I don’t know who is going to take the trophy in November. I know it probably won’t be the person I vote for. All I know is that the game winner is going to have one hell of a lot of problems to deal with.
It looks like we’re heading into recession again. Unemployment is up in 27 states this month. The Fed has a dire outlook and insists Congress do something fast. Housing cannot get any traction. Wall Street is still completely out of control. Gas is $3.50 per gallon. We have a drought that has not been this bad in half a century. Europe is in worse shape than we are.
We, and others, are in a shadow war with Iran. The war drums are pounding louder all the time. It seems only a matter of time before it escalates into full blown war. We cannot afford this and I am not talking money. Our service men and women are killing themselves in unprecedented numbers. Our out of control government has forced this issue by letting the Iraq and Afghanistan wars go on far too long and not giving our people time to come home, rest, rejuvenate and relive what it’s like to be with family and friends (and get to take more than a two-minute cold shower every two weeks). And beyond Iran, what about Syria? Are we headed there also?
When 2014 rolls around, it is said that 30 million more people will have health care. That’s 30 million more people who need to see primary physicians. We have a shortage of primary physicians today. What happens when you dump 30 million more people into the system without any planning for the obvious shortage? This is going to rock our health care system. If there is some sort of plan for how this is to be dealt with, it certainly has not been communicated to us at all.
Those are some major things that will have to be dealt with. Those are things that we ourselves created and are aware of. Now, of course, there is something else to throw into the mix. What happens if we have another massive natural disaster like Katrina? What if we have another terrorist attack like 9/11? What if we have both? We cannot plan for the unseen, folks. That is why it is all the more important to deal with the issues we know we have at hand. And yet, all we seem to have is the “do-nothing <fill in the blank>”.
We’re less than four months away from some team’s victory. Less than six months from either four-more-years or four years of something else. Regardless of which team wins, you can be sure they’ll be throwing high-fives and slapping butts. The question is, will the spectators be wondering what all the partying is about or jumping up and down in unison?
July 20, 2012
