So, I make no secret about the fact that I am a registered Republican. Most of the reason I aligned myself with the Republican party is because of their stance on foreign policy where I have always been a bit more hawkish than most. Sure, negotiation is a fine thing but, there are times when military might is a necessary component of foreign policy. Of course, I am presupposing that any application of military force is used judiciously - let’s just leave it at that without going into the actions of the current administration.
I read something earlier this evening though that got me to thinking...
It got me thinking about what I would like to see happen, going forward in our country. I find that I haven’t been happy with the choices offered up in the last few presidential elections. I don’t know when it happened, I think around 1980, but the nation seemed to have changed how it picked chief executives. Presidential races became more of a beauty contest than anything else.
I always remark to friends how men like Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Harry Truman could never get elected in a this day of television. They’re just not ‘pretty’ enough. Whenever we start talking about how telegenic candidates are, it’s a sure sign that as a nation we’ve lost our way.
So, back to the whole direction of the country thing...
I wonder if any of the three people who are currently in the running to become our nation’s leader have (to use some foreign slang) the ‘stones’ to really change the heading we’re on.
I looked back a little and I found something that I think should be a rough blueprint of the kind of change I am thinking we need. However, it is so far a field from anything I am hearing from the current candidates, I wonder if it is just wishful thinking on my part.
Gross National Product rose 10% in the first year of the tax cut, and economic growth averaged a rate of 4.5% from 1961 to 1968. Disposable personal income rose 15% in 1966 alone. Despite the drop in tax rates, federal revenues increased dramatically from $94 billion in 1961 to $150 billion in 1967. As the Baby Boom generation aged, two and a half times more Americans would enter the labor force between 1965 and 1980 than had between 1950 and 1965.
So, it sounds like all I’m talking about is a further cut in taxes but, it’s more than that, much more:
I have come today from the turmoil of your Capital to the tranquility of your campus to speak about the future of your country.
The purpose of protecting the life of our Nation and preserving the liberty of our citizens is to pursue the happiness of our people. Our success in that pursuit is the test of our success as a Nation.
For a century we labored to settle and to subdue a continent. For half a century we called upon unbounded invention and untiring industry to create an order of plenty for all of our people.
The challenge of the next half-century is whether we have the wisdom to use that wealth to enrich and elevate our national life, and to advance the quality of our American civilization.
Your imagination, your initiative, and your indignation will determine whether we build a society where progress is the servant of our needs, or a society where old values and new visions are buried under unbridled growth. For in your time we have the opportunity to move not only toward the rich society and the powerful society, but upward to the Great Society.
The Great Society rests on abundance and liberty for all. It demands an end to poverty and racial injustice, to which we are totally committed in our time. But that is just the beginning.
Thing is, even if it’s wishful thinking on my part, am I alone in this?
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