The United States is endangered by at least four crises of unprecedented proportion: The nation faces more perilous threats to its national security than at any time since World War 2; the economy has stagnated and the middle class is dwindling; the national treasury is rapidly approaching bankruptcy, and the framework of the federal government has been, to a far greater degree than has ever occurred throughout the life of the country, been diverted and abused for partisan political purposes.
You would hardly know these challenges exist by listening to the general press coverage of the issues facing the presidential election. The level of discourse has been reduced to commentary more commonly found in contests for high school prom kings and queens, or in the pages of supermarket scandal sheets, than in the contest for the most important public office on the planet.
The nation’s safety is at risk as never before, as Russia, for the first time in the nuclear age, has a lead over the U.S. in both strategic and conventional nuclear arms, (thanks in large part to the Obama/Clinton “reset” with Moscow) and China verges on becoming the Pacific’s predominant naval power. The two nations, in combination with Iran, represent the world’s most powerful military alliance.
From one end of the globe to the other, the reduction in and withdrawal of American arms has caused havoc. Russia, after invading the Ukraine with impunity, has now set its sights on the Baltic states Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, all of whom are NATO members. Moscow has moved nuclear armed Iskander missiles into place, and has openly threatened war with the western nations. The Kremlin has conducted massive nuclear drills, and has prepared its forces for conflict. All this occurred while the U.S. cut its defense budget and European nations continued to spend very little on their armed forces. Moscow has also militarized the Arctic, and opened military agreements with Latin American and Caribbean nations.
China, having paid no price for its aggressive moves against the Philippines and in other parts of the Pacific, has swiftly moved to assert hegemony throughout a large portion of the Asian/Pacific region. In the middle east, the premature withdrawal of American forces from Iraq led to the empowerment of ISIS and the horrors that followed. Terror now plays a role in the daily lives of Americans and Europeans alike.
Within the nation, the federal bureaucracy has been co-opted for partisan political purposes, a complete abandonment of the principal and mandate of equality under the law that has previously guided the nation. The deeply disturbing confirmation that the leadership of the Internal Revenue Service was aware that their agency’s resources were being used to target political opponents of the Obama Administration adds to concerns that there has been a wholesale hijacking of taxpayer funded government agencies for partisan purposes. That series of crimes combines with revelations, discovered by Judicial Watch through an examination of FBI documents, presents a worrisome picture, particularly when combined with other research and information about the unlawful and biased practices of various federal departments during the Obama Administration. The failure to prosecute key Administration figures for crimes which have ended the careers and resulted in substantive punishment for others essentially enacts a two-tier system of justice. Add to that the Attorney General’s considering of criminal prosecution for those who merely express disagreement with Mr. Obama’s climate change position. Taken together, the American legal and political system has become unrecognizable.
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Unlike the aftermath of prior recessions, the nation’s economy has not snapped back. A National Review article recently noted:
“The grim news is not that the economy continues to resist returning to normal. Rather, it is that this ‘current equilibrium’…is the new normal. If 2 percent growth is…’the most likely scenario’ for the foreseeable future, the nation faces a second consecutive lost decade — one without a year of 3 percent growth…Those whose wealth comes from wages … are losing ground.”
As the New York Analysis of Policy and Government recently outlined, “As one digs deeper into the official statistics, more distressing news becomes evident, as the data further indicate that steady, middle class employment continues to decline. Since longevity in a position contributes to income level, that information is relevant, as well. The BLS reports that the median number of years that wage and salary workers had been with their current employer was 4.2 years in January 2016, down from 4.6 years in January 2014. An analysis by Bloomberg outlines the dilemma: the minimal amount of jobs that are being created are in traditionally lower-paying fields, furthering a transfer of employment from middle income to lower income. Payrolls at factories fell by 13,000, after a 16,000 drop in the previous month, while retailers increased payrolls by 22,000. Employment in leisure and hospitality rose 15,000.”
These are real issues, worthy of deep consideration and lengthy debates about how to resolve them. Unfortunately, the major media appears uninterested.