I recently had my 10-year old car worked on and it was expensive. That’s what happens when you defer maintenance on something. The bill comes in big. And this was no different. A new fuel pump, plugs, drive belts, battery, oil change, and four tires crushed my car budget this month. The good news is the maintenance is done, it drives like new, and will last me another two years, hopefully. It has 290,000 miles on it, but then again, I have a 2002 Dodge Dakota with 430,000 miles. The present deferred maintenance notwithstanding, I take good care of my cars.
And that’s the key. You can get a lot of mileage out of life if you’re willing to do the maintenance. And to do that maintenance, you first have to realize what must be done to keep a thing running as it should. Second, you have to get about doing what is required. Consider our nation today. We have a lot of maintenance to do. A few areas come to mind that should be addressed including fatherhood, race relations, and indolence.
It’s indisputably sad that we have a true crisis in fatherhood in America. Out-of-wedlock births have climbed to 40 percent. More and more single moms are raising children without an adult male influence in the family. A father should be responsible for the children he brings into the world, hopefully with a wife in a loving and life-long relationship. Sadly, the days of that being the norm have slipped away. The certain reality is that fatherless children, especially boys, will not have the right image of manhood as they grow up. What do we know about fatherlessness? We know this. Children without fathers are at higher risk of broken lives including (1) behavioral struggles with self-control, and making friends, (2) difficulty trusting, building, and maintaining relationships in the future, (3) poor academic performance, (4) exploitation and abuse, (5) low self-esteem, (6) youth crime and gang violence, (7) young pregnancy and promiscuity, and (8) drug and alcohol abuse. In other words, failure and despair at many levels. As a result, the quality of our citizens suffers when fathers walk away from their responsibility. What needs to be done? We need to stop making excuses about fatherlessness and speak loudly that it is irresponsible and unmanly to be a deadbeat Dad. Hard words. Necessary maintenance.
And there is also the business of race relations in America. I grew up in the 1950s and 60s when people were rightfully struggling for racial justice and civil rights. And like many young white boys of my era, I would grow into manhood harboring racist attitudes. Life in the Army taught me the importance of proper race relations and to respect the dignity of all human beings. In the Army, we were reminded that on the battlefield, we all bleed red. And my experience serving with people of other races taught me that unity is far better than disunity when it comes to defending the nation.
Yet look at where we are today. Race relations are more strained, distorted, and disunifying than anything I witnessed growing up. Once upon a time, being called a racist was a profoundly serious accusation. But today, the term “racist” or a “white supremacist” is liberally applied based on your views on just about any policy measure. If a white politician seeks to reduce the cost of the burgeoning welfare system, he or she are labeled as “racist.” If a historian writes a book about any early American founder who owned a slave, he might be accused of suborning white supremacy. If you criticize the performance of any person who is not white, you clearly are ipso facto a racist, not simply someone expressing objective criticism. Indeed, an entire race extortion industry has popped up in America whereby private businesses can be accused of being racist institutions unless they toe the line according to racial activists and fork over money to preferred nonprofits as a demonstration of their contrition. Racism is evil. But accusing others of racism unfairly is equally evil.
And then there is indolence. We have become a nation that thinks “we’ve got it coming to us” regarding government handouts. There are people in America today who honestly believe that it’s better to stay home and not work than go out and get a job. For a nation that traditionally prided itself on hard work, innovation, and attaining the American dream, we are busy destroying the ladder to success. We also minimize the dignity of each individual when we suggest to people that the primary role of government it to hand out money hand over fist.
Yep, America has much deferred maintenance. Wanted: Full time fathers, genuine racial reconciliation, and hard work. The bill is coming due.
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