REPLIES TO THE CURRENT QUESTION

Our question last week was:

Give three examples of change in American life, culture, or politics that you could actually believe in.

Here are your answers.  The name of a writer is included only if he or she actually placed a name at the end of the message.  Otherwise, we assume the writer wished anonymity and "name withheld" is inserted.

I only need one example because it would dramatically change all three.  If the news media would simply revert to news gathering, news reporting and news analysis; and, knowing and identifying the difference between reporting and analysis, I could once again believe in what I read and see.  

Don Newell

I'll believe in "change" when: 1) News pages report, opinion pages opine and newspapers honor the separation. 2) Obama does not genuflect at the alter of the Greens. 3) Celb "news" becomes the exclusive province of mags such as The Star, National Enquirer, and mags that cater to nitwits. 4) Criticism of an American politician who has African ancestry is not automatically characterized as racist.

Beth Dewenter

1.  Stop hyphenating Americans.  African-Americans, Latino-Americans, Italian-Americans, Asian-Americans, Jewish-Americans, etc.  This is Balkanizing our nation.  America is an idea.  It is not a nation based on geography and time.  The only difference between a native born American and a naturalized one is that the former can be president.  During the mass immigrations of the late 19th and early 20th centuries the idea was that immigrants would assimilate into a common American culture while maintaining any individual cultural identity within the privacy of the home or community.  Today, through leftist identity politics, we are becoming sets of victim groups fighting against each other for special treatment.  It will tear our country apart.  It is already tearing the Democratic Party apart.

2. Start dismantling the Welfare State.  This is a total pipe-dream but it is the welfare state that is sapping our strength and turning us into feminized children.  If you want to see what America will look like in 50 years if the expansion of the welfare state continues look at Europe today.  Unfortunately, with the age of Obama upon us the trend will be accelerated.  If a Republican adminstration is willing to socialize the auto industry and the banking system, who is to stop the new Democratic majority from implementing their socialist agenda?

3. Consolidated effort to make the US energy independent.  This is not totally possible, but by restricting drilling within the US we are making ourselves more and more dependent on foreign supplies.  Does it really make sense to send literally trillions of dollars to Russia and the Arabs when we could be keeping the money here by tapping our own reserves?  Do we really believe that they are better stewards of the environment than we can be? One of the great shames of the last election cycle was the trashing of Sarah Palin.  This was the only politician on the national scene who could articulate the issues and solutions necessary for energy independence. Lenin was wrong when he said the capitalists will sell the rope that will hang them.  Today we are buying the rope for them.  


Alan Weick