Hate to Get All Competitive On You, But...

I'd like to talk today about a word that has increasingly become a swear word in 21st-century America, a troubling development indeed. I'd like to talk about the "c-word".

NO, not THAT "c-word"... I mean "competition".

America used to thrive on competition, but since the days of the Baby Boomers, we have become less reliant on competing for things and more okay with just having it handed to us. Hence, Little League games where they don't keep score, participation trophies for everyone, kids passed on through the school system because they "tried". Parents afraid to discipline their kids because Social Services will get called, or worse, because their kids will say they "hate" them. Thanks to a couple solid generations of this mentality, we now have a country where people (and the government) rack up debt at an alarming rate and they don't care about it, because if they go belly-up, they'll get bailed out. Panic alarms from overseas and the ongoing economic mess of the past 3 years have been the wake-up call for a lot of people to start thinking about changing their ways and no longer relying on hand-outs. Apparently, however, the "hand me everything" mentality is still hanging on for dear life.

First, we have a big controversy over the "Tiger Mother" book. If you haven't heard about this book, author Amy Chua writes about abandoning the brutal nature of parenting that was passed down to her from her Chinese ancestors. Some here in the U.S. think that we should be parenting our children like the Chinese, because of fears that the Chinese will overtake us as the world's superpower and eventually overtake our country, period. Never mind that it's the aforementioned debt we've racked up that may be the real reason behind that, not a matter of parenting. Anyway, Chua has been ripped all over the place for trying to make people believe that you don't have to be a machine, cranking out perfect-achieving automaton children. She backed off, and her kids are brilliant, thus proving you don't have to be a harsh taskmaster as a parent to have great kids. A good lesson for all parents, to be sure.

However, the mere presence of kids like Chua's sends other parents off the edge. These are the parents who believe that it is more the mean, cruel world out there that affects how their kids will turn out, and nothing to do with whether or not they actually do a good job of parenting (which usually leads them to do a lackluster job of parenting). These parents are wringing their hands over how competition for all the top honors that are out there is traumatizing their children. Don't want to hurt their self-esteem, after all. Although I have no problem at all with the parent who actually breaks from their contemporaries and doesn't try to schedule every minute of their kid's day (usually done so the parent can rid of the kid for a while and not have to, you know, PARENT), thus letting the kid play and do his own thing, you do have to make sure your kids get their homework done and get good grades. That IS your responsibility as a parent, so don't give me this "well, I don't want to put so much pressure on them, I want to let them be a kid" crap. Making sure your child does well in school does not mean they can't still be kids.

And as for all the pressure the kids put on themselves to make it into the elite colleges, part of letting your kid still be a kid is to tell them that it's okay to fail and it's okay to not bet your life on going Ivy. Ya know, not everyone has to make into Harvard. There are plenty of Susquehannas and LeMoynes that would love to have your kid and his 4.00+ GPA, and they might be less expensive, though not by much. And the degree will still get him or her a job. But speaking of education, part of this outrage over competitiveness comes from our education system. Whether it's "Race to the Top" or schools just trying to get off the "Watch List" for No Child Left Behind purposes, there are added pressures on teachers, so they ratchet up the pressure on the kids. So we are told. And when we blame the educational system for the problems of our kids, it's not too long until we start blaming... politicians.

I was standing in line at the 7-Eleven last semester... because it's the center of the social universe at my current graduate institution. Anyway, there was an irritated English grad student behind me, upset that the undergrads in his class had atrocious grammar and writing skills (and if you're hazy on the definition of "atrocious", maybe you're one of the undergrads in question). Anyway, he decided that the blame for this should be placed squarely on... Republicans. He stated that decades of neglect of the federal education system by presidents such as Reagan (who famously declared ketchup a vegetable) and Bush 43, who championed NCLB, created a nation of undereducated people. He noted that our education level peaked in the mid-to-late 1970s, right before the Reagan Revolution.

