and that is we have lost almost all the compassion we have ever had in our country. And not just in government and politics, but in the general population.

Even as far back as the 1930's families would share what little the had with those who had less. In the encampments, somebody could be counted on to help feed hungry children. Those lucky enough not to have lost their farms would share any extra crops with those who had not been so lucky.

Even during the time from WWII and through Korea, the country came together for a common good. People sacrificed their gas cards for good causes. They held scrap drives and made care packages for soldiers they didn't even know.

In the 1960's and early 1970's people gave their lives for civil rights for minorities. We marched against the useless deaths of our soldiers and the civilians of Vietnam. While there were times when our anger was misdirected, we still had a majority who cared about their fellow man.

I think that we lost our compassion for others about the time of Reagan and the "ME" generation. Companies that used to be small and cared about employees were gobbled up by larger and larger corporations who viewed labor as a necessary, but evil expense. And because of this, any loyalty that the worker ever had for their bosses went out the window.

The Religious Right came out of the woodwork and spread their Gospel of division and fear. People who are different were to be shunned at the very least, and the leaders became determined to push the country into a theocracy and override the Constitution.

Over the years, it has become worse and worse, with the GOP leading the way. The poor are no longer looked upon with compassion but rather disdain. Charity is long gone to be replaced by degradation and taking of funds meant for the disadvantaged to line their own already deep pockets.

It seems that when lost our compassion, the nation as a whole started degrading to the point where we are today, with the Teabaggers barely disguised Racism, the mega corps and the top 1% owning Congress, and the country divided so deeply that we may soon be to the point of the country splitting apart into Civil war.

I don't know how to stop this decline, but I wish I did. Just being compassionate in my own life is not enough. Any suggestions?

I am really hacked off about the way the SSA has treated my wife and I. After fighting 7 years for disability, she finally got a favorable decision last June. The judge took her date of onset back enough years that she is due a good amount of back pay.

Now we are closing in on 9 months that they have been playing games, promising dates, phone calls that have gone unreturned, even getting our Representative's Office involved (Repub, unfortunately. His office was worthless) and trying to hold off the bank, we still haven't seen it. They haven't even paid our lawyer.

Their payment center has been contacted at least 7 times and they always say "we're working on it." I know government agencies are slow but this is past that point.

I guess the bank got tired of their bullshit because we got a notice on Tuesday that they were taking control of the house.

After trying to survive on $400.00 a month for over 3 years that money would have been enough to save the house and get the creditors up to date. Now it will go finding a moving company, storage area, and someplace to live.

If any of you have suggestions, they would be much appreciated. I have written to the district director of the SSA, the White House, and our Senator. I am also going to write to the local papers and television stations.

With all the screaming about the "Ground Zero Mosque" that Fox Noise and it minions, especially Glenn Beck, have done in the time leading up to the election, nobody has had the guts to call them on their hypocrisy in the national media. Specifically the charges that there is a plot to bring us all under the Islamic religion's law.

You hear all these politicians telling us that the Muslims refuse to assimilate and they want to make the rest of the US follow their laws. Yet these same politicians insist that we should honor THEIR religion and let them put their religion's laws into practice nationwide.

Abortion, sex education, Gay rights and more are on the list. "God says" or "the bible says" will be the first words out of their mouth when they defend these issues. Yet these same ones would scream like crazy if it was stated by a Muslim, "Allah says" or "The Koran says".

The teabagger candidates are the worst about it. I haven't been able to ask any of the candidates about the hypocrisy, but the local supporters just get that deer in the headlights look and then claim that it isn't the same thing at all.

I would love to see the Dem opponents of these people point this out to them.

I was wandering through DU today and ran across the Think Progress Article about the Repub party, through their minions the Teabaggers have been doing the past few days. This was part of the first post onto another personal journal. It started when I read this:



>> Slaughter has been at the center of the push for reform. Last Thursday she received a chilling recorded message at her campaign office. “Assassinate is the word they used…toward the children of lawmakers who voted yes".<<

Think Progress broke this story, along with the news that one of the Right Wing base, Mike Vanderboegh taking credit for the organized terrorist acts of breaking windows at Democratic Headquarters across the nation.

The headline of the article plays the violence down, possibly in the attempt to minimize the impact, but it actually is misleading. “Vandals hit at least five Dem offices nationwide…” is not what the people are, they are Terrorists in every sense of the word. No random acts, they are perusing a calculated and well planned attack on those who do not adhere to their ideals.

