But pride is not a virtue. It's a sin according to every major religion's scriptures, the Old Testament, New Testament, Koran, and those of Hinduism and Buddhism. And scriptures also tell us that anger is sinful too, and needs to be controlled. What happens is God's plan. Anger at it is a rejection of God's plan. And anger harms the angry person himself: it raises blood pressure and contributes to strokes and heart attack.

Why are governments “instituted among men?” Our Declaration of Independence says it is to secure to us the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. But you don't have a right to life really, if you don't have air you can breathe without getting sick from it, water that safe to drink, cook and bathe in, safe food, adequate clothing, shelter and some medical care. And you don't have real liberty or ability to pursue happiness unless you can get an education that enables you to get skills that allow you to choose to work in one or more jobs or places.

These fundamental things aren't cheap! They are expensive! I know that you frequently don't have much money to pay taxes. But sometimes you are complaining about people even poorer than you, while the truth is that very rich people get off paying proportionally much less of their incomes in taxes than you do. Before complaining about taxes and too many government workers, please remember main functions that government employees perform.

What government workers should we have less of? Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard, Veterans hospital workers, police, troopers, and prison guards who protect life and liberty? Should we have instead more privately employed retail clerks? Or maybe there should be a cut back in Water Department workers who make sure the water is safe to use, or Sewer departments that take poisonous wastes away? In their place should we have more privately employed workers in plastic factories? How about cutting out infrastructure maintenance and having more private janitors, etc.? Think how expensive it is to maintain or replace bridges or levees in New Orleans or along the Mississippi river: it costs hundreds of billions of dollars. Whatever the source of climate change may be, the U.N. Has estimated that the nations of the world will have to spend $20 trillion to adjust to it over the next 20 years. Where there are costs, there will also be benefits, but the wealthy will find ways to exploit those benefits.

Would you really want to give up Social Security and Medicare to cut payroll taxes? Are you sure on the income you have had that you could voluntarily have saved enough to pay your own medical bills and for decades of retirement? If you want SS and Medicare for yourselves, even though it is partially paid for by the taxes of others, is it fair to complain if some of your taxes go to help pay for it for others?

Education is very expensive, but do you really want to cut school taxes greatly? If the next generation of kids aren't educated well enough, they won't be able to be employed productively enough to contribute to your social security and medical care.

Why was the Constitution of our country formed? The Constitution itself says:

“We the people,... in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure Domestic Tranquility, promote the General Welfare, and secure the blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity...”

Increasing inequalities of wealth versus poverty make for a less perfect union, envy, and anger. They promote crime, which is injustice, not justice and Domestic disturbance rather than Tranquility. Poverty restricts rather than enhances Liberty. The poorer you are, the less free you are to go where you want and do what you want. And please remember the purpose “to promote the general Welfare!”

You complain about personal laziness and schools not doing their job. The truth is that children of very poor people, whether black, white, yellow or red, are disadvantaged from birth, or maybe even before conception. Their mothers have poor diets, and other health problems that leave their babies less healthy, born into poor homes. Spina bifida, for example, is related to a deficiency of folic acid in mom's diet. Studies of meaningful differences in the experiences of young American children show that the poorest adults speak much less to their babies and offer less encouragement than do adults in middle class families, and middle class adults speak somewhat less to their children and encourage them less than do wealthy adults, who also provide much more stimulus from toys and learning objects, not just TV. And runaway fathers are hardly confined to black men who may have no resources for support. By the time very poor children get to school, they are much less capable of schooling than middle class and wealthy family children. Schools are a false scapegoat for the effects of poverty!

Yes, there are some differences of behavior and values between subcultures in our un-melted pot of a country and throughout the world. But it's judgmental and prideful to hold many or all of another group in contempt for differences they may not be able to help. Judge not, that you be not judged. We all make some poor choices. We marry Mr. or Ms. Wrong and 50% end up in divorce. We smoke, drink, we buy SUV's and bottled water. We mostly don't even choose our religion but are born into it. But we pridefully choose to believe it is the only true religion and morality and others hold “false religions.” And we try to impose ours on them. Historically this has led to terrible killing.

Our federal government as a whole is extremely corrupted by campaign contributors and special interests. That goes for Congress as well as the Presidency, and Democrats as well as Republicans. They serve these concentrations of wealth and votes. Twice we chose to elect a president partly because he said he was Born Again, a “Compassionate Conservative” and shared our values. But he's recently admitted that he abused alcohol up to age 40. And he has been terribly badly advised and served by others. Pride tends to prevent our admitting poor choices and correcting them. Let's put it aside, stop trying to force our religious and political values (like voting democracy for Muslim countries) on others, and make a better choice next election. Please put a little study into the Libertarian and or Green parties. They can only grow, and do better, if you do so.

Please pass these words on, if you find good in them.

Your Friend, Progressive