Is anyone listening to the people?

Call me slow but I have recently noticed a similarity between our “leaders” in Olympia and that bunch at the federal level in Washington, D.C. Birds of a feather flock together. I was very angry, but not surprised, to hear that our “non-representative representatives” voted on a measure to suspended the Taxpayer Protection Act of 2007.

Has it really only been a little over two years since “We the People” told those people in Olympia that they will not raise taxes on us without a 2/3 majority vote? That we told them that we have the right to know how they voted through the transparency clause of that act. A mere two years is all it took for them to decide that what you and I want…just does not matter. We are not smart enough apparently. Not wise enough.

I wondered why it took them so long to commit this offense against “We the People.” I discovered that a law must be on the books for a minimum of two years before it can be amended. So looking at it that way…it really took them no time at all to cast us aside did it? They also tried to do away with that pesky transparency requirement but so far they are not successful in that effort. Darn, won’t be nearly as good at hiding things in Olympia as they are in D.C.

“Transparency,” that’s that thingy President Obama promised about the debate on health care, remember? Gonna be on C-SPAN and everything! Must have said that like seven or eight times I guess. But the folks at C-SPAN found it hard to televise a debate through closed and locked doors…huh, that’s funny…cuz I know that transparency thingy is really, really important to the President. He was always saying that those mean, nasty, “Party of NO” Republicans were holding things up. See, he was telling us who was doing what, being “transparent.” But then I remembered that the Democrats control the whole process, both in D.C. and here in our state. And with sizable margins..enough that if EVERY SINGLE Republican voted “no”… they could still easily pass anything they want. And yet they still had trouble with their health care “reform” and other things…hummm…I think that maybe that transparency thingy isn’t working so well.

So…here in Washington We the People tell our representatives what we want or don’t want and they thumb their noses at us, and a clear majority of us across the nation tell them folks in Washington D.C. what we don’t want or want and they thumb their noses at us. I think it’s high time WE thumb our noses at THEM. November would be a good time to start.

Tim Personius

Buckley