First, Healthcare is NOT the most important issue we are facing. Important? Yes. Should it be compulsory? No. Why? Because it amounts to a tax on simply being alive. That is against the Constitutional limits placed upon Government. Besides, why are we creating a whole new healtcare program when Congress has what amounts to one of the best there is. Give us that program. It already exists, just needs to be expanded to handle the citizens who are paying for it anyway. Further, Congress could have been more productive with their time had they done this. Which leads to…

Second, jobs should have been the primary issue this past year. Jobs should have been at the top of every politician’s agenda. The stimulus package at the beginning of the year did not create jobs, it bolstered an industry that should have been allowed to sink or swim – the market should have determined who survives and who fails. Look, a business survives by being smart savvy and capable of understanding what products or services are in demand. Businesses need people to run them. The strength of any nation is in its manufacturing base. The US manufacturing base has eroded so much that this nation risks sinking into the miry clay of despotism and, gasp, second world status. And we are all the weaker for sending those manufacturing jobs overseas.

Third, government should stop asking the citizens of this nation to conserve, save, and be more responsive, and also foot the bill — all while encouraging businesses to make sure the American public buys products they don’t need, can’t afford and shouldn’t buy. Hmmm… The problem here is that our government needs to look within, find the bloated bureaucracy and over employment and, yet another gasp, cut jobs. Corporations are cutting back and requiring fewer employees do more work, shoulder more responsibility. But our government has actually GROWN over this past year. What a great example for the American people: they lose jobs while government rolls grow! Yeah, that will win friends and influence people.

If you want someone to be an example, you should set the example first, not be hypocritical in your demands that others need to do what you will not even consider.

If this nation is doomed, it isn’t because the Founding Fathers couldn’t foresee what we’re doing. Quite the contrary. They understood that bloated government is a danger to the liberties and freedom of a democratic system. We are doomed because we have become self satisfied and of a mind that we are above reproach, and, yeah, too big to fail.

You know the old saying: the bigger they are, the harder they fall.

You almost seem to revile the author’s quote of; “…there will be enough people willing and able to take such action before it is too late”. But I find it to be a salient question. De Tocqueville himself questioned what would become of the Republic once a majority discovered it could vote itself largesse from the Treasury.

The US Senate, in a pre-dawn Christmas Eve vote, just passed their version of Health Care legislation; a budget busting bill by anyone’s measure. They also raised the debt ceiling by $290 billion; and that was only meant to get the government through the next six weeks!

I distinctly remember progressives publicly castigating Dick Chaney when he made comments to the effect that “…deficits don’t matter.” I also recall campaign rhetoric in 2008 excoriating Republicans (as well they should, I thought) for running up a $500 billion deficit. What is that deficit now?

You ask; “But what if our collective survival depended on changing our form of government, what are we prepared to do?” I cannot answer for you, but I know what I intend to do about it.

I refuse to be content with screaming and throwing stuff at the TV any longer. After the recent T.E.A. Party, we asked; “What now?” My personal choice was to run for county office. Here in Arkansas, we just had a County Clerk take $175,000 and pass it out to County Employees as Christmas Bonuses because the money didn’t get spent on software upgrades as it was originally allotted. All this; while wailing over how to close a projected $300k shortfall in the 2010 budget projections.

The current situation at all levels of government exists because; while we’re all willing to blog on some web site about what’s wrong, none of us is willing to take the time to hold our representatives accountable. Scrutinizing the candidates’ records and qualifications in preparation for the vote is not the end of the process, but the beginning. If you’re not attending the County Board-of-Supervisor’s meetings, criticizing wasteful programs, and holding their feet to the fire on issues important to you, how can you possibly expect them to change? If you cannot make the meetings because your life is so full, then request FOIA copies of the minutes of those meetings. Start commenting locally, in the papers, on local web blogs, and on local radio stations, about what you see as wrong and why. People believe they cannot make a difference: And that is exactly what the average activist WANTS you to believe. He already knows that if he keeps writing, blogging, and commenting long enough and loud enough he can get HIS way. The last thing he wants you to do is discover the secret.

A long time ago my Brother-in-Law told me an interesting story. He’s a UAW member and he gave me a glimpse into how his local was run. He said that even though there were several hundred members in his local, only about 5% ever bothered to make the meetings. As a result; maybe 40 or 50 people ended up creating the work rules for hundreds of members. The secret is that participants are the ones that garner attention.

“The squeaky wheel gets the grease” may be cliché, but it is correct. Take a page out of the oppositions’ playbook and become vocal.

