Seven hundred dollars later -- all of it expended the incurably optimistic American way: on credit -- I discovered that my prolonged computer problems could have been fixed by a mere $21 hardware upgrade. And so it goes.
At any rate (and I trust the pricey yet wholly unnecessary ones are behind me for a while, although I was proud indeed to add to the economy's recovery through free-market waste, fraud and abuse), I wanted to highlight a recent, brain-curdling passage from NY Times Magazine that assesses with fairness, I think, the truly wretched state of our union:
White House aides wonder aloud whether it is even possible for a modern president to succeed, no matter how many bills he signs. Everything seems to conspire against the idea: an implacable opposition with little if any real interest in collaboration, a news media saturated with triviality and conflict, a culture that demands solutions yesterday, a societal cynicism that holds leadership in low regard.
Do I hear any objections? That's what I thought. The Nays have it.
I resist, however, capitulating to the voices of irreversible doom.
True, I'm as skeptical as any White House aide that Obama will manage to unseat the above quadrumvirate of mindless partisanship, triviality, unthoughtfulness and cynicism. But look at it this way: He'll have six more years to try, since even this disreputable electorate, according to virtually every poll, isn't so imbecile as to trust any of the current crop of GOP dunces or demagogues with chief executive power. There are, it seems, limits to our descent.
It's also true that Republican reactionaryism is outsizedly popular at the moment, yet economic recovery (yesterday's solutions tomorrow) will work to circumscribe that abnormality. And remember, as for the longer term, the contemporary GOP in all of its inglorious manifestations is the subject of a death-watch: every day the inexorable march of America's diversifying demographics puts it deeper in an electoral hole.
As for "societal cynicism" about leadership? That may not be entirely regrettable. Carlyle-esque "Great Man" theories and interpretations of history have always circulated excessively in America's political culture; perhaps it's time for at least a minor correction.
Finally there's the news media's obsession with "triviality and conflict." I could, I suppose, here devote thousands of words to limitless examples and some scholarly analysis of their whys and wherefores. But, in the end, we'd still be left with that one, ineradicable conclusion: Conflict sells, and as long as news -- especially cable news -- is hustled as an entertainment commodity, there'll be no end to the media's groveling. Short, that is, of more mature consumers. And to that we can only say: Good luck.
Thus a wretched state we're in indeed; yet, in the overall picture, there lie sound reasons for hope.