www.thepublicreader.com     |   home
STORY NICHE   |   Neverland   |   Photographs   |   The neighborhood eight and A. jones   |   nightsounds   |   Saved by Mr. F. Scott Fitzgerald   |   Downhill Lovers-A fifties cop story   |   The Loneliness of the Late-Night Donut Shop   |   bridge from a snowy place   |   :   |   A NOVELETTE   |   An Eternity Together: A Romantic Fantasy   |   Part I   |   Part II   |   Part III   |   Part IV   |   Part V   |   Part VI   |   :   |   POETRY   |   Lost In War   |   The Soldier   |   Babe's Ghost, a poem by Jerry Vilhotti   |   Devious Ways   |   One Crazy Thing   |   Holy Winds   |   Painless Poetry   |   :   |   CHILDREN'S TALES   |   the ring   |   whiffers   |   Farmhouse Fables   |   a special creation   |   Aesop's Fables   |   Bedtime-Story   |   :   |   INTERACTIVE-HANDS ON CHILDREN'S STORIES   |   Bones   |   Sad Samantha, The Sparrow   |   :   |   ESSAYS   |   On The Road Again   |   Baseball, I Love It   |   Retirement Plans   |   Hometown-an essay   |   a retired man's period of adjustment   |   :   |   ART   |   American art by American artists   |   :   |   THE PUBLIC READERS PUBLIC SQUARE   |   :   |   AMERICAN CULTURAL HISTORY, THE TWENTIETH CENTURY   |   DECADE BY DECADE FROM KINGWOOD COLLEGE LIBRARY   |   The Sixties   |   The Fifties   |   The Forties   |   The Thirties   |   The Twenties   |   1910-1919   |   1900-1909   |   :   |   DIVERSIONS   |   Best from the pages of   |   A Book Review   |   Chess   |   Crosswords   |   Daily Computer Tips   |   Ethics and Morals   |   Friends of The Public Reader   |   Game Page   |   What is Haiku?   |   Hazel's Corner   |   Heroes   |   Humor   |   Joe Ditzel, comedian   |   Keith's Page   |   Lazy Gardening   |   Let me think about this   |   Links to sites you'll enjoy   |   A Little Shakespeare   |   Nostalgia   |   Are you good at PUZZLES?   |   Quotations I like   |   The Radio Page   |   Recipes   |   Singleminded   |   Sleep and Dreams   |   Submissions
THE PUBLIC READERS PUBLIC SQUARE

ARE WE A NATION OF WHINERS?
By Jim Kittelberger

Do we know how fortunate we are?

Fortunate in that we were born in a country that allows us to pursue whatever we desire.   Be it riches or just the desire to be left alone.  All because two hundred and twenty five years ago some rich white men thought their taxes were too high.  Now rich white men still worry that their taxes are too high, but somehow I can't see that flat tax guy or the Windows guy in Seattle or The Donald in New York willingly risking their fortunes and lives for a principal.

We who are born in America take our freedom for granted and seldom reflect on a time when miracles took place on our continent of North America.  From 1776 to 1788, a country was established and laws were enacted by a collection of men whom the term, imbued with greatness, would be an understatement.

It was indeed a miracle.  I believe no other word adequately describes the caliber of men who guided our country into existence.  They won a war that logically they could not win.  They then set about framing our constitution and a bill of rights that spelled out the limits of government and the peoples rights under that government, that still exists almost unchanged over two hundred years later.  These were well-to-do men who certainly were comfortable who risked it all and then forged so ingeniously these documents that are more, or at least as relevant today than they were then.  

So listen up you whiners out there.  Get up off your complaining hindquarters, and if you can't think of anything right about the world today, at least remember how lucky you are to be in a country that will put up with the whining.  And will probably, pro bono, find you a group that will fortify what you knew all along, that somebody else is responsible for your unhappiness.  Aren't they always?  Have a nice day.