© Another Day in the Country
I know that The Media are important in our democracy, one of those checks and balances in our society, that exposes corruption and keeps people on their toes; but I’m feeling bombarded by so much negative hype that I want to run away and hide.
For at least six years, after moving to the country, we didn’t even have a television set hooked up — we just used the TV to watch old movies. Sometimes it took awhile for us to hear what had just happened; but word spread and people seemed to love filling me in so I didn’t miss being hooked up to the latest news bulletin from CNN.
Only recently, during this last election, I think it was, I started listening to the evening news on public television — there was more world coverage, less hype, more inclusion, less negative. But, once again, I’ve stopped with the news thing. Even the BBC was becoming too much same old, same old for me.
Evidently, some folks can’t get enough of all this news mania because not only do they listen regularly on television, they listen in their cars on radio and get bulletins on their phones just to keep tabs between receiving their copies of the local newspaper.
I don’t like being the ostrich who buries her head in the sand on purpose, but enough is enough. I got so weary of hearing all the hype about how we were heading toward a fiscal cliff. There seemed to be more information than I needed because it wasn’t anything new.
Our politicians weren’t making any progress, coming up with any new ideas; they just seemed to be entrenched in their fox holes lobbing grenades. Meanwhile we were reminded hourly that we were about to go over a cliff — no one likes that threat.
There’s that feeling in the pit of your stomach which is awful, and what can you do about it as you sweep along in your canoe without a paddle, out of control, adrenalin pumping, toward obvious destruction? What you do, finally, is hold your ears shut, condition yourself to ignore it all and pretend everything is fine. Not good!
Once! I want to hear about things like fiscal cliffs on the news just once! I’d even settle for just one day so that everyone had a chance to get the facts. Then, I want our leaders to get the lead out of their pants and lead on!
The next day, if a cliff is still looming, I want to hear at least one positive suggestion as to how we’re going to get a handle on things. These people we elected to govern (that is a verb isn’t it?) are supposed to be doing something! And that something should be positive! Not posturing, piddling around, putting off standing up for most of us — the American middle class people. C’mon now.
Now that the cliff no longer looms, for whatever reason, I’m hearing about sequester. I got out my dictionary to find the meaning of the word because I thought sequestering is what the Catholic church did when they needed to elect a new pope.
I didn’t know a second meaning, which I guess gives the evening news more meaning. To sequester is to legally take possession of something until a decision is reached. I like the Catholic idea of sequestering, best. If it were up to me, I’d big time sequester Congress inside the building until they started cooperating. I’d sequester their paychecks next — I know, I know, we can’t really do that — until somebody came up with some ideas we could back other than “cutting entitlements” (translation: always Social Security and Medicare).
I expect these guys to be a little more sophisticated and courageous than the local city council that resorts to “tabling” issues every month, just hoping they’ll go away.
We the people have elected our public officials to solve problems, so cut the group think and get creative. Your job in Washington is not to listen to the lobbyists or the special interest groups. We the people back in Kansas are supposed to be your special interest group.
It’s another day in the country and I once I’ve spouted off, I’m going to have to trust the process, trust that democracy will work itself out. Supposedly, we are evolving and I think we have. There were worse things happening in Congress in the olden days, after all — they even shot at each other, literally. I’ve turned off the news, trusting I’ll hear about it when somebody eventually does something!