Rolling Plains Ramblings – Our
Challenge Ahead
© 22 September 2005 –
By Morton Scott
Katrina is potentially a much greater disaster than we have seen on our
TV screens, despite the pathetic pictures of people clinging to boats, or
dead men sitting in wheel chairs or the huddled hordes at the New Orleans
Dome.
As truly tragic as Katrina’s impact was and is, our nation’s
greatest challenges loom ahead. Our place in the world, our future depends
on how we react to these tragedies. Will we continue to be a great nation
in the March of Humanity, or will we be a blip in Earth history?
In Katrina’s aftermath are seeds which may shatter our Republic into
squabbling factions. These challenges may, however, inspire us to sculpt
our Republic to lead Earth’s people into the global society. The choice
is ours. We can shape our future.
Potential seeds are splits between blacks and whites, between haves and
have nots, between the Gulf states and the rest of the nation. All this
would occur against the backdrop of deep economic problems.
Let’s look at that economic backdrop. The nation’s long-term
debt is about EIGHT TRILLION DOLLARS ($7,942,783,923,607.13 last week)!
(That’s over $27,000 for every man, woman and child in the U.S. –
including YOU.) Most is owed to nations less prosperous than we are –
India, South Korea, China, etc. They own our debt and may demand it at any
moment.
The cost of the Iraqi War is at least $200 billions. The Federal cost of
Katrina may be an additional $200 billions. This is on top of an annual
budget deficit over $300 billions. Our debt is skyrocketing. Other nations
hold that debt.
Our economic picture is complicated by the growing income gap between poor
and middle income families on the one hand and rich families. This gap is
rapidly increasing. The rich ARE growing richer. The poor ARE growing poorer.
That’s the grim backdrop. Katrina knocked the scab off our national
secret which mocks those words held by the Statue of Liberty: “Give
me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
….. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me ….”
We saw those huddled masses, homeless, tempest tossed, not overseas, but
in New Orleans: The poor who have no cars, no bus service, uneducated and
unable to solve basic problems. These are our poor, disproportionately black,
but mostly white.
We Americans knew they are there, but we did not have to see them. Of course,
our poor are not only in cities, but also scattered across the land in small
towns, in rural areas.
Those words of Lady Liberty imply a promise that in her land people will
live a better life, they will not be homeless, they will not be poor. Even
before Katrina, every night in our nation 250,000 homeless huddled into
public shelters. Other tens of thousands huddled on heated grates, on curbs,
in doorways. This is not a part of the American dream.
Our American response to the Katrina tragedy has so far been magnificent.
We have opened our hearts, our homes and our purses to hundreds of thousands
of evacuees.
We must seize this opportunity to improve the condition of not only the
Katrina evacuees, but also those poor, uneducated people already scattered
over our United States of America. We must seek better housing, a government
more conscious of their needs, better job opportunities and, most of all,
better education for both adults and young people.
Ironically, if we better the lives of the poor across our nation, improve
their educational opportunities and their conditions of life, they will
increase their contributions to our society.
This may help solve that grim background of our economic status. Out of
the tragedy of Katrina may come a better nation, a stronger nation. With
increased productivity from evacuees and the poor, with the lessons we learn
from solving their problems, we may emerge as a United States of America
which can pay of its debts and remain the greatest nation in human history.
Lady Liberty may smile a bit more.
Contact me at >fmortonscott@aol.com<
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