BY RUSSELL TURNER
QUESTIONS TO BE ANSWERED
We have just finished the primary part of our election cycle and there has been a lot of talk about multiple issues, but I feel there are a lot more questions that need to be asked and answered. There has been a constant drumbeat about education and the talk about more money being spent on it. We need to remember that while education is an important topic, we also need to remember that for our society to function there are countless other occupations that are needed. Politicians have a bad habit of ignoring segments of our society if they don’t protest and march on the capitol. Those ignored people are what I call the forgotten men and women. The forgotten people of this state are the majority, but you would never learn that fact if you relied upon the mainstream media.
I live in Congressional dist #2 in Oklahoma; in this district the median household income is slightly less than 33 thousand per year. That 33k is not per person, but it is the total that a couple makes together. Among others this group includes the working poor, farmers, and small businessmen. Everyone who works wants to be able to pay their living expenses, set aside some money for retirement, and be able to pay for health coverage for themselves and their families. The problem is that the elite class of this state and nation are so far removed from the life that the majority of us have to live they have no perspective of what it takes to keep our heads above water. We in the private sector have no guarantees on what our income will be for any given year, we live in a true free market system. I guess if it weren’t for hope we would be in a much bigger mess; I have often heard farmers when they sold their product say maybe next year will be better, sadly the better year seldom comes around. People in small business would like to have a better life but they cannot charge more than the customer can afford, they often get into a vicious cycle where they are under bidding each other in order just to get enough money to make the bills at the end of the month. As far as health insurance, the high cost and the high deductibles are so much it is like not even having insurance. For far too many of our people health insurance is a luxury they cannot afford.
While most politicians will pander to public employee unions and the mainstream media, the average hard working people of this state are deemed irrelevant. All groups of people in this sate want and deserve a better life; the forgotten people are no exception. The political class has pretty much told us in the private sector that we are on our own. They like to throw around phrases like economic development and lower taxes; how is that working out for you? We in the private sector know we can’t go to the state capitol and get our salaries increased, and we also know that every time a new fee or tax is imposed we will have less to live on. It is time we forgotten people demand our candidates tell us how they are going to improve the lives we lead.
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