Just an ordinary day in your world right?
Rape charges in New York were dropped against Dominique Strauss-Kahn. He can now fly back to his life in France. Tripoli falls to the rebels but Gaddafi is nowhere to be found. Hurricane Irene is about to become a Cat 4. Al Sharpton got the 6pm time slot at MSNBC and rumors of a separation between Jada and Will Smith run rampant.
What a day. A news junkie's delight. Just another day in August when half the world that can afford to be 'is' on vacation. For the rest of us, the living should be easy but it's not. It is an August that matches a year when anything that can go wrong for the world has gone wrong. In February, the Arab spring took us all by surprise. The the market roller coaster ride continues in the casino that is wall street. The downgrading of America's credit rating came from no where and unemployment in some US communities is as high as 30%. So when a day like this comes around, most people don't seem to react. It's as if we have whiplash. What's a revolution or a hurricane or an earthquake when you are out of work and can't pay the bills?
The housing market collapsed years ago, it seems, nothing was done about it. Thirty percent of American mortgages are underwater. Middle class families are under siege. The 'one percent' which is the upper class owns 42% of the nations' wealth. Homelessness is growing. Child poverty hits one in five families in the U.S. Food stamps are used by more Americans' than ever before. Is this the country you grew up believing in? At what point do we get a grip and understand that the real earthquake has already jolted us and the recovery from it is no where to be found.
Congress is out of town on recess. The president is on the golf course taking emergency phone calls and Rome is burning. I understand there is no hurry to fix things here. Is that because things are so broken no one even bothers to try?
If you look at the options, there aren't many. On the Republican side, fringe candidates with the names of Bachmann, Perry and maybe Palin walk among us. They campaign on issues like creationism, right to life, no global warming, and pray away the gay. Where did these people come from, the dark ages? Anything extreme is sure to get the ink and for them in this 24/7 media world, that's what it's all about. It all comes at the expense of sanity and intelligence. We have a Congress now run by the 'tea party' even though it represents the interests of big business and less than 19 percent of the population. Eric Cantor claims the president has declared class warfare.
Huh? Wasn't it your party that didn't want to close the tax loopholes that help only the wealthiest among us? The war was declared long ago when corporations stopped carrying their tax weight and the middle class was asked to pick up the slack. Then there is Romney, who would have you believe corporations are "people too." Ok, so tax those people, they can afford it. Most of the rest of us can not. Isn't it interesting there was an earthquake in Washington and no one seemed to be affected. Are we so numb to anomalies that the metaphor of the day missed those who need to be paying attention the most?
In Libya there is a story of the toppling of a 42-year-old dictatorship but in this country, it's an "oh, by the way, did you hear?" conversation. Until we see Gaddafi dead or in custody, nobody here seems to care what is happening there. Lockerbie, Scotland ring any bells?
In the media world, the Reverend Al Sharpton stumbled through his first block of his first day of an announced contracted job at MSNBC, but I'm sure he got ratings. Jada and Will Smith deny it, but there are rumors that mommy and daddy to the two most perfect children in Hollywood were walking away from a marriage that has lasted for over a decade. Is there no marriage that lives up to the vows "happily ever after?" Then there is DSK: he gets to go home and run for president of France even though other voices of his sexual past are hunting him down.
I guess it all comes down to values and what's important to each of us in our own homes, in our own lives, in our own worlds. We do not, however, live in the 'real' world alone. The earthquake that is shaking us now, collectively, as a people, will shake us to the core if we don't pay attention and get it right. Oh, have you heard, there is another hurricane coming, batten down the hatches, another day, another storm.