To Govern or Not to Govern?

As Hamlet would say, yes, that is the question.

I have a theory that I’d like you readers to look at. Consider it. Then let me know if I’m off the track or on it with this thinking. Either way we will need to determine what to do about it. It can not be ignored.

Currently I live in Illinois. Have since 1961 when I arrived as a freshman at Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois. After graduation I remained in the state, married, built a family with two children, furthered my education, provided educations to the kids, and eventually settled down owning my own business until I was too ill to continue.

During that entire saga I encountered ideologues in the state who felt then and do today that governance is best left to the people without much structure or legal restrictions. I would describe this as the non-government government. Today the Illinois legislature is locked in a political standstill unable to write or approve a budget. The conservative governor refuses to act until a budget is approved, a balanced one at that. Yet he does nothing to make that happen. No compromise. No governance.

The result is that only public safety services, court functions and basic education supports are working partially; most everything else is not working. Our roads get plowed of snow and salted, but not much more. A disaster of unknown proportions is growing in Illinois and will be unveiled one day when the kids in the political parties agree to disagree and then compromise on a budget and get back to work.

If this doesn’t work I suppose we will need to appoint a trustee to govern in their stead until new elections are held; meanwhile all elected officials would be removed from office and their paychecks cancelled.

This chaos resides in Illinois. But our state is not alone. Many others face gridlock or something very much like it; some now and others in the near future.

Congress of course is stuck in gridlock. They refuse to do anything. No agreement, no funding, late budget approved only after unseating the then Speaker of the House. But now the same clowns are arguing over the debt ceiling and a government shutdown is in the offing.

To govern or not to govern is the ideological issue at hand. We thought it was conservative versus liberal, but that isn’t so. Left of center are the doers and supporters of government. Right of the center are the distrusters of all things government and want it shut down and perhaps permanently disbanded. We don’t know the latter very well because they don’t speak of consequences or solutions to anything they say. All they really say is that they are against someone or something. And the answer is not more government.

Then, pray tell, what is the answer? If you don’t speak up with proposals, programs and solutions to the very problems you catalog, then we can only infer that you are against all government and won’t rest until that is a reality.

Doing nothing about everything will lead you to that consequence. Do you really want that? Is this an accurate reading of your rhetoric?

Not one republican presidential candidate has proposed one program or solution to any problem they have castigated. They seem to blame everyone but themselves, especially the current president. But hey, the problems they saddled him with were of their own making and the lack of solutions is not his but congress’. They control the purse strings. They hold oversight on all government operations. They make the laws. So they are busy blocking anything appearing to be a solution so they can go on blaming anyone but themselves.

We have watched this for several years now. Nearly 7 years with Obama; 8 years with Clinton. They didn’t act this way with GWBush, but then, they shared his party label. Truth be told he was embarrassed and chagrined with their intransigence. Just ask McCain about this.

So, I guess governance is back in our lap, the people’s lap. America’s governance structure is of, for and by the people. The structure currently in place has ground to a halt so I guess it is time to take the bull by the horns and remove the people in power and establish a temporary system that will get the daily work accomplished.

Now, to do this we will need some constitutional lawyers and academicians to find the legal way through this forest. We need to get started soon if we are to protect our nation from the nuts residing elsewhere in the global community. But then, we understand about them because we have our own brand of nuts living among us here.

Who says we need border defenses? We have crazies on both sides of the border and last I checked there is no control for that!

December 8, 2015