We are a nation that has historically abhorred the notion of royalty. We rejected that crazy man in the 18th Century, whose goal was to make, keep and control us through taxation, fealty, and loyalty to a distant crown.
We rejected, as a matter of survival, the notion of the top owning all and the middle being none, with the poor and the rich making up a simple two tier society. It happened after the Great Depression, and those born in those times grew up to be the Greatest Generation. That Generation fought World War II, and thought they defeated the Nazis, the fascists, the control grid that was national socialistic in character, and the results were a number of genocidal campaigns. We rejected the policies that brought about the Holocaust, an horrific period that is not further relevant here.
At the end of World War II, we felt and embraced peace. For a few years, we had no war, almost. But upon establishing the large standing army, the Defense Department, the Defense Industry and the Weapons Makers as the huge, and ever growing portion of our economy, we embarked upon policies that have kept this nation at perpetual war.
We paid no attention to the speech of President Eisenhower when he counseled against perpetuation of the Military Industrial Complex, and let it grow baby, grow.
We also bought into Oil as a limited resource, despite huge evidence to the contrary of abiotic oil, as found by the Russians in all sorts of places that shouldn't have any black gold flowing in any pipes.
We have purchased as a nation, many notions that now appear quaint in retrospect, but which still hold sway with a huge number of our fellow countrymen. We still have racism, sexism, and a slew of national bogeymen. Or bogey-women.
Yet our greatest enemy is not the one under the bed, the scarcity in the fuel tank, or the notion that America is the policeman of the world. Not of themselves, that is. Our greatest enemy is taking from Americans to build other economies while neglecting the very foundations of our nation.
We mistake assisting others to achieve a representative government, with the control of those nations as colonies of Empire. We mistake our fights as "for democracy and freedom" as our freedoms are eroded here at home and those abroad are also less able to govern themselves because our assistance, wanted or not, comes at a price. That price is debt.
Same here at home. Debt is our Master, we are its slaves.
Here in the "Homeland," a distinctly odious phrase to those with ears that hurt when National Socialistic phraseology enters the American lexicon, the top 1 percent own more than the bottom 40 percent. The top 5 percent, own most of what the bottom 80 percent otherwise claim. And that is my setting forth shrinking statistics for the bottom end only. The top is growing like Topsy. Economically that is.
Our formerly industrial economy is turning into a service economy, where the only service is to make money for the money makers. Debt service, insurance, banking, and other financial related services are what we do these days. As the greatest debtor nation in history, our government is an ever growing part of the economy.
Recent bailouts and 'nationalizations' of industries have made the government the largest employer or controller of parts of the economy. Health care, auto, banking, securities, and many other industries are now owned by, controlled by, or so regulated by the government as to be government run. Add to that the offshoring, the exportation of jobs to lower wage areas and you have the run for the money taking jobs from our own home areas, our "homeland," to feed the top of the top of the top.
That top of the top is like the top of the cake. And let them eat cake is the operative phrase.
What the top tier, and the bottom tier, do not openly communicate is this one fact. The top tier of the cake cannot be at the top without the support of the lower layers. The masses, forming the lower tiers of the American cake, support the top layer, just as the larger lower layers support the capstone of the pyramid.
They cannot stay up there without us. They need us and our money to make their money.
And how do we flip this upside down distribution of wealth, to get a larger share of the wealth to flow to the supporting layers without resorting to communistic or socialistic systems? Look back at what happened before the Greatest Generation became the Greatest Generation.
Back then, we had projects that built that which cannot be outsourced. We built roads, bridges and infrastructure. Sure it is the unglamorous part of building, with the fripperies and finishes being so much more fun to contemplate and far more beautiful to the eye.
But, our infrastructure is failing. Floods warnings are nearly a weekly event in the Chicago area. Bridges have fallen, basements have flooded, dams have burst. Others are at risk for us all.
What will you do when the only road to the grocery is blocked because a bridge washed out? How about that ambulance you need if you are injured or sick? You don't need to be injured in the actual falling bridge situation to be adversely affected by infrastructure failure.
We must demand that our government take some of the money they lavishly spent on bankers in those massive crises of the past years and put it into building the very foundations that are now in disrepair due to age and neglect.
These are not things that can be brought in from China. No one across any ocean can go to work there and build a sewer pipe in Iowa. Can't happen. Location, location, location.
Let us not despair and do the handwringing over the lavish expenditures of celebrity weddings and faux royalty being feted at celebrations.
Rather, let us celebrate a rebuilding of the nation. Starting at the foundations, let us build the piping, roads and structures that make this nation great. Using American workers, let's get off the bailout bandwagon and get on the building of American back to her status of a first nation among the top of the best. We did it in the 30's and can do it again.
We know, as Americans, that our nation, our sovereign nation, is to be protected as a discreet nation, not a member of a global government. We don't want the world as our nation, we want our borders kept legally, our people as our people, and what is 'over there' to stay over there. We, as Americans, want to rebuild the American economy, and if we need to prop up our infrastructure as a first step in rebuilding our vanishing industry, then let's do it.
Forget international banksters. Keep the money here. Use our labor to make our nation great. Forget about all the CAFTA, NAFTA, GATT and other multi-national, sovereignty sapping treaties that have weakened our economy, and let's build what we know how to build best. American engineers and industries made the best roads since Rome. Let us not let the failures of our infrastructure kill off this great nation.
Let us pull back from our Imperial ambitions as the New Rome, and become the New Home Nation. Houses, like nations, must both be built on strong foundations. We've got money for bankers, so transfer some of that to infrastructure, and infuse the economy with work to rebuild what we have sadly neglected too long.
This will put people to work, which itself creates more jobs. As we build, demand for more grows. Building builds economies. Simple stuff. Let's pick up that shovel, and get going!
No comments:
Post a Comment