We're masters of irony, slaves to it

Human thought has isolated three basic types of irony: There's verbal irony, in which what is said is the opposite of what is meant (think politics). Then there's dramatic irony, in which the audience has information the characters don't (think Wall Street insiders). Finally, there's situational irony, in which the expected outcome doesn't happen (think health care or foreign policy). And isn't it ironic that the same brain that is able to label these ironies is unable to free itself from them?

Isn't it ironic, for example, that a generation which claims to care about upcoming generations leaves huge problems for them to solve? For example, nuclear energy is currently being touted as "cheap and efficient" but will remain a deadly storage problem for hundreds of generations to come.

Isn't it ironic that those who cried, "Drill, baby, drill" are now mad, baby, mad about the gulf oil spill? And isn't it ironic that various technologies were developed for extracting oil while none seem to exist for stopping it?

Isn't it ironic that so many people are willing to boast about being part of the current "tea party" when the original tea party members disguised themselves as Indians and were condemned as thugs and cowards by the likes of Thomas Jefferson for their destruction of private property?

Isn't it ironic that we took so long to do anything about a confusing health care system that almost everyone complained about, but then made a mad rush into a confusing health care system that almost everyone complains about? And isn't it ironic that the drugs which made billions of dollars for pharmaceutical companies have side-effects that will now make billions for law firms?

Isn't it ironic that certain businesses are "too big to fail" while the small businesses that are considered the backbone of capitalism are too small to consider? And isn't that irony magnified by the fact that a good deal of the bailout money came from the taxes of failed small companies and individuals? Add to that the fact huge bonuses were paid with that bailout money to those who led big corporations into failure, and you have irony that challenges all common sense.

Speaking of taxes, isn't it ironic how many of our leaders seem shocked at our national debt when they ran two wars for nearly a decade without raising taxes? In fact, isn't it ironic almost to the point of being ridiculous that American voters were unable to see the irony in a campaign slogan of "no new taxes" during two new wars? Who did we think would pay for them, anyway? The oil companies?

The list of ironies at the national level is almost endless, but even here in Idaho we have a long list which includes such lollapaloozas of logic as the pay raises our legislators gave themselves during the same year they cut the funding that pays the wages of public employees. And how about that multi-million dollar face-lift for the Capitol building in Boise while public agencies around the state fall flat on their faces for lack of funds?

Irony defies logic even as it is defined by a lack of it. So what can logically be expected of a species willing to end itself over different interpretations of its beginnings? What can be expected when we label as "conservative" anyone who is liberal with gun laws while we label as "liberal" anyone who is conservative with laws about the use of public lands? And if you don't fit under one label or the other, if you don't have the us-against-them mentality of those who embrace such labels, then both sides are against you.

Yes, we've mastered irony to become its slave. But if master and slave are one and the same, shouldn't emancipation be a simple self-cure? And wouldn't that be pleasantly ironic?

Mike Ruskovich is a resident of Blanchard.