A Current Outsider's Perspective on America's Political Situation

I'm not American, as my regular readers know, but I dabble in politics and you can't really avoid American politics no matter what country you're from. What they do affects the rest of the world in big and small ways. For the last couple of years I've been watching the US pretty closely, and what I've seen has been very disturbing. I was already well aware of certain tendencies within American culture that would most likely lead to the degradation of the country, but there's been a very sharp downturn recently.

There's been a lot of talk about the disappearance of the middle class in America, and it's not a fallacy. It's getting to the point where people are either poor or they're extremely rich, and the vast majority are very poor. When you work full-time and can't afford to pay your rent and utility bills, and still buy groceries, there's a serious problem. Sadly those in higher income brackets fail to see (or care, perhaps) that this is a self-defeating system. After all, if you squeeze every drop of money out of people for basic necessities, they have nothing left over for luxuries of any kind and they don't spend the money that fuels the economy. Eventually the machine is going to break down.

There are a lot of other problems, but the inability to secure a living wage is the biggest one, because it means there are kids going hungry, people without healthcare and losing their teeth. School programs are being gutted, and the curriculum is geared toward indoctrination rather than education. In some places it's even worse, because the indoctrination comes in the form of religion that contradicts known scientific fact. It's bad enough that people are uneducated. Now they're being mis-educated. At the moment there's a very large number of people who truly believe science has no place in the public school system, and religion is the true story.

Never mind my own personal bias against organized religion - and I freely admit I have one. Let's just look at the big picture. Mis-education is creating states that will have generations of people believing scientific facts to be lies. The United States competes in a global market. How does it expect to continue being competitive when other countries are not only teaching the science these kids need to learn, but other countries are offering free university and college education? The answer is that they won't. While politicians are debating religious dogma, the rest of the world is zipping on by. While politicians debate the reality of global warming and climate change, the rest of the world is looking for (and finding) the answers. Countries all over the world are reducing their dependency on fossil fuel products, and Americans are becoming more dependent.

Mainstream media in the US is too afraid to upset the corporations that sink millions of dollars into advertising on their networks, to subvert the propaganda they're spreading about sustainable energy. So there's still a large portion of the population that believes we're not in an ecological crisis at this very moment. They've become blind to the massively lower water levels in California, and the 4-year drought that's going to make food so expensive only the rich will be able to eat. Now they're predicting that California only has a year of water left, but Nestle is sucking it up to bottle it.

Corporations are controlling every aspect of American lives. Some people are starting to understand that, but so many people still believe what's being broadcast on so-called news programs. I've lost count of the number of studies I've seen that talk about how low the percentage is for truth actually being broadcast. Most news is opinion-based in the US now, much of it is outright deception, and every once in a while they throw in a small grain of truth to confuse everyone. Then that small grain gets lost in the avalanche of dishonesty.

Admittedly it's not easy to tell the truth, the whole truth, so help you. It's not so hard to be honest in some ways, by making the choice never to lie. However, even if we think we're telling the truth, it's only the truth as we know it and perceive it. We can't possibly know the whole story. Even people who are right there when something happens only see their version of it. Witness testimony is always suspect and inherently flawed by our own biases. All we can do is try to be as thorough and as honest as possible, but frankly mainstream media has no interest in adhering to a policy like that.

What's needed in the US now is not just a strong middle class, but also to have the poorest among its population still being able to survive. Working a 40-hour week should be enough to do that. I believe in a fair minimum wage. If a company can't pay someone that much, then they either need to raise their prices or bow out of the business altogether. If people don't want to pay an extra 50 cents for a burger or a coffee so that the person behind the counter can afford to buy formula for their baby, then they shouldn't be going out to eat or drink. I've always had that attitude when it comes to service employees. When I go out to eat I tip at least 15% unless the server was purposely terrible. I do the same with cab drivers because I know very well how little they make. My second husband drove a cab, and was stuck paying for fuel out of those tips. I figure if I can afford to buy pizza or whatever, the tip is a part of that expense.

The second thing they need to do is get corporate money out of politics altogether. This isn't a new idea. What I don't understand is how it ever happened in the first place. Did they not realize the danger? Didn't they know there would be favouritism for big donors? Do the citizens not understand why their politicians are voting against what the people actually want for their country?

