As the election date draws ever closer, the political debates get uglier. Maybe our candidates need to review the rules of high school and college debating instead of using the time to cut each other to shreds. Give us facts. Give us strengths. Give us a logical, practical plan for the future. We’ve had enough rhetoric, pouting, posturing, blaming and insults.

At this point in time, I am fed up with both candidates and both parties. It shouldn’t take a billion dollars in campaign funds and hateful advertising to get somebody elected in this country. Why don’t they use the air time they have to actually tell us how they are going to fix the mess the country is in? Why don’t they use some of the campaign money to do something more significant than run their mouths in front of cameras?

I am a registered Democrat, but my thoughts and heart are more and more Republican. A dear lady whom I respect very much said that if Obama wasn’t re-elected, everyone would know that it was purely because of his race. I was flabbergasted. Was it purely because of his race that he got elected?

I didn’t vote for him in the last election, but it had nothing to do with race. He was a handsome African American man, well-educated and one of the best orators we’ve seen in this country for a long time at that point. BUT he had only served two terms in the Senate, and in my opinion, that wasn’t enough experience to make him President of these United States. No one nationally had ever heard of him until he gave a speech at the DNC for a previous election. Oprah Winfrey declared on national television on her own show that he should be the next president of the United States. The Mayor endorsed him from Chicago, but of course he would endorse someone with roots in his own back yard.

His whole election platform was “Change!” without ever laying out a plan of what that change was going to be or how it would take place. The man was charismatic. People ate it up because they wanted to hear about change and a better future. But promises without a plan are worthless, as we’ve all seen in the last four years. Does his public stand on issues represent the political party as a whole or has he elevated himself to the position of dictating that his political party must support him regardless of what he says, what he does, or how he behaves and believes he’s entitled to do?

And I’m sorry to say it, but I think we are getting more of the same from both candidates right now. They are spending way too much time trying to make each other look bad and discredit each other in the public’s eyes.

The Bible says that “without a vision the people perish.” (Proverbs 29:18) We, as citizens, leaders and politicians, need to get a clear vision of where we want this nation to be 10, 20, or 50 years from now. And we need to figure out which leader has that vision and a plan to take us on a path toward that goal. Maybe our president didn’t inherit the mess, but he sure hasn’t made it better, has he? Would the republican candidate weather the growing storm any better in the next four year? Can either one of them turn it around?

It seems to me that the most obvious goal should be to get every able bodied, of working age, person back to work. Work is one of the things that defines us as individuals, gives us purpose and worth and gives us a reason to get up in the morning and be productive. We shouldn’t have to be bottle fed by our government in order to survive. Southeastern Kentucky is one of the regions of the country that is feeling this pinch the most. We are not lazy people, nor ignorant, which people away from here suppose because of our poverty level, health issues, unemployment and government subsidy programs. We need work for our people to put their hands to and be productive.

I believe our drug culture, family abuse, alcoholism, depression and health issues are in direct correlation to the lack of good jobs in our region. While some parts of the country are still prosperous and the citizens living comfortably, the areas that are mirror images of our own region are springing up across the country for the same reason — a lack of decent paying jobs.

The other main problem is that our government has spent money they didn’t have and that we couldn’t afford to spend, or give away, as a nation. How can we continue to send billions of dollars to other nations when we are trillions of dollars in debt? It’s time for a reality check. Should we defund our military so we can send that money to other nations who will use it to build up their military? How crazy are we?

It’s not the government’s money, after all. It is OUR money — yours and mine. It is our tax money that is supposed to be set aside to run the country, keep it safe, keep our roads repaired, provide education for our children and so on. OUR money. Have you been asked how you want them to spend it? Does our government even take into consideration any longer what the people want, or need to be done with the taxes we have worked out and paid?

Government is supposed to be there to serve the people and not the other way around. I’m sorry, but I believe it has been a lot of years since our government truly had an attitude that it was created for the people and by the people to form a more excellent union. The original vision for our government was that it would be a unifying framework of power, with officials elected by the people who represented their views and needs, by which all of its citizens would prosper. Where did the people begin to give up their power and set their needs aside in order to be ruled over by officials who abuse their privileges to govern? When did “we the people” ever say that our politicians were entitled to live by a different set of rules, taxation, health care, etc. than the people they govern?

With China gulping up our national debt as fast as can be, we should all have enough sense to know that there is something in it for them. They are not propping our nation up out of a sense of “give a neighbor a helping hand.” Our government has put our nation in a position to need a foreign entity to cover our backsides so the nation doesn’t implode. What if China says they are finished with lending and they’ve come to collect their debt? China has been referred to as “the sleeping dragon” in the past, but we better all realize that the dragon is awake, positioning itself for the future.

I recently heard on television that if we want our children to be successful in the future, they need to learn Chinese as a second language. Whereas English has been the most common second language in the world, that reality is slipping away — just like the value of the dollar in foreign trade. The U.S. dollar has been the standard of international transactions for decades. That is also beginning to change.

I want a president who can set his ego aside, look at things realistically and do the dirty work of government spending cutbacks and housecleaning across the board to get us back on solid ground. We need to try to quit fixing everyone else and get our nation back to a place of independence and self-sufficiency. I’m just not sure that either side of this election has the wisdom and the guts to do that. The pinch we are all going to feel while a readjustment and realignment is going on (that has to be done in order to redeem our current situation) is not going to make the man (or woman) popular while it’s happening. I just pray that we haven’t drifted so far in the wrong direction that no one can do it.