More Hypocricy

So I'm listening to the radio on the way home from work the other evening and there is some high-level Republican Senator saying we can't afford to spend trillions on a measure the American people don't want, what with the budget so badly out of balance and all.

So, was he talking about the Iraq War he so vigorously supported? No. He was talking about health care reform.

You know the health care reform proposals that are in front of the Senate now--the ones that will cost less than the Iraq War cost, will actually reduce the deficit according to the CBO, and that the majority of the American public is in favor of.

What a putz!

But then, that is the mindset inside the Beltway. Project onto the public at large what the opinion leaders inside Washington say, completely ignoring all facts to the contrary.

Thus you get the people who got us into the current financial crisis being the very ones pouring money to their colleagues who tore the economy down, in hope of repairing the damage they themselves caused.

Thus you get Obama's latest mistake: The Afghanistan surge.

What a complete bunch of putzes.

And yet, in California, where term limits have been imposed, and tax increases effectively eliminated, the government is completely unable to do anything effective.

So term limits aren't the answer.

No. It's getting big money out of the election system. We need public financing so the lawmakers won't be so beholden to those who finance their campaigns.

The trouble is that legislators draw safe district for incumbents, so I wind up in a district where a Republican doesn't have to campaign at all once the primaries are over to be elected to Congress. Others find themselves in solid Democratic districts, and the same old crowd keeps things running just the way it is.

If an independent commission could draw the legislative and congressional districts, and then if public financing could pay for the campaigns, maybe something positive and constructive could get done.

But I won't hold my breath.