Nation of Whiners, Culture of Complaint
Today's Financial News - Posted August 5, 2008
Former Senator Phil Gramm recently called Americans a “nation of whiners”. Comparing U.S. reality with other countries, Amberger can’t help but agree.
by J. Christoph Amberger
Baltimore — (TFN): Former U.S. Senator Phil Gramm recently stirred up controversy by stating that the U.S. has become a “nation of whiners.” The volume and pitch of what followed proved that he hit the nail on the head. In fact, it is hard to imagine that this is the nation who weathered the Great Depression, won World War II, stared down the Soviet Union, and rallied after 9/11.
Judging by what you read in the media or hear from political candidates, Americans have been raised like veal, bloodless, gutless, and only able to exist in air conditioned environments that are juuuust right.
It makes socks-and-sandals-wearing Europeans look like survivors.
***Can’t bear to read more? How about you listen to it? ***
Unemployment blipping up above 5% (that’s about half what it is in Paradise-on-Earth Europe)? A national catastrophe!
Gas at $4 — less than half of what Europeans have been used to shell out for decades? A harbinger of doom!
Pay a dollar more for a steak the size of a baseball mitt due to your green neighbors’ alternative fuel jalopy… and all those 300-pound behemoths wedging you in on the elevator cry like Eritrean kids down to their last grains of Unicef rice.
It’s embarrassing, really!
The main problem is that the national psyche seems to have stopped being able to cope with anything deviating from the mean.
If you have a real estate boom, people whine that they can’t afford the American Dream of owning a house. Have a real estate bust, and people complain that their real estate values are down. Of course, so are their purchase cost, property taxes, and insurance fees.
Subprime boom? People either fuss that the bankers are out for their blood or keeping the poor and indigent from getting loans. Subprime collapse? The same people sniffle that the bankruptcy of the bankers is due to lending too much money to the monetarily differently-abled.
A high dollar? Americans complain that their exports aren’t competitive. Low dollar? They cry that the greenback buys less French wine on vacation.
Gas at a buck? People whine that there are too many SUVs on the road. Gas at $4? Sobstories about suburban stay-at-home moms feeling the urge to take Daddy’s Prius to Whole Foods.
Oh the humanity!
Free money from the government? People complain they have to spend it on essentials… such as gasoline and paying off debt. And then fall for the first best stuffed suit who promises to take more money away from them, to give them some back eventually.
Consumer confidence, the least rational measure of an economy’s health, has once again been elevated into a gauge of the economy rather than of a nation’s mental state.
What the professional whiners have forgotten is that publicized self-pity is not just undignified but self-perpetuating.
The economy is what it is, and the supposed harbingers of the apocalypse are perfect opportunities to buckle up and exploit them to your advantage.
Stocks are cheap… Housing will be in a year.
And with a Democrat tax-and-spend government in the wings, you will have bigger drains on your livelihood than $4 per gallon of gas.
It’s time to get a grip.
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