fiscal responsibility
Exclusively Inclusive: All Noise on the Western Front
25/February/2009 10:46 Filed in: Weekly
Column
As I was listening to some of the discussions of
our current financial crisis, one of the
commentators began listing some of the impressive
creations of literature that came out of financial
hardships, wars, and similar stupendous change
events. One of the books mentioned was “All Quiet
on the Western Front” chronicling the events that
brought about the end of WWI, the war to end all
wars.
Shortly thereafter I was treated to both far right and far left pundits interrupting each other with pedantic talking points, none of them showing any civility to each other or to the host. Since this financial catastrophe finds its roots in the material crusades of Western Culture, I mused that what we were all hearing was “All Noise on the Western Front.”
Human beings are unique in all of God’s creation, in that we have some cognitive understanding of life. Yet we have developed or fallen to such a desperate condition that we have become completely hostile to others who do not share our appreciation of dead stuff in the way we suppose is the proper way that stuff and money should be acquired. The noise is deafening, almost like artillery attacks, but we have completely missed the fact that we all share a tremendous transcendent gift and that is life itself.
The talk for the last few months is that we have to save the financial system. The current Administration’s conscience is that somehow, someway, throwing enough money at the problem, we hope, we can fix it. There is one truth in all of this; we are throwing money at the problem, definitely not wealth. Eventually wealth will again surface and money will again become worthwhile, but the way things look now, there needs to be a significant change in attitude and policies.
Tuesday Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke said he hoped that the recession would end this year. This hope gave the stock market hope and it regained much of what it lost last Friday. Later that evening President Obama gave a similar speech to a joint session of Congress. Today and following we will find out if those words, just words, will change the perception of economic realities. It seems from my perspective that he is intent on growing government with little understanding on how to pay for it.
Read More...
Shortly thereafter I was treated to both far right and far left pundits interrupting each other with pedantic talking points, none of them showing any civility to each other or to the host. Since this financial catastrophe finds its roots in the material crusades of Western Culture, I mused that what we were all hearing was “All Noise on the Western Front.”
Human beings are unique in all of God’s creation, in that we have some cognitive understanding of life. Yet we have developed or fallen to such a desperate condition that we have become completely hostile to others who do not share our appreciation of dead stuff in the way we suppose is the proper way that stuff and money should be acquired. The noise is deafening, almost like artillery attacks, but we have completely missed the fact that we all share a tremendous transcendent gift and that is life itself.
The talk for the last few months is that we have to save the financial system. The current Administration’s conscience is that somehow, someway, throwing enough money at the problem, we hope, we can fix it. There is one truth in all of this; we are throwing money at the problem, definitely not wealth. Eventually wealth will again surface and money will again become worthwhile, but the way things look now, there needs to be a significant change in attitude and policies.
Tuesday Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke said he hoped that the recession would end this year. This hope gave the stock market hope and it regained much of what it lost last Friday. Later that evening President Obama gave a similar speech to a joint session of Congress. Today and following we will find out if those words, just words, will change the perception of economic realities. It seems from my perspective that he is intent on growing government with little understanding on how to pay for it.
Read More...