What kind of society do you want?

My man Thom Hartmann breaks the difference between the Liberal agenda and the Conservative agenda as a question of: Do we want to live in a ME society or a WE society.  I think this is a great way of understanding and explaining it, but I have come up with a different way of framing it.

Are we, as a society, better served when our primary focus is that we should be competitive with each other or that we should be cooperative?  In the former view, there are limited resources and everything you have takes away from what I could/should have.  I have no responsibility to you and you have none to me.  Might makes right and only the strongest should survive.  The only reason why you would not break into my house, kill me and take all my stuff, is that the combined strength of society is stronger than you and could punish you.  So you play by the rules and defer your gratification because you have to.

In the latter view, we recognize that 1) there are enough resources to go around for all of us and 2) that we can accomplish much more and better things when we combine our strength towards a common goal.  We all chip in some money (taxes) and build a road, from which we all benefit.

I benefit from everyone being healthy, productive, fed, and educated.   It might seem to benefit me if I were the only one with an education and therefore no one could compete with me for jobs; but that is very short-sighted.  I heard a radio interview with a man from India; and the topic was: the emerging superpowers.  The Indian man asserted that India would never be a superpower because of the caste system.  When only 1/5th of society is allowed to maximize their potential, it cripples the growth.  How many Einsteins are we missing out on because college has become prohibitively expensive?   Too many, and the problem is getting worse.

I think there is enough to go around, and that people should view some of our success by the quality of life of our neighbors, not just ourselves.   People talk about running our county like a corporation.  Well, the profits of that corporation should be viewed in terms of health and education and happiness of its citizens, not just GDP, taxes, and military prowess.

This does not mean, as some people like to twist it, that I think we should all have the same regardless of effort or talent.  I do believe (as do 99% of liberals) that hard work, innovation, and risk should be rewarded.  I want there to be incentive for people to contribute.   But I would like all of us to (minimally at least) take care  of all of us.    I want to live in a society where we work together, care for each other, and help each other out when necessary.  Of course there will be some who abuse the system, but I believe that most people do want to contribute.  I do not believe that everyone who is unemployed is happy and lazy.

If we didn't cooperate, the human race would never have accomplished such great things.  We would never build bridges, aquaducts, ships, phone lines, etc.  We are all one big family; and we should start respecting each other as such.