Pottersville

It won’t be long until families will be gathering together in front of the TV to watch the Christmas classic “It’s a Wonderful Life”. The irony is that most of them won’t realize that by the anti-Obama, tea bagger logic that a lot of hard-core Christian conservatives subscribe to, George Bailey is a dirty commie bastard. What could be more socialistic than using the Bailey Building & Loan Association not to maximize profits and support the free market but to share the wealth with the whole community? Pottersville would be the real utopia for these people, not Bedford Falls.

I watched the documentary “Which Way Home” on HBO a few weeks ago and it struck me how misinformed these illegal immigrant children are about the realities of America today. Kevin, a 14 year old Honduran boy wanted nothing more than to be adopted by some caring couple in the United States. Yeah, dream on kid, you obviously haven’t watched Lou Dobbs lately. We’d rather try you as an adult and throw you in prison than invite you into our homes. That’s the compassionate side of America today, a country that locks up more of its own citizens than any other place in the world.

To me, Crystal Lee Sutton, the real life “Norma Rae”, who died last week is the most representative of George Bailey ethics. She spent her whole life fighting for the working poor against powerful corporate interests but unlike “It’s a Wonderful Life“, her story didn’t have a happy ending. After her insurance company refused to pay for possibly life-saving medications, she ended up dying of brain cancer. In America today an angel doesn’t get his wings every time a bell rings, an insurance executive gets his bonus instead.