While America Slept, Lady Liberty Wept

While many hard-working Americans were busy trying to eek out a living and saving towards their retirement, our elected officials were busy stealing our America’s dream. Hope for a better tomorrow was fading as each new bill was passed in the dead of night and contrary to the majority of public opinion.

You realize that the mess that this country is in is our own damned fault; right?

Of course, I would expect many to disagree because we work, we pay our taxes, we support our public servants and the military and we believe in the Rule of Law.

Hey; that’s great!

But, do you follow the news of what our elected representatives do on any given day?

Do you stay close to proposed legislation that could increase the burden to those already over-burdened?

If you do, do you communicate your opinions to your representative?

Do you take the time to vote?

I know that a significant portion of our country isn’t engaged and haven’t been for some time.

Did Strom Thurmond and Jesse Helms serve so many years in Congress because they were THAT good or because they were so insulated from their constituents and so well connected to their political party’s hierarchy that it was next to impossible to vote them out? I think that is a fair question.

At what point did elected officials in our federal government become public EMPLOYEES and not public servants?

I don’t think that the framers of the Constitution ever intended for our elected representatives to become “career politicians”.

How is it that our country’s President can serve no more than two (2) four (4) year terms and yet, a Congressperson can serve 40, 50 or 60 years?

Clearly; while American “slept”, a body of government that was elected by the people for the people morphed into buy the people for themselves.

Equal representation was no longer equal, but directly proportionate to the size of a campaign contribution.

Special interest groups were popping up like zits on a teenage and suddenly, we had politicians with special needs…power and greed.

Now; we are a government by proxy.

Proxy is defined as: the authority or power to act for another or a document giving such powers.

When you strictly interpret that definition, representative government is a proxy process in and of itself.

Americans were either foolish or naïve to believe that they were electing who would; you know…REPRESENT them! When you give something as powerful as your vote to someone else, you have the expectation that they are voting for YOU and in YOUR best interests and not theirs’.

But, what we have gotten is a process that is so convoluted and complex that it discourages a “commoner” from wanting to run, but if they do and by the grace of God and a lot of luck they should win, then the next several months of their term is spent “learning the ropes”. Apparently, it isn’t even close to what we learned in Civics class. I have to assume that getting a bill introduced, debated and passed is every bit as complicated as the current U.S. Tax Code.

Consequently, unless you have been in Congress since the turn of the century (Strom and Jesse); you simply sit there in the Chamber, let the three top dogs of your political party make THEIR decisions, collect your paycheck and points towards retirement and start your campaign for re-election. If you look at recent history, this would apply aptly to our current state of affairs with Reid, Pelosi, Durbin, Boehner, McConnell and a couple of their oldest and dearest friends from “back home” calling the shots.

The days of serving the people have become self-serving.

Recently, a poll has shown that Congress is out of touch with the rest of the country. Could that be because they don’t feel the same economic pressures that America’s households feel while trying to stay within their budgets and avoiding borrowing money? Are their 30 year-old kids still living with THEM? Doubtful.

Our representatives have spent so much time packing their golden parachutes that America can no longer afford the “plane” to jump from.

While America remains grounded, along with our fleet of space shuttles, our elected representatives are flying high with enough perks to insulate them from an increasingly, maddening crowd!

In fact, they spend so much time defending their immoral and unethical ways that they no longer listen to the enablers; the people of the United States.

But, when a collective group made up of both political parties, independents and the awakened Silent Majority rises up to say, “ENOUGH”; THEY are branded as “anti-government” and “un-American”.

How ironic.

Politicians who are blinded by their own greed; politicians living lavishly off of OUR taxes; politicians completely oblivious to the magnitude of the damage that they have inflicted upon this country that we love so dearly believe that THEY are the patriots!

Why?

Because America was reinforcing their poor performance by re-electing them.

We didn’t want to take the time to look at voting records, biographies of new candidates or to run for an office at the local, state or federal level.

No; it was easier to just let someone else handle that “political stuff” (thank you; just give me the bullet points)!

What we didn’t figure on was; while giving someone else the proxy to act on our behalf in matters of government, we were abdicating powers guaranteed to us by the Constitution.

As our Congress sits there in Washington with an 87% DISAPPROVAL rating, the only thing on their minds is how they can survive the next election; even though the very survival of this country is at stake.

Look at it in this rather primitive perspective: government is the cigarette; lobbyists are the smoke; America is the ashtray and Congress is the cancer.

And in my opinion, it is time to kick the habit and get healthy again!

TCSS.

The opinions and views expressed are those of the article’s author, Art Goodrich, who also writes as ChiefReason. They do not reflect the opinions and views of www.fireengineering.com, Fire Engineering Magazine, PennWell Corporation or his dog, Chopper. This article is protected by federal copyright laws and cannot be re-produced in any form.