The Sky is NOT FALLING!

As I glimpsed a few headlines this morning, I saw that stocks jumped 300 points on the news of Obama's plan for the auto industry. And right under that, it said that Dow Chemical is cutting 5000 jobs and will close 20 plants, and that 3M will cut 1800 jobs in the fourth quarter. A few hours later, Anheuser-Busch announces that it will cut 1400 jobs within the next few weeks. How on earth was the Dow up 300 points?

And then there are the conservative talk show hosts. They cry and moan and insist that Obama has it in mind to catapult the price of gas back up to $4 per gallon because Tom Brokaw said that hheeee thinks that this is a good idea. That way, Americans drive less and the green agenda can be powerfully propagated. Well, Tom didn't put it exactly like that. He was much more devious and smooth about it. I just added a bit of drama for effect. Nevertheless, the sound bite was being shared with whomever happened to be listening to the conservative radio talk show at the time. Tom thought that now would be a good time because then Americans wouldn't have the chance to get used to gas that 's been under $2 a gallon.

As for Obama, his sound bite indicated that this kind of burden would not be a good thing right now because, well, there might be somebody in some household who's out of work, or somebody else who's struggling to make their house payment, or somebody else who's struggling to put food on their table or hang on to their car. And the fear factor is that Obama will tax gas behind everybody's back once things get good again. But we keep hearing that things will NEVER be the same again - at least that's what Citibank said last week. And the conservative talk show guys had a field day with that, too. Now I’m not dissin’ conservative talk radio. They need ratings just like everybody else in the media. But both sides are being so overtly and pathetically negative that it just feeds my attitude of being FED UP with the ridiculous victim mentality that’s being shoved down our throats!

So we're all supposed to buy gold, guns, booze and beef jerky and barricade our doors? What on God's green earth has happened to the American resolve? We have had a reputation for being a nation that is great and a nation that is determined and a nation that is strong and able to forge ahead...especially in the tough times! Have we become a nation of wimps? Have we had it good for so long that we have forgotten how to survive? Have we become drunk off of the plenty with which we've been blessed for several decades now? I hope this is not the case. I hope that we've not become so indoctrinated by what the media is telling us (whether liberal or conservative!) that we have forgotten how to think for ourselves. These people tell us it's terrible out there. So terrible that it's not been this terrible since the 1930's depression when the stock market crashed and people were jumping out of buildings and unemployment was the highest that the nation had ever seen.

Okay, if it was that bad in the 1930's and it is now 2008 then guess what? WE SURVIVED! If we are so frightened of what's to come, then perhaps it's time to look backward with a positive and astute eye and see what our grandparents did to survive the economic crash of the 1930's. That was also a time when people were saying that this nation would never be the same.

While things may be bad, things are NOT the worst that they have ever been in the history of this nation. For one thing, as best as I can remember my history, unemployment has been much worse then than it is now. People have struggled to put food on the table, pay for their homes, and supply the basics for their families. But when our nation came out the other side of that thing, we were GREATER than before - not worse. When we were going through it, we didn't have this pathetic victim mentality, we just began to get creative and think outside the traditions of men and the comfort of affluence - and the 1920's, according to history, were an incredible decade of affluence for this nation.

Though it presently seems like I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, I'm going to say it anyway: THE SKY IS NOT FALLING! Now I will agree with you that the sun sure ain't shinnin’. I will even agree with you that the wind and the waves are blowing something fierce and that in the distance, that guy walking toward us on the water looks like a ghost. But guess what? He's not the enemy. He's the Savior and He's inviting us to get some resolve and get out of the boat. Have you ever wondered what it's like to walk on water?