Happy Independence Day

Yes, I know it's not until tomorrow, but I don't blog on Saturdays, so here's my fourth of July post :).

There are so many things I love about our country. Watching something like what happened in Iran after what should have been just a peaceful vote, it makes me realize just how great it is that we have the power to vote without being beaten for it. On the other hand.... I have to say that our voting process isn't all roses and happy smiles, either. Sure, it seems fair and everything, but when you move higher up the food chain in politics, how many poor people do you know that hold an office? It's all about just how much money you can raise before you can run. It's also so much about Democrat vs. Republican rather than issues or values. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm happy I didn't get beaten to death for voting for John McCain in the last election.

If I go back to what I love, I can also tell you that I love living in a country where you can make something of yourself with hard work and dedication. I was one of those kids whose parents constantly said, "You can be anything you want to be in life." And I believed it. In fact, I still do. I haven't gotten rich from these gems of wisdom, but I know that now I am finally working hard towards a solid goal, I am going to be happy in my career now, rich or not. But I love the fact that a poor person can raise themselves up to be rich. It does happen here in America still. I'm not saying it's easy, but it's definitely possible. We have to remember that in some countries, you can work as hard as you can and never make a dollar more than what your government wants to give you. In some countries, entire villages care about nothing more than figuring out how to find food and how to avoid raids by government or other military-type troops. Thank God that's not where we are here in America.

At the same time, however, let me also say that this economic 'bail out' shit is just that.... complete shit. I understand that it's complicated, because hundreds or thousands of jobs and certain pieces of our economy are counting on some of these huge businesses to survive, but since when did rewarding people for failing become part of the American dream? I saw a damn commercial the other day touting free cell phones for those who "can't afford one". They said it's for safety reasons. Now, I don't know what kind of service they're offering, but seriously. Free cell phones? So, basically, if you're poor enough, you can have free cell service, a free or close to free apartment, free health care, free food... AND if you were irresponsible enough to have a bunch of kids when you can't afford to feed yourself... you get EXTRA money.

Meanwhile, people working their asses off with minimum wage jobs or even above that are ineligible for those benefits and STILL can't fucking afford food and cell phone service. All we're doing as a country is telling people that if you work hard and take pride in taking care of your family, you deserve less, not more, than those who sit on their asses and pop out babies all day. Plus, those babies are gonna grow up and know that if they just sit back and do nothing, the government will take care of them. It's their RIGHT to get taken care of. Well, where's my fucking bail out? What happened to the RIGHT to make something more of yourself? It really makes me sick to my stomach.

Not that I wanted this post to be a bitchfest, because I do love my country. I guess I'm just scared of my country turning into the land of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged... a country where the poor suddenly have a "right" to everything that never belonged to them and businesses that can't make it suddenly have a "right" to be as successsful as those who have worked hard to develop new strategies and products. I don't want to live in that world. And, if you read that book, you know that a country like that doesn't last forever.

Happy fourth of July and let's try to make this country better by next year than it is today.