The Good
People are good. You can see it everywhere if you just look. This country is made up of people from all over the world with varying ideas about how they want to live. There is no denying how different we are. But the one thing to remember is that the vast majority of the people in this country are good.
At a yard sale in California, a homeless man walks by. He wanders up into the cluttered isles where he spots an old portable CD player. The owner notices the homeless man's interest and runs inside. Was she going to call the police? Moments later, she came outside and approached the man with something in her hand. "Some batteries. Pick a few cd's to go with it and it's all yours!" People are good.
In the very last row of a jam packed parking lot in North Carolina, a young woman unloads her shopping cart. When she finishes, she looks around for a cart-return and doesn't see one anywhere. She decides to push the cart all the way back to the store instead of leaving it by the bushes. As she got closer, an older man noticed what she was doing and offered to take the cart the rest of the way. People are good.
The Bad
The media in America is beyond terrible. It is virtually impossible to find a non-biased news source. You don't have to look far to find a poll that shows Americans have been losing trust in the main stream media in the last 20 years or so.
Over the past several months, MSNBC has pretty much had non-stop coverage of the Chris Christie "Bridge-gate" scandal. When phone records are released that contain call-logs of Christie's aids contacting the Port Authority, you better believe MSNBC will devote a half-hour of each news program that night to the story. Yet they have maybe given the IRS targeting story a few 6 minute segments in the past three months. Now take that same example, switch the scandals, and replace MSNBC with Fox News. Do you see the problem here? MSNBC wants to do everything they can to stay away from stories that might damage the left while they cover stories that could damage a potential Republican Presidential nominee for 2016. Fox News just wants to destroy the current administration. Shame on you, main stream media.
Not only is the media extremely biased, but it is also encourages the people of this country to argue about everything. Just look at MSNBC and Fox News specifically -- they probably couldn't exist without the other! They can barely go a night without mentioning how biased the other is. But I cant say I blame them. Their ratings are crucial to their survival, after all, and who would watch the news if everything was running smoothly in America?
The Ugly
Money is the root of all evil. It's also the "ugly" part in this article. Our government has practically an unlimited supply of money -- $3,800,000,000,000. No person has ever had that much money. You probably had to count the sections to figure out how to say it -- millions, billions, trillions. And our government wastes so much of that money, it's incredible.
The War on Drugs started in the early 1970's and we spend an estimated $51 billion dollars annually in this domestic fight against illegal drugs. Sure, we might capture and prosecute some guy connected to a Mexican drug cartel. We've probably had some pretty huge busts that they've made movies about. But mostly we just permanently ruin the lives of college-age kids who want to smoke pot and end up with a criminal record for having a bag of weed. That seems like something we should keep spending money on, right?
But the worst thing money does to America is it drives every single policy and decision that our government makes. Behind every law, there is a donor. Why do you think we really went to war in Iraq? The giant oil companies wanted access to Iraqi oil -- and now they've got it. Why do you think the Democrats are pushing for amnesty? The Unions get more workers, which means more union dues and more campaign donations for Democrats (not to mention more Democrat voters).
Our political system is designed so the rich and powerful get to spend our tax dollars while maintaining their money and power. They spend more money than any other nation in the world, and yet no problems are ever solved. The media and government successfully deflect all attention off of them, and the people fight among themselves instead of holding the rich and powerful government accountable. Congress maintains a horribly low approval rating, yet somehow incumbents are rarely beat in their re-election campaigns. Why is that? It takes access to millions of dollars to unseat an incumbent. So the rich and powerful continue to maintain their money and power in our "representative democracy."
People are good. But people put trust in our media to educate them on the state of our country and hold the government accountable. When those things don't happen, the power and wealth of the government increases, while the accountability of the government decreases. The government takes our money, wastes our money, and the people play the blame game. The goodness in people trusts that our government shares our best interests. The goodness in people believes that our government wants to make our lives easier. But money and power trump goodness -- and we are none the wiser.
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