by Ralph Peters
"We've always had blame-mongers on the margins, but, blessedly, that's where they've usually remained.
The Wrights of the world aren't really interested in helping those caught on the outside looking in. Instead of encouraging their followers to grasp the opportunities before them, they preach that all those opportunities are illusions, that the system is stacked so cruelly against their own kind that there's no chance of getting ahead.
I've seen this in the Middle East, where every dead car battery is the fault of the Great Satan America (and of Israel, of course), and in Latin America, where politicians steal everything in sight and blame every shuttered bakery on the Yankees who long since went home.
I've seen it in India, where Hindus blame Muslims or members of other castes for every ill. And (God help that tortured continent) I've seen it again and again in Africa, where blame is the currency of politics.
The global refusal to shoulder responsibility is a strategic issue of the first order - although you'll never hear it briefed in Washington.
As I write, the Chinese are in full dudgeon, blaming foreign devils yet again, this time for embarrassing their Olympic efforts - utterly unwilling to admit that Beijing may have created a few problems on its own.
Russians are again raging at the West for their self-wrought squalor, while Europeans blame Israel (those pesky Jews again!) for their homemade problems with marginalized Muslim immigrants.
In Venezuela, Presidente Hugo Chavez still blames every problem on el Diablo Bush, while wrecking the future of a wretched population. In Iran, fanatics blame everyone but themselves for their country's stagnation, while al Qaeda rages that America has caused the 1,000-year decline of Arab civilization (demagogues have chronic difficulties with dates).
And just to remind us that we aren't fully immune to the seductive appeal of blaming others for our personal disappointments, in marched the Rev. Wright, fists clenched and rhetoric ringing.
His name is Legion. Wright is part of a global phenomenon plaguing every major faith and every civilization. He's not a problem for any one race, but for every race - for all of us who believe in a loving God and who maintain that every man and woman deserves a chance to succeed.
Preaching hatred and vengeance in the name of religion: Heard that from anyone else recently?"
Hey, whatever works, right?
Work hard, do your utmost, accept your station in life with pride, knowing that you have strived to be at the top of your profession whatever it may be.
Damn but that's a hard sell to people who are bombarded daily by religious leaders and politicians pushing the victim button. You complain, and the handouts increase. You threaten social unrest, and apologists flock to your door with visions of sugar plums. You fail at something, as everyone does, and the bar is lowered to accept failure as a standard rather than something to be ashamed of.
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