No one to blame but ourselves

No one to blame but ourselves

AUGUST 24, 2014    LAST UPDATED: MONDAY, AUGUST 25, 2014, 12:16 AM
SUBURBAN TRENDS

Lee Hamilton, director of Indiana University’s Center on Congress, recently sent us a missive about why government fails all too often.

“There’s ample cause for concern,” Hamilton notes. “The VA appointments scandal; the botched launch of the Affordable Care Act; the 28 years of missed inspections that led to the explosion of the fertilizer plant in West, Texas; scandals at the General Services Administration and the Secret Service … There’s a long and dispiriting list of occasions when the federal government has fallen short.”

The bad news is there are no quick fixes. It begins but doesn’t end at the ballot box. We also have to let our political leaders know what we are thinking, and that’s not just those elected to high office but our local leaders. Look around at local politics and you might be surprised about who has influence. Perhaps not surprisingly those who have more of say in what gets done are the very same people who are out in the community volunteering both civically and politically. As important is that they are involved and they stay informed.

People bad mouth the Tea Party and while we disagree with their positions on many issues, it should be noted that they show up, push their agenda and have been effective in pushing the political scrum in the direction they favor.

Contrast this with a recent Wall Street Journal/NBC Poll, which found that a majority of Americans are feeling gloomy. The poll found that 71 percent say the U.S. is “on the wrong track,” and 60 percent say it’s in a “state of decline.” Only 2 percent are “very satisfied” with the political system, while 79 percent are “very” or “somewhat” dissatisfied. Only 3 percent are “very satisfied” with the economy, while 64 percent are “somewhat” or “very” dissatisfied.

We have to wonder how many of the gloomy bothered to vote in the recent primary elections or how many will even vote in November’s elections. If you want the people who are pulling the strings, setting tax policies, funding key programs, and passing out pork to tackle the myriad of problems facing this nation, this state or your community, you have to vote and you have to participate.

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