The Onion recently ran an article entitled "
Failure Now an Option" depicting sullen looking soldiers in their ACUs as the graphic. I don't think it's The Onion ragging on our troopers, since the gist of the humor piece is that Americans in general are starting to feel a lack of confidence and general malaise. The Iraq war is still going on, and despite some slow, steady progress, the
bossman reminds us that we may need to be here awhile. I don't think Petraeus is a partisan conservative as
Openleft proclaimed yesterday, because he's just being honest about what kind of commitment is required for the administration's stated purpose of ensuring a stable, functioning Iraq (as costly and depressing as it may be). The economy is in the
stinkhole, the
environment isn't doing so well, and this crop of presidential candidates is pretty lousy (let's just be honest here). Meanwhile, people distract themselves with the culture of self-absorption surrounding our latest trends of text messaging, facebook, and endless consumer products we don't need. Perhaps we are embarking on a new era filled with self-doubt similar to what followed the sex n' drugs revolution of the 60s. The only thing is we certainly haven't been privy to a whole lot of free love going on in the last 8 years of this decade (at least not on my end!). Sorry about the somber tone, but I'm just trying to tell it like it is.
On the plus side: Music is generally better in times of economic depression! The late 70s may have had unemployment and runaway inflation, but it was host to the birth of punk rock (The Ramones, Sex Pistols, Black Flag, etc.). When the economy was good in the late 90s all you had was a bunch of wussy folk-rock like Hootie and the Blowfish and Dave Matthews Band. So at least I've got some good tunes to look forward to as I sit on the street unemployed.
Jimmy Carter's mug reminds us of our everlasting Malaise
No comments:
Post a Comment