1041 So How About Saving the World?

1041 So How About Saving the World?

A reader hiding behind a fake name and a faker email address scolds me for sitting here on Olympus and throwing bricks, while never offering solutions and asks for my resume of life-long activism, which he requested in a tone I infer expresses doubt there is such thing.  There is and he got it unless it landed in his spam folder.

But he was right when he criticized the lack of proposed solutions.  So here are a few... 20 questions on righting wrongs:

1.  The biggest ecological problem facing the planet is over population.  So how about more protected sex, more abortions and more adoptions?

2.  The Olympic games are useless, corrupt and run by a bunch of inbred Euro-trash.  This country shouldn’t be a part of it.  So how about we make London 2012 our last participation?

3.  Organized religion has caused more damage than all the wars, tornadoes, hurricanes and floods in history.  God, Allah, Jesus, Buddha, and all of the Hindu and Greek gods all have Skype accounts.  So how about dealing direct with the head instead of putting your children and your mind at risk in a house of worship?

4.  Politicians are dirty by definition and if they don’t start that way, they become that way pretty quickly.  So how about banning political contributions as a start, giving the candidates a limited amount of free air time to make their cases and restrict internet postings to unpaid blogs?

5.  You can never keep your eyeglasses clean.  So how about making some that are dishwasher safe?

6.  The house and senate are clueless.  So how about making every member read every bill they’ll decide and pass a test on it before voting?

7. Cell phone conversations by others in theaters, restaurants and on commuter trains and buses are among the most obnoxious forms of … um … obnoxion.  So how about blocking the signals in those venues?

8. Hyperinflation in the price of gold is largely a part of shady talk-radio advertising.  So how about bringing the price back down to earth by encouraging fat cat retailers to sell it as a “loss leader?”

9.  Banks are running amok.  So how about mucking out the stall by requiring them to sell their non-banking subsidiaries?

10.  Private equity firms tend to turn acquired companies to rubble.  If you need examples, try Cerberus and Chrysler, Bain-Romney and Clear Channel and Innovation Partners-Bono and both Forbes and Palm Pilot.  How about eliminating these fake job creators who really create nothing but human carrion?

11.  America is about factories, farms and mines.  We no longer have enough of any of these.  So how about building some and stopping tax breaks for those in #10 and others like them?

12. States are useless.  So how about eliminating them and dividing the country into four or eight time-zone related administrative regions?

13. Number 12, is pie in the sky, so as an alternative, how about making congressional districts that don’t look like Jackson Pollock paintings?

14.  We don’t need an “official” language any more than we need a state religion. But English is the tie that binds. So how about eliminating multi-lingual signs except those that warn of physical danger, like rat poison warnings posted on the subway platforms?

15.  Bike riders and joggers are menaces to each other, accidents waiting to happen.  So how about making them all obey the same traffic laws and then enforcing the laws instead of giving non-motorists a pass when they screw up?

16.  Illegals aren’t “stealing American jobs,” they’re living off the table scraps.  So how about making those table scrap jobs pay a living wage and encouraging legal immigrants and naturalized or natural born citizens to actually want the work and willingly seek it?

17.  Under the mantle of “foreign aid” we bribe crappy little countries to be our friends and allies.  How about using some of that money to help out at home and if there’s any left over, send stuff -- but not cash -- to those countries we still think are worth bribing.

18.  The debt crisis is phony.  We’ve been “forcing our children and grandchildren to pay for our ‘excesses’” since 1776.  You can’t stop it no matter what you do. So how about rolling it over, some of which we do, anyway?

19.  No one can understand an insurance contract.  So how about enforcing a rule that they be written in plain English, with coverage exceptions in boldface and that they never exceed three pages of type no smaller than 12 point, the font size used on this blog?

20.  Desegregation can work, but integration can’t because of our primordial tribalism. How about we try to make peace with that notion and conduct ourselves as if we were sane and not living in the Fred Flintsone era?



Shrapnel:

--If you throw your hat into the ring, it means you’re in it to win it.  If you throw your towel into the ring, it means you quit.  If you throw a white terry cloth hat into the ring, does it mean you’re in and out at the same time?

I’m Wes Richards.  My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®
Please address comments to wesrichards@gmail.com  and if you do, please type them instead of writing them in crayon and scanning them.  I don’t have enough storage space for those attachments.
© WJR 2012