True the economy is bad, oil prices are up, but so what?, you just have to work harder and smarter and stop complaining.
Lets take a peek at the real world. Using pre Boskin Commission inflation, this whole decade has been in a recession. Unemployment: <IMG SRC=http://bigpicture.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/07/04/employment_marginal.png> Red line is U3 - what the media reports and has been altered over the years to remove groups to make it look pretty. Purple line is U6 which is more relevant to today's economy as outsourced jobs means people have to work part time but are available and looking for full time work. Then there's: Employers use federal law to deny benefits If your health care provider denies you coverage yet you've paid for it, then your just another victim on Michael Moore's site. Of course you could just die in the waiting room while no one bothers. Lets not forget the best marketing line ever: America is the greatest country in the world.
Many countries are great, many are ordinary, many are horrible, and some are criminal. America's greatness is derived from the duality of it being a CONSTITUTIONAL DEMOCRACY, and an ORGANIC and ADAPTABLE NATION (not staying static, but rather, rising to new challenges and solving new problems with flexible approaches). America is greatest when it has great leaders who recognize that the constitution governs their actions, they have the best interests of the American people in mind, act in logical ways to further those interests, and when elected leaders fear those who elected them, and not vice-versa. We all have our opinions about politics, but I feel as if the Bush II Administration has truly butchered many of the principles we hold so sacred, and made us feel less great, but I know we will return once again to greatness, regardless of who is elected in the future, because we are a dynamic and progressive democracy. America can only be corrupted for short bursts. Those who corrupted it for those short bursts will be swept aside, forcefully or quietly, while the next generation of true leaders emerges.