Jim Kunstler on Lack of Leadership

Language warning.--Dictynna

February 13, 2006

The failure to lead in this country now includes all the major fields of enterprise and resolves into a general and total failure of authority that threatens to drag us into darkness. Leaders in politics, business, the news media, science, medicine, education, and the organized religions have all failed to prepare the public for the hardships that will attend a global energy crisis supercharged by climate change, disorder in the financial markets, and almost certainly more war.

President Bush's failure to lead was obvious in his state of the union speech, and in actions that followed -- such as signing on with the continued starvation of Amtrak last week. If Mr. Bush doesn't like that crypto-private company, he could start an initiative of his own to reform and reorganize the railroad system we desperately need. So too, by the way, could Hillary Clinton or John Kerry, or any other putative Democratic leader. But they're too busy grubbing around the contribution circuits to fatten their campaign war chests.