Fixing Government – Where Do You Start?

Most reasonable, intelligent people I know, or run into, are of the belief that our government needs a bit of an overhaul. The question of the day is; “Where do you start?” Do you start with the Executive Branch? All things considered, that is where you would expect leadership on this issue to come from. How about starting with the Congress? That has its own set of complications, such as sheer numbers and stubborn partisanship. Some one in one of these two Branches of government simply has to get things going in the right direction in order that this Nation will survive. If, by forgetting the lessons of history, we are doomed to repeat the same mistakes over, and over, again, we are certainly in one of those cycles currently. With few exceptions, the general, systemic forces that lead to the Great Depression are upon us now. I have been reading on the circumstances that were in play back in the 1920’s, and they are eerily similar to those we face today. The one situation that jumps off the page at you is the total disregard the banking system has of any- thing close to social ethics. We have enjoyed our way to prosperity because we also had a sense of what was fair and reasonable in determining the workings of our economy. Of course, the military/industrial complex hasn’t hurt in this respect.

This Country took on a daunting task when the founding daddies thought it would be a great idea to co-join a free market economy with social responsibility. Profitability and Socialism go together like oil and water (as we saw in the Gulf of Mexico, literally and figuratively). Our practice of finding a middle ground by debate And compromise has worked well over a couple of centuries. So well, in fact, that people from around the globe have flocked here to enjoy the mix of structure and individualism with which the United States has flourished. There have been some speed bumps along the way, but currently I get a bad feeling that we’re at the edge of a very deep, dark abyss. We may, indeed, be over the edge and clinging on with one hand.

Our incumbent President and those who are vying to unseat him, are not, in my opinion, of the ability and demeanor to get the job done. We have a Congress that considers their job representing us a career. No longer do we have the “citizen politician” that our fore-daddies envisioned. We have two political parties when we should have four, or five, viable alternatives to choose from. The aforementioned “politicians” are bought, and paid for, by our financial institutions and our mega-corporations. What could possibly go wrong in such a structured environment, you ask?

Most people I know, or run into, cannot answer that question. In fact, a lot of them don’t have a clue what it is I’m talking about. I can only ask them to wake up and smell what they’re stepping in.

Our situation begs for a national leader who can, from day one, lay down a concrete path for us to follow so our course can be corrected in the right direction.

This course can no longer reflect the old saying;”shoot ’em all, let God sort  ‘em out later.” I do not like to ponder the possibility of marshal law, but the severity of our malaise may require that a President declare we are under attack from within, and declare the Country under marshal law until such time as we are back on track.

As I see it, this may be the only way that one person, the President, can grab the reigns of State and set the agenda and priorities needed to achieve the goal. After all, a long line of recent Presidents have used “executive privilege” and the “war powers act” to do likewise outside our borders.

There is a group quietly building toward such an end. The trouble is that many of won’t like where they want to take us as a Nation. Anointing a “king”, or “dictator”, even for a brief period, is also a place we don’t envision going, but it may be our only salvation. If we do nothing about this predicament, we are automatically doomed to fall into the abyss. Life as you and I know it will cease to exist, and our children will be left to pick up the pieces. To make something, anthing, work, all of us need to get involved in our political process.

This means VOTING: your vote really does count, now more than ever.