By Edwin Cooney
As I was considering writing about summer 2022, it occurred to me that back in the 1950s, a young man named Jerry Keller sang a song called "Here Comes Summer,” a happy song anticipating a summer with his girlfriend!
Summertime 2022 is likely to be a very heady time. The worries and woes that are likely to run through our heads could be overwhelming in thousands of instances.
Roe v. Wade will soon be decided by a conservative Supreme Court and the "pro life" people who anticipate victory just may very well be disappointed. It's possible that the court might modify its decision allowing some aspect of Roe to remain valid. Such a possibility is likely to make practically everyone unhappy. Add to that the debate about the Second Amendment which affects those who treasure their guns as much as they value their personal freedom to be who they want to be.
Next, there's the ongoing war between the political forces that pit former President Donald J. Trump against everyone else. It's amazing to me that a man who egged on his supporters to the degree that they were willing to kill the sitting Vice President of the United States is even close to being a serious presidential candidate in 2024. It’s absolutely stunning!
Then, there are the unceasing heat waves, wildfires, floods and tornados, and early hurricanes, all of which are due to our national insistence on using fossil fuels to run our economy when solar energy is clearly the path to a better and safer future.
It's our nature to be curious and to seek control of our social, economic, and spiritual destinies and those of our children and grandchildren.
As one gets older and has less responsibility, there is a tendency to believe that the whole world is going to hell — largely out of a realization that someone else is about to be in control and that our personal existences are about to change forever.
I see our political system dissolving from the balanced federalist system designed by Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and Alexander Hamilton into an oligarchy dominated by the rich just as it was up until the dawn of the 19th Century. Then, young America's leaders began relying on the best thinkers of Ancient Greece and Rome, along with Renaissance France, Italy, and Britain, to shape government from the mere gratification of medieval royalty to the legitimate ambitions and dreams shared by you and me.
It was at that time that the thinkers mentioned above were joined by the young industrialists named Eli Whitney, Robert Fulton and, eventually, Thomas Edison and Alexander Graham Bell who invented the vital tools and processes that changed our agricultural society into an industrial giant. (Read our Constitution which was written just before the dawn of industrialism and you'll see no reference to a specific political doctrine such as capitalism or socialism. These doctrines were the children of the incoming industrial era and were designed to bring forth the hopes and dreams never before experienced by a whole population.)
As Summer 2022 drapes us within her folds, it appears that the political process designed to ensure everyone's freedom may well be modified by various state legislatures that are determined, as they've done for nearly two centuries now, to emphasize "States' Rights” so that the few can control the many when it comes to electing the next President of the United States. The world, they appear to believe, which has always been run by and for the wealthy, should never be guilty of institutionalizing hope and charity as too many “bleeding-heart” liberals and socialists would do if they weren't regulated by the government. Don't ever let a conservative tell you that he or she “hates government” when they actually control government, because it is easier to control others at the regional, state and local levels than at the federal level.
Summer's greatest gift has always been the freedom its weather brings humanity to work and play.
The future, whatever spirit it creates, kind or mean, spiritual or merely profitable, helpful or stultifying, begins at 4:14 EDT tomorrow, ready or not!
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY
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