Well said. But until we return to an era of philosopher/policy makers you need not worry about national enlightenment emanating from from those who are successful at winning elections.
Personal responsibility is everything. I think your opinion about having a government that provides an incentive to improve America is spot on. In order to create an incentive for people to improve America we need to resuscitate an incentive for people to improve themselves. Government in my opinion institutionalizes people into a negative thought process that neither provides an incentive to improve America or themselves. How do we resuscitate the incentive for people to improve themselves? We create the incentive for people to improve themselves by convincing them that they are the only ones who can help themselves. People and major banking institutions will never, i repeat never make attempts to improve themselves when they can simply fall back on the government. Persuading a person to improve their situation the hard way by themselves instead of walking down the street to pick up checks is about as realistic as pleading for a billionare to only spend 25k per year. If we had a government that gave more responsibility to people and their lives we would in my opinion have a better country.
It is up to the people to demand better leaders, and to do that they have to first take some personal responsibility for being the reason we have had bad leaders. The blame has to go to the individual, each and every person has to take this personally and say, "It is my fault we have had bad leadership, and I am going to make a change in myself first and then I will have the right to demand it from my leaders." How can a corrupt society (which we have) have leadership be anything but a mirror back to the public. The least corrupt president in my life was Ike, and the people didn't want to listen to his message at his departure. They wanted the Camelot of Kennedy, and then they wanted the fantasy and "greed is good" of Reagan. I blame myself, which is what ever good American should be doing for the mess we are in collectively. Government is just a mirror of the level of conscience and moral development, and true spirituality of the people they govern. How we could tolerate a Nixon and not want to see him jailed, how we could tolerate the self indulgent good wishes of Carter, the corruption of Johnson, the blemishes of the son of Joseph Kennedy, the son of Prescott Bush, the corruption of Clinton who should have resigned for the good of the country, and Bush II. Now Obama and his lack of a clearly defined practical moral center. Where has the concept of personal sacrifice for the common good of America gone? Let's have a war with other people's children, let's say when they die, "oh well, the volunteered for military service", etc., etc., etc. Let's wage expensive wars, keep them off the books but count the military spending as GDP growth, let's allow secret meetings between oil companies and Dick Cheney...as long as I can refi again, it is all good. The boomer generation is lost, it is their fault, and only now do they have a change to grow up, take control of their own lives, and make our system work...whether that system leans right, or left, doesn't really matter as long as we move back to the center of the road and fly right. The collective mantra should be: "I am to blame for the problems in America, and I am the solution going forward." Not until that happens will we see any real and significant change. All we will see is blame, more blame, and more blame on everyone but ourselves. The psychological payoff for blaming government, the right, the left, etc. is that you can remain feeling like an innocent victim, like a child, who doesn't ever need to grow up. Everything I see happening is a reaction to another reactionary move in the past as we move further and further off course. The current wave though began under Reagan and his fantasy approach to deficit spending and Voodoo economics, and the pitiful "I fogot" response in the latter years. Jem always wants to say we are a Christian nation, but we sure as hell don't act like one. Greed is not good, living an excessive lifestyle is not good, instant gratification is not good. The lying and corruption is in every single institution in America, and until we stop tolerating the lying, cheating, corruption in our own lives, nothing is going to improve.
No system will work when people's hearts are wrong.---true Any system will work when people's hearts are right.----wrong Under socialism, people may be persuaded to work hard when there's nothing in it for them except the knowledge that they are helping someone else out, but socialism impedes price discovery of goods and services (gives price signals that do not relate to real supply and demand) and as a result will create inefficiencies that reduce economic output.
That book is titled "The Case Against Barack Obama" by David Freddoso. He starts off in the introduction by repudiating those critics of Obama who "have been content merely to slander him-- to claim falsely that he refuses to salute the U.S. flag or was sworn into office on a Koran, or that he was born in a foreign country."This is a serious book with 35 pages of documentation in the back to support the things said in the main text. In other words, if you don't believe what the author says, he lets you know where you can go check it out. (I've read the book by the way.) Courtesy of a true intellectual Thomas Sowell: http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=5301
Do you go around forums advertising books? Also anyone with half a mind knows slander is alive and well on both sides. Random.
What's your freaking point? Yes that's what I do "advertising books on Internet forum". I will spell it for you. The name of thread is "Is Obama trying to discredit capitalism". Book will tell you what is he likely to do. So instead of posting stupid shit like the first post go and get actually informed. I know it's too much to ask for majority of idiots here. Now go back discussing non-sense.
First of all you don't need a book that favors Obama to figure out what Obama is doing unless you are a radical with no principles past the point of destroying the opposition. Secondly you can't convince radicals on either side to quit being radical. My point is that your post was irrelevant. Also I think your opinions are irrelevant as well considering that the debate before your stupid book thing was a debate about the improvement of the country which you consider non-sense. Anything else to further prove your stupidity?
zzz - you know I have been saying we WERE a great Nation. We WERE a christian nation. We have not been a Christian nation since the supreme court began ripping God out of schools and public life. You know the problem. You know the solution. Your problem is that liberals like you want our country to display a christian work ethic and sense of value, you wish the citizens would display a sense of working towards a community in the future. But you are trying to do it without the spiritual component. Do you not see the gaping whole in you belief system? You and all the other liberals out there understand the problem. There was no one on wall street to stop the greed, no one in the SEC, no one on capital hill. No one to say you can't have a free lunch. No to say Congress must spend with an eye towards the future. Liberal govern too short term. Liberals have no voice of reason, no one to say hey we have to save today so we can be better off tomorrow. History has also just proven that Republican politicians can't do it either. I wonder why?