PrintJuly 8, 2010
By this time tomorrow, it's a safe bet that tens of millions of Americans (conservatively speaking) will know which team LeBron James has decided to sign with. Millions more will be up-to-speed on the jail sentence for Lindsay Lohan and what her finger painting prowess will get her. I can only imagine how crowded the Twitter airwaves must be today, as these are life-changing events that demand immediate attention, aren't they?
This brings to the surface one of the saddest aspects of our society: While millions devote hours to the social activities of our most-famous celebs; while millions more hang on every word muttered and watch every video shown on TMZ, we can't seem to persuade the majority of them to pay a moment's attention to the fact that our country is hurtling towards the black hole of economic ruin. We can't get them to understand the ramifications of "deemed" legislation. They couldn't care less about border security, unless it meant the possibility that their cell phone service could be disrupted by the throngs of illegals trampling relay towers.
Why is it that so many folks can name the last seven American Idol winners, yet they aren't even aware that our government is spending without a budget for the first time. Why is it that when Paris Hilton takes a new beau, the world knows his name within 24 hours, yet when the President recess appoints a radical ideologue to the Medicare/Medicaid post, skipping the Senate confirmation process, nobody seems to care?
While recognizing the importance of distractions to maintain some semblance of sanity, it would behoove us to put these into perspective and base our daily knowledge input on what is truly important...the honest-to-goodness, life-changing events that occur each day.
Perhaps we need to discover new ways to communicate these issues to the masses? For example: "Oil drilling moratorium in Gulf forces companies to cease manufacturing of oil-based consumer products such as cell phones, Ipods, Ipads and Xbox games, due to the exorbitant costs associated with the delivery of refined oil." I'd be willing to bet that this would generate a couple Twitter messages!