Then there are the big banks that are ripping everyone off. Having people who deal with money that are as unregulated as the financial industry in the US, is sheer idiocy. Bill Clinton drove the nail into the coffin that Reagan built with respect to all that, and it needs to be overturned, along with the aforementioned corporate sponsorship of politicians. I'm sure many Canadians, if they understood it, would hate the thought that they pay for the campaigns of their politicians, but the alternative is unacceptable. Sure we cover that with our taxes, but it's an extremely small bite considering the cap they have on spending, and it means corporations aren't buying/bribing our government officials - in that way anyway. We the people own the rights to our government, and that's as it should be.

So along comes Bernie Sanders. I've been seeing him around the internet for a while now, and the more I learn about him the more I perceive him as the ideal candidate for POTUS. He just announced his run a little while ago, and the media sort of laughed him off at first, until the figures for his campaign donations were announced from the first 24 hours. He received more money than every one of the Republican candidates, his average donation was $43, and it was regular people who were sending him the money. Obviously he had a lot of donors. This is a man who understands that he works for the taxpayers. He's not royalty looking down his nose at his constituents.

A look at Hillary Clinton's campaign funding makes me shudder in sympathy for my American friends. All but one of her top ten contributors are big banks. I don't like her, and I never have. She flip-flops with the wind. She sold out on healthcare many years ago, and she's sold out on other things since. She can't even settle on what name she's using, because she bases it on what she thinks will garner her the highest approval rating rather than on what she really believes. I may be a feminist who looks forward to the day when females are elected as leaders as often as males, but that doesn't mean I want the wrong woman voted in just because of her gender. I want the right person in office, regardless of their anatomy.

As for the Republican candidates, I don't get it. I do not understand why any of them would have enough people backing them that they could even throw their hat in. Religious zeal is only one of the issues they're having. Not everyone is a Christian, and the recent news that Christianity in America is losing ground should be a red flag for them. Campaigning with religion as your hook isn't going to get you far. One big reason for that, which is also a reason the Republicans are in so much trouble with voters, is feminism. Women are subjugated in almost every religion ever invented. There are a few that do not, though they're not widely accepted as religions, and have few practitioners. If you go around beating the drum for Christianity or any faith that doesn't respect women, there are going to be a lot of women who want nothing to do with you. And that's not even getting into the hundreds of anti-woman bills that were introduced in 2014 by Republican politicians.

If the Republicans are to have any hope of securing the top political seat, they need to find someone who isn't going to offend women, LGBT, rape victims, people of colour, people who practice religions other than Christianity, and poor people. Their entire support system seems to be comprised of white, heterosexual, Christian, non-disabled, entitled males (and they don't make up a huge portion of the American population). A couple of them thought they were being funny or something when they started talking about how old and ugly Hillary Clinton is, yet there isn't one among the males that doesn't appear as though he's been beaten with the ugly stick and nobody thinks that impacts their abilities in any way. Insulting Clinton's appearance and age are going to backfire severely if they don't put a stop to it. It amounts to name-calling at a high-school level. If they can't debate the issues any more intelligently than that, I don't see how anyone could believe they're smart enough to run a country.

And back to Bernie Sanders. Do some research if you don't believe me, but this is a man who has been saying the same things his entire political life. And finally people are listening and starting to realize that he's most likely right. I truly believe he is the one person who might be able to get America back on track. On the international stage I'm sorry to say that the US has lost almost all respect. Maybe it's not fair, but a lot of it is a kind of pettiness because America tooted its own horn for so long, telling everyone it was the greatest country in the world, and now that inspires people to cheer when they see it faltering. Pride goeth before a fall, to paraphrase Proverbs, and there are a lot of countries out there that would all too happily give them a surreptitious shove. Kind of like going to your high school reunion and finding out that the prom king is now 300 pounds and sells shoes for a living. You start hearing, "Nah nah nah nah nah nah," in your head.

The problem with that is, America still hold the key to a great deal of security in the world. When they're stable the rest of the world can latch on and be okay. When they're not stable it's like being in an earthquake and having the ground fall from beneath you. So many things in America impact every country on earth. Unless we're willing to see our own countries suffer, we should be cheering on the States and helping them pull themselves together, rather than sticking out our foot to trip them up. We've got a giant rogue army taking over the middle east, sawing off people's heads. What do we think is going to happen if America is no longer a threat to them?

