that people are not going to learn until they feel the pain themselves. The more noise we hear about how terrible this or that is, I think a lot of people just dig in with their previous preconceptions on what is true or false and whose fault it is or whatever... but until people begin to feel the pain themselves, they are not really going to care.

At this point in my life, I'm just glad that we are not invested in the markets anymore and we don't have debt, loans or a mortgage to pay. We can get by with very little if we have to. I'm also glad that most of my family is in a similar position. Of course, if we were to get sick or had a catastrophic illness, all bets would be off.

It saddens me to see the direction this country is taking, but I really don't know what to do about it except to hunker down and just watch. I really don't know what more to say... so I feel like maybe I should just sit back and watch.

I'll still be out there with my signs on certain protest days, but at this point, I just feel like saying "You get what you vote for" and wait to see how long it takes for buyer's remorse to kick in.