I can't help but notice that you have chosen one book by a self educated snark and one by a former professor. :)
In Life Without Principle Thoreau wrote, "The greatest compliment that was ever paid me was when one asked me what I thought and attended to my answer."
Such a simple, yet rare thing.
You've asked me to start off which I'll do with a bit of disclosure. I'm irritated. I'm irritated by a lack of journalistic standards and objectivity, I'm irritated by commentators and pundits who toe the party line religiously, no matter what. I'm irritated by conspiracy theories espoused by those on the fringy edges of both sides. I'm irritated by the kind of ideological group think that demands everyone think alike, before anything can be solved, by the attitude of whichever party is in power that it is somehow "payback time" and federal judges that override the will of the people more and more frequently. And I'm downright worried about the constant slide toward crassness in entertainment, cynicism in thought, and shallowness everywhere.
Is this who we are?
When these two men write about opportunity, faith, family, and the American dream I can agree with both of them that those things, among others, are core values. Common ground we can all agree on. When people refuse to make an attempt at understanding it is exhausting on a personal level and disheartening on a communal one.
I had read Glenn Beck's Common Sense before. I like him. I don't always agree with him, but overall I think he's just a guy who cares about the Constitution and the kind of country we are leaving our children and grandchildren. Most important of all, to me, he worries about the debt, the massive crushing debt hanging over us like some ominous storm cloud that might burst at any moment (so precarious the situation we've gotten ourselves into). He is willing to tell the truth, and a hard truth it is. His ratings and success are a testament to the fact that lots of our fellow countrymen are ready to hear what those in Washington don't think we can take (or are afraid we'll figure out). Let's just take a cold hard look at how bad things really are and stop pretending that it will just magically work itself out. Or worse, like the Congresswoman I saw interviewed about the ever ballooning unfunded liabilities who said she was sure our kids would be smarter than we are and they would figure out a solution. They'll really appreciate us having such confidence in them, I'm sure. I believe Beck when he says he hopes he's wrong. I think a lot of us hope we are too.
As I'm rereading Beck alongside the book written by, then Senator Obama, I find the similarities interesting. At times certain phrases, even entire paragraphs could have been written by either one of them. I'm surprised by Obama's casual writing style especially when relating personal stories and his honesty about how he feels about things. But while I'm glad to have Beck (or anyone) continuously beat the drum on debt and try to get us to rise from our collective stupor I would like to have heard more about it from the Senator. He mentions it only six times. Overall I found much I agreed with (at least in theory) but other things left me questioning his reasoning.
But more about all that in future posts. It's difficult to focus on anything serious as I currently have "visions of sugarplums" and other Christmas related nonsense dancing around in my head. I also don't want to give you any competition for the title of "windbag." which I am only too happy to let you keep. ;)
The Windbag and The Scrivener wouldn't have been a bad name for this blog! LOL
Christmas blessings to you and to our readers.
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