It was 1960 when the first mass-market antidepressant -- Librium -- went on the market in the United States, and three years later that Valium made its entrance.

By 2005, nearly 10 percent of Americans were taking one form or another of prescription antidepressant, more than 27 million people, according to the Center for Disease Control.

If we add in beer, liquor and the mind-numbing effect of television, it might not be unreasonable to estimate that somewhere near half of adults in our country go through their lives somehow sedated.

I'm not sure why it is, but a quote from "Animal House" seems to come to mind.

<em>It always does with you, Mike.</em>

[caption id="attachment_1241" align="alignleft" width="125" caption="Flounder"]<a href="http://mikerappaport.net/onevoice/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/flounder.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-1241" title="flounder" src="http://mikerappaport.net/onevoice/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/flounder.jpg" alt="" width="125" height="181" /></a>[/caption]

"Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son."

<em>Appropriate here.</em>

Quite possibly. I'll bet that if you did a Venn diagram of all the Americans with weight problems, drinking problems and well, intellect problems, it might encompass as much as 75 percent of the country. If that sounds high, consider that two-thirds of Americans are overweight.

So we have an amazingly large number of people who aren't coping well with our rapidly changing country. At the very time we need to be lean and mean, we're fat, drunk or stupid. And remember, the people in the part of the Venn diagram that overlap are like the hapless Kent Dorfmann -- fat, drunk <em>and</em> stupid.

Of course, I'm paranoid enough to believe that was all part of the plan. Not only was there a great deal of money to be made in sedating Americans, whether through pills, alcohol or what passes for entertainment these days.

I took antidepressants for more than 10 years, starting -- possibly coincidentally -- right around the time the newspaper where I worked was sold to an owner who eventually ran it right into the ground. I took a relatively medium-sized dose of Effexor, but last year in Texas, after two years of unemployment, I decided to quit taking it.

I'm glad I did, even if what some people seem to see as my anger or unhappiness at the state of our country may stem from it. At least I feel I'm fully awake.

If we're going to cope with this rapidly changing world, we need to be smarter, better informed and better able to recognize how candidates on both sides play us in order to get our votes. Unfortunately, that only seems to happen with the fringe candidates. When a Michelle Bachmann or a Sarah Palin distorts our history, the media is all over them. But when the real leaders on both sides make outrageous statements in the budget talks, some of them even telling outright lies, they're rarely called on it.

I have been a Democrat all my life, but I honestly believe most of the members of my party in Congress put re-election ahead of principles so often that I wonder if they have any principles left. As for the Republicans, don't get me started. Their one-note mantra of tax cuts won't do anything except redistribute more wealth upward.

<a href="http://mikerappaport.net/onevoice/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/darcy.jpg"><img class="alignright size-medium wp-image-1242" title="darcy" src="http://mikerappaport.net/onevoice/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/darcy-300x204.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="204" /></a>Will we smarten up before it's too late?

I don't know. It has been 40 years since John Prine recorded his wonderful song, "Spanish Pipedream," in which he urged us all to "blow up your TV."

And the sad part of that is that television -- at least the broadcast networks -- were much better back then.

We need to stop thinking about avoiding life, whether it's through sedatives, booze or entertainment. I really don't think it's too late for people to get aware, and maybe to remember the old expression about thinking globally and acting locally. Maybe you can't do much other than vote on national and global issues, but there's certainly no reason you can't make your own community a better place.

You can start with a very easy step, one that anyone in this world is capable of doing.

Resolve to be a little nicer to the people you encounter in your daily life. If the counter kid at Wendy's is a little slow getting your order, don't get annoyed. Just understand that he or she is doing the best they can.

Damn, people. Life is tough enough without us contributing to making it worse.

If you want to be part of the solution, start by making a decision that you will no longer be part of the problem.

It's that easy.