The American Caste System

In India they have a social pecking order called a caste system.  The lowest people class is a group known as the untouchables.   Privileges afforded to the higher castes are not accessible to them.   We look at that here in the United States and we think how archaic that is, and  how odd it is in modern life.   We think ourselves to be more advanced,  more educated, and definitely more sophisticated.   I would propose that all of our sophistication and American pride is a smoke screen.  The reality is that we are more backward than they are.

First of all I would observe that human rights and freedom are not accessible to all.  For example, if a rich man gets accused of a felony, he would immediately call the family attorney, make bail, hire expert witnesses to tear down the prosecutor’s case, and either get a greatly reduced sentence or be aquitted altogether.  But, if a poor man was accused of a felony, he stays locked up during the trial,  he gets a free public defender.  I’ve actually observed trials where the public defender didn’t even have a conversation with the accused until minutes before the trial.  Their reputation is that they carry a heavy case load and are forced to do the bare minimum for their clients.   At least they can wave bye to you on your way to the big house.  There is not justice for all – only justice for those who can afford it.

Then there is the credit reporting system.  Once an individual has a tainted credit score, they will have very limited access to housing and to employment.  So, how can someone get ahead if he can’t access housing or get a job?  And to add to the pain of the credit damaged ones, the insurance company will jack up your insurance rates if your rating goes down.  This creates a slippery slope for those who are struggling to avoid homelessness.

My next exposure of the American caste system is our health care system.   I can remember when my wife’s uncle needed a new liver.   He was told that unless he could ante up $6000 to make a down payment on rejection drugs, he could not get on the list to get a new liver.  Uncle Bill died.

Finally there is the matter of how we deal with life.   Medical technology has advanced to the place where people are killing the handicapped before birth and calling it choice.  Already in this country the elderly routinely get overdosed on morphine as a form of mercy killing if the care givers determine that their quality of life is not worth saving.  The systematic killing of the unborn and the elderly is vigorously defended by the liberals.   One of the first presidential orders signed by President Obama was to allow our tax money to be used internationally to kill unwanted children.  Meanwhile there is a huge shortage of babies for adoption, forcing many in North America and Europe to travel to Asia to adopt a baby.   When we were in China adopting our daughter, we met couples from England, France, Spain, and Italy who were there to adopt.  When people ask me why we didn’t adopt an American baby, I reply that the liberal political system is working overtime to kill them all off.

Your value as a human being should not be determined by your checking account, your credit report, your disability, or your age.  Let’s be the civilized society that we claim to be.   That would be true progress and justice for all.

Stop Messin’ Around

The political media has become a tabloid, more concerned about personalities, emotional issues, and associations than actual issues that impact the daily lives of voters. The emphasis has been on the drama that surrounds the process rather than the purpose of the process, which is to serve and protect the people.

The empasis needs to shift from peripheral chit chat to a focus on improving the security and quality of our nation. Problematic to making that shift is the tendency of campaigns to focus on the short term rather than the long term. Politicians have a tendency to do what is popular at the moment and leave long term problems to future generations.

Perspective on priorities flows from our values. We have a value deficit in our culture. Life has become less protected for the very young and the very old. The family unit has broken down with less children being raised by two parent families. The moral lines have been blurred in issues of integrity and honesty. We have lost our moral compass.

For many, there is no definite measurable standard for morality. I am a conservative on moral issues, but more liberal in social issues. Having twins with disabilities, I tend to see more that government could do to help those who find themselves struggling on this planet without all the needed equipment. Having been raised in a Christian culture, I see the need for moral absolutes and a return to a sense of right and wrong. Having said all that, how can we get away from the he-said, she-said approach and get back to discussing real issues as we navigate through our process of choosing the leader of the free world?

First, the candidates must address their stand on the protection of human life. Which leads us to a debate on when life begins. For many of us, this is the fundamental issue of the election. Sixty million fetuses have been terminated since Roe v. Wade. Even if you are in the pro-choice camp and insist on calling them fetuses, you must deal with the fact that millions of viable fetuses have been stopped from coming to term. Every poll shows that the majority of Americans are pro-life. If they are babies in reality, then we have legally killed six times more innocents than did the Nazis. If the majority of Americans believe that we have a mega-holocaust on our hands, this is a serious issue that must be debated.

There are more important issues than what a liberal socialist pastor of a black racist church has to say. Innocent children are dying by the millions, wars are being waged, we have multitudes of unemployed and hungry, the homeless ranks are swelling, the economy is in real danger, the court system is replacing our democracy, and personal freedoms are shrinking. We have serious work to do, so let’s stop messin’ around.