2016, The Year Of Change?

As the world enters another new year one has to wonder when will times get any better. If this past year was any indication of what 2016 will hold it is suffice to say that the best years of America peaked a very long time ago. One can arguably say though that this past year, 2015 was the year of the gun. Never before has there been a fever pitch to acquire weaponry that by it's very own makeup has only one purpose, to maim and kill. The United States has come a long way since the frontier days of Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett where it was necessary to have armaments for survival. We would think by now our civil society would be far more civilized where weapons are no longer a necessity. Sad to say we are not.

Gun related deaths and accidents along with increasing trigger happy law enforcement officers are all too common place today. Home grown terror has already come knocking on our doors. When you have so much weaponry already in the hands of so many people with the growing frustration of a disenfranchised public sooner than latter there is bound to be a tempest born out of an imbalanced society. If we retrace history we find the United States at this point in time our economic conditions are strikingly similar to episodes that brought about the French Revolution and 150 years latter gave way for a political leader to steer a nation into war.

2016, a most quintessential political year is where the voters will change the direction the United states will take for decades to come. Will apathy rule the day this election cycle or will the light of reason and hope break through the choke hold of the current state of apathy that has continued to drown out the Founding Fathers principles of America? Something to really think about in 2016.

Where there is so little hope for better days ahead despite all the political rhetoric by our Republican Presidential contenders leaving 2015 behind brings little comfort that 2016 will be any brighter. The facts remain despite the many attempts to bring some sunshine in 2016 for far too many will remain much the same. When we look at a valiant effort to bring some hope, the Save the Benefits Act would go a very long way to alleviate much of the financial hardships seniors all around the country are facing. Yet, it is the Republican juggernaut of Scrooge-ness that has derailed too many instances that would benefit millions and not just seniors either.

When the United Nations came out recently with the report on women's rights our current policies are actually an embarrassment in the eyes of much of the rest of the world. Yet, again our government has only perpetuated a continued lack of empathy toward women and the growing poor. It is this type of continued lack of understanding by our current elected officials of the kinds of measures other countries have concerning the welfare of their populations where women's rights are in the forefront of their considerations.

When we turn our attention to one of the most pressing issues of the day we find a continued indifference to what green house gasses are doing to our environment. The recent Paris Accord on Climate Change will be just another feel good attempt at addressing global warming unless there is a direct effort to enforce policies of change to renewable alternate energy sources. The political will has yet to even acknowledge what our current energy policies are doing let alone enact concise efforts to implement change. The fuel that ushered in the first and second industrial revolution have had their day. But, in the process have already done almost irreversible harm to our environment. We have the technology, the resources, and the ability to usher in the energy sources that by their design will enhance our environment and at the same time power our continued growing energy needs for centuries to come. Yet, again if 2016 remains like 2015 that change won't happen.

As we can see to effect change which is so necessary for growth and prosperity this next Presidential election will have the impact to either make the United States a leader among nations of the world or just become another two bit player. The choice is ours to make.