Is Man Dead?

John T. Elson died last week. In 1966, when Time famously asked on its cover, Is God Dead?, Mr. Elson wrote the feature story. His passing prompted me to contemplate a more appropriate contemporary question , Is Man Dead? Below are some of my causes for concern:

• Man's two biggest ideas, Socialism and Capitalism, turned out to be duds. Despite current rants across AM radio, Soviet Communists killed off socialism. Deadski, Comrades. Even the Chinese traded Mao's lethal brand of socialism for State Capitalism. Poor them, although they do not yet know it. Why? They have not yet created enough bankers to realize, as we have, that the biggest enemies of capitalism are the biggest capitalists themselves: bankers. It turns out that bankers are the most efficient bank robbers ever, and they killed their own goose.
• If we survive the remnants of socialism and capitalism, there is a man named Ahmadinejad, who would like to nuke anything left standing in our world. It is one thing to have a few loose nuts in a state legislature, but this fellow runs a whole country has money and terrific nuke connections. Soon, the Israelis will destroy his current nuke sites (further nailing capitalism's coffin), but, this will not deter others like him. Even Putin is scared of this guy, while pretending to be his oil and gas buddy. That's bad, really bad.
• Americans are faced with two wars, unemployment, huge national debt, basically bankrupt Social Security, underfunded pension plans galore, nationalized industries like autos and banking, not to mention an emergent China, and what is our main national focus at this critical time? A Healthcare Plan, as prepared by a man named Max Baucus who hails from a state that has twelve citizens.
• 95% of TV. Make that 98%.
• Our children are upstairs, for those who still have homes, talking to someone in Timbuktu, while we are eating dinner with our BlackBerrys where our spoons used to be and listening to the "news" with Katie, Diane, or Whatshisface. We have means of communicating with people across the world, but have lost touch with those under the same roof.
• We have found ways to rid the world of perhaps the most sane human creation. Books.
• Americans still eat enough bad food for three people, while others get less than a third of what they need for sustenance. Americans are huge compared to everyone else in the world, and, since they don't have passports or travel, they do not yet know it. Want to fight fundamentalist terrorism? Go on a diet.
• American schools, generally speaking, still stink. We focus on sports, while Chinese kids focus on math and science. Yes, this makes us interesting and is supposed to enhance teamwork and leadership. Bunk. We cannot survive by thinking that a couple of wise-asses can just go into a garage and invent an Apple computer or something like it every so often. Survival of the fittest means the leanest and wisest.

There are more, but they will have to wait for another day. You can only take so much in one serving, I know. Both of you.