Philosophical Musings on a 1940 Pickup Truck

We need to brace ourselves for a new political regime, one possibly more socialist, pacifist and internally destructive than anything previous. However, this country has been through political, social and economic upheavals before. With any luck, Barack Obama and the socialist Democrats will one day be just a bad memory.

Today was a warm, sunny, spring-like day in the farm country. My wife and I took a ride over to Casa de Fruta where there are many ancient wrecks to peruse: old pickup trucks, tractors, wagons and farm equipment. Most of these old derelicts are rusting hulks, once used by prior generations in hard pursuit of making a living.

I was fascinated by the old pickup trucks, dented and rusted but still emblazoned with their owner's business name. The driver's seats are tatters and springs, the dashboards solid rust, the windshields covered in the grime of decades. The steering wheels still appear solid and functional, though a bit dusty.

The generation who drove these trucks was that of the 1940's, of World War II and Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal and the WPA. It was a scary time back then, but, while looking into the dusty remains of this truck, it is hard to imagine it. How could these vanished people have been so important in the long sweep of history? But they were -- imagine the world today if they had lost World War II or the Cold War that followed.

Considering the forces in play today, what kind of world will we leave to our descendants? Does it really matter?

It does.