Perhaps I'm off-base here, but wasn't that also right about the time President Carter created the Department of Education? Sure this is now a sacred cow for the Left, and they love to ridicule people who advocate the elimination of the department (and as Mr. Krugman reminded us, ridicule is okay, but more lunacy from him later), but really, think about it, folks. If our education level went downhill right after federal standards and control replaced state standards and control, would it not make sense, both fiscally (there's that humongous national debt again) and logistically, to return control of education to the states? And if you are going to blame both Reagan and Bush 43 (although it was his work with the late Ted Kennedy that cemented NLCB, for which Bush was mercilessly excoriated by his own party) for our education problems, could it not be argued that they were just using the federal controls that Carter put in place? The primary argument against returning education to the states is the fact that right now our states are looking desperately for places to cut money, and the schools (both K-12 and state universities) seem to be the easiest place to cut money. However, we hear complaints all the time that NCLB isn't adequately funded to begin with, and soon enough when we are forced to take the draconian cuts we will have to make to balance our federal books, education will no doubt be one of the easiest places to start.

That is, of course, unless you are still in denial about the $14 trillion in red ink and what needs to be done about it... which brings us back to Mr. Nobel Prize Winner. Yes, I pick on Paul Krugman quite a lot, but the guy can't stop saying things that are beyond ridiculous, and the fact that they gave him a Nobel Prize makes me question not just our education system, but also Sweden's. Anyway, besides the fact that he said the solution to the recession should have been a Second New Deal and more quantitative easing... yeah, rack up trillions more in debt, and print money like there's no tomorrow... apparently his school never taught him about the Weimar Republic... he also decried competition in the economy. President Obama has launched a new challenge for competition as a method of driving an economic resurgence, which I think is perfect. But Krugman doesn't. He believes that emphasis on competition is part of the "failed ideology" that created our current economic problems. He, of course, would prefer more hand-outs, more giveaways, and more debt. Give me everything, I can't handle competition, it's bad for my self-esteem... as it is in education and parenting, so it goes for all aspects of our nation.

I'm surprised Krugman and his ilk didn't respond to President Obama's State of the Union challenge for America to "win the future" by saying, "That sounds a little too competitive... we don't want to put pressure on the nation to win something." Give me a break. Obviously, he didn't get where he did without competing to be the best at what he does (insert your own joke here), but on the whole, competition is bad. Sorry, competition is good. It's good for our kids and it's good for our economy... when done in moderation, of course. Merely throwing out "competition" as tantamount to an obscenity is tossing the baby with the bathwater. Oh, I really shouldn't have mentioned parenting failures there... now people will think that our pressure-filled society caused the baby to tossed...

And speaking of competition, it's time for my annual Super Bowl pick. Just a reminder that I have a lifetime record of 15-8 when picking the Big Game... and 4 of the 8 losses were courtesy of the Bills. I've gotten the last 5 in a row right. Looking at the Packers-Steelers matchup, it's very tempting to say that the Packers are too talented and have too good a quarterback in Aaron Rodgers. However, the Packers offense has been stifled by stout defenses all year long, needed a pick-6 and the Bears playing their 3rd-string QB to get to the Super Bowl, and you just don't bet against Ben Roethlisberger in the big game. Learned that the hard way as a Jets fan last week. Therefore (for entertainment purposes only), here's my pick: Steelers 20, Packers 13.

What to Do When Everyone Wants You to Lose

I am a Jets fan. I didn't realize this was going to make me or my team the subject of ridicule. I mean I'm used to that with my Mets, but that's because I live in Philadelphia and they have caused so much misery over the last 4 years that it's only natural to equate team and said misery. But the Jets? New York's 2nd favorite football team, that hasn't even sniffed a Super Bowl since 1969? Never thought this would happen.

But here we are, the Jets are about to play the New England Patriots in the playoffs, and by mere virtue of the matchup, it would appear that everyone outside of the metro New York City area is fully invested in rooting for, hoping for, and praying for the Jets to lose. Badly. Why? Because they trash talk. The coach likes to talk, the players like to talk. And nobody talks like the New York media, so now it really does feel like it's us against the world. Of course, the New York Post doesn't help much when their back page looks like the poster for friggin' "Return of the Jedi", complete with Belichick and co. in the role of the Evil Empire. This doesn't play well in the part of America that invented the use of "Evil Empire" to describe a sports franchise... one that happened to reside in NEW YORK.

