Americans love sports.  Why?  The reasons are seemingly endless.

A popular feature is certainty.  At the end of the game there’s a clear winner and loser.

Along with certainty comes fairness.  We want what’s “right.”  What else explains instant replay?

Americans loves politics.  Why?  The reasons are seemingly endless.

A popular feature is certainty.  At the end of an election season there’s a clear winner and loser.

Along with certainty comes fairness.  We want what’s “right.”  What else explains the rewarding of success and punishment of failure?

The default answer has been work ethic.  The harder one works and the more one applies himself/herself the greater the chance of success.  It’s the American Dream.

As time has passed the narrative has changed.  Today we’ve come to believe (and never let facts get in the way of an opinion) that circumstances are the driver.  It’s who you know, where you grew up, what school you attended, etc.

Big Media has seized on the trend.  Story after story about the “privileged” abusing their power to keep the little guy down.  We feed off it.  We tune in.  We surf the web.  Ratings and clicks!

Politicians have seized on the trend.  No longer do they wish to address issues or solve problems.  They’re too busy blaming someone else for it.

Here’s an excerpt from The American President:

We have serious problems to solve and we need serious people to solve them.  And whatever your particular problem is I promise you Bob Rumson is not the least bit interested in solving it.  He is interested in two things and two things only:  making you afraid of it and telling you who’s to blame for it.  That, ladies and gentlemen, is how you win elections.

Whether you believe financial success is a result of work ethic, circumstances or some combination of the two is personal choice.  There’s no right or wrong.  But there’s plenty of political rhetoric about it.