The Pit or The Pendulum
The Pit or The Pendulum
Inevitably the pendulum swings, left, right, left, right, pulling towards the center. Although, whether it ever arrives at the center, depends on what a true centrist view might look like.
For some, a centrist view is a humanitarian view. Food, housing, medical care, education, for all. These are humanitarian rights. Of course, the U.S. is so successful that the poorest child will be educated. Or, at least, they’ll have schooling. The U.S. spends more money per child for education than just about any nation on earth, contrary to the political rhetoric. If our schools don’t cut it, a lack of money isn’t the cause.
Likewise, almost no one goes to bed hungry in America. Although, you can find an abundance of articles and more than a few politicians who will say otherwise, using dire language to convince you that tens of millions of Americans go to bed without so much as a bologna sandwich and a glass of Kool-aid. They always make the same "Intentional" mistake, conflating poverty with hunger, when poverty in the U.S. is redefined based on the aggregate wealth, of the wealthiest nation to ever exist. In other words, poverty in America is not poverty in Haiti or Mexico. In fact, it isn’t really poverty at all. A number of studies over the decades have shown that the poor in America, have cars, air-conditioning, cable TV, the Internet, DVD players, smartphones, to say nothing of food. Every day I drive by homeless people, panhandling on the streets with cell phones, who qualify as obese. How is it that even beggars are overweight in America? Are their bellies distended by hunger, like Bangladesh or parts of Africa?
A few years back, the media hammered the idea that as many as fifty million Americans had no health insurance. How could this be true in the richest, most powerful nation in the history of the world? The implication was that if you were without health insurance, you or your children would be left to die on the hospital’s doorstep. “If you can’t pay, just go away and die!” was the media plot-line. Like so many other media generated stories, it was untrue. In reality, if you’re sick, just go to the emergency room and you’ll be taken care of with the best care in the world, whether you can pay or not. I’ve been there, when I was unemployed and struggling, and was taken care of like a king. And, if you’re genuinely poor, you easily qualify for free healthcare.
The reality that there were fifty million uninsured Americans, was relentlessly talked about, but bore little resemblance to the facts. About 1/3 were young people who could afford health insurance, but simply chose not to buy it, precisely because they were young and far less likely to need it. Another third were genuine poor people, who qualified for free healthcare, but never took advantage of it. Leaving about 18 million people without insurance, most of whom were between jobs. That’s in a nation of 330 million people.
What they couldn’t do was have thirty thousand dollars in the bank, own a home and stocks, and get free healthcare, paid for by everyone else. Because nothing in the world is really free. Somebody else is paying, even if you’re not. Even so, no emergency room was going to turn you away if you were really sick. Meaning, that costly emergency room healthcare would hurt your credit if you didn’t pay the bill. And, eventually, the unpaid bill would be passed on to everyone else. Meanwhile, costs at the emergency room would go up and up to compensate for the losses. Which is a prime reason why hospital care is so damned expensive, to begin with?
Therein is the problem; an honest, thoughtful view of American life and politics is never as simple as listening to what “Experts” say. “Experts” tend to be political operatives, and the truth is as distant as a dot on the horizon. That’s because the truth is too truthful for politicians, who need a steady dose of emotional trauma, in order to galvanize their base. This is equally true of the media, who love conflict like an addict suffering from acute withdrawal. Conflict sells, and with enough conflict, media outlets, whether old-fashioned newspapers or television, increase their audience size, thereby increasing profits through ad revenue. That’s how it works. That’s also why there can never be enough conflict. Because greed and ignorance do not sleep. Neither does the human taste for a salacious story, where a warm day becomes proof of global catastrophe. A momentary dip in the market is the beginning of an economic apocalypse. A president’s supreme court pick is an all-out assault on women rights, with back-alley abortionists practicing their craft on the poor because the president hates women, especially poor women. Is another answer possible? No. But only because most people will seldom ever take the time to look beyond their bias, at the cold, hard data, which can be boring as hell. A salacious story works a whole lot better. Making all of us complicit, every bit as much as the politicians or the media.
The bible says, there is no one who is righteous. There’s your eternal truth, as obvious as a rat in the potato salad.
Now watch the politicians and the media try and spin the rat as a condiment, and you’ll see just how true it is.
