Worry...it's why we have to

By Norman E. Hooben

When I was a young guy and didn’t know much about world affairs, a friend of mine had a fascination with a humor magazine of the times.  The cover always displayed a character by the name of Alfred E. Neuman…and usually with the words Alfred was most recognized with, “What, me, worry?”  I suppose that I never learned what it was that he was never worried about, nor was I a subscriber to the magazine (actually I would have called it a ‘comic book’) but my friend always had a copy and would comment about the latest shenanigans of Alfred E. Neuman, the guy who never worried.  Alfred always appeared happy; that in contrast to the magazine’s “Mad” title.   Whether that’s an oxymoron or juxtaposition, or both, it doesn’t matter.  Here we have a happy guy in a mad magazine so I’ll leave it at that.

What, me, worry?  Yes, ‘me’, worry!  I worry now about world affairs, I worry about my family, I worry about my friends, but for the most part, I worry about my country. 
I worry about the world.  Did you know that the world is in so much debt it can never be repaid?  The total amount of debt around the globe has now hit a staggering 152 trillion dollars!  The world’s banks are about to collapse and the average voter has no clue.
Back in the day of no worry, the wars were over (WW II and the Korean War), the economy was good, I had my first real job (big bucks in those days, one-hundred dollars a week!), I bought my first car (it was only five years old and cost $350.00 compared to today a five year old used car measures in the thousands…oh, less I forget, I made payments for almost a year!), and politics seemed like a happy occasion to have a good time.  Every few years the guy running for mayor had a big to-do down at the city hall parking lot where there were live bands and ridiculous speeches which I half listened to (meeting friends and a potential girlfriend was much more interesting). 

Today is different.  I worry!

I worry about the guy in the White House who never should have been there.  I worry about the people (politicians) who allowed it to happen.  The crooked politics that may have been simmering in the background for years have exploded into a bad new world of graft and corruption that I don’t believe ever existed in our country (some would say the Teapot Dome Scandal in the ‘20s and/or Watergate in the ‘70s were worse, but those cannot compare to what is happening now.)  I worry about the people who unknowingly voted for these rascals and continue to do so out of ignorance of what is really happening.  They’re the die-hard party members, both Democrats and Republicans. 

When will I stop worrying?  When Barack Hussein Obama, Hillary Rodham Clinton, John F. Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and all their ilk are sitting behind bars and both Houses of Congress is filled with red-blooded American patriots without the ‘D’ or an ‘R’ following their names.  For it was our 2^nd President John Adams who said it best when he wrote in 1789, “There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.” 

It goes without saying, we are currently a nation divided…I worry about the greatest political evil under our Constitution; the Democrat and Republican parties!

~ Norman E. Hooben