Below is a message I have sent to our senator, our congressman and our Secretary of State. Is anybody listening? Does anybody care?
You are elected by the people to represent the people. But it’s pretty hard to do that if the people don’t confide in you.
So this is one attempt to convey what I and a good many people think.
- Like it or not we live in a connected and interdependent world. It’s called globalization and we, among a host of others, have benefited from that for many years. Arms length, win-win trading is mutually beneficial and the best way to avoid conflict and wars. Yes, we must ensure that trading terms are fair to all, and yes, we must ensure that strategic products, like essential medicines, critical aircraft components, military hardware, semiconductors, etc.are manufactured here at home. But certain discretionary, non strategic items, things like toys, some furniture, clothing, etc. can and should be imported when the cost is more favorable and the quality is acceptable. Confidence and dependability is everything. We are destroying both with our unilateral actions. The sell off of our treasury bonds, once highly valued, is an ominous development which may have negative, long lasting consequences. China is happy to step in where we leave a void.
- Kudos for efforts to protect our border and to tackle the illegal immigration and drug trafficking business. Tracking down illegals, especially criminals, and deporting them is one of the best things going right now, but why are we not sending them back to where they came from? Why El Salvador’s notorious prison? How much does that cost us? Will they live there for the rest of their lives at taxpayer expense?
- We are the greatest country the world has ever known but somehow we seem to think that that entitles us to impose our will on other sovereign nations, even neighbors and close allies; using brute force. That’s not the world we live in anymore. Rectifying imbalances in tariffs is good and overdue, but whatever happened to quiet diplomacy? What’s with this Ready, Shoot, and then Aim approach we seem to have adopted?
- Eliminating waste in government is to be applauded but let’s do it thoughtfully and deliberately. I am impressed with Musk’s DOGE team but let’s not be in such a hurry that we overlook activities that further our national interests and provide needed help for which we have been known, for which we are applauded and for which we still care.
- The war in Ukraine is not a war between Russia and Ukraine but a war between Russia and the West, a war waged against the world order that we dominate. How can we allow Russia to realize a win? Who will be their next victim? How will we preserve our reputation as champion of law and order, of human rights, of democracy. of territorial sovereignty and of justice, all earned by much sacrifice in blood and treasure?
- Our foreign policy in the Middle East is problematic. Yes, we must protect Israel as we have for many years and at great expense to us. That is fine as long as our own national interests are not compromised. Regrettably, they are compromised. We support and enable Israeli actions against the Palestinian people which are contrary our own values, are a violation of international law and a contravention of the United Nations charter that both the U.S. and Israel have signed on to. The U.S., the great Israeli enabler, is seen as complicit in all Israeli actions whether we agree with them or not, – – – the oppression of people who have occupied that land for several thousand years, the property confiscations, the settlement expansions, the arbitrary imprisonments, the utter humiliation of the Palestinian people – – – a situation which has been festering for over 55 years and has given birth to thousands of desperate, hopeless, and denied people who have little left but to lash out at their oppressors, no matter what the cost. They are the modern day renegades we call terrorist. That’s not the America I know and fought for.
- While we acknowledge that Hamas is an abominable organization, we have concerns at attempts to shutter the constitutional right granted by the first amendment; the right to peacefully protest any and all actions, not just the one’s our government may approve. That’s what banana republics do, not the United Staes of America, that stalwart bastion of freedom, liberty and equality.
– – – – Just the view of a common man
Views of a Common Man 