Tag Archives: honor

Biden, Crime, Culture, Education, Health Care, Politics 2022, Religion, Representation, Sex

Psychology, If You Don’t Mind

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I have the answer here in my hand…

We’re all psychologists.  Humans could not work together, form societies or even families, if we could not “size up” one another and make relatively accurate judgments as to the attitudes and outlooks of those we need to live with.  Like every other human skill, psychological survival and progress has attracted experts, often the death knell of progress in the field of interest.  Beyond studying and learning about human psychology, psychologists have moved on to defining and even inventing forms of it.  Today it is almost as though the professional in the psychology field had DISCOVERED psychology in humans and that they, psychologists, must be consulted about any and every aspect of it, lest mere humans hurt themselves and others by trying to comprehend it.

Life is animalistic without psychological abilities.  Animal brains only barely exhibit any sense of meaning to the actions they take.  Humans strive to avoid it.  Part of the magic of human psychology is the ability to worship, and to perceive a spiritual existence that is the greatest sense of meaning possible.  What does – or what will – what I’m doing, mean?

Generally, the actions of today are taken because of their meaning something in the future.  We save today for security tomorrow; we court and marry today to produce a family of children tomorrow; we live honorably, creating friends and earning respect from others, so that we’ll have friends and friendship in our old age; we try to avoid poisoning our bodies and avoid danger and injuries because it means we can live longer.  We even attempt to extend our meaning to others beyond the date of our death with inheritances and bequests and instructions.  Unfortunately, we are descending into a process of talking ourselves out of our own humanity.  Psychologists of various stripes have convinced many to deny who they are, and have convinced many others with influence over them, to help them in the process of denial.  What for?

A large element of civilization has been and remains theater.  It could be as simple as street actors and their ad-hoc creation of scenes, characters and stories, to the elaborate production of operas that remain popular over decades and centuries.  Greek and Roman theater still teach us to look at life and meaning in “better” ways; Shakespeare, Marlow, Bacon and thousands of others from every culture, employed costume, staging, music, masks and pretense to teach cultural truths and lessons for living.  Modern electronics make it possible for every individual – including children – to become a preferred pretense character, almost always on a Snap-Chat stage.  It seems, unfortunately, that the “psychology community” talked itself into treating human theater, down to the individual level, as more valuable – more essential – than reality.

As one old Greek noted, “Virtue lies in Reason and Vice in rejection of Reason.”  However, as psychologists are only too aware, or promoters of, Reason cannot be satisfactorily defined, especially from generation to generation.  There seem to be thousands of permutations of reason, and as communications have advanced, so to speak, certain biases have become widely shared, affecting modern concepts of reason, which is not to say, Truth.  Since the 1960’s and ‘70’s, feminism has become the overriding permutation of reason in the United States, and it has led to a society-bending twist of sexual roles and mores.  Psychologists haven’t tried to stem this tide.  Where “psychology” might add to understanding of various truths, instead it seems to adapt to and rationalize social trends.

Prudence can expect to be roundly chastised for the previous paragraph, and, probably, the next one.

Feminism has done more damage to American society than any other belief system besides slavery.  Bit by bit – now chunk by chunk – it has feminized men and destroyed the majesty of motherhood.  Simultaneous with the explosion in homosexuality, feminism has also led to hyper-sexualization of school-age children down to disturbing ages.  As it has torn down the old morality it has failed to replace it with a new one.  Where women used to “civilize” men, they now compete in an arena of irresponsible sexuality where everything is planned or avoidable based on the whims of women.

Women are now the drivers of the new para-psychology called transgenderism.  And, rather than eliminating confusion about maleness or femaleness, it encompasses a host of “sexualities” that mainly women teachers and gay or other “non-binary” “teachers” feel compelled to dictate to, if not guide and groom, children at very young ages.  Where are “the psychologists” on this strange twist of “education?”  Sadly, they seem able to rationalize or even justify the trans-gender fad.  If it didn’t do so much damage to the kids whose theatrical fantasies everyone is rushing to “confirm,” the psychologists might be forgiven.