The Jets didn't do themselves any favors by drawing the 6 seed in the AFC playoffs, meaning that a win over the Colts would send them to New England for the divisional round. I think the reseeding after the first round is silly anyway; if you're the top seed and you have home field advantage throughout the playoffs, that's enough of a reward, play the winner of the 4-5 game like you'd have to do in any other sport. Suffice to say, I REALLY did not want to face the Patriots, because all of New England is still laughing heartily over the Pats' 45-3 demolition of the Jets a few weeks ago. They are laughing heartily about Sal Alosi and his fine and suspension for tripping a Miami Dolphins special teams player... never mind that we found not long afterward that other teams just plain throw players into the bench if they run 10 yards out of bounds on kick coverage. It's the Jets, so throw the book at them and then laugh your ass off. They are definitely laughing about Rex Ryan's wife and the foot fetish videos. Some have talked about taking foam feet to the game on Sunday instead of the famous "we're number 1" foam fingers.

And why? Because Rex Ryan said he wouldn't kiss Bill Belichick's rings? Because he said the Jets were the best team in the playoffs, and that it was personal between him and Peyton Manning last week, and also between him and Belichick? Sorry, I know it's better if your coach is completely emotionless like Belichick is. Give me a break. I like Ryan, he makes things interesting. I don't want a dullard in a bad-fitting sweatshirt on my sideline, I want a guy whose appearance and demeanor actually says "fired up leader". And yeah, HBO's "Hard Knocks" created a certain image of the Jets, but that image was already there, and I liked what I saw of the series. But Jeebus, nobody was actively rooting for the Cincinnati Bengals to lose every game the year they did "Hard Knocks"... although we did all laugh about the fact that the Bengals seemed to put more players in jail that season than games in the win column.

So the Patriots and their coach just come off as bunch of glum automatons, led by Mr. I Married a Supermodel, Tom Brady. I mean this isn't the first go-around between these two franchises. Bill Parcells jumped from the Patriots to the Jets after he took the Pats to the Super Bowl in 1997. Belichick replaced Parcells as Jets head coach for all of one day, then he turned tail and ran to Foxborough. And of course, there was "SpyGate" a few years ago, when Belichick was found to have secretly taped Jets practices because of his grudge against former assistant-turned-Jets head coach Eric Mangini. Antonio Cromartie of the Jets launched his own verbal salvos the other day, saying "F--- Brady" and calling him an "a--hole." Hey, he wasn't saying anything Jets fans already feel.

Then again, it's not too difficult to make fun of Tom Brady. I mean his wife won't let him cut his hair, hence his opting for the "Justin Bieber" look at the beginning of the season. Of course now it's gotten so long it looks more like Jennifer Aniston's famous "Rachel" haircut. And the media fawn all over him like they do over Duke basketball, Notre Dame football, the New York Yankees, and Kobe Bryant's Lakers. And of course, the ladies swoon over him. God forbid Tim Tebow wins a Super Bowl, Brady may wonder where all of his adoration went when that happens. Yeah, the Jets haven't won anything in a long time, well we've had 40 years to get used to it... how are Patriots fans dealing with not having won a Super Bowl with their golden boy QB and master tactician of a coach since 2004? Apparently they're dealing with it by kicking us around.

So the Jets get ridiculed by all Patriots fans, they are hated by every woman who crushes on Tom Brady, really it seems to be a nationwide obsession by football fans here... I did not sign up for this when I became a Jets fan. I mean don't you actually have to win something every once in a while to deserve this type of hate? Usually such a dislike of a sports franchise is reserved for teams like... well, the Patriots. And yes, we do remember the shellacking we took, as if we really forgot like Pats fans think we have by the volume level coming from New York this week. I would say the confidence from the Jets players and coach right now more than makes up for the fact that I don't know any Jets fan who thinks we are going to win on Sunday. Seriously. I really fear getting taken behind the Woodhead... I mean wood shed again. Because then we'll NEVER hear the end of it, even if the Pats get knocked out by the Ravens in the AFC title game or taken down again in the Super Bowl.

Now I'm not gonna go as far as Baltimore Ravens LB Terrell Suggs did and claim that the Patriots' rings are tainted. People still complain about that "tuck rule" game as much as Democrats still complain about Bush v. Gore. They won 3 rings in 4 years... and that was several years ago. Apparently, the shelf life on disliking the Pats has ended and it's more fashionable to kick a franchise when it's down. That's fine; as I said, I'm used to it. At the beginning of the season, I compared this year's Jets to the 1986 Mets for their swagger, but late in the season I saw it playing out like a different Mets team... the 2007 edition. And when we lost to Miami the week after the New England debacle to fall to 9-4, all of a sudden you had the national media declaring that the Jets would completely implode, miss the playoffs, and that Rex Ryan might even lose his job. Seriously... whose Corn Flakes did we crap in to deserve this?

