IS AMERICA STILL PLAYING WITH LOADED DICE?

A good place to start any discussion is the wit, and often wisdom, of Oscar Wilde. Here are equal parts of each: "America is the only country that went from barbarism to degradation without passing through civilization!"

From the eyes of a foreign elitist, that seems about right. From the eyes of the local booster's club (eg. Moose, Elks, Shriners, VFW, executive suites,Tea Party blogs), arrogant Oscar doesn't get it. Doesn't get the deliciously complex idea that Americans take pride in their raucousness, their shirt-sleeves bravado, their sassy sense of exceptionalism.

There may be something to this.

If God really does look after drunks and fools, then just maybe our recurring national foolishness has been as much asset as debit over the generations. Consider how we blundered into a miraculous treasure trove of natural wealth on this continent...how we lucked out raping the lands from the Native American who owned it....how we caught some lucky breaks in the Revolutionary War against the Redcoats....how we were lucky enough to have some immigrants who led the world in an explosion of new ideas and inventions....and how we continue to beat the odds as we prevail over natural and national disasters generation after generation.

Thornton Wilder alluded to the good fortune of humanity when he wrote the play "By The Skin of Our Teeth." He found a stunning record of survivor-ship, including America.Take for instance our current War on Terror. No doubt there are extraordinary warriors and operatives guarding us against these enemies. And yet, let the record show a large degree of our safety & security has been due less to us than to the bumbling morons the jihadists have picked to attack us.

Whether our luck holds out in the pressure-cooker 21st C is hard to say. Only fools will say for sure. But this much can be said with confidence: Luck runs in streaks, and it's always best to know how to ride or get off them. The casino in which America is playing today is perhaps the toughest test of its many streaks.

Getting back to Wilde, he didn't know much about Polish culture; but if he had, he might have found this proverb reinforcing his squinty-eyed view of America: "A guest sees more in an hour than the host in a year."