Ahhh....America....we have a problem

We seem to be a very odd bunch.  By "we" I mean the upset, disillusioned, gun toting Americans among us.  First the "upset, disillusioned" part:

We have a lot of societal issues.  Minorities feel the deck is stacked against them, and they want fairer treatment.  White supremacists feel that if minorities receive better treatment, it will be at their expense.  

Every kid who can strum a guitar thinks he's going to be a rock star, and every kid who has any athletic ability thinks he's destined for professional sports stardom.  Virtually all hit the reality wall eventually and find their life's work will instead be on a loading dock or at the paper mill. 

Too many seniors had expected a comfy retirement, only to find their life savings vanish when they found themselves with unexpected and overwhelming medical bills, or their 401K's cratered, along with the company they worked 40 years for.  At least they still have their Medicare and Social Security, right?  Umm...maybe not.  Hungry tax-cut vultures are eyeing them both. 

It's been a given that each generation of Americans will be better off than their parents.  Not so fast.  The middle class has been losing ground for the past several decades.  Kids are told they need a good education, then find themselves saddled with tens of thousands of dollars in student loans they have trouble paying back.

Blue-collar middle class Americans have been especially hard hit.  Many have seen their jobs outsourced to Mexico or Asia, and the replacement jobs they can find don't pay nearly what they need to maintain their former lifestyle.

Even comfortable white-collar Americans, who seem to have it all, say they feel overwhelming, intense pressure trying to keep it all.

Obese / short people know they'll never make it to a company vice-presidency.  Those offices are reserved for beautiful / handsome people.

And then we have our addictions....alcohol, drugs, gambling, etc, all impairing our ability to attain the good life.  Even those who take legitimately prescribed medicines....have you read the side effects today's meds bury in the fine print?  Besides the ever popular constipation and / or diarrhea, they often include "violent reactions and suicidal tendencies".  Yikes!

And scorned lovers, and lost promotions, and...

Which leads us to the "gun toting" part:

We do have a LOT of guns in America.  An estimated 300,000,000 plus.  The problem comes when some of those mentioned above just snap, unable to contain their anger.  Then they go after those who they feel are responsible for their misfortune, such as what happened in Las Vegas last week.

Now we're hearing calls once again for gun control.  "Stop making and selling 'assault rifles'", they say, "and we'll see less gun violence."  OK, fine.  Outlaw "bump stops", and suppressors, and even new AR-15's.  (Note: an AR-15 is NOT an assault rifle, legally speaking.)  With 300,000,000 guns already out there, does anyone really believe a disturbed person won't be able to get one?  (Another note: 1,000,000 guns are stolen and presumably resold every year on the black market.)

The fact is, unless we can get a handle on these (and other) societal issues we face, we're just putting a tiny band-aid on a sucking chest wound with gun control.  Once again, as has become the American Way, we're looking for a quick, easy way out.  We're in denial.

S

Think outside the box? I can't even FIND the box!

You're born, you go to school, you go on to a job doing _____, you get married, have kids, and you climb the career ladder, making more $$$ at every step.  You have a house, 2 cars, a retirement plan for later on, and finally you hang it up and relax to a nice life bouncing grand-kids on your knee and traveling the country in your RV.  Oh, and you'll never get sick.  SWEET!

Except you forgot to figure in "reality".

Here's the more likely scenario:  You're born (so far, so good)....then the wheels come off.  Too often kids find themselves without two-parent influence.  The cost of higher education means many kids/parents can't afford it, except with massive student loans that can take decades to pay off.  Jobs seldom have the security of lifetime employment like they did 50 years ago.  Changing technology means you'll constantly have to reinvent / retrain yourself and start over again, which likely means a pay cut.  Which in turn means you'd better think twice before buying that big house with the 30 year mortgage.  It's hard enough seeing 2 years into the future, much less 30.

More and more, new jobs are being created by small companies, as opposed to the big Fortune 500 companies, and small companies often can't afford all the perks such as family health care and retirement / 401K plans that were common not long ago.  Statistically we're having smaller families since, for one thing, it costs so much to raise kids today....about $250K to raise one child to the age of 18 they say.  Ouch!  And if that big house is questionable, an RV is even more of a dream.

And the odds are great you WILL eventually get sick.  I was healthy as a horse until my innards decided to rebel at age 64.  (Maybe I should come back in my next life as a horse?)  Luckily I had good health insurance.  Many of us, however, find ourselves having to pay more for our health insurance than we do for our house payment.  Will it soon be an either/or proposition?  Copays and deductibles are up, yet the percentage insurance pays is often down.

Our personal "plans" are increasingly diverging from what life is actually dealing us.  The trend lines are moving in opposite directions.

The status quo isn't working for us.  Day after day, year after year, we're losing ground.  This isn't meant as a doom and gloom post.  It's just a wake up call.  We CAN turn things around IF we put aside the idea that "we've always done it this way" is the only way.

We're at a crossroads.  Are we going to stick with our "plan", or face reality and consider things that don't fit our stereotypical boxes?

S  

What is that definition of insanity again?

"Doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results."

Why can't we get the Mexican drug cartels to line up for a photo op like this?

 

The United States has a serious problem with drug cartels physically venturing into US territory to expand their base of operations.  Do we go to the UN and ask that they put together a coalition to come help us?  Do we put in calls to France or New Zealand or South Korea and ask them to come to our aid?  NO!  It's in OUR back yard, making it OUR problem.

So why does the world always start chanting U...S...A... when it hits the fan in the Mid East?  In case you weren't aware, Turkey is a formidable power in that region.  So is Iran.  And obviously so is Israel.  And don't forget Saudi Arabia and Egypt.  If ISIS succeeds in Syria / Iraq, those countries have an immediate problem.  It's in THEIR back yard.  (America's problem with ISIS will be a bit longer range.) 

What I want to know is, what are THOSE countries gonna do about ISIS?  IMO those countries should be in the starting lineup.  We should be in the bull pen.  Those countries have their own planes and bombs.  We know this because WE sold them to them (along with Russia, the UK, France, and a few others).  

They save their weaponry for parades and fly-overs (and occasionally crushing a dissident group at home) while we expend ours.  While they spend their money on massive social programs for their citizens, our infrastructure crumbles, our schools struggle for adequate funding, and our food banks have trouble meeting demand.

Ever since Vietnam showed the world our military Achilles heel we haven't been able to defeat a guerrilla-style enemy.  That's because we value life.  We won't wipe out a city block to get one bad guy for fear of killing innocent civilians.  It happens, and we agonize over it, but we do make a valiant effort to prevent it.  Our guerrilla enemies have no such conscience.

We've become a foreign policy "Jack of all trades, master of none".  We try to be everywhere, but we actually accomplish very little.  Trying to prop up "countries" that were just figments of some post-WWI European diplomat's imagination is a lost cause.

I say let "those people" thrust and parry among themselves.  Let them decide their own borders.  Let them organize themselves by clan or tribe or whatever.  Let them establish their own balance of power.  It will be bloody, yes, but even if we try, we can have very little (if any) lasting influence.  It's called "reality".

We need to be backing up the Mid East regional powers who are truly on the front lines, and not the other way around.

Just sayin'.

S