Cut spending, bring down the deficit! That’s the mantra in today’s congress. Good, that’s certainly what’s needed. But, it’s not just about cutting spending and reducing costs. It’s about what we believe is important to us.
What we choose to keep, what we deem worth the expense verses what we consider not worth the cost reflects our real values. Let’s call it the “throw away” factor. We downsize and reduce by getting rid of what we call frill, worthless expenditure, unnecessary excess and wasteful spending that we can no longer afford.
The question is, in the big scheme of things, what has real significant value verses what should be considered mere fluff and frill and therefore wasteful spending in our national budget? What expenses, costly as they may be, are really investments for our future, and therefore worth keeping? And who defines this for us?
It’s not enough to say, “I’m for balancing the budget, slashing expenditures and reducing our deficit.” EVERYONE is for THAT! But some politicians would have us believe that that’s all they need to say in order to get us to rally behind them. Not so fast! Simply saying “I’m going to cut, cut, cut!” does not make one a savior to our economic woes. Cutting requires, nay, DEMANDS hard CHOICES. And it’s the financial choices we make that are the real indicators of what we value and who we are as a people.
You have a lifestyle, a comfortable one. You are settled in. You like the way you live: movies, pizza, dinner out here and there, two fairly new vehicles in the garage, kids in sports, piano lessons, golfing on the weekend, a summer week at the shore, skiing in the winter, whatever. Then the economy crashes, your income drops by a third to a half or more. What are you going to give up, what are you going to keep? How will you change your lifestyle to fit your new economic situation? This is where the real you arises. You hate making these choices. You would rather keep everything as you had before. But you can’t. You are forced to make some hard choices, you cannot avoid it. Your true values, what is really important to you, will now surface.
Remember the movie, Sophie’s Choice? Talk about an impossible choice! Yet, she was forced. She had to make a choice: shall her daughter live and her son die, or…? Seemingly unwilling or unable to make that horrible choice, the Nazi soldier orders that both children be killed. “Take my little girl!” Sophie shouts in response. That decision, the fact that she even made the decision, haunted Sophie over the years and eventually took its toll on her. Is this too dramatic? Does this have anything to do with our budget cutting needs? If we are serious about our values, being and becoming a people of freedom and justice, honor, courage, and integrity, then yes. It does matter, very much so. Our choices matter. What we value, matters. How we spend our money, what we spend it on, and for whom we spend it on, matters. It reveals our real character.
Take for example our military budget. Our military is sacrosanct, extremely sacred and inviolable. We dare not touch it. We’d rather pull our kids out of college, sell our house and rent an apartment, eat less, skip doctor visits, and go without our prescription medicine before we reduce our military expenditure. That’s how necessary and important our military budget is to us. Okay, this is understandable. After all, we are the mightiest nation on earth and we do have to defend our interests. Nevertheless, I offer this one cautionary note. When we make something sacrosanct, we no longer manage it with cool reason. It is no longer accountable. Given free reign it becomes dominating.
It’s like a homeowner handing over a major portion of the household budget to a Security Company and saying, “The skies the limit. Whatever you need or want, we’ll find the money for it, just as long as you promise to keep our home safe from intruders.” So, the Security Company gets all that it wants and asks for, with little accountability, no scrutiny whatever. But, at the same time, the rest of the household budgetary items are attacked and thoroughly scrutinized with a fine tooth comb, with the war cry, “Reduce, cut, downsize, restrict, turn-off and shut-down; we simply can’t afford it!”
The military is only one of a few sacrosanct budgetary items we have. There are others (consider our home mortgage tax deduction). Yes, there are other major budgetary items that we hold sacrosanct and continue with, unquestioned; the military budget is simply the most obvious as well as the least likely to be questioned. It seems to me that we are being unwise and foolish for worshipping such gods, treating them as holy and therefore untouchable.
So, yes! Cut, downsize, and reduce the deficit. But all choices have their consequences. We should ask our politicians to provide us with a detailed analysis: Who will benefit the most from the programs that are marked for cutting? What sector of the national population will suffer the most? What values are being reflected by your choice cuts? What do these cuts say about our national character and our supposed values of the pursuit of life, liberty, justice and happiness for ALL?
And let us ask ourselves: What gods do we really worship? Is it the rich, the powerful, big business, military might, greed, selfishness, and elitism? Or are we making choices that reflect real concern for equality, a level playing field for all, fairness and fair play, with integrity and accountability? Our national ethos says that we do not and will not neglect the needy and will not oppress the less fortunate, and will not favor the few over the many. It is simply not who we are and not the kind of people we choose to be. Or is it?
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