The Generation Gaps

Todays political gab often uses the term "the generation gap" to partition groups of voters by age classification. Age is not the factor, but our ability as humans to think and act for the longer term is a major factor that curtails our ability to grasp the significance of real changes that dominate this planet called Earth. We tend to simplify problems and cast the solutions, as we see them, in very short term fixes. Therein lies the real "Generation Gaps." Are we able to look beyond a few years to extrapolate solutions for today's problems? We foster a political system that treats every issue as the recipe of the day. News media get bored after a few days on virtually any issue regardless of how significant it may be. Politicians ramble on about yesterdays problems and issues and generally fail to discuss the long term issues and solutions that seem to be beyond their intellectual capacity. We seem to be limited by a vision and capacity to act only for the short term.

Hence, issues like universal health care are debated while nearly 50 million Americans do without any care. We debate environmental pollution while carcinogenic toxins stream into water supplies and air causing millions of cancer deaths while we collectively allow elected politicians to dilly dally and piecemeal todays favorite environmental hot topic. We talk about peace while politicians that we select arm our country to the teeth to fight nearly perpetual wars. We jockey for our pet energy project and politicians are wined and dined by petrochemical corporations to retain the status of our energy dependence on foreign oil supplies.

As our planet's population grows from the present level of about 6 billion humans to an estimated 10 billion during the next ten years, and as we deplete the natural resources that we have depended on, and as we continue to contaminate earth and its atmosphere with toxins and global climate-changing pollutants that cause disease, death, and chaos we will still be debating these politically charged issues while descending into greater and more intractable problems unless we become less generational and more inspirational.

We must inspire ourselves and the politicians that we elect to become visionary leaders who grasp the long term meaning of today's life and death issues and work on visionary solutions that provide long term benefits that span the generation gaps and reach out to all generation present and future.