So what to do Sunday? Well, I'll watch the game, through the cracks between my fingers in the classic "I can't look... oh, maybe..." pose. I mean this is seriously what it's come down to... the reward for Rex and co. making Jets football watchable again and being in the playoffs every year is fearing complete annihilation and nationwide ridicule. It's enough to make me want to go back to being a Bills fan... no, wait. Nothing could make me do that.

Now let's go eat a god damn snack.

Tucson Postscript: Let He Who Is Without Sin...

According to a CBS poll, 57 percent of Americans believe that heated political rhetoric was not to blame for the tragic shooting in Arizona that killed 6 (including a federal judge and a 9-year old girl) and wounded many others, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. But we continue to see people proclaim that Sarah Palin and the Tea Party are to blame. I agree with Jon Stewart here in that our political rhetoric may not be the root cause of what Jamie Lee Loughner did, but this is a teachable moment for America and a time for us to stand down on the heated back-and-forth that passes for political discourse today.

Some are getting the lesson. Roger Ailes at Fox News issued a directive to his employees to back off and take it down a notch. Glenn Beck (as he does quite frequently) reminded us that violence is never the answer, and he challenged the media and politicians to rise above playing this tragedy for politics, stating, "America deserves bigger people." I already noted Keith Olbermann's apology. However, as I feared, Rush Limbaugh was all set to take this horrific event and use it for his own ends. He even went so far as to say that the Left was HOPING for something like this, because it will boost President Obama's poll numbers like President Clinton's after Oklahoma City. And as I expected, he warned of an impending crackdown on talk radio and our freedoms in general. Despicable. Plain and simple.

Also unfortunately, the people who rushed to judgment on Saturday continue to believe in what they decided in their own minds minutes after hearing the news. And they continue to believe that it is solely the Right who is responsible. Paul Krugman managed to put himself right on par with Limbaugh in terms of being despicable, stating unequivocally that only the Right is to blame, and that the Left is absolved because their rhetoric only serves to ridicule. I'm sorry, but WHAT? So it's okay for a liberal on the Daily Kos to post that Giffords was "dead to me" because she voted against Nancy Pelosi for Speaker of the House, it's okay for Joe Manchin to show guns in his campaign ads because he's a Democrat, and above all, it's okay to use the terms "whacko" or "teabagger" (a term used to describe a male who places his testicles in another person's mouth) to describe political opponents because it is only done for ridicule. Never mind what kind of response it may provoke. I mean when the Right says what it says, obviously anger is provoked, but when the Left hurls insults, well that's just ridicule. We're all having harmless fun, right?

As I said in my previous entry, I don't care if the incendiary rhetoric is more available from right-wing sources than left-wing sources. This is NOT the time for any kind of moral equivalence. Saying "I'm bad but they are far worse" is wrong, saying "they're bad and I'm not responsible at all" is even more wrong, and as I've said before it makes you a hypocrite. A large part of the reason for the anger on the Right is the endless belittling from elitists. Think about it: if I told you that you were stupid or "whacko" or worse day after day for years on end (particularly for the 8 years that your guy was in the White House), how long would it take for you to get VERY angry at me? Now do you see the cycle to which I was referring? Right is displeased with the way things are, says as much in their preferred manner (media, protest rallies, etc.). Left responds by calling Right "whackos" or stating that they have the IQ of rutabagas. Right gets angry, says as much. Insults from Left get worse. Right gets angrier. And so on. Switch the side that's in power and you may get the same result with names reversed.

So I will say it again: BOTH SIDES NEED TO CHILL. Understand I'm not playing "thought police" here and stating that the 1st Amendment right to make certain kinds of political statements should be limited in any sort of way. I'm saying that people need to understand that all divisive rhetoric has consequences, whether it's crosshairs on a political ad or a caustic Tweet asking if Sarah Palin will replace those crosshairs with a "body count". We all need to take a look at what we say, take a step back and think about what we might provoke. It has to be done voluntarily, obviously, but I'm encouraged that some of us are doing just that. I wish more would.