MOST of transgenderism is theater.  Children, some genuinely confused about sexuality, a very small fraction, and the rest who want to play at being the opposite sex, are pounced upon by agenda-driven teachers, psychologists, doctors and even hospitals(!), who are all in a hurry to “confirm” trans-gender fantasies.  Confirmation, unfortunately, consists of largely irreversible hormone injections and blockers, and even surgeries to remove perfectly healthy organs.  The children are permanently changed and their developments confused chemically.  The greatest effect?  Sterilization.  Not many teenagers and damned few adults can conceive of what full medical transfiguration means as time goes by.  Most come to realize that they have attempted something that is impossible in the majority of cases, and that leaves them neither male or female.  There is more at stake than pronouns.

Yet, some dysphoria is real – the people who transition to another way of living are still real people who deserve as much respect as anyone else.  Heterosexual people are largely unable to accept trans-gender people at “face” value.  Reactions vary over a short spectrum, from disbelief to disgust.  Normal people have a duty to learn respect for those who have found the only way to deal with their relatively rare dysphoria is transition.  Let the rest of us count our blessings.

This doesn’t excuse the agenda-driven recruitment of children to a belief in gender-fluidity.  Parents know that childhood whims and fantasies usually fade away or are outgrown by maturity in nearly all cases.  To pounce on these susceptible kids, especially for teachers, is criminal.  For administrators and political / civic leaders to make it ILLEGAL to prevent gender-predation shall remain a stain on the conscience of the nation.  Shame on us and kudos to those leaders wise enough to resist this weird aberration in human purpose.

Those who are committed to the “trans” state of being and living also need to recognize that their own, understandably very deep biases toward “non-binary” sexuality, bends their views to find trans potential atop almost every pair of legs.  Bigots on both sides need to stifle their angers and misunderstandings.  Professional, expert psychologists and psychiatrists ought to be guiding the confused toward a path that is constructive for society and civilization.  Unfortunately, they have agreed among their professional, expert-laden Societies, to avoid moral judgement and even counsel patients to dissociate themselves from religious codes.  Indeed, such counseling tends to affirm those ideas that comfort the patient, rather than disturb him or her.

In other words, psychology can affirm one’s deepest beliefs, which is not to say truth.  Unfortunately, sometimes beliefs are just wrong and counter-productive or damaging to society.  They can interfere with forming positive bonds with others, with family members, or with others who would be good for the individual.  Psychology has drifted too close to chemical solutions for too many conditions/reactions; they also tend to counsel for far too long, with patients dependent upon their therapists to maintain a new normalcy.

As Americans ponder the decline of trust in the institutions that ought to defend successful traditions and uphold the greatest strength of U. S. culture, one of those has been medicine, including mental health medicine.  The professionals in that society have always been people of sense, ready willing and able to advise patients toward the healthiest, most sensible habits and actions.  This used to include psychologists and psychiatrists, but this has all changed.  Why?  How did industries – professions – of HONOR, become so sullied? 

Politics and money, not synonymous, but often congruent.  If politics were corrupted by only money we could survive and even thrive as the running battle against corruption played its parallel games.  But politics has been corrupted by ideology, hatred and mendacity.  The Covid pandemic exposed the degree of twist that has occurred.  One political party routinely condemns half the voters in the country, not as those who see a different way to improve and strengthen America, but as a group that can’t be permitted to hold or even share power… a group that threatens the republic, that is racist, homophobic, transphobic and every other epithet that can be used on TV to denigrate another person.  Then that same party does everything that their opponents are accused of doing, BY THEM.  It is no longer politics, but managed hatred, and it has coopted the institutions of government, justice, education and medicine, among others.  None of the professions that once held the nation together have been spared.

The various forms of artifice are all masks, covering the faces of evil.  Millions of true patriots resist and believe in the majesty of the American way – most are Christians.  They – we – are the conscience of America.  A new professionalism and a new citizenship are all that can restore us… and a new / old spiritual understanding of why humanity is male and female, and how it can survive and grow stronger.  Honestly.

