Terry Cowgill

A Laugh A Minute

July 12, 2008 on 9:08 am | In Race for Prez |

You know, the presidential campaign is making great fodder for late-night comedians. That means people like me have plenty to write about and that we can all have a good laugh on a regular basis. Indeed it would be most amusing if the stakes weren’t so high.

Take Jesse Jackson’s recent “hot mic” comment about Obama “talking down to black people” and how the right reverend wants to turn the senator into a eunuch. Of course, Jackson’s crude comments are fed by two things: 1) Jackson’s jealousy that Obama has succeeded where he himself has failed (in case you’ve forgotten, Jackson ran for prez in ’84 and ’88).

But 2) there is a larger dynamic at work here. When Jackson accuses Obama of “talking down” to African Americans by highlighting the importance of their own personal responsibility for improving their lives, it bothers Jackson to no end.

What is wrong with delivering an empowering message to the African-American community, as Obama and Bill Cosby have?: “Yes, there is still racism is this country and we need to work hard to end it, but you can also do your part to help yourselves. Black men have to stop abandoning their families in such great numbers. Black parents have to do their best to emphasize to their children the importance of education.” and so forth.

After all, if you go through your life thinking the blame for every adverse circumstance you experience can be laid squarely at the feet of whitey, how will you ever improve your lot? It’s profoundly paralyzing and fatalistic.

People like Jackson, Al Sharpton and Ralph Nader have done some good work over the years, but let’s face it: they thrive on victimhood. It’s how they’ve made their livings all these years. They don’t want you to believe there is a whole lot you can do to improve yourself beyond looking to them and their organizations for guidance.

To suggest otherwise is (in Jackson’s words), “talking down” to blacks. To Nader, it’s “talking white.” Indeed, to Jackson, any black man who has the testicular fortitude to spout such heresy deserves to be emasculated. I guess we all know why Jackson, Sharpton and Nader failed so miserably as presidential candidates.

Speaking of which: Now we know why Phil Gramm made such a poor presidential wannabe as well. The McCain economic adviser and 1996 presidential candidate made a huge political blunder by minimizing the sluggish economy and saying we’re merely in a “mental recession.” Worse yet, the former senator from Texas with a Ph.D in economics described the American people as “a nation of whiners” for complaining about their plights.

I actually agree a little to this extent. The economy as a whole isn’t in terrible shape (at least not yet). And there are people out there complaining who really don’t know what it’s like to struggle in the way my grandparents did during the Great Depression, for example.

But here’s the problem. There are millions of folks out there who have defaulted on their mortgages and have essentially lost their life savings. Unemployment, while only at a little above 5%, is rising steadily. Moreover, fuel costs are killing most of us whose margins for error in the family budget do not allow us to easily absorb an almost 100% rise in gasoline prices in the last 18 months or so.

I figure it will cost my family between $7,000 and $8,000 to heat our home this winter. Every time I drive to and from Millbrook to tutor students, it sets back me $8 (at current prices; who knows what this will cost when school starts again in September?). Even a trip to Falls Village to cover an event will cost me 2 or 3 bucks.

Something’s got to give. And currently that means cutting back on discretionary spending. Is this good for the economy? I think the problem is that for so long our economic model has been built on cheap fuel. When that fuel doubles or triples in price, the whole system becomes incredibly stressed and people have to start making tough choices.

So the author of the Enron Loophole thinks it’s all in my head. The dictionary widget on my Mac OSX desktop defines whining as “complain[ing] in a feeble or petulant way.” Sounds like you’re the one doing the whining, Professor Gramm!