Baby Boomers: Forget retirement! There's work to be done!

In his latest column lamenting Bush's many messes, Joe Galloway blasts Karl Rove who, "more than any other in a century, so polarized and divided a great nation and people and and converted the great game of politics into a blood sport, a killing sport."

Rove is gone from the White House but still has Bush's ear. And Bush will be gone soon enough. But Galloway asks some key questions about how we, as citizens, are going to help fix the twisted wreck of a nation (and world) that Bush will leave behind:

We are within some 500 days of the end of the Bush League Era. Near the time when all of us are going to have to roll up our sleeves and lend a hand at fixing all that these folks have broken or bent or twisted in our society: Our military, Constitution and Bill of Rights, our economy in which the very rich have only gotten richer and the poor poorer and our great American middle class has become an endangered species.

There is a generation's worth of work to do. It will be a time when we all will have to sacrifice. We're not used to that. Sure, we'll switch from a gas-guzzler to a hybrid and recycle our diet soda cans. But the workload will be enormous. As Galloway says, it's all broken or bent or twisted. Once we get our government back on track as a servant of all the people and not just a privileged few, then we have to undo Bush's damage to the Bill of Rights. And then there's a war to stop. And all of us -- you, me and the neighbor -- have to come up with an energy plan that weans us from fossil fuel. A real challenge in mt state of Wyoming, where fossil fuel is king.

Let's face it, Baby Boomers. It's our mess and we have to spend the rest of our lives cleaning it up. I don't want to hear "It's not my problem, man." It is. No quiet retirements will be allowed. That's not a problem for most of us, as we had planned no rest in our declining years. I don't know about you, but I plan to continue being a pain in the ass right to the very end.

But just writing cranky letters to the editor (or blogs) won't cut it. To use Galloway's term, we're going to have to roll up our sleeves and lend a hand. Real work will be involved. And we can't just leave it all for our kids and their kids to fix. They're going to have enough problems with competition from China and India and the so-called War on Terrorism continuing ad infinitum.

Here's the first change Baby Boomers can make: stop belittling members of Gen-X, Gen-Y, Gen-whatever and serve as mentors to them in your field of expertise. Bring them into the fold, don't shut them out. And here's an important point: sometimes mentoring involves just getting out of the way. My younger colleagues have great ideas. Sometimes the wisest course of action is stepping aside and letting them get on with things. That's a tough decision to make. When you start having to get out of the way, you begin to think that you may be old and in the way and maybe it's time to retire.

But no retirement for you. There's work to be done. So grab a shovel and help me dig out the manure pile Bush and Cheney (Wyoming's Favorite Son!) and Rove will be leaving behind.