This article was posted on January 22, 2009 on The State's website (thestate.com). Cindi Ross, Associate Editor, is the author. While Cindi admits that she herself has used analogies comparing families to government in the past, she is telling us that doing so at this moment in time really isn't appropriate. It doesn't capture the enormity of the problems at hand.
Yes, analogies help people to understand things by putting terms and situations into a form that is simpler, less complicated. This method is usually very helpful to people that wouldn't otherwise truly understand what is going on. However, Americans must understand that the issues our government is facing are not easily simplified. An analogy comparing decisions that affect a handful of people to decisions that affect hundreds of millions doesn't quite cut it. Government officials have the task of making decisions that benefit as many Americans as possible. Their job is to look after the common good of American citizens. And because there is no way they are going to be able to make everyone happy, compromises are going to have to be made in order to progress.
DeDe Sinatra
