As I sit here with my morning cup of coffee, keeping up with what I think is worth while, my mind wandered over, around, to and from the interlocking web that is politics and government.
More particularly I went to responsive governing, then to egalitarian stewardship, and then wrapped it around the idea of distraction, code words, and good policy.
There is always something going on, and I don't consider myself expert on any of it. I follow and generalize, just like everybody else. But I also deep think, because I got the time and obviously I'm taking great delight in following Trump.
Trump presents himself as responsive government, and give him credit, he put himself there. There is also the great lament that government is unresponsive, and I'm not going to argue the point.
The Senate, in particular, is considered the the most unresponsive of governing bodies, and the argument utilizes also the gross years many Senators have persisted in that chamber to bolster that notion. Which altogether form the impression that they are more removed from understanding directly what ails common society than any one else with like power, i.e. the House or the President.
Distraction is really not a singular object. Consider instead distraction more of a portfolio, metaphorically speaking a distraction is nothing more than a successful rhetorical device. It's doesn't matter how factual or apt the rhetoric is, the use of distraction conspires toward less attention on what matters should be attended to. Distractions, as is said, are all around us.
Code words trigger distraction, in the intellectual sense. Once I got turned onto the idea that party politics is more distraction than policy, I've began to recognize more code words than policy. Perception is reality, they also say. But I've been triggered less as a result, and am enjoying politics all the more.
In my opinion, an egalitarian chamber such as the Senate, full of long serving and far removed members isn't necessarily a bad thing. At base we are people, and there is no evidence that I've seen that suggest a rule that people at the opposite ends of a senator's experience are necessarily a good thing. How, why, and what decisions are made could be a more suitable criteria than tenure.
In fact, I can support the Senate and seniority in any number of ways, but suffice to say my opinion is that it's more important to know who is empowered than what number of years an empowered person has to his or her credit.
Removing people based more on seniority than merit seems like more distraction than good policy, and also seems "un-American." Electing someone who doesn't know what he is doing is turning out to be ______. (Fill in your own code word here.)