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Part 118: The Remaining Issues:
August 30.2004:
In essay 117 if finished with my thoughts on democratizing the world. This was the fourth of the major issues I spelled out in essay 38. If we don't resolve those, nothing else we do will matter. We will, and should, go the way of the Roman Empire and all other failed systems. Too reiterate, the issues are child welfare, restoring the rule of law in America, restoring and preserving our environment, and finally democratizing the world.
Way back in essay number two I also presented a list of basic
issues. These are the things I think we must address if we are
to maintain our position of strength in the world community. I
have added a couple of items since I built that list. In no particular
order, here is the list of issues.
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Economy Energy Election reform Education Religion Police Draft and service Transportation Highway safety Foreign Policy Military Readiness Court System Justice Delayed Cost of Justice Uniform Laws Prison Reform Technology Research Obesity United Nations |
Internet Communications Women's Rights Minority Rights Right to Life Right to Death Abortion Taxes Social Security Health Care Postal Service The Arts Cuba Military and War Defining Treason Terrorism Oil Environment, pollution Palestine NAFTA |
Crime Drug Trade Capital Punishment Gambling Land Mines Human Rights School Vouchers School Testing Taxation and Funding Guns NRA Equal Employment Equal Opportunity Sports and Education Commerce Communication media Psychopathic kids Unions The two party system Censorship |
One thing I notice about this list is I have inadvertently addressed some of them in my series of essays. Education is one I covered in child welfare. I have adequately covered police, cost of justice, justice delayed, capital punishment, crime, and uniform laws in my essays on law and the government. I may want to do a bit more on our court system, prison reform, and election reform after I reread what I have said.
Draft and service, military readiness, miliary and war, and terrorism have been covered in my universal draft essays. On foreign policy and the United Nations, I will want to expand on what I have already said. I addressed the postal service and other civil services in my civil service essays. Let me say, I think these systems can be reformed, but they will require some rethinking. I will get to that.
I have adequately covered the environment and pollution. Two related topics are energy and oil. I believe these two must be addressed together. In schools and school vouchers, I have said enough. This is also true of sports in education and psychopathic kids. As to the arts, I have concluded the government has no business funding art. This would require the government to define what constitutes art. The only people who would want that would be people pretending to be artists so as to get a free ride.
I also want to weed out of this list those issues which I call
pseudo issues and fringe or minority issues. This has nothing
to do with the morality of the issues involved. It is about the
number of people involved. These issues may be important to a
limited number of people. I can cover all of them near the end
of this series. Some of them truly are pseudo issues. I see obesity,
right to life, right to death, homosexuality, and abortion among
these. Unfortunately, I will need to address the homosexuality
issue immediately. This is simply the result of dishonesty in
government. I will entitle it Homophobia. That leaves me with
this list of issues still unaddressed or only partially addressed.
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Economy Energy Election reform Religion Transportation Highway safety Foreign Policy Court System Prison Reform Technology Research United Nations |
Internet Communications women's Rights Minority Rights Taxes Social Security Health Care Cuba Defining Treason Oil Palestine Drug Trade |
Gambling Land Mines Human Rights Guns NRA Equal Employment Equal Opportunity Commerce Communication media Unions The two party system Censorship NAFTA |
I would like to place some order on my procedure from here on. As I said, the next essay will address dishonesty in government in the out of order issue of homophobia. After that, I will present a discussion on the entrepreneur initiative. This comes under the broad heading of the economy which also includes commerce. As I expand these ideas I see essays on several of the issues above. These being economy, commerce, unions, equal opportunity, and equal employment. Closely linked to these concepts are the issues of human rights, woman's rights, and minority rights.
Beyond that, I want to take up the energy problem. This will include oil and the organization of oil producing countries (OPEC). This will necessarily lead into a further discussion of foreign policy which I have also covered in my essays on democratizing the world. The drug trade, land mines, and Palestine will also fall under this set of essays as will Cuba and defining treason. A discussion of NAFTA may also be part of this set.
Health care is an issue that is important and must be addressed. I intend to borrow from other essays to lay out a plan that I believe will save a fortune by eliminating fraud in the industry. To some extent, this is about the government and I see taxes and Social Security as part of this set.
I want to cover religion as a separate issue. I consider fundamentalist religions to be the biggest threat to America and to human rights. To some extent this ties into terrorism, but it is an issue by itself. Guns and the NRA are another issue that I have somewhat covered in other essays. I will not hurt to take a longer look at it again.
Another group of essays will come under the general heading of technology and research. In this, I will include my views on transportation and highway safety. The other issues which belong to this group are communication and the internet. The communication media is a separate issue to take up in this set or the next.
The final set will contain essays on the remaining bits and
pieces. One of these is gambling, which too often is about bad
government. I also want to look a bit more at our two party system,
and censorship. After that, I can pick up whatever remains in
separate essays, including those minority issues.
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