Needs vs. Wants!

 I love oversimplifications. They encourage generalizations. That was one.

In an item I read the other day, a chap from Norway compared his life there to what it was like when he lived in the U.S. for a few years. He noted that he had had heart bypass surgery in Norway that kept him in the hospital and rehab for a few weeks, for which there was no charge. Not unusual in most countries. He complained that they billed him for the parking garage.  

He opined that his government provides what people need. People then pay for what they want beyond their needs. A gross generalization, but the point is made.  

The end of the year is a time for thinking about the old, contemplating the new, and imagining the what-could-be, a time for generalizations. 

Wander with me as I wonder. 

What if everyone in our country had access to great healthcare?  

• Would families with low-income sleep better at night because they know they and their kids would be treated well if they got sick 

• Would homeless people get the mental health care they need, would it lessen their stress 

• Would we not be ranked 35th in child mortality 

• Would we live longer; our average age would not be declining as it did again this year 

• Would medical care not be a political lightning rod 

What if anyone could get a college education, without going into debt?  What if those who wanted to learn a trade could do so without going into debt? 

• Would more people be better educated 

• Would minorities and low-income people have greater access to advanced education 

• Would more people become well-trained craftspersons to build and repair our buildings and equipment, make our machines, or run our factories  

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What if everyone had a decent place to live? 

• Could more families afford decent places to call home 

• Would fewer people be forced to sleep on the streets and in camps around our towns and cities, freezing to death in the cold 

• Could social workers be more effective if their clients were not worrying about where to sleep each evening 

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What if everyone had as much healthy food as they needed? 

• Would fewer children go to bed hungry or go to school undernourished 

• Would families be healthier if they had real food rather than relying on processed food 

• Would malnutrition be an issue in our country 

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What if children didn’t fear for their lives when they went to school?  

• Could parents send their kids to school each morning without wondering if they would ever see them again. 

• Could fire drills in schools be the norm rather than active shooter drills 

• Could guns on school campuses be a thing of the past 

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What if we all had cleaner air to breathe? 

• Maybe respiratory illnesses would decrease drastically 

• We could see the mountains surrounding our cities 

• Clouds of dark smog wouldn’t cover our view of the sky 

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What if everyone had access to clean water in their homes? 

• Maybe families could wash dishes without boiling the water first  

• Maybe families would not have to brush their teeth and shampoo their hair with bottled water 

• Maybe drinking water from the tap would become the norm again 

• Maybe people would be healthier 

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What if our political system worked for the betterment of the people, rather than the daily sound bite and Twitter feed? 

• Don’t get me started 

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Aren’t these just the basics we should expect and have for a good life? In many countries, they are considered human rights. (Maybe not the political thing)  

Someone is bound to ask – how do we pay for it? Won’t the taxes be too high? Aren’t the taxes already too high? One could also ask the government to spend our tax money on things we need before they spend it on things we want. 

Not to overgeneralize but ensuring the basic needs of life for all people isn’t impossible if we want that to be our policy. It isn’t a progressive idea or a socialist idea. It isn’t a liberal or a conservative idea. It’s a humane idea. 

Most states and cities decided long ago that we should be a country of the haves and have-nots. We wrote laws to make it such: single-family zoning, separate and unequal schools, excessive regulation, lack of affordable housing, failure to provide clean water, expensive public colleges, unregulated fossil fuel plants, and the like.   

It’s not an overgeneralization to say that we can do better!  

 

 

 Is it OK?

“…Once America decided killing children was bearable, it was over.”[i]

We, our nation, experienced another mass shooting last week. It happens all the time. The world looks at us and wonders; who are we, and why do we tolerate violence? We too wonder why. Nothing happens. We know the solution; we do not want to deal with it. Why?

A mass shooting is an event in which four or more people are killed by a gun. They happen all the time in the U.S. Not so much in other countries.

Through October, there had been:

·       662 mass shootings in the United States in 2022.

·       Six hundred seventy-one people killed

·       Two thousand six hundred sixteen people were wounded.[ii]

It is OK to kill people; it is the price we pay for our freedom we are told.

It is immoral, that is what it is!