Crime, Culture, Economics, Education, Elections, Family, Politics 2021, Race, Representation

FIELD OF TRUTH

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We, meaning the Exchange Club of Lawrence and the Andovers, and a bunch of wonderful volunteers and relatives thereof, installed the “Field of Honor” for the third time on the North Andover, Massachusetts Common, this past Saturday.  It is a labor of love and patriotism and, in fact, a most serious community service, part of two of Exchange’s Four Pillars of Service.  To do a lot of what a “full-calendar” Exchange Club wants to accomplish each year requires money, and mixed with our forms of service to our communities are some vital fund-raising events; the Field of Honor is a four-way winner on that calendar.  With a single project we fulfill “Americanism,” we raise needed funds, we unify our Club and we provide “Community Service” for all of those who sponsor flags in memory of loved ones or in honor of them, who recognize first-responders, health-care workers, coaches, teachers and other personal “V.I.P.’s” in their lives.

Each sponsored flag has affixed a colorful, laminated “Tag” that names the honoree, field of service and heartfelt commentary by the sponsor about this very important person.  The first time we “did” a Field of Honor we followed the lead of a nearby Exchange and tried to read all the dedications on the day of ceremony at the end of the Field’s term of display.  We messed it up fairly well since we didn’t have a good database, but the hearing of one’s dedication was very important to the flag sponsors, a fact made abundantly clear to us by those who did not hear their own, or who missed the reading.  That is when the nature of the service we were suddenly responsible to provide properly, became clear.

We’ve fixed that database problem.  We’ve also fixed our lack of recognition among the communities we’ve served for, now, 75 years.  Both our Club members and the Club, itself, can be identified with this beautifully visible display, now of three-week’s duration.  But, the “Field” is still greater than the values already noted.  It’s a unifier when Unity in these “United” States is under its greatest stress.  This is the larger part of the story.

Dis-unity is the most potent weapon there is in the hands of an enemy of a democratic republic – a republic built on personal morality and personal responsibility and above and beneath all, FREEDOM.  In the past dozen (or five-dozen) years, or so, we have witnessed the coalescing of “liberal,” socialistic tendencies toward dictatorial government, around the always-tender concerns about race and attendant hatreds.  There is very little within the non-discussive discussions about race in the U. S. that involve truth.  Among intentional, often political LIES about race or racism, exist often-repeated – shouted – non-truths that are based upon beliefs that are just not so.  That is, many, mostly guilt-ridden liberals, repeat statements they believe are true, but the premises of which are false.  They have no intention to lie, per se, but become greatly exercised as they parrot non-truths.  We should stipulate some truths.

One – Different races are not limited compared to any other race in terms of ABILITY, only by BELIEFS.  Within those beliefs are familial, parental and social expectations that are imprinted even before birth, as to what constitutes propriety and success for an individual.

Two – Mixing races together, including by force, as with slavery, ALWAYS carries the risk of continuing division because of conflicting BELIEFS, not because of mental or physical abilities.  Humans are much more alike than not, despite oft-repeated untruths we may have grown up with.  Diversity, in and of itself, is a weakening agent to the cohesiveness of a society, to a nation.  Similarity is the great strengthener, and, when reinforced by diverse experiences, a tremendous strength to the United States nation.  Diversity for its own sake is a source of social divisiveness, yet now governs our economic and social constructs, including valuations of one another as “sufficiently diverse” enough in our daily lives and actions.  No nation can survive, no society can succeed if its interactions are biased toward the non-traditional beliefs of newcomers, rather than the newcomers being required to live by our traditional moral standards, no matter their personal beliefs.

Three – Shared morality is essential to social unity and to economic success.  America’s economic success is based on fundamental honesty in contracts written and unwritten, from marriage to multi-year leases, commodity pricing and delivery, and in covenants between the people-formed governments and those governments, themselves, local state and federal.  Together with honesty in contracting, our sense of – belief in – sacrifice for a better future for our children and for people unknown, made our phenomenal growth and wealth possible.  Welcoming, or allowing establishment of, moralities alternative to the historical, traditional morality of a society, is a first step to social suicide.  Americans, in our folly, are not merely tolerant of other beliefs, which is relatively harmless, but we fail to require all citizens to live by our own fundamental moral traditions.  Indeed, we have managed to talk ourselves out of living by them.

