I can appreciate your passion, "c". For the record, let me state that you and I most likely agree on a number of seminal issues, some of which you raise in your courageous soliloquy, such as:
-a concern over partial-birth abortions as a means of birth-control (thought I'm not sure that it is used as such...hence, I withhold judgment);
-that a climate of moral nihilism and lack of educational standards (no, not lack, but a set of standards that defy the laws of logic) have, in part (and only in part...for I also hold the impotent and too-often insensitive religious community to blame for this) set the stage for the sorts of irrational acts of violence against innocents we have seen in recent times;
-that the leaking of military secrets and strategies is a grievous offense to national security (for good reason Dante consigned traitors to the lowest bowels of his hell)...
But from that common ground we begin to part ways.
For the record:
-the Democrats are right about the NRA and the tobacco industry;
-Naomi is right about masturbation: it beats teen pregnancy and STD's any day of the week;
-my own "wallet" is a lot fatter under the Democrats than it ever was under the Republicans;
-and whether we have a Republican or a Democrat in the WH, one thing is certain: we will never be able to maintain our present economic success without maintaining, and improving upon, three things in our culture:
a) (and I think we agree on this): ambition for the highest and best, which is best fostered in an environment of freedom, creativity, and opporunity;
b) discipline and self-restraint, which our culture at large lacks but which is evidenced in certain sectors of the business community, namely, those which still produce, through hard work and intelligence, good value for money;
c) institutional compassion (and here is likely where we part company), which we sorely lack across the board. By this I mean: universal healthcare (it is a positive sin that of all developed nations we rank at the bottom for healthcare coverage for children and low-income families); a restructuring of our judicial system, along with a re-thinking of capital punishment (which keeps us completely out of step with the rest of civilized society...i.e. we are the only industrial nation still to harbor this gruesome medieval legacy); and the eradication of our gun-crazed culture at all levels, by whatever means necessary (again, we are very far behind the rest of civilization on this!).
But hey, keep your dream alive. Sometimes, dreams are all we've got...
TC |