There is something about a gun. What is it? It seems different today from years ago. Back then guns were for hunting, target shooting, or skeet and trap shooting. Dads took their kids to the rod-and-gun club to learn gun safety, Boy Scout camp taught gun safety and target shooting along with archery. It did not occur to people to use guns to kill people. Well, except for the gangster element.

A major study in 2015 by Adam Lankford of the University of Alabama found that the only correlation between a country’s rates of mass shootings is its rate of gun ownership.[iii]

·       The U.S has about 4.4% of the world’s population

·       The U.S has 42% of the guns[iv]

Politicians across the country tell us that something must be done because shootings are horrible. Ask them what they want to do about the shootings, and they take you on a trip to fantasy land. Most of the folks left of center want to implement all kinds of restrictions on ownership, knowing they will never be enacted. The folks right of center want to concentrate on the nation’s mental illness crisis, which does not exist. Few want to deal with facts or real solutions.

Those who oppose gun control want us to do something about the nation’s mental health issues to reduce the killings. Others want to add to police forces to reduce crime rates which they say will reduce killings. Study after study shows that:

·       The U.S. does not have mental health issues any greater than other nations

·       The U.S. does not have crime rates much different than other nations

·       The U.S. does not have people more evil than other nations

·       The U.S. has more guns than other nations and they are used more often to commit crimes.

We are told, most often by the NRA, that “Guns don’t kill people; people kill people.” That has a nice ring to it, for some. An alternative might be: “People use guns to kill people.” That may have a hole or two in the argument, but it makes a point.

If we want to stop the killings, we should consider who can own guns and who should not own a gun and the process by which a person can purchase a gun. Ideas like that run into some basic notions that we in the U.S. have about gun ownership, and varying interpretations of the Constitution.

Any proposed limitation on who can own a gun comes face to face with the “they are coming after our guns” catchphrase. There is some truth to that, but …

Let’s dig deeper. Ask ourselves - should felons have guns, should people with mental issues have guns, should those with criminal records have guns, should a spouse who abuses another have a gun, should a child molester have a gun? Should a person who is a danger to himself or herself have a gun? I think the answer to those questions is NO!

Our culture tells us that owning a gun is a God-given right. That makes us outliers in the pantheon of nations. The rest of the world takes the opposite view. In most countries, one must justify the need for a gun and go through an extensive process to prove that they are not criminals, abusers, or molesters and are mentally fit to have a gun. Then they must get a license to buy the gun. These background checks can take months. The point, however, is simple: do a background investigation before the purchase of a gun, not after.

Last week, the shooter at the Walmart store bought his gun only hours before he killed five people and injured many more. He was arrested a year earlier for threatening to bomb his mother’s home. The local sheriff did not implement Colorado’s Red Flag Law to prevent the person from buying a gun in the future and did not report it to the FBI National Crime Unit. The person’s name would not appear on a background check.

Texas recently passed a law allowing the open-carry of weapons without a permit. Other states allow anyone to own a gun and do not send crime reports to the national government so that they can be included in background checks. California has strict laws related to gun ownership. Yet, it reports a lower percentage of crimes to the FBI than forty-nine other states. Forty percent of law enforcement agencies nationwide fail to report crime data in a timely and complete way.[v]

In the last year, there have been seven hundred armed demonstrations in the U.S., and 77% of those were open carry.[vi] Understandably, school administrators and city officials feel intimidated when people show up at meetings in camo and rifles slung from their shoulders. The Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, and other white supremacists go beyond local events. They were leaders of the armed insurrection on January 6^th at the Capitol. Many members are now in jail or awaiting sentencing. They claim that they need the Second Amendment to protect their First Amendment rights. Hogwash!

Mass shooting after mass shooting brings the wringing of hands but no new laws. Few elected officials want to tackle the hard job of getting guns off the street, out of the hands of criminals, and away from the mentally ill. Irrespective of the Supreme Court’s ruling, the need to have a gun at home to protect the family is a myth.

