FRAGILE: HANDLE WITH CARE

Talk about your paradigm changes in perspective. We have gone from an arrogant administration who actually thought (and desired) a complete regime change in the Middle East, to a President who will look you in the eye and admit our mistakes. Admit our past mis-deeds and seek to resolve them, to discuss them, and to a certain extent, make amends for them.

While the Bush administrations two terms focused on our (perceived) omnipotence and super-powerdom, the first 100 days of the Obama administration are being spent wading through the aftermath of those eight contemptuous years of hubris.

Today, more than at any time in my lifetime, we are reminded of just how fragile this world truly is. Our economy, once considered impenetrable, has proven to be a house of cards left on its own. Millions of Americans are scrambling for jobs that simply do not exist at the moment, they have vanished waiting for the market place to reinvent itself.

It has been reported that the Pakistani government is dangerously close to be taken over by Al-Queda, including its nuclear capabilities. Lebanon is about to have another election, where Hamas has become a player on that political scene. And Iran is seeking to be a player on the nuclear scene, and experts state it is only a matter of time for that uncertain eventuality.

We still fight diseases across the globe that in civilized portions of the world have all been eradicated. Malaria still kills hundreds of thousands of Africans, especially the young. And a majority....a majority of the world's population live on nothing (less than $2 a day), have no sewage waste systems, and do not even enjoy clean drinking water.

Domestically, nearly one-third of our young drop out of high school, and for low income high school graduates, they have a better chance of landing in prison than graduating from a college program.

As if this were not enough, the world is fighting back in its struggle with its human occupants with an N1H1 "swine" flu that may come back this summer with the vengeance of the pandemic of 1918, and the deaths of literally millions of the stricken. And for all our accomplishments, for all our technology, the advise we get for avoiding catching this deadly monster is to wash our hands and sing "Happy Birthday" twice while we do it. Reminds me of the governments proclamation years ago to have plastic sheeting and duct tape on hand.

This world has turned into an inter-dependant pillow fight, only with higher stakes weaponry. Forget global warming and the ozone layer. We have bigger fish to fry. This world is at a very tenuous and fragile point in its existence, and we need more than statesmen to get us through. We need the worlds occupancy to get involved, to become increasingly more charitable and benevolent. We need everyone to see the enormous stakes at play, and act accordingly. Oh God, we are doomed.