Musings on problems and possibilities

This is a guest post by my good friend, Bob Poris.

In the middle of the last century, when I went to college, we studied politics and propaganda, in addition to history, as the cold war was not cold, but still hot. There was agitation in 1946 for a preemptive war with Russia! I sat in class full of other recently discharged veterans arguing over should we, or should or should not go to war before Russia attacked us!

It was quite serious and very possible, as we were still armed and ready for war; we had all the machinery still in place and were flushed with victory, an ongoing draft, etc plus THE BOMB.


Some saw Communists under every bed and in every department of the government. (We had our fools then, too.) In addition, we had people who were strongly anti black, anti Jew, anti- socialist, anti-communist, anti-foreigners, etc. (Today we have added hispanic laborers too) Little seems to have changed EXCEPT WE ARE MORE FULLY AND LEGALLY ARMED IN OUR STREETS, OUR HOMES, OUR POLITICAL RALLIES, ETC. Preachers pray for the death of our new president and parents are afraid to let 6-year-olds listen to his speech. Our politics are more polarized than ever. We are more brain washed than ever. Money dominates politics more than ever, our universities are busy spouting “stuff” and furthering polarization. Instead of discourse, any attempt to compromise and find a middle ground are ridiculed. We use labels instead of logic. We spout bumper sticker slogans as truth, Some seek leaders that are just like them, who know more about drinking beer than they do about scientific efforts to cope with new problems of disease, climate, and world wide terrorism emanating from caves with no borders to restrain them. Others sit back awaiting the Rapture, believing therefore there is no urgency to solve problems that might take a few more centuries.

At almost 83, a veteran, a parent and grandfather etc, I believe we can overcome most of our problems if we remain an open democracy and ignore the one issue pundits from all sides trying to scare us all, so they can continue to get paid for upsetting their particular audience.

We had better learn what our Constitution really says; how it is interpreted by the Courts and why it works. We should know that legislatures make laws, not mayors, governors or presidents. We elect them for many of the wrong reasons. We have veto rights and overrides of vetoes; we have checks and balances that used to work but were ignored for a period of eight years and CAN BE AGAIN, IF WE DO NOT INVESTIGATE AND REINSTATE RULES OR CHANGE THE LAWS.

Congress has rights and responsibilities, but so do we, the voters, the electorate. We have gained ground racially but are not out of the woods socially yet. We have the opportunity to stop wasting talent on labels, colors, religions, lack of religions, etc. Let’s get back to some basics and use the new tools of the internet to replace what we have lost in the role of the media we were accustomed to. Let’s get our schools to compete worldwide or prepare to move to lands that have the new jobs and technology we seem unprepared to teach. Our forefathers came here for the same reasons some might have to leave if we do not get our act together!

This is a great land and should continue to lead the world if we want it badly enough to get down to the work needed. We still have more people seeking to come here than leave. That should tell us something!