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Frank Rich wrote an interesting column in the New York Times this past weekend that has generated over 600 comments so far, in which he asserts that the rage seen in the news lately, as expressed by the "tea baggers" and others  is not about health care.  The article implies that he believes that the underlying cause may be the ugliness of racism raising it's hideous head against our president. 

I was greatly saddened as I read that in his column, and it caused me to think further about the issue. Is that really what is making people so angry? For some perhaps, but I don't really think that is the root cause.   

Instead, I think that people who have always considered themselves to be in the American  middle class have a nagging sensation that something is wrong, but they do not know how to articulate or explain what is causing that feeling. They only have a sense that things are slipping all around them and under them and they do not know how to stop it. The sense of unease that that breeds causes some to "look for someone to blame." Unfortunately, that feeling tends to bring out racism in some, or a "blame the immigrants" attitude in others. Some people blame themselves and sink into depression. Frustration tends to lead to anger, then to depression. 

Those outcomes are by- products, however, and I do not think they are the root cause of the rage. I think that Elizabeth Warren has a better explanation. Click here to listen to her and see what you think. 

Instead of sinking back into racism and increasing our fear or blame of each other, we need to work together to fix our economy and to use our collective political clout to demand policies that keep jobs onshore, circulating money and opportunity for all throughout our economy. Current tension expressed as rage against health care reform is masking a real issue of loss of discretionary income. It is not that people want to deny their fellow Americans health care that is needed. The real cause of the rage is the sense that money seems to be flowing only upward (away from the middle class) and not circulating in small business and consumer lending or in the form of pay raises, and the resulting fear and sense of general dis-ease is horrifying to people. Fear and rage accomplish nothing productive.  But working together, we are some of the most productive people on earth. It is time to face up to what is bothering so many of us and get back to being the "can-do" nation that we are. Correcting unfairness in taxation and the sense that we no longer have representation are two good places to start. Instead of repeating talk show slogans and getting all worked up into a rage, let's contact our representatives with constructive ideas and rebuild our country with or without them!