Insanity, ego, to fill my time, to convince myself I am useful, concerned about the direction of my country, having something to do other than watching reality TV, which includes news and commentary, wanting to appear young and cool, to embarrass my kids, or just to be profound or just to be stupid. The best answer is that common saying – “It’s complex.”
I do not have an answer as to what puts me at the computer every day to turn out material on reforming government, a topic which has a small audience on the best of days. However, I do know that the government of the United States has separated itself from the citizens of the United States. We need to find a way to get it under better management if we want to avoid putting our country into a barrel and pushing it over the waterfalls. This is my only explanation of why I am starting a blog at my age.
Starting it has been the learning challenge of my life since I did not grow up with technology and have never been comfortable with it. While at work there was always someone to handle my technology issues. So, I had to learn the basics of computers, websites, blogs, mobile applications, and many terms to get simple ideas into public space. Acquiring such knowledge gave me a great appreciation of the many talents possessed by the people at work who assisted me and the unique value of a great team when trying to achieve the assigned goal.
Knowing that my effort would be an uphill struggle I needed to focus on my passion of wanting to make government work for people who can’t always participate in it due to work, family affairs, or a lack of resources.
When I worked on policy issues, I was somewhat successful. With my counsel, Congress enacted the nation’s first law to regulate hazardous waste and the reorganization of the Penn Central Railroad into Conrail that kept the freight lines operating in the United States. I wrote an early and lead law review to spur recycling efforts throughout the country. In other endeavors, I lead key coalitions to enact Brownfields legislation, the Energy Policy Act of 2005 and permit streamlining legislation for large infrastructure project needing federal environmental review.
Unfortunately, even with significant resources, I failed in my multi-year effort to have enacted the Regulatory Accountability Act which would have required federal agencies to implement the intent of Congress; not the intent of the Executive. The people elect Congress every other year. Each member of Congress is our representative in government. Congress is constitutionally required to make the laws, not the President and indeed not the courts. The one passion I have is to do whatever I can to help Congress reclaim its legislative powers from the Executive and the courts and to ensure it operates as the check on the powers of the other branches of government.
In simple terms, this means we citizens need to elect members of Congress who act as fiduciaries giving their loyalty to the Constitution and the institution of Congress; not the political parties that support them. Political parties are nothing more than self-interested associations organized to gain control of our government. We citizens need the protections provided by the Constitution that mandates strong institutions that act as a check on each other. Relying on political parties to protect us is a fool’s errand since the goal of a political party is to gain control of the government and by extension the wealth and resources of the nation.
Our Framers gave us a Constitution that allows ordinary citizens, in a short time-frame, the right to start a legal revolution by changing the entire government of the country. If we are genuinely as upset with our government as polls suggest, it is time we exercise our legal right to revolt. By voting, we can start a constitutionally sanctioned revolution.
At my age I am secure enough to state my opinion, to listen to the views of others, accept criticism and to hopefully interest ordinary citizens in adopting and implementing some of the proposed reforms on the unfolding pages. My goal is to generate a discussion on how ordinary people can reclaim the management of their government.
I solicit your ideas and I hope you will send them to me. Your comments will be read and if well-written, thoughtful articles, will be placed on the blog with full credit to you. My goal is to get the ideas for government reform into the marketplace. With this background, the readers will be able to decide why someone of my age would start a blog on government reform.
Follow Bill @WilliamLKovacs