Well you know ~TL and Giz I am certain that I am old enough to be your Mom and I can say that yes, things are or can be bad but I have made it this far and wouldn't want to be anywhere else. My husband and I went through the Viet Nam War. He received his Draft papers in the mail leaving his house for our wedding! He went to Basic Training two weeks later and was in Viet Nam BEFORE our first anniversary and thankfully came home in one piece just before out second anniversary. Our oldest daughter was born while he was there. Before he went over we survived on $185 a month which paid rent, utilities, gas, car payment, insurance, food... The base we were stationed at had a lousy commissary and px so our shopping was done in "regular" stores, at the end of the month we purchased our food by clipping coupons and turning them in for cash...you could do that "way back then".
What has not changed is the giving of the American People...never count on the government, count on the people. They always come through. Saw a long piece last week on the Katrina clean up....the bulk of rebuilding has been done AND paid for by the private sector, NOT FEMA or any government agency. So this shows when something is needed the American people come through. As the commentator said, "if you want to know what kind of help you can get if YOUR town has a natural disaster look at Mississippi and Louisiana. It is the American people you can count on NOT the government, not FEMA. If you count on them you will just find yourself drowning in paper with nothing to show for it except stress related illness."
Look at Heylinder's Habitat For Humanity Project to show you that. You can ALWAYS count on "We the People".