The problem is not that Americans are disheartened over inability to solve our problems.  Here is what Noonan is missing

I started reading Peggy Noonan in the Wall Street Journal some time ago. Unfortunately, all too frequently I found her disappointing. Yes, she was a speechwriter for President Reagan, but since then she seems to have lost her edge and perhaps her ability to reason. Maybe she needed Mr. Reagan to point her in the right direction. When she all but endorsed Barack Obama in 2008 I gave up.

Recently I was referred to one of her columns We're Governed by Callous Children and decided to look in on what may have happened to her since last November. My reaction was still one of disappointment; Noonan still doesn't get it. In her opening remarks she opines that

"The biggest threat to America right now is not government spending, huge deficits, foreign ownership of our debt, world terrorism, two wars, potential epidemics or nuts with nukes. The biggest long-term threat is that people are becoming and have become disheartened, that this condition is reaching critical mass, and that it afflicts most broadly and deeply those members of the American leadership class who are not in Washington, most especially those in business."

Later she states "Americans are starting to think the problems we are facing cannot be solved."

Meanwhile she also has concluded that the problem with many of today's politicians is

"… that they've never seen things go dark. They came of age during the great abundance, circa 1980-2008 (or 1950-2008, take your pick), and they don't have the habit of worry. They talk about their "concerns"-they're big on that word. But they're not really concerned. They think America is the goose that lays the golden egg. Why not? She laid it in their laps. She laid it in grandpa's lap."

Noonan is dead wrong. The problem is not that Americans are disheartened over inability to solve our problems. Anyone who examines the population seriously on this issue will most assuredly find that there are two large categories of people present. The first is absolutely sure that the problems can be solved if the government gets out of the way and stops creating more problems in the name of solving them. These people are the producers, business owners and American traditionalists. The second group believes that the problem is a lack of enough government and wants more. This second group can also be divided into two subgroups that either believe they will be able live off of other people's money forever, or that "social and economic justice" require the producers to support the lazy. They are, unfortunately, just plain ignorant.

Do Americans think that their nation is the goose that lays golden eggs? Perhaps, but some don't know that they are killing the goose and others don't care because they would rather that no one had the goose instead of only one nation or perhaps only the productive class having it. Of course, everyone could have such a goose if they emulated the American productive model, but very few people in politics seem to understand this. And outside of politics the lure of laziness is hard to resist.

Meanwhile, Peggy Noonan has apparently missed the Tea Party movement, and the inspired activity of so many people who were sitting on the sidelines two years ago. She has missed the enthusiasm that is motivating people to participate in ways they have not before, and the possibility that this may spark a second American Revolution and an American Renaissance. At the same time she is out of touch with the attitudes affecting public and political behavior.

Here is what Noonan is missing.

There is anger on both sides of the aisle. Center-right Americans are angry that the government has screwed them and is trying to do it again, to an even greater degree. They now realize that they can't fully trust anyone in politics regardless of political affiliation.

The Left is angry that because it hasn't achieved a utopia, despite having elected the people who promised one. They continue to blame the previous administration and the political opposition because, regardless of who is elected, utopia is unachievable. Of course, if you are a leftist office holder, you are also angry because you haven't achieved absolute power, despite who occupies the Legislature and White House.

What the center-right now understands in ways that it hasn't during the last several decades is this: The people in government can't solve problems because they refuse to acknowledge that they are part of the problem. They offer only the old, ineffective tax, spend, and regulate solutions because those maintain their power. Stepping away from power is not what government does well; perhaps it doesn't know how to do it, and if so, power may have to be forcibly removed from government. Time will tell.

Noonan is right about one thing about many people in government "They are stupid and they are callous, and they don't mind it when people become disheartened. They don't even notice."

They are stupid because they would rather not solve the nation's problems. They are callous because they figure that they won't be affected if the economy implodes. But do they notice? Yes they do because they want a disheartened America; a disheartened America will turn to them and will allow them to maintain their power.

Peggy Noonan may be well intentioned, but she is too far out of touch to see all this.  Maybe it is too much time inside the beltway that is the problem.  As Laura Ingraham says whenever she leaves DC "I'm glad to be back in America."