What a World It Could Be

The United States is my country. I have spent about 10 hours outside of the borders in my 55 years. I did some research about my country which I thought was very interesting. These are the things I found out.

According to the Heritage Foundation, in partnership with the Wall Street Journal, two bastions of left wing thinking, since the break up of the Soviet Union, the United States is the third most populous nation, behind China and India.

The United States ranks 10^th in the world in economic freedom.

The United States ranks 19^th in the world in property rights.

The United States ranks 22^nd in the world in freedom from corruption.

The United States ranks 133^rd in the world in fiscal freedom.

The CIA Factbook, another bastion of liberal philosophy, found:

The United States ranks 7^th in the world in literacy.

The United States ranks 27^th in the world in mathematics.

The United States ranks 22^nd in the world in science.

The World Health Organization, those kooky main-stream doctors, found that:

The United States ranks 49^th in the world in infant mortality rate.

The United States ranks 50^th in life expectancy.

The United States ranks 1^st in healthcare spending.

I think the United States ranks near the top for viagra and cialis sales also. Many men suffer from low T and many women want their men to have more testosterone. Americans don’t want nature to take its course where testosterone is concerned. Nature is the purview of cancer and abortions, especially for the uninsured. Otherwise, if you pardon the metaphor, we’re not getting much bang for the buck with our healthcare spending.

Finally, the United States ranks 1^st in the known universe in prisoners per capita.

We have 20% more prisoners in this country than the 2^nd most country, which is Russia. We have more than double the amount of prisoners per citizen of Grenada, Poland or Costa Rica; over triple the prisoners in Jamaica, Israel or Brazil; over four times the prisoners in Spain, Australia or China; over six times the prisoners in Argentina, Germany or France; over ten times the prisoners in Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway or Japan; finally, over 20 times the number of prisoners in India, United Arab Emerites and Cuba. Why? To paraphrase Maude (Ruth Gordon), the United States so loves a cage; birds, cats, dogs, zoos, even humans. You got a problem with that?

The question I've pondered is, are we the greatest country on earth? In the sense that Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey’s Circus is the greatest show on earth, I suppose the United States is the greatest country on earth. If you don’t allow facts to cloud the issue, it could be true. If you’re a citizen of the United States, and not in prison, enjoy the fantasy of world superiority.

I would love to live in the greatest country on earth. It’s not that I’m rooting against the United States. In baseball, I’m a Colorado Rockies fan. I love that team. I want them to be the best team. I would have to be absolutely delusional to believe the Colorado Rockies are the greatest baseball team. To a much lesser degree, the same is true for the United States.

Let me illuminate some of the problems we have as a country. I am not suggesting any solutions. It's my prerogative as a Republican not to discuss solutions. I have suggested and will continue to suggest solutions in other blogs, other discussions and other dimensions. 

There may have been a time when the United States was the greatest on earth, sometime in the 20^th Century. Now, in the 21^st Century, with our problems in education, healthcare and the economy, we’d struggle to break into the top 10. We are wealthy. Does wealthy translate to great? Is it possible to be wealthy and not great? I think so.

Great starts with free. There are many countries as free as the United States including Japan, Canada, England, France, Spain, Italy, Brazil, Switzerland, Denmark, Norway and Australia, to name a few. By one estimate over 90% of the people on earth live in a free society. Freedom is not a big problem for the masses.

To be certain, the United States of America is a great country, but not the greatest and certainly not the freest. We have great things about us as citizens and great resources as a nation, however we are wasting them. We are not capitalizing on all the wonderful things we have. The blame can be put on Congress, both parties, which is one of the only things in Congress that is bipartisan.

We need to work on solutions for infant mortality, not just pay insurance companies. These companies have no incentive to minimize infant mortality, cancer, diabetes or any of the ills of our country. Their incentive is to not pay for these problems because the bottom line for insurance companies is the bottom line. Health insurance companies need to be extinct because there are much better ways to solve health issues, and cheaper.

