On the Contrary

Okay, I have been beating up on the press’s unbelievably poor job of covering of the news and separating fact from innuendo and outright prevarications, but what about us.  What does it say about a nation who favors offshore drilling when there is no gain, puts our environment at risk, and keeps us addicted to the very substance that is causing all of our problems?  What does it say about a nation that thinks lower gas prices is a fix for our addiction to oil or warming climate?  It is the rise of gas and oil prices that just may be our salvation.  These higher prices are forcing us to reduce our use and consider alternate energy.  We are so stupid that we preach marketplace economics, and then when it starts to work, we beg our elected leaders to lower prices, negating the marketplace forces.  Of course the real indication of our stupidity is that there is any kind of quick fix to this problem.  I don’t think we are stupid, I think we are blithering idiots.

Of course the Republican’s have been selling us this snake oil for years telling us that if we just cut taxes, have less regulation, and reduce government, better known as a free ride America, their will be no consequences and the economy will soar.  Working swimmingly isn’t it?  Now their quick fix is drill, drill, drill, and once again you lemmings out there are racing to find some easy painless solution to your self-absorbed life unable to think about your children’s future.  Of course the Democrats will also stoop to feeding the pigeons with their “let’s pump out the Strategic Oil Reserve and go after speculators”.  It is all snake oil and the fact that we don’t demand better says so much about how dumbed down and self absorbed we are.

A just released study by the GAO shows that the majority of firms in the United States paid zero taxes (Most Firms Paid Zero Taxes from 1998-2005).   Are you starting to figure out how dumb you are yet?  John McMean and the free ride Republicans have been telling you that taxes have to be low for the economy to thrive, and oh, don’t forget we are taxed too much.  Well maybe WE are because businesses are getting a free ride and are they doing just hunky dory?  But let’s just continue the Republican economic strategies with John McMean and expect something different to happen.  That was Albert  Einstein’s purported definition of stupidity, keeping doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome.

John McMeans reaction to the Gerogia crisis again feeds our impulses, but doesn’t address any long-term consequences.  Russia invaded Georgia with a brutal assault and our initial reaction is to punish the bastards, so the tougher the better.  But first impulses are what are driving our descent into a second class nation.  There is a long history there and it is not a case of a single bad guy and some very complex historical roots.  But we in stupidville like easy answers and simple villains.  The hypocrisy of the United States scolding another country for invading a sovereign nation and causing wonton destruction shows you we can’t remember that we are still occupying Iraq.  Not only are we stupid, but we have memory deficit which really helps us with our reasoning skills.  John McMean wants to take a cold war approach to the Soviets and I guess that makes American feel warm and cuddly with that approach.  The problem is that it is a different world and if anybody is going to go broke this time, it is us. Our military solution to every problem is one of our greatest problems.  But stupid is as stupid does so we are really unhappy with George Bush and we are going to vote for a man who is still in the 1980’s and voted for almost everything President Moron wanted, a man who wants to fight the cold war again?

Healthcare is a case in point.  American’s hate socialized medicine, but love Medicare.  What do they think it is?  The Republican answer and to some extent the Democratic pander is to have a combined system of private and government insurers.  How many studies have to tell you the major problem with our cost of healthcare is for-profit insures who skim the healthy off the top and deny coverage to the sick.   The Republican pander is that more competition will get these prices down.  Never has and when the profit is in denying care, why should it.  They will be just better skimmers while the government absorbs the major cost of the really sick.  The rest of the industrialized world has figured this out and we are still terrified of socialized medicine.  The rest of the world has many models to choose from that are working well, and we still think we have the best system in the world, until we get sick or lose our job.  Just how stupid are we?

Bottom line:  we get what we sow or stupid is as stupid does and we have really done stupid well.  The press is terrible because we don’t hold them accountable.  The government is terrible because we put the people in place who reflect our moron views.  Then we say they all ought to work together when we are not even willing to realize there is no free ride and we put those bickering morons in office.  No, America is not a place to be proud of.  I know, that is the end of my political career.  But I am ashamed of my country because its people are so poorly informed that they can be led around by promises of easy fixes and free rides.  They are so self absorbed and selfish that they ignore our future trying to recover our past.  If we do this same stupid thinking one more election cycle it will be over for us.