two on the list of the seven deadly sins.