What’s that saying? If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, it’s a duck? Yet, regardless of the evidence of one’s eyes, there wouldn’t be a saying if people were not inclined to still be led down the garden path. So, for some Americans, approximately 42% or so last count, when the duck walks like a duck, talks like a duck, and looks like a duck, they believe it’s an Eagle, maybe a Hawk.

“Ignoring isn’t the same as ignorance, you have to work at it.”

Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale

The dumbing down of America has taken a nation once prized for its healthcare and education, to a place where today ranks 27th in the World in terms of Human Capital.

So, why is that important? Because nations failing to invest in education and health care at risk of slow economic growth.

Well, and of course the less education one has, the less critical one is.

hu·man cap·i·tal (noun): The attributes of a population that, along with physical capital such as buildings, equipment, and other tangible assets, contribute to economic productivity. These attributes include aggregate levels of education, training, skills, and health in a population that affect the rate at which technologies can be developed, adopted, and employed to increase productivity. In “Measuring human capital: a systematic analysis of 195 countries and territories, 1990–2016” IHME provides the first internationally comparable index of human capital. Building on past efforts, the study offers a measure of expected human capital that incorporates educational attainment, education quality or learning, functional health status, and survival for 195 countries, from 1990 to 2016.

HEALTHDATA.org | What is human capital and why is it relevant? | Publication date: 
September 24, 2018

The American dream today is totally out of reach to many, for those working class slogs struggling to make ends meet have little time for dreaming of anything but where the money to pay their mounting healthcare bills will come from.

No tax breaks for them, silly, socialism is for the rich, capitalism is for the poor.

A lack of education is an important factor in why so many Americans can not see Trump for what he is. And don’t get me wrong, a lack of education does not imply one is stupid. Far from, actually.

Yet, education is a way for everyone to broaden their perspectives, it helps us to see when the facts don’t add up. Basically, because people with higher levels of education do more reading, and more reading from a much broader subject matter. Also, people with higher levels of education often have friends with similar education levels, and are exposed to more diverse points of view, allowing them a broader insight, a diverse perspective, are more able to think creatively, more apt to find opportunities, more able to adapt to change.

Taken on its own, as far as education, America actually fares even worse.

The latest findings from the Pew Research Center have the US in 38th place out of 71 countries when it comes to math scores and 24th place when it comes to science.

Perhaps the biggest surprise of the study is just how far the US has fallen in the rankings. In 1990, the US ranked sixth in the world for its levels of education and health — 21 spots ahead of where it is now.

BUSINESS INSIDER | The US was once a leader for healthcare and education — now it ranks 27th in the world | Aria Bendix, Sep. 27, 2018

So, in a nutshell, Americans are less educated and have poorer access to quality healthcare then they did just 30 years ago.

For some reason I don’t quite understand, the U.S. has gradually and systematically spent less and less over the years on education at a national level, and fought tooth and nail against any sort of universal healthcare. Therefore, today they are one of the few industrialized nations without some form of a unified healthcare system for all, and are less educated than their global peers.

Less educated, no universal healthcare, but why?

Well, maybe it is because instead of investing in its citizens America has been busy bombing the snot out of the Middle East for the last 30 years, concentrating vast amounts of resources to secure control over the entire region, and now we know that came at the expense of their own people.

“Children must be taught how to think, not what to think.”

Margaret Mead

Basically, one result of that is decades of propping up their economy artificially, socialism for the rich corporate cronies, and working class families get less and less, who have decade after decade struggled more and more to make ends meet while trillions have been spent towards the mechanisms of war and bailing out banks and the auto industry tycoons.

Oh, but the boogeyman is the guy who just arrived from some foreign shore?

Riiiight. I don’t think so.

The boogeyman is the wealthy 1 % that have been allowed free-reign to make policies and direct spending towards whatever enterprise suits their own interests, at the expense of millions and millions of Americans.

You hear some Democratic presidential candidates talking of free tuition, freeing graduates from decades of staggering financial debt and the wealthy white privileged lawmakers head spin and shout SOCIALISM, like it’s a dirty word.

The reality is, not just the debt forgiveness, but that for many families today in 2019, with little to no financial means, higher education just seems out of reach. Even if the jobs that are available for them after college are low-paying, sometimes merely contract, and certainly with none of the financial securities even their parents had, little lone their grandparents, many Americans don’t even think of higher education. Over time this lack of investment in their own citizens has become a sinkhole of poverty and debt, and the sense that their voices are irrelevant.

And in walks this boorish bully, talking about bringing back the dying coal industry, blaming everything on refugees and migrants and everyone else with skin that doesn’t look like theirs, all the while fighting to make dang certain the rich get their handouts, and the rest can feed off the scraps of their bigoted beliefs.

Essentially, I suppose it can be said that America has been resting on its laurels, believing that this ‘greatness’ was inherent, was bred in the bone.

Well, its not.

It’s from the opportunities that once defined them, like education, healthcare, infrastructure.

America no longer leads the world in anything but, maybe, gun deaths.

The extreme level of racism we still see throughout the U.S. is in direct relation to the systemic levels of uneducated poor white folk that are easily duped into believing that some refugee from some far off land is the problem, rather than the governments complete disinterest in their plight.

Well, that refugee or migrant from some far off land is not resting on their laurels. Instead, they are driving forward the economy, they are investing in education, investing in their futures.

Forbes lays out 3 factors as to why immigrants are key to economic growth – Labour Force Growth – Entrepreneurship – Human Capital

“Immigration supplies workers, which increases GDP [gross domestic product] and has helped the United States avoid the fate of stagnant economies created by purely demographic forces – in particular, an aging (and, in the case of Japan, a shrinking) workforce.”

{…}

“Perhaps even more important than the contribution to labor supply is the infusion by high-skilled immigration of human capital that has boosted the nation’s capacity for innovation and technological change,”

FORBES.COM | 3 Reasons Why Immigrants Are Key To Economic Growth | Stuart Anderson, October 2nd, 2016

Something that should be considered in all this, is that fascism rose to power across Europe due to the fact many parts of Europe, most really, had an uneducated rural populace, watching as the global economy chugged along under the industrial revolution, as they in turn watched their own jobs go obsolete.

So, then of course, the problem must be all these Jewish people, these foreigners with their denial of Christ as the Messiah, succeeding, prospering, living well while they struggled to make ends meet – an easy scapegoat.

A co-worker who grew up in Poland told me that his father had spoken of Jewish people in much this fashion, stories of poor farmers going to Jewish lenders for financial assistance, just to watch when the loan came due these lenders come and take away their land and their livelihoods when they defaulted.

First off, Jewish people in Europe were not better off than their fellow countrymen, nor can we say they were more educated. However, just like today, they were a convenient scapegoat since they were perceived as different due to their religion.

And again, much like today, as the juggernaut of progress steamed along during the opening decades of the 20th century, all sorts of folks across Europe were not reaping the rewards of industrialization. Their prospects were dim, their jobs were disappearing in a tidal wave of progress, and they saw little gain for themselves in this new economy sweeping the globe.

Rise of industrialization led to massive financial disparities, much as we see today, with small concentrated groups of haves, with no concern for the welfare of the have-nots.

Thus rose two opposing political theories in the 20th century – Socialism, with the idea of more equitable sharing of the wealth in order to lessen the effects on the populace – at odds with – Social Darwinism, with the rise of the fittest, that certain people become powerful in society because they are innately better. (history.com)

Yeah, well, reality would beg to differ. Use the evidence of one’s eyes, folks, not the lies and gaslighting of a self-serving failed businessman with no morality.

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”

Nelson Mandela