At some point, before the country becomes more disjointed, Congress should deal with the issue. They should find a way to ensure that those who truly need guns and gun-sport lovers can have their guns, but they must also find a way to limit ownership to those who should not have one. They could start with baby steps:

·        Implement improved background checks before the purchase of guns

·        Outlaw assault-type weapons for personal use[vii

·        Outlaw guns that carry more than five shells

·        Limit the sale of bullets to fifteen or fewer except at gun clubs

·        Outlaw handguns except at gun clubs

·        Outlaw open-carry laws

·        Outlaw stores from advertising the sale of guns

·        Make licenses to own guns renewable every five years

We can eliminate the killing fields if we want to. These baby steps would put us on track to be as tough on gun ownership as most of the industrialized world. Why has it become OK to kill kids in their classrooms, partygoers in their clubs, Bible study groups in their churches, and people attending outdoor concerts? Why?

Perhaps the British journalist was right: “Once America decided killing children was bearable, it was over.

But it’s not OK!

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[i] Dan Hodges, Mail Commentator, June 19, 2015, on Twitter – Referring to the Sandy Hook school shooting “In retrospect…”

[ii] Wikipedia compilation

[iii] Max Fisher & Josh Keller, NYT November 7, 2027

[iv] Ibid

[v] FBI data – Axios November 25, 2022

[vi] NYT, November 2022

[vii] An assault weapon is a firearm that is chambered for ammunition of reduced size or propellant charge and that has the capacity to switch between semiautomatic and fully automatic fire. They are designed for and used by the military. Assault-type weapons are sold to non-military individuals and may vary in design to bypass various state laws.

Autocracy Blinked!

 There was one thing on the ballot in last week’s elections – Democracy.

Yes, there were real people seeking office, but they were stand-ins for the real issue. The candidates represented two very divergent views about America’s future, our way of life, and our institutions. In the end, we are still a much-divided nation on many counts, but more united about the importance of our democracy.

The U.S. Senate is split 50/49 with a run-off election to follow in December for the remaining seat. The House is nearly evenly divided, with leadership still in question. It may be another week before all the election results are tabulated.

 

In nearly every election, even in the “battleground states,” the losers called the victors and publicly conceded defeat. Civility returned to our election process. Sometimes the small things matter.

 

In the “battleground states” every “election denier” who ran for Secretary of State was vanquished. Republicans, Democrats, Progressives, and Independents, divided on so many issues, united to keep our election processes fair. Democracy prevailed.

 A couple of months ago the Supreme Court overturned a basic right that we believed had been settled fifty years ago. The court ruled that the Federal government did not have the authority to enact a law that allowed abortions because that right was not enumerated in the Constitution.

New voters registered by the hundreds of thousands across the country and then expressed their anger at having a basic right torn from them. In five states, voters approved state constitutional amendments and other laws that make abortion legal.

 Dobbs v. Jackson did more, however, than overturn perceived freedom. Two justices suggested that they would support overturning other non-enumerated rights based on the 14^th Amendment. That may suggest the possibility of overturning the right to gay marriage, contraception, privacy, and other freedoms we take for granted. It foretells a possible reworking of the Federal government’s relationship with the States.

Dobbs also puts stare-decisis into question. Our entire legal system is based on the idea that precedent is the compass for judicial rulings. What now?

Thirteen states passed antiabortion laws that took effect soon after the Court ruled against Roe v. Wade. Those laws will provide full employment for lawyers for years to come. It took fifty years for antiabortion supporters to reach the point where the courts were filled with sympathetic judges and justices. and it may take that many years to reverse the trend unless Congress codifies Roe into a national law.

The court’s reversal of Roe raises this question: If a court can tell a person what not to do with their body, can they tell them what to do with their bodies, which is the antithesis of freedom, as we have known it. Italy tried that approach. Napoleon tried that approach. Both needed more men to fight their wars. Both attempts failed.

 Our country has been tossed and turned in a not-so-good way in the last six years. Respect for our institutions was obliterated, our standing on the world stage diminished, and party loyalty was made more important than the common good and a court that demonstrated that basic liberties can be erased ever so quickly.

 David Brooks, a NYT opinion writer, speaks of the start of an effort to build a wall around the Nationalists’ effort to bring an autocratic government to our country. The people voted against extremism. In California, for instance, the proposition to enshrine the right to abortion in the Constitution is winning in districts where antiabortion candidates are winning: democracy over party.

The stakes were exceedingly high in this election because it was about the future of our democracy.

