The images from Cairo are disturbing as thousands take to the streets to protest.They're protesting a faltering economy. They are protesting poverty. They are protesting a non-responsive government that is ignoring their pleas for stability.
The situation worsens as Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak shuffles his feet, making superficial changes to his government to try to appease the protesters while not realizing that he is the problem.
The rioting and protests in Egypt should serve warning to U.S. leaders, who don't seem to have a very good handle on what is taking place here.
We have huge unemployment. We have a shattered economy. We have a non-responsive government that drifts farther and farther away from reality with each passing day.
The unrest in Egypt? Don't kid yourself, it can happen here.
All it will take is a blunder of some kind during the dog days of summer when tempers comingle with the heat in a dangerous, volatile soup of discontent.
It could be a bum arrest on an inner-city street. It could be a cracker gone over the edge. It could be political debate gone awry, but the finger is on the trigger in America and there is a frightening chance it can be pulled.
We saw, just before Christmas, how Congress strung out the American unemployed, using them as a political chit, refusing to approve additional emergency unemployment funds until the last minute before the holiday recess. We see now a Congress intent on repealing a health care reform bill. Why? Because it could add to the national debt which is, admitedly, out of control. But, instead of making cuts to the precious earmarks so beloved by our leaders, they want to implode a system of safety nets put together to ensure the health and welfare of our people.
The distance between rich and poor continues to grow. The rich, insulated and protected -- for the time being -- don't quite get it. Sure, their paychecks may not have expanded with the same regularity and predictability of the past, but, they're still doing OK. They can make the mortgage payment, can trade in the family wheels for a new car, can put their kids through school. The poor? Many have lost their homes. They baby the old clunker along, hoping to get another 100,000 miles out of it. College? They do the very best they can and are silently ashamed that they can't provide for their kids like their parents did for them.
At some point, it could all boil over.
People are learning that corporate America has little interest in their welfare. It's the profit margin, the year-over-year comparison that matters, not the people who have put in long, hard years of effort. Instead, loyal employees become unwitting targets because they have worked long enough to earn a salary at the upper end of the company pay scale. Get rid of them, hire some kid out of school as a replacement and the bottom line looks better. More money for the money machine.
The loyalty dies off when jobs are shifted overseas. Wrap your arms around this. A mining company in this country can dig for ore and ship it overseas to be refined, then have it shipped back here for sale and make more money than hiring Americans to do the work. Why is there no tariff on these companies that are adding to the economic misery of so many? It would be one way to level the playing field.
How long before the bile chokes in our throats, the frustration overflows from our hearts and the anger spills out unrestrained?
Take a good look at what's going down in Cairo.
It could happen here.
