Sunday, June 08, 2008
How dare you, Mr. Congressman. What are you doing to this country?
From the RoundTable blog
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Chuck Angier
Angier, of Sandy Level, is self employed in agri-business in Pittsylvania County.
Any glimmer of respect I might have had for our lawmakers was extinguished with their condescending and holier-than-thou treatment of the big five oil executives at the recent Oil Inquisition.
The abuse cannot be portrayed well in print, but the session began with Chairman Patrick Leahy of Vermont asking, "How much money did you make last year?"
Charles Schumer of New York grilled Chevron Vice Chairman Peter Robertson regarding Chevron's activities in Burma. When Robertson admitted that Chevron had committed $2 million in aid to the cyclone victims, Schumer had the audacity to respond, "Do you think they could use a lot more than $2 million?"
OK, Comrade Schumer, how much do you want us to give? How much will you make us give? But wait a minute ... then it's not "giving" is it? How much have you given? How much has the government been successful in giving? How dare you, Mr. Schumer!
The corker was Dick Durbin, D-Ill., who asked, "Is there anybody here that has any concerns about what you're doing to this country with the prices that you're charging and the profits that you're taking?"
I wish the insult had been directed at me. My reply would have been: Excuse me, sir! How dare you address any American in that manner? Is this the humble servitude envisioned and practiced by the Founding Fathers? The real question is: Do you have any concern what you are doing to this country? Let me give you just a few examples:
You and those before you have accumulated a federal debt of more than $9 trillion so that each child born in America is born with a debt of $30,000. Unfunded entitlements may increase that amount by a factor of four or better. Some independent organizations place the total burden of public debt and unfunded entitlements at around $500,000 per person.
At the behest of the special interests that line your pockets, you have been successful in foiling any hope of a comprehensive energy policy, and at great cost to the national treasury, I might add. This has resulted in the annual export of $700 billion to $800 billion out of our economy in oil purchases, with a substantial part of it going to our enemies, only to be spent purchasing our own assets right out from under our noses, further weakening our currency, our economy and our position in the world.
You have stolen a fine education system from the hands of parents and communities, only to indoctrinate students in a moral vacuum, teaching that life is fair (which it's not) and that they are entitled to the American Dream (which they're not). The result is a system where dropout rates of 25 percent are common, and the graduate is ill-equipped to become a productive, compassionate adult. To add insult to injury, as always, you use the dismal failure of this system to justify more funding and poor results.
Those who have been indoctrinated to believe that life is fair and that they are entitled to the American Dream have persuaded you to legislate a labor environment that has resulted in the loss of our manufacturing capacity, the backbone of any vibrant economy, to overseas competitors for obvious reasons.
You have oppressed the productive and subsidized the slovenly in a great "war on poverty," accomplishing absolutely nothing other than providing employment to legions of bureaucrats who add no value to the economy. Poverty rates are unchanged from the start of this great war, indicating that maybe there are some who just can't or won't be lifted from poverty. Again, this dismal failure is used as justification for more funding.
Health care up until about 1950 consumed a small part of our resources. Under your direction it has grown to be our greatest expenditure, consuming 20 percent of our personal spending while providing declining quality and availability of care. Yet another dismal failure used to justify more funding.
Many have acquired the American Dream of a higher education but only by incurring huge debt, all at the behest and design of the government. This has driven the cost of higher education at a rate twice that of inflation. Many have no hope of repaying this debt and, as I understand it, it is not bankruptable. Can we say "slavery"?
You have created a false economy through deficit spending and, while wishing to ensure that life is fair, you have created an environment where the citizens have done the same. The result is an economy where many "own" their home (The American Dream) but have little or no equity in it. We have a stock market bloated not by value but by an abundance of cash created by, among other things, tax-deferred investments and those 700 billion or so annual petro-dollars returning to roost.
Mr. Durbin, Mr. Schumer, Mr. Leahy. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. Please awaken and understand what is really happening.
