Haiti and other stuff

Its been a while since my last blog. It's not for lack of subject matter. Like everyone I have periods where my motivation is not so high. I wont use the term depressed because I hate the term. Nowadays if you are "depressed" they have a pill for it. It is a shame we have sunk to a society who believes there are pills for anything. We all go through times where we are less happy or less motivated or less confident. When I was growing up, people didn't go to therapists or take pills, they learned to work through "stuff". "Work shit out" as the linebacker in the movie "the Replacements" said.

So for the last month or so, I have been trying to "work shit out". No answers yet, but I am sure I will get to them. My biggest problem is that lately I don't feel needed. When I was the primary earner, I provided all the money in my household, which made me feel needed. My job also was basically to help people ... again, it made me feel needed. When my kids were younger they needed me to help them with lots of things. Now that they are 20 and 16, they don't really need me.

For the first time in a long time, I feel more like a burden than an asset. But I will get through this, I just need to "work shit out".

On to Haiti. What a terrible, tragic, horrible event. Our government responded the way they always do. America to the rescue!. What I prayed for (in addition to all the Haitians that were impacted by this tragic event) was for a President to have the guts to say something like this:

Our hearts go out to all those effected by this tragic event. The American people, as usual, are responding with gifts of money as well as giving their time and energy in the form of doctors, nurses, and other professionals who have gone to Haiti to help them recover from this catastrophe.

Unfortunately, as a country, we no longer have the resources to give the millions of dollars in aid we have given in the past. Congress was recently forced to raise the debt ceiling to 13 TRILLION dollars ( a figure so large no one can comprehend it). We have an unemployment rate that is over 10%. We recently had to bail out some of our largest banks as well as two of our "big three" automakers. Our social security system will be unable to continue past 2020 unless we fix it. We are involved in 2 "big wars" as well as sending many of our military personnel to other battles around the globe. We still have a problem of illegal immigration to work out, and of course the "war on terror". For these reasons (and many others) we can not, as a country, afford to give you millions of dollars in aid.

We know that by not giving you aid we will subject ourselves to world wide criticism. After all, we are the "richest" country in world. Unfortunately we also have the wolds largest debt, and until we tackle that problem, our resources must be used to fix our roads, bridges, healthcare system, unemployment, immigration, homeland security, etc. Besides, its not like right now we get worldwide praise for all the good we do. Around the world we face criticism, terrorism, and outright hatred. Tacking on a few more criticisms will not be overwhelming.

When the big earthquake hits California (or any other state on the fault lines in America) we promise not to look to other countries for help. We will do as we have always done and"Work shit out" all by ourselves.

Again, our thoughts, prayers and hopes go out to you in this time of trouble, we just don't have the money to give.

I doubt we will see President Obama make such a speech. Too bad. It would guarantee his re-election. Sooner or later a President will make such as speech...he will have to. It will happen when they can no longer sell Debt. When our treasury bills go to junk bond status, they will have no choice.

I know my view will not be popular with some people, but this is America...and I am entitled to my opinion!