in too deep

I remember a commercial for ‘The Lending Tree’ where the ‘protagonist’ was hopelessly in debt by living well beyond his means by living well beyond his family’s needs. His last words, before the announcer cuts-in, were ‘Someone help me.’ Too many Americans found themselves in this position, and are paying the price. Too few of them plan for the good times and easy living to end. too few people take responsibility for themselves.

Cheap oil. We can get it from the Middle East. We do not need to get it locally. Why would we want to make our own country ugly. And, who needs alternative fuels. Leave them for the environuts. Home ownership. It is an American right. It is an American duty. We can all own a home. Credit problems? No problem. There is always more where that came from. Ooh! Look at that latest doodad. I got to have it. I got to be the cool kid. [Never mind my age.] Health care. I deserve whatever is out there. Never mind I do not actually need it. I deserve it, and I deserve it for free. Heck, I have the right to do whatever I want. I do not need to be responsible for my actions. My Speaker Nancy Pelosi tells me so. The government will take care of everything. They must. I am a victim. It is the evil Republicans, big corporations, gun owners, religious groups, foreign workers. Except the Mexicans. They are more deserving of protection than our own citizens. They are bigger victims. Why can’t they just cross the border. Saving for the future. Why? It will always be good.

While I have sympathy for those who were sold a ‘bill of sale’, I do not have much. When I got myself in financial trouble, I got myself out of it. It took time. It was not easy. I did it, without Government intervention. When I get in trouble, I own up to it. I know the Government, while there to proect me, is not there to mother me. It is there to prevent Islamic radicals for harming my life. It is not there to prevent me from doing the same. It certainly is not there to clean-up the mess after I do so.

With all the talk about ‘how terrible things are’, that ‘things are worse than they were in the Great Depression’,  with the traditional media selling-out to the vicitmization of America, with it being beaten into people how angry they need to be at ‘those who did this to you,’ is it no wonder people are snapping. Granted, there may be reasons for people being angry, people are using it as an excuse to eliminate responsibility for failures in their lives, caused more often than not by their own judgements. It is about time the American people stopped running from first-person responsibility and stop trying to find third-person fault. Accept that things are not going they way the script had intended, clean up the act, and move on.