United States Of Purple

In the September 19, 2009 issue of The Week magazine (www.theweek.com), William Falk did a great tongue-in-cheek article about how to solve the acrimonious and bitter state of political debate in this country. He facetiously proposes to divide the country into the two countries, one with the "red" states and one with the "blue" states. In the red state nation:

• The Federal income tax rate would by reduced to 10%.
• Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security would be abolished.
• Abortion would be illegal.
• Gays would be closeted again.
• Christianity would be the official state religion.
• Anyone could be any kind of gun with no questions asked.

In the blue state nation:

• The Federal income tax rate would be raised to 90%.
• All employers would institute quotas for minorities, women, and less-abled persons.
• You would get all of your health care needs handled by a single government run. organization like in Canada.
• Fast food would be banned.
• Gun ownership would be banned.
• Gay marriage would be legal.
• Marijuana would be legal.

While I applaud Mr. Falk's originality, I would suggest that he left out another segment, call it the purple states. In the purple state nation:

• I would be free to keep much more of my wealth since the government was efficient and non-wasteful, providing only essential services without any pork barrel projects at all.
• I would be free to participate, or not participate, in cost effective and efficient government retirement plans.
• I would be free to do whatever I wanted to my body from a pregnancy (if I was a woman), fast food, and drug perspective.
• I would be free to practice whatever sexual orientation I wanted without threat of retribution or ridicule.
• I would be free to practice whatever religion I wanted without threat of retribution or ridicule.
• I would be free to own whatever type of gun I wanted, assuming I was a law abiding citizen.
• I would be free to hire whomever I wanted for as long as I wanted without interference from an overreaching government bureaucracy.
• I would be free to choose health care options which were market driven and priced and which excluded any overreaching government interference and bureaucracy.
• I would be free of petty, ignorant, and arrogant politicians who divide citizens into warring tribes.
• I would be free of petty, ignorant, and arrogant politicians who do not understand what the word "respect" means, and thus, do not apply that definition to all citizens including those that differ in their opinions.
• I would be free of petty, ignorant, and arrogant politicians because they are restricted to term limits less than the current Presidential term limits.
• I would be free of petty, ignorant, and arrogant politicians who have no idea how damaging their economic policies are to both the economy and to freedom.
• I would be free of an election system that allows ungodly amounts of money from corporations, unions, PACs and lobbyists to render the ordinary citizen's voice almost moot.
• I would be free of a government who thinks being a Patriot involves almost unfettered access to every citizen's private life without any checks and balances.
• I would be free of an inept government and political class that has not solved any significant problem in over forty years including the war on drugs, failing public schools, foreign energy source dependency, war on terror, etc.
• I would be free of an inept government and political class who think foreign policy involves stationing combat troops in over 150 countries worldwide.
• I would be free to live my life, raise my family, and spend my wealth anyway I wanted with minimal interference from the political class.

This is the nation I want to live in. I understand it existed once. It was called the United States of America.