In all sincerity and seriousness, America needs to get back on its collective feet. The infighting weakens it on the public stage, especially in the age of the internet where everyone gets to see what's going on. Rumours start flying about every little scandal, and everyone has an opinion before the facts are even released. It's one reason I never weighed in on the whole issue of the so-called wave of killings by police officers. When you start to look closely at those situations, and then go over the statistics, there really hasn't been any sudden changes or increases. The difference lies in the focus. Thank mainstream media for turning every molehill into a mountain. Yes, every life is important, whatever race, colour or creed. I agree with the sentiment wholeheartedly, but we have to look beyond what the media wants to show us.

Corporations that control the media are not doing their country any favours, and truthfully they don't really care. They're interested in nothing but pure profit. They don't care if America is reduced to ashes. They build their business on the backs of fellow Americans, they squeeze out their profits, and then they take their money and stick it in offshore accounts. They move their headquarters to Canada because they prefer our less-complicated tax system, or they go to another country where the taxes are laughable. Their gratitude to the people that gave them their billions is non-existent.

Frankly I don't want those companies in Canada. When I sell products to American customers, I'm required to pay taxes on that. Royalties through Amazon book sales are taxed through the IRS - I haven't published a book yet, but they've already got my tax information for when that day comes. I don't mind one bit. If I make a profit in a country, then I'm using or doing something that has been created through taxation and socialism, like postal services, or the roads that are used for shipping my items to customers. I have to pay for that, and I should, so corporations that don't pay for it really burn my ass because they can well afford to. Instead of giving back to the community that made them what they are, they take the money and run. It's contemptible, and tells you their true morality. If corporations are people and there is a God, then they're going straight to Hell.

America has the foundation to make a comeback, despite the cracks in it. And whether or not they like socialism, I believe we all have to help one another. Socialism builds the roads we drive on, and the services we use, but it can also be a way to accomplish the big things, like protecting the rest of the world from the Islamic State and keeping the world economy stable. In my electronic travels I've made some very good friends, and many of those friends are American. I care what happens to them, and it doesn't matter to me that we don't share a country. We do share a planet and personal experiences. We share resources. We share technology and the responsibility of cleaning up our ecosystem. Without international cooperation and aid, we would all have faltered long ago, but I think we keep forgetting that. Our trade agreements allow us to have so many of the luxuries and necessities that we currently enjoy.

I'm very proud to be a Canadian, but (even if it perhaps sounds silly) I'm also proud to be a Terran. I want my whole planet to experience all the happiness and security we're capable of. Linux users have heard of Ubuntu, which is a computer operating system used in lieu of Windows or Mac OS on Linux-based systems. However, many people don't know the meaning behind the word Ubuntu. In short it means, "Humanity to others." The longer version is, "I am what I am because of who we all are." There's a story that goes along with that about the sharing of apples between three friends and their refusal to race and have one of them win all the apples because the one couldn't be happy if the other two were not. I think this is a truism of our world. We will never experience happiness the way we were meant to until everyone who shares our world has that same freedom. How can we sit, greedily eating all the apples while our friends have nothing?

The Only Rights We Have Are the Ones We Fight For

Oftentimes in life, just showing up to a fight is enough to end it. Thus was the case with my most recent battle a couple of days ago. My landlord attempted to take me to court to get me to pay for renovations they were doing. Yes, that is totally unfair, as well as completely illegal, but if I hadn't gone to court I'd have been charged more than $2,600 in absentia. They tried to lie and say we'd damaged a floor that had been in the building since it had been built. I won't bore you with all the details, but I will say that the guy who did our walk-through when we were looking at the place said they would fix the floor before we moved in. They didn't, but that tells you the damage was pre-existing.

The end result was that as soon as they saw we had shown up to court (they saw our names on the sign-in sheet) they decided they would be willing to go through a mediator rather than the adjudicator. Fancy that! We presented numerous pictures showing the water damage in the apartment that could only be pre-existing, and entirely out of the realm of our control. The roof had leaked for a long time, there's a wall in which there's a leaking pipe, and there is so much mold and mildew that I can no longer use my bedroom. By strange coincidence they were no longer interested in pursuing damages. Happily this mediation gave us the opportunity to bring up their numerous illegal activities without actually reporting them, but they took them a little more seriously at least. It also gave us the opportunity to let them know we'd happily be vacating the premises at the end of March. Yay!

