Count 'em Again, Barack!

Never before - with the possible exception of President Obama being prevented by a downpour from delivering remarks at a Chicago Memorial Day event - has a metaphor been so chillingly on point. I’m talking about the Gulf oil spill. It conveys everything, from the precipitous general decline of America (especially within the span of the past two years) to its flailing, ineffective measures to get a grip on itself. We must then ask ourselves: Was it inevitable?

Unlike the 9/11 attacks on New York’s World Trade Center, by which a vile and cunning enemy declared war on us, the oil spill appears to have been self-inflicted - but may not be entirely unrelated. We have since done everything possible to obfuscate the reality of the war. There was of course one brief glimmer of recognition as to the enormity of what was at stake, and we did react - some say, stupidly.

The 9/11 bombers never knew just how successful they would turn out to be. Not only did they bring down the (physical) Mecca of American economic dominance, but they also managed to fracture America’s unity, confidence, and will. It’s reverberations would spread poison throughout the American political system, which was the beginning of cascading dominoes, affecting virtually every public and private sector institution.

It would be naïve to think that only a handful of crazed men (who commandeered aircraft and sent them crashing into the heart of America’s economic genius) could accomplish all this with half a dozen box cutters. (By the way, has anyone ever actually thought about what exactly they did with those box cutters?) The ground had already been well prepared. The very idea of America had become brittle as eggshells. It didn’t take much to crack it open.

It starts in the schools. We’ve gone over it dozens of times. Now comes the following insight: A recent study finds that knowledge is absorbed best when it’s imparted by native speakers. How many TA’s today are native speakers?

If the 9/11 attack had not been successful and the Gulf oil spill had happened as it did, we would now be also first stunned, then outraged. We would have plugged that gusher with dynamite and blown it to Kingdome come. As it is, we’re just numb, content to have dodged the bullet ourselves.

I, for one, am beginning to get tired of the story. It’s following exactly the same tired script as everything else these days: ‘We’re ahead of schedule; we’ll have it fixed in no time’ and then: ‘So sorry, it didn’t work; don’t know what could have gone wrong. But we have a much better idea which we’ll start testing tomorrow. It may take a little while to find out if it works…’

It’s the same with the economy. Every day they tell us we’ve turned the corner; that things are on the upswing; improving. And then, when the numbers come out, they tell us it could have been worse. We are in effect asked to praise Obama for the sun coming up in the morning.

Obama’s campaign slogan, ‘Yes, We Can’, now sounds hollow. It’s even gotten to the point where most people think he’s doing it on purpose; that nobody could be that incompetent. Who ever thought that competence was even needed? POTUS has always been largely a ceremonial post; hasn’t it? A laugh line on SNL? If that’s true, who (or what) is actually running things? And why are they running us into the ground? What was that spy thing with the Russians all about? They got 10 of theirs back; we only got 4 (but we got the better deal, we’re told). Sorry, Barack. Count them again!