DISCOURAGED BUT HOPEFUL

Tonight the President speaks to the State of the Union. SOTU it's being called.  Next Tuesday the DFL Party caucuses all over Minnesota.  So it's time to take stock of where we are in this governing business. 

A pundit from the NY Times declares today that our policy has failed in Egypt.  A cartoonist in the local daily shows Uncle Sam hapless in the face of horrific suffering in Syria.  Economic inequality and a lack of upward mobility are dragging many of us backward in this young 21st century. 
A book on my shelf is titled "When Corporations Rule the World," and I tend to agree that much of the time this is true. Money, BIG money, not only talks, but shouts its demands of us. The causes of  "malaise" are many, and I am discouraged as I write this.

Today we mourn the death of folksinger Pete Seeger.  He was 94: sixteen years my senior.  He greatly inspired many of us with his passion, his melodies, and his words.  Freedom, justice, equality, and peace.  We know the tunes.  We know the message and the promise.  As was said to us at my Dad's funeral, "Now we must do the singing."  And the marching and the believing... again!