We've got problems. Big problems. Individually and as a country. We are divided and seemingly incapable of coming together as one to rally around any worthy cause. But no amount of current suffering or separation can compare to what members of the military experienced during times of war -- particularly World War II -- where soldiers lived in mud for months with little food or water, walked into enemy fire and sustained injuries too horrible to detail. They fought in far away places, across both oceans, without the benefit of modern communications devices to tie them to their loved ones back home. They died in numbers that I doubt we could tolerate now.

I am not sure how Memorial Day weekend turned into party time, but we shouldn't entirely lose focus of the real meaning of the holiday and why we're free to head to the beach or break out the keg.

This blog often comments on some difficult challenges that we face, but for the next three days I am going to give it a rest and allow myself to let go of my own hardships and the worries that I have for society as a whole. This is a good weekend to remember there are even worse things in life than oil spills, partisan politics and unemployment. It's a time to take a few minutes to be thankful for those who suffered and sacrificed in ways that are unimaginable to most of us.

Obama suddenly on the ropes

I find it very strange from a news judgment perspective that the USA Today (my former employer) home front is leading with the gays in the military story tonight while virtually every other major news web site and television broadcast is all over the oil spill events of the day. PBS, for instance, spent half of its newscast on the spill. Furthermore, as I drilled down into the USA Today site, I noticed the coverage hasn't been nearly as comprehensive as other major media sites have been in the last few weeks. Being that stories like this spill were what that national newspaper lived for in the past, I am baffled by USA Today's lack of coverage.

Here are a few observations about this ongoing story:

- CNN called out President Obama and BP for an entire hour on Anderson Cooper 360 tonight. It was startling to see what many right-wingers consider a liberal news organization catching Obama in several "gotcha" moments, as if Obama's middle initial was W. Cooper asked good questions and raised many excellent points about Obama and BP's failings in the last few weeks.

- Obama's press conference on Thursday was a bad performance. He didn't seem to have a firm grasp on the details like he usually does. He often contradicted himself. And the story about his daughter asking him about the oil leak while he was shaving was simply cheap and sappy. It was like he was groping for something to deflect the heat. I was disappointed in Obama's sense of command and I began to wonder for the first time whether Obama might be better at long-range, big-picture thinking, but not so good at dealing with a serious and immediate crisis. The lack of urgency he showed about addressing unemployment in his first year in office was inexcusable, but in that case he might have thought he had time to work on it. There was and continues to be no time to be wasted in this current environmental disaster. Not a single minute. Of course, some of the criticism Obama is taking is nothing more than political payback for the heat President Bush took for the feds' slow response to Katrina-ravaged New Orleans. So it's important to consider the source of the attacks on the current president.

- Is this oil spill going to ruin the Obama presidency? Everyone thought the health-care battle would jeopardize Obama's remaining years in the White House. The ongoing economic woes are certainly a major threat. But the disaster in the Gulf of Mexico has the potential to turn even the most liberal people against Obama. It's beginning to look like a botched operation, and that's not sitting well with environmental groups like the Sierra Club. With Obama taking full responsibility for the operation to stop the leak, I am not so sure how forgiving people are going to be.

This situation is bound to get worse. We don't even know a fraction of the damage that has been done yet. This could linger well into the remaining years of Obama's first and maybe last term. His enemies are salivating over a chance to pin real blame on him for showing a lack of leadership. Of course, Republicans aren't exactly champions of environmental causes, so it's kind of ridiculous to hear conservatives all of a sudden worried about the deaths of brown pelicans and sea turtles. It is important to remember that these are the "drill baby drill" people.

It's also important for the media to do its job and stay on this story in the most objective and thorough way it can.

More questions being raised about BP

British Petroleum apparently took risks with the oil well that eventually exploded and has been leaking oil into the Gulf of Mexico for over a month. This shouldn't surprise anyone. This is what big businesses do. They push deadlines and search for materials and shortcuts that will save money. They take calculated risks in the quest for bigger profits and maneuver around weak government regulations while hoping for the best. When it doesn't work out, consumers die in runaway Toyotas and fall to their deaths from exploding oil rigs.

It appears that BP, like Toyota, gambled and lost. Unfortunately, their loss cost lives and has destroyed unprecedented amounts of natural habitat, which in turn will ripple through our already ailing economy and create further mistrust of big oil.

What is adding insult to injury is BP's continuing inability to stop the oil and to safeguard sensitive areas along the Louisiana coast. (See the above video.) The company suits talk a lot about the thousands of workers employed to handle the emergency, but it's clearly not enough.

As a report on 60 Minutes recently documented, and this New York Times article details, this wasn't just one of those unavoidable accidents. There will be plenty of blame to go around and hopefully some criminal charges. But in the meantime, BP has to stop this leak and contain what oil is already in the gulf.

It's becoming more difficult to believe that BP is doing everything it can to solve this crisis. Is BP following the same playbook that caused this catastrophe -- cutting corners, trying to find the most cost-effective way out of this mess? Sure, the millions of dollars BP is spending sounds like a lot of money, but to a giant oil company, it's a drop in the bucket. It seems they want us to believe that they are sparing no expense, but common sense tells me that really smart people should have been able to plug this leak by now.

BP has wanted us to believe a lot of things, including that drilling is safe, that backup systems would prevent this sort of disaster and that the rate of the leak was far less than what it now appears to be. I think the company's credibility is shot.

