A Close to Our Summer of Discontent
I don’t quite remember the last time I heard some good news. Violence continues in Libya. It grows in Egypt and Syria. A stalled US government is no better off than before finding a resolution to the “debt ceiling debate” that never should have been debated to begin with. The stock market has been like a moody teenager, overreacting to every word it hears. People cheer when Ron Paul implies he would let a man die (link). Michelle Bachmann makes up a story about a woman’s daughter becoming mentally retarded after being given the HPV vaccine (link). I’m sorry, being sexually active is not mental retardation. Nor does the vaccine even promote sexual activity. Do you think most 13-year-olds would even understand what the vaccine is for? They hear it can prevent cancer. Sure I’ll sign up for that. Now millions of people will probably avoid the vaccine and they or their daughters will pay the consequences in the form of cervical cancer. And people claim that they are trying to reign in medical spending.
I’m harsh on the republicans, yes. More and more I find myself baffled that I live in a world where “liberal” is a dirty word, yet “conservative” is a gold standard. Why is it a liability to be liberal? What is wrong with progressivism? What happened to make people cheer the death of a hypothetical uninsured person?
Yes, we need figure out a long term solution to America’s debt issues. But, this shouldn’t mean turning the US into the Wild West again. The federal government had to spend a lot of money to put an end to the systems of vigilante justice. The railroads were built by private companies, but enabled by an act of congress (see Pacific Railway Acts). Infrastructure spending held the union together. Cuts do need to be made. The Postal Service probably should end standard Saturday delivery. Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security need reforms (reforms not termination).
Unlike the Wild West, though, there is no gold rush that can save us now. Oil is a dwindling resource that is costing us more and more to clean up the messes from. The Tech and software industries employ far too few people to carry 300 million people on its own. US wages would need to fall much more for manufacturing to make a return. It won’t be easy to get out of our predicament.
Change will take intelligence and patience, two things that America definitely does not have respect for. Maybe we should ban abortion so we catch up to China’s population. I guess then we’ll have the cheap workforce for China to start outsourcing jobs here.
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