Things became remarkably friendly during these proceedings, considering how nasty they tried to be. They talked about what great tenants we were, because we were quiet and always paid our rent. I guess they figured we were so nice that we would happily roll over and pay for them to replace the floor in our apartment. Right. The funny thing is, they truly have no clue how absolutely nasty I could have been. I could have forced them into bankruptcy had I chosen to make my complaints known with the appropriate legal parties. If I had chosen to be vindictive, the city would have come in and shut the place down. They would have been charged many thousands of dollars just to be able to continue as landlords.

Instead, I simply stopped them from screwing me over. If they had chosen to keep on with their case, I would have pulled out all the stops, of course, if for no other reason than to show the true state of their general character. Their blatant dishonesty would have been more than enough to have my case thrown out. As it is, that's what the end result was here, and they were forced to swallow the application fee of $170 for filing against us. They've also told us they're going to provide us with a good reference, etc. I don't care if they're doing it to placate us, as long as they don't screw up our reputation as tenants. Here they tend to keep a record, and it becomes really difficult to find a place to live if you've been a bad tenant - similar to having a bad credit rating.

It just goes to show, though, how far some people will go to get you to pay their bills for them, and how little you sometimes have to do to stand up for yourself. Just because there are laws that exist to protect us, does not mean we won't be taken unfair advantage of. Every time we do not force people in power to abide by the laws, the more likely they are to run roughshod over us. Landlords seem to be some of the worst, because so many of them are owner-operators, basically, uneducated in the terms under which they are allowed to continue said operations. They seem to think that because they buy a piece of property they automatically have the right to rent it out in any manner they choose. They don't, and the courts can remove their privileges as landlords. They can also be heavily fined and find themselves stripped of their property if it turns out to be unfit for residential use.

There are people in this world who have a gigantic sense of entitlement. They've somehow come to believe themselves above the law, or simply better than others around them. They feel like they deserve better treatment than that which they afford others. You find it a lot in wealthier people, who have never had to live through difficult times. People who inherit their wealth in particular, such as the Walton family brats who now run the Walmart empire, and the Koch brothers who now run Koch Industries. They didn't build their businesses themselves. They just suck every last ounce of profits out of them with no consideration for what they're doing to others. They simply do not care, and the government lets them get away with it.

Things aren't a whole lot better in Canada, but all companies are forced to comply with much higher minimum wages, and there's a lot more protection for employees up here. Yet, somehow, Canada has been listed as the number one country to do business in. A less complicated tax code helps. We have very little local interference in business, too, so businesses generally only have to deal with provincial and federal legislation, and they do not contradict each other in any case I've ever seen, because the contradictions have already been dealt with very simply. If the business runs across provincial lines, such as transportation, it's governed federally. If not, it's usually governed provincially.

Very few of our laws are municipal or regional. Sometimes they're managed by regional departments, but the laws are still provincial. I had American friends be confused about how little concern I showed for the mayor of Toronto being a crack-head, but truthfully there is almost no power in being the mayor of a city here. He could have done something stupid like have a garbage truck dumped onto someone's car, maybe, or change parking legislation, but that's about it. It wasn't until it came out that (allegedly) he was abusive to his wife, I even looked twice at him. As far as I (and most other Canadians) are concerned, scandals aren't really something we pay much attention to in politics. Drugs aren't legal here, but a lot of people think they should be, so people think nothing of offering to share a joint with their neighbours. My own mother smokes a fair bit of the stuff, which I find funny because I can't stand it. I don't mean that I judge anyone who does it. I just mean I don't like what it does to me, so I don't smoke it myself.

Over the last few decades, sadly, many people in North America have given up on the idea of fighting for their own rights. We had a big lull where we thought things weren't perfect, but it wasn't worth getting worked up about, but now we're seeing the harsh reality that crept up on us during our political slumber. In Canada our environment is being destroyed. The entire province of Alberta is a disgusting mess. Yes, people still live there, particularly since there are a ton of high-paying jobs, but it really isn't a healthy place. There are so many toxic spills in Canada, that they're almost uncountable. Close to 2,000 per year for the last 37 years. About 6 per day.