If you look at the antics of the Teabaggers over the time of the health care debate, you will see a group who has been fed a steady stream of glorified violence, heated sound bites, and outright racism. This diet could only have one outcome and we are seeing it in action now.

The GOP in their fustration of being tossed from the majority and losing the White House, devised a plan to whip these people into a frenzy, in order to intimidate everyone else. Instead of coming in with ideas and plans, they just tried to shut down congress all the while feeding more lies to the fringe.

Well, it’s backfired. Just like their plans on healthcare, they lost control of their lunatics. But what has made this more frightening, is that the Republican leaders are still egging these people on and making excuses for them. They have lost all pretense of working for those who elected them and are now for their party’s power and that alone.

I fear that this will all come to a head with the attempted assassination of President Obama, and or members of the House and Senate. We need to investigate and arrest these terrorists, and go after their enablers and money suppliers. Lets give them the same taste of “justice” that Dick Cheney advocated for the Iraqi prisoners. For after all, are they not working for the same common goal, the destruction of our Nation’s Government?

The Vatican and the church hierarchy simply cannot or will not allow the blame to be placed where it belongs, and that is, IMO, directly on the arrogance that the church has built up within itself over the centuries. The RCC can do no wrong, so it must caused by something or someone else.

One of the exorcists is touting that the devil is loose in the Vatican and causing all these problems. Still others have stated that the "Catholic Haters" (whoever that is supposed to be) have infiltrated the church and are causing the bad things to be known. Some old time Catholics are blaming Vatican Council II for all the problems.

All of these are just allowing them to sidestep the issue. The reputation of the church must be protected at all costs. Intimidation and payoffs to shut the victims up and then move the priest. When he molests again, you start the cycle over again. Never once have the looked into the possibility of admitting that their own rules such as celibacy could be a problem. That having an all male population that is housed together along with the notion that the 'gayness' of a homosexual man could be somehow removed if they were celibate, would attract homosexuals and pedophiles trying to lose their leanings. This all contributes to the problem they have.

And if you would look closely, you will find that most of the world doesn't directly blame the institution for the abuse itself, but rather for the cover up and the arrogance that went along with it. Will the RCC as an institution survive this? I don't know, but I'll be willing to bet that if it does it will be from changes that they have to make and soon.

Rev. Patrick McCollum is an ordained Wiccan Priest with a long history of working for Pagan religious rights. In 1997, after the settlement of a case involving a Wiccan inmate, the California Attorney General's Office asked Rev. McCollum to serve as a Wiccan chaplain, making him the first government-recognized Wiccan chaplain.

<snip>

I have been spit on by government staff, I had a Protestant government chaplain hold a religious service in a prison that was working in, tell a group of over 100 level IV Christian inmates (level IV being the highest security level inmates within the prison system, i. e. murderer's, rapists, and other violent offenders etc.) that they had a responsibility under God, to make sure that I didn't return to the prison to provide Wiccan/Pagan religious services and that the Pagan services didn't go forward.

On another occasion, I was told by a government administrator who was my direct supervisor, that it was his obligation according to the Bible, to kill me, and then while I was present in his office, he took out a Bible and read to me the passage saying: thou shall not suffer a witch to live! But, setting these and many other incidents prior to filing the case aside, I've had several significant incidents since the filing of the case.

http://aren.org/newsletter/2010-imbolc/act...

I have known the author, Christopher Blackwell, for several years and after doing what research I could, I would tend to believe this article to be true. The five 'first tier' religions having more rights than the rest of "lesser" religions isn't just discriminatory, it is Unconstitutional! I just wish I had the patience this man has.

edited to add the article URL

We are hearing a lot about the crisis of healthcare, on the cable news shows, the newspapers, on the radio and of course the internet. I agree that something needs to be done and done now. We lose, on the average 120 of our citizens PER DAY because of the lack of healthcare. This is unacceptable for a nation that is supposed to be the leader of the world. However, what I am writing about is a facet of healthcare that doesn’t get a lot of exposure, even though it is part of the system.

In addition to paying for the healthcare, I believe that there has to be an overhaul of the system in the attitude of the medical community. After being under the massive thumb of the insurance agencies for so long, they have forgotten the fundamental purpose of all medicine: To Heal People.

