Palin Makes Fun of Hope and Change

At a recent Pitty Potty Tea Party rally Sarah Palin mocking President Obama in her gum chewing breezy glib way said:  "How is that hopey changey thing workin out for yah?"  Is Ms Palin capable of using correct English?  Anyway,... thank you Sarah now I realise what you and the tea party are all about.  You have abandoned the hope of modernity that each day can be better than the day before, and that we can make the world a better place for everyone.  It is the cynicism of Fox News and the usually fellow travellers of doom, gloom, and despair having given up hope.  This was a remarkable revelation for me.

We have been indoctrinated through civics classes (do we even teach that any more?) that America is a place where you can make it, where you have a chance, and where hard work pays off.  Even Ronald Reagan believed that. It was not too bad of a social construct!  It provided the conscious of the civil rights movement and the women's movement.   The current bunch of hard core conservatives do not believe that stuff anymore..

The current tide of conservatism is cynical, greedy, and has turned its back on American values instead embracing some kind of Christian capitalism, Ayn Rand philosophy of the damned.  I opposed Ronald Reagan on some issues but I NEVER doubted his optimism.  He was many things but not a cynic. 

Our current struggle is not with communism, Islam, or any of that stuff.  It is much more insidious and much more powerful.  It is materialism. We have drank that hemlock.  Is it a fatal dose?