Government Responsibility

In an earlier post I wrote about the lack of corporate responsibility to many of its constituents, such as customers, their employees, etc. The government “of the people, by the people and for the people” has become the government of the special interests, by incompetent politicians, and for the party. Nowhere do “the people” fit into governmental priorities these days. The politicians are answerable to, and should be working on behalf of those whom they represent. Instead, their priorities are elsewhere: the party, special interests, and ideology.

They throw crumbs to their home districts or states through earmarks, which are often a colossal waste of money (think bridge to nowhere). Their districts and states would be much better off if these politicians just did their job and forgot about wasteful earmarks.

Sadly, congress and statehouses are so divided ideologically that they’ve lost the ability to compromise. The main goal of politicians these days is to work towards achieving or maintaining a majority position for their party so they can stay in power. Yet what’s the point of being in power if you accomplish nothing?

Government was established by God for the good of people: keeping order, defending against enemies, etc. The Founding Fathers of this country established a government that was supposed to be limited in power, that guaranteed certain rights to the citizens, and that worked on behalf of the people. We’ve lost that vision and must get it back so that “… government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” (Abraham Lincoln in his Gettysburg Address)