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As everybody else is giving advice, I may as well do so, too.
I realize that the 112th Congress is going to be filled with a lot more men and women who actually take seriously the notion that they are there to serve the public, and not batten off us like leeches.* And I also know it's probably looking a little daunting, what with the new Congress having just started yesterday--and along with that also begins the realization that This Is Really Happening and There's No Room For Error. But that's okay; it's a natural reaction. So is worrying about messing up, and getting fired for it.
But this is the lesson of the 111th Congress: it is amazing what one can accomplish when personal job survival is no longer an issue. Now, in the previous Congress this lesson was perverted into a clique of safe liberal Members of Congress ruthlessly sacrificing and betraying their supposedly more 'moderate' fellow-Democrats in order to pass health care rationing. But here's the funny thing: there's nothing stopping anybody from voluntarily sacrificing his or her career on a point of principle. It is, in fact, a meritorious act--and if enough people do it, a transformational one.
Remember: the Democratic leadership is made up of a pack of cowards--if they weren't cowards to the bone, they would have passed a budget in 2010. Because they are cowards they cannot understand bravery. They can only hate and fear it. And when cowardice meets bravery . . . cowardice cuts and runs. We saw this during the lame duck session, when the Democrats gave up their central 2006 and 2008 campaign pledge for . . . a treaty that half the GOP Senate was ready to vote for anyway and an end to DADT.* * They were still in control of the apparatus--but they were scared of the reaction, and they didn't have the promise/threat of election campaign support to give them artificial courage. So, the Democrats collapsed.
And that was when we just had the 112th Congress waiting in the wings. Imagine what the Republican party can do once we have control of the purse strings again. Imagine what government agencies can be cut--or simply removed--if we simply don't care what the media and the Democrats will scream about it. Imagine the fear in the Democrats' faces as we smash the public sector worker stranglehold on the government - and smash it in a manner that will be hard to reconstruct.
It's easy, if you try . . .
* My apologies to leeches.
** Yes, yes, yes, those RiNOs gave away the store, and you'll hate them forever now. Heh. If you told me on 01/03/2010 that we'd be doing this well on 01/03/2011, I'd have cursed you for trying to get my hopes up so unreasonably.
Also, while I'm in hectoring mode... before you start complaining that the Republicans will never do this - and loudly insisting that they won't even try, or succeed if they do try - ask yourself a quick question: how do you expect any of that response of yours to actually help? Be as specific as possible, to the level of how your rant will motivate specific Members of Congress, and why.
If you can't do that, perhaps you should be thinking of productive ways to solve our problems. Because, really, we already have a Whine-and-Cheese Party.
