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Economic slavery: So what is the answer? This column is a continuation from the one I began last week. It’s meant to address the belief that this nation is in a condition of economic slavery and why apathy is not the answer to that condition. What follows are thoughts and suggestions. They are not meant to be the only answers available. I hope our readers across Georgia and beyond will suggest some of their own. If apathy was currency, many in America would be billionaires. This is nothing new. Directly or indirectly, we are led to believe that the average citizen doesn’t have the sense (excuse me, I mean the business acumen) to discern the intricate complexities involved in the national and international issues that face this country. Only those Congressional and corporate titans, from their supposedly stratospheric vantage point, can find the solutions and point the way. If you believe that, you’re already lost. As a nation of people, we need to understand that the economic and political servitude referenced here transcends gender, color, religion or party preference. We are all paying more than $4 for a gallon of gas, we are all paying high prices for food (for example, a 5 percent increase in food prices is forecast for 2008, up from the 4 percent hike just last year) and we all are subject to economic forces beyond our control. Aren’t we? That’s what we’re told. And in the meantime, Congress, political organizations and the national news media continue to keep us immersed in the Politics of Division. Politicians point their fingers and wag their tongues, yet accomplish little to diminish the mounting economic burden faced by the very people whose votes they need to stay in office. And “we the people” sit largely silent. The thing is, both parties in this country have sold us out. Democrats, for example, the supposed “party of the people,” won’t even let their own people determine a Presidential candidate without oversight from their political-elitist “leaders” on high. Meantime, Republicans, for example, continue to spend taxpayers’ money in ways the Democrats could have only dreamt of. And between the two, they have a lock grip on economic policy and a two-party-only government. If the supposedly-environmentally conscious Democrats really cared, why haven’t they in past decades secured legislation to force the introduction of alternative energy sources? And if the supposedly morally-based Republicans really cared, why haven’t they done the same? Yet Brazil, as a rising, but developing nation, is energy independent, while America, still the planet’s technological and innovative powerhouse, can’t seem to find the solution for its energy problems. In my opinion, Congress, as a body and including both parties, by negligent naivete or by design, is guilty of a kind of economic treason against the American people. Treason is defined as “the offense of acting to overthrow one’s government or to harm or kill its sovereign (as in sovereign state); a violation of allegiance to one’s sovereign or to one’s state; the betrayal of a trust or confidence; breach of faith; treachery.” In the case of America, we are being overthrown economically and in other ways from within, incrementally, exactly the way Lincoln said it could happen:. “America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.” Perhaps as much as any other time in our history, Americans know precious little about the state and federal governments that take so much of their income in taxes. Many today know more about contestants on “American Idol” than we do about the people we send to Congress. They make the rules that govern our lives, and we don’t even know their names. Here’s the bottom line. Silence equals consent. Consent equals servitude. And your servitude equals your slavery to conditions that continue to jeopardize your rights, your freedom, your home and your family. So long as the average American remains silent, they remain in servitude, whether economically or politically, and regardless of their party affiliation or income level. We’ve had a stable nation for so long we don’t understand the danger that severe instability can bring. Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. Folks, the antidote for apathy is action. But how might that action be potentiated and how might it be manifested? In any or every way imaginable, it means getting involved, even a little. Action is potentiated, brought into reality, when we make it our business to know more about what is going on around us, to know more about the things that directly impact our life and that of our family. Locally, at the state level and in national affairs, knowledge is power. If you care enough about yourself and your family to become informed, you’ll do it. The information resources available are endless. Though it has to be filtered with scrutiny, the Internet, for example, is a tool for the acquisition of knowledge unlike anything available in human history. How can your action be manifested? Here are two ideas. Doubtless, there are many others. First, write a letter or an email (have you noticed the price of stamps lately?) to as many members of Congress as you will. Tell them what you think, tell them how current energy or other policies are affecting your family, tell them what you want them to do. You can make it a short statement or something longer. The first email starts with you. Or actually, it starts with me. I’ll begin by sending copies of this column and the one last week to the Georgia Congressional delegation, to members of the U.S. House Energy & Commerce Committee, the House Standards of Official Conduct Committee, the U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee and Senate Governmental Affairs Committee. I hope you’ll do something, too. How else might your action be manifested? I’ve spoken with plenty of people here and around Georgia and elsewhere who are beyond fed up with the illusion of Congressional action and the reality of inaction. Of those expressing frustration, even outrage, some are Democrats, some are Republicans, some are Independents. And their ranks are growing. Maybe you’ve heard the same. Are “we the people” at the point where we are sufficiently fed up with the political status quo in this country that we’re willing to put the hot-button issues of division aside long enough to center our attention on, for example, the creation of a new party, comprising those Republicans, Democrats and Independents and others whose objective is economic and political freedom? A Freedom Party: one promoting freedom from economic policies that intensify servitude, freedom from the erosion of our human rights, freedom from corporate-backed policies that continue to allow our children and grandchildren to be poisoned by countless chemicals we think are safe, freedom from Congressional demagogues whose source of continued power resides in the very apathy that allows them to act out of synch with the circumstances of the average American. Personal action of any kind provides the impetus for that action to replace apathy and reduces the opportunity for further subjugation through economic servitude. login to post comments | Ben Nelms's blog
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