In the US, there are so many problems that may be unresolvable. The education system was attacked and dismantled a long time ago, so it becomes a struggle just to make people understand that there is a problem, much less what to do about it. George Carlin did a far better job of explaining it than I can here, but it boils down to a system of government wanting a population that is easily controlled. I'm hoping the people in both our countries wake up to the reality, and that we can come up with a solution before it's too late. However, so many just shrug their shoulders and say, "What's the point? There isn't anything we can do about it anyway."

Of course, that's exactly what they want you to think. And by "they" I mean the giant corporations that are profiting off our ignorance and inertia. The government itself wouldn't be a problem if big businesses weren't there to hand over the cash. In the US it's even legal to bribe your senators and congressional members. It's called lobbying. They have to be a lot more circumspect in Canada, but they still manage to a lesser degree. If people are led to believe that nothing they do will make a difference, they simply won't try. If they don't try, it just makes it easier for their rights to be stripped, even if those rights are protected by law.

Every time we allow someone to step on us, we contribute to the larger issue. In fact, there's a butterfly effect. I'll use my own example to illustrate what I mean. Let's say I hadn't fought my landlord on this, and they got my money to pay for their renovations. There's no way they would have stopped with me. They would have found it a very easy way to renovate the whole building, and would be encouraged to try it with everyone, knowing that it was unlikely anyone would try to stop them. Every single person in this building (about 30 apartments) would most likely have been taught that they're just going to be screwed over for the rest of their lives. Maybe that's an exaggeration, but I don't think it's too far off the mark. The people who live here are mostly uneducated, and they're all poor. Nobody would live in this building if they were bringing in a decent income. In my case my daughter makes minimum wage, and I'm on disability. Even still, we're moving on to better things. I've never lived in a place this disgusting in my life, and I don't intend to stick around.

Back to my point, however. So, you have a building with 30 families, all being taught that they have no power and no rights, because none of them here will likely have read the Residential Tenancies Act. In fact, most tenants never read even excerpts from it. I'm an exception, apparently. I like to learn new things, and I like to know what my rights are. My landlord is far from unique when it comes to bending and breaking the law. I don't think I've ever come across a landlord that wasn't breaking the law in some fashion or other. Most of them violate entry laws, most violate anti-smoking legislation, most don't pay interest on deposits, and most do not maintain their buildings mechanically or health-wise in accordance with the law. When tenants don't fight back against them, they simply continue doing business in the way that brings them as much profit as possible.

Our homes are the places where we spend most of our lives, usually. At the very least we usually sleep in them. To have our rights taken from us in our own homes is very meaningful. This mentality invades all other parts of our lives. When you stop to think about the fact that most employers also violate the rights of their employees, there are very few ways in which citizens are not being stepped on. It becomes a constant, daily thing. Again, so few actually read about employment legislation, so they don't even know that their employers are supposed to provide them with a copy of the Employment Standards Act in order to educate them on their rights. When employees don't know that, they don't ask. They don't know where to go to get the information, because they aren't researchers by nature.

Even thinking about the ways we're always being taken advantage of is exhausting. There are just so many battles to be fought. I haven't worked for anyone other than myself for a long time, and even then I worked in payroll and human resources, so I was the one making sure the employees were not having their rights stripped. My employers weren't thrilled, but I didn't care. I wasn't going to be a party to it. These were people that were paying themselves a million-dollar bonus at Christmas, but they didn't want to pay two hours of overtime to an employee. This attitude is typical, and I've never worked for an employer who wasn't like that. I'm sure there are some nice employers and landlords out there, but like most people I haven't been lucky enough to run into them. In many cases landlords and employers don't even know they're doing anything wrong, but it's their legal obligation to know these things, so I feel no sympathy for their plight. If you're going to hire people, or rent property to people, then do your due diligence.

At work and at home we're getting screwed over constantly, and then there are all the other things that are coming down on us. Our lands are being stripped and destroyed, the environment is becoming toxic, and in twenty years there's a good chance we're not even going to have breathable air unless something is done immediately. There will be continuous changes to what we can do in our leisure time, simply because there will be places we'll no longer be able to go. People are discriminated against for their gender, race (theirs or their spouse's), religion, and sexual orientation.