Four – There are two genders: many feelings about one’s place and purpose and pursuit of happiness, but only two genders.  That so much heat is generated over “trans-genderism” or “trans-sexuality” is based on those individuals who desire so much to believe in two contradictory ideas at the same time, that they will endure a host of suspicions and fears among “straight” populations.  Others who desire acceptance of aberrant lifestyles, AND those who are mainly interested in the dissolution of the United States, seize upon those who believe in trans-genderism and employ their suffering – which is real – as a further wedge to separate the vast majority of Americans from their traditional morality.  Sadly, ultra-progressive parents, themselves, are changing their own beliefs to accommodate the popularized mental incongruity that two diametrically opposed concepts may be true at the same time.  Small children who claim to be other than their actual gender are encouraged in this incongruity even to the point of chemical – EVEN SURGICAL – modification of growth and maturation (with untold consequences, nearly all of which are negative).  Supposed psychologists, scientists of a sort, including “child” psychologists, have bent their attitudes towards normality and no longer advise maintaining traditional roles for children until maturity.  Most minors “grow out of” dyspohric fantasies.  Unfortunately, a less and less morally constrained population has created political pressure sufficient to have draconian laws passed requiring society to accommodate these incongruities, to the direct affront of not only honesty, but of all traditional moral codes, including religious codes, and to our peril as a democratic republic, which, as noted, can function only amidst a population self-controlled by shared morality.

Five – Derek Chauvin did not kill George Floyd.  Oh, he was “convicted” of murder, much like Joe Biden having been certified as President.  The Chauvin conviction was mere confirmation of what weak, jittery politicians had agreed with mobs to do.  The nearly sainted George Floyd was on an express bus to an early death that day, before his antics even gained police attention.  Chauvin, not the brightest bulb in the string, could have feigned great concern and demanded that people taking videos go find a doctor instead.  He could have laid George’s big head on his lap and tried talking to him while they waited for the EMT’s.  He’d still have his job, Minneapolis would still be a city, and dozens of businesses and thousands of jobs would still be supporting families in Minnesota.  No, Chauvin didn’t kill Floyd, but he caused the deaths of many others and many more to come as idiotic, fearful, politicians attempt to buy favor from Communists and fascists by weakening police departments.

Six – To say that “black lives matter” is to state an obvious fact; all lives matter in a non-communist society: our morality informs us of the sacredness and sanctity of human life.  To adhere to the “Black Lives Matter” organization as some sort of leaders in the mattering of black lives, however, is to put the lie to every aspect of the sanctity of black and every other life.  More than in any other “advanced” culture, lives matter most under a system of freedom and personal worth.  Religion has a lot to do with that, Christianity most of all in this Prudent view.  To latch on to anti-Christians for leadership in this area of humanity, is utterly nonsensical.  Misguided blacks, in fact, are at the forefront of DISCOUNTING the values of black lives!  Let us count the ways.

          Blacks are solidly Democratic in their politics, evidently expecting expansive government to make their lives better.  Yet it is they who have the most to say about the betterment of their lives and the lives of all blacks.  After 60 years of federalized welfare and the concurrent dissolution of the black family, wise blacks can readily describe the negative impact on black lives, a gift from Democrats.  The incessant turning away from success by so many black youth, consumed in hatred for anything “white,” like educational excellence and personal merit, is also a product of political divisiveness employed by the great protectors of blacks: Democrats.

          Just as was done in South Africa during apartheidt, unions have been strong promoters of unionization and minimum wage laws – the net effect of which have been to make it more comfortable to hire whites instead of blacks.  Black youth, more likely to be lower-skilled, unfortunately, are denied their best marketable quality: willingness to work for less to get started up the ladders of success.  We have made it illegal to work for less.  Alternatives on the streets and gang associations where all the leaders are non-white, are made much more attractive to disaffected youth.  Keeping blacks unskilled and inexperienced serves to make unionized jobs more white… just like in South Africa.  Who are the strongest proponents of unionization and minimum wages?  Democrats, who are trying their hardest to improve the lot of blacks, just ask them.  Those are they who celebrate success of black Democrats while heaping scorn upon blacks of other political views.  Black lives matter, so much.

President Joe Biden, race-baiter in chief… and great “unifier,” has authorized the flying of “Black Lives Matter” flags at American embassies around the world.  It is a move so utterly offensive to so many, and so essentially diametric toward everything the United States has ever professed, fought-for or relied upon in its founding ideas and ideals, and so stupid, as to expose the rank folly of this man’s being president of this nation or of virtually any organization of alert humans.  Nothing he does is to be trusted.  Nothing he has done as president is pro-American… or anti-racist.

