I find myself angry about a great many things these days. At first, I thought that I was just being cranky and cantankerous as I approach middle-age. I've contended with bitterness, malcontent, and shades of anxiety and depression. Every time I look into the world around me, I'm awash with frustration and defeat. How could things have gone this wrong?
The answer is gradually.
It didn't all go to shit over night. No, we've been on this path for a long time. Little by little, we've come to accept that mediocrity is exceptional, and the minimal efforts of society at large somehow constitute cooperation and peace.
I do not vote for any particular party, so I have no political agenda with respect to either of the main parties. The last several weeks have made a mockery of democratic elections, constitutional reverence, and liberty. We are presently in the path of the loosest cannon that has ever been unleashed on the American People, and he is armed with a hair [piece] trigger.
Today, Elizabeth Warren was shushed in the Senate for impugning a fellow Senator. I have read the letter from Coretta Scott King and found no injury so severe that her voice as Representative of her constituents needed to be silenced. The audacity that has bled from the GOP following Trump's election reeks of cigars, shitty brandy, old leather chairs, and even older money. Yes, I'm talking about the Old Boys Club.
Your Government doesn't belong to you anymore. It hasn't for decades. Career politicians that will retire wealthy while having done a half-assed job are the ones we keep putting in office. Why? Because they are the only ones with money to run for office? This is absurd! We vote for the douche or the turd sandwich because we believe that the third candidate can't win, and as long as we believe that, we're right! We can only accomplish that in which we believe.
Mr. Trump won by appealing to the lowest common denominators - ignorance and fear. The latter being the offspring of the former, America voted with its uncertainty. We have been sandbagging against our deepest concerns and placing into positions of leadership persons who have the uncanny ability to appear useful by looking busy. If there was half as much effort put into cooperation as there was making sure the other side of the aisle didn't get theirs, then this country could be in a very different position.
We live in a connected world now. Anyone with a modicum of intelligence, some public speaking ability, and decent sense could make a run for office. However, we still see the same formula playing out in every election. Wealthy people with super-PACs who have not lived in the midst of working-class America since before college go on television and tell you how connected they are to the plight of the middle-class. No they aren't... and it's an insult to suggest that the public should buy into it.
What do we look like? Oh... yeah... votes. I forgot.
You're being sold promises in exchange for your future. That's a bit of a high cost for representation that is as familiar with your lot in life as you are with theirs. Though we've been making strides with respect to equality, having more female and minority House members with each passing election, they are still stymied by the collective non-cooperation of Washington. The largest issue that government has suffered from is the inability to drag themselves from the mire of committee upon sub-committee that do little more than achieve impasse.
In my profession, I have had the opportunity to engage the government in its decision making process. This has taught me one unfortunate truth. The bureaucracy is so stratified and convoluted that no single position can affect change. That's not a terrible thing, since things like executive orders are subject to judicial review. The real hurdle is that no group of people can affect change either. They are so compartmentalized in their authorities that no other group (who may have the duty to implement changes dictated by the first group) have the duty to listen to the ones making the decision.
This is magnified by the fact that important data needed by those trying to affect change is under the control of a second governmental entity, who cannot be approached through direct channels, and who otherwise have no procedural accountability to those attempting to affect change.
To be quite blunt, Right Hand needs Left Hand to reach for the soap. Left Hand doesn't know Right Hand is dirty and there is no channel through which to communicate that need. To really put the icing on this bukakke, in which the tax-payer is the catcher, Right Hand is obligated to leave the soap alone... I truly wish I was kidding.
Mr. Trump is used to being a CEO. They tend to wield a lot of unmitigated authority, and my fear is that he's carried that forward into his Presidency. Much of this administration is going to be marked by overturning executive actions that are unconstitutional because our Republic is inherently structured to prevent the bull from running loose in the China shop. This bull may not yet get that message.
In the meantime, however, there are a lot of Senators and Congress[men] who will have their antics go unnoticed because of the shit-storm coming out of the Oval Office. The amount of damage that will be done in the next few years may take decades more to correct. Meanwhile, we have elected officials spending more time quibbling over hurt feelings and procedure than they are on issues of substance.
This will be a long and bumpy ride...
