Political Amnesia

Quote of the Day

 

"The blogger Billmon writes: 'I don't know if it's a byproduct of decades of excessive exposure to television, the state of America's educational system, or something in the water, but the ability of the average journalist -- not to mention the average voter -- to remember things that happened just a few short months ago appears to be slipping into the abyss. "If this keeps up, we're going to end up like the villagers in "One Hundred Years of Solitude," who all contracted a rare form of jungle amnesia, so virulent they were reduced to posting signs on various objects -- 'I AM A COW. MILK ME' or 'I AM A GATE. OPEN ME' -- just so they could get on with their daily lives.'

 

quoted from: Political Amnesia Is the Enemy

http://www.alternet.org/mediaculture/36743/

 

 

Well it's high time that we all pinch, kick or slap ourselves (and our friends and family if necessary ) if that's what it will take to regain our memories.     I can understand that it can be easy to forget events when so many critical issues are thrown at us in rapid succession.   However with the very survival of this planet at stake it's time to make a concerted effort to regain consciousness.

 

Each of us needs to create two important lists:  

 

1.  A list of the top twenty issues that we care the most about.   Twenty may sound like a lot but once you get started you can come up with twenty items in no time.

       

    For example here's a quick list of 24 items that quickly came to my mind:

1.      decelerating the rate of global warming

2.      reducing dependency on fossil fuels

3.      improving the quality of public education

4.      making a secondary education more affordable

5.      honoring and taking care of the elderly in our society

6.      fighting the spread of HIV

7.      ending world hunger

8.      fighting poverty

9.      fighting terrorism

10.  ending genocide and ethnic cleansing

11.  border security

12.  immigration reform

13.  healthcare reform

14.  reducing infant mortality

15.  sheltering the homeless

16.  ending adult illiteracy

17.  protecting wildlife and their natural habitats.

18.  fighting racial, ethnic, sexual discrimination 

19.  protecting the family farmer

20.  rooting out corporate corruption

21.  ending government corruption

22.  protecting children from internet predators

23.  fighting domestic abuse

24.  ending the proliferation of abortion

 

2. A score card of how our elected representative have voted on those issues since coming into office.  

 

Once we've compiled our two lists we need to take them with us the next time that we have occasion to visiting our local voting place.

 

plk