America Is, America Ain’t (Full, Unfinished)

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Icebreaker

America Is, America Ain’t

Polarizing Our Passion Issues

The Violent Delights with Violent Ends

Left and Right Perpetuate the Stalemate

Welcome to the Jungle

Make a America Real, Finally.

Icebreaker

Life’s a bitch, and then you die. You’ve heard that before, right?

Well, I wholeheartedly disagree with that mantra. I’d say life’s more of a mother fucker. Haha! Who’s your daddy? Lol. Life is, that’s who.

That’s just an icebreaker, but if you’re still reading perhaps that joke made a lot of sense to you. The American dream for our nation has been living in a nightmare.

Are you, like me, disgusted by the dividing nature of information coming at us, 24/7, trying to force political alignment against our individual morals and ways of life at every turn? The overwhelming majority of Americans are unhappy with the status quo of life in our country and the direction they worry so many things could go from the cross roads in history we are all feeling today.

In my life, it seems that every conversation about any problem needing action in the USA today comes back to a partisan argument about political parties rather than what’s is objectively “right” and “wrong” on the merits of issues from the fundamental purest “American” ideological perspective, even among people with the same points of view.

Opposing points of view these days get real vicious in political partisanship, even when the perspectives on the issues aren’t that far off.

I’d say it’s a fact, at this point, that our politicians have collectively steered us far away from what is “American” in many of the norms we’ve allowed to manifest in our societal culture today.

We have wavered from what is American by endorsement of politicians who have not upheld it in our systems, but rather have suffocated it slowly to near death now, over the course of our country’s history.

Our political parties paint a picture where we as Americans must fit what we want into only one of two neat packages at the voting booths…

…but the issues in America are more complex than that. Let’s we, the people, solve the issues by looking at them without politics in the way through the lens of our common values, as Americans, logically and objectively.

America Is, America Ain’t

Philosophical versions of America are like assholes. There’s at least 330 million of them in 50 states, it seems. Well, after first unpacking facets of the party-and-media-centric dysfunction that are in the way, this series will bring food for thought on issues of today based on the way America is supposed to be in my book, without regard to parties.

The guiding principles and values of my America are pretty simple. All men are created equal. All individual Americans have inalienable constitutional rights, and entitlement within them to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.

“America” as an entity is truly just the sum of our public institutions, which exist only to embody the rights of “We the people” in real life sustainably. Again, America is our rights, built into institutions by law.

Our local, state, and federal governments exists only to serve the collective needs of our societies of peoples, and to administer justice on behalf of the people with checks and balances on power to ensure that the laws of the land put into practice do not infringe our constitutional ideals and rights as free individuals.

Officials in government, elected by the people, are expected to see to the will of the majority who elected them, but never in such a way that conflicts with their duties of office as a servant against imposing requirements on people that are ideologically unAmerican or unconstitutional.

This is why they take an oath.

America wants America to live the real American dream, in a way it’s never achieved. This country needs major overhaul to ever be America, and the time is NOW for us to chart the course on issues first, and then lift our voices to make sure the politicians serve OUR needs above their parties.

Polarizing Our Passion Issues

Facts can hurt feelings, but feelings don’t hurt facts.

Thing is, industrial press these days has clearly shifted into a pillar prioritized for influencing the public as its purpose more so than properly informing it foremost. There’s an insidious and ever growing amount of loud contrarians whose only real purpose is to try and blur lines and distract away from change, or any of the issues that are important to someone else from them, including to you, and me.

They get paid a whole lot to gum up the works too. Part of their goal is to confuse us, so that we’ll believe their story as “the truth.”

Be vigilant, people, in the facts you deduce from media these days… don’t you confuse what you believe as fact to be someone else’s feelings, or opinion.

It’s amazing how media and our politicians shrouds the facts between the feelings so often and calls it news and government while shoving their customers and investors down our throats… and pitting peoples’ views against each other for the sake of market share (aka “votes”).

We’ve gotta stop lapping it up like doggies and living with our tails between our legs, hyper-fearful of our world and other people. We’ve got to break through the mass gaslighting on our screens.

It’s like being strapped into a clockwork orange on media and social media these days, where every comment, like, thought, feeling, and decision is under attack as a line drawn against the future of America according to one person or another.

The Violent Delights with Violent Ends

Shit is intense. It IS real life. Our political machines and all the hoopla their oodles of money generates in buzz and (dare I say it?) propaganda media seeking our allegiance at all costs is fucking exhausting… and all around us shit is popping off right now while we’re looking at this screen.

