by James Glaser
January 15, 2003

I read it in the morning paper, "more than 6% of children were taking drugs such as Prozac, Ritalin, and Risperdal." This according to a study by Dr. Julie Magno Zito, an associate professor of pharmacy and medicine at the University of Maryland. Does anyone doubt that the kids that take drugs that their mom and dad get for them all through their school years, will continue to need some sort of drug for the rest of their lives.

After ten or even fifteen years of popping pills every day, isn't there some sort of dependence built up? There are a lot of kids that can't even remember what they were like before the drug therapy started.

It really wasn't that long ago that I was in school and I can not remember one child in my class that took any drugs. Well I take that back, in the last three years of high school their were kids taking speed, downers, and smoking pot, but nothing from mom and dad.

Everybody has their own theory about what happened and why so many kids and parents are screwed up. I like my mom's theory. She told me when I was a little kid my dad worked at the post office. We had our own house. One that the government made it easy for returning World War 2 veterans to buy. Our house was and is still nice, as my mom still lives there. Three bedrooms, fireplace, hardwood floors, and a good size yard. When I was growing up the neighborhood was filled with the kids of the post war baby boom and today it is filled with kids again.

Think about this, when I go visit my mom I can sleep in "My" bedroom and that bathroom light shining in my bedroom door at night is the same triangle of light that was there when I was a kid. There is something real comforting about living in the same house in the same neighborhood for all of your school years, now America is on the move and kids are moving in and out of schools and neighborhoods every few years. That means making all new friends only to lose them a few years later. Kids need to be grounded in security and America just doesn't have that any more.

A family can "buy up" thinking that new house and "better" neighborhood is a step in the right direction, but for who? A lot of times it isn't fun at all for the children. Best friends are hard to find when you don't stick around in one place very long.

Growing up, my family had one car, we did lots and lots of cheap stuff as a family for entertainment. Weekends we would go to a playground and while my dad was playing softball my sister and I would be playing with all the kids. We didn't go out to eat at restaurants much, but we did go to every aunt and uncles house often and they came to our house for dinner regularly.

Every summer we would go up to Grand Rapids and stay for over a week at a resort and my dad went duck and deer hunting in the fall. Hey as I am writing this and think about my past, I can say we lived good, but it didn't last that way.

As my mom says, later on the pay at the post office didn't keep pace with the cost of living and it wasn't just the post office, but all families were feeling the pinch. My dad took on a second job and we did less together as a family. I can still remember that my dad was always looking for some nap time because he was beat.

As the cost of living went up, my mom finally went to work and that was kind of the end of family life. Believe me I don't fault either my mom or dad, but I do the fault our government and large corporations. I don't fault the government about pay at the post office as much as I hold it responsible for letting large corporations take over America.

No joke, think about it. Now corporations have a TV channel just for schools and hit the kids with a stream of advertisement each and every morning in school, its called VH1 here. Those drugs that over 6% of all our kids are taking, just who do you think is pushing that? Corporations. You can argue with me all you want, but I am not buying it. There are pop machines in every school and you want to tell me that sugar rushes from Mountain Dew and Coke are not some of the problem for these kids on drugs?

Other nations don't have kids on drugs in numbers that even come close to ours, this is an American problem. Today parents are both working just to make ends meet while General Electric is having record profits. Sure the stock market has doubled and doubled some more since I was a kid, but those profits were made on the backs of, no not the worker, but on the backs of the whole family structure.

Now you want to tell me that this war coming up with Iraq isn't for the corporations and not just those wanting the oil action, but all those that make money off of defense. Heck if you will hook little kids onto prescription drugs so you can make a profit. If you will destroy the American family for profits. It is not a stretch at all to believe you will kill lots of people in a country thousands of miles away to make even more money.

What we have to remember is that America is still ours and if some how we can get a handle on our own government we can still take back America and a lot more kids will be able to grow up in a real family again.

I finished this column and read it over and thought this isn't the kind of column that I usually write, but you know what, that is OK. I have a real thing about America killing kids in foreign lands because we have been doing it for years. Well for years now our corporations and government have been having kind of a war on our own kids.

I grew up in a America that treated both families and kids real well. Because of that I grew up being real proud to be an American. Looking at how kids and their families are treated by government and corporations today, I don't know if I would have that same pride, if I was growing up today. If things don't change for our children and their family environment real soon, I don't think these kids will have that pride either.

Now just one more thing I would like to tell you. Now this is not bull shit, this is the truth. We have people in our government that have no idea of what war is, never been to a war, and they are pushing and pushing our country into this war. These same people or their families will make lots and lots of money off the pain and suffering of all the people that are in this war.

President Bush is one of these people and his dad and his company will make a fortune off this war and any others George W. can drag our country into. We have many American companies that make their money off of killing other human beings. Hey, it is a fact and it is also a fact that our nation does not have a Department of Peace. We have no official trying to stop wars. Sad huh?