Place of Refuge

Place of Refuge

11 July 2011

Casey Anthony, Betty Ford, and Barack Obama

I have to do this:



For the past week, I have been visiting family
which has meant I have watched a heck of a lot more television
than I usually do.
The week began with coverage of
the Casey Anthony verdict -
 I actually had very little knowledge of this trial
until this week.

I guess I'm one of very few in the U.S.A. who can say that.



So, the verdict is in;
we know what it is;
folks are angry,
lots of folks have an opinion,
and lots of folks are looking for ways
to continue to make money
off of this sad case --

On the day the verdict came in,
I vowed to not say a thing on this blog
about Casey Anthony,
because
I figured every blogger in the USA
would have something to say about it.




( please see Yahoo News
for the source of this photo & obituary )

Then,
Betty Ford died.



And today,
Barak Obama held an unusual Sunday meeting
to try to keep the U.S. government
from going into default.
No decisions were made --
the government is still divided,
and can't seem to find a way
to set aside differences and realize
exactly what is at stake.

U.S.Debt Clock

~ ~ ~

I did Google searches on all three topics,
and found that there is much more being written 
still
on Casey Anthony
then there is on
Betty Ford,
a very dignified woman who had the nerve to admit her shortcomings.
As one British newspaper article I read said, if given the chance,
Betty Ford may have been a better president
than her husband was.
-- May she rest in peace -- 

And the Anthony case may also surpass the U. S. economy
on the amount of media attention it continues to receive.

This leads me to form the hypothesis that
the American public is probably more informed on the sundry details
of a very sad murder
and a case of very poor and irresponsible parenting
than it is on their economy.

As a professional educator
in higher education in the U.S. of A.
who every year meets a new crop
of the children of the average American public,
I would venture to say that most citizens here
really do not understand
the crisis the government is in,
yet,
some have the nerve
to criticize the work of our own president,
who after a mere two years has not been able
to clean up the mess he inherited
from about 50 years (or more)
of increasingly irresponsible
government spending.


But ask most Americans about Casey Anthony,
and you will get a very informed opinion.



You know,
even a search on
"duct tape"
brings up,
first and foremost,
a number of entries
about Casey Anthony.


In fact,
I'm willing to bet that I will get quite a few hits on this blog
simply because I wrote something with
Casey Anthony's name in the title.

Let's see if I'm right.



I'm only modestly sorry
if you came to this blog to read
more dirt
on Casey Anthony,
because I'm not going to give it to you.
But I would suggest you
do a search on
the U.S. deficit,
or something else
that probably has a heck of a lot more relevance
to your own life.
And when you do that search,
please make sure you read about 10 articles
from a wide range of sources -
or read at least as many sources as you have read
about Casey Anthony,
and use the same amount of care you are taking
to form your opinion on what to do
with Casey Anthony
to form your opinion about that deficit
and the best way to support our government
so we can solve it,
rationally,
and with respect for every American,
whether we agree with them or not
 .
 .
 .
.
.

2 comments:

Billy Joe said...

Like the way you put this all together. We stopped watching tv a few months ago. Life is so much better now. We watch movies and documentaries. Gosh, have you seen 'Encounters at the End of the World', a great documentary by Werner Herzog.

I appreciate your comments at my blog.

Billy

HK Stewart said...

I agree. Thanks for the post.

H. K.