When did this happen to us? When did we become obsessed as a county with fixing blame? When ever anything goes wrong in government, business, or society today all efforts turn to finding the culprit or the scapegoat. The problem is left unsolved. Let’s take an example from each sector. The war in Iraq is going badly. It’s clearly Bush’s fault. Let’s spend all our time blaming W and no time suggesting solutions. The war in Iraq is going better. Let’s forget Iraq and go to the economy. Who can we blame? Greenspan, he seems to be getting a lot of heat. Enron goes to pot. Let’s wreck Arthur Anderson. Just destroy a long time successful company. They must have been at fault, they were the auditors and shredded files. Gas prices are high, the oil industry is setting prices illegally. Let’s have another hearing in Washington. We’ve had ,what, 50 since 1973. Have any produced one barell of oil or one indictment? No. But, they make voters feel like Washington is doing something.
How do you solve problems in this environment. Maybe you don’t. What’s being solved today? Immigration. No. Social Security. No. Energy. No. Health care. No. Elected officials just point across the aisle and say they did it. Or, they hunker down and hope no one is pointing at them. When a corporation gets to this point, one of three things happen. One they go away. Or, they go broke, then get fixed or go away. Or, someone with a healthy culture takes them over. If the US doesn’t move on from the fun of fixing blame or the fear of getting blamed to the point of accepting accountability for making decisions, good or bad, and fixing the bad ones, we will just continue to accumulate problems until they sink us.