By Richard Berkowitz | April 28, 2024 | American Thinker | Opinion
I listen to an untold number of videos relating to Congressional and Senate hearings, Investigations of witnesses, etc.
In each instance, and maybe more in the ones taking place in the Senate, I find them to be a lot of blowhard but overly courteous discussions where nothing truly is accomplished.
Sometimes, I am sure, legislation results from the information gleaned but it seems to me, that while the world is burning, they are more engaged in drinking water than hosing out fires.
Frankly, the British are, in my opinion, far more eloquent and humorous, though Sen. John Kennedy, from Louisiana, (who incidentally was educated at Oxford where British parliamentarians learn their skills) is a hoot. He is our equivalent of the great humorist from Oklahoma, Will Rogers.
The second thing I notice is when agency heads are called upon to tell why information requests are constantly ignored, withheld, or blacklined, the answer usually given is due to an ongoing investigation we cannot comment on. FBI Director Christopher Wray is particularly evasive in these ways.
The consequences are mostly dispiriting and continue to validate the comment ‘you don’t want to see how sausage and laws are made.’
The critical issue is how do we get trustworthy candidates for Congress; people who care deeply about the nation, who put the nation’s interest first, and who are willing to take the slings and arrows public service subjects one to in today’s highly politicized environment?
It takes a great deal of money to campaign and the last thing we need or want is to be governed by elite oligarchs like Mark Zuckerberg, or Bill Gates or those who engage in public life for the purpose of self-enrichment, such as Nancy Pelosi, Maxine Waters, Bob Menendez, or, worse still, those who crave power to bring about our nation’s transformation like Obama or those of their ilk.
Politics historically attracts some interesting and equally dangerous characters.
As for limited terms, time and again I know how popular it is, but unless the bureaucracy can be fired or their own service limited, they present the highest of all risks.
Christopher Rufo’s book: “America’s Cultural Revolution,” devotes a significant amount of discussion to how those who work in government, at all levels, ” … fortify power and privilege while waging grievous harm which eventually becomes the pretext for domination.”
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which Sen. Elizabeth “Pocahontas” Warren shoved down America’s throat, expanded its demands and power far beyond the benign intent upon its claimed initial language. It went from a legislative squeak to an omnipotent roar,
And what of the IRS, the FBI, the Department of Education, etc? I could go on and on as every one of these benign well-intended agencies have morphed into abusive ones, which at times, have threatened our freedoms and even our Bill of Rights.
If you do not believe me, ask FISA judges how they were exploited by the FBI.
No, if you’re here from the government, you are not here to help me. Lamentably, you are not to be trusted. You can be terribly harmful and often are.