Over the past few days, I have been forced to reflect on this campaign and the history of the Hickory Hound. What is the deal with all that has gone on and where does someone like me fit into this community. They don't want people like me to fit in, but I have never been a "They" person. I could care less about they. I care about We.
I have always been in a working class situation. My family has always labored to earn a living and we are proud people looking to make our own way. We haven't ever asked for more than what we have been afforded. I personally have never been afforded the excesses of life and I have always looked to maintain a proper budget. I haven't had vacations, new cars, dates, dining out, etc., especially over the past eight years or so.
My grandparents passed down a traditional value system to me. Work hard, be honest, sacrifice now and when you get older you will have more. Well it hasn't worked out that way. Wealthy people will look at these lamentations and say that I am bitter. No, I'm not really bitter. I am weathered. I don't covet what they have. I want my own. What I am tired of is the class warfare corporate entitlement syndrome that they focus on in dividing the middle class against the poor in this economic slide to the bottom.
When I was a kid I looked up to the wealthy and successful who it seemed had made their own way. I bought into the idea of this being the land of opportunity... the beacon on the hill... American Exceptionalism. Now, with the system we have seen set up in this nation, I see an elite wealthy who refuse to accept risk, aren't creating jobs and who feel entitled to their status in life in perpetuity.
The post World War II progress our nation enjoyed has been offshored as our American industries have been globalized. This has caused a huge erosion in the upward mobility of our middle class structure and increasing wealth disparity between the wealth structures in our nation.
What has been left behind is a casino type economic system. A paper system not built upon productive value, but built upon speculative paper assets. People think because they have accrued some wealth that they understand Economics, when what I have seen is that for the most part nothing could be further from the truth. The wealthy have for the most part soiled their bed; destroyed the viability of their ecosystem in this looking out for Numero Uno Economic Environment that has been created.
It is more than obvious that the middle class economic structure needs to be shored up in this nation. The wealthy illiterate are never going to understand that in the "Looking out for Numero Uno" economic system, because they already have theirs and they want yours. They look at it all as a zero sum game. It seems that the Powers That Be around here and across this nation are no longer interested in growing the pie.
The reason why I became a Republican was because I thought that they better understood realistic, common sense economics. Too all, but the most blindly loyal, it is obvious that is no longer the case. That doesn't mean that the Democrats understand economics better. As I have said, this isn't a zero sum game. Supply side economics could have worked, in theory, but it did not because there was no incentive to allow the assets to flow to the bottom. The economic and tax structure created barriers that have slowed the ability of the poor and middle class to economically progress and the wealth that the upper class accrued has been sent out of the country through the race to the bottom labor model. Things are going to get worse around here, because we have fully embraced the above model of an economic structure.
The reality: get in your car and ride around here. People are leaving. They have no incentive to stay and the political class is pushing for more of the same. The Powers That Be seem to think they don't need a working class/middle class in this community. Please look at all of the houses for sell. Open your eyes. Why are people leaving, because they can't afford to stick around here. Life moves forward, but this community is not moving forward.
You can continue to funnel government resources to the wealthy to build buildings, but those buildings are going to lose value faster than a new car as you drive it off the lot, because we have eroding population and income bases in this community. As more houses come on the market through simple supply and demand we see that the price point equilibrium is going to fall. That means the value of all property is going to fall in this community... diminishing prospects and diminishing returns. Sell it today, because it's going to be worth even less tomorrow.
The Powers that Be in our community are not going to listen to me, because I'm a nobody. You go to any meeting around here and it isn't about gathering facts and ideas and formulating a plan; the first question is who are you and the second is who do you represent. What we have is a go along to get along system... s social system. They already have all their plans. The meetings are windows dressing and hobnobbing events. That is not the foundation of the American system, but no one seems to understand that and even less no one seems to care, because no one says anything about it. It is all about Groupthink. Making these people feel important and like they played a role in the process.
Go to a meeting and it is the corporates and the government. If you are a middle class person they will glad hand you and then see that you are dismissed. You are treated like a visitor. You are there to see them in action; there to see the egos in action. You are there as a useful idiot. Just think if you didn't have a vote! And that would be these people's fantasy world.
If you aren't hugged up to the structure, doesn't it make you sick!
