The ballots have been tallied and Obama received his second term in office.
While I am incredibly disappointed, I am NOT surprised.
Why, you may ask?
We have allowed a perverse notion to take root and flower in this nation. The idea that if you do nothing for yourself and your family even when you are perfectly able to do so that you deserve to be taken care of because you are entitled to it. We have allowed the robber barons of our government to dole out tax dollars to cheats and fraudsters without doing a thing to stop it.
So now, we see them elect their rightful king. A charlatan and poseur who says whatever they want to hear so long as someone else picks up the tab for all the toys and goodies he is dispensing.
To paraphrase Rush Limbaugh, when you have a nation of children, then Santa Claus gets elected.
Santa grants wishes and gives presents and makes promises that hardworking and tired people have to scramble to fulfill or risk the almighty displeasure of people who have no stake in the fiscal side of granting these wishes.
Santa can say "sure, you can have that!" and never be held accountable when Mom and Dad fall through on another persons promises.
Santa can say 'you've been good so you deserve it" and "you are entitled to it because the neighbors have one". Santa can tell someone that if your folks don't pony up, it's because they are scrooges who don't really care about your interests.
It's hard for me to get behind that kind of cosmically warped thinking simply because I'm one of those trying to be responsible parent types who has to face the reality that we cannot afford every single thing that we see. In fact, we cannot afford even half of everything that we see. Any time that a politician promises you ANYTHING, you can rest assured it didn't come from HIS salary. It came from yours.
Santa Claus is a jolly fellow because he never has to actually be in every one's home when the bills come due and the fun is over and hard decisions have to, of necessity, be made. Santa is always pictured as smiling and happy because Santa doesn't have to explain why we are on a fiscal cliff, both as individual families (in many cases) and absolutely as a nation.
Our nation is awash in Chinese red. The ink is indelible. We have allowed our elected representatives to go on for FOUR YEARS without passing a single budget to detail why they are spending like there is a honey pot of money that is bottomless. Now, we have elected Santa Claus for 4 more years of endless spending without any responsibility.
Who picks up the check? It will be multiple generations worth of Americans, if America even exists by the time we are discussing full payoff. And with the growing mentality of "you owe me", that time of payoff will never come because the bill will continue to be passed until NO ONE will want to buy up any of our debt because we are like the mooch who never remembers our wallet but always reminds you how much you have in yours.
I am not bitter. I am sad and frustrated that the entitlement generations of our nation have become so large, so vocal and so powerful that their angry demanding voices can drown out truth.
I will share with you a painful truth that is coming: when the number of people taking completely exceeds the number working to pay for the "free stuff" that isn't really free at all, our nation will collapse like a house of cards in a gale.
And it is not just fiscal issues. The moral turpitude that is becoming "no big deal' is horrifying. People are not perfect. I get that. But giving in to our baser selves and calling it "a lifestyle choice" is not God's will. Not in any measure. When we start to say some sins are just fine, where do we draw the line? Our entire judicial system is based on the Judeo-Christian principles that built our framework of laws. We have elements of the Ten Commandments, the Code of Hammurabi and the English Law that came from our Mother country.
So how do we decide which of our laws can be trampled next? Which of God's commandments no longer matter? I fear for the legacy we are establishing in our nation and which we leave to those generations who will come after us.
They will not be as free, nor will they be as Godly. They will have been raised to believe that the problems will be remedied by 'someone else'.
I pray for our nation and its leaders. But more, I pray for what we will all be compelled to endure together. I pray that we will have the moral fiber to endure the fire that is to come. And I pray that we will not rejoice in the sufferings of others, even when they have brought it upon themselves through unrighteous and unwise choices.
May God have mercy on us if it is right that He should show us any mercy at all.
