As a new school year begins, I can’t help but wonder how our kids are really doing. Will our kids learn values such as empathy, compassion and integrity as they watch politicians and billionaires dismantle USAID and other agencies resulting in hundreds of thousands of children worldwide needlessly dying of starvation and disease?
These same people greedily kick millions of American children off Medicaid/SNAP health care and food benefits, just so the billionaires can get more of our tax money. As a bonus, our kids will be paying for the trillions of dollars added to our national deficit for their entire working lives.
Our kids are watching as thousands of hardworking moms and dads are picked up off the street and detained in concentration camps or deported to foreign lands. The only crime most of them have committed is coming to America at great personal risk so their kids can have a better life.
Our kids witness the attacks on courts, judges, universities, public schools, military veterans, our natural environment, LGBTQIA people, people of color and anyone who speaks truth to power. Our kids are so young that this is the only America they know. Is growing up in America now similar to growing up in 1930s Germany?
What might America look like if our politicians went to Washington, D.C., to develop family friendly policies that actually improved the lives of their constituents? Maybe they could learn a lesson from our immigrant population that good parents take great personal risks so their kids, grandkids and great-grandkids can have a better life.
Jim Barnaby
Durango
