Okay, well, I am not a regular to the Business Insider, or anything. Yet, they have some interesting, even revealing, articles, that seemed worth sharing on this day. These just all happened to be with the Business Insider, and once I noticed the trend, it was a no-brainer to put them together into one blog entry.
So, the first one here that is not so recent, but which is extremely relevant. I would dare say it is more relevant now than it was was when it was written 4 1/2 years ago. It also goes with a similar story that came out not long after this, when former President Jimmy Carter stating that the United States was no longer so much a functioning democracy anymore, and was more like an oligarchy.
Here, in this article, they mention what has been actually a truth that most of us seem to already know, but which few of us ever rarely admit, that indeed, this is not a real democracy now, if indeed it ever was. After all, we have had several elections in our history where the "winner" of the White House was the man (so far it has always been a man) who actually got less votes. Two of them, George W. Bush in 2000 (lost the popular vote by approximately half a million votes), and Donald J. Trump in 2016 (lost by roughly 2.7 million votes) happened in our lifetimes, in recent memory.
Please take a look at this revealing story:
Major Study Finds The US Is An Oligarchy by Zachary Davies Boren, The Telegraph Apr. 16, 2014:
Saudi Arabia has been in the news a great deal as of late. Not long ago, it seemed to be for positive reforms, as the crown prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammad bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, made some sweeping changes that brought his country firmly into the 20th century, by allowing women the right to vote...er, sorry, to drive cars. Earlier this year, women finally could drive cars in that country, and everyone applauded this modernization attempt. So, changes are coming around in Saudi Arabia. It outlawed slavery in 1962, and now, women are even allowed to drive cars. At this rate, women might even be able to look forward to the right to vote by some time in 2125, perhaps. Maybe they might even stop the practice of public beheadings before then? Who knows? The possibilities seem endless.
But now, the real bummer for American billionaires and prominent politicians who rely on all of that Saudi money is that Jamal Khashoggi, a journalist well known to criticize the Saudi government, entered the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, and never made it out alive. The Saudis at first denied these reports, and then changed their story. Supposedly, the Saudi crown prince expressed surprise that people around the world were outraged at this story, or that it has become an international incident. He simply could not understand what all the fuss was about. Why would his ordering a man who caused trouble for him and his government killed inside of the Saudi embassy in a foreign country such a big deal?
It has gotten so bad that even President Trump, trying to elevate his speech to sixth grade level, issued a scathing condemnation of the Saudi government's rather pathetic attempts at how they have handled this:
"They had a very bad original concept, it was carried out poorly and the cover-up was the worst in the history of cover-ups.
"Whoever thought of that idea, I think is in big trouble. And they should be in big trouble."
Apparently, though, the death of Khashoggi was not such a big deal that Trump wanted to take any strong action. After all, he assured us that a $110 billion dollar arms deal that everyone in the world wanted was just gifted to the United States. Why dissolve that, just because the Saudis killed one man? Or that they are carrying out a war of massive genocide on Yemen, creating a humanitarian crisis that is apparently growing so big, that it might eclipse the horrors that we saw for years in Syria?
After all of that, here is a story that shows that the wonderful deal that Trump was touting is, apparently, not a reality. His own story keeps changing, as it was $110 billion, and then turned to $450 billion, while in reality, it apparently is merely a fraction of that.
Why is it that he never gets in serious trouble for his transparent lies?
Anyway, this story stinks to high hell, frankly, and the stench is on everyone involved, from the leading Saudi officials - particularly the crown prince - as well as Trump. Here are a series of articles related to this story:
It turns out that the $110 billion Saudi arms deal is actually 'fake news' Daniel Brown Jun. 6, 2017:
Quotes used were from this BBC article:
Trump calls Khashoggi murder 'worst cover-up in history' by BBC News, October 24, 2018:
The Saudi crown prince reportedly couldn't understand the outrage over Khashoggi's killing Alexandra Ma Oct. 22, 2018:
https://www.thisisinsider.com/saudi-prince-salman-reportedly-confused-khashoggi-outrage-report-2018-10
In this next story, we return back here to the United States, which also happens to be the only advanced nation to fail to provide it's citizens with affordable, universal healthcare.
