What Are We Doing?

Lately, over the past couple of months my comments
have fallen off. I have lost my enthusiasm for
intellectualism. Sure the posts are well written,
thoughtful and present interesting topics for
discussion. However, it seems to me that we have
to move beyond these topics. As we discuss these
topics and issues, the country continues to fall
apart. Some months ago, maybe even a year now,
in a comment or post I wrote that this country was
about to drive over a cliff. This term is now used
on many programs discussing the financial melt down.
I believe Obama even used the term tonight in his
televised news conference. At that time I wrote about
the terrible debt of the country and of the statements
of economists like Steglitz and David Walker. I even
wrote that it was hard to say what would drive us over
the cliff, but that it was entirely possible we would be
blindsided.. Then September 15 happened. We were blind
sided.

Now, we are being told by a Democratic Administration that
the country has avoided a meltdown. Every day we are
inundated with issues which hide the true state of the
country. Issues such as birth certificates, health care,
Iraq, Iran, N. Korea, Israel, abortion, religion, energy,
environment, democracy, black holes, and so on and on.
Today the hype was all about the Obama "show" tonight.
There was even countdown clocks on MSNBC and CNN...It
is a red herrings to cover up the real disaster that is
still coming.

The disaster is still the economy. I am now changing my
description of the United States falling over a cliff. It
seems to me that a more accurate representation of our
crisis is that we have hit an iceberg. What we are now
experiencing is the tip of that iceberg. We have collided
and taking on water seriously. It's as Carvelle said to
Clinton in 1992, "It's the economy, stupid." For us to
write about all these other issues is to ignore the obvious.
We are accomplishing nothing. Look, there is virtually
no real manufacturing being done or proposed. Within a few
years there will be hardly no one working full time. The
population of the United States will be working part-time.
And, this is what we are not being told. We will be a
nation of part-time workers. Moreover, incomes will drastically
shrink. This is already happening as wage earning income
has remained static for the last 10 years. How many of these
millions of unemployed will be rehired in full time positions?
In the next three months the unemployment benefits of all the
laid off workers will expire. Then what? Our challenge is
to fully explain what has happened and is happening to the
United States economically. This ought to become our mission,
our cause to be.......