French Fries for the Soul

When I was in college during the early 60's, a book on the required reading list was Alexis de Toqueville’s Democracy in America. De Toqueville was a Frenchman who traveled in this country during the 1830’s and recorded his observations of American society. One of his most noted remarks was that Americans seemed to be so in love with equality that they would put up with slavery as long as they were made equal slaves. I haven’t read the book in about 45 years; but that was the gist of his commentary.
At the time I was too young to make very much of his observations; but, curiously, today, just after I had submitted a blog entitled Terrorism: The New Excuse, the book came into my mind.
Think about it. Today Mr. Bush and his corporate cohorts have so stacked the game against the general population that thousands of young Americans are being slaughtered and maimed in a war that’s really about oil and power bases; energy costs are prohibitive; corporations pull working people’s pensions with impunity; millions are without health-care coverage; the environment is being re-polluted with God knows what consequences to life and health. I could go on at length. And what are most Americans doing? “Adjusting”-- as if to say “ Well, we’re all in the same boat and will just have to work harder.” A staggeringly high percentage don’t even vote. And where are the protests, the marches?
There was another book on the required list: A Nation of Sheep.