Things Ain’t Working Out For You. Here’s Why

BY LOUIE OVERSTREET

We now know the 47th POTUS plans to lord over America by administrative fiat. If you are uninformed or lack means, then sadly things will not be working out for you. 

If you are questioning what makes me qualified to speak of the harm caused by being nescient and why poverty is often a generational affliction, here is my answer. No one has proven me wrong, since I first started writing about these subjects 45 years ago for the Anchorage Times, during my days in Alaska. 

Without the fear of contradiction, I can state that clueless and/or poverty-stricken people are going to be hit with the realization that no improvement in their lives will occur, despite campaign promises to the contrary. Given that their conditions will worsen, the question becomes: what will they do? 

Not even my momma would consider me to be a William Shakespeare. Thus, I can only paraphrase him by stating that, if past is prologue, then they ain’t gonna do squat. 

Learning from history has never been uninformed Americans’ strong suit. History records that there are seven primary reasons empires fail, either singularly or in combination. I would suggest that there is ample evidence of the existence of at least three reasons in present day America. Namely, climate change, economic inequities, and internal decay. 

The lack of attention to climate change could prove to be the most ruinous in the future, but this assumes we have a future. Thus, our gross economic disparities — such as unsustainable practices and internal decay to include political corruption leading to the lack of social cohesion — are strong indicators the American experiment in democracy could well fail. 

Given the current political makeup of the three branches of government — particularly the Supreme Court — and since uniformed and poor folks will continue to behave as they do, American democracy may well find itself on the extinction list alongside the dodo bird, woolly mammoth, and saber-toothed cat.