Reforming America: Healthy Skepticism
The important thing is never to stop questioning. - Albert Einstein
It is unwise to be too sure of one's own wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err. - Mohandas K. Gandhi
What are the moral convictions most fondly held by barbarous and semi-barbarous people? They are the convictions that authority is the soundest basis of belief; that merit attaches to readiness to believe; that the doubting disposition is a bad one, and skepticism is a sin. - Thomas Henry Huxley
Most of us would like to believe that the people we send to Washington to lead us have our best interests in mind. That’s why we vote for them. We listen to their words and when they resonate with us we support them. What most voters fail to do is question the honesty of the people that they support. It is a hard thing to do. There is no question about it. Nobody wants to think that they have been fooled by a con man trying to take advantage of them. Unfortunately, many of the people running for office are tricksters and con artists only interested in their own personal power.
Two of the most powerful words in the English language are; “Prove it.” Those two words should be at the core of every patriot’s vocabulary. Not nearly often enough do we ask our leaders to prove what they are saying is true. We listen to political ads and point to them as proof of the correctness of our positions on issues. Now, this is not meant as an insult to anyone in particular but that is about the stupidest possible way to make political decisions. Advertising is meant to manipulate you. Ads, especially political ads are meant to mislead and manipulate the audience into taking specific actions that benefit the sponsors of the ads. They are never objective or completely without bias so by their very nature they cannot be trusted. As voters we need to demand proof of assertions made by people seeking political power.
The hardest part about living in a democracy is doing the legwork to understand the issues before voting on them. The duty of every American though, is to do just that. We enjoy freedoms and prosperity not experienced by most other people around the world. The only thing we have to do to preserve our nation is pay attention. The sad truth is however that we do not and have not done a good job of paying attention for a very long time. There are people in Washington that have been there for decades selling out the working people of this nation to make the privileged richer while their constituents re-elect them year after year because they don’t know what they’ve been doing while in office. To be blunt, as a nation we kind of deserve what we’ve gotten because we’ve been too lazy to pay attention to what our leaders have been doing.
Virtually every campaign this year is talking about the deficit and national debt but nobody is talking about the billions in lost revenues because of tax laws that overwhelmingly favor the wealthy. Who passed those laws? Democrats? Republicans? Both. The simple answer is that both Parties have given away the farm to the people who finance their campaigns every year. With the Supreme Court ruling making it legal for businesses and individuals to buy unlimited political ads without disclosing their donors it will only get worse. Politicians wanting to get re-elected will be forced to choose between their principles, if they have any, and their political futures. In the modern era of media politics money rules because people are not holding candidates accountable for the things said by them or their supporters.
If we want things to improve we need to hold the feet of the politicians to the fire and force them to prove what they are saying is true. We need to make sure their words match their deeds or we will be responsible for letting them take advantage of us. Additionally, we need to educate our friends and family about the issues when we take the time to investigate them. We have to shine the light of truth on the lies and half-truths of the politicians. If we don’t, things will get worse than they are now. It is clear that there is an extreme disconnect between the wealthy and everyone else at this point. We cannot count on the benevolence of the wealthy to save us which is exactly what voting based on nothing more than political ads is doing. We have to take matters into our own hands and force change to happen and until we understand what is actually happening, we will not be able to put the right people in place to make the needed changes. It’s time to tell the politicians to “Prove it.” and refuse to vote for them if they cannot.
Troy Wilson-Ripsom | Staff Writer | E-mail Comments on this column. | Click icon to Digg this article
 Get Involved Do you sit and yell at the TV when politicians come on? Do you shake your head sadly whenever you see a homeless veteran? Is that all you tend to do? It's time to put up or shut up America. We all love to talk about how we could do things better or how we would do it if we were in charge. Well, it's time to put your money where your mouth is. If you can think of it, you can write it down. If you can write it down, you can type it. If you can type it, you can e-mail it and if you can e-mail it, you can send it here. We at Reform America are committed to giving voice to anyone who wants to put their ideas out there to make our nation a better place. As the readership grows, we are able to take those views to a wider and wider audience. Grassroots campaigns begin with voices speaking out. You have opinions. Voice them. We aren't about conservative or liberal. We aren't about pro-this or anti-that. We're about Americans and the First Amendment. Reform America is about politics by, for and of the people. You are the people. You only need to speak up. America is listening. Send your article to: stories@reform-america.net |
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