Seven – Education is the primary business of parents: not of the government at any level, or of teachers unions or of mediocrity contracts with arbitrary groups of teachers.  Teachers are hired, fundamentally, to teach our children how to be honest, literate, knowledgeable about science, mathematics and the natural world, and knowledgeable about our culture and founding, governing principles.  Educators need not teach religion, per se, but about religion as part of World History.  Nor should they teach against it.  They should teach common decency and respect for others, good manners and propriety in all things within the school campus/environment.  Sports and other team functions and competitions are relevant for good health and good adjustment to the individual strengths and weaknesses of others.  Exposure to the Arts is also essential for becoming well-rounded individuals, armed with some choices of direction to follow after the first 12 years of instruction.  Elective courses should include “manual arts” and tool use, carpentry and basic trade skills.  It is not the business of educators to expose minor children to unusual sexual practices or any sexual practices.  The subject matter of any “Health” class should be vetted by the parents of children in the school system, else their children may not attend said class.  Any school or “system” unwilling to collaborate with parents at that level about sexuality or any other area of controversy, perhaps with open petitioning by a certain percentage of parents, requiring such vetting, does not deserve access to students or to the tax monies that follow them.

          Ideally, every school should be a Charter School, and every child should be expected to excel… and to behave.

Eight – The breaching of the Capitol Building on January 6th was not an insurrection.  It was several things, but “insurrection” was not one of them.  There was no attempt, or even hope, to overthrow the sitting government or our governing “system,” EXCEPT where said system was lying to the American people.  The mealy-mouthed half-truths and outright lies tossed around in the hallowed halls of Congress, ostensibly to do “the people’s business” has become so offensive and off-target that people wanted to talk to their erstwhile “representatives” who were about to certify a most questionable election of one of the most crooked presidents-elect to ever reach that level.  The actions of some who assaulted the building were clearly unrelated to the President’s words; those are they who entered the crowds at the Capitol and who had not attended the rally.

          Capitol police, oddly, had not, despite advance notice for days, made any reasonable attempts to make such a breach difficult and, in fact, made the breach easier, even to helping people enter the building once the physical breaches had occurred.  Offers of reinforcement from the Trump administration were refused because of “optics,” we’re told.  Yet the entire period since the rather silly impacts of the vandalism and broken windows, has been nothing but “optics,” as conservatives and Trump voters, generally, have been branded as “white supremacists” and “terrorists” and greater threats to “democracy” than “9-11.”  What hogwash.  The greatest threat to “democracy” in the past several decades exists among those who engineered the 2020 Elections that led to certification of the electoral College votes that propelled Biden-Harris to be sworn in on January 20th.  To say that the January 6th events were not a legitimate “protest” against perceived government mendacity is to rewrite history and word-meanings simultaneously.  Long before the 2020 elections, sufficient reasons to protest the actions within the Capitol were accumulating: things like $27 Trillion in debts.

          Breaching the Capitol was foolish, obviously, and illegal in its own right, from which a host of other crimes and misdemeanors flowed.  The worst crime, committed by a Capitol Police officer, was the point-blank murder of Ashli Babbit, who was not assaulting any person or presenting a threat to the officer who shot her.  Ms. Babbit was unarmed.  Four months later we can finally identify the police officer at fault, despite video of the incident.  He is a Trump-hater, reportedly, but not charged with this crime.  Can we suppose that had the breach been the work of “BLM” that the entire congressional leadership would have taken a knee on their Communist behalf in the Rotunda?  Fourteenth Amendment, anyone?

Back to the Field of Honor in North Andover: Exchange attempts to gather good people to a common purpose, much of which is helping, serving, others.  Through scholarships, recognitions of excellence and of overcoming tough challenges, and through Americanism, we attempt to remind our fellow Americans of the qualities that are worth emulating, honoring and teaching.  In our experience, people need that reminding; they need to remember or recognize and honor those who were raised with those vital qualities; people truly want the reminding: it affirms that the best of being an American is still true and worth emulating, including to whatever extent, in their own lives and in the lives of those around them.

To all those who, for whatever reason or untruth you are convinced of, teach our children, and who convey that America and its entire history and purpose is to be hated and discarded for a socialized, anti-Christian system that has failed wherever tried, stop!  You have no right.

