I feel compelled to address the absolutely crucial issue of national security that seems to have generated a lot of hot gas post-debate. Bernie is absolutely right in his statement that climate change poses the number 1 threat to national security. I find it mind boggling that people cannot see that. The DOD is fully aware of it, as is the CIA, time.com/...and spelled out by the White House. abcnews.go.com/... Majority of the people, however, seem to have buried their heads deep in the sand on this because the truth is too frightening to accept and deal with. Let's be rational about it. Yes, it is extremely frightening but by not doing anything about it we are not exactly making things any better. Unless you believe in some kind of religious reckoning and eternal life among lions and bunnies on sunny meadows filled with flowers, ambrosia and nectar....If you do, then why don't you just speed up your own reckoning and leave the running of the country to those of us who are using the power of rational thought and science?!
It has been known and shown to those who care to do the research, that the current crisis in Syria was hugely exacerbated, even sparked, by a historic drought. www.nytimes.com/...Drought leads to hunger, hunger leads to despair, despair leads to desperate measures. Beside Syria there are numerous other examples of this growing trend. As weather patterns become increasingly extreme, so will the social unrest created by those patterns. This is rational thinking. But if you happen to be one of those people who conclude there is no climate change based on the mighty evidence of the existence of a snowball in Congressional chambers, then I honestly do not know what to tell you.
Also, another issue of central importance, heavily intertwined with the first issue. Apropos Bernie's seeming non sequitur when asked about how to respond to the situation in France. He responded with his usual inequality speech. At first I was a little taken aback, but after much thought I have concluded that yet again he is right. The man is really smart and connects the dots well, so sometimes it is hard for others to follow his train of thought. What we are seeing unfold in the world is the direct result of greed that has got out of hand, way out of hand. Fools are killing each others at the behest of those who profit from their grief. I personally learned and understood that when NATO was bombing Belgrade. (There was nothing I as a Croat wanted more than that, but when it actually happened I had a moment of crystal clarity: we, the Croats and the Serbs, we the ordinary people, are fools. There is a rather small number of greedy monsters who are making an awful lot of money off our suffering). FOLLOW THE MONEY!!! Check out SIPRI.ORG databases of global arms trade. Juxtapose/plot those numbers with the petrochemical trade, as well as heroin and other opiates routes. The US is by far and wide the number 1 exporter of weapons. Add the other four P5 states (permanent 5 members of the UN Security Council) and Germany, and voila! Consider the untenable structure of the UN Security Council that has been effectively neutering that organization ab initio. We - as a nation, we who elected corporate lackeys to run the show - are responsible for what our "democratically elected" government does. As long as Citizens United is the rule of the day and the powerful lobbyists for the merchants of death are running the show -- we are heading in the direction of heat death. We sell obscene quantities of weaponry to the Gulf States, who in turn sell us oil, and - ironically - arm Al Qaeda and ISIS - who then terrorize the people in our cities, as well as people everywhere else in the world who oppose the interests of war profiteers. When one sees these dots connected it can be emotionally quite overwhelming. Nonetheless, I believe these to be the basic underpinnings of the tragedies that unfold in the world daily.
I think that at the core of what the world faces at this very moment is a concentration of greed in a widening and deepening ocean of discontent. If we do not address corporate personhood and Citizens United, if we do not elect Bernie to lead the way to dismantling the dangerous power of corporations, we as human species are done. ISIS feeds on the ever growing despair and discontent created mainly by corporate greed of all stripes and colors. Let's starve it by removing the source of despair and discontent rather than by continuing business as usual. O'Malley and Bernie were both right on foreign policy in last night’s excellent debate. We need superior intelligence (in more than one way) and we need to lead by moral example. We need a lot more "soft power" and a lot fewer nuclear weapons, tough talk, and carpet bombing. Violence only begets more violence. Moral leadership is way more powerful than all the bombs in the world. Just think of post WW2 America and compare it to America George W. Bush left behind!!!! That is not to say we should get rid of our defenses. No, not at all. It only means that we need to truly govern, without our decisions being made for us by corporate lobbyists. They are the root of nearly everything that has gone wrong in the world today. Unchecked corporate greed.