And this issue just keeps being dragged through the headlines, for year after year, decade after decade. You might think that Americans would grow tired, maybe even feel a little embarrassed, for standing out like a sore thumb for all of the wrong reasons on this, as well as some other issues (like the most prisoners of any nation in the world, having the only major party to reject climate change, one of three countries to fail to provide new mothers with maternity leave, and on down the line).
Yet, change never seems to come. In the 1990's, President Clinton promised that sweeping changes to healthcare in this country would become a reality.
It didn't.
Battles kept ensuing, and the healthcare system kept generating controversy, mostly because of it's glaring flaws, such as tens of millions of people unable to afford healthcare and going uninsured as a result, or the thousands of other people who actually had healthcare, but who were seen as too high of a risk because of that infamous phrase, "pre-existing conditions."
Just ridiculous.
Then, Obama came and promised some significant improvements and - wonder of all wonders - he actually passed it. Now, to be sure, it was a small step, and did not nearly go far enough, in my opinion. A lot of the inadequacies still existed, although it generally was a step in the right direction.
What happened? Many people were convinced that this was a disaster, that it was an outrage! They were slapping Hitler mustaches on the image of President Obama, suggesting that this was merely the first step of a government takeover, of fascism/socialism/communism right here in the United States! Never mind that this did not go anywhere near as far as the systems that exist in every western European nation, and Canada, and Japan, and Israel, and Australia, and New Zealand, and the United Kingdom, and...well, you get the picture. Somehow, all of those countries managed not only to get those healthcare system established, but to do so without a fascist takeover and setting up of concentration and/or death camps! And here's the real kicker: people in those countries have not shown a desire to change their systems in favor of the American model! Even more shocking: the American model keeps having these huge, glaringly obvious failures attached to it that never seem to get addressed, but which the rest of the world recognizes as failures and recoils from!
But Obama care would finally address some of these issues.
Except that the "repeal and replace" campaign kept gathering team, as American grew ever more convinced that Obamacare, which many Americans did not know was the same thing as the Affordable Care Ac, was a bad idea. And so, they elected government officials who would finally get rid of it, and return the worst abuses. Sure, polls showed that many Americans finally recognized that Obamacare might not be something that they really wanted, or could afford, to lose. But by that point, it was too late, because Republicans were obviously hell bent on repealing it. Even when they could not do it in Congress, President Trump effectively gutted it by Executive Orders.
Sometimes, things feel hopeless in this country.
Except maybe not. Maybe enough Americans are finally getting fed up enough that change will come. After all, Bernie Sanders is the most popular politician in the country, and he ran a strong campaign in 2016 with a single payer healthcare being one of his main proposals. And now, apparently, it is being embraced by more prominent Democrats, some of whom apparently are planning on making White House bids for 2020.
Knowing how strong and brainwashed the opposition is, you can bet that it will not be an easy fight. But hey - maybe at least there will be a fight!
That in and of itself would be an improvement.
Here is the article:
Democrats are embracing a radical change to US healthcare, and it could be the defining political fight for years to come Eliza Relman and Bob Bryan Oct. 15, 2018:
This last story is also the most recent of the articles, although it is nevertheless one that we should all be familiar with. I remember as a kid back in the 1980's, the military supposedly spent $10,000 on toilet seats. Back then, I felt outrage that they could do such a thing, although now, being a bit older, I started to suspect that those were just the official allocations, and that the extra money likely went elsewhere.
Where?
Who knows? Apparently, not even the military can keep track of the vast sums of money that it receives. According to a Forbes articles written by contributor Laurence Kotlikoff, just two years and change ago, the military apparently could not account for literally trillions of dollars of spending.
Now, a new article reveals that the Air Force apparently spent well over $1,200 on a coffee cup.
Better not drop that damn cup!
But you know what they did drop, and are dropping when such stories come out? The confidence of the American people who pay taxes, and then have to hear stories like this.
Might I suggest, once again, that the military industrial complex is simply getting way too much, just outrageous sums of money, to the point that a cutback is absolutely not only needed, but long overdue? Even the military apparently does not know what to do with all of the money it is now receiving, which is actually more than it requested, but which Trump insisted on providing it.
The US Air Force still can't explain why it spent $1,280 on a coffee cup Paul Szoldra, Task & Purpose Oct. 22, 2018:
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