Mark Magula
Inevitably the pendulum swings, left, right, left, right, pulling towards the center. Although, whether it ever arrives at the center, depends on what a true centrist view might look like.
For some, a centrist view is a humanitarian view. Food, housing, medical care, education, for all. These are humanitarian rights. Of course, the U.S. is so successful that the poorest child will be educated. Or, at least, they’ll have schooling. The U.S. spends more money per child for education than just about any nation on earth, contrary to the political rhetoric. If our schools don’t cut it, a lack of money isn’t the cause.
Likewise, almost no one goes to bed hungry in America. Although, you can find an abundance of articles and more than a few politicians who will say otherwise, using dire language to convince you that tens of millions of Americans go to bed without so much as a bologna sandwich and a glass of Kool-aid. They always make the same "Intentional" mistake, conflating poverty with hunger, when poverty in the U.S. is redefined based on the aggregate wealth, of the wealthiest nation to ever exist. In other words, poverty in America is not poverty in Haiti or Mexico. In fact, it isn’t really poverty at all. A number of studies over the decades have shown that the poor in America, have cars, air-conditioning, cable TV, the Internet, DVD players, smartphones, to say nothing of food. Every day I drive by homeless people, panhandling on the streets with cell phones, who qualify as obese. How is it that even beggars are overweight in America? Are their bellies distended by hunger, like Bangladesh or parts of Africa?
A few years back, the media hammered the idea that as many as fifty million Americans had no health insurance. How could this be true in the richest, most powerful nation in the history of the world? The implication was that if you were without health insurance, you or your children would be left to die on the hospital’s doorstep. “If you can’t pay, just go away and die!” was the media plot-line. Like so many other media generated stories, it was untrue. In reality, if you’re sick, just go to the emergency room and you’ll be taken care of with the best care in the world, whether you can pay or not. I’ve been there, when I was unemployed and struggling, and was taken care of like a king. And, if you’re genuinely poor, you easily qualify for free healthcare.
The reality that there were fifty million uninsured Americans, was relentlessly talked about, but bore little resemblance to the facts. About 1/3 were young people who could afford health insurance, but simply chose not to buy it, precisely because they were young and far less likely to need it. Another third were genuine poor people, who qualified for free healthcare, but never took advantage of it. Leaving about 18 million people without insurance, most of whom were between jobs. That’s in a nation of 330 million people.
What they couldn’t do was have thirty thousand dollars in the bank, own a home and stocks, and get free healthcare, paid for by everyone else. Because nothing in the world is really free. Somebody else is paying, even if you’re not. Even so, no emergency room was going to turn you away if you were really sick. Meaning, that costly emergency room healthcare would hurt your credit if you didn’t pay the bill. And, eventually, the unpaid bill would be passed on to everyone else. Meanwhile, costs at the emergency room would go up and up to compensate for the losses. Which is a prime reason why hospital care is so damned expensive, to begin with?
Therein is the problem; an honest, thoughtful view of American life and politics is never as simple as listening to what “Experts” say. “Experts” tend to be political operatives, and the truth is as distant as a dot on the horizon. That’s because the truth is too truthful for politicians, who need a steady dose of emotional trauma, in order to galvanize their base. This is equally true of the media, who love conflict like an addict suffering from acute withdrawal. Conflict sells, and with enough conflict, media outlets, whether old-fashioned newspapers or television, increase their audience size, thereby increasing profits through ad revenue. That’s how it works. That’s also why there can never be enough conflict. Because greed and ignorance do not sleep. Neither does the human taste for a salacious story, where a warm day becomes proof of global catastrophe. A momentary dip in the market is the beginning of an economic apocalypse. A president’s supreme court pick is an all-out assault on women rights, with back-alley abortionists practicing their craft on the poor because the president hates women, especially poor women. Is another answer possible? No. But only because most people will seldom ever take the time to look beyond their bias, at the cold, hard data, which can be boring as hell. A salacious story works a whole lot better. Making all of us complicit, every bit as much as the politicians or the media.
The bible says, there is no one who is righteous. There’s your eternal truth, as obvious as a rat in the potato salad.
Now watch the politicians and the media try and spin the rat as a condiment, and you’ll see just how true it is.
Mark Magula