Do you really know what you oppose or support?

The political, social, and economic systems of societies depend
on the ability and willingness of the people to participate actively
in the decision making process of their governments.  But, this 
ability to participate meaninfully is undermined when there is no 
easy access to reliable information.

When governments operate in secrecy, restricting the freedom
of information, and when private companies gain monopoly
power over the media, the information to the public can be
manipulated, distorted, and incomplete. Lack of trustworthy
information leads to confusion, proliferetion of extremist groups,
social disorder, and corruption permeating to all levels of society.

Napolen used the printed media as his mouth piece to promote
his own agenda. Hitler used it successfully to divert pulbic
attention from the real issues of public concern, and united people
under a baseless idea called Social Darwinism. This idea is a mis-
aplication of Darwin's theory of biological evolution of the species
to the social world. It served him to justify imperialism, racism,
wars, and concentration of power. Social Darwinists saw the anglo-
saxon (British and North American), and Teutonic (German) races
as superior, and therefore, with the right to conquer other peoples.
(Western Civilization, by Perry et al)

In the United States, deregulation of media ownership since
the Reagan administration, made possible for media companies
to merge, or buy out smaler media outlets in the most important
cities and regions. Information content depends on the interests
of those who own the meda.  Owners and managers of media
outlets have more power than the journalists who work for them.
Therefore journalists find themselves in the difficult position to
either comply with the orders of their bosses or leave. 

People in the United States and other western naions have seen
a progressive deteroration of the quality of the news they receive
from newspapers, news magazines, and the broadcast media.

The Dangers of Fear and Misinformation

The New Testament describes an event in which Jesus sees the
crowds hungry for the truth. And he felt sad for them because
they were like sheep without a shepherd.

Despite of all the technological developments behind the
communications systems and media development, the crowds
are still like sheep without a shepherd. Hungry for the truth and
trustworthy leadership.

It is disheartening to see large crowds on the streets protesting
against positive reform projects, such as health reform, energy
reform, foreign policies reform, and financial reform. The current
health care system is inadequate, wasteful, and inefficient.
Just as it is easier and less expensive to build a new house from
the ground up than to renovate an old house part by part, it
would be much easier and less costly to get rid of the current
health care system and design a new one according to our
present needs. Unfortunately, most people fear real change,
and private interest groups who benefit from the current system
take advantage of that fear to mislead and easily turn people
against positive changes.

As a result, good reform plans are eroded progressively as time
passes and corporate lobbyists spend millions of dollars a week
to buy the votes of the members of congress. The final health
reform bill in Congress is not worth the amount of time and
resources spent in the process. The Washington Post from
Nov. 15 says:
"Legislators are designing this new marketplace to protect
consumers from many of the pitfalls and inequities in the
current system. But even as they focus on the details of how the
marketplace will work, senator have indicated thay they would
allow insurers to continue operating outside it, much as the
health-insurance lobby has sought."

Private insurance influence in Congress opposed to general
public interest is clear in such provisions such as the bill written
by the Senate health committee, which "would not require
insurers operating outside the marketplace to provide
standardized disclosures about what they cover." To read more
about this topic go to:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/13/AR2009111303160_pf.html

Even the Goldman Sachs report says that the "watered-down
Senate Health bill (is) a windfall for big insurance." Sam Stein
from the Huffington Post reports the Goldman Sachs
analysis, indicating that no reform would be better than the
watered down version of the Senate Finance Committee (SFC)
which does not include a public option, called the "base"
scenario. The report shows that under the senate version of
health reform, Cigna, Aetna, WellPoint, UnitedHealth, and
Humana, will stand to increase in profits. The earnings per
share will experience a 5% growth from 2010 to 2019. (The
Huffington Post, Nov. 17, 2009)

" ... the report also points out that a more
'centrist' version of the Senate Finance Committee (SFC),
legislation would lead to the 'highest aggregate revenue growth'
for the insurance industry. Should lawmakers further water-down
the SFC bill, the industry will stand to profit, the report implies,
suggesting that the 'bull' case scenario is a reform package that
brings millions of government-subsidized customers, without
requiring the industry to pay any new taxes." Alternate.org.

Health Reform is not the only reform plan facing extremely
strong attacks from private interest groups.  The same is tru
for energy reform, with oil and coal companies spending millions
of dollars every week to stop reform that would cut unfair and
undeserved subsidies for these multibillion dollar private
companies, would enforce tighter regulations against pollution,
and dedicate billions of dollars for research and development
of renewable energy sources. Although the investment in
the development of green technology is initially costly, it
will pay back for itself in a few years because of the savings
from cuts in oil imports, cleaner and healthier enviroments, and
millions of new jobs that will stay in the United States.

The attack of oil and coal industries against energy reform
focus the attention of the public only in the amount of funds
that will be invested, and call on citizens to opposed the reform
with scare tactics and accusations. The attacks do not come
directly from these interest groups, but through paid politicians
and media outlets owned or sponsored by them.