You know what’s not gonna fix America? Hanging around and singing kumbaya. For God’s sake, just look at us: indebted; overextended; weary. All of this because our elected “leaders,” for the incompetent life of them, can’t stop hymning a centuries-old African-American spiritual.

Until very recently, I had no idea of the devastation left in kumbaya’s tinny, hilariously campy wake. And then—by fate, My Lord?—I happened across the online message boards for a hodepodge of regional newspapers. Alas, the influence of the campfire favorite was far, far, far deeper than I could have ever imagined. Consider:

In an editorial today, the Baltimore Sun examined Sarah Palin’s dubious record on special-needs assistance, only to have this surface from an outraged policy wonk:

“Oh thats right, I forgot. Lets cut the military in half, not worry about any interest abroad, bring home all our troops, admit defeat in the face of a success hold hands and sing kumbiya. And lets be sure as well as solving all our home problems we give the U.N. 50 billion. After all the U.N has done so much for us. And when we get hit again at home the liberals can say again we had it coming to us.”

Dumbfounded, I tripped, only to wake up staring at this Nevada man's letter to the editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal :

“In just the past couple of weeks, some casino executives have gone on record to support higher room taxes and higher payroll taxes, and some attended Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s National Clean Energy Summit. So let me get this straight—in an economy where gaming volume is down and casino construction projects are closing, they want to increase the size of our already wasteful and inefficient government and then hold hands and sing 'Kumbaya' with Harry Reid?”

Poster “libsrcorrupt,” writing on The Oregonian's message board, also identifies the threat:

“Now that is just silly especially coming from a person who’s ideology justifies the slaughtering their unborn babies by calling it choice. I simply point out the hypocrysy of the liberal mindset. If you call it negative, so be it. Sorry to get on your nerves. Maybe we should all gather around for a big group hug and sing kumbaya…"

Kumbaya-singing, like gravity, doesn't exist in a vacuum. As with any malignancy, it has to start somewhere. The Dallas Morning News identified the cancer almost two years ago, and its more recent metastasization seems to have started in Unity, New Hampshire. Those guys probably got the idea from the original community organizer, Joan Baez.

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