Will somebody please tell me the truth?
January 16, 2012 · 0 Comments
By: Dale M. King
I am desperately searching for someone who will tell me the truth. Not just a little truth, like “The sky is blue” or “The grass is green.” I mean something meaningful – like what is really happening in the United States and even around the world.
Politicians have always been known for bending the truth to fit their own fancy. But now, untruths seem to be trickling into other areas of the federal bureaucracy.
Case in point. I would really like to know what the unemployment rate really is. Let me tell you what I know. The government said it dropped in December to about 8.5 percent. President Barack Obama had a two-day festival of making hay out of that pronouncement. And any time a president makes such hoopla about a seemingly small statistic, I begin to wonder. I take a hint from former British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli who complained about “Lies, damn lies and statistics.”
So, President Obama seems happy about the nudge in unemployment. Then, I happened to catch Rush Limbaugh who talked about the lies that Obama was perpetrating. The unemployment rate had not gone down. Tens of thousands of people who are unemployed or underemployed had just stopped looking for work. If the total workforce were the same number as it was when Obama took office, the jobless rate would be 11 percent or more. And if you add in the underemployed – people working part time or below their training level – it’s even worse.
Let’s apply some logic. The unemployment rate can’t have gone up and gone down at the same time. That’s impossible. So what is the answer? Who can tell me the truth?
I really wish I could revel in what I think is an upturn in the economy, but I can’t. I have always trusted my eyes to feed signals to my brain. And right now, my eyes aren’t seeing anything good.
What I still see are closed-down stores, malls with many empty shops and other businesses continuing to fold. Just since the New Year, two places my wife and I enjoy going to breakfast have closed. We also hear that Kmart and Sears and going to be shutting stores and cutting staff.
If things are getting better, why can’t we see it? Why aren’t things palpably improving?
Here’s something that may not be a truth, but it should be a way of life? Why can’t people get along? Not just politicians, but all people.
I was out shopping with my wife on the day before Christmas, and I never heard a more consistent blare of car horns. In a mall parking lot, I saw a woman get out of her own car, storm over to the motorist behind her and read him the riot act.
I am amazed at the value people place in parking spaces. They want them desperately. And if they don’t get them, they become childish, pounding on the horn, yelling the f-word or using the equivalent hand gesture.
Whatever happened to holiday spirit? What should be peace and good will is not very peaceful and not very good.
One more thing and I’ll end my rant. Something just broke in the news about a big, elegant and overpriced party that President and Mrs. Obama held several years ago. Apparently, the party was so opulent and such a major waste of money that the Obamas decided not to tell anyone, particularly the many people looking for work.
I heard a comment on the Glenn Beck show. Referring to the Obama-rama, he said, “If you do something, and you have to hide it, chances are you are doing something wrong.”
If only they had told the truth in the beginning.
