DON’T SWEAT THE BIG STUFF

DON’T SWEAT THE BIG STUFF
"DON’T SWEAT THE BIG STUFF: 
Near the end of his 1979 film Manhattan, Woody Allen, playing a TV writer who quits his day job to concentrate on his novel, talks into a tape recorder to begin outlining his book: “An idea for a short story about, um, people in Manhattan who are constantly creating these real, unnecessary, neurotic problems for themselves ‘cause it keeps them from dealing with more unsolvable, terrifying problems about the universe.” Which neatly summarizes the theme of the movie we’ve been watching.

In real life, what do “Progressive” politicians do to create unnecessary problems for themselves to avoid solving the simpler more mundane problems they were elected by taxpayers to solve? Invoking another neurotic controlling Manhattan lefty, Victor Davis Hanson warns that they employ “the Bloomberg Syndrome:”

Former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg used to offer all sorts of cosmic advice on the evils of smoking and the dangers of fatty foods and sugary soft drinks. Bloomberg also frequently pontificated on abortion and global warming, earning him a progressive audience that transcended the boroughs of New York.

But in the near-record December 2010 blizzard, Bloomberg proved utterly incompetent in the elemental tasks for which he was elected: ensuring that New Yorkers were not trapped in their homes by snowdrifts in their streets that went unplowed for days.

The Bloomberg syndrome is a characteristic of contemporary government officials. When they are unwilling or unable to address pre-modern problems in their jurisdictions — crime, crumbling infrastructure, inadequate transportation — they compensate by posing as philosopher kings who cheaply lecture on existential challenges over which they have no control..."

Read on!