2008 was a good year

2008 was a good year! You may disagree, but bear with me. The collapse of the financial system may have borne its ugly face in 2008. The energy crisis may have reached its peak in 2008. These, however, have been years in the making and we should not blame the innocent 2008 for the failures of its ancestors. Even if you insist on blaming 2008, there is still a silver lining: you were not alone. It is a true statement that misery likes company and plenty of that there has been in 2008. This, however, is not the reason I consider 2008 to be a good year.

Looking back at 2008 ten years from now, I hope to remember 2008 as the year we discovered what was wrong with our economy and energy policies. Without such discovery, we could have continued the old ways until it is too late. I will look at 2008 as the year the US started the return to the world as the beacon of hope. To me, 2008 will always be the year that America showed the world the source of its true might: its people. America has shown the world the ability of its people to seek, embrace and accept change. By many accounts the election of Barack Obama was historic, but history was not just made on this election night, it was liberated. It was liberated of the injustices of slavery, prejudices of the past, and stereotypes of the present. For those that may argue that all of these remain part of us as a nation, it may be true, but history has now become the head wind pushing us forward not the skeleton in the closet. Obama shared something with so many Americans, yet he stoked a fear or a prejudice in just as many. There were few that voted against him for his color or their perception of his religious beliefs, but yet the Bradley effect proved a myth.

Obama will be president for all and we can proudly say ‘Only in America’. There are other nations where people can claim to be wealthier, but no other nation can dare to compete with America when it comes to embracing newcomers. There is still more to do, but a threshold has been crossed. 2008 is my proof and that is why I will consider it to be a good year despite the painful personal losses.

Do More for Less

Have you ever watched Dr. House's show on Fox? To some, the guy is a lunatic, and to many fans he is a brilliant physician. He saves his patients by trying tests or procedures that could possibly kill the patient. What works to his favor is that the patients are always in a bad enough condition that they would be dead if not for these drastic measures. Lucky for Dr. House, the aid script writers are always on his side and it always works out to his favor and the patient is healed after a few brushes with death.

The current economic crisis has the same feel of watching House. We are waiting for the show to end happily to continue our normal programming. The government is playing Dr. House with the economy and our lives as the patient: taking actions hastily without much thought and with the qualifier that no one knows better how to handle the situation, but inaction could be fatal. We can take a wishful thinking approach and hope for a good ending to the show or we could play an active role. The ending of this show is not written by a paid script writer. The ending will be up to us. The implications of a bad ending are a lot more than a few minutes of emotional disruption. So I do not see how we can just sit back and watch the show as it unfolds.

We cannot just take a holding pattern, waiting for someone or something to fix the problems. We cannot weather this storm by hunkering down in the trenches, doing the bare minimum wishing for the storm to pass quickly. I hope I am wrong, but I do not see this except as the prelude to the real storm. We need to rediscover the spirit of sacrifice and innovation. What made America the great country it is was hard work and open arms welcoming talent from all over the world. The solution to our problems will be found in a school, a lab or a factory not in a shopping cart.

We need to believe that we must and can "do more for less" instead of adopting an attitude of passivity. Instead of cancelling plans to improve how we do business because of budget cuts, we need to stretch our dollar and our time to make these plans a reality. We need to remind the leaders on the national, local, and institutional levels that the American people know how to make the good times not just how to live them. They need to lead and make the tough choices not the safe ones that will turn out to be the wrong ones on the long run.