There’s all kinds of violence with all kinds of agendas behind it happening right now, somewhere in America, and politicians and the media are cashing in on the unrest at the expense of the American dreams of 99% of us, economically. So much of the violence is paid for by our taxes, inflicted back on the people, by our government servants in one way or another…

… and then we pay for cleanup of the unrest out of our pockets and taxes too. Is that irony?

In any case, it’s fucked up to pay taxes towards a system that uses them against our common interests and values with such imbalance and indifference… and on politicians who collect their checks, but collectively get us unsatisfactory results for our spend on them.

How much money in your life have you personally paid in taxes? Have you ever gotten an itemized receipt? How much dollar value of the taxes you personally have paid do you think has gone to fund the war on drugs? How much has gone towards your local schools, or to federal education programs? Any idea?

How much of your tax went to tea for government dinners? I seem to remember some kinda thing about Americans having a problem with tea tax before…

Every year of my 18 in the Army I got a statement from the government telling me what I was worth that year, as a direct labor cost. Every Solider gets a statement of benefits annually explaining that (using made up numbers), for example, while they may have only been paid $30K gross that year, they should feel like they made $45K, or something, because of the cost value of all their benefits.

Well, if all (~330 Million) Americans paid an equal share of that example, collectively we each paid $0.000136 for that one Soldier to cover their basic compensation and benefits that tax year.

I wonder how much of the taxes I’ve paid went back into my own gross check in the Army over 18 years. Less than a cent, for sure. I wonder how much I’ve spent on taxes has gone to the war on drugs, and how much has gone to my kids teachers.

At this point I’d like to move my investment off the war on drugs and over to teachers, starting next check.

Why can’t we all do that as simply as changing our paycheck withholdings for dependents on any given day? As a nation have we tried to set that up? No… not that I know of. But we could.

Our democracy is inflicting a double tax on us when it charges us to get set back as a nation in its outputs, or to make barely any progress at all, at best, given all the money individual Americans put into it. We pay more on interest as a nation annually right now than we do on education. Did you know that?

There’s more interests with their hands in our taxes now than ever before, and they are not interested in our rights with anywhere near the gusto that they are our constituency, patronage, and/or followership. Detroit got milked bankrupt my bad government decisions, I hope you realize politicians could be steering America there too.

Things are going to escalate significantly in the next 6 months in our country. It’ll get worse, but it WILL get better, don’t worry. Although if you don’t have your seatbelt on yet strap in, cause 2020 ain’t slowing down, and we gotta make it, baby, even if we make it home with only one headlight.

If there’s gonna be another civil war it’s going to be because political parties and media have driven the public to fight out the two party system to determine a winner. There’s not gonna be a civil war though.

If America breaks out into real internal war it’ll be more like a coup or some type of chaotic “revolution” where we go from a two party system to something like 10, representing values more dialed into regional majorities of populations, that will offset voting stalemates on divisive issues.

However, spoiler alert, we aren’t gonna see anything like real civil war or the like so long as the government now doesn’t drive it. Well, not in the next 6 months anyways. What we might see is enough grassroots change at local levels that it might add up to bigger changes over the next several years, spurned by the will of people in separate places all at once across our country.

But as we already know, violence to assert our way of life is very much American across the political spectrum. There will be violence in the absence of progress for certain, but perhaps little delight.

For certain it is worth violence for the ends of truly upholding American freedom in our nation for all if we cannot depend our politicians to bring us that delight.

Left and Right Perpetuate the Stalemate

In our current two party system the progress being slow going is self serving for both sides. It gives them all careers and job security. Why would they want more fair competition? If there’s a “monopoly” in our country it’s our electoral college, in a way.

That is, there’s systemic barriers that stifle the rise of more parties and greater selection for Presidency which is against the interests of Americans. How come at least 10 other Democrats (out of the 20 or so we saw debate) can’t/don’t also run in the at large race, in addition to Biden? How come 10 other Republicans aren’t running too against Trump?

Why do the President and VP come together? Why don’t we pair the two candidates the with highest votes, regardless of party? I have to work with people I don’t like all the time… In America, don’t we all? Our politicians’ work isn’t so hard that they can’t partner wholeheartedly. Lead by example, bitches.

I’d get fired for acting the way with coworkers that politicians do to each other at work, or in dereliction of their duties, sometimes… toxic to the team, and all that, yet they get away with it. Why? They’re not put upon. They are spoiled much better than you in and I in their work perks. I never saw federal officials on “Dirty Jobs.” Just sayin. No slack.