 Democracy won.

 

 

Your Vote, Your Democracy!

 There was a time when we all watched the same news. There were three or four channels available from which to choose your evening news and they all reported on the same things for the most part. The anchors were veteran journalists, not entertainers or mouthpieces for one political party or the other.

Today half the country watches and listens to two different sets of news and commentary, maybe five or ten, which results in a nation divided in its views of reality, and neither trusts the other. The divide is so great that too many citizens distrust our election process.

The young may be too young to know and the old may be too old to remember, but there was a time, long, long ago, when voting in the United States was easy for white folks but forbidden for other people. The people in power, especially in the South, tried to make voting inconvenient for those in the opposing party and impossible for Black people.

The Civil Rights Movement of the sixties put pressure on Congress to pass a monumental Civil Rights Act, intended to make voting fair and easy for everyone and to reinforce our national commitment to equality. Most people thought it settled the issue; it didn’t. We need another call to rouse our better angels, to make voting fair once again and easy for all, and to protect the bulwark of our democracy.

Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi chief of propaganda, told us that “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people eventually come to believe it and you will come to believe it yourself.”  Even a far-left activist, Saul Alinsky, tells us that “If you push a negative hard enough, it will push through and become a positive.” Far-right extremists in the U.S. have duped a large group of people that the last presidential election was stolen from President Trump, with all evidence to the contrary.

Fox News and conservative talk radio continue a daily barrage of misinformation that supports the “big lie” about a stolen election, about people from South and Central America being imported to replace whites as the ruling class, about non-Christians trying to change historical values, and educated elites trying to do who knows what.

In the upcoming mid-term elections, many people who deny the results of the last election are running for governor and for secretary of state. People in those positions are responsible for certifying elections. Democracy is being chipped away.

Television programs show videos of armed militia in camo and masks camped out at ballot drop boxes in Arizona. There are videos of militia taking pictures of voters’ license plates so that they can identify them by name and home address. Groups are calling for armed insurrection if their party loses the next election. That is intimidating, yet a federal judge has ruled that it is free speech and cannot be made illegal.

Members of Congress, judges, and families of politicians are being threatened daily. There were over 9,000 reported threats to members of Congress in 2021. Representative Debbie Dingell of Michigan and Senator Collins of Maine have both warned that the vitriol is so strong that “Somebody is going to die.”

In Nye County, Nevada, early voting has begun. The election department is forced to hand-count ballots because of the overwhelming belief that voting machines are programmed to favor one candidate over another. It is taking hours to count as few as 40 ballots. It could take days to determine who won close elections. In some states, people are asking for the hand-counting of ballots and an end to the use of voting machines.

In some states, extremists require the election offices to check the addresses of tens of thousands of voters. In other states voting hours are shortened, voting by mail is discouraged, and early voting is unavailable. These actions are designed to reduce people’s ability to vote and create a distrust of the voting process. It is a threat to our democracy.

Thousands of people in some states are trained to monitor those who monitor the voting process or count the ballots. including the opening of mail-in ballots, which could afford a view of a person’s voting choices. People who work at polling stations are being threatened and their families intimidated. It is on the news nearly every night.

The movement to make the voting process favor the minority of voters rather than the majority has been building for decades. Technology is one reason for the movement of large numbers of people from the small-town heartland to urban areas. Urban living draws the better educated, the better trained, and the more progressive risk-takers.

Urban living tends to be more diverse and inclusive than rural areas with smaller communities. Urban areas are more likely to accept different beliefs and viewpoints more easily than non-urban areas because they live with that diversity all around them.

A recent NYT research study found that in districts whose members of Congress were election deniers, there had been a reduction of the white population 35% greater than in other districts. For many, the loss of white power means the loss of a way of life. Many whites feel that diversity is a euphemism for replacing them. They need someone to blame. They are willing to follow those who articulate their plight.

It is one thing to disagree with another person’s position in an election. It is another thing when they try to discourage someone from voting. What results is a country in which about 50% of the people think democracy is at risk and the other 50% think that democracy is at risk, but for distinct reasons.