Where one notices more than anywhere else is in the Emergency Rooms and Trauma Centers across the United States. The kind of treatment you receive is dependent on the thickness of your wallet or the pockets of your insurer. With the amount of uninsured and underinsured that has to use the ER as their primary care, it is obvious that there is a problem with space, staffing, and so on. But if you are unfortunate to have no insurance or on a state indigent program, then you get the very basic care which amounts to getting you so you can walk out without dying.

Doctors are told that they cannot order any expensive tests. It drives up the cost of the treatment and hurts the bottom line. So they order an x-ray, technology that only shows a bare minimum and skip the CT or the MRI that would show much more detail and possibly, what is wrong. Anything more complicated than a broken bone or a cold, the standard treatment has become to give the patient some pain killers so they don’t feel the pain and send them out with orders to see their primary care physician. In short, what they are doing, or rather being forced to do, is to mask the pain and ignore the source of said pain.
It is not much better if you are lucky enough to see a physician. Almost all doctors will admit that the insurance companies call the shots on the care of their patients. The Doctor will suspect a partially crushed or bulging disc in your back. An MRI would show the damage in detail, but the insurance will insist on the old-fashioned x-ray even though they can very easily mask the problem. Then if the x-ray doesn’t show anything, the next step is to ignore the problem rather than to search for the problem.
It is even worse if you are on a community or state health program. Many times the illness or disorder is known to exist, but there is nobody willing to fix the problem. As an example, our son had a stroke at the age of 23. He couldn’t work and the place he worked didn’t have insurance. His entire left side was paralyzed. Therapy should have been started as soon as possible. However the community program couldn’t or wouldn’t spring for the therapy. It is almost 3 years later and he still has no use or feeling in his left arm and can walk only with braces. In addition, he has two crushed disks in his back that are pushing on his spinal cord causing extreme pain. The answer for all of this is to prescribe pain killers so he can get a little sleep. Instead of being a productive member of society and going to school or working, he is going in for a disability hearing tomorrow. That will give him the state Medicaid program, and the chance to get his problems taken care of and maybe be able to work again. But it has been so long without proper care that the chances are only 50/50 that they can repair the damage.
As you can tell, the system is broken. The whole system, not just the insurance companies. Legislation should be put forth that wrests the decisions from the insurance companies and back into the men and women who have trained for years to know what is needed.

Then we will have to retrain the doctors to take the needs of the patients first. There are probably very few doctors left that were trained before the insurance companies took over. The rest have been trained to put the demands of the insurance companies first, the patient a distant second.
The first step will be to get all people insured. In my opinion the best option would be single payer care, but there is no way to have that yet with all the Senators bought and paid for by the insurance companies as well as the problematic propaganda that we hear from the Conservatives and Fox News.

But as soon as that is done, we have to work on getting the Quality of our healthcare back to acceptable standards. The Conservatives tell us that we have the best health care in the world. It might be there, but the majority of Americans will never see any of it.

What good is “the best health care in the world” if you can’t afford it?

This is a very simple proposal and should satisfy the Rethugs in the House and Senate as well as give us the care so many desperately need.

First we tell all the lobbyists to go find a corner to pee in. Then the Democratic majority should ignore the Rethugs, since they are not interested anyway, and pass a bill that sets up a system like medicare for all basing any co-pays on your ability to pay.

Now this will be specified as an OPTION only. All those who are throwing the fits would be encouraged to drop Medicare in favor of a private plan. Those Rethugs could still keep their insurance from the private plans. To make it even better for those opposing Obama's plan, we could even take the caps off as well as all those regulations that they believe are keeping the insurance companies from being able to compete.

Now there would be only one catch. If they choose to not accept the National Option, they cannot come crawling back after Aetna or Blue Cross bankrupts them and then drops them. They are so against the thought of a national plan, I don't think we should allow them to go against their sensiblities on this one. They are so sure that the 'free market' will take care of everything, it is about time to see them after they experience the harsh reality of a half-million medical debt and their insurance payout is zero because they dropped them without notice.

Give them all a taste of what their utopia would really be like. The companies would be delighted with this. The rethugs all signing up and receiving a free cell phone so they can call someone who gives a damn.

