In this intolerably drawn-out election cycle, perhaps not one thing strikes me as more socially dishonest than the candidates’ continued promotion of a hazy, mystical idea known throughout history as “the American Dream.”

If social security is the third rail of American politics, then “the American Dream” ought to be a first-class ticket to victory. For more than a century, American politicians and business leaders have systematically spread the falsity of “boot-straps” economics and social responsibility, arguing that anyone is capable of advancing him or herself with only a bit of hard work and American capitalism.

Unfortunately, and like most election promises, the reality is not so simple. And with 80,000 U.S. jobs lost last month alone, the latest New York Times/CBS News poll revealing that 81 percent of Americans believe the U.S. is on the “wrong track,” and our presidential candidates (some more than others) spreading the message of economic self-determination at a feverish pace, now would appear to be an appropriate time to break the news:

Santa Claus is dead.

And “the American Dream” is not real.

With three months of increasing unemployment, dim prospects for a speedy stabilization of housing markets and an unrelenting foreign occupation draining billions of U.S. dollars by the week, it’s safe to say that the recession has landed.

Admittedly, I’m no economic expert. But I’m not sure the average American family, struggling to retain work, pay the mortgage or even put food on the table, is interested in hearing about why things aren’t so bad, just give it time, and the state of our Union is strong.

The state of our Union may be strong, in the sense that there has been no serious threat of secession since the end of the Reconstruction, and yet “the American Dream” is a figment of the establishment’s imagination.

For decades, those in power – economic, political and otherwise – have used the illusion of “the American Dream” to subdue the nation’s poor (a.k.a. our economic heartbeat). While Horatio Alger & Co. have promoted a kind of one-step social ladder, they have intentionally left out the part involving THE SYSTEM and purposely limited one’s potential to the most modest of middle classes.

Especially having lived in West Michigan for the past 19 years, I have become particularly accustomed to – but nonetheless offended by – the more privileged of my acquaintances’ thinly veiled disgust at the “laziness” of the less fortunate. These are the same people that drive luxury SUVs, wear fine jewelry, never drink tap water and always talk about their moral virtue.

These are the same people who will tell you twice in one evening about their entrepreneurial genius in founding their own company, but who will not mention once that their wealthy parents fronted the money.

And then, of course, they will inevitably tell you, their breath drenched in 12-dollar martinis, how the working classes – the “peasants,” perhaps, if it’s been a few martinis – are inherently lazy, how government welfare is ridiculous, how they did everything for themselves so why can’t the “other people” do the same, and how it is abhorrent that they might have to skip their eighth trip to Europe because their investments, well, “just haven’t been performing.”

“Why don’t they just pull themselves up by their bootstraps?” they’ll ask, leaving a three-dollar tip on a $49 check. “This is America. Look at me.”

This is America, yes, but the problem is that for far too long our society has been instructing its least-fortunate to “look at me,” when often we, in fact, are not (to our surprise and extreme indignation) the solution so much as the problem.

“The American Dream” does not, and, with few, laudable exceptions, has not, ever honestly come to terms with THE AMERICAN FACT that many in this country are discriminatorily disadvantaged. THE AMERICAN FACT is that this country, like most others, depends upon the downtrodden to accomplish its dirty work. And I don’t know about you, but that kind of environment has certainly never appeared in any of my dreams.