Break the Cycle

Sometimes I think our immediate media society is a little TOO immediate. It allows us to vent our immediate visceral reactions to things without taking the time to think about it and adopt a measured tone. While our elected officials are parsing their words and trying to be diplomatic, all thought of that is abandoned by Left and Right alike. Sadly, we now have a brand new Exhibit A of such an immediate visceral response.

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona was shot in the head by a deranged gunman who opened fire on not only the Congresswoman but practically anyone in the general area, killing 6 (including a child) and injuring 13 more. She was conducting a public event where she was meeting with her constituents at a Safeway, the kind of openness that we want to see from our elected officials. She's a Blue Dog Democrat, one of the few moderates left in our Congress, someone who sides with many of her fellow elected representatives from Arizona on border security issues. She had voted for the health care bill, but she also most recently suggested a pay cut for all House members as a first step toward fiscal sanity.

Let me put this right out there before I respond to the media's "first responders": NO public official should EVER have to fear for their safety when going out amongst their constituents. We shouldn't have to worry about whether our elected representatives need more or tighter security. Do we live in a climate of anger right now? You bet. There has been a general dislike of our president and our Congress since at least 2000 and maybe going back farther. But this is America, not Pakistan. Those who disapprove of the way things are in this country should NEVER resort to violence. PERIOD.

That being said, I should not only never have to log onto Twitter or other new media and immediately see a story about a member of the House of Representatives being shot, I should also never have to immediately see people leaping to political conclusions. It only took a matter of seconds after the Giffords story broke before the Left was screaming, "Sarah Palin! Look at her ad with the targets on the various Democrats!" And they were invoking Sharron Angle and her remark last year about "2nd Amendment remedies". Ever wonder where the phrase "knee-jerk liberal" comes from? This is it. See a news story, immediately go on the attack. Let's not wait for the facts to come out. Let's say all who oppose us are to blame. It was bad enough when people I know saw the story about the wastewater from hydrofracking and how it was causing problems in Pennsylvania and immediately blamed Republicans (when the outgoing governor of PA who green-lighted all this is a Democrat). This is a million times worse.

And when people (such as I) tried to point this out and settle them down, they listed the threats and the images of tea partiers with their guns and other incidents that spell out a willingness to state, "If the shoe fits..." Well, you know what, I DON'T CARE if the shoe fits. I am NOT going to make that leap. I am NOT going to rush to judgment. I am NOT going to think this is a "typical" Fox News viewing, Palin-following, tea partying conservative. My first public response to this tragedy? It was to tweet a message stating that anyone who IS making that rush to political judgment should be ashamed of themselves. And I'm not apologizing for that. It's one thing to admit that there is violent rhetoric in our politics today; that is all too true, and speaks to the fact that the anger is coming from BOTH sides. It's quite another to block the inflammatory statements of your own side from your mind and make what, in effect, are MORE inflammatory statements. IT DOESN'T HELP.

Having seen this initial burst of reaction, I tuned to MSNBC for a few minutes, and they had the local sheriff on, and when he ranted about the inflaming rhetoric on talk radio, I changed the channel. Great, I thought, even law enforcement is making the leap (to be fair, he later amended his statement to include "some on TV", at least giving a hint that he wasn't only going after conservatives). I tried Fox but they weren't much better... if a Congresswoman is in the hospital fighting for her life, shouldn't you show a LITTLE bit more respect than referring to her in your graphics as "Gabby"? So it was over to CNN, which wasn't doing that good a job either... they were relying on the reports of an affiliate with the unfortunate call letters KGUN, and they were continuing to run their normal crawl at the bottom of the screen, which included such inappropriate announcements as "Eminem to Star in 'Random Acts of Violence'." So I guess the broadcast media, while slightly more measured in tone, aren't necessarily that much of an improvement in terms of message. Those who were closest to the situation, those in Arizona, actually were most likely to say "I don't want to talk politics right now." The ones who may have been most emotionally rocked were saying that. Think about that.

