Double Standards

After a few more meetings and several hundred pages of more reading, I’m starting to gain increasing amounts of clarity about the work that is being done here and needs to be done. Today one thing kept hitting home for me. Why are we willing to make difficult choices and decisions that consider long-term impacts and opportunity costs in other countries when we aren’t willing to do the same in our own?

In the two crisis response operations I’ve been involved in, the US Government was willing to consider things such as wind farms, hydro-electric power, and here, we’re even distributing seeds that can be used for crops, and then collected for planting during the next cycle. I am glad we are making such choices, don’t take my observation as a complaint. I even acknowledge and appreciate that the choices are being funded from my paychecks. What perplexes me, is why don’t we have the willingness to fund such things through taxpayers dollars domestically? Why do we allow private companies to “harness” nature so that if a farmer replants seeds, a lawsuit for intellectual property rights awaits? Why are we still beholden to oil? Why even with these massive stimulus packages are we not seriously committing our country to a clean source of energy and ensuring independence based on renewable sources, thus undercutting the main source of funding for so much of the terrorism that goes on around the world-not to mention addressing the key issue facing humanity and creation itself-global warming?

In my opinion, the easy answer is a mistrust of the federal government that I believe evolved during the Vietnam conflict and was solidified by the Watergate affair. Compounding that mistrust, have been a few decades where we looked purely for short-term gains as reflected by the housing market, the dividends of stocks, and the next election campaign cycle. This pulled us away from investing in our communities, neighborhoods, infrastructure, and future and it eventually came back to haunt us. One could hope that this current recession may serve to correct our moral compass as a country, but I had the same hope after 9/11 and that was a small blip on the nation’s conscience.

A few other really neat things I learned about today...some of our messaging to the people in Afghanistan has been really good. Several provinces are hosting Women's day events, others are holding prayer breakfasts during Prophet's day. A jazz quartet is performing in many towns and we are passing around calendars noting mosques of America. Ok, the last one isn't perfect, but then again, I think it is vital if we are to convince the world that we aren't on a crusade.

I moved into some new digs today. So far so good! More tomorrow...

Peace...