Why do we as Americans only get to choose between two candidates that have gotten any significant national media for President in the actual race? Doesn’t pass the common sense test to me. Our system needs to be re-calibrated.

Our system has been set toward sustaining itself, rather than advancing our American institution as if its life depended on it.

We have not made progress in the last 8-16 years as a nation (at least!) on so much basic shit because of our two party system. I’d say the two-party faultiness is clearly evidenced by the persistent problems it’s never solved in our history.

Regulate businesses and the economy? Social injustice? Tech? Poverty? Equality? Homelessness? Problems in the military and in foreign relations? Drugs? Health care? Prisons? Hate? Infrastructure? Terrorism in America? School shootings? Fucking clean water in Flint, Michigan? Bad corporate behavior and rampant white collar crime? Human trafficking and modern day slavery?

Seems like government has been “busy” not ever getting shit done because they are too invested in playing fuck fuck games party against party, to me. Pretty obvious. Can I get back the taxes I paid this last decade? Why is there no guarantee to voters that the people we vote for will carry out our will?

We should be able to warranty trade in substandard reps much easier, they work for us.

What I see happening right now between people is that there’s a million different things going on to be addressed in all different directions, in everyone’s lives. People lead more intersectional lives than either party is willing to satisfy, and there’s a wide spectrum of interests heating up the American melting pot to a fast boil.

Everyone is being made aware, constantly, that the right or the left is trying to take something away from them… and it’s all true, depending on your perspective.

Most people have to trade off some value or another of theirs when choosing a political party. Why? Why should any of us have to trade off our values in who gets our vote? We shouldn’t.

We can have democracy that more holistically represents intersectionalities in our majorities on different issues much better with political power split in more than two halves. It’s really basic, but the irony is that our parties would have to act against self interest to help see to something so bold.

Aren’t they there to serve us?

Welcome to the Jungle

There’s alot of lies, denials, and false information out there, in the jungles of media, driving the wailing and gnashing of teeth and fanning the flames of truths of people’s lives that will not be suppressed against the bad shit they see happening in their personal experiences…

… and the unstoppable forces and the immovable objects are either gonna fight or fuck sooner or later.

Don’t you see it happening too?

Well, today there’s so much shit I wanna write about deeply that I couldn’t pick a single topic.

Over the last few days I’ve started several pieces that were triggered by seeing opposing sets of headlines and their conflicting opinions abounding between friends, family, and among people who would otherwise be colleagues on a whole host of different hot button issues… and it’s all totally fuct.

Parties are tearing our country apart for self preservation as a priority above the kind of values that should work for us all, as Americans.

I say fuck Trump and I’m pissed that the Democrats didn’t have the balls to feel the Bern, so to speak. Biden ain’t a game changer. I hope he don’t lose, cause he might, yet at the same time I don’t like settling for him at all. At least he’s not Hillary, I suppose.

Last election I might have gone Republican had they nominated someone else… and I’m from Michigan (originally) and have always leaned Democrat before then.

For the record, I didn’t vote in the last election at all.

Make America Real, Finally.

It’s easy to get all pissed off about the candidates (some more than others) cyclically ever 4 years, and to complain about our stifled progress all along the way. However, the erosion of America isn’t the result of any one candidate at all.

The cognitive dissonance of what we’ve come to accept in America is because our political machine is a habitual line stepper, and it hasn’t been working to police itself to be a better value for America at all. The system is what produces the limited options we get to choose, unnecessarily.

Well, the whole system needs an overhaul, quite frankly. It’s a cesspool on all sides as is, but the point of all this ain’t about that. No.

This is about the America we should be now and forward, not about any politician or party individually.

Tonight as I looked over the battlefield of comments and headlines and posts coming across my screen, and watched all the viciousness unfolding before me, the blood and tears online, feeling the indignation, contemplating what to address among so many fucking arguments in a way that could bridge gaps on any issues at all…

… what was clear is that too many people and our government have lost sight of what America is supposed to be, and particularly so now because of partisanship, even in the face of obvious moral and constitutional absolutes.

So, please, for a moment, let’s hang out for a sec and talk about some basics that could help make us America that lives up to the hype by looking at issues and ideas without any regard to political parties.

Let’s focus on how to make America free and equal like the country it’s claimed to be, in real ways we have never achieved. It’s time to envision and manifest America with a modern day mindset open to possibilities unconstrained by our political systems “as-is”, yet truly rooted in our constitutional ideals, in word and spirit.

Let’s make America real, finally.

Next Chapter: Coming Soon!!!

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