I remember being a child and having a paralyzing fear of thunderstorms. My family lived north of Dallas in place that served as the southern end of the infamous “Tornado Alley.” The death and devastation of the spring storms never escaped the top news slot each evening. I managed to capture those images vividly in my mind and I built my fear on them. I was convinced we were going to die in a tornado.
My mother and father spent many days and nights reassuring me that no harm would come to us and that even if it did they had the house built to withstand anything. They even suspended any attempt at rational explanation when they told me that in all their lives they’d never been hurt in a storm so it was quite possible they’d never be. After all, they were age 34 and had not a scratch on them from a dark cloud. They even dangled the completion of homework in front me as a sure-fire deterrent for tornados. Of course, kids who play quietly in their room were also immune to tornados as well.
Later on in life I figured out that my parents' solutions to my tornado fears were all lies. No amount of homework would stop a tornado from ripping our house apart, sucking us all out and impaling us on the flag pole at my elementary school down the street. I just couldn’t figure why they would look me in the eye and invent all of those lies.
I eventually figured it out. My parents wanted me to shut up and be scarce. Yes, there was impending danger, but they weren’t going spend their final moments on earth listening to their crybaby kid when they could be watching “Hill Street Blues.”
Last night’s speech featured President Obama playing the role of my parents and you were cast as the part of me. It was a scene we know all too well, the all-knowing parent filling their child’s head full of crap to get them to shut up and relax while they tend to “adult business.” I don’t know about you, but I don’t like being put in a corner.
I was looking for specifics in that speech. I was not looking to hear a stump speech made to tell me to shut my mouth, look the other way and be patient while the adults figure things out.
Of course, you might have had honest parents who told you that you were in fact going to die in a tornado and there was nothing you could do about it so you all sat and prayed together until each storm passed. In that case you might relate more to the average girl who got run over by every good-looking guy she could find until she decided to give up on guys with good looks and self-confidence and settle for a short fat guy with an inferiority complex. Have I admitted too much?
I really do feel like we’re a high school girl with low self-esteem who keeps looking to our boyfriend (the government) to treat us better. They grab us by the arm, sit us down and look deep into our eyes when they tell us that they’ve really changed this time and they care oh so much about us and are sorry for how they treated us in the past. He knows what to say and how to say it. We cry a little and quickly forgive our boyfriend (the government) because he’s so handsome and looks right into our eyes with the clearest sincerity. Six months later we’re pregnant at prom with no date and no clue where our boyfriend went. We’re left feeling used with a bastard child, an unhealthy addiction to American Idol and nowhere to turn.
With $787 billion on the table already and another $410 billion being anteed up for the next bet, it’s time we were treated like big kids and given the straight facts.
When Obama tells me that he’s going to make sure that mortgage relief money won’t go to the careless real estate speculators out there who can’t pay for their bad business sense, I don’t want top people in his administration contradicting him. I feel like he’s lying to me to make me feel better about something I should be worried about.
When Obama says “tax cut” I hear a buzz word. When I’m told it’s $13 a week extra in my paycheck I hear actual numbers. “Tax cut” sounds better than the actual number in this case. Obama knows this. That’s why he repeats the words “tax cut” over and over again. Like that bad boyfriend, if he says the magic words “I love you” enough I’ll forget about your naked wrestling match with my best friend and go back to letting you screw me both literally and figuratively.
Big hopes and big promises usually lead to huge letdowns. When Obama says his plans won’t come to fruition overnight I get the feeling he’s already stumping for his 2012 run for President. He’s trying to keep me on the hook just long enough for him to figure out how to get me on the boat and into a cooler. Like a bad boyfriend, we’re expected to give him more chances than he deserves based on hollow, vague promises. Those bad boys are always telling us that they’ll “make it right” or “do right by you,” which makes us feel better but leaves us wondering exactly what they mean. Often it turns out that “doing right by you” is a fancy dinner where he gets drunk and you pay. I can’t stress it enough how much our current situation with our federal government resembles that exact statement.
Smooth talking wise guys always lose the battle when it comes to the bottom line. The put-up or shut-up moment always comes. Obama may be able to woo us with his handsome presence and his melodic speech now, but one day we’re going to expect him to put a ring on our finger. We’re not talking about a promise ring, which is $13 a week and the cop-out that any jobs he doesn’t create, he “saved.” No sir, we want the real thing, a two karat diamond with multi-quarter GDP and job growth. And we want you to figure out how to buy that ring without using our credit card. It means so much more when you work to earn that kind of trust from us.
Somehow I think President Obama is just like the rest of them – telling us whatever we want to hear just to get into our pants. He may wine and dine us a little bit better than the other guys, but the result always seems to be the same - a whole lot of talk and not much action.
We should expect more than a good speech. We deserve details. Details that do not contradict what his administration officials tell us. We don’t need to be taken as fools when there is so much on the line.
While our government isn’t actually a tornado or a jerk boyfriend, they can have the same effects on us. Destroying our country with selfish agendas can leaves us pregnant, alone and wondering where our trailer home blew off to during this financial storm – and that’s no way to go through life, my friends.
Amen.
