LOOKING FOR WORK IN AMERICA

Some of us started working as kids over half a century ago. We worked and earned our way through college without trust funds, allowances, or gifts. The campus was for learning, not partying. So the other day when the President told students in Richmond, Virginia, to "Hit the books!" I thought "It's a start."

Back in the 1950s and 1960s, with our nation at war, some of us signed up with the military, and even stayed in beyond our "obligated service." So I have a problem today when most upper class and middle class kids see no purpose for themselves in national service.

Now that the earned benefits from my lifetime of labor - social security and medicare - play a major part in my security for the declining years of life,
I get pretty angry at politicians who attack them as "costly entitlements."

Time was when the credentials I had gained through education and experience could help me find new work when an employer eliminated my position, or when I saw a better career path. I overcame such job crises in 1968, 1971, and 1977.

In recent months I wrote in a blog that "Hard work and hope" were essential in digging out of today's jobs crisis. Today it is only getting tougher for at least
14 million Americans who cannot find any work. Having been unemployed, but never filing for jobless benefits, I have some feeling for the daily depression that can overwhelm the long-term job seeker.

The President went before a joint session at the Capitol last Thursday with a legislative proposal he calls the Jobs Bill. Now that Congress is back in Washington after more than a month away I hope that finally they will get to work and pass something for those without a job.

CAN WE LEARN ANYTHING NEW?

Watching a little television on a Sunday night in May I was assaulted by the commercial advertising my son-in-law sells. A previous show on PBS from Great Britain had entertained us, uninterrupted, with a drama titled "South Riding" It was a masterpiece.

Then, wanting to watch Horatio Caine's final episode of the season on "CSI: Miami," we sat through more than a dozen loud commercial pitches for our attention, before a wounded Lieutenant Caine was left on the ground to endure the long summer break.

Circuses and Bread. TV, professional sports all the time, and pizza everywhere. The American Empire declines, while we watch passively.

Around my house I have books, magazines, newspapers, several musical instruments, and a collection of LP records, cassettes, and CDs. Shutting off the television provides time to read, enjoy music, think, talk, write letters, essays, and poems.

This past week has marked a milestone in American history. Our terrorist enemy number one, Bin Laden, has been killed by a commando team after a ten-year hunt. President Obama has just reported why and how it was done.

I am taken back over my lifetime of listening to Presidents. Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George Bush, and George W. Bush. From the White House our Presidents have spoken to us about war, sacrifice, and the defeat of America's enemies. But a couple are still out there, in Cuba and Korea.

It was during the Korean War that I first put on a military uniform, and it was during the energy crisis of Jimmy Carter that I took it off. I went to GTMO with the Navy four times, before it became an off-shore prison where United States civil and military regulations were adjusted.

What have we learned about war, peace, and freedom in seventy five years?
Do the religions of our forebears instruct us?
What are we teaching our children today?
Perhaps it is "Do not kill, steal, or bear false witness."

This week, as we reflect on what just happened in Pakistan, it can be a time to ask where should America be headed in this world. Who is our neighbor? And how can we be of service?