After two months of the new 112th Congress, its members and the president have managed to keep the government going for another two weeks. Wow! There’s only six and a half more months to go in this fiscal year. They are really on the ball!
The workers who landed one of those 192,000 jobs created last month to bring the unemployment rate down to 8.9 percent have got to be celebrating. I am happy for them and hope they are not so deep in debt that they can still avoid personal bankruptcy. We now only have to create another 14,808,000 jobs for the unlucky ones who could not find a job because the economy is still stalled.
Or how about those two warships the president dispatched to the Middle East? That ought to scare those dictators into doing the right thing. And maybe the warships will convince Gaddafi that the United States will get the United Nations to do something other than issue another toothless verbal condemnation. Maybe Gaddafi will stop killing his own people in defiance of those wanting him gone.
The turmoil in the Middle East has already caused gasoline prices to rise, and they will continue to rise. We can’t blame the Obama administration for that because former President George W. Bush should have developed an energy-independence strategy.
Then, President Obama would not have to make any decisions during our coming energy crisis.
Yes, an energy crisis is coming! Because we have shut down the development of the energy resources we have right here in the United States of America.
We are the OPEC of natural gas and coal, but we don’t want to offend the environmental wackos who don’t believe we can develop these resources responsibly. And while we are creating this self-induced energy crisis, let’s continue the moratorium on oil drilling in the Gulf, while China, Cuba and the rest of the countries in the world (who do not like us) suck as much oil out of that area as they can before our so-called government leaders wake up.
Obamacare is a disaster, but the administration wants to roll it out anyway. Never mind that the majority of the American people are against it and that a majority of the states have joined in a lawsuit to declare it unconstitutional.
Obama said deficits don’t matter. We now have the highest national debt in our history and we are on the brink of national financial collapse. By the way, how are those “shovel-ready” projects working out for us?
If the possibility of a government shutdown, out-of-control federal spending, a chronically high unemployment rate, a stalled economy, failed stimulus spending, the uncertainty about the crisis in the Middle East and the coming energy crisis do not get your attention, then how about the recently released Government Accounting Office (GAO) report?
The Government Accounting Office has identified over $200 billion in government waste and overlapping programs. In Washington, that’s not real money because it’s not their money. But around kitchen tables, where real people struggle to make ends meet, that’s $2,500 for a family of four to help pay for the increasing cost of gasoline and other necessities.
If my sarcasm was not so close to the truth and the facts about the crises we face were not so compelling, then we could all sleep soundly at night. Unfortunately, I can’t, because it is not about us. It’s about our grandchildren.
We have a crisis of crises. This is insane!
If we keep sending the same people to Washington who keep doing the same things and expecting a different result, then we ARE insane.
We need to send somebody else to the White House. We need a new kind of leadership. In fact, we just need some leadership.
Herman Cain is a former CEO, a radio talk show host on AM 750 and 95.5 FM WSB in Atlanta, and a Fox News contributor.