WHAT IS WRONG WITH AMERICA?

                                    

I often hear the comment and especially in an election year—“What is wrong with America?” As I look back through history I find very few times when everything was hunky dory. There has always been challenges and most of the time we have met them but that is life right? You have problems and you fix them. If I had to pick out one thing right now that is different. We have problems and we’re not fixing them. Instead of working together and fixing things, the common practice in Washington, and at the state level too, is to not fix things so you can blame the other party for the unsolved mess at election time. When you have nothing to brag about in respect to your own behavior then the next step is to point fingers and make excuses. Try to make yourself look good by making others look bad.

It makes me think about times when my kids were little and got caught with their hand in the cookie jar, they often would say, “Ya, but do you know what she did Dad?” It never worked with me then and it doesn’t work now. Most of our unsolved problems came about because of inattentiveness and no responsibility. Kicking the can down the road or what ever clique you want to use.

I while back a presidential commission named Simpson and Bowles was commissioned to look into a fix for some of our financial problems. It was a bipartisan panel and they spent a great deal of time on it. The problem was their solutions would cause some hurt and hurt is political suicide, so it was wasted effort. You know it’s kind of like not going to the dentist and spending your money elsewhere. Your problems get worse every day you ignore them. In some cases they get so bad there is no fix anymore. But you had a good time while it lasted. If your my age, in my seventies, who gives a rip huh? But if you’re my age, in your seventies and you love your kids and grandkids the picture does get a whole lot cloudier.

This pervasive attitude about debt is growing worse each and every day in this country and it has it roots right here in the population. It has become a way of life. We no longer manage our money, we manage our debt instead. Young people start accumulating credit card debt the day they get out on their own. No one saves for anything anymore, just put it on the card. No one saves for college. Just borrow the cost on student loans. When you do have an asset that becomes worth more then you owe on it, you borrow the equity and buy a boat or go on a vacation.

That’s the way the government operates now too. They borrow one fourth of all the money they spend. 19 trillion right now and counting. They spent every penny of the social security trust fund with no way to pay it back. No one ever talks about paying off the debt anymore because to be truthful they feel it’s not feasible. Just pay the interest and get on with it. So I ask you. “What’s wrong with America?” The same things that have always been wrong with America-- but now-- unlike the past, we have elected to do nothing about it.