I remember a conversation I had with my grandfather. He was born in the 90's, that's the 1890's. He was born in the Canadian prairie in a sod house. He saw the first automobile. Worked in the west coast paper industry and lived through the great depression. He witnessed vast changes from the world he was born into. He helped to organize the labor unions and was involved with struggle of the workers to get fair pay for a fair days work. One of the questions that had intrigued me was this, "Had he every dreamed when he was growing up that he would see a man land on the moon?" His succinct answer was no.
Here was a person who literally was born dirt poor but throughout his life he was able to improve his lot and see tremendous progress for America. I grew up in a family where my father was the sole breadwinner. We weren't rich but we lived the life of improvement thorough the 50's and the 60's. While my father didn't start out as poor as his father he did maintain the middle class life his father obtained.
I went to college on the GI Bill and got a degree in psychology and went on to graduate school in clinical psychology. When I got out it was the late 70's and I had trouble finding employment. I was lucky enough to get a job as a firefighter. In the late 80's I went back to college and got a degree in CompSci. From there I was able to surpass my parent's lifestyle and become what one might refer to as upper middle class. So in two generations my family went from dirt poor to upper middle class. We are what the American dream is all about.
Now as I look to the future I truly believe that my grandkids won't have the standard of living I have. It is getting harder for anyone but the wealthy to afford college. With the industrialization of China and India the environment is getting hammered. One only has to look to Africa to get a glimpse of how the exploitation of the earth's natural resources will play out. The Amazon rain forest is being logged into extinction. Even here in the US we have lost most of our old growth forests.
The idea of the American dream is become increasingly impossible to reach. We are running up enormous debts. Most Americans are not saving money and living with personal debts that could push them into insolvency. The gap between the rich and the middle class is growing and forget about the poor. Katerina showed us how they will fare.
So where does that leave our children and grandchildren. If you're rich then you'll get to be like Paris Hilton. If you're middle class then maybe with a little luck and a huge amount of hard work you will achieve the American dream. But if you're like most of us you will slowly see your life style decrease and your choices become more and more limited.
That is why I believe in the idea of helping others to improve themselves. I feel that if a person is hungry then we as a society should help to feed them. I believe that education is the key to a better life and all Americans whether they are rich or poor deserve the opportunity to get it. I know that everyone should have good health care. We should not be shut out just because we are poor or old.
These are some of the reasons I believe that we need to change the direction of this country. No more exporting democracy by war. No more pushing science to the side. No more appointing incompetent people to run important government agencies. No more disguising environmentally unsound policies with misleading names. No more letting corporations write the laws that govern them. No more letting the rich get richer while the poor fall off the grid and the middle class become the neo-poor.
When I think about your children and grandchildren I feel sad.