You know, nobody loves you when you’re...

I was jobbing around the other day when I came across this sign. I had seen the sign before but, this time when I saw it, it resonated.

Not because I feel down and out but because there are so many people I know who are living life close to the edge. People who are in their 50’s or 60’s and who are finding the road tough going. There isn’t the safety net our parents had - a safety net of pensions and lifelong jobs. All that is gone and employees today are and have been for at least the last decade and a half (if not more) disposable.

People are living off their savings, they’re having trouble finding work and in some cases they’ve just given up looking. These are the people who don’t show up in those high unemployment numbers we’ve seen over the last year or two.

I don’t profess to have an answer. I know it isn’t industry specific either but what it means is something has to change in this country.

I get a lot of emails from people all across the political spectrum and the one common thread in all of these emails is the underlying anger evident in people’s words. Anger when the government takes some kind of action or anger when the government doesn’t act. Most of what I get in these emails are platitudes, chanted repetitions of the same stale party line whether it be from the left or the right. To me what it underscores is our system is broken and ineffectual – there is no grey area anymore only stark contrasts, polarizing extremes which stunt any forward progress by our nation.

And who pays for all of this?

Why you and I of course and we pay billions upon billions of dollars to feed this great, monstrous beast we call a government as it thrashes about in its death throes while we sink further and further into irrelevance.

The guy who disagrees with you is not your enemy, he is merely a fellow citizen who doesn’t share your opinion and if you cannot find common ground the only thing left is to fight until you are both dead.

Wake up America.