As anybody who keeps up with the news at all knows that those who we elected to represent us in Washington have been talking about changing healthcare. The problem is they are doing nothing but talking. No real action has taken place in spite of over 47Million citizens of one of the greatest countries in the world are without any kind of health insurance.

Now I'm usually for free enterprise as long as it is benign, i.e. it doesn't harm the environment, doesn't harm people, and treats their employees fairly. However I say this about the insurance companies without an ounce of regret: FUCK YOU ALL!! You make a killing in premiums all the while denying the very services you are supposed to provide. There are uncountable deaths on your heads where you denied lifesaving treatments because it would cost you a couple of bucks.

I wouldn't give a damn if the government drove every health care insurance company out of business tomorrow. They have become a detriment to the health of this nation rather than an asset.

Conservatives complain about if the government takes over health care, then it will be socialism and everybody will have the same care. So Fuckin' what! Why should you get better care than me or even some bum off the street just because you inherited your Daddy's fortune?

Right now, what I'm hearing from the Congress is that they want to make us all join some company's plan. That just won't work. There are too many who are too sick or have some illness that would be cause to deny us coverage. Then we will still be stuck with a dual tiered system.

I can tell you from experience that the catch-all government programs don't work. Our son has two discs in his back that are basically gone. He is in extreme pain 14/7 and with the way it is pressing on his spinal cord, one slip, one wrong move, and he will be paralyzed from the waist down. But this is how the health care system works if you don't have insurance:

The ER doctor found the problem, but wouldn't do anything because they are only there to get you stable enough to leave. Our son is on an indigent program since he can't work. The doctor that he has to go to did send his file to a teaching hospital who rejected him because he didn't have a tumor or lesions. They told him he could foot the bill which would be over $50,000 because he doesn't have insurance and he wouldn't get the discounts they give insurance companies. Now remember, he cannot work, so how is he going to get the money? Nobody has an answer.

Meanwhile, since he was turned down there, instead of trying to find some alternative place to get the surgery done, or just paying for it, the CICP program just decides to ignore the problem. They just keep giving him stronger and stronger pain killers and tell him there's nothing else they can do.

If he would get the surgery needed, there is a chance he could get some kind of gainful employment. Now instead, he is in danger of becoming a permanent invalid that will never be able to work.

So what I'm saying is that I think we need to dump these fat-cat insurance companies that do nothing but screw their clients and go to a national system like France or the other European countries have. When you figure what would be saved from the insurance premiums the cost wouldn't be much more. We would end up with a much healthier and more productive workforce. But mostly it is the right thing to do to help those who need it.

In our household, we have three disabled people and we have the license plates that allow us to park in the "handicapped" (I really don't care for that term) spaces. The times we have had someone who takes one of those spaces because 'I'm only gonna be a minute' are too many to count. For us, if the parking lot is full and the disabled spaces are full, we simply cannot shop there. I can walk less than a block before my legs start to give out. Even when we can find a 'normal' space, it is close enough that we cannot get the wheelchair to the door. The spaces are too small.

One other thing, the extra area next to the disabled spots are there for a reason. They are not made for someone to squeeze their compact into. I have actually seen this happen several times. Once when it happened to us, my late mother was with us and she couldn't take more than a step or two. We ended up having to carefully pull out of the space and help her into the van while in the driving lane. People got mad because they had to wait, but there was nothing else we could do. The fire lane in front of the store was also parked full. (This was during the Christmas rush BTW)

I also want to take a dig at those drivers who borrow their parent's or grandparent's placard so they can get the good spaces. Besides being arrogant, it is also illegal (in my state anyway) and the person who was issued the placard could end up losing the privilege and pay a fine.

So with the Christmas season coming up, I want to ask people to help with this problem. I figure most of us Dems have a sense of justice about things like this and wouldn't do this personally. (The majority of the offenders, if they have a political sticker at all, it is Republican) If you see things like this happening, please alert the store, or call the proper agency. Those caught without a placard in a disabled space here get a ticket for at least $50.00.

It would make it a darn sight easier on folks like us, and maybe we could go out of the house more.

Within the last week, we have received at least 6 robo calls from all kinds of GOP members, including Rudy G. hisself (I felt so honored). We did have one door to door repub come by, but one look in our front yard and the Obama signs scared him off I think.

