A July
4th Memo To America From a Concerned Citizen
by Pastor
Paul J. Bern
To view this in any
browser, click
here! :-)
One of the primary
purposes of this Web ministry is to stand against social injustice
and economic inequality in all its forms, as well as the extreme
immorality of waging warfare. I firmly believe that any minister who
does not do these things is only doing half his or her job. In that
case, all they would be doing is collecting a paycheck every Sunday
morning for the sake of profit and materialism, forgetting that Jesus
preached against this very thing over and over again. (But don't take
my word for it, it's in all four gospels, go and read it for
yourself. Anyone who doesn't have a Bible should visit the “Contact
Us” page on my website and ask for one. I will personally send you
an Adobe/PDF version free of charge. Don't forget to include your
email address.) Although Jesus did take His ministry to the religious
establishment of his day, which centered around the temple at
Jerusalem and the Sanhedrin (or Hebrew ruling elect) of that time, he
was rejected and ultimately executed by them just as the Old
Testament prophets foretold. This compelled him to reach out to the
poor and downtrodden, the outcast and the marginalized who otherwise
had no voice at all. He ministered to the sick, the homeless, the
addicted and the unemployed and all others who had nothing, with the
knowledge that the indwelling of the Spirit of Christ is vastly
superior to mere material possessions. I try my best to emulate this
mind-set in my ministry and in the people I meet in order that my
words and actions may most accurately imitate my Savior and the
redeemer of my very soul, Christ Jesus the Lord.
In
today's world there is social injustice and what I call 'enforced
inequality' everywhere we look. A veritable class war is ongoing here
in the USA, throughout the Middle East, in Europe and in Asia that
has the wealthy accumulating ridiculous amounts of wealth in a
downright obscene orgy of greed, and all at the expense of the middle
and working classes who are being economically decimated. This
illegal and immoral accumulation of wealth is unparalleled in world
history. The signs and indicators of these obscene amounts of wealth
that has fallen into the hands of an elite minority are everywhere.
Mass unemployment is at every turn and stands at stubbornly high
levels. I am well aware that the US Labor Department just released
figures last month stating that unemployment is at all-time lows. But
if we look at the true levels of unemployment, which by definition
must include those who are underemployed (working part time at one or
more jobs when full-time employment is both desired and required) or
those who have left the job market for good (like men and women in
their middle 40's and older such as what I experienced first-hand),
the true level of unemployment exceeds 24% in the US alone, not
counting the rest of the developed world. Instead of creating more
jobs that are the hallmark of any economic recovery, fewer and fewer
people are doing more work for less pay. The rest of US and European
workers are increasingly finding themselves out in the cold, often
literally.
In
the meantime, those lucky individuals who still have jobs run the
increasing risk of having their jobs out-sourced overseas for pennies
on the dollar, or being replaced by workers being imported through
H1B work visas to work for wages that are a fraction of their
American counterparts. Those who are agile enough to avoid either
fate will find themselves being replaced by robots and automation in
10 or 20 years. The government has been concealing this from its
constituency for decades, but they can't keep it a secret any longer,
thanks in large part to the Internet. One thing is for certain –
the centuries-old paradigm of working for money to buy or rent
overpriced housing, not to mention overpriced food, clothing and
oftentimes poor quality merchandise, is going to have to be replaced.
This is simply inevitable. What is also inevitable is that this
change will have to come from the bottom up rather than from the top
down for obvious reasons. It will also mean the end of the capitalist
economic system as we have known it, and the same goes for the
current 2-party political system. Until then, the unending occupation
of Afghanistan plus the clandestine wars being wage on every
continent are costing the US government $6 billion dollars each day,
money that could be much better spent here at home to create some
badly needed new jobs.
Clearly this is
unsustainable and will bankrupt the country if it isn't stopped, if
we are not there already. American capitalism and the American empire
have run their course, and I maintain that capitalism and the
American Empire as we have known them are on the deathbed of history
where all empires go when they die. America is in decline while the
former “third world” has become the developing world, and where
even poor countries continue to develop rapidly. The combined
economies of China, Russia, India, South Africa and Brazil will
overtake the US economy by 2020 at the latest, with China in the
lead. The US could change this
trend by creating jobs through large public works programs to give US
infrastructure a badly needed overhaul, and by an accelerated and
invigorated space program. On the other hand, there must also be a
program in place such as a civilian version of the GI Bill to retrain
all the workers who are unable to find jobs, or who would like to
change careers. What's holding that back, you may ask? Political will
power; and the people are just as guilty as those elected to lead.
Let me illustrate why America can easily afford to do this. If the
combined US military and intelligence communities set aside the
financial expenditures equal to a single day's cost of the occupation
in Afghanistan and put the money into an interest-bearing account of
your choice, there would be sufficient funds for a 4-year college
education for every school kid in America, from pre-K to a high
school senior inclusive. And that's just from one day's expenditures!
So, those who say we can't afford free public education from the
cradle to the grave simply don't know what they're talking about.
But
what do we have instead? American workers are being discarded like so
much human scrap by multinational corporations as being no longer
useful or too expensive to keep around, resulting in a wave of
homelessness not seen since the 1930's. The majority of today's
homeless population are college educated professionals, not
stereotypical street bums, and that is a great social injustice, not
to mention a colossal loss of human potential. This has been going on
for so long now that America has become indifferent to it. I strongly
wish to shake you all out of your indifference and complacency! If
people don't snap out of it and come to grips with the fact that we
will all soon be facing financial oblivion, oblivion is where we will
all soon be!!
So
it is for all of the above reasons and because of my deep concerns
that I say we don't have much to celebrate this Independence Day.
'America the Beautiful' has become America the tarnished, America the
bankrupt, America the ruthless drug dealer, America the hustler of
oil, and America the unscrupulous arms merchant. I want no part of
any of the above. I want to be part of the American resurgence, but
also part of the American resistance. My country has been stolen by a
cadre of very wealthy psychopaths, and like millions of others I too
have come to that realization. Like all those other millions, I too
have come to the realization that we will have to retake our country
by force, since it will never be returned voluntarily. How that comes
about remains to be seen, but we won't have long to wait until we
find out. Happy independence day, then, such as it is. Let's
all start planning how we can restore that independence which has
been taken away. That's when our true independence will begin!
No comments:
Post a Comment