J. D. Pendry

Looks like I’m not an Average-American.  Whether I’m above or below the mean is debatable.  Each time I hear the news, or look at the Internet some pundit person or pollster tells me what Average-American thinks.  It’s odd how my thinking always falls into the group that doesn’t think as Average-American does.  So, I can only conclude that I am the Below Average-American.  Either that or some entities are working extra hard to convince me of it.

For example, I think the economy is in great shape.  Best in my lifetime.  My retirement account is a crankin’ and there’s no Internet bubble to pop and suck the life from it.  Yet, each day I hear that Average-American believes the economy is a wreck.  Rather makes me feel guilty that my middle-classed hillbilly self thinks it’s doing OK.  It makes me pine for the good old Carter days of gas lines, 7.6 percent unemployment, 20 percent interest and 13 percent inflation.  Where the solution offered for our problems was turn down the thermostat and put on a sweater. Average-American doesn’t believe the war in Iraq is going well either.  He hears the daily casualty count.  He knows how many car bombs went off in Baghdad.  He knows that a dozen politicians a day call the President an incompetent liar and demands the resignations of all of his cabinet.  He hears about the Soldiers that committed acts of stupidity and got themselves into serious trouble.  He knows that it must be bad when CNN decides to show terrorist propaganda and call it news.  After a daily dose of that for several years, what else could we expect Average-American to believe?It’s a tragic event when any Soldier is injured or loses his life.  It’s sadder still when the people who control information that gets to Average-American can’t take the time to tell him or her what those Soldiers accomplished for their sacrifice.  It’s distressing when the Department of Defense has to put up a webpage to correct the misinformation that appears in our Nation’s largest papers and to provide Americans with information that they simply don’t get from any other source. Mr. and Ms. Average-American go to work each day, except for about 4.5 percent of them, and rely on traditionally trusted media sources to bring them information.  Generally, they accept it as truthful and if it’s all negative gloom and doom, they begin to believe it.  They don’t know the things that the Below-Average Americans know because they don’t have or take the time to study for themselves.  This is why politicians resort to slime campaigns instead of campaigns of substance.  That, they believe, is the depth of Average-American’s knowledge and thought.  They maybe right, but in this information age probably for not much longer.As for Iraq, I don’t expect that Average-American knows how many schools we’ve rebuilt, how many medical care facilities, roads, sewage treatment plants, how much fresh water we’ve provided, how much we’ve improved electricity service, how we’ve raised their oil production to near capacity…(slow loading PDF document, but worth the wait and read) or much of anything about the 11,000 reconstruction projects either completed or in progress. This is information you won’t hear from Brian, Katie and Wolfe or read about in the New York Times.  Terrorist’s hits on our Soldiers is news, but reporting this would be to them pro-war propaganda.  We Below Average-Americans can’t comprehend that logic.  Guess that explains our below average-ness. Average-American, led by politicians and popular news media believe the war is taking too long, the cost is too great and that we need to bring the troops home right away.  He’s told it’s taking longer than World War II did.  World War II casualties were around 450,000.  In Iraq, we’re mostly rebuilding what the Hussein regime destroyed through neglect.  In Japan, Germany and South Korea, we rebuilt what war destroyed.  Do you think it registers with Average-American that United States Military Forces are still in Japan, Germany and South Korea?  More than a half-century after those wars ended.  And because of that presence, each place has seen peace and prosperity.  Wars such as those and the one we are now in never end completely because Soldiers stay on to rebuild and secure the peace.  Average-American’s Grandchildren will see, from necessity, strategic United States Military Bases in Afghanistan and Iraq – regardless of which political party controls Washington, DC.Now we’re hearing about some active duty soldiers who are petitioning their representatives to withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq.  It’s their right to do that.  John Kerry and others did it.  I guess they’re no different from our bevy of retired Generals and are probably following their example.  I expect Average-American will hear much about this group of soldiers, in between the campaign slime ads, in the days before the election.  He will not hear much about the achievement and sacrifice of other Soldiers unless we Below-Average Americans make an effort to tell him.Why don’t we do that? 

Copyright © J. D. Pendry 2006