This year has proven to be a dismally disenchanting one so far. For a year starting with so much potential, this past month has been overwhelming with bad news making it seem like the world keeps taking a turn for the worse.
We’ve had the debacle in Wisconsin with the GOP assault on public labor, which was fully willing to take cuts and cooperate with the governor to help balance the budget. Hiding under a guise of fiscal responsibility, the GOP is showing its colors once more, though this really should not come as much of a surprise to any of us. They simply are looking out for those who got them elected, which sad to say, sure as hell isn’t the people. And similar legislation is passing in several other states where the Tea Party fever managed to capture the GOP a majority. But why should we be shocked? The so called “government for the people, by the people” hasn’t given a shit about us for a long time, only who can attain and control the helm of the American Empire. The Democrats tried to play nice (well some of them did, the rest are just as bad as the GOP) and in turn lost control. Again. It’s no wonder so many voters are becoming disillusioned with the system; the only people that win are the ones running the show. We certainly don’t. I keep watching jobs disappear, schools, clinics, fire departments, pretty much everything have to run on ever shrinking budgets, all while my taxes and tuition keep going up, my rights keep getting restricted or denied entirely (looking at you Maryland and the cowardice of your legislature). And yet the ruling class keeps getting favors and breaks, swimming in record profits for the year. For the greatest nation on Earth, we could certainly be doing better. I only continue to vote because it gives me more say than not voting, little as that say may be. And I keep hoping that things will improve.
And of course, I look at what’s going on in the Middle East and North Africa, it kicks in some perspective to how much harder some people live. It is incredibly encouraging to see so many people fighting for what they think is right, to demand more say in how they are governed. If our generation here in America had even a fifth of the ambition and organization of these protesters, we could change things for the better. We’ve seen several peaceful topplings of the old regime now, and even the birth of a new nation from Sudan. And yet, these protests also remind me of how little our people actually care about the advancement of democratic life, of free speech and the press, as we sit here and do nothing as Libya begins to lay the grounds for a genocidal blood bath. Our leaders sit here and twiddle their thumbs while we have a angry leader determined to hold power at all costs waging war on his own people. And I am so deeply saddened by how quickly our attention to this all has been lost with the devastating disaster in Japan.
Now, don’t you dare say the I am unsympathetic to the plight of Japan. It is absolutely horrendous there right now, and they are struggling. And need all the help they can get. And I don’t seek to pull away from any effort to do so. But it deeply saddens me that we cannot focus on the plight of more than one nation or people at a time. The Middle East is essentially being entirely ignored now in our media for the terrible conditions in Japan. All of these people need support. They all need to be heard. They should not be forced to fade into the background because our attention is so fickle. Which is why everyone should begin to try and pay more mind to what happens in this world around them. Because we never know whose voice and pleas we cannot hear and cannot help because we did not listen.