A few numbers to think about, and a plea for Hope

(OK, i was going to transfer over all my previous blogs, but i realized that they’re a shade on the outdated side, so for now i’m just going to rock the most recent one instead.)

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I feel strongly that we are currently living in a critical time; a time for serious thought, and a time for the consideration of some unpleasant matters.  Please know that although I did write this, and although you won’t find any proper citation in it, it is not a work of bullshit speculation (credit for the numbers and the specifics goes to such organizations and programs as The Iraq War Card at The Center for Public Integrity, The Washington Post, NBC news, and The Bill Moyers Journal, and credit for the editorializing goes to yours truly, a well-read and moderately well-educated thinker of thoughts and seeker of truth), and even though these are things that you may have heard before, I beg of you to open your heart, your soul, and your mind, and consider them at least once more.

Thank You.

Tony C. Asaro – Californian, and Citizen of the Planet Earth

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The day that George W. Bush took office, the price of a dollar of gas was $1.47.  Now, 8 years later, it is over $4.00 (and quickly rising to $5).

Chevron earned $4.35 billion last quarter, a record profit for them, and an 18% increase over the profits they posted this same time last year.  Exxon earned a record $40.6 billion last year, and Shell a record $31 billion for that same period.

This is not an accident, nor is it the natural work of a fluctuating or self-correcting market, nor a result of any sinister scheme by OPEC.

The Iraq War is now ( dated to the first week of May, 2008 ) costing the taxpayers of America $435 million per day, which totals up to $3 billion per week, or $12 billion per month. All told, over $500 billion taxpayer dollars have been funneled into Iraq since the beginning of the invasion 5 years ago. Interest payments will, as it stands currently, add another $615 billion, and the price tag of repairing our depleted military is projected to add another $280 billion.

The reason for the state of the US economy is not a mystery.

The minimum wage, even after the increase that will soon take effect, is, in terms of purchasing power (ie. adjusted for inflation), roughly 65% of the minimum wage 40 years ago, and neither of the two biggest employers in the country, Walmart and McDonald’s, pay anything close to a living wage to the vast majority of their employees.

The gross disparity between the indebted and impoverished masses of America and the top 1% of the wealthy in America has now reached levels so critical, so institutionalized, that the only comparable periods in the history of global civilization that even come close to matching our current state are periods directly proceeding eras of widespread violence and social uprising.

Take note of that.  As Mark Twain once famously (and accurately) observed, “History may not repeat itself, but it does rhyme a lot.”

I know that some of those numbers are difficult to grasp, and that some of the concepts and interpretations involved in what i’m saying may seem to the most cynical part of you to be warped, skewed, one-sided, tired, outdated, oversimplified, or out of context, and I know that you would rather distract yourself with something else and wait for it all to “blow over” (I know I sure would), but I humbly request, as a fellow citizen and as an advocate of honesty, that you trust that what I am writing here has not been altered or tampered-with, that it is relevant, that it is critical, that it is something that you can affect via the power of your social and political voice, and that you think about these things for a second.  And then another second.  And then another.  And another.  Copy; Paste; Repeat ad nauseum.  Consider what this all means.  Please.

The tanked US economy, the new droves of homeless, jobless, and uninsured, the underfunded schools (and the resulting plummeting test scores of American children), the relatively poor life expectancy and infant mortality rates in America, the staggering accumulated private debt in America (by far the largest in the history of mankind) that drags us down and weighs so heavily on our spirits and our fading dreams, and, of course, the more-than 4,100 US military deaths in Iraq since the invasion, the more-than 30,300 injured among American troops sent to Iraq, and, the most important number in this whole diatribe, the 700,000-1.3 million deaths of Iraqi citizens over the last 5 years that are directly attributable to the actions of our elected officials (and to the greedy soulless bastards that those elected officials serve) . . these things, these terrors, these atrocities, these overwhelmingly-sad states that we find ourselves mired in, they are not mysterious, they are not “someone else’s problem”, they are not a part of the natural waxing and waning of the various facets of global society, economy, and community, and truly, they are not inevitable nor completely out of our hands.

The place we are living in today is not a place of enlightenment, or compassion, or intellectualism, or progressivism, and I think that we all know that it is not nearly the best we can do.  Not even close.  We can make this a better country, and a better world to live in, and we can begin to effect change together immediately if we so desire, and if we so believe.

That there are not any easy solutions does not mean that there are not any solutions.

We all have choices to make.  Take your time and think about what you can do directly about the degradation of compassion, the epidemic of disillusionment, the near-destruction of empathy, the currently unchallenged rule of the corrupt, the greedy, the power mongers, and the merchants of death, and the collapse of the American “civilization”.

You know what i’m ultimately talking about.  It’s obvious.  I don’t have to spell it out for you or conclude with an ill-advised, second-hand stump speech.  Soon enough, one of the choices that I spoke of a second ago will rear-up before us.  Make yours wisely, and please, look deep inside yourselves and allow the bits of hope, and optimism, and heart that remain in you to help you make that choice.  Remember, it’s not out of our hands.

Those of you who know me personally and know me to be largely an agnostic, may see this as an odd way for me to close out this plea, but if there’s one segment of that oft-overrated and outdated tome (which need not be named) that contains priceless wisdom of an absolutely indisputable nature, i think that this is it.  Oh that these words and all those like them could touch the heart of every man and woman, every day, until the end of it all:

“Blessed are the merciful,
for they shall obtain mercy . . .

Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they shall be called children of god.”

- June 2008

Hullooooo

in the next day or so i shall transfer my previous blogs over to meyah.  Until then, keep your pants on (or not . . it’s your call really) and bask in the suspense.  : )