The President and the leadership in the Congress delivered a bill to the House of Representatives from the Senate with the plea for urgent action to supposedly stabilize the credit market. Absolutely none of the House members liked the bill, but a majority voted for it and some voted against it from both political parties. Public sentiment was to vote it down, yet some voted in favor in spite of the public input. It remains to be seen whether the President’s plan will work, time will tell.
The reasons for passing this “rescue” plan are still not clear. I have listened to a few supposedly knowledgeable media people with different suggestions and there are some patterns and themes that point to possible fixes to prevent another catastrophe like this one. I am not hearing those suggestions coming from Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi. I would hope that the Congressional leadership would be focusing on specific changes they think will prevent subsequent damage.
My real question here is for all those elected officials out there who know there are mine fields in their respective jurisdictions that have the potential for raising havoc and yet they sit on their hands and do nothing. When are you going to get off your butt and do your job? Members of Congress knew about the problems developing for several years and still failed to act. Even though this disaster is far from over, we need to appeal to our elected officials at all levels of government to step forward with concerns or ideas to address other sleeping catastrophes.
How many times have you heard an elected official say “I had no idea that the problem was so bad!” after a problem surfaced? Or, how many times did they say “I warned them about this problem X months ago and they failed to act!”? Junior members of the Congress don’t have much power, but they can stand up to raise the alarm. It could be their challenge is to convince the media to run with the issue to give it the hearing it deserves.
Doesn’t it make you wonder about what elected officials actually do in their jobs?
We elect them to office to be executives or legislators with the idea that they will be knowledgeable enough about the law to protect us from this kind of fall-out. The failure of so many elected officials to recognize the potential for not just this current disaster but others in the past suggests that elected officials are not doing their jobs. I expect more from my leaders.
Even if a Congressman is in the minority, he/she can be persistent in raising the alarm even if leadership chooses to do nothing. A failure to act is what this is all about.
If you are a rookie on the football team, it might be appropriate to defer to the veterans. They have demonstrated mastery of their sport through their performance on the field.
If you are an elected official, you need to make a case for your membership on the “team” by demonstrating your mastery of the “sport” so your constituents can be confident you represent them. Too many are elected and you never hear a word from them except at election time. The observation I make is that they are more often than not beholding to a political party and not to the voters. The party is their master, and us voters are just dupes in the process.
In light of the fact that our federal government came together in a bi-partisan manner to address the current problem after the fact, I would challenge elected officials at all levels of government to get past the partisanship that paralyzes government so often today to be proactive in identifying other problems that will be similarly damaging in other arenas.
The fixes for Social Security and Health care will require ideas and cooperation from both parties. Does the problem have to turn into a disaster before our “leaders” get to work? I want to see some leadership before the fact.
The spotlight is focused on the federal government right now, but there are persistent problems in our state, counties and cities that require action from elected officials. Isn’t it about time that we remind all of them that our future support is contingent upon their past performance and that for candidates that have never served our support is based upon specific ideas they have to make government better.
I am tired of political parties feeding me “political ‘yes’ men” who are either incompetent or blatantly deceptive. If we all sit back and accept this low level of service from our government, we might just deserve what we get.
Posted on October 7, 2008 at 3:22 am in Political commentary, Snohomish County Political Commentary | RSS feed
|
Reply |
Trackback URL
No Loss for Words
Get to work or get out of the way!
by Steve DanaThe President and the leadership in the Congress delivered a bill to the House of Representatives from the Senate with the plea for urgent action to supposedly stabilize the credit market. Absolutely none of the House members liked the bill, but a majority voted for it and some voted against it from both political parties. Public sentiment was to vote it down, yet some voted in favor in spite of the public input. It remains to be seen whether the President’s plan will work, time will tell.
The reasons for passing this “rescue” plan are still not clear. I have listened to a few supposedly knowledgeable media people with different suggestions and there are some patterns and themes that point to possible fixes to prevent another catastrophe like this one. I am not hearing those suggestions coming from Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi. I would hope that the Congressional leadership would be focusing on specific changes they think will prevent subsequent damage.
My real question here is for all those elected officials out there who know there are mine fields in their respective jurisdictions that have the potential for raising havoc and yet they sit on their hands and do nothing. When are you going to get off your butt and do your job? Members of Congress knew about the problems developing for several years and still failed to act. Even though this disaster is far from over, we need to appeal to our elected officials at all levels of government to step forward with concerns or ideas to address other sleeping catastrophes.
How many times have you heard an elected official say “I had no idea that the problem was so bad!” after a problem surfaced? Or, how many times did they say “I warned them about this problem X months ago and they failed to act!”? Junior members of the Congress don’t have much power, but they can stand up to raise the alarm. It could be their challenge is to convince the media to run with the issue to give it the hearing it deserves.
Doesn’t it make you wonder about what elected officials actually do in their jobs?
We elect them to office to be executives or legislators with the idea that they will be knowledgeable enough about the law to protect us from this kind of fall-out. The failure of so many elected officials to recognize the potential for not just this current disaster but others in the past suggests that elected officials are not doing their jobs. I expect more from my leaders.
Even if a Congressman is in the minority, he/she can be persistent in raising the alarm even if leadership chooses to do nothing. A failure to act is what this is all about.
If you are a rookie on the football team, it might be appropriate to defer to the veterans. They have demonstrated mastery of their sport through their performance on the field.
If you are an elected official, you need to make a case for your membership on the “team” by demonstrating your mastery of the “sport” so your constituents can be confident you represent them. Too many are elected and you never hear a word from them except at election time. The observation I make is that they are more often than not beholding to a political party and not to the voters. The party is their master, and us voters are just dupes in the process.
In light of the fact that our federal government came together in a bi-partisan manner to address the current problem after the fact, I would challenge elected officials at all levels of government to get past the partisanship that paralyzes government so often today to be proactive in identifying other problems that will be similarly damaging in other arenas.
The fixes for Social Security and Health care will require ideas and cooperation from both parties. Does the problem have to turn into a disaster before our “leaders” get to work? I want to see some leadership before the fact.
The spotlight is focused on the federal government right now, but there are persistent problems in our state, counties and cities that require action from elected officials. Isn’t it about time that we remind all of them that our future support is contingent upon their past performance and that for candidates that have never served our support is based upon specific ideas they have to make government better.
I am tired of political parties feeding me “political ‘yes’ men” who are either incompetent or blatantly deceptive. If we all sit back and accept this low level of service from our government, we might just deserve what we get.
Rate this:
Share this:
Related
Posted on October 7, 2008 at 3:22 am in Political commentary, Snohomish County Political Commentary | RSS feed | Reply | Trackback URL