We live in one of the last strongholds for the Religious Reich/wingnuts, El Paso County. The same place where it is close to only 15% Democratic and every office in the city and county are GOP. On a side note, we did send a Democrat rep to the state house, but the local is all GOP.

They were so cocksure of taking the district, that the GOP never used to bother spending any money here. But that has changed in recent weeks. The Obama office is busy all day long. A quick look around the neighborhoods seems to show Obama/Biden signs about 6 to 1 over McCain/Palin signs. Bumper stickers seem to be the same way. And now they are spending money on robocalls and ads.

I really believe that someone is soiling their fruit-of-the-looms over this change. Even Mr. Dobson's messages of fear aren't doing the job they would have in the past. Now don't get me wrong, there are still pockets of morans who are buying the smears, but so much less than before, that I am feeling more hopeful that Obama can and will carry Colorado this election.

Personally, I have been more involved than ever before. We donated $30 to the campaign (a first) and only took two yard signs instead of six. We have been convincing any who will listen to vote for Obama. Our daughter is taking real pride in being able to vote this time. (this is only the second national election for her).

I really hope for this to be the start of a trend that this state, and especially this county is breaking the bonds of the Reich and moving into the 21st century.

My mother, who was 79, passed on September 11 this year. For the first time in decades, she had registered to vote, and supported Obama big time. She tried so hard to make it to early voting, but the fates were against her.

Now this woman had survived the great depression as a youngster. She had seen family go into 4 major conflicts, saw the murder of so many of our young leaders. She had become quite the pessimist when it came to politics. Her last presidential vote was for Kennedy. "And you see what they do when we get a good one in the White House" was her comment when I would ask about her not voting.

When I was a teen and pushing for the end of the Vietnam conflict, she would often tell me that it didn't matter what we did, the big shots in Washington would do what they wished. As I continued to be a progressive and get involved in things that mattered to me, I would sometimes see a spark of activism from her. She went to a protest to help save a local fire station with me once. I asked why she did it, and she admitted that perhaps we could do something on the local level. But she would still refuse to vote.

Her opinion was somewhat proven true in 2000 and 2004 when the elections were stolen. "See, I told ya they won't let a Democrat in," was her smug answer.

So it really surprised me when she started to listen to the primaries and would be cheering for Obama. She started watching "Countdown" with me every night and would even remind me if I was busy. She had us record Obama's speeches for her so she could listen again and again.

She wanted to go to the speech in Denver where Obama accepted the nomination, but by then she was getting too weak. She watched with great interest on the television, though. "Now this is a man we can believe in." she would say.

Even though her family came from the racist part of the South, she never was that way. She felt that Obama's skin color was not important, only what was in his heart. And he spoke to her. He told of ideas that were close to her own. Most important though, he gave her hope for her children and grandchildren to have a better life.

A few days before her death, she told me that she wished she could have lived to see Obama in the White House. She knew she wasn't going to make it, but she wanted to see it happen. And the most amazing was that she had wanted to vote! First time in over 40 years!

It looks like if things go as they are, Obama will do as she had hoped and become President of the United States, even without her vote. But I am also sure that she will be watching and cheering like she did at his nomination.

So Senator, and soon to be Mr. President, you gave an old cynical woman hope, and a reason to get involved. Thank you for that.

This is something that I wrote a year or so ago, before I became a member here. I wanted to share it with you all on this day:

Veterans Day

As I look over the parades that were moving down the streets filled with the throngs of flag waving people, I felt the pride of the sacrifices that the veterans who were being honored today must have felt.

I could hear the speeches being broadcast from different locations around the city. The calls for unity and pride from politicians. The vendors offering all sorts of items both useful and useless with a copy of the American flag attached.

I turned toward the path that would take me to where I had left my car when I spotted a old man moving slowly with a cane in one hand, and a handful of small flags in the other. In the cool of the day, he was bundled in a faded coat and a woolen hat on his head. He moved like his joints would prefer to have been somewhere warm, but you could see the determination in his gait as well. Much like a man with a mission and the drive to carry it out.

He headed past the gates of the cemetery, shuffling his way toward the rows of white headstones that were set in perfect symmetry. He would stoop to set one of his small flags at the base of a headstone, stay kneeling for a moment, then struggle to stand once again to continue on his way. I moved closer, interested in his ritual, but loathe to interfere.

