BORN ON THIRD BASE

OK, now Congress has passed the minuscule part of budget needed to manage the debt. I have not yet heard just how much the poor and lower middle class will suffer from the spending cuts in place due to the deal made by Congress. I suspect that bits and pieces will trickle down to us in the next few weeks. The only certainty we have is that the distressed wealthy few will have to wait just a little longer to have their terrible burdens relieved. Ah!!
 
When the Tea Baggers helped their Republican sponsors get their desperately needed tax cut extensions for the wealthiest 2%, they moved on to breaking every kind of opposition to their self-deceiving, socially-dividing proposals for spending cuts. These “Baggers” and their sponsors believe that they are entitled to everything they have and since they “did it all by themselves,” they make the assumption that anyone who is not a “Have” is that way because of laziness, lack of intelligence, or some other factor that could be controlled if one tried hard enough. So, why should society “pander” to those pathetic fools?!

At the “Rally to Restore Sanity” in Washington in October, my favorite sign was “Americans, born on third base, but think they hit a triple.” That certainly applies to our top 2% who are so unaware, they truly believe that family, luck, right-place-right-time, and various other factors out of their control played no major role in their achievement. Many of the wealthy are hard-working, but can one honestly say that they work harder than the people who clean their offices and homes, or the teachers and public workers whom they disparage?

One gets the feeling these days that the “Baggers” and their wealthy supporters think they can channel the Founders, the “Christian” Founders. It is hard to imagine, though, that our founders would have sacrificed so much to benefit so few.

Peace,
Ruth