A Country of A**holes

It has been quite a week of contrasts.  First let me begin with what is right.  We saw once again that our country can come together in the time of crisis.  The city of Boston showed what any community does in the time of crisis.  It helps those in need and does so in an unabashed fearless way that only makes one wonder why we have to wait until a crisis to see the good in people.

We also saw some of what is really wrong with the country.  While 90% of the population favoring some type of gun regulation, the US Senate did not have the courage to stand up to the most powerful lobby in the country, The NRA, and voted down a simple gun registration law.  They did this while the events in Boston were page one on all the media outlets.  They knew that their lack of courage, which would have been spotlighted on almost any other day of the year, would go largely unnoticed as a result of the terror attack.  Not even the President on the lawn of the White House with parents from Sandy Hook broke through.

But this latest failure by our elected officials is but a symptom of what we have become.  This lack of leadership and more importantly an inability to do the right thing exemplified by our nation's leaders has been trickling down to those of us who try to go about our business every day and are stopped in our tracks by those who simply are in a position to put up roadblocks. 

Tasks and daily chores at the city or community level that used to be taken as common courtesy are now being filibustered by small minded people who simply refuse to help or even do their job simply because they can.  There is no oversight or even if so, the overseers have no power to stop those who they supervise. 

I began to see this degradation in society several years ago.  I wanted to add onto my home.  I had gone through the entire planning and pre-permitting process before I was denied a permit to build an additional room and bathroom.  Why?  Because someone said my home was built closer to the next property than what now was allowed.

My home was built almost 30 years before I purchased it.  I have to assume that at that time it conformed to current laws and regulations.  Yet someone in the planning department just decided to make things difficult.

The addition to my home was not even on that side of the house so why should this matter.  Eventually I was able to get the permit but not before I had to wait several weeks and go before a building commission to beg them to allow me to add onto my house.

When I was young teachers like to teach.  They were respected.  The problem was that I was lazy and did not want to study.  Now for many like my daughter they know that the only way to get a head is to study.  But the roles have been reversed.  My daughter is begging for help from her teacher and he refuses to help.  Why?  He appears to be lazy but it gets even better.  They are "on strike" this week and refuse to help their students who need extra time at lunch.  He has also refused to help during his two prep periods.  To make matters worse, the teacher gives an exam on material that the students cannot get help on and then wonder why they are not "getting it" in class.

My wife has taught art part time in the schools for almost 14 years.  She has received nothing but positive scores on her performance review for the past 12 years.  She had been through two principals before a third arrived two years ago.  Although she had hardly spent any time with her the Principal decided to give her two poor scores on her performance review; just for the fun of it.

My wife had been teaching an optional after school art program for some of the kids who enjoyed the program but wanted more art than was being offered during the school day. 

A full time teacher in the school decided that she liked art and wanted to teach after school art too competing with my wife.  Now my wife is the only art teacher in the district that has to compete with another teacher teaching art in her school.  To make matters worse this other teacher is now teaching curriculum that my wife teaches during school that is part of the required state standards!

The parents are paying for something that is being taught for free.

My neighbor, after seven years working at a company flies to Europe on business only to be blindsided when he is terminated upon his arrival. 

I am sure you have examples of some of the inequities out there that you have been victim to.  But the question needs to be asked:  when did we become a nation of a**holes? 

With freedom comes responsibility.  What exactly does that mean?  With freedom we do have free will and can do within limits what we want.  But what most have forgotten is that with that freedom we need to remember to do the right thing by people.  When did common decency between two people become a sign of weakness.  It is that part of the equation that we seem to have forgotten and this week the spotlight has shown brightly.