Politics is just groups of people making decisions. We stink at it which makes the political world hilarious and tragic. It’d be a great sitcom. The problem is that the political world affects real people all the time.
Every day. Every hour. Every minute.
So the answer to the question of why you should care about those idiots in Washington or on Goat Hill or down at the county courthouse or in city hall or on the school board is that those idiots are representing YOU and they are doing things in YOUR name. At the very least you should have the sense to tell them they are being idiots. Just remember, they’re your idiots – all of them – even the ones you didn’t vote for.
That’s just how a democratic republic works.
Those we elect are our representatives no matter how stupid they are. Of course, WE hired them so maybe we might wanna think a bit more about who we’re hiring before we mark our ballots. Regardless, genius or idiot, we give them a job to do and pretend that they don’t need any supervision – you may have noticed that hasn’t worked so well – and they go off and make decisions for us. Those decisions can help a disabled person or destroy a young entrepreneur’s dream.
We give a huge amount of power to our elected representatives. That’s not necessarily a bad thing but it quickly becomes a disaster when we don’t do that boring, tedious supervision that is part and parcel of enjoying the rights and privileges of being an American.
We can limit the government’s power if we would rather not deal with so much oversight. I don’t think this is a particularly good solution bur we can do it. Mind you, in order to do it we have to start doing that boring supervision we wanted to avoid in the first place. Or we can just do a better job supervising the kindergarten that is government. Choice is ours, but we do need to make that choice.
Because those idiots are running around playing with people’s lives. That’s the power of government. It should not be taken lightly – or too seriously. Too lightly and we let the idiots hurt people. Too seriously and we make the idiots hurt people trying not to. Balance is such a pain, isn’t it?
Truth is, they aren’t just idiots. Most wanted to make a difference and do something good. But we’ve let our government run wild a bit too long and it’s little wonder that even the best intentioned get caught up in the political whirlwind – or run over by it. That’s partially our fault because we didn’t do our job.
See, that governing of government that is part of the Constitution is an important part – the most important part. Controlling power so that it serves the people instead of oppressing them is tough. The Constitution sets up a delicately balanced yet robust system that does just that – controls political power so that it can be harnessed to benefit people. Our part is more than just showing up at the polls every couple years. We are the oversight. We are the supervisors.
We’re what makes the difference between a functioning Constitution and a lovely old piece of paper in a museum! We the People are what stands between a government that serves its weakest and most vulnerable and a government that tramples the rights of all.
It was never about the old piece of paper. It was never about the personalities. It was never about the history or the flag or all the stuff.
It was always about people. That and that alone is why politics and why government matter. All else is just window dressing.
If you care about people, you care about politics.
Or you end up helping clean up after all those idiots.
