We have to hold ourselves accountable

A headline from The Hill today read "The American Dream is Dead." It was referring mostly to housing prices, and how the dream of owning a home was out of reach for many Americans. I see that as part of the dream, but it also encompasses improving ourselves; outworking our competition to rise above; starting from nothing and overcoming.

Not only is housing a problem, but so is health insurance, and the cost of day care. Families are struggling to buy food and pay the bills. This is because our priorities are wrong. We've been busy giving tax breaks to corporations and millionaire's while our schools are underfunded.

Somewhere along the way we stopped caring if other people did the right thing or not. Maybe because we had strong institutions, or a strong sense of civic duty. Maybe we were deluded into thinking that people would do the right thing. But they don't.

We have to hold ourselves accountable. None of this works on its own. It requires all of us, working together, to make something better.

Martin Luther King said there's never a wrong time to do the right thing. I believe that. Maybe, if we all tried a little harder, we could come up with something better.