An Op-Ed piece in the NYTimes describes it conservatively as an "unrelenting stream of bad news and broken faith," but anyone who has not lost touch with reality in recent years would describe it as an absolute disaster, but also the inevitable product of our national indulgence in denial, political stupidity and greed.
The country and all its people have lived through an extraordinary year, defined by searing events and inescapable symbols. People are haunted by the deaths of Sept. 11, the destruction of the World Trade Center and the still unsolved anthrax attack through the mail. This was followed by war in Afghanistan, and now the possibility of war with Iraq looms.But polls tell us that approval ratings for the silly puppet manipulated by those who have hijacked America are still in the sixty-some percentile. What will it take for us to actually come to grips with the incompetence of this regime and the threat it presents to our welfare, and indeed to our lives?Enron came to represent a new kind of villainy, as corporate executives cashed out and employees lost their jobs and pensions. Arthur Andersen did more shredding than accounting. Ken Lay and a parade of other chief executives who had run their companies into the ground slunk across the news. The WorldCom scam was followed by a stock market crash and the shrinking of once-flush 401(k) plans.
When do we march on the White House and throw the bums out?