And the same, familiar bill of indictment followed by the now standard remedy, vague, almost wistful in nature – in this author’s words: “there will be enough people willing and able to take such action before it is too late” . Which people? Exactly what action? How many is enough? He doesn’t say. But the author did make one penetrating accusation describing the nature of modern democracies, “the desire to use govt. spending for political purposes”. Depressingly obvious revelation to most conservatives but, up to now, a political reality impossible to change or to channel within a productive direction.

As to the rest of the author’s prophecy, China isn’t about to supplant America, nor do they wish to. They have more citizens without indoor plumbing or a reliable, fresh water supply to their homes than we have citizens living within these United States – and that’s a lot of folks. This was precisely the point China’s representatives to Copenhagen offered in response to requests they curtail their heavy industry to avoid Global Warming. India’s representative was nodding vigorously in agreement with these sentiments while loading his plate with free shrimp provided by his Western hosts. China and India are proud modern nations now, off the world’s welfare rolls and not for one minute about to curtail helping ALL their citizens obtain the good life due simply to “save the planet” pleadings from the West. However, indoor plumbing isn’t a problem for us, we have it and our problems stem from too much wealth rather than too little, an undeserved collective legacy our ancestors left their spoiled children.

This author wrapped himself in the Constitution but he should have speculated out loud whether our present form of constitutional government is really effective within a modern nation state battling for economic dominance among more populous enemies. (Note to the FBI: This remark isn’t a call to armed rebellion in any respect, just an intellectual exercise, go back to investigating why terrorist slackers visiting Detroit failed to detonate those bombs they shouldn’t have had in the first place.) Let’s put aside the sacred Constitution for a moment, primarily because we have a “Living Constitution” now (yes we do, and holding your breath until you turn blue won’t alter that fact) which means it’s completely irrelevant what the Founding Fathers thought about governance in colonial times.

The government is confiscating ever larger portions of our national wealth and spending it for political purposes – but, more importantly, on things that have no economic value to our collective culture. How has our democratic, republican political system functioned to prevent squandering our national wealth on poor investments – it hasn’t, it has failed, it’s become the problem, not the solution. Should we cling rigidly to our present form of government hoping that by doing the same things over and over, future reality will somehow change? Maybe we should, maybe we are no longer the daring innovators our ancestors were and tinkering with our form of government in hopes of improvement could prove well beyond our collective abilities.

But we’re also a people who habitually generate hope for our nation’s future, all isn’t lost by any means, we’ll throw those political bums out come next election, then things will change, we’ll return to self-reliance, we’ll return to those virtues that once made this nation an economic giant. We will? Really? No, we won’t, things won’t change, our government’s actions will remain as formal and rigid as a Medieval dance. But what if our collective survival depended on changing our form of government, what are we prepared to do?

1. Health Care legislation will not survive a Constitutional challenge in SCOTUS in late 2010. Progressives will blame the decision on ‘judicial overreach’; a concept formerly near and dear to their hearts.
2. Credit will remain tight, forcing many small businesses to declare bankruptcy in 2010. Forcing the US government to downgrade tax receipts by 20%
3. The ‘second shoe’ of commercial real estate foreclosures will hit the economy in the first and second quarters, further battering an already weak mortgage market
4. Hyper-inflation will begin to rear its head as the FED will be unsuccessful in unwinding the enormous amount of liquidity pumped into the country during 2009.
5. The FDIC seized 140 banks in 2009. Expect this number to rise above 350 next year.
6. While cap & Trade will not pass the senate; the ability of the EPA to regulate greenhouse gasses will provide the second of the ‘one two’ punch in the stomach of small business, the first being the increased employee costs decreed by health care reform. Expect hiring to slow dramatically in 2010 and the use of contract employment services to skyrocket.
7. These two described effects will further depress the employment outlook, with unemployment continuing to remain at or above 10 %. The administration’s only reprieve will be just as many people dropping off the rolls in disappointment as are added. The disingenuous manner in which they calculate such things will hide the true unemployment rate which will continue to hover at 17%
8. Iran will test a nuclear weapon. The administration will want to initiate a ‘summit’ to inquire as to what to do about it.
9. The Democrats will lose 6 seats in the Senate and 35 seats in the House in 2010 as a result of ignoring constituents’ input all during 2009.
10. The Obama administration will continue to blame its ineptitude in all policy areas on the previous administration.

Do what we’ve done; refuse to participate in this madness. Have a Happy 2010!