As I get older I find myself pondering this question more and more, " Where is American society headed towards?"
There's been a lot of sad and tragic news involving guns.
We spent more money on a war that will take nearly 50 years to pay back.
America is indebted to China. Gosh knows how much.
It's sad to see that the morality of our younger generation has been reduced to heart felt conversations in 140 characters or less (Twitter), connections on Facebook, and bullying has been taken to new heights due to the internet. Mental illness has taken center stage yet nobody in congress wants to stand up and make changes to help people in need.
Due to lack of investment in cultivating our nation's future, we see money being spent carelessly on the military overseas while our war veterans are suffering on our soil. And they want to tell us that cutting military spending will make it worse for these military vets and families. But in actuality the money is going to the outsourced military contracts...not these people who are using the equipment to fight these wars.
In my high school economic class my teacher said, "If there's anything you need to know about the US economy it's this: When America spends more money on butter then life is good for everyone. When it spends more money on guns life is bad." Butter stands for investments in infrastructures, education, programs to help everyone, offering more money to each of the states to sustain and build needed programs for people of all ages. Guns = military.
Now there's this talk of the fiscal cliff, and quite frankly the bottom line of the matter is this: We need to start paying back the deficit. It's going to hit everyone hard, but the middle and lower class cannot continue to carry the brunt of the deficit issues passed on by those who only served lobbyists and the wealthy population. We need to stop outrageous military spending, and allocate it to badly needed programs the states can use to help their residences with. We need to save our education system. We need trade schools and college educations to be more affordable.We need to help our people who suffer from mental illnesses. We need to close tax loopholes that benefit corporations and the wealthy. We need to keep semi-automatic and automatic guns away from those who are not fit to use these. We need to offer universal health care. As tax paying citizens we should be able to see that our basic needs can be taken care of, as also it's a level playing field for those who want to pursue their career and personal aspirations. That is the American dream, right?
However, the rich think they did everything without the government's help and now the government wants to take their money for no good reason. The poor are losing hope and as a result, they are moving towards more desperate measures to escape their harsh realities through drugs and alcohol. Mental illness programs have plummeted so low that most of the time these state run facilities just drug these people up instead of dealing with the issues at hand.
A lot of these things feel like short-term duct taped solutions.
And it worries me. It's a bit sad to see our country in this state. I don't think my parents escaped Vietnam to see their kids and future grandkids struggle. However, what can we do? The christians say we need more God, the gun advocates says we all need guns everywhere, the rich people say they need to be taxed less so they can create more jobs for those out of work. And then there are those who are saying the very opposite of this. It's all very confusing.
Throughout all of this, I still have hope for a brighter future. It starts with the family and friends you surround yourself with. It starts by saying hello to your neighbors and taking the time to remember names and faces of those around you. It starts with putting away your cell phone or iPad and connecting with a person face to face. It starts by limiting your escapism methods whether it is too much tv, internet, texting, or drugs and alcohol and embracing life completely sober, fully awake, and fully aware. This way everyone around you can embrace the goodness of butter. And Butter makes everything better.
