Posts Tagged ‘US government’
Our Comeuppance
There isn’t a vast amount of international perspective that I can refer to from my limited travels to other countries of the world, but I believe it’s been enough for me to understand that my home country doesn’t deserve to boast about our democracy as if it is the beacon of greatness above all others.
In fact, I have come to believe that our form of government is proving to be a failure. Our democracy isn’t working. Voting for individuals to represent us is supposed to give power to THE PEOPLE. If the majority of people in this country don’t want our government to bomb boats or commandeer oil tankers from Venezuela, our representatives should have sway in the actions of the current administration.
If we don’t want ICE agents to wear masks and travel in packs, driving in unmarked vehicles to nab citizens off the streets without legitimate charges or warrants, THE PEOPLE should be able to persuade our elected officials to adhere to our laws.
Judges on the Supreme Court should be ethical and unbiased. When it becomes obvious they are not, THE PEOPLE should have a way to ensure that our government officials in each branch are being held accountable.
I admit that I once thought our democracy was better than most of the governments in the world. I’m embarrassed that I thought poorly of populations that allowed atrocities to occur by their leaders, or corruption to run rampant in their systems of governance.
Well, I now can understand it when people around the world feel the citizens of the United States are responsible for the inappropriate actions of our government. We thought we could rely on the checks and balances of our form of democracy to keep the wishes of THE PEOPLE in place. I’m afraid it’s not working.
We, the people, have made this mess. It appears we are getting some comeuppance.
At least my ATV and plow are working well again. We probably gained 6 or 7 inches of new snow from the last system. There was no evidence of my boot tracks from Tuesday night on the driveway yesterday morning.
That’s my path through the new snow upon returning from the barn after feeding the horses. After plowing the driveway, I moved to pulling snow off the roof in the two problem spots. While shoveling away the mess that had been created on our front steps, Cyndie texted that we would be receiving feed for the horses in around half an hour.
That meant I needed to switch focus and get down to the barn to dig out the big doors and slide them open. One of the doors wouldn’t budge. It took some creative persuasion to eventually bust it free, and I got it done just in time to see the huge red Gertens Garden Center truck coming up the driveway.
I had tried to plow that circle around the hay shed extra wide in advance of a hay delivery sometime in the near future. I wasn’t thinking of the feed delivery. The last few times, the driver parked on the road and drove his forklift up the driveway. The driver yesterday had never been here before. He decided to back out to the road and bring it up on the forklift.
He wasn’t confident that the big truck wouldn’t slide sideways. I’m happy he chose the safer option.
I’m feeling a lot less cocky about everything these days.
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Especially Exhausting
I suspect people around the world have already received news of the Trump-inspired mob storming our nation’s capital yesterday. It brought me to tears. It felt like a disaster to our democracy that can’t be undone, even though it accomplished nothing in terms of the mob’s assumed goal of disallowing a peaceful transfer of power to happen.
What can’t be undone is the obliteration of our ability to profess our style of government is above the violent disruptions common in many other parts of the world. The 45th President has successfully trashed everything about our reputation as a world-leading country.
Luckily, the brief insurrection was pushed back, out of the capital and off the grounds by the time darkness fell. Unfortunately, I doubt we will recover any respectability for decades, if ever.
By the time I was ready to turn in for the night, there seemed to be a few glimmers of hope that some of the Republicans who have been enabling the dumpster-fire of a President for years were finally making timid statements that hint of a realization of the error of their ways.
In a year of unprecedenteds, I found myself actually listening for the first time in my life to a few speeches from the floor of the house and senate chambers after they reconvened. They actually sounded sane to me! They also sounded like there was a growing momentum to drop the fomenting of election fraud claims. Ya think!?
The whole afternoon was especially exhausting. The day of certifying the electoral votes historically was only noticed by a small number of geeks who live for all things political and the press whose job it is to cover it. Yesterday, it grabbed the attention of the nation and beyond.
Why? For only one reason. The delusions of a lunatic. He is the main reason, but also fully culpable are the political fools who enabled him and the hoards of citizens who choose to believe the lies professed by him.
I guess it should be no surprise that it’s all so bleeping exhausting.
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Relative Something 