This is why every single one of us has to stop in their tracks and say, "Enough already!" We have to stop this on a daily basis. We have to fight against it. We have to share information with one another about what can be done. We stand to lose every one of our rights without a single battle being fought, simply because we don't want to deal with confrontation. I'm well aware that confrontation sucks. I absolutely hate confrontations. I hate drama and fighting. I don't watch reality TV, and that's one of the biggest reasons. I don't mind sports like UFC and boxing, because there are rules and they're not based on personal issues. It's about technique and skill in the ring.

When it comes to fighting 'city hall' as they say, it's different. The results matter. They have an impact on your life, so it's scary to fight against someone. I guarantee, however, that if you don't fight, the results will be far worse than if you do. If I hadn't shown up in court the other day, they would have ruled that I owed the money, and I would have been charged for the filing fee as well. I would have been stuck owing almost $3,000 for something that wasn't even my debt. Not showing up for a fight is basically considered tacit consent. Courts will almost always rule against the party that isn't there. You simply must refute the claims of those that would take advantage of you. If you don't, your neighbour is going to be the next one footing the bill.

If it's your boss taking advantage of you, your co-workers are likely getting the same treatment. I actually had a friend go to work for a company that had screwed me over in the past, and they did even worse to her. I helped her fight it, and she won, but she would likely have never been put in that position if I'd fought them when I had the chance years earlier. An employer that's forcibly reminded by the courts that what they're doing is illegal, will think twice about doing it again. An employer that is never challenged will keep doing the same things, and will likely get progressively worse. In some cases they never learn, but as long as people keep fighting, then there's a good chance the company will end up getting shut down and the employees will be awarded what they're owed.

It's always worse in lean times when there are few jobs and few places to live. People are afraid of losing their jobs and apartments, because they know it's going to be tough to find another one. That fear is what keeps us all down. We fight when we know we've got the upper hand, or we fight when we know things can't get any worse. The common person rarely has the upper hand, though, and if we're in a position where we know things can't get worse, that's a terrible place to be. It's easier to give up then.

I'm of two minds when it comes to unions. I know they've served a purpose, but I also know the unions aren't exactly the benevolent organizations they pretend to be. In some cases they simply clog up the works and take hard-earned money from their members for doing absolutely nothing. Their existence, however, is a benefit in that they're a constant threat to the employer. I'm well aware that it was union efforts that organized the workers and they were responsible for getting us our shorter work weeks (and many other benefits), so we certainly need to show our gratitude there. However, I've also worked for a company where I have been harmed by their presence. It's a sort of catch-22. All in all, though, I do think they're needed, if for no other reason than the silent threat factor. Any company that has a union in place is well aware that they're being constantly and closely monitored, and not just by a single individual. They aren't faced with only one employee that knows their rights, but every employee that has an ironclad contract. That can make a big difference with a crappy employer.

Organized protest is always what leads any social change. A single person can be responsible for a great deal, and usually that's because they've managed to gather together a group of like-minded individuals. The shouts of a group become loud enough that the governing bodies can't tune them out. The public starts hearing their voices, and they often add their own then. Social change happens because the majority of people want it, and they force the legislators to acknowledge that it's what the public wants. Government is supposed to work for the people, but it doesn't unless the people force it to. Government simply goes on doing whatever it's doing, often being bought and paid for by big business, unless the citizens put their collective feet down.

The other part of understanding social change, is that we have to realize it starts small, and it starts locally. If we want change, we start with our neighbourhood, because it's really not that hard to get a few hundred people together. Then we can move on to our city. Once we have our cities back, we can deal with state or provincial government. After all, if every major city has changed, the province or state no longer has a choice, really. Once each state or province has changed, that changes the whole country. It's not that hard to remove the corrupt government officials if we band together and decide we don't want them. We hired them, and we can fire them.

All of this begins with showing up. Until we show up for the fight, we will be walked on. Once we show up, we can plead our case. Enough people together, fighting for the same rights, and you've got big change. It may not be changes to the law, because the laws might already be on the books. They just have to be enforced, and if you don't fight for your own rights, then who do you think is supposed to do it for you?