The Great American Blame Game

Here’s the American dream in a nutshell. Do nothing for 40 years, retire and do less. We’ve lost our competitive edge as a nation because we produce nothing. Our whole society is based on paper pushing (sorry, I mean financial services) and consumption. In order to consume as much as we do, we import goods and export debt. Someone explain to me how this is sustainable? In order to fix the imbalance, we are going to either need to work harder, consume less or some combination of the two. The forces to drive this change are in motion (falling dollar, higher inflation, etc…) – it’s unfortunate we weren’t able to proactively change them on our own terms. It’s very likely a massive redistribution of labor is on the horizon.

Call it what you will but we are clearly having a fall from grace in this country and I believe it stems from one main indomitable trait we hold as U.S. citizens: ENTITLEMENT. Nobody wants to look themselves in the mirror and take responsibility for their own actions – it’s always someone else’s fault. Everyone faults George Bush for attacking Iraq but at the end of the day he did it to secure the oil our country consumes. When push comes to shove, every president is a populist – he’s going to pursue policies to get the American people what they want. George Bush attacks the Middle East, while Obama will shake their hands – all in the name of oil. If you want to blame anyone for attacking Iraq, blame yourself as an oil consumer.

Last night in our maintenance class I couldn’t contain myself when Eric was complaining how the government’s stupid decision to use ethanol as a gas substitute was driving up food prices. With his permission to speak candidly, I hauled off on him (just to clear the air, we’re cool now -- he was just busy the day I came in the store/The Morning After). I told him I found it laughable that a guy who drives 100 miles a day round trip to work and consumes tons of oil would complain about the very problem he is causing. I couldn’t script a better example of the American Blame Game. Of course he went into a story justifying how he can’t take the train because he’d miss time with his kids, etc… I’m not trying to sound insensitive but there’s always a way to justify the habits created by our momentum. This also highlights another absurdly irrational mindset we have. Every person I speak with agrees we consume way too much as a country yet nobody thinks they consume too much themselves – this is a mathematical impossibility.

The Bully has a cure all for what ails our country: Go ride a bike.