Compassion and justice: Are we so fearful of losing any of our toys that we conveniently forget our Christian principles? Are we so insecure that we are scared of competing in our laissez-faire economy, with the poor inner-city and immigrant workers?
If not, we need to upgrade the educational system for all of our people. Our brand of capitalism requires fresh infusions of creativity and innovation, to keep ahead of the rest of the industrialized world. Without universal participation, America will be short of intellectual capital in the ongoing competition between industrialized nations, for scarce resources and investment capital.
Principles and stability: Conflict theory is a tried-and-true social hypothesis for society, but it is only stable if individuals can utilize upward mobility by hard work, education, creativity and/or innovation. Theoretically, the uneducated and immigrants fill the bottom rungs of society, while their children become socialized and upwardly mobile.
Our future and hypocrisy: America has lost a great deal of its good will around the world, so we cannot afford to lose our economic leadership role. Regretfully, we have lost our rose-colored glasses and have been forced to acknowledge our hypocrisy. Our gigantic foreign aid is usually dependent on a country purchasing arms from us. Our rejection of the Kyoto Accords, missile nonproliferation pact and rewriting the Geneva Convention, are damning enough. But our stipulation to be exceptions to the World Court, and our historic support for bloody dictators, just so the Third World country is stable for our multinational corporations to invest in, has demonstrated our hypocrisy.
Capitalism and materialism are great economic systems, but the Chinese have an excellent saying: “All things in moderation.” Greed and power hunger rule corporate America, and their lobbyists presently rule the Congress of the United States. It is up to “grass roots” citizens to vote for idealistic and honest politicians of whatever party, who will nurture this land and its people.
Dave Gebhard
Lakeport
