A Land of Haves and Have-Nots

[marmar]

from Consortium News:



A Land of Haves and Have-Nots

Like much of the U.S. news media, the Washington press corps likes a good diversion from the real problems facing the country, such as having to deal with new research confirming that the United States is dividing into a land of a few haves and many have-nots, a crisis that Michael Winship addresses in this guest essay.

By Michael Winship
June 28, 2011


Washington, D.C., is a Potemkin village of alabaster and marble where the perpetually stalled and broken escalators of the city’s subway system are a perfect metaphor for the government’s inability to generate positive, upward movement.

Yet with all the calumnies that are committed on an hourly basis behind the facade of our nation’s capital, what had local media there outraged a few days ago? Lemonade.

Seems a TV news cameraman caught a county inspector in an affluent Washington suburb trying to shut down a kid’s lemonade stand just outside the Congressional Country Club during the recent US Open.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, he slapped the enterprising tikes – who were raising money to fight pediatric cancer – with a $500 fine. ...........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://consortiumnews.com/2011/06/28/a-land-of-haves-and-have-nots/