This came from a day in late December, just before the government of the United States actually shut down:
Today
I heard a snippet of an interview on National Public Radio. I try not to comment on politics because it
generally get me in trouble, but this was troubling. President
Obama was speaking to NPR's Steve Inskeep and stated, "I shouldn't have to
offer [the Republicans] anything. They're not doing me a favor by paying for
things that they have already approved for the government to do. That's part of
their basic function of government; that's not doing me a favor. That's doing
what the American people sent them here to do, carrying out their
responsibilities." In
fairness, as a friend pointed out to me, he isn't saying Congress should do him
a favor, he is saying he doesn't owe them anything because they are not doing
anything for him. Why should they do
anything for him? This was his job, last
I checked. And if that’s supposed to
mean government is supposed to do something specific on our behalf? It should be about what government CAN’T do
TO you, a list of the freedoms they can't trample on... we need a legislative
body, not a wet nurse.
*sighs too deep for
words, followed by head shaking and mumbled profanities*
Dear Mr. President,
I'd like to introduce
you to the concept of compromise. See, I was taught once that a good
working relationship, like a marriage, was like a capital H: both sides
standing strong, but meeting in the middle. A crippled relationship
involved a little h: one party bending over backwards to reach the other while
the first stayed rigid.
Which are you,
sir? For your information, both sides of the government voted, and by
that vote approved payment for a lot of things that none of you can
afford. Frankly, becoming sanctimonious and condescending because the
other party had the sense to see that fact before your party did is nothing but
poor sportsmanship.
Look, I know my
vote helped you get into office originally, but this is a mess, and standing
rigidly and refusing to consider a valid issue because it comes from the other
side is as short sighted and selfish as some of the Tea Party Republicans were
at a rally in my own town last year when faced with some liberal issues. I
don't care what side you're on. The fact is, the emperor is naked.
A few points come to mind…
One, why do they
owe you a favor? Just because you're the president? Last I checked,
the branches of government were supposed to be equal. No one should owe
anyone favors.
Two, it seems both
sides have forgotten how to listen. And as such, how to tell the truth,
and explain things so that the American people can know what is really going
on. Because I can guarantee you that the founding fathers never sat down
and said "hey, let's see how complicated we can make this, so that America
will have no idea what the government is doing and will wish they lived
somewhere else... because I just KNOW we're going to miss constitutional
monarchy eventually, so we'll just phase it in slowly by amplifying the
public's stupidity... sound cool?"
Finally, please stop
blaming everything on each other. America is not really as stupid as you
think we are. I know you're a lame duck and we can't touch you unless you
walk out onto the white house veranda in a neon muumuu and start singing
"C is for Cookie" at the top of your lungs while simultaneously
firing live rounds from an AK-47 into the air at random angles, but trying to
get us to swallow the fact that everything is all the naughty conservatives'
fault just isn't washing anymore. Stop making it about red versus blue!
Overdrawn is overdrawn, period. You as the leader of the free world
should be calling for people to sit down and fix it, not stamping your little
foot and screaming my-way-or-the-highway like an overgrown Honey Booboo.
Look, I have an
expensive prescription. I need insurance. Hell, I sell insurance,
just not the average health coverage kind. But the way this is going,
it'll actually be cheaper for me to pay cash cost for my generic meds and pay a
fee (it ain't a tax... NO ONE bought that one, sorry) than to pay hundreds a
month to insure myself. And that's just me. What about the
perfectly healthy person who has no scrips, no conditions, no nothing but a
yearly once over, which costs about $80 in cash? This bill isn't workable
yet. What's worse is that I think you know that, and just don't care,
which is all kinds of wrong.
And
unfortunately, they (publicly) figured it out first. Grow a pair and
admit it. Being rude about it solves nothing. Rudeness is nothing
more than a weak man's attempt at a show of strength. The government is
supposed to be a group of thinking men who represent Americans at large.
Does this mean we are mostly a nation of greedy children who would rather be
right than admit that there's a problem and try to sit down and solve it?
Never mind,
please don't answer that...
Either way, when
you are the unyielding side, it's not the Republicans who have to bend over
backwards to finish the h. It's all of us. And we're tired of
bending. We, the American people, did not send representatives to
Congress for crap like this. It's time to be a leader, not a bully.
If you know how.
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