The most interesting thing of the moment

Who makes your decisions?

Up until recently I was not affiliated with either party. This last primary I had to declare myself Republican so I could vote. That being said, I do not consider myself strictly Republican or Democrat. Neither party has a strangle-hold on good ideas or bad ones.

In an effort to get more informed, I signed up for the newsletters for all the major candidates running for president. The news filters the message and I wanted to give each candidate the opportunity to tell me their message in their own words.

So far I have been disappointed. The newsletters consist of nothing more than "vote for me, send me money and go get others to do likewise". There has been no real substance to what is being sent.

Today I received one from Hillary Clinton which read in part:

Americans need solutions to the challenges they face every single day, and they are depending on us to deliver them.

I wanted to send a rebuttal, but there was no place to send it. Instead, my rebuttal follows.

Americans do face challenges every day. Most challenges should be and are met by the people facing them. Americans are not children who need coddling but are inheritors of a proud tradition of meeting adversities and turning them into opportunities. The citizens of this country do not need or even want the federal government removing every challenge. Anything worth doing will require facing and overcoming challenges along the way.

There are of course certain challenges to which the federal government can and should find solutions. The first is partisan politics. What this country needs is a federal government willing to address the tough issues, regardless of who gets the credit. Hillary has not shown herself to be willing to do that. She has contributed her fair share to the political bickering that highlights congress and the presidency. She is not part of the solution but part of the problem.

Another challenge is ethics reform. The old joke about "how can you tell a politician is lying?" (His lips are moving.) applies as much today as when I first heard it, during Bill Clinton's term as president. Both parties are pork-barreling and there have been so many gift and bribery scandals that they barely even make the news. Hillary's proposed government reforms reform everyone else, but not the abuses in congress itself. Everything else is a band-aid.

Americans do not want the government to interfere in their lives to the level of solving their everyday challenges. Americans do want a government that can solve the larger issues and keep itself above reproach. Americans should vote for a leader who is part of the solution, not the problem.

posted by Matthew O. Smith @ 2:54 PM