Shared Sacrifice

"Shared sacrifice" is the latest focus group-tested mantra from the Democrats always eager for more of your tax money. They want you to sacrifice so they can further spend us into oblivion. Pathetically, they even brought forth a symbolic resolution in the Senate that was shot down Wednesday. This group of multimillionaires, led by fatcat Harry Reid, have decided anyone making more than $1,000,000 need to pay even more than they already are so they can decide what to do with it.

Which brings us to this supposed notion that we all have to suffer equally. If that's to be the case, could we please put a stop to the media sob stories every time a service of some kind is reduced or eliminated? Americans every day are sacrificing already, yet they do so as adults. Little whining or sniveling, they just suck it up and use good old American ingenuity to figure out how to get by.

Then here we have a story from rural Waverly, Washington, a town of 109 people now facing the ultimate hardship: the closing of the local post office. I heard a CBS Radio News spot on this early today and by the melodrama I heard I expected musical accompaniment to the sorrowful tale of people who may have to find somewhere else to pick up their mail. For them this isn't just an inconvenience, it's a calamity.

About half of Waverly showed up Monday night to protest the proposed closing of the town’s U.S. Postal Service office.

The 40 or so people waved signs and expressed disgust with post office officials, saying they’ve responded to citizens’ concerns with form letters.

Waverly is among about 2,500 small and rural towns with post offices targeted for closure by the USPS as part of a $500 million budget-cutting plan.

Town Council member Kim Billington said such a closure would be calamitous: It is the only building in town that is staffed every day.

The tornado that ripped Joplin, Missouri to shreds was calamitous, Kim. The floods in Minot, North Dakota are calamitous, Kim.

Closing your post office? Not a calamity. Got that?

“This is the link to the outside world for many people here,” she said.

Really? Don't these folks have phones? The Internet? Didn't All Gore wire rural America way back when so everyone could enjoy his creation?

Letter carriers don’t deliver door-to-door in Waverly, making the post office a community kiosk of sorts for the town of about 100 residents.

It’s where people might read a neighbor’s urgent notice about a mama cougar and cub seen in a backyard, where they read a death notice of a friend or learn about a stolen car.

Again, if there's an urgent notice about a rampaging mama cougar, wouldn't it be more logical to have a call alert system in place? Why risk people leaving their home and being mauled by the cougar just to get their mail?

If someone dies, would it not make sense to maybe pick up the phone and tell people?

This is what we've come to. We hear these cries for shared sacrifice, yet every time someone actually has to sacrifice, it becomes a media tearjerker. This is just a minor example, yet it's blown entirely out of proportion. How can we cut (or reduce the growth of) a large program such as Social Security or Medicare without the requisite fear-mongering by the Democrats and their media enablers?

Why don't they just suck it up and start sacrificing?

Resident Janet Price, who is disabled, said she relies on the tiny post office to mail gifts to her grandchildren and write letters to friends.

“If they close it, I don’t know what I’ll do,” she said.

Now while I feel for Ms. Price, if this is such a close-knit community, isn't there anyone, friends or family, who can, um, sacrifice a little time to help her out? Perhaps the locals could make a schedule where they share the sacrifice?

No, instead we get stories where minor inconveniences become calamities. Just imagine how the media will portray the next round of layoffs at a major newspaper or television outlet.