The Beltway
Beast
STEALING FROM FUTURE GENERATIONS AND
DESTROYING THE MIDDLE CLASS
Munir Moon
MGN Books
Copyright 2016 by Munir Moon
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author. For permission requests, please write to:
MGN Books
640 Maple Avenue
Torrance, Ca 90503
Printed in the United States of America
First Printing, 2016
Revised 2017
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Publishers Cataloging-in-Publication data
Moon, Munir
The Beltway Beast: Stealing from Future Generations and Destroying the Middle Class/ by Munir Moon.
p. cm.
ISBN 0991372107
ISBN 978-0-9913721-3-3 (Hardcover)
ISBN 9780991372102 (Paperback)
ISBN 978-0-9913721-1-9 (eBook)
ISBN 978-0-9913721-2-6 (Abridged Version)
Library of Congress Control Number: 2016908963
1. The United States Politics. 2. Current Affairs. 3. Healthcare. 4. Economy. 5. United States-Political Parties.
For Atif and Elena
Table of Contents
Prologue
T he American political system is going through an unprecedented transformational process by having a disruptor and an outsider President Donald Trump. He won the 2016 presidential election by defeating an establishment candidate Hillary Clinton and challenging The Beltway Beast. Candidate Trump used the metaphor of draining the swamp as one of his campaign slogans, referring to Washington D.C or The Beltway Beast as described in this book.
According to a Gallup survey, sixty percent of Americans say that a third major political party is needed because the Republican and Democratic parties do such a poor job of representing American people. Therefore, the time is right for a grassroots movement to start a mainstream third party that represent all Americans and can not only place a check on both major parties but also bring Americans together. That is why this book is so necessary - more than when it was first published.
The aim of this book at the first publication was to make a contribution, however small, to bring the voice of Main Street America back into our public discourse, front and center. The American Dream is threatened by a widening gap between our leaders and average, everyday citizens. The former seem quite oblivious to the grindthe daily struggles and hardships of lower and middle class America. It is frustrating to watch our political leaders, who we are supposed to look up to, behave like children, pointing fingers at each other instead of fulfilling their promise to serve the people and own up to their failures.
Numerous books on the subjects covered here have been written by well-qualified scholars and many solutions have been offered. The Beltway Beast compiles some of those ideas in one place and provides the perspective of an outsider to our public discourse. It is a compendium of the real state of our union, covering a broad range of subjects affecting our lives instead of offering an in-depth analysis of one subject. It contextualizes the current crisis at a macro level and proposes a way out of our current quagmire.
The solutions offered in the book are not an end all to our problems, but a beginning of a discussion for the future of our children. The hope is that upcoming leaders use this book as a framework and a platform to set up a new party, The Peoples Party of America (PPA), a party that is fiscally responsible, socially compassionate and represents all Americans. We are facing a crisis of confidence because we have stopped believing in ourselvesand in doing so have stopped leading the world, much of which looks up to us as a role model.
More than anything else, this book transcends anger and frustration with our leaders to solve our problems and revive America with simple common sense solutions. The Beltway Beast documents our current reality and calls for real competition in electing our leaders and transforming our political, healthcare, and tax systems. In every crisis there is opportunity, and this book will mobilize Americans to take back the country. Prosperity will come back once we get our leaders to stop stealing from future generations and destroying the middle class and we can all be part of that change.
Introduction to the Original Edition
M ORE THAN FORTY YEARS ago, I came to this country on a one-way ticket, hoping to get a quality education. I had no friends or relatives here and barely spoke English. Over time, I was fortunate enough to earn two masters degrees from UCLA and am well aware that this sort of thing happens only in America. Needless to say, I am eternally gratefuland this book is my way of trying to repay my debt to this country that welcomed and enabled me to prosper.
After completing my MBA, I had aspirations of climbing the corporate ladder and running a large enterprise. As is so often the case, though, life does not turn out the way you plan it. At age thirty-three, my life changed forever when my second son, Atif, was born with Neuroblastoma, a rare cancer of the spinal cord. He was given very small chance of survival. Atif fought hard against the cancer from day one, undergoing three surgeries and eighteen months of chemotherapy, starting at the tender age of one month. He conquered the disease, though he was left paralyzed from the waist down and is now wheelchair bound.
Ive had a close-up view of what this country has given Atif when it comes to healthcare, education, and personal opportunity. I am also mindful that only in America is a story like Atifs possible.
I am not a pundit, scholar, or expert, but an average American who has experienced a range of emotions from frustration to anger to disillusionment over the last few years with regard to the state of our great nation. I spent the first ten years of my corporate life mostly in the financial industry, where I witnessed the collapse of the housing industry and the demise of the Savings & Loan industry in the late eighties, repeated twenty years later in 2008 in a different form. I have experienced the best and worst of our healthcare system over the last twenty-eight yearsmuch inefficiency is built into the delivery of service, resulting in ever increasing costs to all of us. As a small businessman over the last twenty-five years, I have been at the receiving end of all the government regulations, taxes, and fees that impede job growth. However, my faith in the American Dream has never been shattered. In recent decades, both major parties have failed us. In this book I am making a case for transforming America through a third party that represents all Americans and brings us together.
We are leaving a mountain of debt for our children to pay so that we can live beyond our means. Thomas Jefferson said, I sincerely believe that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.
We have an educational system that fares poorly in preparing our children for the intense competition that awaits them in the global marketplace and a tax system that is grossly unfair to the working American. Our civil liberties are violated by the Big Brother Eradrones are flying over American cities, multiple cameras are watching us at road crossings, and our phone and emails are being monitoredall in the name of security that actually renders us less personally secure.
