On a holiday of Thanksgiving that dates to the beginnings or our country, I want to pause and be thankful.

We’ve got it so good in this country that we can bitch about minutiae in so many areas.

Roads? Yes, the Interstate Highway system is aging and it’s bumpy sometimes, but I remember a cross-country jaunt across the north end of south Korea where more roads weren’t paved than were.

Food? Cheap, plentiful, and healthy. Unless you eat too much of it. Walk into a major chain supermarket and see entire aisles devoted to eery major food group, and a produce section that sells fresh vegetables of every variety all year round.

Health? In a hundred years, the expected lifespan has increased from fifty years to almost eighty. Yeah, people die of more exotic diseases today. We know that. It’s because they lived through things earlier in their lives that would have killed them a century ago. You can’t die of congestive heart failure at 78 if you’re already dead because of a ruptured appendix at 22.

Safety? With the exception of a few notorious areas like inner cities and government housing projects, you don’t have to fear criminal activity. Our law enforcement can be amazingly effective, since so many homes are armed that criminals don’t feel really safe in trying crime in many areas.

Housing? Even our poor live better than 75% of the world. An American home has larger living area and more amenities than the rich in many countries, what with multiple TV’s, indoor plumbing and running water, multiple bathrooms, air conditioning and heating, indoor kitchens, and laundry facilities.

We are riding a wave of prosperity from the work of generations before us. We’ve been presented with a tremendous gift, we funny group of homogenous rejects of the nations of the Old World. God has blessed us. May we maintain the wisdom to keep it.