Luckily, they got the gunman right away, Giffords is out of surgery, and doctors are optimistic about her recovering, which we all should be. So after all this speculation about what we THINK we know, what DO we actually know as of 8PM Eastern Standard Time? Well, this moron who allegedly shot Giffords is about a burger shy of a happy meal, posting a YouTube video about a new currency, brainwashing and mind control, and railing against "non-English speakers". And he apparently yelled something before opening fire but we don't know what that is. And he left a rambling "goodbye" message that said "don't be mad at me". A true nutjob if ever there was one. And apparently, he didn't act alone, so there is another suspect on the loose. But now we see (and will see) attempts to generalize and paint way too many individuals with the same brush of lunacy.

It's a cycle that has been spiraling downward for years now. The Left blames the Right and talk radio and so on. The Right will yell, "You can't shut up talk radio", cry 1st Amendment (how painfully ironic that Rep. Giffords read the 1st Amendment the other day during the reading of the Constitution on the House floor), and get more angry about attempts to "silence" them. And the cycle will continue and get worse. And all the while, those who decide to make immediate political grist of this attack will fail to see it for what it truly is: a tragedy. One that should never happen in this country to ANY elected official.

I worry about what we'll see and hear on Monday, as the regular originators of the rhetoric come back from the weekend and make their statements. To their credit, some of them have already spoken. After reading that Keith Olbermann was doing a special episode of his show tonight and that we would be shocked by his conclusions, I was moved to do the unthinkable: watch his show... particularly while my Jets were playing a playoff game. Although he did spend a lot of his show talking about the Palin "target" ad and Angle's statement, and he took the obligatory potshots at Beck and O'Reilly, when he said that those who utter the type of rhetoric that may incite violence need to repudiate that rhetoric... he included himself, apologizing for anything he has said in the past that could have led to violence. I read Rachel Maddow's response (which was very similar to what I am saying here about rushing to judgment) and did another unthinkable thing: I retweeted her. Will Limbaugh and Hannity take the same stand on Monday? Let's face it, a lot of the stuff that Limbaugh says is likely said just to get a rise out of the Left, to get them angry, and a lot of the time, he gets the desired reaction. I sincerely hope he does not choose to do that again on Monday. Worse yet, the local tea party head in Tucson just said that she doesn't see a need for this kind of rhetoric to stop.

Ultimately, both the Left and the Right need to take it down a notch. I don't care that these violent incidents are usually aimed at progressives and government. Again, I DON'T CARE. BOTH SIDES NEED TO CHILL. I don't want to hear about who is at fault or how unequally; to make such attacks is not only ignorant of the complete picture, it makes you a hypocrite. Although the Washington Post's Eugene Robinson (on Olbermann's show) started to go down that road, he backtracked, said we all need to look in the mirror, and try to break the cycle, although it may be very difficult to break the cycle. Our new Speaker of the House, John Boehner, sounded the appropriate tone when he stated that an attack on one elected official is an attack on all. And that should be our first reaction, that a member of one of our great institutions has been shot and critically wounded. Not "she's a Democrat, this HAD to be a tea partier!" Too many people have it as gut instinct now to make that sort of leap any time a news story comes out. I don't make that leap. I wish Rep. Giffords well and hope she can recover from her injuries.

Our National Temper Tantrum

Who would have thought that the symbol of our nation's current discontent would be a 19-year old college freshman and his father. But no better metaphor could be available than the case of Penn State quarterback Rob Boldin and his dad, Robert Sr.

Boldin surprised many by being named the Nittany Lions' starting QB at the beginning of the season as a true freshman. Anyone familiar with Joe Paterno and his football program knows that freshmen rarely get to play at Penn State and even more rarely get to start. True freshmen playing is even more crazy. But the octogenarian patriarch of Penn State football handed the keys to Boldin because he was the best guy for the job. Well, Boldin struggled, as freshmen do, but he kept the starting job until suffering a concussion in the Lions' 8th game of the season. When he came back, he was shaky and finally replaced by walk-on Matt McGloin, who led a dramatic 2nd-half comeback to beat Northwestern. Well, a walk-on who becomes the starting QB makes for good copy, and so it was that Boldin became the forgotten man while McGloin led PSU to the Hall of Fame Bowl (yes, I know it's called the Outback Bowl, but I don't recognize corporate titles for bowl games). Then, McGloin threw 5 interceptions in the game, leading to a loss to Florida. joePa never turned to Boldin to bail his team out.

