The last few weeks, I’ve been watching the TV show Heroes (on DVD) with my son Nicholas.<\/p>\n
The premise of the show is that normal people discover that they have super-powers…and a destiny to save the world. <\/p>\n
It’s charming, exciting – great entertainment – and I think the show reveals a lot about our hunger for saviors.<\/p>\n
For better or worse, the last few years, Americans have seen a lot of our heroes unmasked. <\/p>\n
After 9\/11, the CIA was touted as a batch of James Bond (or maybe Jack Bauer) types.<\/p>\n
But they got it entirely wrong about the Soviet Union, and then bungled the intelligence on Iraq.<\/p>\n
President Bush’s war council looked like rocket scientists during the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, but proved to have feet of clay.<\/p>\n
Even our collective fantasies about America’s armed services have been shaken, by skyrocketing rates of PTSD and soldier-suicides.<\/p>\n
And those Masters of the Universe on Wall Street? I’ve been watching today, as they were grilled by Congress. <\/p>\n
\u201cHow can you justify paying bonuses to managers who are running the company into the ground?” asked NY Rep. Carolyn Maloney. <\/p>\n
Yikes. There’s a bumper crop of disillusionment out there.<\/p>\n
The latest hero we’ve hoisted onto the pedestal seems to be President Barack Obama.
But events of the last two weeks show that he too is mortal. <\/p>\n
Which means that we better brace ourselves. Without a Superman to lift this economy over the chasm, all of us “muggles” could face some tough days ahead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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