Cliff Dwelling

As we look ahead on the road to the future, there is an enormous pile of cans in the way. These are all the cans that president Obama kicked down the road so that they could be dealt with after the election. There is the problem of a nuclear armed Iran. Four years ago, there was time for negotiations without conditions. Now, the time to act to stop a nuclear Iran is measured in weeks rather than years. There is the expiration to the current tax rates. These will jump in five weeks and, while there is much talk about how everyone wants a deal, there is no agreement in sight. There is the automatic sequestration of spending that will gut the defense budget and cut other programs substantially as well. These cuts were designed to hurt key constituencies rather than to rationally reduce federal spending. Here too, there is talk of a deal, but no indication that one will be forthcoming. Then there is the issue of the implementation of Obamacare. We know that starting relatively soon, millions of workers will lose their health insurance as the law that was supposedly going to guarantee everyone coverage goes into effect. No one is even talking about how to deal with the regressive aspects of Obamacare. It is perhaps, a can too far. On top of all this, there is the looming deadline for withdrawal from Afghanistan. The plan is for the Afghans to take over their own defense, but American forces are still not even going on joint missions with the Afghan forces. At some point, a decision is needed on how to deal with the likely inability of Afghan forces to maintain control without an American presence.

There are other cliffs we are about to fall over and other cans to be reached. For all the campaigning that went on for the last two years, there is precious little told to us all about how Obama will handle this mess. Indeed, with all this about to happen, perhaps the best summary of the situation is to quote Obama's long time pastor, Rev. Wright: "America's chickens are coming home to roost."