According to Boldin Senior, this was the last straw, and he immediately announced his son was transferring. Are you having the same reaction that I had to that announcement? My initial reaction was, "WAHHHHHHHH... Coach wouldn't play me so I'm leaving, WAHHHHHH!!!" Yeah, two Robert Boldins, one temper tantrum. Not even caring that Boldin could win the starting job back next spring and keep it for 3 more years, they didn't get what they wanted so they want out. Well, JoePa has the final say over such matters and he put his foot down and said, "NO. You don't get a transfer." Stay in State College and deal with it. Maybe you might learn some life lessons, like the thousands of other kids who toughed it out and stuck with Paterno for four years.

That's what is happening all across America right now, and especially in Washington as the new Congress takes office. First of all, rather than actually get right to work on our debt issues or putting people back to work, the first major vote taken by the new GOP House will be to repeal the health care bill passed last year. Even though it has NO chance of passing the Senate or being signed by the president. All it will do is cause the Left to throw their own tantrum, waste time that could be spent fixing problems with the bill, and make future efforts to do just that unworkable, because the Left will throw such a tantrum over this original bill that they won't sign onto common-sense legislation about it. We have Senators Wyden and Brown trying to come up with a bipartisan fix in the Senate and this repeal vote will either mean that this fix won't see the light of day in the House or worse it won't see the light of day in the Senate because Harry Reid will be so angry over the repeal vote that he declares that there will be NO future action on health care in the 112th Congress. Way to go, Tea Party. Enjoy your tantrum.

Meanwhile, you have a tantrum-within-a-tantrum in the form of Rep. Michelle Bachmann of Minnesota. She made herself a bit of a kingmaker by latching onto the Tea Party vibe during the midterm elections last year, and she expected to be handsomely rewarded for it in the form of a committee assignment or leadership post. She didn't get them, and now she is throwing her own temper tantrum and threatening to use her standing among the Tea Party Caucus to block her own party from doing anything constructive. I had warned that this could happen when I did my election recap, but I didn't think it would come from such a wig-out as this. Well, maybe it will subside now that she has been tapped for the House Intelligence Committee; the squeaky wheel gets the grease, right?

But even this pales in comparison with the nationwide tantrum that the Baby Boomers are having, and will continue to have in the coming years. After having things handed to them their entire life, they were hoping to sail into retirement with comfortable pensions or Social Security, and the recent economic troubles have soured the deal for them. Hence, why so many of them got especially angry about things in the last few years. But even worse than the fact that they will have to keep working is the fact that they see the mounting debt and they realize what it will do to their way of life. And as the Baby Boomers go, so goes America. We want to get rid of the $14 trillion debt but we don't want any of the solutions that would best fix that problem. Don't touch my programs and don't even THINK about raising my taxes. Raise the rich's taxes, that'll fix things, but don't raise mine. Never mind that last I looked, there are a heckuva lot of "rich" Baby Boomers out there making over $250K a year.

Nevertheless, a recent poll (although it's from Vanity Fair, so consider the source) stated that 60 percent of Americans want the debt paid off by soaking the rich. 20 percent want defense spending cut, but that was probably the peaceniks talking there, so I doubt it was really about fixing the debt. Very small percentages wanted anything to be done to Medicare and Social Security. Meanwhile, the British made another tough choice this week by raising their VAT tax, affecting everyone. Our politicians don't have the stomach to make a move like that which will affect the non-rich, we can't ask people to sacrifice because we might lose reelection. Now don't get me wrong, I am in principle against the VAT tax, precisely because of a situation like this where it becomes another lever to pull for revenue, but increasing the taxes we DO have seems to be a nonstarter for deficit hawks.

If we ever get around to working together as a country to fix our economy and make sure that those who want to retire can have the means to do so and make sure that we don't default on our debt or become property of the People's Republic of China, hard decisions will need to be made. Sacrifices will need to be made. You better start getting used to the sound of that, because it's our only way out. Tea Party Congressmen say they want to chuck farm subsidies, slashing $20 billion from our budget annually. That's a good start (although a couple of the ones who were farmers and accepted those subsidies had to swallow hard a bit). I hope when the pedal hits the metal, the president and the Congress can figure out real ways to fix the tax code and the spending structure of Washington to get our house in order.

But until then, we have to act like parents who just sent our screaming little children off to sit in the corner for a while. Let them sit in "time out" until they get this tantrum out of their system, then maybe we can start getting somewhere.