By kat calvin
To absolutely no one’s surprise at all, the supercommittee has failed. The official deadline is midnight tonight, but the real deadline was Monday, because it takes 48 hours to push the bill through to a vote.
So here we are with: unemployment at 9%, but real unemployment closer to 16%, Congressional approval ratings at about negative 375,two wars and troops expanding even to Australia, Iran building nuclear weapons whether we like it or not, Wall Street remaining occupied and the nation’s police partying like it’s 1969, the country falling apart with no end in sight, and the Democrats and Republicans in Congress can’t even get it together enough to save the nation from defaulting again. And by “get it together” I don’t mean put together a plan. That was never going to happen. They can’t even sit in the same room. They haven’t actually met since October. This whole thing was a pantomime. It was better performance art than the Herman Cain Art Project. And, again, no one is surprised.
The problem, though, is that while we’ve been consumed by the latest Congressional failure (although they did manage to declare pizza sauce a vegetable, so they’re not completely useless) they have managed, yet again, to ignore the problem of jobs. And they’ve taken the American conversation with them. I have been amazed in the last few weeks by how many people have said to me that it’s the fault of the unemployed that they don’t have jobs. From a coworker in Washington to a cab driver in New York, they have all railed against the "lazy" Americans who just don’t seem to want to work. When I politely point out that, in fact, most Americans do want to work, if only there were any jobs, and isn’t it interesting that such a large number of Americans became lazy around the same time that the economy crashed, they declare that surely there are jobs somewhere but people are just so lazy. These same people also claim that the Democrats (just the Democrats, mind you) keep extending unemployment so the poor can live high on the government hog. Even when I ask if the fact that thousands of people are moving to North Dakota of all places because it’s the one place in the country where jobs have suddenly appeared is proof that Americans do, in fact, want to work, doesn’t sway them. The line is “Unemployed people are lazy”, or, in Cainian, “If you’re not rich, blame yourself”. Never mind that none of the people I’m having these conversations with are rich themselves.
It’s remarkable that we seem to have lost our empathy. Oh wait, for a second I forgot the last 250 years of our history. It’s remarkable that the same segment of the population that never had any sympathy (some middle class white Americans) still doesn’t get it, even when the issues are affecting them. Sure, ignore slavery, it has little to do with you. Ignore the feminist movement, they’re all a bunch of unattractive lesbians anyways. Ignore Vietnam, your son is in college. Ignore the Civil Rights movement, there aren’t any black people in your suburb anyways. Except the maid, but she’s thrilled to be cleaning up after you. Ignore the immigration issue, you don’t live near the border. Ignore the health care problem, your job covers your family just fine. For decades and decades it has been easy for a very insulated segment of our population to ignore the world around them, but not anymore. Now it’s your house that’s underwater (although you’re blaming the “Wal-Mart employee with the $600,000 palace” according to my cab driver yesterday). Now it’s your job that’s laying people off and getting steadily closer to your middle-management position. Now it’s your recently graduated college student who is moving back into your basement. Now it’s your SUV that you can’t afford to fill up with gas, your vacation that you have to cancel this year, it’s your life that’s being destroyed. All of a sudden that insulation is giving you cancer and you can’t ignore the outside world any more. So what do you do? Listen to Michele Bachmann and blame the wrong people. Get passionate about abortion and gay rights, neither of which affect jobs or the economy. Forget that we’re in a war. Call the Occupy Wall Street protesters “hippies” and leave it at that.
The supercommittee hasn’t failed because Congress is useless. The supercommittee has failed because America doesn’t care. After all, their net worth has gone up 25%. Congress is doing just fine.
We used to be a country that fought for what we believed in. We went on strike for labor rights after a devastating fire proved that Americans deserved better working conditions. We marched for the right to vote. Twice. We marched for the right to sit anywhere we damn well please. We marched to end a war that was killing our young men by the thousands and we marched to protest an election that was stolen from under us. But now, in yet another of the worst times our country has ever seen, with everyone suffering and no one paying for it, only 1% of the 99% are standing up against the 1%, and 98% of the 99% hate them for it. Where’s the solidarity? Where’s the sympathy? Where’s the outrage? This is your life, America. And you have no control over it. Why the hell aren’t you mad as hell?
What YOU Can Do
March on Wall Street (or Main Street, or whatever street is near you); call, tweet, email, and write your Congressman; attend a town hall and ask them about jobs and the economy; run for office; find someone else to run for office; write a letter to the editor; turn off the Kardashians and watch the news; donate money to campaigns you believe in; debate the issues.
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