There has never been a shortage of stuff to worry about, but it seems that there is more of it these days and it is worse than ever. I grew up under the threat of things like thermonuclear annihilation, epidemics of deadly diseases, and godless communists bent on taking over the world and enslaving us all.
Those fears have faded in the glare of newer threats like climate change, collapsing ecosystems and terrorism. Joining those existential threats is an ever-growing list of insomnia-inducing “crises”: health care, opiate abuse, gun violence, crumbling infrastructure, housing shortages, economic disparity, student debt, stratospheric national debt and a deteriorating Social Security fund.
And, I’m pretty sure that is not the entire list.
The nation seems to be in a state of perpetual anxiety coupled with frustration that nothing is being done to address these threats and problems. The people we entrust to govern wisely and effectively do not. They are caught up in an all-consuming contest of political partisanship that divides all human thought and all possibility into a simple ideological dichotomy — liberal and conservative, Democrat and Republican.
Their constant complaining, rancorous finger-pointing and smug self-certainty resolves nothing, while noisily seeking to convince Americans that if they want to get things fixed, they must support one side entirely while entirely rejecting the other side. There are no alternatives.
While our political system is pretty much hopelessly entrenched in duopoly, most of us understand that neither side has an ideological panacea that if applied would cure all of our ills, and so we are reluctant to give complete control of government to either side. But sometimes we do because we must break the gridlock and get something done.
We gave control to the Democrats under President Barack Obama and we got legislation to address the health-care issue. Some like it, some don’t, but it at least recognized a national problem and attempts to deal with it. Many Democrats selflessly sacrificed their House seats to pass the Affordable Care Act.
We gave control to the Republicans under President Donald Trump and we got significant tax cuts for corporations, and smaller, temporary cuts for everyone else — once again, we got trickle-down economics.
Lowering taxes wasn’t exactly a priority for the nation given the already impossibly high national debt and the many other problems confronting us, but, hey, maybe voodoo economics will work this time to more equitably share the nation’s wealth, grow the economy and pay down the national debt.
Yeah, sure.
The United Nations’ recently issued global assessment report, completed after a three-year study by more than 450 scientists and diplomats, concludes that the earth’s ecosystems are indeed collapsing under the weight of human activity. The natural life-support system that sustains all living things on this planet is being destroyed at an alarmingly high rate by a burgeoning human population.
But not to worry, we got those tax cuts, unemployment is at historic lows, wages are rising and quarterly GDP is up. The human species may well go extinct due to its own greed and stupidity — and take much of the earth’s other life forms with it — but stock indexes will have never been higher.
Meanwhile, Trump and the Republicans confront this looming global ecological calamity by conveniently denying it as junk science, which allows them to justify reversing environmental regulations and promoting increased extraction and use of fossil fuels. And, if they are wrong about the science, no worries, they all expect to be raptured to heaven before the earth chokes to death on human effluvia.
While Trump, to his credit, has confronted illegal immigration and China’s unfair trade practices — although in his own inimitably ham-fisted manner — he and the Republicans have mostly focused on cultural issues like abortion, sexual identity, gun rights, kneeling football players and religious freedom (i.e. Christian preeminence).
You know, all the real important stuff — at least to the gullible bumpkins who crowd around Trump’s garish carnival wagon to buy Doctor Donald’s elixir: “Only I can cure all that ails the nation!”
Right.
Apparently, not everyone thinks so. The nation reacted to the first two years of the Trump presidency and GOP control of Congress by overwhelmingly returning the House to the Democrats.
However, the pressing issues that affect the vast majority of Americans are still being stuffed into the overflowing file, labeled “for later consideration,” while the Democrats obsess over Trump and pursue their Quixotic quest to bring down his presidency.
Give it a rest, Democrats. Impeachment will go nowhere with a GOP-controlled Senate. There are precious few Republicans in the Senate or the House who would dare stand up to Trump and selflessly sacrifice their positions for the best interests of the country. Trump is safe until the next election.
And, yeah, we know Trump is unfit for office; heck, even many of his obstinate supporters recognize that he is a mendacious moron, unethical, immoral and untrustworthy, but they don’t care. He is their moron who they expect will address all their important issues, like banning transgenders from the military, prohibiting abortion and insisting that everyone stand for the national anthem.
You know, all the important stuff.
Trying to remove Trump from office before the 2020 election is a waste of time. It squanders opportunities to make some headway to address the truly critical, even existential, issues we face.
Hey, Democrats, instead of participating in a continuation of the duopoly food fight, govern responsibly. Work the best you can with Trump and the GOPers to provide for the general welfare. Show the vast majority of us who are not intoxicated by either left or right ideology that at least one party will work for the best interests of the nation.
— Randy Alcorn is a Santa Barbara political observer. Contact him at randyaalcorn@gmail.com, or click here to read previous columns. The opinions expressed are his own.