2 million kids in NYC
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Homelessness Increases
I heard a report on MSNBC this morning that claimed 2 million kids were living in shelters or were homeless on the streets in New York City. If that is correct, then we have joined such fabled cities as those in South America where the homeless kids run rampant and free, in absolute poverty, and where once we Americans clucked our tongues and said "How unfortunate to live in a country that is so poor."
Have those chickens Rev. Wright talked about in his much maligned sermon come home to roost? Are we paying the price of our neglect of our own people? It seems we are, and with all the right wrong reasons.
We still have a racist country. People of differing ethnic groups continue to eye each other with suspicion. It is sad, mainly because America is arguably the wealthiest nation on Earth and yet we can't provide adequate housing, medical care and the basic necessities for our citizens. Why is that? Are we rich in money but poor in spirit? Again, it seems so.
People, especially those with money, seem to be more concerned with paying fewer taxes, and I guess I can't blame them, but what good will your money do when society breaks apart? And, believe me, if things keep going downhill as they are, and if basic and fundamental inequalities are left unsolved, things will break down.
Some states are even bringing up the old song of secession, as if leaving the Union will solve their problems. States such as Texas, which receive more money back from the federal Government than they lay in as taxes, are whining, with the governor Rick Perry now pleading for Federal Disaster funds after spending many weeks decrying the "Socialism" of the government under the Democrats.
South Carolina receives back near one dollar for every fifty cents they pay in and yet people there are whining about high taxes. I live in Illinois where roads are crumbling and bridges are rusting away, and under the previous administration I rarely saw substantial repair work.. Most of it was cosmetic, covering up the rust but not addressing the problems that lay beneath. When will we as a nation repair the damages beneath the fascade of our alleged prosperity?
Years ago I visited the movie sets in Los Angeles, where clever fronts of buildings gave the appearance of an actual town. But behind the fascades there was nothing. No house, no store, nothing but empty lot. Is America becoming more like that? Are we a nation of loud talked afraid of our own shadows? Are we going to spend ourselves into wastedful wars and neglect our own nationb as a result?
Why is it that some people claim we had a sacred duty to invade Iraq and spend billions upon billions of dollars, but we can't do things at home because they smack of "socialism?" I think it's ridiculous that we waste so much money elsewhere, to no good end, and then shout down any plan to rebuild our own nation.
I heard Senate and House Republicans screaming about wasteful spending under the Obama budget, lying about trains from Disneyland to Las Vegas, and saving some mouse in California, etc. These are subtle or outright lies, propaganda, but also self-destructive claims because the light rail could save us a lot of money in gas, saving open land can save us from devastating floods, and here in the Midwest, road repair will prevent bridges from collapsing and roads from becoming impassible.
I also heard a lot of so called Comservatives crying that alternative energy will cost us a lot of money and to use government funds was, again, socialism. Yet if we are to spend billions every year buying foreign oil when we could spend a lot less, employ people and build solar and wind power, how is this anything but common sense? Or have we lost that as well in our rush to make everything political and dirty?
OK, America, we boast about our power and our "we're number one!" attitude. But history will teqach us very quickly that no nation remains #1 when it ignores its own people, its own welfare and its own well-being. In 20 years America may be just another old, tired nation, too weak and poor to even take care of itself. Will that come to pass?
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I could not find the report you mentioned but it seems to me that someone made a mistake. First, the total population of New York City is around 8.2 million people. That would mean almost 25% were homeless children. That does not compute.
Secondly, the National Alliance to End Homeless estimates that between 1 and 1.5 million children NATIONALLY experience homeless at some time during each year. They are not homeless consistenly or permanently - just at some time during each year.
I agree that even one homeless child is one too many. But I believe that there was a mis-communication on how many are homeless in New York City.
Yeah, John, it sounded like a lot. As for the number of homeless nation wide I wonder how they compute that? Does someone actually go out and count homeless people?
I wonder if they meant New York state and said city by mistake. Anyway, the basic premise stands that we are a prosperous nation and need to reconcile ourselves to either taking care of our own or giving up the fiction. A fascade is not a home, as they say.
The 1.5 million is based on information form 2005-2006. By now the numbers are more likely 1.8 million or more.
As I'm sure you are aware, in a nation of over 300 million it's a little difficult to get really accurate population statistics. Things like this are usually best guesses and generally err conservatively.
The point is that we are headed for "third world" status. Tent cities and shanty towns are slowly beginning to spread. Within a decade or so, our country will consist of Red and Green Zones.
Green=opulent, gated and guarded, with all the amenities and occupied by the ultra-rich supremacists who have sucked the life from America.
Red=the rest of the land, barren, poisoned and barely habitable, occupied by what was once the working class population of America.
It’s all good Jeff. Everything is going according to plan.
Oh, sorry. I forgot your not a multi-billionaire.
I do not see how this statistic can be accurate—or even in the ballpark. I think part of the opposition to Socialism is that it requires governmental control and with each new part of our lives ceded to governmental control there is a corresponding loss of freedom.
It seems to me that the commentator was mistaken on the number for New York or even New York City. Perhaps she meant in the U.S. overall. Still, there are many families that have lost their homes and their jobs.
And my question remains the same: Is the United States going to break apart and fail as a nation? Even the best of intentions may not be enough to save it when one portion and segment of the nation seems bent on causing the other portions and and segments of society and the nation to fail.
Can we live in a nation that is divided between such unreconcilable political positions as those put forward by our major and import minor parties? In a paraphrase of Lincoln; can we continue half-Conservative and half-Liberal?
In answer to your question Jeff, the country isn't going to break apart. It's being intentionally shattered as the final stage in the creation of a new third world nation. It's The Project For The New Third World Amerika! Catchy name, don't you think?
"It's easy to imagine a future in which growing numbers of cities have their frail and long-neglected infrastructures knocked out by disasters and then are left to rot, their core services never repaired or rehabilitated.
The well-off, meanwhile, will withdraw into gated communities, their needs met by privatized providers."
SHOCK DOCTRINE by Naomi Klein
I've been talking about this for a long time. I've just finished this book. I regret having my opinions corroborated by such a respected and reliable source.
If you haven't read it, I strongly recommend you do so.
Patty Inglish, MS 3 years ago
Yes, I'm tired of lies. The three people I knew that had solar or underground homes for 30 years, and other alternative energy sources, saved lots of money and were in no way inconvenienced by any of it
I think the National Fair Tax proposal could also be deception - a national sales tax on everything purchased, at 23%, leaves poorer people more starving than before, since groceries would be taxed in all states then. The more wealthy would pay not 50% of income (if that, given deductions and shelters) but only 23% of what they might purchase - and how many free goods do they already receive yearly anyway? I don't see fairness in that, either.