Rainy reason to look back more than a year...

A lot of what was said about the governmental response to the Gulf Coast aftermath was way off base. Rush Limbaugh is correct in saying an, "entitlement mentality" spurred the chaos of flooded New Orleans. But, in my opinion the problem goes even deeper. Diana West wrote a piece last year extolling the virtues of our forefather's work ethic. And it has given me pause to wonder. Just imagine a hearty soul during our country's great push westward, and the toil and strife he was met with during that journey. Much of that hardship would have been courtesy of good ol' Mother Nature. Now, it does not take much to realize that governmental handouts would have been nowhere to be found. There would have been no local office with a placard out front reading, "Social Security Administration", or "Department of Unemployment Benefits". On the other hand there are plenty of people today who could not imagine life without these offices and many others. Which in some minds provide care and comfort wrapped in a warm fuzzy feeling of being cared for in a way only a huge, over-bloated, down-right, obnoxious bureaucracy can provide. I fear there may be no boot straps to be pulled upward in a lot of cases. Where is the hearty soul, has it been drown in a pool of subsidized medicine? Where is our pioneer spirit, our tough exterior? Has it been it been washed away with cleansing death of a masculine mystique? Just a thought while I survive an evening of a howling Nor'easter.