Patriotism Means Standing Up – Walk the Walk – Fight Corruption

Sunday, November 2, 2008
PATRIOTISM MEANS STANDING UP – FIGHT CORRUPTION
With the 2008 election imminent I want to pause and discuss Patriotism. Patriotism to me is helping not just secure our country and protecting the Constitution, but ACTIVELY working on a daily and regular basis to make our country better. This means walking the walk and not just talking the talk. Patriotism is a constant war where we serve and protect our values embodied in our Constitution. Never fight a war unless you are willing to die. Yes there are sacrifices, but that is the price of justice and freedom.

In the United States ask who in the population is thought to be putting themselves on the line every day and not shirking their responsibility to their country? I don’t just mean upholding the law as an officer! I mean standing next to your neighbor, your colleague, your co-worker, your enemy – whenever and whereever the Bill of Rights is threatened. Stand up for compassion. Stand up for opportunity. Stand up for education. Stand up for justice. Stand up for those who can’t stand up for themselves.

We have failed as Americans in the last few decades by looking the other way, being only self-centered and self-interested, putting profit before compassion and justice, ignoring our neighbors, wearing blinders next to the needy, and justifying our mistakes with pat phrases. Silence and lack of action are the biggest dangers to our democracy. Transparency, action, and open debate will save us.

Please be patriotic – VOTE at EVERY ELECTION. INFORM yourself about the candidates. Please DON”T cover up corruption. BREAK the thin blue line and stand with what’s right. SPEAK OUT for those who are attacked for defending the Bill of Rights.

UNITED WE STAND – DIVIDED WE FALL!

How to Decrease Teen Pregnancies, Decrease Crime, and Build Our Economy

Personally as a pediatrician, I found the highest teen birth rates in three groups. 1. Teens in distressed families (drug addict or absent parents [not single moms], poverty where parents are working 2-3 jobs, overextended and therefore technically absent and rich parents with unsupervised kids); 2. Teens in very religious families relying on abstinence, that wouldn’t talk about sex, leaving kids to figure it out on their own (these kids constantly were super rebellious); and 3. idol teens who had no hobbies except hanging out with friends and who had self-esteem problems such that they would do anything to appear popular.

The saddest case that is a commentary on how we talk but don’t help distressed teens and families was an eighth grade girl who told me she purposely got pregnant because she wanted someone to “love her.” She had lived mainly on the streets taking care of herself in South Carolina (the bible belt) where social services were inadequate to help her. Her parents were unavailable. The churches, schools, and social services viewed her as important and worthwhile as a dead dog. What do you expect! Three girls in her class were pregnant that year.

Until we promote individual worth; provide adequate eduation so that kids are motivated to learn and therefore kept busy with self motivation(our high school education is like a junior high education in most civilized countries – teachers are in general miserably undertrained); teach kids the value of being involved with others and with activities such as the arts, volunteering, involvement with government and social services, gardening, sports without a goal of being a major leager; teach that community and family is more important than self and instant gratification or material goods; promote a village atmosphere where people in one small neighborhood or a few blocks in a city know each other, meet regularly with each other (difficult with two jobs and long commutes) and help each other (70 % of Americans don’t know their neighbors); make real job training and jobs available to young men and women; reform laws so that like in Europe women can stay home with a child the first two years of life and still have a job available and career available when they return to work, we will make no progress in regards to teen births or abortions.

We need to shift our priorities and donations to the REAL problems that result in teen pregnancies and abortions. If we simply fight about ideology nothing will be accomplished. United We Stand, Divided We Fall. Perhaps it is time to agree to disagree on ideology and work together on issues that we all agree upon!

The benefits would be enormous. We would not just deal with teen pregnancies and reduce abortions, we would reduce crime and increase our countries productivity saving huge amounts of money and rebuilding our economy.

Proposed New Cabinet Position – Secretary of Communications

Communications is the new frontier. Newspapers are being converted from print to internet. Huge amounts of money are wasted through lack of standardization, redundancy, and difficulty in querying and finding data. We need to standardize not just electronic medical records, to prevent duplicating services and errors, but also utility bills, credit card bills, contracts, court records, prison and jail records, government forms and records, and any communications which are fundamental, frequent, and subject to privacy and security concerns.

Elderly and disabled persons often have difficulty in the area of communications. Changing the format of utility bills causes a problem. Difficult to read credit card bills causes chaos. Incomprehensible contracts are a disaster. Difficult to read and fill-out forms deny access.

National security is highly dependent on communications – on the battle front, for homeland security, to prevent terrorist attacks, to prevent crime. However the privacy concerns are huge. Intelligence may sometimes compromise privacy. How do we balance these?

Information technology is poorly understood by most Americans. We need increased education in this area.

Mediation, debate, giving and following instructions, about almost anything are necessary skills in society. How can we increase our skills as a nation in this area?

            I feel a cabinet level position is warranted to help us move from the paper age to the digital age, just as we have moving from the agricultural age to the industrial age, and have entered the computer/internet age. Laws must be reviewed and new laws implemented regarding this new frontier. Careful thought must be given to implementing incentives that enhance are goals and principles. Communications in this new age cannot be without strings attached, just as one cannot shout “fire” in a movie theatre.

 

Please give your thoughts on this proposal through the comment feature of this blog.