Economics, Governance, Representation, Responsibility

ARE-EEE-PEE, SPEAK FOR ME

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Thank Goodness they are willing to fight for us...
U.S. President Trump Addresses Joint Session of Congress – Washington, U.S. – 28/02/17 – U.S. President Donald Trump addresses Congress. REUTERS/Jim Bourg – RTS10VKB

The United States was born in a time of idealism, and “we” incorporated many ideals into our structure of distributed governance within which power is distributed across centers of responsibility: executive, legislative and judicial.  Ostensibly, the legislative center is the most powerful because it represents the people, not the government.  That’s a critical distinction: the EXECUTIVE and associated departments thereof, is the government; the REPRESENTATIVE LEGISLATURE (House and Senate) represent the people and the states, respectively, TO the government.  In other words, the legislative “branch” is not technically part of the government.  It exists to reign in the government and to make certain that the executive branch is conducting business AS THE PEOPLE WANT it done.

Unfortunately, but ideally, the system depends upon honest executives and honest representatives, and that means widespread sharing of a moral code, never a perfect circumstance, and much less so today than ever in our short history.  The trouble with dishonest representatives is that they quickly figured out that they can vote themselves riches from the federal treasury.  Taking more money required new justifications, mostly comprised of establishing one’s own importance and unique abilities to act as our representative.  Senators started out very differently than representatives, and much differently than they claim to be today.

Senators started out being chosen by the legislators in their respective states, based on the concept of states being somewhat sovereign and deserving of their own representation, specifically separately from citizens, themselves.  That is, states’ interests deserved to be watched out for, essentially to keep the federal government from encroaching on states’ rights and authority, which was a good thing for states to do.  It didn’t take too many decades before legislatures demonstrated their inability to agree on who to send to Washington, particularly in the run up to The (second) Civil War.  By 1900 vacancies in the Senate were common and years long.  Voters were really irked.

Finally, in 1913, the 17th Amendment was passed providing for direct election of senators, as there had always been for representatives.  “More democracy” always sounds good, despite its own spotty record, and there has rarely been a senatorial vacancy since then.  The upshot of direct election is that Senators, with their 6-year terms, are now simply more important “representatives,” who may or may NOT represent the interests of their state, and the Senate is the favored way for the lucky Representative to feather his or her retirement.  It’s a nice, cushy job with few responsibilities.  Senators don’t have to answer for every vote, and have found that they can depend on voters’ forgetfulness, while they campaign for re-election in the sixth year of their terms.  Those unlucky Reps have to campaign every other year, if not more, with voters remembering more of what they promised and have done in the first half of their terms.

Still, one of the bright marks of the failure of our ideal system is the 95% re-election rate for our “elected” representatives.  Along with voting themselves (automatically!) increasing amounts of pay, Reps and Senators take part in the finest health care and pension programs in the country.  And, they have monstrous staff and support agencies who barely enable the two houses of Congress to get their work done!  The work burden is unimaginable.  There’s plenty of vacation time to provide relief from those burdens and to allow for basic mental health, there’s so much stress.

There’s so much stress, in fact, that basic work required by the Constitution and the by the citizens who send these sacrificial men and women to Washington to reign in the government on their behalf, often gets rushed through if done at all… stuff like an annual budget, for example.  Not that it must be annual; the constitution says “…from time to time.”  With all the stress noted, bi-annual budgeting would be perfectly useful IF, and only IF the Congress published a “…regular Statement and Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of all public Money… from time to time.”  Other burdens not listed in the Constitution are preventing this requirement from being fulfilled.  What a load… these public servants bear.

Now that the financial underpinnings of representatives and senators are firmly in place, and now that most of those same are likewise firmly in place, we find that members of Congress are mostly representing the GOVERNMENT to US, not us to the government.  If you, the employer of these elected bureaucratic swells, ever attend a meeting where one is speaking – maybe even a “Town Hall,” – you’ll find the discussion one of why things that their employers (you) want done by the “government” can’t or won’t get done.  Then you begin to recognize that our “representatives” are anything but… unless money is going to enrich a favorable someone in the district or state.  Then it’s full steam ahead.