I finally approached him when he stumbled and almost fell. I helped him to stand upright and asked if I could walk with him. He thanked me and gave his consent in a voice that was soft and wintry. We walked along and I asked him why he would be out here on such a chilly day.

He stopped in front of another one of the white headstones in that sea of graves. He knelt down and placed the flag near its base, pushing hard to force the stick into the ground. I knelt down next to him as he began to speak.

“While the politicians and the others talk about remembering the veterans, they only talk about the ideals in general. I come here each year to honor the ones that they don’t know about. Family and friends that gave their lives for the love of their country. My father who died in France in 1916. My buddies who died in the rush onto Omaha Beach on June 6, 1944. A cousin that perished during the push at Inchon. My son, who lost his life in the Tet Offensive.

More than anything I want to remember the ones here that have been forgotten. They made the ultimate sacrifice. I was there and remember the horror and the pain that they had to go through. All in the name of freedom. Those of us who made it back have to try and make the rest of the world understand the price those here made.”

I watched as a tear moved slowly down the weather-beaten face of this man. I could not fathom the emotions that his memories pulled up him. He struggled to stand, determined to finish his self appointed task. I helped him with the rest of his flags and as the last was planted, he lamented that he could not afford enough so all there could be honored. I stayed with the old man for the rest of the day, while he told me of acts of heroism and the sights that he had seen. We shook hands that day, and I promised to meet him again here next year.

------=======+++=======------

I stood once again in the sea of white headstones. There within the silence, I knelt and planted the last flag. This was a new headstone, the marker of my friend. He was gone, but I think he would be proud that someone carries on his devotion that all here should be honored. Farewell my friend. And thanks.

Gay Rights, Abortion, Marijuana, Sexism, Racism, Right to Die, Gun Control, these are all single issues that many people are passionate about. Hell, I am passionate on these issues myself, and that is a great thing to care about these things.

However voting for (or against) a candidate just on one issue can be taking a chance that it will be detrimental to the country.

It can be, and already has been harmful to the country. In 2004, the Roman Catholic Bishops across the country put out letters to their faithful threatening them with loss of communion or excommunication if they voted for Kerry. The single issue was abortion, and Kerry, himself a Catholic, wanted to follow the law and keep it legal. Who knows how many voters that may have lost him.

On the flip side, Bush was thought to be against Gay Rights and Abortion. This earned him the endorsement of the Religious Reich and the votes of their followers.

As everyone knows, we ended up with the worst pResident in the country's history and his policies have almost ruined the nation. Yet people voted for his second term, knowing just how evil he was. It was those damned single issues that helped it along.

And if you really look at what has to happen with these issues, they are not going to be decided by the President. Most of them will eventually be decided by the Courts. There are just too many GOP pols who think the country is a Christian one to be able to get Gay Rights, Abortion, or any of the others through. It will come down to having the courts declare the issue unconstitutional or not.

Yes our Supreme court is packed with conservatives. But we need to replace them with more forward thinking people. If a candidate is not totally behind what you want don't discard them completely. They may have the ideas that will start to heal the country. And by deciding your vote on just that one issue you could lose that chance. Worse yet, if you ignore everything about a candidate except for their view on your issue, we could end up with something akin to what we have now.

So please look at your candidate's position on all the issues. Don't decide on one based on just the one thing you feel passionate about. While you might win on that one issue, you could lose a whole lot more.

With all the fighting going on with the race between Obama and Clinton, I am just doing my best to look past it all and think about the GE and ultimately, when a new president is sworn in.

The new Democratic President (thinking positive here) will be sworn in and then give his/her speeches, have the parties and balls with all the pomp that goes with the office.

But what do you really want to see come out of that office after he/she gets settled in? What do you think are the priorities that really need to get done first?

My own list:

1. Halt any residual escalation of troops to Iraq and firm up a reduction plan that will work.

2. An immediate retraction of all the powers that Bush has gathered, and put those powers back where they belong.

3. Return the Constitution and the Bill of Rights to their original meanings.

4. Revoke all of Bush's signing statements as law.

5. Have Bush, Cheney, and the rest of those rat turds arrested and sent to the Hague for their war crimes. (never happen, but I can dream)

There are so many other issues that they will have to attend to, but I believe that he/she should get us back on the moral track that we once expected for our leaders. Once our system of government is back to the way it was attended, we can pursue the other major problems that are affecting the nation.