Okay, I'll just come right out and say it. I am so worried about this country of ours, which I love so much.
I read somewhere, some time ago, that the downfall of a democracy is when legislators (or maybe it was people) start voting themselves benefits in excess of the ability of the government to pay. This is what I see happening.
Our national debt is huge and growing. We spend billions of dollars on items such as agriculture support, social security and medicare, and then get all convoluted when we can't afford it. Support for agriculture is selective support for certain crops (I've heard that they even pay farmers to grow tobacco, how weird is that). The idea is the help family farmers and keep agriculture a thriving business. However, the vast (vast) majority of the payments go to megacorporations and wealthy citizens who happen to own "farms", although they aren't out there tilling the soil personnally, you understand.
However, these payments do not, on the whole, really contribute to making agriculture a thriving business. Just look at the USSR (have we forgotten our history already) and how well the cooperative farms and factories worked. Let agriculture thrive because farmers grow what people need and want to eat. Perhaps some insurance is needed in case there is a total disaster (the entire state of California is underwater due to an earthquake and the rest of the country still needs food)(It could happen.), but let's stop rewarding people for poor decisions and sheltering them from the consequences of their own actions.
Social security is another can of worms. But I'll have to tell you later.
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