You may also realize that the language of Congress is not freedom, justice or Prudence, it’s power.  Oh the money is nice, and all the trappings and perks, they’re okay.  If a congressperson is able to take sufficient advantage of his or her influence over public monies to become wealthy during his or her decades of sacrifice, who really cares?  But when talking power, there are but two potent factors: re-election and avoiding blame.  For these things it is crucial that voters vote at least twice: once with their checkbooks and at least once at the ballot box.  Indeed, public service has become so service-oriented that if voting at the ballot box is too great a burden for you, why friends of the congressperson will do it for you!  And if there are citizens too infirm, confused or temporarily deceased, why they’ll make sure that voting isn’t burdensome on them, either.  Re-election, step one precedes all things.

Step two, also an unending step, avoiding blame for much of anything, requires careful cultivation of scapegoats, but not just any scapegoat, he, she or they – especially “they” – must be plausibly portrayed as directly responsible (blame-worthy), probably responsible (blame-worthy), responsible for someone who made the mistake (blame-worthy), part of a group that has historically been responsible for a history of mistakes (blame-worthy).  It’s simple, but requires a number of staff to keep abreast of.  So, do you get it?  Re-election and avoiding blame… re-election and avoiding blame.  One need not be a genius to run or win for congress; just understand two principles.  The rest of us are left to deal with honesty, honor, duty, tolerance, charity, courage, wisdom, thrift, family, service to others and Prudence.  There is a point to this disparity of lifestyles.

The principles of purposeful citizenship in the United States are a burden that Americans gladly accept… at least they do if educated and prepared to do so.  But they are easily set aside amidst a land of plenty, including plenty of diversions.  Unless we are constantly reminded or constantly remind ourselves  of our exceptional responsibility in the world, the principles and responsibilities with which we are charged as U. S. citizens can be forgotten, as will our unique place in the firmament of mankind.

In other words, “America,” the ideas that created and sustain her, can be lost in a single generation.  Unfortunately our elected representatives, given their disconnectedness from the exigencies of real life and utter concentration upon the two factors outlined earlier, seem to forget the longer list of principles that must be upheld by citizens who remain the strength of our nation.  First of these to become foggy, slipping into haze and irresolution once re-election is achieved that first time, is honesty.  This no longer means lying about what one believes or does, something that can be ferreted out with evidence and records; now it means being afraid to tell the truth about what one does believe!

Now, we need courage in order to exercise honesty.  Americans have been lied-to for decades… by people who promised to “fight” for us once in office.  What does such a “fight” consist of, one wonders?  Does he or she, candidate to represent US, promise to tell the truth about, say, the budget?  Will he or she promise to read and understand every bill that comes to the floor?

Will he or she promise to fight against  any bill that includes items unrelated to the purported title and subject of the bill?  Will he or she insist on budget, and therefore, policy approval, for every titled agency and program in the Executive branch?  You’ll be able to judge where to give your vote if the answer to any of these questions is some mealy-mouthed explanation of why things can’t be done as we ask.

The Courage to be Honest with voters – what a concept.  Maybe there’s hope for Charity (with their own money, not our great grandchildren’s), Wisdom and Thrift.  Thrift would mean reducing the profligate federal budget, something that must be done as part of Honesty.  Of course, they’d have to become conversant with the budget in the first place, and not simply enough to blame one another for wrong-headed spending.  The federal budget is essentially a Trillion dollars out of balance.  Ask any rep or senator you have a chance to meet if he or she is going to fight to cut spending?  Will he or she fight to prevent raising the “debt ceiling,” so called?  Honesty requires an answer, doesn’t it?

Will your representative and senators represent us with Honor?  No sly side-agreements that do not serve their constituents FIRST?  No personal aggrandizement through any piece of legislation?  Honesty would demand proper response to these questions.  Who, after all, is at the top of our system?  The government?  “Brrraaaap!”  You’re out.

We are at the top.  We are sovereign citizens who have ceded LIMITED power and authority to the federal and state governments, and to municipal governments; all other rights, powers and freedoms belong to each of us as sovereign individuals who possess unalienable rights.  Don’t you forget this.  People in government are there to serve us and protect us and our private properties – including our rights: private properties we are born with.

Our success as a self-governing people can be measured only by how much SMALLER we can render our governments, not by how much larger.  Ask your rep and senatorial candidates if they will fight to make government smaller.  Good luck.