Sayonara 2015

(printed in the Las Cruces Sun-News, December 31, 2015)

Good riddance 2015, hopes for better 2016

If I could, I’d give 2015 a swift kick in the pants as it made way for 2016. Consider what went on during the year now ending: a mother who gave her six-month-old child a bottle, then suited up and joined her husband on a killing spree at a holiday party; a group of thugs in the Middle East who “inspire” others, (not themselves, oddly enough), to blow themselves up in various parts of the world expecting to get to paradise before anyone else; “low information voters” who become low information candidates for president of the U.S. — along with assorted sneerers and overstuffed billionaires. You couldn’t make this stuff up if you tried.

How about the “smart money” guys of 2015 who pride themselves on sending young people out on international soccer and (U.S.) football fields to beat their brains out to generate bribes, payoffs and lucrative TV contracts for their handlers. Or the characters who buy up drug companies to enrich themselves on the pain and suffering of others — not to mention congressmen enjoying the best medical care in the world seeking to deny health care to the working poor.

How about the makers and marketers of the guns spewing ammunition out of car windows; within classrooms, clinics, hospitals and churches; into playmates from other playmates; and, at close range, into the bodies of tortured souls afflicted with suicidal impulses.

Finally, 2015 saw another bump in the profits of predatory loan stores now on street corners around poor neighborhoods and military bases — so much for military preparedness.

Hope springs eternal, goes the expression. Will 2016 give hope a chance?

Dan Townsend,

Las Cruces