It's almost cliché at this point, but Benjamin Franklin was correct when he warned that the republic needed nurturing to maintain it. These mid-term elections aren’t so much about which candidate gets elected or which party wins the most seats in Congress. It is about saving our democracy. Each side thinks the other side wants to tear it down. You decide which is which. But vote for democracy or we won’t have it the next time.

THIRD WORLD?

 The world was divided into three groups after WWII.

The USA, the UK, the NATO countries, and their allies were termed First World. The Eastern Bloc, Russia, the Warsaw Pact, China, and their allies were deemed to be Second World, and the Third World was comprised of the Non-Aligned Movement[i] and their allies. Of course, it was the first-world nations that decided who was in second and third place!

At the same time, the third world is referred to as countries with extreme poverty. When you come of age, which school you attended, or whom you talk to on a regular basis may determine how you configure the world.

And Today - Definitions do not change overnight but they do evolve. What seemed appropriate eighty years ago, politically, or economically, is now thought to be insulting to those in the “lower” classes. So, now we refer to nations as developed and developing.

Developing - Mark Silver, in an op-ed piece for NPR last year, suggested that today, developing countries are those that need better healthcare systems, better schools, and better ways to bring water and electricity to their people. I would add the need to build more democratic systems of government to the mix. One can think of Nigeria, Kenya, Burkina Faso, Yemen, or Laos among the developing countries. But, who else?

Us - It is hard to conceive of the USA as anything but the most advanced of nations. We think of ourselves as the best, blessed to live in an exceptional place.

Yet too many of us have not left the state in which we were born or traveled outside our national boundaries, except to fenced-in island resorts, or on cruise ships to make that judgment. Much of the world has caught up to us or surpassed us in some ways.

What if someone told us we have lost our luster and are now part of the developing world? How would we react?

Developing- We are impressive compared to a lot of spots on the globe, no doubt about it. And yet, we do have some developing to do, don’t we?

·       We are a divided nation that needs to unify to remain a democratic republic. We are generally rated as the 15^th to 25^th most democratic country.

o   Many states are trying to take away people’s right to vote, making it harder to vote, while some candidates this year will not even commit to accepting the vote of the people in the coming elections

o   Nearly a million people are armed and ready to overthrow the government if their side does not win

·       We have a healthcare system often ranked 11^th in the world or 33^rd among wealthy countries.[ii] Our child mortality is rated at least 15^th in the world, or higher, depending on the source. Insurance companies do not want to cover pre-existing conditions, and serious sickness can result in financial bankruptcy. That doesn’t happen in other developed countries

·       We allocate healthcare based on a person’s employment or wealth. We need to change that.

·       Political hacks are trying to convince school boards to reform curriculum to their political views.

o   Teachers are afraid to teach the truth about our country’s history because it is against the law in some states to teach anything that would make white students uncomfortable

·       Over a million people in California do not have clean drinking water in their homes because the state is unwilling to spend the money to upgrade the infrastructure. Flint Michigan went years without safe water, Jackson Mississippi went weeks without clean water and people are afraid to drink it

·       Puerto Rico lost power nationwide in a recent hurricane because the electric grid and power plants were not brought up to standards after a hurricane five years ago.

 Slippery slope – For the most part, we were better once. The U.S. is still the most vibrant economy in the world. We invent technology that changes the world; we can do anything we set our minds to. But that is economics and technology, not democracy. Our democracy is on a slippery slope.

Bottom of the hill - No, we are not a third-world nation, but we have, in many areas, slipped into the developing nation status.

We need to fix our infrastructure, improve our educational system in many parts of the country, get college and university costs under control, and bring ourselves out of a 1776-bound country and into the world of the 21^st century.

We must convince people that our democracy is in peril and needs to be shored up. We could use some development here and there.

 Bottom line – Let us get out the vote in the next election. Let us vote against those who want to take away our rights. Let us vote against any new law that would make it harder to vote, or limit who can vote. Instead of voting for a party, let us vote for democracy.

 

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The Non-Aligned Movement consisted of 120 countries, including Yugoslavia, India, and Cuba who were not part of another bloc of countries.

[ii] OECD ranking. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development comprises 37 democracies that regularly shared economic and other data for decades. They rank U.S. healthcare 33^rd of the 37 countries. Our child mortality rate is 33^rd as well.