Our country has many long-term problems which have been floundering along for decades – problems such as climate change, our federal debt, our expensive and inefficient healthcare system, and our dying middle class. The reason that nothing has been getting done to solve these problems is largely due to our failing, gridlocked two-party political system which increasingly represents only those with more extreme ideological beliefs.
We now have a crisis coming that cannot be kicked down the road – the Coronavirus. Getting the virus with our healthcare system will likely bankrupt many people, including those that have health insurance, because insurance often pays little when it comes to major health issues. Even before the virus, over 60% of person bankruptcies in this country were the result of people unable to pay medical bills.
On top of that, the Coronavirus will likely cause a recession which will dramatically increase our federal debt and cause the approximately 40% of our population that now lives paycheck-to-paycheck to go completely under. These people won’t care much if the stock market collapses because about half of the people in this country don’t own any stock. The 40% that has some small amount of money invested in a 401(K) will lose half of what little they have. And the record credit card debt that American consumers have built up over the past few years will break those whose jobs get interrupted or lost.
In the past most people, for some strange reason, seemed somewhat content with what was going on even though they had no money, little health insurance, no retirement savings, no pension, and no capability to ever retire. And with all of these problems who can worry about the fact that the climate of our planet going to hell. In the near future, unfortunately, lots of people will likely get sick and unfortunately our economy will likely go down the toilet.
All of this is pretty sad but maybe there is a bright spot. Moderates, centrists, and Independents have had little voice in running, or more correctly, not running our country. Maybe in the next few months the political apathy of these groups, especially among the young, will go away. Bad times bring unrest and this has a tendency to wake people up. Moderates do things that make sense, we don’t agree with the Republicans or Democrats, and we need our own political party.
If you are a moderate conservative or moderate liberal you need to stand up for the fact that you are one. The people who now claim to be conservatives and liberals more often than not are either far-right and far-left. The terms conservative and liberal don’t mean what they used to mean any more. Be proud to be a moderate, stand up and reach out to others who are the same. And join the fight to start our own political party. Volunteer and support the Alliance Party. Remember that no matter who wins the presidential election this November, nothing will continue to get done because of gridlock. The same two political parties have run our country since the 1850’s and now is the time to change this.