Real Thought

We need to have real change here in America, on this point almost everyone agrees.  No candidate, especially Barak Obama,  has explicitly stated what the changes would be.  I offer a few suggestions:

1. Reduce America’s dependence on foreign, especially Middle Eastern, sources of petroleum.  America could and should exploit domestic sources of energy, from biofuels to wind, solar, oil, coal, water and nuclear energy.  There is no reason on this Earth why we should not have ninety percent of our electricity generated by nuclear power.  None.  There is no good reason not to increase domestic exploitation of our oil reserves nor to develop large scale coal and gas to liquid fuels production.  After all, Nazi Germany had massive “alternative fuel” programs during World War II.  You mean to tell me that in over 60 years if steadly improving technology we can’t do better than they did?  Finally, there is no reason why we shouldn’t be planting soybeans in order to produce bio-diesel and encouraging the large scale production of bio-fuel.  Encourage the production of non-petroleum based plastic substitutes like good old fashioned glass bottles.

2. Fix public education.  Begin by realizing that every child is neither prepared nor able to meet some artificial “annual yearly progress” benchmark.  Children are individuals and should be treated as such.  Scrap the Federal Department of Education and the so-called “No Child Left Behind Act”.  As any teacher and they will tell you that the Federal government has no place in the education business and  NCLB has resulted in the gutting of science and history education across this country.  Finally, make free public education a privilige, not a right.  If a child in destructive, refuses to behave in a civilized manner or is a danger to others, remove that child from the system.  Force the parents to be responsible for the education of their little hellion and move on.

3.  End farm subsidies, NOW!  With rising fuel and food prices the United States has no business paying farmers not to plant and artificially raising food prices.  We must produce more and cheaper basic agricultural products in order to offset rising fuel costs.  Furthermore, any surpluses can be sold on the open market thus adding to the overall world food supply and providing food to those who suffer from hunger the most.

4.  Stop direct foreign aid.  We have a myriad of problems here in the United States.  We do not need to send billions of dollars overseas where much of it is wasted on programs which are ineffective, squandered on bloated international aid bureaucracies or simply stolen.  Spend the money here at home, on our own.

5. Fix the immigration problem.  We need border security now more than ever.  Every year hundred of thousands of “undocumented immigrants” in reality illegal immigrants, enter our country.  Why is it that it is harder for me to board a domestic airline flight than it is for someone to come into the United States?  Strict immigration control must be implimented and enforced.  Anyone who is found in this country without proper or expired visas should summarily be deported.  Anyone who hires an illegal worker should be fined 75% of their annual earnings.  Once we get immigration under control, then we can go about solving the terrorist crisis.

These are just a rough and incomplete outline of what I would try to achieve in order to solve some of our country’s problems.   Perhaps one of the candidates for president will have a similar vision for America’s future, but I doubt it.  I have some more proposals which I will post at a later date.