I'll have some vitriol and a side of lost opportunity, please

"Don't let a good tragedy go to waste?" Wow. This was a new interpretation, by Neal Boortz, of something that Rahm Emmanuel had said about not letting a good crisis go to waste. Now, Boortz was not, in my humble opinion, legitimizing either statement. However, he paints an interesting picture: that any shade of the political spectrum is ready to pounce on a negative situation for political gain. I think he's right.

Now, in the name of freedom and liberty, one might agree that it's okay to do this. It's low, but hey, it's a free country. Have at it. I think it borders on the shameless. There is a great deal of discussion going on about how the rhetoric fuels the flames of political rivalry. Well, one can imagine that there would be some level of name calling and general discontent between two groups of people that don't see eye to eye. And there is always someone to lay blame when something goes awry. I think it is next to impossible to show a causal link between what a prominent politician says to what an apparent lone gunman does on a sunny morning in Tuscon, AZ.

However, it's not just the prominent politician spewing this negative language. It's not just the other side, the prominent other side, trying to lay blame. It is all or some of us caught up in this nasty business. But we learn it from our leaders. We see. We hear. We do. The real crisis - the true tragedy - is that we lack leadership in this country. Not Obama. Not the Bushes. Not Clinton. Not even Reagan. Not all the others. They've sold this country down the river. They've pitted citizen against citizen for their own unworthy gain.

And we plod along, hoping one day that some great political savior will save us from ourselves. I'm waiting. How about you?

As always, be thankful for what you have, buy only what you need, and work diligently for peace. Put down your arms, folks. Violence only begets more violence.