Guns, Butter, And Social Injustice

An old man with shaking hands counts out some crumpled bills to a receptionist in a doctor's office. The sign above the cashier's window says: nn"If you are a Medicare customer you will be required to pay your $135 deductable before service is rendered." But the old man only comes up with $95.00. Will he be turned away? This could only happen in one place in the industrialized world - America. During recent congressional hearings, a congressional representative asked some CEOs of mortgage companies under investigation if they were getting too much compensation, which is in the millions. The reply was . . . Silence. Then he asked if maybe a trillion would be too much to pay a CEO, or maybe a few trillion. . . . Silence again. nnFRANCES D'EMILIO (AP) on March 10 said that the Vatican is paying attention to social injustice "along the lines of the age-old maxim: 'The rich get richer while the poor get poorer.' "In the Vatican's latest update on how God's law is being violated in today's world, Monsignor Gianfranco Girotti, the head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, was asked by the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano what, in his opinion, are the 'new sins.' "The poor are always becoming poorer and the rich ever more rich, feeding unsustainable social injustice," Girotti said in the interview published Sunday." Does greed ever have limits? The wealthy seem to have none regarding their insatiable desires. A 100-foot yacht? No - a 200-foot yacht! Maybe one in every port in the world. And a home in every city in the world. Maybe a private army! . . . It never ends. And since the wealthy usually hold the reins of power - it never changes. This is going in the opposite direction of spiritual values, the values Jesus talked about with His Sermon on the Mount. nn Matthew 5: 3-12: nnn - Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. nn - Blessed are they who mourn, for they shall be comforted. nn - Blessed are the meek, for they shall possess the earth. nn - Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for justice, for they shall be satisfied. nn - Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. nn - Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God. nn - Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. nn - Blessed are they who suffer persecution for justice sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Wealth for a few comes at great spiritual cost for everyone, including the wealthy, because their spiritual life has ended. How could anyone accumulate wealth for themselves when so many people in so many ways are hurting in this world? The wealthy will never make it through the eye of that needle, regardless of how cleverly they rationalize their destiny. They are kidding themselves. The current argument that is draining our social programs and transferring our money into that big casino called Wall Street is that we must protect ourselves from "terrorists" regardless of the cost. But is spending so much money on foreign wars really protecting us, or is it killing our social programs so that people can no longer go to doctors when they are sick, or buy medicine when they need it? Insurance companies make sure that we pay the first few thousand dollars of doctor's bills ourselves, a "deductable" they call it. So how can poor people afford to go to a doctor these days? Health care is out of control, and we are killing our old and our sick just as surely as if some fairytale terrorist bombed their homes. The more sinister aspect of this is that the killing of social programs may be a hidden agenda. Social programs are hated by certain segments of our society ever since Franklin D. Roosevelt gave the poor a break and shared the wealth of our country, a hatred exacerbated by the Ronald Reagan era. An effective way to kill social programs, such as Social Security and Medicare, is to spend all our tax money on bombs so that none is left for the continuance of social programs. The idea is to break the country by spending so much militarily that the deficits become enormous, all in the name of the flag. Then congress has no choice but to cut back on domestic programs. We have seen this play out in the last seven years where a war has been kept alive that should have ended long ago, and never should have been waged in the first place. President Bill Clinton left office in 2001 with a federal budget surplus of $127 billion. Some deficits under George Bush so far are: 2003 $378 billion, 2004 $413 billion, 2005 $318 billion 2006 $296 billion. Is this an accident? We no longer have to wonder why foreign wars continue far past their relevance, or why money continues to be poured into bombs instead of help for everyday Americans that have no health care . . . it's an agenda. Soon, older people may be losing their Medicare and Social Security as well if we believe what those who want to end these programs are saying. By hook or crook, all our social security money will someday be funneled in to Wall Street as inflation eats us alive. Those who hate social programs feel we should all fend for ourselves. Sick, poor, needy, old - it doesn't matter - "If you're not smart enough or healthy enough to make it on your own, don't expect me to help you; you are just lazy and don't deserve help." This is unfortunately the attitude of those who hate socialism or social programs of any kind; that are against sharing the wealth beyond their immediate families. These are the ones itching to go to war with whomever they can so that they can move their agenda ahead, selling patriotism while our young men and women die and are maimed, and while America is viewed by the world as an out of control, immature country. These are the ones whose vision goes no further than this life, and don't realize that they cannot take it with them, and have no idea how sharing wealth and helping everyone else feel satisfied, not rich, is what Jesus was all about. Jesus was a socialist; he was for the poor, and for the common people. Those who hate social programs are callous, non-spiritual, uncompassionate people who are nothing but selfish, and only interested in their own wealth. They try to rationalize their greed by complaining about lazy people who want to live off their money, but this is a smoke screen. It is not true. What we are facing in America today is a power struggle between the vast majority of folks who want nothing more than fai ess - and a very few greedy, ignorant, insensitive, well connected people who want all the breaks for themselves, and have the power to pull it off. Wrapped in the flag and their religion, these hypocrites have cleverly channeled all the people's money, our tax dollars, into the military industrial complex, and are purposely exhausting our money so that a huge budget deficit will result in the elimination of social programs. This is an agenda of an entirely selfish segment of society; people who would like to eliminate the social programs that have kept our country strong and fair for so long. Don't be fooled by the rhetoric and fear mongering. It's all about money and power while it should be about how Jesus lived; caring and sharing, healing and working hard to better everyone. Jesus didn't accumulate wealth; He gave everything, including his life, to others. But some today won't even give a nickel, unless of course, it's deductable. The country is at a crossroads. We must be keen to understand what is happening. We must be aware of those who encourage us to argue and fight amongst ourselves, who spread hatred and keep us distracted by irrelevant side issues, while our pockets and our very souls are being cleverly picked. They are the ones who fear terribly that the people might wake up. Middle class Americans just don't understand how much influence they can have if and when they find their voice. This is a very important time in our history, and in the history of the world. The old ways of a few holding all of the wealth now prevails, which means that the rest of us must fight and claw for what little is left over, or whatever "Trickles Down," as Reagan cleverly promoted. This all must change soon if it is to change peacefully. The world must become more social, more compassionate, more sharing. The wealthy laughing behind our backs won't be tolerated much longer. It's not that the middle class wants to be wealthy; they understand that money will never make anyone happy; quite the opposite, it makes people increasingly greedy. What the middle class seeks is fai ess, that's all, just being respected as human beings, no better or worse than those who hold the reins of power now and refuse to share it. So will it be bombs and hatred, or medicine and compassion? Will those in power capitulate, or will a social revolution (peaceful) be necessary? Will the quality of our bank accounts prevail, or the quality of our minds? A new vision is emerging, even in politics, where the old ways of hatred, division and character assassination are being rejected. Money and power in the hands of the few means that the common folk have no peace, no time to spend on things that are really important, such as spirituality, and such as sharing, and not just looking out for ourselves and our own. But this is what the wealthy few don't want, regardless of their religious proclamations of charity, or the bible passages they recite that they think excuse their greed. They want the common people to believe their stories of fear and danger, and would love us middle Americans to all just go away! Jesus wouldn't have understood this at all. It is time for us to wake up if we truly love our country. Just look around at what our country has developed into, here on Main Street. Where has our standard of living gone? Whose pockets have been lined? And in the eyes of the rest of the world, what has America become? Just look for yourself; Maybe the Vatican has it right this time about "Social Injustice." Is it time to make the world a better place? n