Striving For Mediocrity?

I once wrote about the “Rise and Fall of the American Empire,” at the time more tongue-in-cheek, but as we slog through campaigns and elections I begin to worry that something in the American Enterprise isn’t working.

Some like to say that America is “exceptional” and while that may be true, it is certainly not demonstrated in our seats of government. Despite the pleas from the citizens, the pundits, and even the media, politicians seem willing to ignore the pitfalls of doing nothing.

Doing nothing with the budget, doing nothing about the deficit, doing nothing about serious healthcare issues, and doing nothing about the unsustainable growth of Social Security and Medicare, all seems to be OK. Just push it down the road. Instead the Congress and the President try to one-up each other with cute sayings and epithets that add nothing to the solution. The old adage, “If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem” is even more true today.

I have written to my senators and representatives begging them to propose some compromise, to be true statesman, and not just partisans who tear asunder our American fabric. Discussion is good, lively discussion is better, but in the end it probably takes a compromise, a bargain, a deal. We used to denounce such back room dealings where senators would make an agreement to vote for one of the opposition’s pet projects in return for support for another on the other side. Oh, I long for those days of “sausage making.” At least there was a product, a movement forward. Today we are stuck; no, we are in reverse, and if something doesn’t happen soon, it will be irreversible.