Years before I was born, a crotchety Grinch made his way into children’s books across America. With his half-sized heart that grew threefold by Christmas, the cranky creature from Mount Crumpet delighted and frightened imaginations for decades.
In the end, the Grinch figured it out, much like his wealthy predecessor Ebenezer Scrooge, arriving onto words a hundred years earlier and turned from greed to generosity by holy magic.
In real life, stuff got so expensive that right wing pundits are on TV telling us that affordability means not getting kids all those presents this year cause stuff costs more. For wage earners, tariffs are the Grinch of Christmas as Scrooge-like politicians run D.C. with no ghosts in sight.
Back in the late 1980s a downtown businessman lit up a Bah! Humbug! sign on the façade of his Whitefish restaurant and townspeople got worked up, saying it didn’t fit their theme of the holiday themed village. Today, Bah! Humbug! sounds like what D.C. politicians tell locals.
In Christmastime news that surprised no one, the four yes-men that Montana sent to Congress just put massive health insurance hikes into effect for self-employed workers across the state. D.C. politicians left town early to holiday at some far away swanky town, clearly not Whoville.
The roaring 2020s got the K graph-shaped economy going again. Investor income spikes up while worker prospects nose dive. That makes optimism harder for the working guy. It feels like we’re stuck in that awkward adolescent part of our national politics again, bogged down in disagreement, ignoring everything we agree on. Next culture war distraction, pending.
If your family is lucky enough to have good work, healthcare and a house it doesn’t get much better. Free interest on credit cards would be nice since gifts are so bloody expensive thanks to those costly tariffs. Maybe the feds will finally release those promised rebate checks for Americans who’ve been paying extra for everything all year. Take any money that arrives.
The four men Montana sent to Congress spent all year proclaiming that everything is fine, nothing is askew, it’s apparently all part of some big weird plan. These four men aren’t even trying to get Grinch to return our Christmas gifts or tell Scrooge to make holiday hams affordable again. Healthcare got a lot more expensive in the past few days. Pay up, no back talk.
Luckily for the Flathead, locals remain generous and have a much better understanding of community, of place, of people. We can’t do much about health insurance costs except choose better representatives who’ll actually work for us. Yet we’ll help locally, most all the time.
Locals are the drive and money behind the multiple nonprofits working throughout the valley. You know the organizations which help local kids with better access to education, food, and housing. You already trust a variety of local community-based organizations. You’ve seen the work locals do over time. You know your money will be well spent helping Flathead locals.
This is the season to give. Some can afford to donate a lot, others only a little. But everyone must give a little bit of time or money for community to work. Find your local organization that helps feed kids and donate to help a new generation. Do it for grandma.
After years of waiting, we know the men of Congress hardly lift a hand to help locals. Politicians act like Mr. Potter in “It’s a Wonderful Life,” selfishly making Bedford Falls and the Flathead into a more expensive place to live, work, and raise a family. Politicians look like they’re in it for themselves. Polls say the New Year might deliver fresh leaders who’ll work for everyday locals.
Even Grinch and Scrooge figure it out. Sure, it took Cindy Lou and a trio of ghosts to get naysayers to see the light. But hey, it’s Christmas Eve, Santa is en route. Festivus was yesterday, the airing of grievances over. Time to move into the new year. Merry Christmas friends. Find some optimism, dig deep, it’s there, then sing it and celebrate another year with friends.