They're all patriots

The nattering nabobs of negativism have increased a hundred fold since Spiro Agnew made that comment penned by William Safire many years ago when he was vice-president of the United States. It seems the only way we can sell newspapers or get people to watch our television shows or listen to our radio programs is to be on the attack; to be negative, to denigrate character or motive, or to lampoon honest and heart-felt sentiments.

But I would suggest to you that in a world of Keith Olberman, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Rachel Madow, Bill O'Reilly and Chris Matthews there is a better way. And that is to recognize those who serve us, serve as patriots who only want what's best for this country.

Certainly they have different ways of going about it. But do any of you honestly think that anyone elected to public office is thinking of ways to screw you? Do you think they're having closed-door meetings to discuss the possibilities of trashing the Constitution, taking away all of your guns and sending the black helicopters in on a midnight raid?

Do you really think that all Democrats are Socialists and Communists who want to quietly and systematically overthrow the country and force-feed you their own scurrilous brand of politics? Or that all Republicans are knee-jerk, right-wing, conservative bigots and racists who want to deport everyone who isn't white and replace the Bill of Rights with the Bible?

How many of you have read the health-care bill? How many of you have read ANY bill that comes before Congress for a vote? How many of you have listened for even a second to the other side? How many of you trash this administration and trash the people who represent us without any knowledge whatsoever outside of what your favorite commentator says, who by the way, may not mean ANYTHING they say but if it gets ratings, then they're gonna say it because capitalism is what America is all about.

Those people who are elected by and for the people, for the most part, ARE patriots. They feel an honor and a duty to serve this country. There are very few places one can go where there's only one way to get there. Often times there are numerous ways to get there. Sometimes we choose the shortest path or the most scenic but the destination remains the same. And when we're talking about our political leaders, that destination is to make America the best it can be.

Oh, it's easy to take pot-shots at our elected officials. They're fair game. They're in the public eye. Everything they do or say or sometimes even think is public fodder and there's never a shortage of critics.

Monday morning quarterbacking is a favorite pastime for those of us who love sports in general and football in particular. We sit in our home or our favorite watering hole or other meeting place with friends and expound exponentially about how we would have called the game differently had we been the coach. But we weren't the coach and we don't know what we would have done because we weren't there and it WASN'T our call.

We're not there in Congress or the White House either. How can a Senator from Nebraska be an independent thinker when he votes the way you want him to vote and a turncoat when he doesn't? We can't have it both ways. When we vote for a person running for public office, we're putting our faith and trust in him to vote his conscience after he or she has been exposed to information we'll never have. If we're not willing to do that, then we shouldn't have representative government at all. We can just take public opinion polls on everything and let the majority rule.

Except when you look at history, the majority have been wrong about a lot of things; like the earth being flat, the earth being the center of the Universe, that women are subservient to men, that Blacks are less than whole people and much, much more.

Governing is complicated. Governing is hard. Governing requires difficult, sometimes excruciating choices with the knowledge that whatever one decides, some people, maybe most people back home are going to be disappointed, upset or angry. So if we don't want someone who thinks for himself; if we don't want someone who examines all the evidence we don't have; if we don't want someone who doesn't walk in lockstep with a particular political ideology then kick him out and get someone who will.

The one thing I try to teach every student that sits in my classroom is to develop the ability to think for themselves.

And then they're confronted with the overwhelming sentiment in some parts of the country that thinking for yourself is not a good thing.