We need to work on solutions for education, not just allow the government, local or national, to cut funds. We need more and better teachers; more and better schools; not less of either. We need to be spending the last of our trillions of dollars on educating ourselves. Otherwise, those trillions will not grow because education is the root of economic growth. There is an unquestionable and explicit correlation between education and economic growth.

We need to work on solutions for the poor, not just allow them to be jobless, homeless and malnourished. We need to employ, house and feed our populace. The citizens of a nation is its greatest resource and should be the focus of its investments. A great country employs, houses and feeds its citizens. Everyone that wants these should have them. Not just 91.9% but everyone.

The United States is a great country; just not the greatest country. If we stop being a country of politicians, if we stop being a country of bi-polar political parties, maybe we can sit down to talk to each other. Then maybe we can come to some small agreements; then larger and larger agreements. Then maybe we can finally, once again, become the greatest country on earth.

Christian Right.....or Wrong

I don't believe the Christian Right knows or understands Jesus Christ at all. They don’t practice what he preached. They don’t do what he did. They most certainly aren’t willing to suffer as he suffered. Here in the twenty-first century, Christian is simply a moniker that has no relationship with the person or preachings with which it is synonymous.

My grandmother was a big fan of all things Catholic. She believed in God, Christ, the Bible, saying the Rosary, the whole shebang. If she were more mobile, I think she would have made pilgrimages to the Promised Land. I would often come home to see her praying the rosary at the dining room table or in her bedroom. We would have conversations about who Jesus was, what he preached and mostly why he died. It still makes no sense to me why he couldn’t have simply died of old age after a long and successful life of preaching the word, but that’s another blog entirely. Concerning this one, I understand what he said and what he meant, at least according to my dearly departed grandmother.

My grandmother believed in Catholicism so much, that the priest that eulogized her said one of the most amazing things I had ever heard a Catholic priest say. He told the listeners that if my grandmother was not in heaven right then, with Jesus Christ himself, then he and everyone in attendance had no chance of going to heaven. That’s how much a Catholic priest who couldn’t even speak Italian – my grandmother only spoke Italian – understood what Jesus meant to my grandmother. 

The Christian Right, particularly the Tea Party, aren’t interested in knowing the Jesus my grandmother knew. They don't believe the things my grandmother believed. They can't. Are you hungry? Get a job. Are you sick? See a doctor. Are you poor? Get a better job. It’s all so simple, these solutions should have occurred to me. I guess they didn't occur to me because I'm Christian in a non-Christian way.

What ever happened to feeding the hungry and comforting the sick. I don’t remember anywhere in the New Testament where Jesus said feed the hungry unless they refused to get a job. I’m also guessing that Jesus would have found the very idea of the Healthcare Industry being for profit to be the most unchristian thought in the universe.

Another thing; ninety-nine percent of the people I have ever met would rather work and support themselves than ask for a handout. Does the Christian Right actually think people are unemployed because they would rather monitor Drew Carey and Vanna White’s career than go to work?

Most people don’t understand the teachings in the New Testament. When Jesus talked about the Good Samaritan, that was a person from Samaria. Samaritans were heathens; people not respected in Christ’s day by the holy rollers to whom he was preaching. It was shocking in those times in the Middle East that a Samaritan would stop to help a stranger. You might as well believe an atheist would help you out in this day and age.

My understanding is that Jesus didn’t ask for health insurance when he comforted the sick. He didn’t ask people for work cards when he gave them fish and bread to eat. While he said the meek shall inherit the earth, he had more than a few choice words about the rich. In the New Testament, Jesus is supposed to have said it would be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than a rich man to enter the gates of heaven. If you believe in heaven, that's pretty powerful stuff.

My question is, does the Christian right read the New Testament? Do they know the stories of Jesus, what he did in his last three years and what he actually believed? I’m not so sure they do. As a matter of fact, I doubt that most Christians have read the New Testament and actually know what Jesus preached according to it. But if they do know, I say Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.