If you have not noticed that there is an election pending in the Disunited States of America, it is not for lack of vast amounts of time politicians routinely divert from doing the jobs we pay them to do in order to raise ever more funds, $2 billion this time around. They actually believe that Money, if the form of TV sound bites, can convince (or is it confuse?) you on the limited issues they care to discuss. Well, it does seem that Money works, not on you of course, but on those with poor memories and for whom the Age of Enlightenment has yet to reach.
Dashed were my hopes that the four debates would correct all this and reveal promised in-depth actions carefully designed to tackle the many major problems we, and our world of which we are a small part, endure. I soon smelled conspiracy among the organizers, the media, and the debaters. The questions were limited and confined to few categories. Where were the presidents of the splinter parties? I rather like many of their arguments. What a criminal disgrace when Jill Stein and Cheri Honkala, president and vice president of the Green Party were arrested and handcuffed to chairs for over eight hours when they attempted to have a voice in one of the debates.
Debaters did talk about jobs which we can agree are vital but, like understanding the Higgs boson, the math eludes me on how to have an ever-increasing GDP in a finite world where Greed plays a dominant role. The current recession was started in this country and exported criminally overseas especially to Europe. The pain is not shared equally and my hearing was inadequate to understand how contesting parties plan to ease the hurt while explaining the long, hard road to eliminate it - if ever we can in the face of the self-made catastrophe of climate change which was ignored so that implies, to them, it does not exist. But, for whom will we need jobs if climate disasters prevent us from growing the food job seekers need to exist?
Health Care remains an acceptable topic, We brag incorrectly that our expertise is the world’s best while admitting its availability is the worst in the industrialized world. We allowed the hope of a single-payer system, common in more successful systems, to be killed by vested interests, so millions suffer.
The Foreign Policy debate was a farce, limited to hugging Israel and kicking Iran while unsure what to do about the rest of the world other than continue to protect the interests of multinationals. Both major parties cater to the Jewish vote, overlooking the fact that many thousands of Jews oppose Netanyahu’s ploy of creating dangers from Iran to gloss over his atrocities against Palestinians. The regime in Tehran is easy to dislike, but so is Bahrain’s, Saudi Arabia’s. Mali’s, and so on. Besides, our interference created it, so who is not a rogue? But, in the last several hundred years the only Persian/Iranian actions that could be even remotely considered aggressive to other than their own people are the reclaiming of a few Gulf Islands after the British moved out in 1971. Other than repeating it wants nuclear power for peaceful purposes only and supports a Middle East, if not a world, free of nuclear arms, Iran has not left the door open too widely for inspectors (have we?) even if much more so than Israel that refuses to sign the non-proliferation treaty, allow any inspections, acknowledge it has an arsenal we suspect to be about 200, has defied scores of UN resolutions, and has invaded with overwhelming and devastating force it neighbours,
And we wonder why most of the world, including the non-aligned states, consider Israel and the USA to be the world’s two top rogue nations.
Both the USA and Israel voice excellent ethics. They would be better loved if actions emphasized them.
I am not alone in expressing disgust at the format of US elections. The elements have elected Sandy to voice their displeasure.
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