The federal government claims to have a boot on the neck of BP, but that boot appears to be a fuzzy slipper at best. The feds probably can't fix the well, but they can determine whether BP is doing all it can. So far, the Obama administration has failed to apply an effective amount of pressure on the oil company. Again, this should be no surprise. Large corporations run America. It was one of the fears of our founding fathers. In the last few decades we have been watching those fears play out, taking down our economy and destroying our environment.

One has to wonder whether BP is searching for a financially feasible way of conducting operations and exaggerating their efforts to contain the oil for public relations purposes. Do they want the oil leak fixed? Absolutely. Do they want to bankrupt the company to do so? Probably not. So the trick for the BP brain trust is to find a way to deal with the leak and cleanup without going broke. I suspect that is what is causing the delay and why folks, like those in the above video, aren't seeing enough BP workers in the waters and marshes.

When the leak is finally fixed, BP will have an opportunity to clean up. It might take many years. Whether or not the company finds it financially feasible to stick around long enough to do the job properly remains to be seen.

Read why this is the worst oil spill in U.S. history.

Wins should dictate where Super Bowl is played

While I am a native New Yorker and fan of most Big Apple teams, I don't believe today's decision to play the 2014 Super Bowl in the new billion-dollar stadium in the New Jersey Meadowlands is a wise one.

This will be the first Super Bowl played in a cold-weather city without a domed stadium. Being that the game will be played in February, weather conditions are likely to be miserable, which is why the NFL has always stuck to host cities like Tampa, Miami and San Diego or played in domes to showcase its final game of the season.

Anything in New York tends to draw extra attention and extra money. Like with most things, the bottom line probably had a lot to do with today's decision by the NFL.

If the Super Bowl is now going to be played anywhere and everywhere, I would like to see one other change. I suggest allowing the higher-seeded team to host the game, essentially giving home field advantage to the franchise with the best record, as is done for all of the other postseason games in football and other sports. Season-ticket holders of both teams would have first shot at Super Bowl tickets, thereby keeping out some of the corporate types who tend to fill too many seats at most Super Bowls. The game would have the same dynamics as the conference championships, with true fans rooting for their teams.

Minority opinion about oil spill defies logic

These kinds of polls often throw me because there is always some small group of people who either live in blissful ignorance or just want to defy logic when answering questions. This poll was conducted by CNN and the Opinion Research Corporation. I've illustrated one particular question that caught my eye. What baffles me is this: Who are the people in the 16 percent -- the ones who don't think they or anyone close to them will be impacted by the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico -- and why do they feel immune from such a disaster? Even if you're living off the grid in the wilds of Montana or are a fanatical follower of Rush Limbaugh (who is not concerned about the gulf situation), this spill will impact you, at least indirectly. I can explain the ways it might do this but I suspect it would be a waste of time. Fortunately, 84 percent of Americans get it. Click to read the entire poll.

Tough talk isn't enough to fix this problem

Frustration and anger are building as BP continues to fail in its attempts to stop the massive oil flow into the Gulf of Mexico. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar blasted the oil company this weekend for missing deadlines. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal is upset with the poor response time from BP. And some are saying that President Obama should issue an order for the federal government to take over operations from BP.

Over 60 miles of the Louisiana coast have been severely impacted by the oil that has been flowing for over a month. Many more miles of coastline and islands are expected to be severely impacted. Large areas of the gulf are now off limits for fishermen and tourist areas have suffered a major economic hit as the summer season is about to begin. And no one really knows what damage is occurring on the ocean floor.

Meanwhile, the debate continues over how much oil is pouring into the gulf. Most scientists and scholars have calculated estimates far higher than what BP is stating. Worries continue that the oil will eventually make its way into the loop current and begin to move around the southern tip of Florida and up the Atlantic coast.

The controversy over the chemical dispersant is growing, as some have said the chemical is worse for the environment than the actual oil. Yet, BP continues to use the chemical.

There are some who fear BP isn't doing all it can do because it doesn't want to permanently seal the well. They are alleging that the well could still be a money-maker for the company once the crisis is resolved.

This oil spill shows how helpless we've become. Solving tough problems just doesn't seem to be something we do very well anymore. It's not a Republican or Democrat trait. While politics play a role in almost everything, it seems there is something more at work that is preventing us from fixing what's broken. Maybe we've gotten too big, too bureaucratic, too soft or too corrupt. Or maybe the smart people aren't in the power positions where they could make a positive difference.

So will all this frustration and anger lead to a solution to stop the oil from killing everything within its reach? Probably not. This crisis, like the economic collapse, was predicted by people in-the-know. And like the great recession, this environmental disaster is just going to have to play out, taking with it tens of thousands of victims -- from pelicans to entire industries and livelihoods. BP will pay for the cleanup with a mere fraction of its profits and go back to business as usual.

I can't help thinking what people would be saying if President Bush were in office right now, watching this event unfold for this many weeks. President Obama's response to the oil spill is making the prior president's actions after Hurricane Katrina seem swift and decisive.

It took three weeks before Obama showed any sense of urgency about the spill in the tone of his voice. Now entering the fifth week of the oil rig disaster, he's talking tougher but still not taking any significant action to help fix the problem. Just as he didn't seem to have a sense of urgency about the unemployment problem in his first year in office, Obama and the feds seem to be late to the party again.