In the beginning

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. After that, humans have managed to mess up almost everything. We are always struggling to have things that we don’t have. We want more of everything. This leads to war, crime and personal irresponsibility.

Currently, the U.S. has troops in Iraq and in Afghanistan so that the United States can have “more.” President Obama has committed to a surge of U.S. troops this summer to Afghanistan so that we can “stabilize” the area. Look at the history of the area and see if you can find a time in history that it has been “stable.” I understand that we can’t just pull out until the infrastructure is more stable than it is currently but we are still in South Korea after sixty years. How long can we sustain being the world’s police force when we are struggling with our own internal problems?

Are we safer with troops in Afghanistan and Iraq than we would be if we brought them home? This is a question that I struggle with.

We can’t control the gun violence in our own country, adequately respond to the disasters that routinely occur here, and protect our borders from illegal aliens. Look at what has happened inside our own borders since January 1st. We have had flooding in Tennessee, Georgia, Massachusetts and southern California, wildfires near Flagstaff, Arizona, multiple outbreaks of tornadoes and the oil spill in the Gulf. We haven’t had a hurricane yet. Everyone is waiting to see what will happen then. We are also waiting to see if other terrorist attacks occur since the Time’s Square bomber has said that other attacks have been planned.

We moved quicker with the Haiti disaster than we have done with the oil spill, but then it was primarily private efforts and not those of the government.

The larger the animal, the slower it moves. Our government is no exception. It has become so large that it moves slowly, and stumbles over its own feet. It intrudes in other countries and leaves our homeland vulnerable in order to do so. There needs to be a greater balance between what we do overseas and what we do inside our own country.